Positively Incorrect!

I'll be speaking about my Contactees book tonight on the Positively Incorrect radio-show with host Scott Cluthe. Here's all the details.

Up Rainbow Hill: Update

A few days ago, I mentioned here (at this link) that Tim Beckley had just published a new edition of Dana Howard's book, Up Rainbow Hill. As you may know, thanks to the good work of researcher Regan Lee, Howard's story is told in my Contactees book, too.

Tim has emailed me with the updated Amazon link for Up Rainbow Hill, which now includes the book-cover image (see above), and which can be found right here.

Up Rainbow Hill is a classic book from the era of the Contactees, and one that should be read by anyone and everyone with an interest in the subject.

HAVE A MERRY CHRISTMAS!

I will be offline for the next few days, so will take the opportunity now to wish all of you a very merry Christmas, and a happy and healthy 2010!

A Contactee Synchronicity

I've mentioned at previous posts on this blog how a number of odd and curious synchronicities have occurred during the course of writing my Contactees book.

Now, Regan Lee (who contributed data for the book on Dana Howard) relates yet another event of the synchronistic kind involving the book...

Micah Hanks Reviews Contactees

Over at his Gralien Report, Micah Hanks (see photo left) reviews my Contactees book, and says in part:

"...In addition to providing brilliant, informative first-hand research, Contactees also highlights the work of a variety of other individuals who have staked claims in the field of Ufology and alien encounters. Greg Bishop, Timothy Green Beckley, Joshua P. Warren, Jim Moseley, Regan Lee, are all interviewed within its pages, providing what may be the most diverse argument pertaining to human-alien interaction throughout the ages that has ever been produced.

"Perhaps, though sadly, one of the book’s brightest points of interest involves the discussion of cryptoterrestrials, a sort of last will and testament given by the late (and sorely missed) researcher Mac Tonnies. The inclusion of Tonnies’ futuristic interpretations provide icing on the cake to what otherwise would still be by far the best—albeit the strangest—book on UFO contactees to-date.

"Indeed, Contactees outlines a peculiar subculture that remains present in the fringes of Americana, and though well known to some, it has received its best treatment thanks to the efforts of Redfern. With the information provided in this book, one may even begin to interpret the manner and appearances of UFO craft throughout the decades… perhaps the next move of the trans-generational 'Space Brothers' lies within its very words."

Contactee Defense

Regan Lee has a new post over at her Vintage UFO titled Defending the Contactees, and which you may find interesting.

Contactees & Radio

Two more shows where I'll be speaking about Contactees:

Positively Incorrect Radio on December 29; and Mancow Muller Show on January 18.

Paracast Link: Contactees

Here's the link to my recent appearance on The Paracast, with David Biedny and Gene Steinberg, on the subject of my Contactees book.

A Contactee and a Crashed UFO

It's not often that the Contactees are mentioned alongside reports of crashed UFOs. But, there are exceptions to the rule - one of which involves one of the most controversial of all the early Contactees, Truman Bethurum (author of Aboard A Flying Saucer and several other books) and one of the more well-known alleged crashed UFO cases. Namely, the reported crash at Kingman, Arizona in 1953.

Although I have a chapter on Bethurum in my Contactees book, due to space-limitations and word-count, I was unable to include everything on the man; such as the following, which details the strange saga of Bethurum and Kingman. So, I figured I might as well post the material here, as it's a genuinely weird addition to the fairly substantial body of data on the Kingman affair.

Situated in the scenic Hualapai Valley between the Cerbat and Hualapai mountain ranges, Kingman, Arizona was founded in 1882. Today, it has a population of approximately 28,000; and the nearby communities of Golden Valley and Butler bring the Kingman area’s total population to around 40,000.

The town is known for its very modest beginnings, as a simple railroad siding near Beale’s Springs in the Middleton Section, along the newly-constructed route of the Atlantic and Pacific Railroad. The city of Kingman was named after Lewis Kingman who surveyed along the Atlantic and Pacific right of way between Needles and Albuquerque; and who supervised the building of the railroad from Winslow to Beale's Springs, which is near the present location of the city of Kingman.

But, it is Kingman's link to the crashed UFO issue upon we are most focused.

Before we get to the crux of the matter, it is important to note that - despite what some researchers have claimed - the evidence in support of the notion that something extraordinary occurred at, or near, Kingman in May 1953 does not stand or fall on the word of one solitary witness - who has become known by the pseudonym of Fritz Werner.

