WANAQUE, Part Eight {The End? We can only hope...}

Well, I can't answer The Thinker's question, but that has rarely deterred anyone with a PhD from spewing forth unconcernedly, so here goes:

PHENOMENOLOGICALLY: What's real??

One: there's a robust phenomenon of "something" in the sky, which has manifested at Wanaque over decades. Whether it's still going on I don't know. And whatever this phenomenon is, it's not hoaxes, kids with laundry balloons, weather balloons, planes, helicopters, Menzelian star and planet misidentifications and atmospheric bogglements et al. It's one of our favorite things: an anomalous mystery.

Two: this "phenomenon" COULD be "phenomena". Some of the best observations seem to be "only" strange lightforms, but some rather good observations seem to be non-self-luminous objects. Whether one phenomenon [lightforms] is the product of the other [objects] is a unifying possibility, but this is a case where my usual Occam's Razor might be set on the shelf. I can just imagine here one oddity "attracting" another.

Three: the lightforms phenomenon seems "connected" to the geography of the reservoir area, and possibly even to the geology of it. Chief Casazza said that the great majority of instances occurred over the western mountains or at the southern end of the reservoir. If true, this aspect of the anomaly could be site-specific in the sense that it might point to a "natural" or at least a "terrestrial" phenomenon.

Four: the BOL incidents have a small number of unusual qualities. They are small and extremely bright, FAR brighter than one expects any object so small to be. The BOLs move in similar ways: usually hovering or in slow meanders, they often take active episodes of eye-confusingly quick darts and dashes, and do so in apparent non-inertial angle-defying motions. These motions have been described by more than one person as geometric displays.

Five: the BOLs sometimes just fly away, but sometimes seem to simply disappear as if suddenly switched off or extinguishing.

PHENOMENOLOGICALLY: What Might also be real?? 

One: The light from these BOLs/objects might have special properties. The power of the illumination seems great, but the light does not always quite affect things as expected. Despite the brightness, it seems possible to look directly at this "mellow" light for longer than you'd think, and the light doesn't quite seem proper in its illumination. In fact, in the intense Officer Thompson case, the light illuminated some things sort of "in its direction" but not things if Thompson turned away from it. Thompson's own eyes seemed to become weirdly dependent upon just this light, for he could not see anything even close up when he turned away, nor later when the light itself turned off. It was as if this light was "for him" in some bizarre way, and his optical pathways were dominated by it during the experience, only returning slowly to normal function once the object and its light "went out".

Two: The light from these whatevers might be light generated by something rather than simply a self-transmitting entity. The light was described as a "hole punched in the sky", and as emerging from a funnel-like corridor [from where?]. The emerging weird light was also described as being a solid hard-lined streak of light "drawn" on the ice of the lake. All this seems to be "Light Behaving Badly".

Three: Occasionally objects appear which seem to belong clearly in the UFO class of flying objects. These things are described as automobile-sized, not self-luminous, sometimes associated with satellite or some other lightform.

Four: At least two pretty good "stalker" cases have been reported. Both cases had larger-than-usually-reported lighted objects following automobiles in secluded areas for long distances. "Stalkers" have usually been seen as experiences indicating "intent", and are always felt that way by the person being "stalked". Intention of course is synonymous with intelligent direction, and not natural coincidence nor "accident".

Five: There MIGHT be a few CE2 type cases [electrical or physiological effects], but we can demure on that [other than the peculiar effects on Thompson's vision].

"SOCIALLY/GOVERNMENTALLY": Ho Hum, but some questions exist.

One: The known elements of the Air Force were utterly uncaring about the 1966 events. This was probably true because they were in Quit Mode. Other more secretive elements of the intelligence/security community may NOT have been uncaring. As we have seen, a separate long-established reporting method for potential threats to the NYC water supply system had been in place for  decades. This could have still been "current" in 1966 and explain arrivals of helicopters, planes, and even an on-ground-intel agent or two.

Two: The UFO community basically stunk this up. The only positives in the story are bits of NICAP, Goodavage, Sanderson, and most of Mallan. And this is the point. The situation at Wanaque was complicated and long-term, and no one came anywhere near putting the story together. It's telling to me that I couldn't find a single Map in the reference material charting out a case. We today, to my reading, are not even sure if that big January display had an early "trip" coming down from the north [as FATE said] or whether it just started with Ball's sighting south of the dam. Pretty darned embarrassing.

