UFO History Group Get-together #4: a small add-on.

Robert Powell sent me some pictures of the May 22-24 get-together, and I wanted to use them as an opportunity to make a point or two about UFO research work and information sharing. {The above picture is of eight of us around the archives room table skyping with Barry Greenwood in Massachusetts.}

The point of the get-togethers seems at first to be information exchanges and brain-trusting but it's mainly about community building. In my many years watching the UFO researcher circus, the thing which has been most appalling to me is the lack of true community and, therefore, an unwillingness to contribute without ego to team projects. Community however takes work.

I and others [it seemed to me] had a need for creating true colleagues and ultimately true friends to facilitate getting projects done which almost demanded a team of people to encourage and support one another, and share the load. That's why I, not knowing if the concept was impractical or not, began inviting some old friends and some new associates, all of whom appeared as civilized humans, to come to Kalamazoo for small-work, high-companionship, styles of get-togethers. I was surprised a bit as to how much people wanted to do that "impractical" thing, and also how little [essentially zero] conflict occurred even among folks on record with opposing opinions on certain things.

{Barry and Bill via Skype}

I'm posting this because I believe that it's time for anyone in UFOlogy who has low enough ego and high enough humanity [and who has been lone-wolfing it] to quit behaving that way and create community with others who share one's UFO interest and who bring something to the table. {The Skype technology isn't ideal, but it allows a "nearly-personal" contact with great guys like Bill Chalker and Barry Greenwood who can't make it to Michigan}.

We all have experienced some of our field's Sounds-of-Thunder Stage-Dominating UFO Egos long enough. More tragic than the consistent lack of open-ness that we have to put up with from such "UFO authorities" is the other group of basically good people, who however have to plough on virtually alone with no real support and, this is important, no pre-publication sounding boards of respected people. We need research teams, and research teams who know one another as human beings and have civil sympathy for each other.

UFO research is hard. But it's a lot more promising [and fun] when you're doing it in a shared community relationship with people that you've grown to like.

As in everything: together is better than alone.

As the Wiccans are wont to say: Merry Meet and Merry Part, and Merry Meet again.

Till then, friends.

UFO Meeting at 818 South Park

Hello, folks. The UFO History Group get-together [which has been occupying a lot of my attention for the last two weeks {since I was host}] has come to pass, and I believe that a report on it would be of at least mild interest. Eleven folks migrated into Kalamazoo from around the country [Tom Tulien/MN, Linda Murphy/MI, John Reed/MD, Rob Swiatek/VA, Robert Powell/TX{strategically hiding from CIA surveillance behind Rob }, Bill Murphy/MI standing, Jan Aldrich/CT, Sue Swiatek/VA, Will Matthews/MI, and Eddie Bullard/IN.] I am claiming to be behind the camera.

It was a very good time --- these folks like each other and like to be part of a team. We discussed interesting things and "news". Some of that news was that all three of Jan Aldrich, Robert Powell, and Barry Greenwood [who joined us on Skype for a bit], have, in three separate ways [USAF case index cards, Otis AFB documents, Viet Nam history documents] found UFO incident reports allegedly reported to the Air Force system BUT WHICH DID NOT REGISTER IN THE PROJECT BLUE BOOK RECORDS. At the very least this means that a mother-load of UFO military reports exists out there in hidden cubbyholes, which are, however, accessible by us if we can just figure out the right "questions" to ask. 

{{ Up on the roof on a perfect Michigan day --- fellow second from the left is one of my house buddies, Fr. Michael Howell, semi-retired Catholic priest and a great friend }}.

Another thing of interest were Robert's revelations about how well MUFON was acting [but unfortunately still mainly behind the scenes and still dependent largely upon himself and a few critical guys on the scientific review board and the Director of the Star Team investigations. ... and most importantly, himself --- this is me saying this, not Robert.] MUFON's case reporting mechanism is now getting about an equal share of reports as is NUFORC [c.6000 per year]. MUFON is, in my opinion, a FAR better choice as a reporting destination as every report gets assessed and, if it has seeming merit, gets acted upon. Of those 6000 cases per year, the case review board will sift out about 90 as particularly interesting. Those will all be parceled out to the state directors, who then have responsibility for the investigations --- if they blow it, it's on them. Of the 90, about ten will be considered excellent cases as to credibility, strangeness, and solid investigation. These ten cases MUFON will consider eminently defensible in front of any reasonable open-minded individual. I, despite a very good friendship with Robert, had not realized that the behind-the-scenes work was getting that well organized. I wonder if MUFON knows how much they owe him?

We skyped, for the first time, both to Barry Greenwood in Massachusetts and Bill Chalker in Australia, with modest success --- the connection to Australia was stronger than the connection to Massachusetts, proving that Skype is in fact Magic and not Science. The picture above is Bill skyping back at us [he's the little window at the bottom right.] Barry told us about the Viet Nam news [oddly involving an Australian ship] and Bill told us about everything else.

Although the skyping didn't have anything to do with it, the third thing of interest [at least to us] was the decision to go forward, at a very modest pace, with the idea of a master book on UFO phenomenology --- think chapters on the case categories [CE1, Distant Objects, Radar Cases et al] including readable narratives followed by intellectual studies --- and doing this with the mild twist of making our website-in-process largely dedicated to "book support" information [think of a reader getting curious beyond the book text and being able to go right to the website where "book search" sent them to a large number of vetted supplements to the text.] This concept puts a double-barreled strain on us for both book and resource production, but with patience and perhaps trustworthy "outside" help, we should slowly grind it out. We see this as important as we believe that there has never been an english-language book on UFO phenomenology which has contained both readable engaging narratives and scholarly research. Just like UFOs and Government for the human-response history, this book is the other necessary bookend for the University shelves [more than 90 universities now have UFOs and Government.]

Lots of other things were discussed and are being done. The most significant of these for a historian of the anomalies is that John Reed is preserving the entire collection of the notes of Charles Fort in a format which will be readable, searchable, and available to researchers.

Stuff still happens, folks, and stuff is still out there to do. I can recall someone showing me the website of some trollish disrespectful boor who stated that he could not wait for us oldtimers to die so that the youth could jump in and solve all this. That same person said that none of us do any research. I'm not sure what reality those slurs could exist in; it is not mine. My friends are Warriors for research on UFOs and the anomalies --- and we produce.

God Bless all of them, and may they have long lives [despite the sociopathic voodoo of some cheap shot artists out there].

And God Bless all of you, too ... and if I can get a little of that, maybe I can get more work out now for the blog.

Till then.