In reality, there are far more than a handful of stories, reports and testimonies that collectively have a significant bearing upon this decades-old incident.

Highlights of the Kingman controversy include the original testimony of Fritz Werner, as provided to researchers Jeff Young and Paul Chetham in 1971. Chetham and Young were the first people within the UFO research community to speak with the source; and very brief aspects of the story and interview were published in the Framingham, Massachusetts edition of the Middlesex News on April 23, 1973.

According to the newspaper, Jeff Young had interviewed a man who asserted that he had worked with Project Blue Book and had made, “contact with an alien craft.”

The Young-Chetham interview revealed that their source had been at the site of a UFO crash at Kingman, Arizona, approximately twenty years previously.

According to Werner: “The object was not built by anything, obviously, that we know about on Earth. At that time I was out of the atomic testing, but I was still with the Air Force and this was the time I was on Blue Book. There was a report that there was a crash of an unexplained vehicle in the west and they organized a team of about forty of us. I was one of those forty.”

Concerning the reported recovery of an apparent alien body at the scene, Werner said: “I saw the creature [that] you’re talking about. It was real and I would guess about four feet tall.” Its body was dark brown in color; and Werner offered the theory that perhaps the creature’s skin had darkened due to “atmospheric exposure.”

The respected researcher Ray Fowler later spoke with the witness, who prepared the following affidavit: “I, Fritz Werner, do solemnly swear that during a special assignment with the U.S. Air Force, on May 21, 1953, I assisted in the investigation of a crashed unknown object in the vicinity of Kingman, Arizona. The object was constructed of an unfamiliar metal which resembled brushed aluminum. It had impacted twenty inches into the sand without any sign of structural damage.. It was oval and about 30 feet in diameter. An entranceway hatch had been vertically lowered and opened.. It was about 3-1/2 feet high and 1-1/2 feet wide. I was able to talk briefly with someone on the team who did look inside only briefly. He saw two swivel seats, an oval cabin, and a lot of instruments and displays. A tent pitched near the object sheltered the dead remains of the only occupant of the craft. It was about 4 feet tall, dark brown complexion and had 2 eyes, 2 nostrils, 2 ears, and a small round mouth. It was clothed in a silvery, metallic suit and wore a skullcap of the same type material. It wore no face covering or helmet. I certify that the above statement is true by affixing my signature to this document this day of June 7, 1973.”

And with that brief summary of the Kingman case highlighted, let us move on to the realm of the Contactees.

Beyond any shadow of doubt, the number of people who can claim aliens wrecked their marriages is infinitely small. But, such claims have been made – the most memorable being that of construction-worker Truman Bethurum. His idea of a close encounter was very different to those of other UFO witnesses: his alleged 1952 liaisons – atop Nevada’s Mormon Mesa - with Space Captain Aura Rhanes, a supposed citizen of the planet Clarion, ultimately led his outraged wife to file for divorce!

Mormon Mesa is a 1,893 foot high summit which dominates Nevada’s Moapa Valley. Between the mesa and its two, near-identical neighbors, are two huge chasms created by the Muddy and Virgin Rivers that carved the mesa eons ago. Visually stunning, both then and now, Mormon Mesa was about to become a veritable hotbed of alien activity – specifically when, in the mid-to-late part of 1952, Bethurum began working in the area.

Bethurum’s wife was a collector of seashells; and as the area had been covered by ocean during prehistoric times, after he finished his shift one particular night, Bethurum headed out to the Mesa to see if he could find any fossilized shells as a gift for his wife – who had decided not to accompany her husband to Nevada, and instead elected to remain at their home in Santa Barbara. Yes: the cracks in the relationship were already showing.

Bethurum searched the pitch-black area for a couple of hours; but, having failed to find any such seashells, returned to his truck “to take a little snooze.” It was while snoozing – or while, it might be argued, he was in an altered state-of-mind – that Bethurum was blessed with a visit from the inhabitants of another world: the Clarionites. An hour or so after falling asleep, said Bethurum, he was awakened by what he described as “mumbling.”

As he began to stir, Bethurum was shocked to see that his truck was surrounded by between eight and ten men. They were all olive-skinned, around five feet in height, wearing uniforms and black-billed caps – and who were in stark contrast to the long-haired, hippy-types that hung out with George Adamski. The encounters had begun – according to Bethurum, at least.

It must be stressed that much of Bethurum’s tale is, frankly, unbelievable. His encounters with the shapely Captain Rhanes come across like a cross between Star Trek and Baywatch, and read like a wild sci-fi novel. But, there is one particularly intriguing aspect to Bethurum’s story.