Three: Elements of the UFO community were CLEAR detriments to understanding the story. Augie Roberts interjected photos, one of which was not his own, though he didn't make that clear at first, and one of which was not a Wanaque photo though he didn't make that clear either. Further he appears to have projected the fact that Officer Theodora's smudgy photos [which do appear to have been taken by some official] were maybe the bogus disk-and-beam photos not taken at Wanaque at all. Lots of fuzz and allusion by Roberts, none of which was headed towards truth. And then there's Keel with his involving Wanaque with sinister Men-in-Black, who seem not to have been involved in any way other than a small meeting between some agent and the police officers with some suggestion to keep quiet about their sightings [which they ignored]. Moseley as usual added nothing but fog and cheap shots at NICAP. One can imagine the level of seriousness in the minds of the police witnesses deteriorating with these guys around.

Four: Thanks largely to Keel, an atmosphere was woven about Wanaque in the minds of certain hysterical followers of Keelian thought, that we could get a "prominent person" visiting Wanaque and reporting that it was a town full of military policemen and Zombies. ... Laugh or you'll cry.

THEORETICALLY: What have we got??  

When we reach into our "explanations box", some of us are reaching into a fairly small container of options. Of course, that's not our problem on this blog. Here we can somewhat sanely and civilly look not only towards mundane things, but also extraterrestrial things, Magonian things, psychic things, spiritual things, and weird sciencey stuff which we haven't "discovered" yet. {I'm probably missing a category or two}. What's Wanaque look like?

If it was just the BOLs and if they really began with the dam, then this would smell like some Earthlight phenomenon catalyzed by the damming up of a larger than previous mass of water, which in turn applied non-normal stress on the geology under and around nearby, and Voila!, Earthlights {Whatever THEY are}. Is Wanaque our Eastern seaboard's version of Hessdalen, Yakima, Brown Mt., et al? That hypothesis would be simply convenient if the whole of Wanaque would be more simply convenient.

But it's not, as we have seen. And, even for the part about the BOLs, that January case with its TWO HOURS of duration, really stresses the typical Persinger geomagnetically-produced plasma ball theory.

The good UFO cases look to me not at all like nature-produced lightball phenomena, but like good ol' UFOs. MAYBE they could be nudged over to become some faerie lightform types of things, but simple plasmaballs, no. And that peculiar light.... it "feels" like it's being produced by something which we cannot normally see; maybe something which is sort-of there in space, and sort-of not... maybe like something with a "window". Sometimes it feels like whatever this is is moving on some unseen grid, or something which is determined by a relationship between our space's force characteristics and something about its own physics or construction. .... the geometry in the sky.

There is just enough "display" in these things to make them feel deliberate. That throws me towards intelligence, and I can get intelligence into this only via something like ET doing its famous covert/overt displays, or nature spirits playing their games. Should I go for Tau Ceti or Magonia?

The easy way out is to cobble together a multivariable theory --- always a dangerous move {too much to play with to allow one to explain anything}. But, darn it, this DOES seem to me to be more than one thing. I actually like the Earth-generated BOL hypothesis as a base theory. I'd like it less if I found out that it never happens anymore. But overlain on this region of repeating earthlights, there seem to be good ol' UFOs.

Is such an overlay unreasonable? I don't think so. UFOs are a phenomenon which likes to display {for whatever reasons "they" desire to do so}. "They" seem to want to get some sorts of response, yet stay fairly covert. Wanaque seems a very good place to do that to me. One could hide your "tree" in the "forest" of BOLs, while worrying the central nervous systems of isolated witnesses to your heart's content.

Not a testable hypothesis... no control over the alleged "agents/causes" and you could get the same effects by having the Tricksters of the Pre-Columbian Native Americans sub in for ET, just as Vallee did. The UFOs here don't have the thumpingly obvious nuts-and-bolts which tosses them towards ET, but are far more technologically vague.

But just maybe not.... Chief Casazza's mysterious incident where he "did not do as I should have done", sounds VERY much to me like he and his three officers came upon a landed object ... and though required to inspect anything abnormal at the reservoir, "did not do as I should have done", and backed off. THAT would cast a different light on this for sure.

But he left us hanging, and that's as far as I'll go. Wanaque's a genuine mystery, and in the broadest sense, at least, a UFO one. It may be a candidate for a Hessdalen-like automated observation post. Maybe we'd find out a little more.

I'll go out on one last limb: there are no zombies in Wanaque.

THE END.

.... or IS it??

Yes, it definitely is.

WANAQUE, part four

Yes. A great conundrum.

The unexpected thing to me is that both of these "entities" were playing their roles, symbols of the division occurring in UFOlogy, and setting a background for cases such as the Wanaque Mystery. In this mainly BOL situation, somehow all this stuff was becoming entangled, and it probably shouldn't have. Wanaque was a case which, like all incidents, should have simply and competently been researched. But it was seemingly not "technological" enough for the NICAPs and Condons, and not weird enough for the Keels. More thoughtful consideration of these BOL manifestations, for this writer, would probably have shown both divisions to be wrong.

