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A mainstream media piece by The Guardian from the UK is worth a look for it's portrayal of one of ufology's biggest embarrassments. "The Curious Case Of The Alien In The Photo And A Mystery That Took Years To Solve," written by Les Carpenter, a sports journalist, it sympathetically presents the Roswell Slides story from the POV of the promoter of the events, Adam Dew. There, Dew finally names and discloses the role of his silent partner, Joseph Beason. I'm not sure just why the story was newsworthy at this late date, but it does contain a few new bits, chiefly quotes from the perpetrators, and is the first interview with Dew since the events. It's a nice

By Curt Collins www.blueblurrylines.com 10-2-17

piece, but there are a few things that need to be clarified, and a few errors that need to be corrected.




Printy is correct. Carey and Schmitt’s claim that they received deceptive, manipulated versions of the scans is false. On the April 20, 2015, KGRA show, Fade to Black, a few weeks before BeWitness, Tom Carey said he was sent a high resolution version of the two Slides, and he describes both pictures in detail, the placard and the man and woman seen behind the body. (In other words, the museum setting was pictured.)

Video: "Ep. 241 FADE to BLACK Jimmy Church w/ Tom Carey, UFO Roswell Slides LIVE on air"
Carey, on receiving the Slides by email: 131:30, describing Slides images: 137 and 140.


Portions of those same scans were sent to David Rudiak and Anthony Bragalia in an attempt to read the placard. After the RSRG deblurred the placard, those scans were made public, and they could be deblurred and read just as easily. The charges of digital manipulation of the slides against Dew and Beason are false. However Dew admits to exploitation being "guilty of not discouraging the talk [of it being alien]. It was good for the project.”

Beason's Accusations of the RSRG Ffaking the Deblurring with Photoshop. ( - click and or right click to enlarge -)

BeWitness, Dew's clip of the Nov. 2013 meeting in Chicago

The story confirms that after the deblurring, it was Beason who the RSRG was corresponding with, not Dew and Beason who posted at Slidebox Media the RSRG were "internet UFO Trolls" hoaxing the placard. It was later toned down, and proven to be false, but no apology from Beason was offered. The Slidebox site, http://www.slideboxmedia.com, is now dead, but the YouTube account remains. It's reported that "Beason has moved on."

The most glaring distortion in the Guardian itself is the claim that the show was a last-minute 2015 decision made as a last resort:

"By early 2015, Beason and Dew knew they had no choice but to reveal the slides. The pressure to do so was extreme and Dew needed money to fund his documentary... The only appealing proposal came from Jamie Maussan, an investigative journalist based in Mexico City."

This is inaccurate. At BeWitness, Dew showed a clip documenting how the deal deal was brokered in November 2013, with Carey, Schmitt and Maussan traveling to Chicago for the signing the partnership arrangement.


The best quote in the Guardian story is how the investigation went off the rails. The pictures looked alien to them, and after pursuing details on Hilda Blair Ray's past, Dew said, “You start to fill in the blanks." Those blanks were filled with wishful thinking instead of evidence.

BeWitness promoter Jaime Maussan didn't get much coverage in the article, and it’s almost sad that "World-famous researcher" Anthony Bragalia who dreamed up much of the Slides narrative was not even mentioned.

If at first you don't succeed...

Jaime Maussan has never given up on the Slides and continues to promote them, and has since used some of the same “experts” to promote a series of Peruvian mummies as alien bodies. The enterprise was was heavily promoted and exploited by the subscription-based video service Gaia, that bills itself as “a member-supported conscious media company.” For further details, see The Atlantic's article, "The Racism Behind Alien Mummy Hoaxes by Christopher Heaney," Aug. 1, 2017

The new Guardian piece closes by saying that Dew intends to complete his documentary, Kodachrome, but otherwise life goes on. Of Carey and Schmitt, Dew says, “They got their hopes up,” but “will never get the answers they are looking for.”

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General Curtis LeMay was a larger than life figure who rose to prominence through his command of bombers in the second World War, and and afterwards for his development of the United States’ armed warfare during the Cold War. For an overview of his military career, see the biography at the Air Force’s site.

By Curt Collins thesaucersthattimeforgot 9-26-17

To UFO buffs, Gen. LeMay is best known for his role in the anecdote that Senator Barry Goldwater told....


Gen. Curtis LeMay, asked what he thought about flying saucers, replied:

"The best information in my opinion on them is to be found in a book written by an Englishman explaining numerous such mysteries. He says that the first flying saucers were seen in Egypt about the year 3,000 B. C."

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Bobby Mohon called the Jackson paper late Friday night from Crystal Springs with the story of how a flying saucer had struck a power company transformer on the night of May 12, causing an electrical outage in the city. He reported mangled bodies laying near the wreckage which had markings indicating it was an unusual military

By Curt Collins Saucers That Time Forgot 8-4-17

aircraft. In 1950, the term "UFO" had not yet come into usage, and "flying saucer" was used for unidentified flying objects of any shape. Mohon's saucer was actually described as cylindrical, and "definitely not an airplane." The Clarion Ledger scooped the nation with the saucer news, and credited the witness as co-author of the story, along with reporter Tommy E. Hederman.

The story was rushed to press and was on sale Saturday morning before all the facts were in. The investigation by Crystal Springs authorities was reported later the same day by other area news papers.
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“Ufology today is in the state I would say chemistry was when chemistry was alchemy, a mixture of superstition, wild ideas, unproved claims, and yet out of that whole mess, finally the very first class science of chemistry evolved. And I think the same thing is going to happen eventually with Ufology, but right now, it is a mess. ..."

