Popular Mechanics Smacks Down Annie Jacobsen and Her Area 51 Book

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September 2011 edition of Popular Mechanics:
"we asked whether she realized this story might strike some people as "pretty nutty" (our exact words)"

Thanks to Popular Mechanics, Peter Merlin and the Roadrunners for trying to set things straight.

Originally posted by FosterVS
[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/a2170f6f5e22.jpg[/atsimg]
September 2011 edition of Popular Mechanics:
"we asked whether she realized this story might strike some people as "pretty nutty" (our exact words)"

Thanks to Popular Mechanics, Peter Merlin and the Roadrunners for trying to set things straight.

what's your point, i don't get it

ETA:

obviously i'm not the only one, poster above me has the some problem ??

reply to post by OmegaLogos


I seen her being interviewed on tv this morning. She was saying the last 7 pages of her new book were very controversial and that people who read the book are mad at her conclusions of what happened with the Roswell crash. She said that she received her information from a higher up that told her the Roswell incident was a ship that flew all the way over here from Russia and they had placed malformed bodies inside and our Government had said that if they are doing this sort of thing then we need to be doing it also. But, I have read this already somewhere before so, its no big news really.

I will try and find the link to that program, it was on just this morning at around 5:30am or thereabouts.

I think this has something to do with the fake Russian body alien Roswell crash ship thing that Annie Jacobsen is promoting in her book.
The OP is less than clear on this.

Already discussed here
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Originally posted by alfa1
I think this has something to do with the fake Russian body alien Roswell crash ship thing that Annie Jacobsen is promoting in her book.
The OP is less than clear on this.

Already discussed here
www.abovetopsecret.com...

www.abovetopsecret.com...

www.abovetopsecret.com...

www.abovetopsecret.com...

www.abovetopsecret.com...

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Well, I had hoped people might actually BUY the issue, out of respect for the fact that they had the guts to not pander to Jacobsen and her, what I term as, "Book of DISINFO".

Unfortunately there are a legion of people who have bought this book and accepted the contents as fact. I feel somewhat a duty to point people to the truth.

reply to post by OmegaLogos


Explanation: I apologize as it seems my post broke some T&C's which I have subsequently reread.

Personal Disclosure: I didn't intend at all to breach them and I was only trying to bring a relevant [IMO .. i was wrong. sorry ] link. I am withdrawing from participating in this thread!

There are two major problems with Jacobsen's book. First of all, it is not just the last chapter that contains her source's ridiculous Roswell story. The author starts setting the stage for this epic with the first chapter and keeps it up throughout the book with hints of Soviet and Nazi conspiracies, UFOs, and allegations of government misconduct. When she finally reveals what her source (subsequently identified as 89-year-old Al O'Donnell) told her, it is a tale so outlandish that any real investigative journalist would have refused to publish it without corroboration

Moreover, Dwayne Day - a researcher with solid credentials - has found parallels between O'Donnell's tale and “Tomb Tapper,” a short story by James Blish that was published in the July 1956 issue of Astounding Science Fiction magazine. Blish’s tale follows two men investigating what they at first believe to be the crash of a Soviet bomber on U.S. soil. Instead, they find a rocket ship made of advanced alloys. When they finally gain access to the cockpit, they discover that the pilot is a little girl, barely eight years old and apparently genetically altered with an enhanced brain. To survive extreme acceleration forces during flight, the child-pilot was enclosed in a tubular tank filled with a viscous substance. “And of course,” wrote Blish, “this way, the USSR could get a rocket fighter to the United States on a one-way trip.” Similarities between the Blish and O’Donnell stories are hard to ignore. Perhaps O’Donnell read the story or perhaps he heard of it from his EG&G supervisor. It may have been passed down as something heard from a “reliable source.” Eventually, perhaps, O’Donnell integrated it into his own memories, conflating fact and fiction.