Onwards... The EXPERTS, Again, Speak:

a). APRO was first this time in their September/October 1966 Bulletin. Again working from newsclippings, they compared Wanaque 2.0 to a sighting in Kanabee, SD, and went on to present Officer Thompson's sighting. Getting most of this minimally correct, they then said that the object had stirred up brush and water, which I believe he did not say. There was also a slightly garbled notice of the Zick siting of October 16th. This presentation probably was harmless in the quest for truth;

b). NICAP followed in the UFO INVESTIGATOR of October/November 1966 with about two-thirds of a page. Relying, thankfully, heavily on John Pagano's interview transcript, they got this one correct and in pretty good "tone" as well. They DID claim "Many" reports without much to support that. Another NICAP member seems to have investigated a case from October 12th by a group of teenagers saying that they had witnessed a mushroom-shaped UFO going up and over a hill.

c). Moseley waited until the Spring of 1967 to put out two pages in SAUCER News. Giving NICAP no credit [of course], Thompson's sighting was presented in some detail. Moseley claims that his information came via a phone interview, so maybe that's why he could ignore the better source. A comment from the Pentagon was quoted as to their having no report and therefore nothing to say. Moseley then shifted to a "monster" sighting in another New Jersey town, obviously with intent of weaving the two together. He and Keel investigated this one personally. Moseley says: the boys story "rang with evident sincerity". Well, you decide. Moseley then characterized Wanaque after the Thompson sighting as an area of "virtual hysteria" over-run by thrill-seekers. This seems more to characterize January than October, but it makes better drama. He then presented three other claims from elsewhere in New Jersey and later in time. He did characterize the obvious hoax as a hoax to his credit.

d). Meanwhile the Air Force was in full goofball mode. There seems to have been no investigation at least as to anything documented. This might not be true due to the incompetence in the attitude at Blue Book at that moment. One would think that with the embarrassment of Swamp Gas and its resultant political problems ringing in their ears that they would have shown some urgency. But to my eye, nothing. Blue Book seems to have gone into Duck-and-Cover mode. Colonel Quintanilla knew that Colorado was starting ---he was about to head out there for an Air Force consultancy--- and he probably realized that the end of Blue Book was in sight. All he had to do was survive the next year or two without much pot-stirring and he was free of this dammed job forever.

 In this particular case, there may be some evidence for this wayward incompetence in the microfilmed record. The only geographical designator for October 1966 which comes close to addressing Wanaque is the file for Hazlet, NJ. What's in there for Hazlet is not at all interesting for our current incident. But what IS in there speaks to "attitude". The Hazlet file is WAY over 100 pages thick. Why? Because several unrelated things are just sloppily stuffed in there having nothing to do with any Hazlet case, nor anything else from even New Jersey. This is the behavior of a crew who doesn't anymore give a damm. So, maybe elsewhere, misfiled, are documents related to Wanaque.

Someone else can find them.

What they might have found if anyone really tried:

A: Split Rock Pond. October 16th, 1966.

SITU consultant and Ivan Sanderson friend, Berthold Schwarz,  had written an article for Medical Times, October 1968, entitled "UFOs: Delusions or Dilemma". Schwarz was, naturally for him, very sympathetic to the possibility that the UFO phenomenon was concretely real. Whenever a sympathetic man gets up on a stage about one of the forbidden mysteries, he becomes an attractive front door for witnesses to walk through and tell their stories {John Timmerman was the Ultimate Storefront Door for relaxing witnesses}.

One of the cases that Schwarz used in the piece was a report that had come to him by being such an open door. The witness had told the case to a mutual friend and agreed to see Schwarz about it. Without this "sympathetic aura" the UFO community would probably never heard of this case.

This fellow was a young forester taking the day off camping and fishing on Split Rock Reservoir, slightly south and west of Wanaque. He had packed up and was driving home at about 5am. He noticed a bright glow out the back of his rear window. He stopped the car and stuck his head out to look. Here's what he saw:

Stunned for a moment, he just stared at the glowing discoidal object with what seemed to be a dome at its top. The thing hung in the air at about 15' or 20' high ["treetop"] and was 25 or 30' wide, and a little shorter than wide. [The above is a rapid sketch]. It was silent.

As he began to clear his head and get out of there, his car malfunctioned. Power seemed to drain away. Headlights... dashboard... engine. Now the object was directly overhead. He rolled up the window, locked the doors "and hoped". When the thing was a little behind or off to the side, his car would function and he beat it out of there. His cue for trying the engine was when his lights came back on. Driving all the way to Charlottesburg Road, the thing stayed with him. He got home, the ground glowing all around him still, but didn't look up as he ran to the house.