By Curt Collins Blue Blurry Lines 6-30-17

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Isaac Koi is a well-known researcher from the UK working to preserve and share UFO literature and documents, with the stated purpose of making them freely available to all. Isaac is known personally by a few trusted colleagues, but uses a pseudonym while

By Curt Collins Blue Blurry Lines 12-4-16

working in the UFO community in order to protect his career. Recently, exposure of his identity has been threatened, causing him to announce that he was leaving UFO research.

Here's how it came to be.
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The Cash-Landrum UFO case publicity made a splash in 1981, but had a second wave starting in 1983 after the filing of the lawsuit against the US Government for 20 million dollars in damages. The suit stuck to the details of original incident, avoiding later embellishments such as the legend of the scorched road being removed and replaced by men in unmarked trucks. Despite the resolve of Betty Cash and Vickie Landrum, there was not sufficient evidence to take the case to trial, and as attorney Peter Gersten later revealed, it was a bluff:

By Curt Collins www.blueblurrylines.com 3-18-16

“The lawsuit was brought in hope that behind the scenes the government would say, `Let’s keep this quiet, we’ll take care of the medical expenses and make sure nothing else happens’."Houston Chronicle, Texas Magazine, Page 8, 2 Star Edition, 11/17/1996 [...]

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      Robert Sheaffer has been covering the UFO beat a long time, reading the literature, attending conferences, corresponding, debating with the players, and has become a part of its history. In the book,"Bad UFOs: Critical Thinking About UFO Claims," Sheaffer covers a range of UFO cases, topics and personalties from the dawn of the era, up to recent events. Frankly, some of which read like a hall of shame, and it could have been titled, UFOlogy’s Greatest Misses.” I can picture some scoundrels in UFOtown tearing through the pages, praying that their products and names aren’t in it. Sheaffer does mention a few good eggs along the way, “UFO realists,” but as the title suggests, he’s focused on the bad ones.

Robert Sheaffer, meanie. That’s what some UFO buffs have heard, and skeptics and debunkers are supposed to be attacking the very existence of UFOs, close-minded to the point of denying the truth, and rumor has it that some of them are even discrediting witnesses and evidence. Trace those tales to the source, and you’ll see they originated with phonies who didn’t want their carnival act exposed, people like Silas Newton, George Adamski and Jaime Maussan. The truth is more complicated, but then, that’s why so few people bother with it.

What many UFO/ET proponents fail to appreciate about skeptics and debunkers is that the devils are observing the same kind of claims about extraordinary things on a range of other topics, not just UFOs. There’s more in common with UFOs, Ghost, Bigfoot and Nessie than the ET camp would like to admit, and it lies in the seeker. It’s about the quest for something extraordinary, with belief driving the investigation. The big problem there is that they regularly accept insubstantial evidence if it bolsters their beliefs. Witness testimony is subject to great problems ranging from accuracy to authenticity, and the record of photo and physical evidence shows an alarmingly high tolerance for counterfeits. Sheaffer sees the absurdity and humor in the UFO circus, something the field seems incapable of seeing about itself. Worse, they seem incapable of dealing with frauds, and policing themselves. Like disgraced televangelists, if they have an apology or excuse, proven UFO scoundrels are welcomed back into the fold.


One recurring theme in Sheaffer’s book is that a UFO claim surfaces, gets embraced by the ET camp, and then is fiercely defended against not only challenges to its authenticity, but even logical questions about it. They get sour when it falls flat, but they are willfully ignoring their own statistics. According to MUFON, 80 to 90% of UFO reports crumble after being investigated, the remnant serving to keep hope alive, designated as “unknowns.” By cherishing UFO stories before all the facts are in, frequent disappointments are assured.

Sheaffer holds up a mirror to the UFO circus, and many in it won’t like the picture. Where I disagree with Sheaffer is over the conclusion that the study of UFOs is futile. My personal opinion is that it ufology should work towards co-operating with existing astronomical and meteorological projects, instead of trying to re-invent or duplicate them. Sheaffer convincingly makes the case that the current value or purpose of UFO study is only self-perpetuation, promoting UFO beliefs: that there’s a mystery and behind it is ET visitation.

The book discusses several key cases, some in detail, others in passing, including famous sightings from Kenneth Arnold to Kenju Terauchi’s report of a giant spaceship to recent cases. In these, he points out the recurring problems with the evidence or the interpretation of it. So often, it comes down to stories, and looking at the alien abduction accounts from Betty and Barney Hill to Emma Woods, these incredible tales emerged through hypnosis. In other stories, like those of Roswell alien bodies and the conflicting claims at Rendlesham Forest, Sheaffer shows that many of the heavily-promoted UFO tales have plot holes, big black plot holes, big enough to swallow planet Nibru.

Chances are, if you are seeing this, you’ll read a UFO book or two this year, and “Bad UFOs” should be one of them. If you are used to taking UFO stories on faith alone, you may want to throw it across the room a few times. Instead, take one of the cases discussed and look up the documentation for it, and to see for yourself if the facts back up the legends you’ve been told about it. The cases that hold up to the challenges of skeptics are the one really worth pursuing.

About the UFOs being spacecraft, Sheaffer also reintroduces some hard scientific facts that many ET proponents don’t know, or choose to ignore about the overwhelming physical impracticality of interstellar space travel. Even folding or warping space seems out of the realm of possibility, and to make it work, something like magic must be needed. Just how are the visitors getting here? Perhaps believing is the key to seeing. Dr. Steven Greer can lead you through meditation to summon and communicate with ETI spacecraft. Sometimes, you won’t see them at first, but with patience, Greer can teach you how- for a price.

Sheaffer thinks that behind all the UFO stories, there’s nothing but cases of mistaken identity, wishful thinking and fraud. I hope he’s wrong, and that there is a rare, genuine phenomenon, whatever it is. I do agree, however, that the problems he discusses are severe and until UFOtown polices itself, it’ll remain a ghetto- or a ghost town.
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