Early UFO / Saucer Reports

Old Australian disc/saucer UFO reports - first three examples also describe paralysis from occupant light beam.

1893 Central New South Wales

An anecdote handed down within a farming family told of an extraordinary UFO story that was alleged to have happened in 1893 in Central New South Wales.  A farmer claimed that a saucer-shaped object landed in a paddock on his property.  As he approached the object, a man in strange clothing emerged from it.  The farmer walked towards the being. The stranger shone some kind of beam at him, whereby the farmer was thrown to the ground, stunned.  His hand where the beam had hit him was paralysed for life.
Source:  Chalker, Bill The Oz files. Duffy & Snellgrove. Potts Point, NSW. 1996. p.28.  Citing that the story was told to Dr Miran Lindtner, UFO Information Centre, Sydney in the 1960's.

Note:
1.  Details similar to the 1919 Central NSW case and the 1913 Nuriootpa, SA case.  Are one or more of these three similar events, a distorted recollection of an original story?




1919 Central, New South Wales

While travelling down a country road, a man came across an artifact resting near the roadside.  He saw that a 'man' was apparently working on it, and went over to offer assistance.  The stranger turned as if surprised and pointed something at the witness, who was knocked senseless.  When he came to, the object and the man had gone. He found that his memory was never the same again.
Source:  Chalker, W C. “The CEII experience in Australia.” “Australian Co-Ordination Section” (for the US based Center for UFO Studies) Bulletin, March 1977, number 9, p11.

Note:  Note the similarity with the 1893 Central New South Wales report and the Circa 1913 Nuriootpa event.




Circa 1913 Nuriootpa, South Australia

A farmer discovered a landed object and was “zapped” by a humanoid which appeared from within it, leaving a lasting paralysis in the witness.
Source:  Personal communication from Darryl Tiggeman of Adelaide to Keith Basterfield. 2004.  Citing the source as a radio talk back show featuring Adelaide UFOlogist Colin Norris in circa 1984.

Notes:  Note the similarity with the 1893 Central New South Wales event and the 1919 Central New South Wales case.




1911 Gumeracha, South Australia

As a young lad in 1911 a man had been working on his father’s farm, milking cows.  While carrying two buckets of milk, he felt a pain in his head and placing the buckets down, he observed, in front of him some distance away, a disc shaped object.  It was about 10 feet across and was silver and glowing like the Moon.  He watched it for about 15 seconds, then it rose into the air and disappeared at a very fast rate into the horizon.
Source:  UFOPI’s “Panorama” magazine Volume 3 Number 5 page 18, Jul-Aug 1964




Spring 1921 Prospect, Adelaide, South Australia

One evening, a man named Felix Jones saw a circular-like saucer.  It was 12-15 feet across, and 3 feet deep.  It was a lightish colour but reflecting green from within it.  It had neither wings nor propeller, but did have rectangular windows.  It was seen in the north-north-west, stationary from three minutes.  It then moved off to the west, slowly, then quickly.  When it moved it glowed at the back.
Source:  Australian Saucer Record volume 2 number 4 1956 page 7.  The item stated that the report was received 15 Oct 1956.




1924 60 miles south of Coolamon, NSW

‘Some years ago, an elderly man, Ian Rogers, rang me about an incident when he was a boy in 1924.  One morning he was checking their rabbit traps in the Lysterfield State Forest, south of Coolamon.’  He heard a humming noise and saw a landed object, some 100 yards distant.  It was a ‘long, cylindrical shape, rounded at both ends, with four square windows along the side.  It was at least 30 feet long…’ At one stage ‘people’ got out of it. It then flew off into the sky.  The witness said the ground was burnt black and trees singed.  At one stage he said he had a ‘small piece of metal’ and that ‘When I rubbed it with my hands it would move off of its own accord.’
Source:  McGhee, M. (2016.) ‘Contact Down Under.’ Independent Network of UFO Investigators. Katoomba. Pp 97-98.