The second major problem for Jacobsen is the large number of factual errors in sections that deal with straightforward history. I read through the book twice, and cataloged as many mistakes as I could find. It is not a complete list. Other subject matter experts have found additional errors.

www.dreamlandresort.com...
Chp. 1, p.4

In describing the selection of Groom Lake, Jacobsen writes, “Richard Bissell and Herbert Miller chose the place to be the test facility for the Agency’s first spy plane, the U-2.”

According to a 1974 U.S. Air Force oral history interview with Maj. Gen. Osmond J. Ritland, USAF liaison to the CIA for Project Aquatone, it was Ritland who recommended Groom Lake to Bissell. This makes sense because Ritland was familiar with the location, having flown over it many times while he commanded the 4925th Test Group (Atomic).

Jacobsen also writes that, “Part of Area 51’s secret history is that the so-called Area 51 zone had been in existence for four years by the time the CIA identified it as a perfect clandestine test facility.”

There was, in fact, nothing at Groom Lake prior to May 1955 other than a WW2-era dirt strip and debris from gunnery practice. Aerial photos taken in 1952 show no man-made structures whatsoever.


Chp. 1, p. 5

Jacobsen writes that, “For more than sixty years, no one has thought of looking at the Atomic Energy Commission to solve the riddle of Area 51.”

Actually, declassified and unclassified AEC documents available at the Department of Energy’s Public Reading Room in Las Vegas have been a rich source of information on Area 51. Researchers have been using this resource to solve the riddle of Area 51 since the mid-1990s.


Chp. 1, p.8

Describing the EG&G radar facility, Jacobsen writes, “One dish is sixty feet in diameter and always faces the sky.”

I assume she is referring to pictures showing the dish pointed straight up. There are two such antennas. Both are only pointed toward the sky when parked. Historic and recent photos show the dish antennas pointed in different directions and at various angles, including parallel to the ground.

She writes that, “The Quick Kill system, designed by Raytheon to detect incoming missile signals, sits at the edge of the dry lake bed.”

There are three Quick Kill radar sites known as QK-1, QK-2, and QK-3. They are simulators of the Russian Fan Song fire control and tracking radar that is typically used to guide the SA-2 surface-to-air missile. At Groom Lake they serve as part of the radar test complex used to evaluate stealth aircraft.


Chp. 1, p.10

Jacobsen claims that the Area 51 bar, called Sam’s Place, was “built by and named after…[Oxcart navigator] Sam Pizzo.”

According to established Area 51 lore, the bar is named in honor of Sam Mitchell, the last CIA commander of Area 51.


Chp. 3, p.50

Jacobsen writes that in 1955, “Richard Bissell and his fellow CIA officer Herbert Miller,…flew across the American West in an unmarked Beechcraft V-35 Bonanza in search of a location where they could build a secret CIA test facility,…”

Lockheed test pilot Tony LeVier and shop foreman Dorsey Kammerer conducted this reconnaissance trip in the company’s Beechcraft Model 50 Twin Bonanza.

Jacobsen conflates this with Kelly Johnson’s first trip to Groom Lake, further claiming that LeVier flew the plane with Johnson in the back looking at maps. She appears to have taken this account from Bissell’s autobiography, written shortly before his death. According to Ritland’s 1974 oral history interview and Kelly Johnson’s personal log, written in 1955, the April 1955 visit to Groom Lake included LeVier, Johnson, Bissell, and Ritland.


Chp. 5, p.89

Jacobsen claims that the CIA sought “to hide the U-2 from Soviet radar by inventing some kind of radar-absorbing paint.”

Approaches to reducing the U-2’s radar cross-section included application of radar-absorbent blankets and wires with ferrite beads strung across stand-off posts.


Chp. 5, p.95

She writes that, By the winter of 1957, the Boston Group had completed what Richard Bissell wanted in radar absorbing paint.”

In the first phase of Project Rainbow, technicians coated the lower fuselage of the U-2 prototype with a fiberglass honeycomb sandwich, varying in thickness from a quarter-inch to about one inch, was topped with layers of Salisbury Screen, canvas painted with a conductive graphite grid.