On the night of November 2, 1952, Bethurum was out in the desert, actually very near to the town of Kingman.

Anxious to see his gorgeous Captain Rhanes again, Bethurum fired into the air one of several flares supposedly given to him by his alien friends, as a means by which he could contact them at any time. Sure enough, Rhanes and her crew were quickly on the scene. For the final time, Bethurum was invited aboard the saucer and the pair chatted at length about life on their respective worlds, their hobbies, and much more of a friendly nature.

At the end of the exchange, there was no real indication that this was to be their last meeting – and yet, it certainly was. Rhanes escorted Bethurum out of the saucer and back to the desert floor, where they bid each other farewell. In a few moments, Bethurum was alone, standing in the stark desert darkness; watching in awe as the huge alien craft grew ever smaller as it rose silently into the starlit sky.

We could, of course, relegate Bethurum’s story to the realm of fiction and nothing else – and, indeed, many people within the UFO research arena have firmly done precisely that. In the minds of many, the Contactees of yesteryear most certainly do not stand strong against today’s Abductees. There is, however, one intriguing factor suggesting that, just maybe, Bethurum wasn’t quite the fantasist that so many believed him to be.

Recall that Fritz Werner had told Ray Fowler in his 1970s affidavit that with respect to the alien body found at the Kingman site: “It was about 4 feet tall, dark brown complexion and had 2 eyes, 2 nostrils, 2 ears, and a small round mouth. It was clothed in a silvery, metallic suit and wore a skullcap of the same type material.”

Compare that with the words of the aliens that Truman Bethurum claimed to have encountered in late 1952 very near to Kingman: “They were all olive-skinned, around five feet in height, wearing uniforms and black-billed caps.”

The location is, of course, the same in both stories. The aliens in both accounts are short in stature – which is in stark contrast to most of the long-haired beings reported in Contactee cases in the 1950s. Both Werner and Bethurum said that the aliens wore uniforms and caps. The body viewed by Werner was dark-skinned; and the skin of the aliens that Bethurum claimed to have met was olive-skinned – not too much of a difference, one could well argue.

The wholly skeptical commentator might say that Bethurum simply made up his story after hearing of the Fritz Werner revelations in the 1970s. There is, however, a big problem with this theory: Bethurum’s account was published way back in 1954 – less than one-year after the alleged events at Kingman occurred, and no less than two-decades before Fritz Werner even surfaced. In view of the above, perhaps Bethurum was not the mere hoaxer that many have assumed him to be, after all. And, maybe, some of his alien friends met their deaths in Kingman in 1953, only a few months after he encountered them for the very last time and very nearby...

Dana Howard Update

I mentioned a couple of days ago that Tim Beckley had reprinted one of Dana's Howard's classic Contactee books: Up Rainbow Hill, which includes a new introduction from researcher-writer, Regan Lee; and who kindly shared her data on Howard for inclusion in my Contactees book.

The good news is that it is now up on Amazon, and can be pre-ordered right here.

And, here's what the publisher has to say about the book:

DANA HOWARD S SPACE CONTACT WAS A BEAUTIFUL, BLONDE, EIGHT FOOT TALL WOMAN WHO MATERIALIZED IN FRONT OF A ROOMFUL OF PEOPLE

All Onboard!

The great Golden Age Of Flying Saucers complete with encounters that bordered on the outrageous ran from the early 1950s for just about a decade. During this period, dozens of individuals came forward with seemingly far-fetched stories of having established an ongoing relationship with benevolent almost angelic beings from space.

With a few exceptions, these contacts took place in the desert regions of California and Arizona, and sometimes the proud earthlings that became known in pop culture as contactees, were honored by being invited inside the exotic, airborne, circular foils of the visitors for a test ride into outer space. Some even insisted they had stepped out onto the worlds from which their newly found ET friends had arrived.

Some of the best known names from the Golden Age of Flying Saucers include George Adamski, George Van Tassel, Truman Bethrum, George Hunt Williamson, Howard Menger, Orfeo Angelucci and a farmer named Buck Nelson who with his dog Bo established a strong bond with the space beings who landed quite regularly outback of his farm in the Ozarks.

For the most part the UFO contactees were men, but Dana Howard was a rare exception. Her first contact transpired in 1939, about which she said:

"Still wrapped in the warm intoxication of the spirit, my vision was directed to a gnarled old tree overlooking the antediluvian hills. Leaning casually against the grotesque trunk was a woman being of unsurpassed loveliness. Her head was radiant with a crown of fire, strands of golden hair cascading gently over her beautiful, slightly olive-tinted shoulders. The strange mystic light flooding her dark, prophetic eyes, added a wishful something to all her other charms."

