- It has been announced by the University
of Texas at Arlington that on June 1, 1998, a special exhibit will open
in the Special Collections Section of the Main Library featuring super-enlargements
of the more than half-century old famous Roswell UFO crash photographs.
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- In making the announcement, Dr. Gerald
D. Saxon, Associate Director for Special Collections, Branch Libraries
and Programs, University Libraries, stated that the special exhibit will
be offered in response to an unprecedented demand by the public to view
at close range details of the newly enhanced photographs of the most famous
and controversial UFO wreckage, which was "captured" by United
States military forces near Roswell, New Mexico in 1947.
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- Dr. Saxon stated that photographic exhibits
at the library usually are scheduled at least two years in advance, but
that this special photo exhibit has been arranged on very short notice
due to world wide attention once again being focused on the UTA Library
following a recent announcement that it has finally been established that
the photos are of portions of the actual Roswell crash debris.
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- Dr. Saxon said that due to a series of
recent telephone calls being received at the library inquiring as to details
of the library security system, that increased surveillance plans will
be in effect. Visitors to the exhibit will not be permitted to bring into
the library any purses or brief cases but that hand magnifying glasses
will be allowed.
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- The UFO research community was electrified
this week by the surprise announcement that modern technology has debunked
a longtime charge by some UFO writers of a blatant "cover-up"
by Air Force Lt. General Roger M. Ramey in connection with the sensational
Roswell Incident of 1947, which involved the announced "capture"
of a crashed UFO.
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- The results of a new digital scan applied
to super-enlargements of the famous UFO photos taken by a reporter-photographer
for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram show that the debris displayed in General
Ramey's 8th Air Force Headquarters office in Fort Worth on July 8, 1947,
is clearly consistent with eyewitness descriptions of the world's best-known
"flying saucer" which had crashed near Roswell, New Mexico, a
few days before and is not a "weather balloon" which had been
substituted on orders of General Ramey. This includes clear identification
of the "hieroglyphic-like" characters displayed along stick-
like structures, including I-beams, and inclusion of very thin, but super
strong metal-like material that resisted bending or crumpling.
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- The resulting new discoveries discredit
frequently repeated claims that General Ramey had concocted the "weather
balloon" ruse and then had ordered the substitution of the "weather
balloon" for the real wreckage, which had been flown secretly to Wright-Patterson
Air Force base -- then known as Wright Field -- in Ohio for "further
analysis" and where it reportedly has been kept under tight security
for more than a half century.
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- The newly obtained, digitally enhanced
photographs reveal for the first time that "out of this world"
qualities described by Major Jesse A. Marcel, Sr., Intelligence Officer
stationed then at Roswell Army Air Base, who retrieved parts of the wreckage
of the alleged alien-operated craft, are clearly established in the photos.
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- The photographs were taken by Dr. J.
Bond Johnson, who had been a reporter for the Star-Telegram since January
of 1943. At the time of the Roswell Incident in 1947, Dr. Johnson had been
discharged from the Army Air Corps after World War II service, which included
training as an aircraft mechanic and pilot. He has practiced as a clinical
psychologist and United Methodist minister for the past 35 years in Long
Beach, California. He also is a retired US Army colonel.
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- Upon arrival at General Ramey's office
on July 8, 1947, Johnson unpacked portions of the wreckage from its paper
wrappings and arranged the pieces for the photos while awaiting the arrival
of General Ramey at his office. Johnson then took six shots with General
Ramey, Colonel (later Brig. General) Thomas J. Dubose, Ramey's chief of
staff, and Major (later Lt. Col.) Marcel, who had couriered the wreckage
from Roswell to Ramey's headquarters in Fort Worth. Other packages of the
wreckage, still unopened, also appear in the photos
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- Two of the negatives have disappeared
from the files of the UTA Library but four original negatives remain and
are safeguarded under heavy security. These four photographs will be featured
in the special exhibition.