Chp. 5, p. 97

Regarding the loss of the U-2 and test pilot Robert Sieker during a Project Rainbow test flight, Jacobsen writes that, “the Boston Group’s paint caused the airplane to overheat, spin out of control, and crash. Sieker was able to bail out but was killed when a piece of the spinning aircraft hit him in the head.”

The thick radar-absorbent blanket was nicknamed “thermos” because it acted as insulation that prevented dissipation of engine heat through the aircraft’s skin. Airframe heat build-up caused the engine to flameout at 72,000 feet. Normally this would not be a problem because the pilot could glide to a lower altitude and relight the engine. Sieker’s pressure suit inflated properly when cabin pressure was lost but the clasp on his faceplate failed, resulting in a loss of oxygen that caused him to temporarily lose consciousness. He died while attempting to bail out at extremely low altitude.


Chp. 6, p. 100

In discussing a nuclear weapon safety experiment called Project 57, Jacobsen constantly uses the misleading phrase “dirty bomb.” Using inflammatory language she writes, “The dirty bomb menace posed a growing threat to the internal security of the country, one the Pentagon wanted to make less severe by testing the nightmare scenario first.”

Actually, tests of this type were conducted to determine that a weapon or warhead damaged in an accident would not detonate with a nuclear yield, even if some or all of the high explosive components burned or detonated. While not producing a nuclear explosion, such a detonation usually spreads plutonium into the atmosphere and across the surrounding landscape. As such, safety experiments are also known as plutonium dispersal tests. Such experiments were necessary because aircraft crashes and other operational and logistical accidents involving nuclear weapons could result in one-point detonation of the weapon’s high explosive components, producing no nuclear yield but contaminating the local area with radioactive materials. Project 57 was designed to study the particle physics of plutonium, biomedicine of animals exposed to the fallout, radiation monitoring techniques, and decontamination of plutonium-contaminated surfaces.

Jacobsen claims that Project 57 was conducted “in total secrecy. No one outside the project, absolutely no one, could know.”

This seems to have no basis in truth. AEC Nevada Test Organization public affairs officers regularly supplied the news media with booklets containing background information on nuclear testing. The September 1958 edition contains a section titled, “Safety Experiments at Nevada Test Site.” It describes “so-called safety experiments” as part of “a continuing program…intended to determine which among several weapons development designs affords the maximum assurance of nuclear safety in handling and storage.” This section also includes a summary list of all 14 safety experiments at NTS that had been accomplished to date, including the April 24, 1957, test, including the fact that it was a surface burst and also that it was sponsored by Sandia National Laboratories.


Chp. 6, p. 101

Jacobsen writes that, “If the dirty bomb was set off outside the legal perimeter of the Nevada Test Site, secrecy was all but guaranteed.”

Area 13, the Project 57 test site, was adjacent to public lands, as well as private mining claims and ranch properties. It was highly visible from the Groom Mine and the nearby mountains that were frequented by hunters and prospectors.

read more at the source

The world will never know what we have done.

The ladies book saying the Roswell crash was a Russian item....could very well be true.

We flew over them. They flew over us.

I've read this book, page for page. She definitely does her best to get her facts right about the history of Area 51. Unfortunately, what is happening there today and for say, the past 15 years, is still very classified. The concept that the Roswell UFO was from Russia is a very interesting one, surely in regards to the Horten brothers advanced flying concepts, and the brutality that the Nazi's portrayed, means that there is certainly a chance that what is in her book is fact.

Another notable point the book makes is that fact that if America is doing horrible things to children there to advance technology, medicine or what have you, then that is close to being the most believable reason (besides Aliens) as to why the American government has never officially said that Area 51 exists.

All in all it's well worth reading and has some interesting points of view.

Well, first of all, no, she did not do her best to get the facts straight on the history of Area 51. As I pointed out in my post above, the book is full of factual errors.

Second, the government has acknowledged the existence of the base since its construction in 1955, and repeatedly confirmed this acknowledgement over the years. This is all well documented.