Later, the thing gone, he got back into his car and drove to his supervisor's  home [the mutual Schwarz friend] and told the tale. Police were told and went out to the site. Nothing was there of evidentiary nature. Some odd things later took place regarding the engine of his car, which ultimately "exploded" and had to be replaced. The witness was a former race car driver and this weird occurrence completely mystified him.

Shortly after the incident, the witness felt that he was becoming ill. By three months time, he was admitted to Montclair Community Hospital suffering from fatigue, anorexia, soreness and weakness of muscles, drowsiness, chills, and 35 pound weight loss. This syndrome rose for three days or so each month from October to January then retreated for a while until cycling up again. Whether this condition had to do directly with the UFO, or was the product of PTSD, or an allergy [there is some reason to credit this], we don't know. The local physician diagnosed this as "the flu", probably the least likely of the hypotheses. Schwarz did a series of blood tests and found nothing out of line. I'm betting on the allergy and/or PTSD. The witness ultimately made a full recovery. Schwarz remained puzzled as he felt that no theory easily handled the symptoms and their cyclical nature.

Schwarz was a medical advisor for NICAP at the time, and so they knew of it. Ted Bloecher asked him for permission to publish it in UFOs: A New Look [which featured the growing phenomenon of closer encounters] and it appears there faithfully rendered. Dick Hall viewed this as the only Wanaque case deserving inclusion in his UFO Evidence, Two. 

And where was the Air Force?  Or Colorado? 

OCTOBER 17th, 1966: This case is odd in that it was reported twice to NICAP by one of the witnesses who obviously was not about to give up on her interest in UFOs and her own sighting. The event took place on Westbrook Road just about where the words "Wanaque Reservoir" are on the map above.

This lady and her friend and her friend's teenage son were driving down Westbrook road with the intent of watching for the Wanaque BOL, which was hopefully still about despite no public sightings for a few days. They parked. Some woman came up and said: "It's coming down Westbrook Road!". They drove in that direction; and the UFO ended up nearly directly over their heads.

The thing looked like it was standing still, white lights ringing around the edge and one red and one green flashing light on the bottom. It was said to be like a walnut held at arm's length in apparent size. The surface was described as shiny. It was silent. The UFO stood there for about a minute and then moved off behind cedar trees which lined the road.

The witnesses then moved back towards their original spot where many people had gathered. There were claims by others to have seen it from Stonetown Road, which intersects with Westbrook. The local radio said nothing about the event the next day, despite getting many phonecalls. It is likely that the radio stations were being asked by the police to not publish these things anymore due to traffic hazards on certain concentrated "Observation points" on the reservoir.

October 21st, 1966.

It's possible that while John Pagano was in Wanaque interviewing Thompson, he left behind information to be contacted if other cases arose, and, when one did, he was. However it happened, he got a letter from a witness, describing a "late" case of the 21st.

The letter is brief and unfortunately not followed up.

The witness was driving home from her evening job at 11:10pm. She was headed for West Milford on a long secluded road owned by the watershed authority. She was the only person on the road.

She noticed a bright white light in the sky to her right. As it approached, she could see that it was a small object, about the diameter of a clock which might be mounted in a school corridor. She slowed down. The thing then began to make circles around her car [at some distance, not right up close, but still obviously circling her]. She put on a little more speed, but the object kept circling her. Getting close to her home, she now gunned it, and the object rose far up into the air. It still circled as she drove into her driveway and cruised away towards the lake. Her husband was able to see it hovering out there. Then, they heard the sounds of jets, and the object disappeared. Neighbors confirmed this latter part of the story.

This case is a version of the fairly well-known BOL-Stalker cases, which, due to their seeming "interest" are plenty high strangeness to me. Back then? Apparently not so much.

KEELNESS: All these sorts of things were apparently working John Keel into a froth. 

Next time I'll try to squeeze him into the story ... and Ed Condon...

Yeh... and those guys.

WANAQUE, part three.

Here we go again.

Across the spring and summer of 1966, nothing in particular happened at Wanaque, but something seemed to be happening to UFOlogy. Whether it was the phenomenon itself which got stranger or "just" the minds of some of the people pursuing it, there was a windshift. "Keyhoe-ian" style UFOlogy seemed in retreat, while high-strangeness thinking was creeping about [in almost every sense of the word "creeping"]. This was all in spite of the famous Hynek "Swamp Gas" gaff in March, the Gerald Ford blow-up at the Air Force, the somewhat humbler tone of the military, and the secretly manipulated TV documentary by Walter Cronkite. That documentary, molded into a masterful debunking production by Robertson Panelist Thornton Page, was "The Empire's" way of striking back at UFOlogy's newfound support. Somehow, in the midst of things which might have produced a moderate mildly positive atmosphere for UFO research, elements of the field began to go a bit "Keelian" shall we say. Interest was dividing between the persons who were hoping for a more-or-less "scientific" approach, and a whole wave of people heading rapidly Out Proctor. During the summer, people knew that something like Colorado was coming. The Keyhoe's, Hall's, McDonald's, Hynek's of the world quietly cheered. The Keel's and Barker's of the world thought: who cares?