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- The frequently quoted descriptions by
Marcel, and repeated by Marcel's son, Dr. Jesse A. Marcel, Jr., an Army
helicopter pilot and flight surgeon, who was shown some of the wreckage
parts by his dad prior to their being turned over to the Roswell base commander,
are further corroborated by civilian eye witnesses who were employees of
the Brazell Ranch 85 miles northwest of Roswell, where the craft crashed,
and some of their neighbors.
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- The witnesses described the wreckage
as including material that was "very lightweight, lead foil-like,
very thin, metallic-like but not metal, and very tough." It also included
very light "balsa-wood appearing sticks," including I-beams,
some of which included "hieroglyphic-like" characters, possibly
depicting some unknown writing. One witness described the "figures"
as similar to the petroglyphs the ancient Native Americans etched on rocks
in the Roswell area.
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- Further, the witnesses described that
some of the material, even though very thin, when crushed tended to "smooth-out"
when released. There also was a quantity of black plastic looking material
"which looked organic in nature that had either been melted or burned."
Johnson also described the strong odor of burned debris when he was in
the general's office with the wreckage.
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- When questioned, Marcel -- who retired
from the Air Force as a Lt. Colonel -- described the unusual markings on
the sticks as "like Chinese writing....nothing you could make any
sense out of." In his interviews Marcel stated that "they took
a photo of me on the floor holding up some of the less- interesting metallic
debris...pieces of the actual stuff we had found." Marcel said that
the debris was scattered over a square mile of a ranch near Roswell. "It
was something that must have exploded above ground and fell...it scattered
all over."
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- The new digitally enhanced, super-enlargements
clearly show the strange metallic debris as described, including some thin
metal-like parts, which are quite rigid and smooth, and the I-beams identical
with the witnesses' descriptions. Marcel stated that the solid members
were mostly square, "of varied lengths, and along the length of some
of those they had little markings...two color markings as I can recall...like
Chinese writing." His son described the markings as "flower-like"
figures printed along the sticks.
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- Yet for nearly 20 years UFO writers have
claimed that the Air Corps engaged in a dramatic fraud to protect the UFO
wreckage from Roswell and to mislead the press -- and the American public.
The story concocted by the writers tell it generally this way:
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- When Marcell turned the portions of the
UFO wreckage he had recovered over to his base commander, Colonel William
Blanchard. Blanchard then issued an official public announcement that the
Air Corps had "captured" a flying saucer near Roswell and then
notified his boss, General Ramey, of this dramatic event. The military
had been widely searching for UFOs following sightings in many parts of
the country during June and early July 1947.
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- For some unknown reason, the writers
decided that Ramey had concocted and executed a careful hoax. It was claimed
that he sent the real UFO wreckage directly to Wright Field in Ohio for
study and while the burning of a weather balloon and Rawin target. This
fraudulent substitute was dispatched along with Major Marcel to 8th Air
Force Headquarters in Fort Worth.
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- There, the bogus material was displayed
in Ramey's office and the Star- Telegram was invited to send out a reporter-photographer
to cover the story. Johnson was selected and dispatched by his editor with
camera in hand. When Ramey told Johnson that he didn't know what the unimpressive
looking debris was, Johnson took his pictures and left.
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- No other media representatives were allowed
to view the debris or to take any pictures. All these exotic actions apparently
were taken solely to mislead and misinform one 21-year-old photographer-reporter.
Later that day, Ramey summoned a weather officer, Warrant Officer Irving
Newton, to his office and instructed him to agree that the debris displayed
was only a "weather balloon" and Newton was then photographed
by a military photographer holding portions of this debris.
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- Other Roswell writers have claimed that
Marcel did accompany the actual debris to Fort Worth and was photographed
by Johnson holding pieces of the wreckage. However, the actual debris was
switched with the fake "weather balloon" before Ramey, Dubose
and Newton were photographed. The new studies confirm that pieces of the
wreckage seen in all the photos actually are identical.
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- General Ramey then quickly went to a
Fort Worth radio station and announced that his weather officer had decided
that the Roswell crash was only a weather balloon with an attached radar
target. Also, a news release was distributed to the press containing this
false information.
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- The press and the American public accepted
the story based on the word of a distinguished war-hero general. There
never has been any reason given as to why Ramey would have taken such a
drastic and risky action to deceive the press and the public in this very
dramatic way.