The stories about a Soviet "UFO" and human atrocities at Area 51 have no basis in fact, and the author never offers anything remotely like proof. All she has is the story of one elderly man who, according to at least one other journalist who interviewed him, seemed confused and gave conflicting accounts. There is no corroboration or supporting evidence.

Annie Gets More Spanks, This Time from Stanton Freidman

Area 51: An Uncensored History of America’s TOP SECRET Military Base
A Review By Stanton Friedman

By Stanton Friedman
www.stantonfriedman.com...
6-4-11

I frankly cannot remember the last time a “UFO” book was published that received as much attention as did the publication in May of Annie Jacobsen’s “Area 51: An Uncensored History of America’s TOP SECRET Military Base”. The book is a big one at 523 pages and was published by Little, Brown and Company. The last 133 pages are notes. I am listed as one of 45 secondary interviews along with investigative Journalist George Knapp, Norio Hayakawa and Robert Lazar. Strangely, what has received the most attention, despite the title, is the claim of a totally new explanation for the Roswell Incident.

There have, of course, been several official Roswell explanations put forth by the government, including a ”flying Saucer”; a weather balloon radar reflector combination; a Mogul balloon train and my favorite, to explain reports of alien bodies: Crash test dummies dropped all over New Mexico. Of course, none were dropped before 1953 and all were 6’ tall and weighed 175 pounds and were in USAF pilot uniforms. Unfortunately, this ridiculous explanation was uncritically accepted by the New York Times which also carried a favorable review of the new book. In stark contrast the Washington Post of June 3 carried a scathing review. As the original civilian investigator of the Roswell Incident, I have been convinced, based on my own very extensive research, and on that of other serious investigators such as Don Berliner (we co authored “Crash at Corona: The Definitive study of the Roswell Incident”), Don Schmitt and Tom Carey’s “Witness to Roswell” and Don Schmitt’s and Kevin Randle’s Roswell books as well as research by Dennis Balthaser, Dr. David Rudiak and others, that the explanation best fit by the evidence is an alien spacecraft. Of course, the debunker explanation is always “ABA” or “Anything But Alien”.

Annie, apparently only supported by an anonymous source who worked at Area 51 for many years, claims that in reality what was recovered was basically a hoax: a flying wing aircraft designed by the German aircraft designers brothers Walter and Reimar Horten.

It was flown remotely somehow from Alaska containing five 13 year old boys genetically modified by Dr. Josef Mengele (the Nazi angel of death at Auschwitz) by arrangement with Joseph Stalin. Stalin’s goal supposedly was to create a panic in the United States when this craft crashed, similar to what happened in response to the Orson Welles “War of the Worlds” radio broadcast in October 1938. People would interpret the deformed boys as aliens and there would be panic! Don’t laugh, she is very serious.

Anybody who recalls the radio broadcast knows it was presented as a live news broadcast in real time as people and buildings were supposedly being destroyed by strange Martian invaders. This was in New Jersey in one of the most densely populated areas of the USA. If the stories were believed, then there was certainly reason to panic. What could we do against such an attack? Of course, near Roswell there was no real time event, no reporters present, and no mention of killing or destruction. It was truly out in the boondocks. The Anonymous Source (AS) says the flying wing, with sort of a dome on top, was taken with the bodies, some of whom were alive, to Wright Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio. Then a special area was created in the Nevada desert to which the bodies and the craft were brought in 1951 because the guys in OHIO had been unable to determine how the vehicle worked. It was named area 51 because of the year!! No evidence was provided except the story by AS..

It should be noted that the Air Materiel Command under General Nathan Twining (who later became Chief of Staff of the Air Force and then Chairman of the Joint Chiefs and was a member of the Majestic 12 group) had brought back literally tons of German Air Force research and development reports which they had translated. To say the least, it was very unlikely that the US couldn’t figure how the Horten Brothers flying wing worked. It was made out of wood! Jack Northrop (with whom I spent some time years ago) had built flying wings and was the Godfather of the B-2. Annie says the craft could supposedly hover. It had 2 jet engines which would certainly have been noisy. Nobody has ever claimed the flying wings could hover. One could understand that Christopher Columbus in 1493 could not have back engineered a nuclear submarine. But nobody would have been fooled by a wooden flying wing.