Into this schizophrenia Wanaque manifested again. And, for the most part, no one cared.

Wanaque, October-style is essentially one well-known instance. It turns out that other things went on, but it was one particular report which was covered by the papers and got the hullaballoo going again.

OCTOBER 10th, 1966: c.10pm.  Betty Gordon was at home with her husband, Robert, a reservoir policeman off duty, and a visiting neighbor. She spotted a very bright discoidal light like a "saucer", and all three watched it. They called the on-duty police, and an officer responded also seeing the thing. He then radio'd officer Ben Thompson who was out in the field. Thompson's position is difficult to surmise due to our, as usual, geographically-lousy field research, but may have been somewhat at the south end of the usual sightings of January.

Thompson sees the thing as an extremely brilliant blinding lightform. He radios back to base that the object "is lighting up practically the whole southern end of the reservoir". Officers Pastor and Webster then go out to look and they see it too. Thompson has much the closer position and should be considered the primary witness, although as we can see, there are many witnesses. The newspapers reported that when Thompson turned on the light on top of his patrol car, the object's light went out. I do not believe that this was accurate. Pastor and Webster continued to observe the bright object as it flew a leisurely course up the reservoir to the north and beyond towards New York state line. This doesn't seem to have been true either, and the newspapers were having a bad day. We will come back to what may really have happened here, as, wonders of wonders, we have an actual field report interview of Thompson. But, for now, lets complete "the news".

Shortly after the event, helicopters of an undetermined source showed up. The relevance of this is your guess. Newspapers swooped in for interviews and television got Thompson and his fellow officer, Gordon, to do an interview program on what happened. [ I have no information on what was said on that show other than what's been written above and a couple of other thoughts --- Thompson said that the light was the third one he'd seen since last winter, and Gordon said that this sort of thing was 'old hat' on the reservoir. Whereas the initial news story had said that it was automobile-sized, Gordon said more like a grapefruit. {as we know, and will hear later, this shows how tough it is to estimate size if the object isn't REALLY close and/or on the ground}.There were brilliant flashes at one point like giant flashbulbs. Both officers said that six helicopters which showed up seemed to them to be looking for the object.]

Augie Roberts again did his thing, showing up with a photo [the infamous one with a fuzzy domed disk radiating a spreading lightbeam downward] and alluded that this was the Wanaque object. People bought it, and the story was printed. It is good to remind oneself that the original source for the "beam" story was a misquoted engineer, Fred Stein, who clearly debunked the misquote. Such matters would of course make little difference to Roberts.

On the 15th of October, an unknown case occurred. It was only reported later to Berthold Schwarz. We'll get to it later in part four. On the 16th another unreported case occurred which was witnessed by three adults in Pompton Lakes, looking towards the reservoir. Very unusually for Wanaque, this was described as a metallic disk, rounded top but flat bottom and quite shiny. The next words are difficult to interpret precisely, but the witnesses seem to be saying that the disk had a light beacon on the top, and when the light came on, the disk disappeared. The light was then seen flying off to the north.

The renewal of action at Wanaque was enough to generate crowds again, though apparently not so badly as in January. As time went by, other sightings sprinkled all across northern New Jersey in a sort of miniflap. During this flap, persons were getting phonecalls and visits from UFO investigators [of unknown affiliation, if any] and some of these visits irritated witnesses enough so that they were reported. For people like John Keel, this was evidence of a great wave of Men-in-Black sweeping up UFO evidence and generally causing trouble. Keel would phrase this concept in the most sinister of terms. And he would refer to Wanaque and the New Jersey flap as evidence for this which he knew about personally.

NICAP does something [mainly] right: 

Although no flurry of personnel showed up, we can give honest thanks to Dr. John Pagano for doing so and going directly to Officer Thompson for an interview [transcribed and available]. Three cheers for Dr. Pagano.