1925 Moora, Western Australia

Two young men came across an object resting in a paddock.  It was described as two saucers on edge, with oval shaped 'windows' and four 'legs.'  The men beat a hasty retreat and didn't return for several days.  When they did, they reportedly found the earth scuffed about.
Source:  Chalker, W. C. “The CEII experience in Australia,” “Australian Co-Ordination Section” (for the US based Center for UFO Studies) Bulletin, March 1977, Number 9 p12.




About 1945 Wilcannia NSW

‘A senior police officer told me of an elderly country woman, now deceased, who saw a traditional flying saucer, during daylight hours, near Wilcannia, in Western New South Wales, in the 1940’s, just after World War 2.  She claimed that after reporting the sighting to the authorities, she received a letter from the Australian Air Force confirming the report, and warning her not to tell anyone about the craft.  The police officer attested to having seen the letter, which appeared to be genuine.

Source:  McGhee, M. (2016.) ‘Contact Down Under.’ Independent Network of UFO Investigators. P. 112.

link

Saucer over Hanford Nuclear Reactor - July, 1945.

Sourced by A51Watcher (and his thread The Day Before Roswell also contains some extremely interesting early flying disc reports).


Incident:

UFO SIGHTING OVER HANFORD NUCLEAR REACTOR

Mid-July, 1945

Case report from NICAP files

Radar detected a fast-moving object that was in a holding pattern directly above the Hanford plant. It was extremely high and the pilots couldn't see it at first. As they rapidly increased altitude the pilots all spotted it at about the same time and headed directly for its position.

None of them could recognize it, but they could see it well from their vantage point. It had a saucer-like appearance, was bright, extremely fast, and very high.

The F6F had an operating ceiling of 37,000 feet, but on this day they exceeded that considerably and still couldn't get close enough. It didn't make any overt moves, gave no signals, just hovered there as if observing, staying well enough out of reach.

When some of the engines began to fail, and fuel consumption got critical, the planes returned to base one by one, and the strange craft disappeared as quickly as it came. The six F6F "Hellcats" made visual contact with the object described as the size of three aircraft carriers side by side, oval shaped, very streamlined like a stretched-out egg and pinkish in color.

The witness who filed this report said that some kind of vapor was being emitted around the outside edges from portholes or vents. The object was observed at noon in a clear sky at an estimated altitude of 65,000 feet. After hovering in a fixed position above the Hanford Nuclear Reactor for an additional twenty minutes, the object disappeared going straight-up as the six Hellcats limped back to the Pasco Naval Air Station (Washington)

Post

Also one from January, 1945 here and more about intrusions over the nuclear facility in 1950 and 1952 on this thread.

Plenty of pre -1947 reports of unknown objects submerging into (or emerging from) the world's oceans in Skyfloating's USO Research thread and below are a few potential disc shape candidates:

1943: Persian Gulf

Seaman Matthew Mangle, from the bow of his ship, sighted a huge disc beneath the surface of the water. The object, glowing with a soft, greenish light, paced the ship at about 12 knots before speeding up and moving out of sight.

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Feb 26, 1942

When in the Timor Sea, the cruiser Tromp was approached by a large aluminum disc that flew at tremendous speed. It then circled the Dutch vessel for about three to four hours. Finally, it flew off at an estimated speed of 3,000-3,5000mph.

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1945

Object witnessed by crew emerging from ocean aboard the U.S. attack transport 'Delarof':

Summer of 1945; Aleutian Islands

A large UFO was seen by crew members of the U.S. Army Transport Delarof which had been hauling munitions and supplies to Alaska. Robert S. Crawford was serving as one of the Army radiomen aboard. The attack transport ship, heading back to Seattle, was in the open sea past Adak. Crawford was on the port side near the radio room when he heard shouts from some of the crew. He turned and saw a large, round object which had just emerged from the sea..

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May. 15, 1879

Persian Gulf. Two very large "wheels" were seen spinning in the air and slowly coming to the surface of the sea. Estimated diameter: 40 m. Distance between the objects: 150 m. Speed: 80 km/h/ Duration: 35 min. Witnesses aboard the ship "Vultur"

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1929 - Saucer/Disc

..about a sponge diver in his home town of Tarpon Springs, Florida. It seems that an old Greek sponge diver back in 1929 was underwater doing his sponging in his old-type sponge diver’s suit and helmet, and as he looked up from what he was doing, he saw a saucer-shaped silver disk fly by him under water with lights on it, and then it flew by him again, this time in the other direction.