This is when Dana Howard noticed a strange object suspended in mid-air about three hundred feet above the ground: "In the main it seemed to be constructed of some sort of translucent materials, but trimmed in gold, and gem-studded. An almost invisible ladder extended from the ship to the earth, and I obediently followed the radiant being up the filmy stairs without questioning."

It wasn t until sixteen years later that Dana had her second encounter when the same radiant being materialized in front of a group of individuals gathered for an occult workshop in Los Angeles. By this time New Age philosophies were widely being accepted and so no one cringed or got spooked out when this beautiful being appeared out of thin air and announced that she was from Venus and wished to speak directly with Ms Howard.

What followed was an ongoing series of contacts that lasted for several years and culminated in a series of UFO contact books by Dana Howard, including this classical reprint of UP RAINBOW HILL.

OTHER BOOKS BY DANA HOWARD WILL SOON FOLLOW!!!

Coast to Coast Last Night

I was very pleased with the way things went on last night's Coast to Coast show with George Noory.

From the witching-hour until 3 AM we discussed a wide range of Contactee-related issues and people, such as the nature of the alien presence on Earth; the FBI's secret surveillance of the Contactees of the 1950s and 1960s; the cases of George Adamski, George Van Tassel, Truman Bethurum, and many more.

You can find a summary of the Coast to Coast show right here.

In additon, I have spent much of this morning responding to numerous emails from people who heard the show, and then related to me their own experiences of the Contactee-kind; several of which date back to the dawn of the so-called modern era of Ufology, and which are of profound interest and significance. Hopefully, I'll be able to expand on some of these cases at a later date.

Coast to Coast & Contactees

Tonight, I'll be doing a marathon session on Coast to Coast: midnight to 3.00 AM Central Time. The subject: my Contactees book. Hopefully I'll see you there! Here's the link to all the info.

Dawn of Shades Radio - Tonight

I'm being interviewed about Contactees tonight on the Dawn of Shades radio-show - and here's the link, in case you want to listen in.

Up Rainbow Hill

One of the Contactees who I devoted a whole chapter to in my book (thanks to the excellent research of Regan Lee) is Dana Howard; whose story is of definitive Space-Brother (or in this case, Space-Sister) proportions. Well, the good news is that Tim Beckley's Global Communications has just published a brand-new edition of Howard's book Up Rainbow Hill, which is essential reading for anyone wanting to learn more about Howard's story. I can't find the book on Amazon yet; so in the meantime, here's a link where you can find more about her. And, as soon as the book is up on Amazon, I'll let you know.

Linda Godfrey Reviews Contactees

Linda Godfrey (author of such excellent books as Strange Wisconsin; The Beast of Bray Road; and Hunting the American Werewolf) reviews my Contactees book at her MySpace blog.

In part, she says:

"...The disturbing fact, according to Redfern, is that a common thread tends to lead to the same, surprising conclusion in the bulk of cases. We are not alone, he posits, but the 'others' are not necessarily from Venus or the Pleiades. Where they do originate, and what it is that they want, I will leave to Redfern's eloquent explanation."

And here's the link to the full review.

Paracast Radio: Sunday Night

Yesterday morning I did a pre-record of a show for David Biedny and Gene Steinberg, the guys over at the Paracast. The subject: Contactees. This was a 2-hour interview, in which we covered a lot of ground: the story of George Adamski; government interest and involvement with the Contactee movement; the account of Truman Bethurum and his space-babe, Aura Rhanes; and much more.

The show will be broadcast this coming Sunday night from 6PM to 8PM Pacific Time; 8PM to 10PM Central Time, and 9PM to 11PM Eastern Time.

You can find more about both the episode and the show itself right here.

Badlands - Tonight

I'll be discussing my Contactees book tonight on Badlands with Captain Jack. Here's the link if you want to listen in.

Space-Brother Radio

Last night I recorded an interview with radio-host Bruce Collins on the subject of my Contactees book. The show will air this coming Saturday at 10am EST; 9am CST; and 7am PST on WSMN 1590 AM Nashua, New Hampshire and can be heard online at www.wsmnradio.com

Swedenborg & Contactees

Good friend Micah Hanks (seen here with me on the left in the photo) has generously shared extracts from his excellent manuscript, Magic, Mysticism and the Molecule.

