UFO Encounters Book 1978

In a recent ebay lot of magazines I bought there were also 3 books.  One of those books is UFO Encounters, it was published by Scholastic Book Services and copyright is 1978.

I had never heard to this book.  Being that it is published by Scholastic Book Services, I assume it was written for children.  It is a thin little book, only 80 pages, but it is quite well done with lots of photos and covering some of the most well known cases of the time.  It doesn't try to explain anything, it leaves it up to the reader whether or not they want to believe it.

One of the photos in this book:

According to the book, this photo was snapped by a boy in Utica, NY, in April 1966 and the flaming object was seen by thousands.  I wanted to know more about that and if there were any other photos so I googled, but really found nothing not even a copy of that photo, which is why I am posting it here.  It very much reminds me of the "Norway Spiral."  I don't think it is a spaceship of any kind, most likely some sort of rocket/weapon test.

UFO Report Feb/1980

Several great things in this issue!  Probably my favorite is an article by Jerome Clark and Lucius Farish "UFOs of the Roaring 20s."  I especially like that because many people seem to think that modern sightings of UFOs did not begin until WWII.  Here is a very interesting 1927 account from a witness of a craft in West Frankfort, IL:

A large round sphere, it was nearly the size of a house underneath it -- approximately 40 feet in diameter.  At first the object had been revolving from right to left, but the revolving motion stopped when the UFO did.  The thing seemed to be made of a stainless steel-like material.  The surface was smooth, unmarked by seams or rivets.

Underneath the UFO was an attached "gondola" which appeared to be part of the object.  Four or five illuminated "portholes" suddenly opened on the gondola.  The light shining through them was blue-white. 

After a while the UFO drifted 100 feet to the right and then stopped again, this time letting down a thin, reflecting line from it's bottom section.  Mr. Jones thought it might have been a glass rod or pencil-thin pipe or wire.

Finally the "portholes" closed just as they had opened, in an effect rather like that of "the iris shutter of a modern day camera."  The UFO began to rotate again and departed toward the same direction from which it had come.

Another article I found to be of great interest was Yurko Bondarchuk's "Alien Occupants: 5 Startling Accounts."  I had heard of Bondarchuk, but was not terribly familiar with him.  That led to a google search, which led to me purchasing a used paperback copy of his book - UFO, sightings, landings, and abductions: The documented evidence.  Seven dollars for that seemed like quite a deal since used pb copies of his other book UFO Canada were not available for less than $30.

Funny enough, since I just complained about another magazine having a cover article by him, James Oberg wrote the cover story about SETI in this issue.  I haven't read that article, but it did make me think that we have now had over 30 years of SETI and nothing to show for it.  As is known, I am not a big fan of SETI, but I do think it may be interesting to read Oberg's article and find out what people thought about it back then (or possibly just what Oberg thought about it).

Official UFO

I had looked forward to receiving that issue of Official UFO.  The photo on the cover was taken 6 days before I was born, which was cool for some reason that I am not quite sure of.  The cover story also promised to expose the lies we've been told about Astronauts and UFOs.  So imagine my great disappointment when it arrived and I found out that cover story was written by James Oberg and is just a long debunking piece!

Compared to other vintage flying saucer magazines, Official UFO pretty much sucks.  Not just that issue, none of the others I received in that lot seem to be any better.  I suppose if I found another big lot of them really cheap on ebay I would buy more, but I would much rather have Flying Saucer Magazine or UFO Report.

Flying Saucers, September 1963

Saga's UFO Report, March 1977 & The Mafia

As mentioned in the previous post, Tim Beckley did a lot of writing for UFO Report.  Yesterday he told me something interesting -- it was owned by the mafia!  He couldn't remember which family, but I did a search on the publishing company which was Gambi Publishing.  I found that the Gambino family owned a book publishing company called Gambit, so I think that is probably who it was.  Tim said, "you had to go through a meat slaughter house to get to their office."  How stereotypical!  LOL!

That said, UFO Report, which is sometimes Saga UFO Report, Saga's UFO Report or just UFO Report was a really great magazine with well written and very interesting articles.  I already have more vintage copies on the way.

Saga's UFO Report, August 1977

A fantastic illustration of a flying saucer near the WTC towers, back when they were still standing.  It goes along with an article called Saucers over our Cities, by Timothy Green Beckley.

In the same magazine is another article (or what I think is a reoccurring column) by Tim Beckley, called Saucers and Celebrities.  It had an account of a celebrity sighting that I had never heard before, though it may be in one of Tim's many books.  Musician Billy Squier had a sighting of what seems to be the BVM.  He and 3 others guys noticed a glow in the woods and went to investigate "a strange figure appeared out of nowhere in the midst of the glow."  Billy said, "The figure was that of a woman and I would say she looked something like a Madonna --- you know, like a holy statue."  The figure remained stationary for 30 seconds or so and then just disappeared.

Another great thing about this issue is the illustrations on a piece about "Florida's Bigfoot Terror."  Probably they are available online somewhere, but I am going to post them here anyhow:

From what I can tell by comparing the signature the drawings seem to have been done by Gabe Perillo, who is now the official artist of ESPN's Sports Century Series.

Flying Saucers Magazine, July 1963