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1910 The Danish Meteorological Institute

Capt. Breyer of the Dutch steamer Valentijn was in the South China Sea, midnight, Aug. 12, 1910, he saw a rotation of flashes. "It looked like a horizontal wheel, turning rapidly." This time it is said that the appearance was above water. "The phenomenon was observed by the captain, the first and second mates, and the first engineer, and upon all of them it made a somewhat uncomfortable

1936

Elliptical shaped object which departed silently at amazing speed - witnessed by Canadian Government pilot in Northwest territories (Canadian National Archives).

See 20:00

Report of silver disc shaped zig zagging object - Argentina, July, 1947.

Argentina's First UFO Sighting – 1947

A serious person and - according to his son - not much given to rumors...Therefore, this gentleman told the following story over the dinner table: at the break of day on Monday, he saw a silvery object shaped like a disk pass by at an incredible speed at an estimated altitude of 1000 meters. It was disc-shaped, flying in an impeccable zig-zag pattern. Suddenly, it plunged vertically, falling into a field five hundred meters distant from the observer's perspective..

Source: El Día (Argentina) and Marcelo G. Metayer
Date: July 13, 1947

link

Also six flying discs reported over California on the same day as Roswell newspaper report.

On July 8, 1947, the very same day that Roswell’s Daily Record was reporting the initial “flying disc” story, a remarkable incident reportedly occurred in the skies above Avalon.  An article on the front page of the week’s issue of the Catalina Islander details an alleged sighting by three visiting Army veterans of six “flying discs” traveling at high speed from the northeast and passing directly over Avalon before disappearing over East Peak.

According to the story, the six discs appeared at about 1 p.m. and flew in a formation of two sets of three and were witnessed not only by the veterans, but by “hundreds” of others as well.

Alvio Russo, one of the reported witnesses and an Army Air Corps veteran who had flown 35 bombing missions over Germany with the Eighth Air Force, estimated the velocity of the discs at “850 miles an hour,” according to the story.

Bob Jung, listed as a “former aerial photographer” agreed with this estimate and said they were flying roughly as fast as the U.S. Navy’s “Tiny Tim” rocket, which he had photographed numerous times for the Navy.

Mysterious Island: UFO Action Galore

originally posted by: ConspiracyMysteries
a reply to: karl 12


In 1897 a UFO crashed in Aurora, Texas where it hit a windmill and exploded. The remains of an alien body were recovered and buried in the local cemetery. This documentary was premiered at the first annual Aurora Alien Encounter on Saturday, April 16th, 2016 - An event to commemorate the historical incident[/url]

Aurora, Texas, UFO incident
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Hoax theory
Aurora, Texas, UFO incident is located in TexasAurora, Texas, UFO incident
Location of Aurora, near Dallas, Texas
The hoax theory is primarily based on historical research performed by Barbara Brammer, a former mayor of Aurora. Her research (featured as part of the UFO Files episode on the incident) revealed that, in the months prior to the alleged crash, Aurora had been beset by a series of tragic incidents:

First, the local cotton crop (the major source of town revenue) was destroyed by a boll weevil infestation.
Second, a fire on the town's west side claimed several buildings and lives.
Shortly after the fire, a spotted fever epidemic hit the town, nearly wiping out the remaining citizens and placing the town under quarantine.
Finally, a planned railroad got within 27 miles of Aurora but never made it into the town.
Essentially, Aurora (which claimed nearly 3,000 residents at the time) was in serious danger of dying out; Brammer's research also showed that Haydon was known in the town to be a bit of a jokester, and her conclusion is that Haydon's article was a last-ditch attempt to keep Aurora alive.

The theory was further supported by the fact that Haydon never performed any sort of follow-up on the story, not even to report on the alien's burial, which is highly unusual given the significance of the event.