Hopefully, Micah's script will be published in the very near future and you'll be able to read this ground-breaking work in full. Be sure to keep checking Micah's Gralien Report for the latest news on MM&M.

As Micah noted in his email to me, this particular extract has distinct Contactee-style overtones to it. And with that said over to Micah:

Psychic Travel to Distant Planets

"Close to a century after magicians John Dee and Edward Kelley parted ways, Christian Mystic Emanuel Swedenborg would claim to visit other planets and learn languages of 'angels' as well, by means of out-of-body experiences. This was made possible after a spiritual 'awakening', during which Swedenborg claimed that God had opened his eyes, allowing him to see the spirit-world around him, as well as its various inhabitants.

"In his popular 1758 work Heaven and its Wonders and Hell From Things Heard and Seen, Swedenborg claimed to have witnessed firsthand the vastness of the afterlife, and spoke of the manner in which angels communicated both to him and to one another:

"'Angels talk together just as men do in the world, and also on various subjects, as on domestic affairs, on civil affairs, on the affairs of moral life, and on those of spiritual life; nor is there any other difference than that they converse more intelligently than men, because more interiorly from thought. It has been given me often to be in company with them, and to speak with them as friend with friend, and sometimes as stranger with stranger; and then, because I was in a similar state with them, I knew no otherwise than that I was speaking with men on earth.

"In addition to being made privy to angelic languages similar to Dee and Kelley’s assertions, Swedenborg took things one-step further by claiming to have visited other planets in his out-of-body travels, a practice similar to branches of the Hindu religion that refer to 'planets' in their meditative out-of-body journeys. Such claims have certainly helped stifle Swedenborg’s intellect in the minds of many modern scholars and theologians, prompting various theories that question the scholar’s sanity in his later years.

"Swedish co-founder of the Royal Academy of Sciences Count von Höpken once posed the question whether it 'would not be best for him to keep (these angelic accounts) to himself, and not publish them to the world?' However, von Höpken also provides rationale for Swedenborg’s actions: He answered that he had orders from the Lord to publish them; and that those who might ridicule him on that account would do him injustice; for, said he, 'why should I, who am a man in years, render myself ridiculous for fantasies and falsehoods.'"

"Similarly, the Swedenborg Scientific Association dedicated an entire issue of its publication The New Philosophy to the question of whether Swedenborg could have suffered from failing mental health in his lifetime. Editor Kurt Simmons Ph.D. notes that, 'Swedenborg presents a particularly, indeed perhaps uniquely, daunting challenge to any observer attempting to evaluate the applicability of the madness hypothesis to his claims of revelation.'

"When taking into consideration the sheer volume of scholarly study Swedenborg undertook in his time, ranging from interest in biology, engineering, physics, philosophy and, finally, his theological works, it is difficult to leave with any notion that these were the ramblings of an unsound mind.

"Of particular interest here may be another book Swedenborg published in 1758, titled Concerning Earths in the Solar System. In it, Swedenborg describes his bodiless travels to nearby inhabited planets, the furthest from Earth being Saturn. This is peculiar, as noted by J. Gordon Melton in his essay Contactees, especially due to the fact that Saturn was only the furthest known planet from Earth at the time Swedenborg wrote the book. Had he known of the existence of planets scattered amongst the outer portions of our solar system, would he have known to visit those also?

"Could it be that Swedenborg wasn’t insane at all, but instead that he had merely had such a fertile mind that he began to tie associations between his theological interests and the known astronomy of his day, drawing together early visions of science fiction set on a stage elsewhere in the cosmos?"

Contactees: Reviewed

Robin Anderson-Forbes of My Strange Blog, has reviewed my Contactees book and, in part, writes:

"...Redfern has managed to round up a great selection of contactee cases. He’s managed to use some good sources of information, including people who are able to provide some fascinating insight into the various cases and the phenomenon of alien contact in general. Overall, I believe that Redfern has given this subject a very good treatment and that Contactees is well worth reading.

You can find the full review right here.