I do recall that Joseph P. Farrell had a big book (“Roswell and the Reich: The Nazi Connection” -2010) claiming the Roswell saucer was advanced Nazi technology somehow shipped to Argentina and then flown to Roswell and the secrecy was because the USA did not want to admit that the Nazis were still going strong. One does have to ask, if the Nazis had perfected a truly advanced aircraft, why they didn’t use it in the war??

Nick Redfern’s “Body Snatchers in the Desert: The Horrible Truth at the Heart of the Roswell Mystery” (2005) claimed, again based on second hand information, that what crashed was really deformed experimental humans flying in a Japanese Fugo balloon carried aloft by a Horten brothers craft to perform radiation shielding experiments for the Aircraft Nuclear Propulsion program (on which I worked for 3 years)! The secrecy was because we didn’t want to admit, after Nuremberg, that we were doing such inhumane experiments! AS seems to have combined all this fiction in one grandiose scheme.

Annie mentions that Walter Haut, the PR man at Roswell, brought the press release about the crash to a Roswell radio station KGFL and the Roswell Daily Record on July 8, 1947, and that it also appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle the next day. For some reason she seems unaware of the fact that it also appeared on July 8 in many many evening papers from Chicago West.

She then claims that three hours later she brought the new weather balloon press release to the station. That is nonsense. The 2nd press release was issued for General Roger Ramey, Chief of the 8th Air Force, based in Fort Worth, Texas.. a good ways from Roswell. She mentions that a statement by Walter testifying to seeing strange bodies was released after his death, but doesn’t reference the Carey/Schmitt book in which it appeared. She does mention “The Roswell Incident” by Berlitz and Moore, but none of the other books noted above. She does reference debunking books by Benson Saylor, Jim Oberg, Curtis Peeples.

She talks a lot about the CIA, but seems unaware that it was preceded by the Central Intelligence Group. Her lists include Blue Book Reports 1-12, which were progress reports, but doesn’t mention “Blue Book Special Report 14” which was comprehensive and included more than 220 charts, tables, graphs, and maps. She mentions the Congressional UFO Hearings of 1966, but not the much more comprehensive Hearings of 1968 with testimony from 12 scientists (including myself). She doesn’t mention Colonel Blanchard by name though he was the Roswell base commander and went on to be a 4 star General and vice chief of Staff of the USAF. She doesn’t mention Ramey’s chief of Staff, Thomas Jefferson Dubose. His testimony is included in a referenced DVD “Recollections of Roswell” with that of 26 other first hand Roswell witnesses. He and Ramey are in a widely circulated photo taken in Ramey’s office.

She also never mentions Air Force UFO consultant Dr. J. Allen Hynek. She doesn’t mention Dr. (Colonel) Jesse Marcel Junior or his testimony about the material he handled on July 7, 1947,which certainly wasn’t conventional or from a Horton Brothers flying wing. His father’s testimony (in our first conversation in 1978) made clear there was nothing conventional on the debris field. She claims that according to AS there was a ring on the craft with Cyrillic letters on it. If the purpose was to cause panic because of an alien invasion, why would there be Cyrillic symbols? Did Stalin really think there were no Americans who could read Russian?

She falsely claims that Bill Moore and I just showed up in Roswell in 1978 and started asking questions there! We spent a great deal of time money and effort tracking down 62 witnesses (huge phone bills in those pre-internet days) after I had talked to Major Marcel, the intelligence officer of the elite 509th. I had located Walter Haut, the Rancher’s son, William Brazel, Brazel’s neighbors, etc. etc. Haut had a base yearbook with loads of names and pictures.

So I am obviously very much bothered by her ignoring first hand testimony from dozens of people who handled wreckage and even flew with it to Texas or Ohio.

