Fascinating- I love reading these historical reports. Seems UFO's (and USO's) have been with us for a long, long time.
I think somebody has already mentioned the 1897 Aurora case, where the 'airship' collided with a windmill, crashed and the small humanoid occupant
was killed. Buried in the local cemetary, its said that the body lay complete with gravemarker unmolested for decades. It is believed today, however,
that whatever was buried there has been removed as metal detector returns have ceased from the area since a MUFON investigation asked the cemetery
association (and were refused) permission to exhume the body.
I think this, coupled with the many witness testimonies at the time may rule out the 'newspapers made it up' to 'put the town on the map' hoax
theory.
ufo.whipnet.org...
www.chron.com...