reply to post by FosterVS
Bravo to Foster VS for sharing Laramie75's Amazon comments. They sum up just part of what is wrong with Jacobsen's book. I will eventually read
through the book and comment on it in detail, when I have time.
For the moment, I have skimmed through it and found numerous factual errors. Some of these might be forgiven because the erroneous information has
been published so many times that it is just assumed to be fact. An example is the description of Kelly Johnson's first visit to Groom Lake in 1955.
Jacobsen writes that he, Tony LeVier, Richard Bissell, and Herb Miller flew to the site in a Beech V35 Bonanza. That is how the aircraft has been
identified in numerous books and articles over the years, and when one hears the name Bonanza, the V35 is the first model that pops to mind. It
doesn't take much effort, however, to find photos (one of which appears in the book) clearly showing the airplane to be a Beech Model 50 Twin
Bonanza. This may sound like nitpicking but details are important, and demonstrate the researcher's credibility and diligence.
As I noted, the same passage claims that the fourth person on the expedition was Herb Miller of the CIA. Jacobsen gives no reference for this
information but I assume it to have come from Richard Bissell's autobiography, written shortly before his death in 1994. However, according to a 1974
oral history interview with Col. Osmond J. Ritland (USAF liaison to the CIA for the U-2 program), it was Ritland who accompanied LeVier, Bisselll, and
Johnson to Groom Lake. Ritland had recommended the lakebed because he was familiar with the area, having commanded the 4529th Test Group (Atomic) and
had flown over Groom lake numerous times during atomic bomb tests. Kelly Johnson's personal log from April 1955 (it was not winter, as described by
Jacobsen) also states that Ritland was the fourth person on the lakebed scouting trip.
I provided much of this information to Jacobsen in the form of articles that I have written about the history of Groom Lake. She seems to have ignored
some important points while apparently using some of my material (again without providing a reference in the book) in the context of her apparently
preconceived notions. A lot of the Project 57 material appears to have come from one of my online articles but it has been mutated into some horror
story about a "dirty bomb."
For me, Jacobsen lost all journalistic credibility in Chapter One where she tells the story of Bob Lazar. Although she allows Stanton Friedman to
accuse Lazar of being "a total fraud" and suggests that he might not have really seen anything extraterrestrial, she seems to accept Lazar's story
of working at the secret base despite acknowledging his lack of proven credentials, and the fact that no bona fide person who worked at Groom Lake
ever knew Lazar.
Area 51 Goes Main stream / street on NPR today with Fresh Air's Terry Gross!, page 2
privacy
The Above Top Secret Web sites are a
wholly owned social content community of
The Above Network, LLC.
This content community relies on
user-generated content from our member contributors.
The opinions of our members are not those of site ownership
who maintains strict editorial agnosticism and simply provides
a collaborative venue for free expression.
ATS Server: www2.theabovenetwork.com
Header data: 0.004 seconds
Page processed in: 0.068 seconds
wholly owned social content community of
The Above Network, LLC.
This content community relies on
user-generated content from our member contributors.
The opinions of our members are not those of site ownership
who maintains strict editorial agnosticism and simply provides
a collaborative venue for free expression.
ATS Server: www2.theabovenetwork.com
Header data: 0.004 seconds
Page processed in: 0.068 seconds