In a note on page 474 Annie briefly mentions a published story about Stalin in 1947 asking Sergei Korolyev (his top Rocket Designer) to review documents about flying saucers and Roswell(some obtained from spies at Los Alamos).. in secret and with the help of translators to see if the saucers were a threat. Why in the world would Stalin have asked his top designer to waste his time if he had already known that the Roswell saucer was of Nazi/Soviet origin?? Details are given in “Crash at Corona”. One must also ask why the Russians did not build many of the jet powered Horten Brothers Flying wings? Years later they were building copies of a propeller driven B-29 to be used to deliver their atomic bombs. It was certainly slower.

Annie covers a lot of ground, seems terrified by anything nuclear, but for no good reason suggests that the Soviet Cosmos 954 satellite, one of many powered by a small nuclear reactor, must have required phenomenal power to get it into orbit “most likely nuclear”. This is nonsense. She mentions nuclear rockets many times, but doesn’t seem to understand that they were only designed as upper stages and would not be used, (not nearly enough thrust and serious concerns about launch pad safety), to launch payloads from the ground. She talks about operating them for long periods of time to get to Mars. Maybe she thinks rockets operate all during their flight. They actually operate for short periods of time. I worked on nuclear rockets for 3 years.

Summing up, she talked to loads of people connected with area 51 activities, could surely have used a review by knowledgeable people especially about Roswell, and certainly does not substantiate this latest fictional Roswell explanation. Far more fiction than fact about it is supplied.

I read the popular mechanics article last night and some good points are made. All in all, I think it shows that Annie Jacobsen could have probably done a better job researching and following up on leads.

However, there are a few things I wanted to point out that are still important to keep in mind.

1) Popular Mechanics doesn’t exactly have a perfect track record themselves…

In 1997, Popular Mechanics did their own article on Area 51. That article, like Jacobsen’s book, was wrought with errors and false claims.



The entire article was built around the premise that Area 51 had been shut down and efforts relocated to facilities elsewhere – Perhaps most notably, Edwards AFB. Either that was just bad investigative journalism, blatant disinformation or a combination of the two. We may never know.

I heard a few years later that the Author totally “screwed the pooch” by taking some wrong turns in the Nevada desert and ending up on the outskirts of other government lands with no security in sight and instantly thought he’d cracked the case. He then found someone willing to talk to him about the base who claimed that Area 51 efforts had been relocated. The Author mentioned this in the 1997 article.

Anyway, whether or not you buy their explanation isn’t important. My point is just to keep it in mind with relation to this more recent article and come to your own conclusions.

I also suggest checking out the article on page 58, “The Real Truth of 9/11”. It’s an interesting read. If nothing else, I think it proves without a doubt that these folks would make great ATS members - Being interested in debunking conspiracy theories and all. Popular Mechanics on ATS? I’m lovin’ it.

2) The article does a decent job at pointing out a lot of Jacobsen’s errors and generally trying to get down to the nuts and bolts of what really happened and what didn’t. But there is a lot that is not mentioned with relation to Roswell and/or UFO’s in general.

For example, the allegations of multiple UFO crash sites, excluding the Roswell crash, which have been researched for decades. OR the fact that UFO’s are witnessed by thousands of credible witnesses every year from all walks of life and countries all over the world. I won’t even get into abductions, lost time, etc.. But it is important to note that regardless of what Jacobsen got right or wrong in her book an immense swath of people, including myself, still believe the UFO phenomenon is very real and still a complete mystery.

Many of these UFO encounters are well documented. Some include physical evidence that has been studied, sampled, tested, and unable to be debunked by physicists, scientists, etc. Others include radar data showing unknown objects in American airspace that have yet to be explained by anyone.

3) On page 147 of the Popular Mechanics article, Peter Merlin disputes Jacobsen’s quote from the dust jacket and in the Prologue in which she wrote “the U.S. government has never admitted [Area 51] exists”. The author of the article points out a 1996 news-conference in which then Defense Secretary William Perry states: “We do have a military operation going on at Groom Lake, highly classified and highly important to U.S. security”.