Further, in 1980, Time magazine interviewed Etta Pegues, an 86 year old Aurora resident who claimed that Haydon had fabricated the entire story, stating that Haydon "wrote it as a joke and to bring interest to Aurora. The railroad bypassed us, and the town was dying."[2] Pegues further claimed that Judge Proctor never operated a windmill on his property, a statement later refuted as part of the UFO Hunters episode, which found the base of a wooden water pump tower constructed around the well.

Jim Marrs interviewed an eyewitness who allegedly saw the UFO crash; also, the Judge's windmill technically was not a windmill but a three-story wooden water pump tower.

An interesting report back from when vomitoriums where in vogue,BCE 66

We have an account of a spark falling from a star, and increasing as it approached the earth, until it became of the size of the moon, shining as through a cloud1; it afterwards returned into the heavens and was converted into a lampas; this occurred in the consulship of Cn. Octavius and C. Scri- bonius. It was seen by Silanus, the proconsul, and his attendants2

Link

a reply to: karl 12

a reply to: Ophiuchus 13



Great thread about what these are and arent here

a reply to: IMSAM

The Annunciation, with Saint Emidius

The light ray from the heaven represents Mary's impregnation by the Holy Spirit.[2] The closed passage into the depth at the left and the flask of pure water in Mary's bedroom conventionally refer to Mary's virginity.[2] The winged angel Gabriel is depicted with Saint Emidius, the patron saint of Ascoli Piceno carrying a model of that town.[1] The apple in the foreground represents the forbidden fruit and associated fall of man. The cucumber symbolizes the promise of resurrection and redemption.[2] The peacock symbolizes associated immortality, because it was believed that its flesh never decayed.[2] An oriental carpet adorns the loggia on the first floor of the Mary's house.

The bottom portion of the painting features the coats of arms of Pope Sixtus IV and the local bishop, Prospero Caffarelli.[1] The Latin words libertas ecclesiastica (church liberty) refer to the self-government of Ascoli Piceno under the general oversight of the Catholic Church.[2] In fringe theories, the halo of the Holy Spirit on the painting is sometimes interpreted as an UFO.[3] According to historian Massimo Polidoro who says what you are actually seeing is "a vortex of angels in the clouds, another frequent representation of God in Medieval and Renaissance sacred works of art". Painters at this time used "symbolic meanings that were anything but random." Polidoro calls the UFO explanation, "reinterpreting with the eyes of twenty-first-century Europeans the product of other cultures".[4]

a reply to: IMSAM





Two more pre 1947 disc shaped UFO (and occupant) reports.



New Zealand, August, 1944.

The Sign of the Takahe event, August 1944


One of New Zealand’s most interesting vintage UFO cases took place during August, 1944.

On a wintry afternoon, a senior nurse stationed at the Cashmere Sanatorium was out walking on the Port Hills overlooking Christchurch when she came upon a landed UFO, complete with ‘little green men’.  

The Mrs. Church caseis highly detailed, unusual, and attracted much interest world-wide when it was first reported by Bruce Harding some thirty years afterwards.


Walking downhill, amongst the low hilly slopes, Mrs. Church saw a large ‘upturned saucer’, sitting on a gentle slope. Mrs. Church noted that, although it was “very close to the road”, it would have been hidden from traffic on Dyers Pass Road by a slight rise..

Mrs. Church quietly walked over to the upturned saucer, stopped and stared at it, for about 8-10 minutes in total. She was “quite close really” and “didn’t feel any effect at all”. She thought to herself how unusual it was – “What will they invent next?”

She immediately thought the craft was some gimmick from the Industries Fair which was running at the time down in the central city. However, on noticing “occupants” nearby, no more than four feet tall, she surmised that it must be a Japanese device. 

The three “little men/occupants”, or “little fellas”, were inside transparent cases. One was standing outside the craft. Another was in a “doorway-window” area of the craft and she could see the top of a third helmet in the same “window” area. Mrs. Church thinks that the trio were watching the Industries Fair and looking at the city – the city lights were starting to come on, as cloud descended and the late wintry afternoon got darker.

“The occupants of the object appeared to be absorbed in watching the fair and city generally.” 