Pagano got over there quickly. The interview with Thompson was on the 12th; outstandingly fresh. A newsman was also present as a third party [well-behaved; asked no questions]. So, here's the detail:

1]. The event began about 9:30pm;

2]. Thompson was aware of several witnesses to what he saw [from varying distances];

3]. He parked his patrol car and got out when he saw a very bright light in the sky. He was on a potentially trafficked road, so he put his signal lights on, and watched the thing going slowly left to right mainly for about 3-4 minutes;

4]. Occasionally the thing would engage in short rapid violent maneuvers. It might "shoot straight up with a square curve" [i.e. to his eye a right-angle turn], and then dive straight down, make rapid left/right zigzags all throughout this time. {My comment now: for those who think that this might have been a student prank "laundry-bag" style hoax, note the next comment}. The BOL was so bright that it lit up the whole area of about 400 yards square. When the light suddenly went out, Thompson's eyes were so affected by the brightness that he temporarily could not adjust to the immediate darkness, and he could not see his car, even though it had its top dome light on. { student hoaxers would be playing with some mighty powerful light sources here. The old candles-in-the-translucent-bag bit doesn't quite cut it, does it?}.

5]. Apparently Officer Gordon, though off-duty, had a curiosity attack, and drove out to join Thompson. They stood around looking and talking for another hour, but it did not return;

6]. What Thompson was looking at, to him, seemed pretty globular but still with some form to it. He described it as a basketball into which was inserted a football halfway. His nearest view of the thing was about 150 feet away and about the same distance high. [my guess is that he is overestimating the angle here as most witnesses do, as other parts of his statement would make it lower --- here is where we needed Walt Webb for precise angles and mapping];

7]. Thompson estimated the size as about that of a car;

8]. He felt that the only trait that it had other than its brightness and erratic motion was a slight mist that it left close behind as it moved;

9]. He verified that within 15-20 minutes of the thing disappearing, six helicopters arrived and around thirty planes crossed the area;

10]. After making a right angle turn, it drifted slowly left towards the mountains, and "right near the mountain somewhere it disappeared";

11]. The police went up to that area of the mountains the next morning to look for a possible landing site but nothing was found;

12]. He believed that the one that he and many others saw in January, though much smaller in relative appearance, also had a similar shape, though more difficult to tell;

13]. He commented on another incident where he had seen two BOLs, one red, one white, which seemed almost to be playing with or chasing one another in the sky. One would approach; the other would zip away in a straight lin, then make a right-angle turn and stop dead and wait. Several times the red one would close, and the white one would do something like that;

14]. Thompson mentioned that "government officials from Ohio" had come and questioned him {so apparently Wright-Patterson showed up, afterall};

15]. When the October 10th object would make wild maneuvers, or shoot straight upwards, it showed a lot more light intensity than when it was slowly cruising at level; it would markedly glare and flicker;

Sergeant Thompson concluded with this: " Whatever they tell me it was, I think if they were there, they'd have to admit it was something they'd probably never seen before theirself".  {Yep, my good man, I'm with you on that}. Ben Thompson and all his police officers buddies who had seen the BOLs in January and October and other times unmentioned, were always solidly backed up by their chief, John Casazza.

Not really surprising, as Chief Casazza had seen the things himself in 1965.

We can only wish that Dale Spaur had received such solid support after his spectacular sighting in the famous "Portage County, Ohio Police Car Chase" case, which happened in April of this same year, and helped ruin his life. Once again the Air Force played their inhumane role, insisting that officers Spaur, Neff, Huston, and others had seen a satellite and Venus.

I'll get back to Wanaque with part four. There is still more to tell, including Ivan Sanderson's role.

Till then, Peace.

WANAQUE 1966: part two.

THE EXPERTS DO THEIR THING:

I don't believe that the experts have a lot to be proud of here, but I don't know the whole story, and should keep my opinions moderate.

The Air Force was in top form throughout. They didn't even investigate the case formally as far as I can tell. This did not stop various representatives from voicing their theories that the BOL sightings were planets seen under odd atmospheric situations [maybe some were but that three-arc passage on January 11th... Sheesh!], or helicopters, which didn't exist with strobe beams [which turned out also not to exist], to ECHO satellite spottings, which is so preposterous as to make one wish that you could make citizen arrests on military people for violations of brain function. Yep, the good ol' Air Force was in its prime.

This case was NICAP's. They were the only big UFO group which was properly placed geographically AND with responsible intelligent personnel. And, on the surface, it seems that they rolled into Wanaque in force. The big mystery to me is : WHERE is the full case information on this very complex series of incidents? It MIGHT be somewhere buried in files or lost, but I've not seen even good hints of it.