That being said, the base actually came into the limelight in 1995 after John Turley filed a lawsuit against the government on behalf of injured/disabled military members and families of deceased military members who claimed to have been exposed to toxic substances at Area 51 during years prior.

President Clinton “put the brakes” on the lawsuit by signing Presidential Determination 95-45. You can see a copy of that HERE .

Did they get away with murder? That is certainly still argued by some. What we know is that John Turley still has a federal seal on his office after all these years and noone is aloud in except for him.

So, if you want to really get technical about when the government publicly admitted to a base/installation at Groom Lake, it was on September 29, 1995 (the date presidential determination 95-45 was signed by Clinton). The following is from the above link..

I find that it is in the paramount interest of the United States to exempt the United States Air Force's operating location near Groom Lake, Nevada (the subject of litigation in Kasza v. Browner (D. Nev. CV-S-94-795-PMP) and Frost v. Perry (D. Nev. CV-S-94-714-PMP)) from any applicable requirement for the disclosure to unauthorized persons of classified information concerning that operating location.

There was also a press conference on April 17, 2000, not mentioned in the article, in which an Air Force spokeswoman stated “We acknowledge having an operating site there [Area 51], and the work is classified”.

-ChriS

If you really, really want to get technical about when the government admitted the existence of the Groom Lake base (Area 51), it was on 18 May 1955, when Seth R. Woodruff, Jr., manager of the Atomic Energy Commission's Las Vegas Field Office, announced that he had “instructed the Reynolds Electrical and Engineering Co., Inc. [REECo] to begin preliminary work on a small, satellite Nevada Test Site installation.” He noted that work was already underway at the location “a few miles northeast of Yucca Flat and within the Las Vegas Bombing and Gunnery Range.” Woodruff said that the installation would include “a runway, dormitories, and a few other buildings for housing equipment.” This was in a press release that was distributed to 18 media outlets in Nevada and Utah including a dozen newspapers, four radio stations, and two television stations.

Subsequent press statements in the late 1950s referred to the base as "Watertown Airstrip" or the "Watertown Project." In 1959, a little more that a year after the land had been formally added to the Nevada Test Site as one of its "areas," the AEC released some information to the media about "the Groom Lake Project 51" and included the term "Area 51," perhaps for the first time. So the base was really acknowledged by government officials long before 1995.

I'm glad to see that Popular Mechanics is making up for past sins (i.e., the 1997 article) by presenting documented factual material on Area 51. It was not a conscious effort on their part, however. The Pop Mech staffers working on the new piece were unaware of the older article, and were simply trying to follow up on a previous interview with Annie Jacobsen. Prior to publication of the new article, they went to great effort to check and document any claims they planned they planned to present.

Originally posted by FosterVS
[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/a2170f6f5e22.jpg[/atsimg]
September 2011 edition of Popular Mechanics:
"we asked whether she realized this story might strike some people as "pretty nutty" (our exact words)"

Thanks to Popular Mechanics, Peter Merlin and the Roadrunners for trying to set things straight.

Awesome just seen your video on youtube.

Its like trying to get into fort knox. It aint gonna happen

Originally posted by Shadowhawk
If you really, really want to get technical about when the government admitted the existence of the Groom Lake base (Area 51), it was on 18 May 1955, when Seth R. Woodruff, Jr., manager of the Atomic Energy Commission's Las Vegas Field Office, announced that he had “instructed the Reynolds Electrical and Engineering Co., Inc. [REECo] to begin preliminary work on a small, satellite Nevada Test Site installation.” He noted that work was already underway at the location “a few miles northeast of Yucca Flat and within the Las Vegas Bombing and Gunnery Range.” Woodruff said that the installation would include “a runway, dormitories, and a few other buildings for housing equipment.” This was in a press release that was distributed to 18 media outlets in Nevada and Utah including a dozen newspapers, four radio stations, and two television stations.