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- Roswell UFO writers generally have continued
to repeat the "balloon switch" fable. Nevertheless, Lt. Col.
Marcel contended until his death in 1986 that the material he recovered
and which he posed with in Ramey's office was "not part of any kind
of weather balloon or experimental craft ... it was not made of anything
available on earth." This description also has been corroborated by
the civilian primary witnesses.
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- Likewise, General Dubose was very clear
when interviewed by UFO researcher Jaime Shandera shortly before the general's
death. When asked to describe details of the photo session in General Ramey's
office Dubose made the following statements:
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- Shandera: J. Bond Johnson, reporter for
the Fort Worth-StarTelegram, has stated that when he asked General Ramey
what this debris was, Ramey said that he didn't know. You were present
in that room at that time. Also, the Associated Press had carried a story
indicating that General Ramey didn't know what the debris was when talking
to (Air Corps Chief of Staff) General (Hoyt) Vandenberg in Washington."
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- Dubose: "Well, that's true. None
of us knew what it was."
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- Shandera: "There are two researchers
(Don Schmitt and Kevin Randle) who are presently saying that the debris
in General Ramey's office had been switched and that you men had a weather
balloon there."
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- Dubose: "Oh Bull! That material
was never switched."
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- Shandera: "So what you're saying
is that the material in General Ramey's office was the actual debris brought
in from Roswell?"
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- Dubose: "That's absolutely right."
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- Shandera: "So not you or anyone
else ever switched that material for the cover story."
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- Dubose: "We never switched anything.
We were under orders from Washington to look at that material. We wouldn't
have switched anything. We were West Pointers -- we would never have done
that."
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- Shandera: "But General Ramey did
put out a cover story that it was a weather device."
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- Dubose: "Yes. We were ordered to
get the press off our backs -- things were getting out of hand."
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- Memories of witnesses may dim over the
span of half a century and more. But West Pointer General Dubose remembered
that day in July of 1947 very accurately it now appears. But digitally
enhanced, super-enlarged photos taken by a 21-year-old reporter-photographer
provide even a more convincing record. The debris of the Roswell crash
photographed in General Ramey's office is indeed genuine. General Ramey,
General Dubose and Lt. Colonel Marcel all were telling the truth about
the Roswell Incident of 1947. Their reputations remain intact! And now
the public also will be able to view the famous photos and speculate for
themselves whether debris is from an extraterrestrial spacecraft or some
earthly earth device. Now that it has been established what the Roswell
wreckage is NOT -- maybe modern technology can help to solve the half-century
old mystery of what the Roswell debris in fact IS!
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- Meanwhile, from her home in Denton, Texas,
Mrs. Latane Ramey, widow of General Ramey, issued through an official of
the Air Force Association a statement that the family is very grateful
that this new information has been released finally clearing General Ramey
of any wrongdoing in handling the Roswell Incident.
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- "We all want to keep him in high
esteem. He was a wonderful man. Apparently everyone liked and respected
him", Mrs. Ramey said.
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- General Ramey was a native of Denton
and attended North Texas State Teachers College before entering the US
Military Academy, where he was graduated in 1928. During World War II he
led the 58th Bomb Wing of the 20th Air Force, a B-29 unit, on several fire
bomb raids over Japan.
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- He later commanded a task force in the
Army Air Corps during the Army-Navy participation in the 1946 atom bomb
tests at Bikini Atoll in the Pacific.
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- He was assigned to the Fort Worth Army
Air Field in the spring of 1947 to reorganize the 8th Air Force, which
had gained fame in leading the bombing of Germany during World War II.
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- In 1949 he was honored by the Fort Worth
Chamber of Commerce as "man of the year" for rescue work during
the Trinity River flood that year. In 1950 he was named director of operations
for the Air Force in Washington, DC, and promoted to three-star rank. After
retirement from the Air Force, General Ramey served as vice president of
Northrop Aircraft in Los Angeles.
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- He was the father of a son, Kent, and
daughter, Mary Latane, both of Denton.
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