NICAP published its January/February 1966 UFO Investigator with a two-column write-up of the investigation. The illustration above was its lone picture. Here are some of the highlights:

1]. NICAP taped the first witness, Howard Ball, newspaperman, who saw the thing in the north about 6:20pm. Well, that's good. Very little content was revealed, but Ball's statement that the thing moved away from him to the NNW is the wrong way for the rest of the scenario. No concern about this is mentioned.
2]. Next it's reported that the thing is south at the dam. I'd have wondered about that, but NICAP did not seem to be bothered. The fact that the FATE Magazine article writers seem to have gotten the sequence correct indicates to me that it was POSSIBLE to string these observations together. NICAP allegedly had something like SEVEN people there.
3]. Officer Dyckman was apparently interviewed [by Katchen and Paz?] and this too is good. Some quoting of him is made. Were the other officers interviewed?? They certainly were a cooperative friendly bunch to everyone who asked.
4]. The bogus rumors of a beam burning a hole in the ice was debunked [Standing applause on that] by interviewing engineer Fred Stein [this fellow is called Steines and Stennes also in print, so who knows what his name is].
5]. It is simply stated that officer Theodora saw the thing blinking on and off in the am hours and head off north --- other sources said west into the mountains. Was this an interview?
6]. January 12th evening Wardlaw and Cisco [actually Sisco, they got the two guys mixed up] are stated as seeing a disk which maneuvered faster than a jet. NICAP language seemed straining a bit to maximize "strangeness".
7]. No further comment was made about reports from the 13th, 14th, 19th, nor any civilians whatever. I'm not at all "happy" with the effort here.

Well, SOMETHING at least was done, fragmented as it was. There has to be a reason for this: too busy, bigger fish to fry, not "strange" enough --- who knows? No mention of this occurs in other NICAP publications, and Dick Hall doesn't think enough of the case to put it in his UFO Evidence Two. ... Sigh.

Well, in consolation, everyone else was worse. Hayden Hewes was next to publish about the case in his Interplanetary Intelligence Report of March 1966. He was quick because Augie Roberts was on his board of experts. THAT of course spells immediate doom and the half=page report has exaggerated enthusiasms. Several Hundreds of people saw the thing , for example. Augie Roberts contributed the photo above for Hewes, claiming to have camped out several days and finally snapped this on January 22nd. You be the judge as to how impressed you are with this streak of light on a photo filled with streaks of light. Roberts claims to have interviewed a person not named anywhere else, Tom Garrison, who saw the thing come down to treetop level, dimming and brightening. If that last is true, it adds something.

FLYING SAUCER REVIEW was next with its April 1966 issue. In its World UFO Roundup pages, a fellow from Florida sent the newsclipping from the Newark Evening News of January 12th, and FSR transcribed it. This clipping could actually have been written by one of the witnesses as two different newsmen from east of Wanaque supposedly had observations. The information in this news story seems pretty good, so that FSR didn't misinform its readers much. However, the "bolt of light" directed out of the object towards the water is repeated. {I am going through these "references" because they are opening my eyes a bit as to how the UFO community's newsletters themselves embed bad information which will then stick in people's heads. In this case, unless you read, and believe, the NICAP work, you will come away thinking that this BOL beamed energy at the reservoir and burnt a hole in the ice. THAT, in turn might build up in your mind some odd theories about BOLs or UFOs.}.

APRO followed in its May/June BULLETIN with a column=length report. This case was WAY out of APRO's territory and they probably should have just left it alone. Working it seems entirely from newsclippings, they put forward some accurate information, then restate the bogus "bolt-of-light" comment which Stein/Steines/Stennes refuted, and claimed wild maneuvering at the dam for two-and-a-half hours.

Lastly, the main clown of UFOlogy, James Moseley, decided to cover the incidents in his June 1966 version of Saucer News. This was about a page and a half. Stating that he himself lived only twenty miles away [something which, I guess, authorizes his opinion], he says that he led an investigation of these matters with Augie Roberts, Timothy Green Beckley, and two other members of his staff, The writeup is mainly from newsclippings but, if you can trust it, does mention a few interesting things.

1]. It perpetuates the allusion that the thing produced a hole in the ice [negative points for that];
2]. It knows that Officer Cisco's wife saw the thing in the daytime, despite misspelling her name;
3]. It knows about the CBRangers' "fat cigar" case, with radio e-m effects--- missed by NICAP;
4]. It knows about Wallach's case, though it doesn't quite get it right [also missed by NICAP];
5]. They seem to have actually interviewed David Sisco, who wondered about draining water;
6]. It knew of a later March case where the Mother Superior of the local convent spotted the thing;
7]. And of course it took a shot at NICAP, Don Berliner, and the Air Force.

This COULD have added something to the case if any of the civilian observers had been really interviewed and those findings written up. But no way --- hard field work and analysis is no fun. As usual, there is no depth whatever in anything Moseley did.

The final "contribution" of the external UFO community at this time was an extensive article written for [maybe] the New York Daily News [his employer] but available to the UFO community via one of DELL's Flying Saucers: UFO Reports [#2]. The author's name: Joseph Goodavage. Some of you might recognize that. I will try not to let it prejudice me.