The thought of little green men crossed her mind (“in thefairy-land, not the flying saucer sense – flying saucers came along much later!”), but, as she put it, “I thought they were Japanese.”

Full Report - UFOCUS NZ Research Network 

And Argentina in the early 1940's (EM effects also on police car).

Eyewitness sketch:

After covering a significant distance in the police car, their guide pointed out the possible impact site: There, some 200 meters away from the group, near a hill, was an exceedingly strange, glowing, disc-shaped object, which remained on the ground and in their sight. Surrounding the object was an undetermined number of figures that “came and went”.

At a distance, these being appeared to be very tall, clad in seemingly metallic and luminous outfits. They moved slowly and they carried in their hands what looked like “mugs”. We must imagine such a sight in the early 1940s.

THE FIRST HUMANOIDS IN ARGENTINA

originally posted by: ConspiracyMysteries
a reply to: karl 12


In 1897 a UFO crashed in Aurora, Texas where it hit a windmill and exploded. The remains of an alien body were recovered and buried in the local cemetery. This documentary was premiered at the first annual Aurora Alien Encounter on Saturday, April 16th, 2016 - An event to commemorate the historical incident

The Aurora 1897 UFO crash was a hoax. Simple research will guide to many sources and here's one of them:
www.dallasnews.com...

'Fake News' from Wise County brought UFO believers to Aurora — eventually

"Fake news" may seem like a modern concern, but people have been printing tall tales since the early days of newspapers. On April 17, 1897, Wise County resident S. E. Haydon reported in The Dallas Morning News that an airship had crashed in the small town of Aurora, a full six years before the Wright brothers' first flight at Kitty Hawk.

The story was fake, of course, but as Haydon told it, an unknown man was killed when his "airship" collided with Judge Proctor's windmill. The windmill, as well as the judge's flower garden, were reportedly destroyed. The resulting "fake news" made the pages of the paper:
------------
Many believed fervently in the story of the martian, however. Why would S.E. Haydon risk his own reputation as a frequent contributor to local papers by telling such a tall tale?

Many believe his story was a last-ditch effort to revive a town decimated by an outbreak of "spotted fever," which not only took lives but triggered an exodus of Aurora's healthy citizens. One story in The Dallas Morning News described a town so plagued by illness, people were afraid to patronize its businesses.

Haydon himself lost his wife and two of his sons to the epidemic. Another son was blinded. The illness devastated the town - along with soil problems, fires and the bankruptcy of the much-anticipated railroad. Haydon, many suspect, wove the tale in an attempt to drum up interest in tiny Aurora and save his town. This theory is backed up by the work of Etta Pegues, town historian, who was 10 years old in 1897.

The article continues with more facts.

February 1942 - bronze coloured, 150 foot long object with 'dome or cupola' on it's upper surface flies parallel to RAAF patrol before diving into the ocean (Bass Strait).

UFO-USO with "Fins" paces Aircraft then Dives into Ocean - Bass Strait, Australia

RAF Supermarine Spitfire

In mid-February 1942–five years before Roswell–Lt. William Brennan of the Royal Australian Air Force was on patrol over the Bass Strait south of Melbourne, Australia, on the lookout for Japanese submarines or long-range German U-boats. Fishermen in the area had reported mysterious lights bobbing on the sea at night, and after the Japanese attack on Darwin on February 19, the Allied High Command was urging the strictest vigilance.

The air patrol was flying a few miles east of the Tasman Peninsula about 5:50 P.M. on a sunny evening when a strange aircraft of a glistening bronze color suddenly emerged from a cloud bank near them. The object was about 150 feet long and approximately 50 feet in diameter. Lt. Brennan saw that the peculiar craft had a dome or cupola on its upper surface and he thought that he might have seen someone inside wearing a helmet.

The unidentified aerial craft flew parallel to the RAAF patrol for several minutes, then it abruptly turned away and dived straight down into the Pacific. Lt. Brennan emphasized that the USO made a dive, not a crash, into the ocean; and he added that before the craft left them, he noticed what appeared to be four finlike appendages on its underside.

USO Research

Another very strange one from Oak Ridge - September, 1944.


