Hangar 18: Difference between revisions
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In 1966, the book ''[[Incident at Exeter]]'' by journalist [[John G. Fuller]] mentioned 'frequent and continual rumors' of 'a half-dozen or so small humanoid corpses, measuring not more than four-and-a-half feet in height' in an Air Force morgue at Wright-Patterson Field.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Fuller |first1=John G. |title=Incident at Exeter |year=1966 |publisher=G.P. Putnam's Sons |pages=87–88 |url=https://archive.org/details/incidentatexeter0000john}}: "There have been, I learned after I started this research, frequent and continual rumors (and they are only rumors) that in a morgue at Wright-Patterson Field, Dayton, Ohio, lie the bodies of a half-dozen or so small humanoid corpses, measuring not more than four-and-a-half feet in height, evidence of one of the few times an extraterrestrial spaceship has allowed itself either to fail or otherwise fall into the clutches of the semicivilized Earth People."</ref> | In 1966, the book ''[[Incident at Exeter]]'' by journalist [[John G. Fuller]] mentioned 'frequent and continual rumors' of 'a half-dozen or so small humanoid corpses, measuring not more than four-and-a-half feet in height' in an Air Force morgue at Wright-Patterson Field.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Fuller |first1=John G. |title=Incident at Exeter |year=1966 |publisher=G.P. Putnam's Sons |pages=87–88 |url=https://archive.org/details/incidentatexeter0000john}}: "There have been, I learned after I started this research, frequent and continual rumors (and they are only rumors) that in a morgue at Wright-Patterson Field, Dayton, Ohio, lie the bodies of a half-dozen or so small humanoid corpses, measuring not more than four-and-a-half feet in height, evidence of one of the few times an extraterrestrial spaceship has allowed itself either to fail or otherwise fall into the clutches of the semicivilized Earth People."</ref> | ||
On October 11, 1974, science-fiction author and UFO conspiracy theorist [[Robert Spencer Carr]] conducted a live radio interview where he publicly claimed that alien bodies recovered from the Aztec, NM crash were being kept at "Hangar 18" at Wright-Patterson.<ref name="CarrRadio">{{harvnb|Disch|2000|pp=53–34}}, "Even the Roswell case [...] has its component of science-fictional fraud. Robert Spencer Carr became famous, briefly, in the '70s when, in a radio interview, he concocted the still-current story of aliens' autopsied and kept in cold storage at the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, near Dayton, Ohio. Carr."</ref><ref>{{cite book | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=KYKKiU9cvZEC | title=Shockingly Close to the Truth!: Confessions of a Grave-Robbing Ufologist | isbn=978-1-61592-541-4 | last1=Moseley | first1=James W. | date=2 November 2010 | publisher=Prometheus Books }}</ref> The claim garnered substantial press attention, and led to official denials.<ref>{{cite news|date=October 12, 1974|title=UFO-oria's Back Again|newspaper=The Cincinnati Enquirer|location=Cincinnati, OH|page=29|url=https://www.newspapers.com/image/101291218}}</ref> The Air Force replied that no "Hangar 18" existed at the base (perhaps somewhat disingenuously, given the existence of Building 18), and noted Carr's claims bore a close similarity to the fictional ''Fortec Conspiracy''.<ref>{{harvnb|Jones|1974}}</ref> | |||
During the interview, Carr also relayed a tale of Senator [[Barry Goldwater]] requesting and being denied access to a restricted area. Reached for comment, Goldwater admitted to having requested a tour and been denied, but Goldwater said he'd never heard any rumors of alien bodies.<ref>"Goldwater, contacted at his home in Phoenix, told The Enquirer he had indeed made such a request, 'But that was at least 12 or 15 years ago. Good God. That's so long ago I can't remember. The answer was negative, but I was an officer so I followed orders. What's this business about 12 little men? That's a new one on me.'" [https://www-newspapers-com/image/101291218 source]{{Dead link|date=September 2023 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref> | |||
By September 1979, Carr's claims included a surgical nurse who witnessed an alien's autopsy.<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://aadl.org/node/198259|title=Air Force Freezes Ufo Story | Ann Arbor District Library|website=aadl.org}}</ref><ref>{{Harvnb|Peebles|1995|p=244}} "Stringfield described the evidence Carr had collected on the Aztec "crash." Carr said he had found five eyewitnesses to the recovery. One (now dead) was a surgical nurse at the alien's autopsy. Another was a high-ranking Air Force officer. Two others were aeronautical engineers who described the UFO's structure and systems. The final witness was an Air Force enlisted man who had been a guard." citing Stringfield (Sept 1979) ''Retrievals of the Third Kind, part 2''</ref> | |||
The 1980 film ''[[Hangar 18 (film)|Hangar 18]]'', which dramatized Carr's claims, was described as "a modern-day dramatization" of Roswell by the film's director [[James L. Conway]],<ref name="Erdmann-p287" /> and as "nascent Roswell mythology" by folklorist Thomas Bullard.<ref>{{harvnb|Bullard|2016|p=331}}</ref> Decades later, Carr's son recalled that he had often "mortified my mother and me by spinning preposterous stories in front of strangers... [tales of] befriending a giant alligator in the Florida swamps, and sharing complex philosophical ideas with porpoises in the Gulf of Mexico."<ref>{{harvnb|Carr|1997|p=32}}</ref> | |||
==References== | ==References== | ||
{{reflist}} | {{reflist}} | ||