Subsequent press statements in the late 1950s referred to the base as "Watertown Airstrip" or the "Watertown Project." In 1959, a little more that a year after the land had been formally added to the Nevada Test Site as one of its "areas," the AEC released some information to the media about "the Groom Lake Project 51" and included the term "Area 51," perhaps for the first time. So the base was really acknowledged by government officials long before 1995.

Thanks for your information! I was doing some more digging today and found out some neat stuff I thought I would share.

THIS is information from Peter Merlin entitled "It's No Secret - Area 51 was Never Classified".

The installation has had many names over the years.

Another website said that the first documented use of the term "Area 51" was in a film by Lockheed Martin. But no further information or dates are provided.

You can see that HERE .

-ChriS

Originally posted by BlasteR

Originally posted by Shadowhawk
If you really, really want to get technical about when the government admitted the existence of the Groom Lake base (Area 51), it was on 18 May 1955, when Seth R. Woodruff, Jr., manager of the Atomic Energy Commission's Las Vegas Field Office, announced that he had “instructed the Reynolds Electrical and Engineering Co., Inc. [REECo] to begin preliminary work on a small, satellite Nevada Test Site installation.” He noted that work was already underway at the location “a few miles northeast of Yucca Flat and within the Las Vegas Bombing and Gunnery Range.” Woodruff said that the installation would include “a runway, dormitories, and a few other buildings for housing equipment.” This was in a press release that was distributed to 18 media outlets in Nevada and Utah including a dozen newspapers, four radio stations, and two television stations.

Subsequent press statements in the late 1950s referred to the base as "Watertown Airstrip" or the "Watertown Project." In 1959, a little more that a year after the land had been formally added to the Nevada Test Site as one of its "areas," the AEC released some information to the media about "the Groom Lake Project 51" and included the term "Area 51," perhaps for the first time. So the base was really acknowledged by government officials long before 1995.

Thanks for your information! I was doing some more digging today and found out some neat stuff I thought I would share.

THIS is information from Peter Merlin entitled "It's No Secret - Area 51 was Never Classified".
-ChriS

I love this
Maybe Shadowhawk can explain why I find much humor in you quoting him, and directing him to a link by Peter Merlin.
Cause I am biting my tongue here...

As early as 1957, news media handouts from the Atomic Energy Commission described Watertown Airstrip at Groom Lake. A rectangular block of land surrounding most of the lakebed was added to the Nevada Test Site in 1958 as Area 51, and appears as such on numerous unclassified official maps of the NTS.

So far, the earliest documented public reference to "51" that I can find is in a Las Vegas Review Journal article headlined, "AEC Tells Nature of Lake Project." This was published on November 17, 1959, and mentions "Groom Lake Project 51" at Watertown Airstrip. Fallout measurement tables from 1960 include the names "Watertown" and "Area 51" for the same location. A declassified AEC memorandum from September 1961 uses the terms "Project 51" and "Area 51" interchangeably. An unclassified NTS newsletter from january 1960 listed "New Area 51 telephone numbers."

Lockheed film footage from early 1962 shows Kelly Johnson giving a briefing about moving the A-12 prototype to the test site. On a blackboard in the background are the words: "Move out to Area 51."

September 1967 articles in the Las Vegas Review Journal describe the crash of an F-101 that took the life of Lt. Col. James S. Simon, Jr., as having taken place at a "super-secret experimental area of the Nevada Test Site." "This area is known to Nevada Test Site workers as 'Area 51,' and access to the dry lakebed is denied to all but a very few exclusive personnel."

Interestingly, the existence of Area 51 was never classified. Until recently, the CIA had classified its association with Area 51, and redacted the term even from declassified documents. This is apparently no longer necessary.

Oh, popular mechanics, because they have a lot of credibility

With a nod from Popular Mechanics, this book must be good if they bring out the Yellow Journalism to take care of it.

Originally posted by filosophia
Oh, popular mechanics, because they have a lot of credibility

With a nod from Popular Mechanics, this book must be good if they bring out the Yellow Journalism to take care of it.

You sound like a butt-hurt, 911 conspirator.