Dr. William Kenneth Hartman: Friend or Foe of UFOlogy

I first heard of Dr. Hartman when I was reading about the UFO sighting in Virginia at Fort Belvoir in September 1957. As part of the Condon Report, he was tasked with investigating this sighting. According to records, he "proposed tests to establish the geometric consistency of the images." In this particular sighting, I believe Dr. Hartman ruled, "A black ring that became obscured by an opaque white cloud, reportedly witnessed by about 15 persons and photographed by the principle witness is identified as the by-product of an ‘atom bomb simulation’ on the army base."

I have never heard of 'atom bomb simulations,' so this was a first for me. Does anyone else have feedback about atom bomb simulations? What part of the country were they performed in? What was the frequency? Did they resemble UFO's?

Dr. Hartman's bio can be found HERE. He reportedly ruled most UFO sightings as "unreliable," or "inconclusive," he did conclude

two cases were unexplained and particularly noteworthy as probative evidence of the reality of UFOs.

Does anyone know which two cases Dr. Hartman was referring to?

a reply to: Cosmic911

I'm not sure what the feeling of ATS has regarding The Condon Committee, or it's final report, or what light ATS'ers regard Dr. J. Allen Hynek in, however, Hyneck supposedly wrote

"The Condon Report settled nothing." He called Condon's introduction "singularly slanted" and wrote that it "avoided mentioning that there was embedded within the bowels of the report a remaining mystery; that the committee had been unable to furnish adequate explanations for more than a quarter of the cases examined."

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Did Dr. Hynek have an opinion of Dr. Hartman's work?

a reply to: Cosmic911

On the internet (somewhere) are a series of pictures that show that the ring of smoke phenomena is not uncommon and frequently caused by the explosion of a 55 gal. drum of fuel.

Sagan was recruited by Condon for his team. I place that as the point where Sagan was a wide-eyed UFO fanatic and switched sides to, ahem, ensure his career in astronomy. To have followed his original course would have been instant political suicide. (William Poundstone's long bio of Sagan details to some extent Sagan's early beliefs about UFOs which were extreme.)

originally posted by: Aliensun
a reply to: Cosmic911

On the internet (somewhere) are a series of pictures that show that the ring of smoke phenomena is not uncommon and frequently caused by the explosion of a 55 gal. drum of fuel.

Sagan was recruited by Condon for his team. I place that as the point where Sagan was a wide-eyed UFO fanatic and switched sides to, ahem, ensure his career in astronomy. To have followed his original course would have been instant political suicide. (William Poundstone's long bio of Sagan details to some extent Sagan's early beliefs about UFOs which were extreme.)

What's the deal with you and Sagan?

Hartman is still around, you can ask him directly.