Goodavage goes to Wanaque early on with an assignment from his newspaper. He finds the local Reservoir Police extraordinarily friendly and cooperative, even staying over at one's home. On the evening of the 13th, Joe Cisco takes him out on the perimeter road to a "private" type viewing area. It's 10pm and cold. Cisco stays in the car, but Goodavage braves it out. Then:

"... something hanging in the sky, its light flashing bright and dim in rapid sequence. It first moved with a lazy pendulum-like action, then spurted at breath-taking speeds for short distances. Every few seconds it made completely impossible 'angular' turns. Once, it shot vertically upward, came to an incredible dead stop, then spiraled downward until it came to rest --- seeming on top of some trees between two small mountains. I estimated its distance at about two miles. ... Then it fluttered-wobbled slowly off toward the west".

This description, if one assumes that the mad gyrations were of somewhat short distances, is quite in keeping with other reports and may in fact be a good one. The object, by the way, seems to have been simply a bright white BOL. Goodavage was hoping to see more detail than this and employed the trick of looking slightly to the side of the BOL when it hovered. He thought that he might be seeing discrete portholes. We should not value this limits-of-vision remark too highly however. Then, sudden vanishment.

At the moment of disappearance, Goodavage had three "impressions", which each of us can take as internally or externally caused.
1). He felt a prickling sensation all over his body, as if hair was rising on hands, legs, head, and torso;
2). He felt that some pressure was pressing on him all around;
3). and after a few steps toward the squad car: a crackling whining electric motor sound all around, seeming to come from overhead.

Officer Cisco felt nor heard any of this.

He says quite a few other things, about other possible reports by witnesses, but his own experience is the dramatic element of the piece. He speaks of another newsman who is sold on the beam and hole-in-ice element, and seems to credit the story himself. He speaks of witnessing with other locals a distant red BOL. He speaks of another case of a flickering BOL which just goes out. [seen by him and two of the police]. He talks about the Wallach case, getting his name right and a more detailed story. Peculiarly he names Don Berliner as a guy who came along shortly after the event and suggested testing the stopped car to the police. Now, if Don knew of the Wallach case, why in the Hell is it not in the NICAP newsletter report?? Something messed this up at NICAP HQ. Goodavage shows his feet-of-clay by publishing the picture above as a picture of the thing, when any mildly educated sciency person recognizes it instantly as a galaxy. [ I've taped the reader's "hey you got fooled" letter about this on the top of the picture as you see]. Pretty embarrassing. He also accepts a pretty nearly preposterous statement by an acquaintance who claims to be friends with CIA director Allen Dulles, who just happened to sloppily inform him that the CIA was setting up a special UFO study unit. Yep. Dulles. Very wide-between-the-teeth type of guy.

I take two things away from Goodavage's article:
A). He made a honest effort to get information on the events, and proved that the local police were beyond cooperative so as to allow him to do so;
B). His own case is interesting and probably legit. We would need an interview with Joe Cisco to nail that down. The strange element in his sighting is however up for debate. Not only does it honestly bring up subjectivity, but there is another small reason, for me, to doubt it.

Goodavage was one of "us" folks in a very recognizable way: he loved all manner of anomalies and "forbidden mysteries". When he wasn't wasting his time on conventional astrology [whoops, I said I'd try NOT to downplay his good sense by going there --- so apologies], he flirted rather heavily with the effects of magnetic fields on the human nervous system, once volunteering for some rather high intensity exposures. These interests led him to the work of Michael Persinger, and Persinger's theories that you can explain essentially any anomalous report, honestly made, by the brain of the reporters being zig-zagged by fluctuating magnetic fields. I'll go no further into Persinger's claims. They are precisely like Menzel's. They might just explain an occasional odd report, but generally they miss the mark by miles.

Rather, what I think is at least a little interesting is that Goodavage wrote the above book, all about Solar Storms altering the ionosphere and affecting central nervous systems. This, in its way, is precisely in the wheelhouse of his own Wanaque experience. In fact the alleged CIA-knowing buddy told him that electromagnetic fields from the UFO were exactly what caused his three "impressions". Well, maybe [if so the UFO went invisible and right over his head]. But here's why I regard this weakly: I don't think that Goodavage believed it himself. Here was this book, screaming for him to mention his own form-fitting experience, and ... nothing. No mention at all.

Perhaps that's too much surmise on my part, but I'm going to take his case only so far.

That's enough for part two.

If you're wondering what the above picture is, too bad. I know and I'm not tellin'. Why should I have to do all the work anyway...

Hint: it's completely meaningless.

Was Wanaque??

Till next time, when things begin to get more interesting. [how's that for a teaser?]