Space-Brothers on the Radio

For those who may want to listen in, here’s a listing of shows and gigs where I’ll be speaking about my Contactees book:

Explore Your Spirit Radio - Feb. 21;
Voice of the People - Feb. 20;
Parafractor - Jan. 21;
Exploring Unexplained Phenomena - Jan. 9;
Ghosts of Coopertown Conference - Jan. 8 - 11;
X-Squared Radio - Dec. 20;
Badlands Radio - Dec. 18;
Coast to Coast - Dec. 16;
Dawn of Shades - Dec. 15;
Z-Talk Radio - Dec. 14;
Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Conservatism - Dec. 13;
The Paracast - Dec. 13;
The Veritas Show - Dec. 10;
Badlands Radio - Dec. 9;
The Bruce Collins Show - Dec. 8;

The AZ-UFO Show Tonight

I'll be discussing my Contactees book (as well as my Science Fiction Secrets book) on tonight's episode of the AZ-UFO Show with host Rich Giordano. Here's the link.

And Another Helicopter...

Here's yet another military helicopter over our house: this one of the double-rotor variety. It took me a minute or so to find my camera, hence why it's somewhat further away than the 'copters in the earlier photo; but I'm now all set-up with the camera by the back-door if the situation continues...

And Continues...

If a dead frog sitting on a mini-Stonehenge, and two weird stories of a definitively Contactee nature (this one and this one) weren't enough to deal with, there has also been a huge spate of military-helicopter activity over our house for the past week or so.

One - of the double-rotor variety - which flew over two nights ago, not only caused an almighty rumbling; but actually lit up part of our back-garden with a powerful light!

That one, I wasn't able to capture on film. But, all of the others, I most assuredly have been able to - and the photo above shows two of them in action.

Am I simply reading too much into all this high-strangeness that seems to have kicked off in the wake of the publication of my Contactees book, or is something very odd really afoot...???

Ideas anyone...?

The Weirdness Continues...

A couple of nights ago, I was interviewed on the Jeff Rense Program about my Contactees book and noted that the book contains a chapter on sightings of so-called "Space Brothers" in the vicinity of Stonehenge and Crop-Circles, and their relationship to the whole "Trickster" controversy.

Well, it so happens that I actually built my very own (albeit highly condensed in size, of course!) recreation of Stonehenge in our back-garden some time ago (yes, I know it's weird and I am too!); part of which is shown in the accompanying photo. So, imagine my surprise when I was out there this morning - cleaning fallen leaves off the fish-pond - when I saw sat atop one of the henge-stones a frog: and a dead and quite shrivelled one at that, too. How it got atop there, and why it did so to only sit and die, I have no idea at all.

But if this isn't some bizarre Trickster-like game of on-going and currently-unfathomable proportions, I'll eat my hat! And, as this link shows, the frog is a mysterious creature, indeed.

Saucer Synchronicities

As I have noted previously at this blog, a number of curious synchronicities occurred during the course of researching and writing my latest book, Contactees: A History of Alien-Human Interaction.

And, now, there has been another one.

On Sunday morning, I finished reading the newly-surfaced account of a person who - in the 1970s - had a Contactee-style experience that in many ways paralleled the 1952 claimed encounters of Contactee Truman Bethurum.

According to Bethurum, on a number of occasions at a place called Mormon Mesa, Nevada, he met with a group of aliens - led by their Captain, the hot and shapely Aura Rhanes - from a planet supposedly called Clarion.

Of course, like most Contactee stories, Bethurum's was highly controversial and attracted as many believers as it did disbelievers.

But, as I note in my book, I do believe that Bethurum had an interaction with something. The precise nature of that something is, of course, a matter of debate and personal interpretation.

Anyway, after I put away the file on this newly-surfaced story that very much reminded me of Bethurum's experiences with the Clarionites, my wife Dana asked if I could help her try and find her camera which she had misplaced.

We looked high and low, but unfortunately (thus far at least!) failed to find it. But, while checking behind the TV set (to see if the camera had perhaps fallen there), I came across Dana's high-school yearbook for 1982.

What on earth (or off it!) does all this have to do with the Contactees you may justifiably ask? Okay, I'm coming to that!

Although Dana is a U.S. citizen, she actually grew up in the Cayman Islands and graduated from school there. I picked up the yearbook, with the intention of moving it to one side while I looked around for the camera, and was startled by something that I had never noticed before (admittedly it had been at least 7 or 8 years since I last looked at the yearbook): the cover of the book reads: 82 Clarion (see the photo above).

Of course, skeptically-minded souls might say this is all some bizarre coincidence. However, I do find it odd that after spending about 2-hours Sunday morning reading a report very similar to that of Truman Bethurum and his friends from Clarion, that I should then - immediately after, no less - stumble across a book with that very word - "Clarion" - adorned across its cover!

In view of this, perhaps I can be forgiven for thinking we live in a dream-world of truly Matrix-style proportions!