Was an Unidentified Flying Object Similar to the USS Nimitz “Tic Tac” Seen in 1944?

Early 1947 UFO/USO report - sourced by RealTVUFOs

“Objects in Sky Seen at Lock”

21 February 1947

Source: Trove, National Library of Australia, Canberra, ACT, Australia

“Writing in The Advertiser, Mr. F. W. Flavel of Lock,Eyre Peninsula, states: ‘I saw objects in the sky between 7 and 8 o’clock the same day (5 February 1947) as you received a report from Port Augusta. I was walking in a north-westerly direction to the house after feeding the pigs. There were five of the strange objects and they seemed to be coming up out of the sea, like a shadow with smoky greyish color around them. ‘They were oblong with narrow points. I saw them quite plainly. They seemed to be floating in the air from north-west to south-east and caused a shadow.’ ”

link

Fascinating info, Karl.

On a more philosophical note (and because you've been at this far longer than me), are we able to pinpoint when UFOs in the 1940s actually came to be regarded as potential "ET" vehicles rather than foreign spy vehicles?

As far as I can tell, like the so-called 'Battle of LA' in Feb 1942, the notion of "ET" provenance was not mentioned AT ALL whilst Roswell was in the news during July 1947; even Kenneth Arnold a couple of weeks earlier believed he'd seen spy planes (a world away from the more exotic ideas that he espoused later), and the public at large also agreed... poor 'ole ET not even getting a look-in... except for readers of 'Amazing Stories' of course.

So, which case was responsible for planting the ET notion more widely in the public and media's heads?

Worthy of a thread?

originally posted by: Hunkadinka
Pegues further claimed that Judge Proctor never operated a windmill on his property, a statement later refuted as part of the UFO Hunters episode, which found the base of a wooden water pump tower constructed around the well.

Jim Marrs interviewed an eyewitness who allegedly saw the UFO crash; also, the Judge's windmill technically was not a windmill but a three-story wooden water pump tower.

The UFO Hunters show also found that the tree next to the tower was full of pieces of aluminum. Like something HAD crashed and sprayed hot aluminum through the tree.

www.youtube.com...

1290AD Byland Abbey, England, a silvery, flat, shiny disc-like object appeared near the abbey, frightening those who saw it.

originally posted by: ConfusedBrit
So, which case was responsible for planting the ET notion more widely in the public and media's heads?

Good question. Like you said, the Army investigated the "Battle of L.A." and one of their big conclusions was that it might have been the work of enemy agents flying small planes out of the desert. Kenneth Arnold thought the UFOs he saw might be foreign planes or some secret aircraft the government was working on, although it's reported that he commented on them being possibly extraterrestrial. The "mystery airships" of the late 1800's were generally considered to be daring human aviators, although the newspaper clipping about the Aurora, Texas crash did suggest something otherworldly.

I'm thinking that the 1947 saucer flap may have started it really rolling, but the idea that they could be aliens probably ran parallel with the notion that they could be Commie airplanes. The alien stuff goes back to War of the Worlds and Buck Rogers and so on. But it probably really took off with Kenneth Arnold.

originally posted by: Blue Shift

I'm thinking that the 1947 saucer flap may have started it really rolling, but the idea that they could be aliens probably ran parallel with the notion that they could be Commie airplanes. The alien stuff goes back to War of the Worlds and Buck Rogers and so on. But it probably really took off with Kenneth Arnold.

Kenneth Arnold became increasingly obsessed as the years rolled on (there's a recent relevant thread I made that's accessible via my profile), even accommodating the idea that the 'craft' were the souls of the dead, as well as the alternative notion that they were an unknown living species resident within the Earth's atmosphere. Fascinating conjecture from the granddaddy of UFOs!

By the way, I was a fool to forget Orson Welles' late-30s radio adaption of 'The War Of The Worlds' and its attendant panic, albeit exaggerated by the press. Coupled with a six-year World War shortly after, perhaps real-life UFO sightings were shuffled to one side until the late-40s as things began to settle again (despite the Cold War).

Regarding the airship sightings of the 19th century, I wonder how much influence the work of Jules Verne had on the public's imagination and perception of things in the sky.