High Alert! UFO over Oak Ridge National Laboratory, circa 1951

Professor Alan D. Conger is the key player in this case, and we'll begin by introducing him thorough a few key quotes from his obituary:

Alan Conger, a pioneer in genetic effects of radiation, died 22 Dec 1995... He was 78 years old. Alan was born 23 Mar 1917, in Muskegon, Michigan. He attended Harvard as both an undergraduate and a graduate student, and received the Ph.D. degree in biology in 1947.

After (working in the weather service for the Army during WWII), Alan returned to Harvard to pursue his graduate work.. Alan had become interested in the genetic effects of radiation... He began his research career in this field at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in 1947 and had a major role in the early bomb tests in the Pacific.

 

Only small part of the following plays a role in the UFO case, but it's too valuable not too repeat.

Alan was well known for his puckish sense of humor... One tangible artifact to have survived his Florida period is associated with Alan's service on the Radiation Study Section of the National Institutes of Health. He donated to that body an alligator coprolite that he had collected in the Florida swamps, which he had mounted on an impressive plaque for presentation annually to the member chosen by his colleagues to have propagated during his study section tenure the greatest quantity of the material of which the coprolite was composed.

( We had to look it up. Coprolite means fossilized excrement.)

Flying Saucers over Oak Ridge National Laboratory

First, we need to introduce the location.
"Established during World War II by the Manhattan District, Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) occupied the X-10 site on the fifty-six-thousand-acre reservation between Clinch River and Black Oak Ridge purchased by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in 1942. Initially called Clinton Laboratories after the nearest town, it began as a top-secret installation to produce plutonium for the first nuclear weapons." For further details, see The Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture: Oak Ridge National Laboratory.


In The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects, Capt. Edward J. Ruppelt, ex-head of Project Blue Book said, "...UFO's were habitually reported from areas around 'technically interesting' places like our atomic energy installations, harbors, and critical manufacturing areas." He cited a notable UFO case from Oak Ridge, where an object was sighted by ground observers, confirmed by radar, and pursued by an Air Force plane:  

On June 21, 1952, at 10:58P.M., a Ground Observer Corps spotter reported that a slow-moving craft was nearing the AEC's Oak Ridge Laboratory, an area so secret that it is prohibited to aircraft. The spotter called the light into his filter center and the filter center relayed the message to the ground control intercept radar. They had a target. But before they could do more than confirm the GOC spotter's report, the target faded from the radarscope. An F-47 aircraft on combat air patrol in the area was vectored in visually, spotted a light, and closed on it. They "fought" from 10,000 to 27,000 feet, and several times the object made what seemed to be ramming attacks. The light was described as white, 6 to 8 inches in diameter, and blinking until it put on power. The pilot could see no silhouette around the light.

Ruppelt's story was just one of many from the facility. It's an old question: Are there more UFOs reported around sensitive government facilities because the objects are attracted to them, or is it just that the heightened security produces more false alarms? Fran Ridge's site has a page, NICAP: The Oak Ridge Sightings, featuring several similar events of this kind from around 1950, other Radar-Visual cases where planes were sent out to pursue UFOs reported over ORNL. 

1976: Alan Conger's UFO Disclosure

The Oak Ridge National Laboratory Review's Fall 1976 issue featured a look back at the organizations history: "this special issue of the Review contains a skeleton history of the Laboratory's first 25 years, interspersed with reminiscences, anecdotes, funny pictures, and a few expansions on particular aspects of importance to the Laboratory." There was only one reminiscence about a UFO.

Alan Conger Remembers... 

     Old-timers in the Biology Division may remember the overhang roof facing the highway outside my second floor lab in 9207 -our lunch patio where we dined on balmy days under the morning glories. At the height of the UFO scares (ca. 1951 ?), coming across some balloons and a helium tank left over from our first lab Open House, I filled six or so balloons with helium, tied them together with string, and attached a 6-ft strip of aluminum foil beneath as a radar target. With Kim Atwood's help, I got it out of the lab and launched from our roof patio, admiring its stately ascent as it drifted down Bear Creek Valley, rapidly transforming from a recognizable bundle of balloons and foil into an unidentifiable flying object. We then ran down the hall, calling out to Jack Von Borstel, Bill Arnold, Shelly Wolff, and others, "See the UFO!"
     It caused great excitement and much speculation about what it was, its size, velocity, and height; and soon, even more excitement when it was detected by the nearby radar station on Pilot Mountain, and the fighter-interceptor squadron then stationed at Knoxville was scrambled to intercept the intruder. With planes buzzing around, and our scientist friends seriously considering the object, the situation had rapidly become so very imposing that neither Kim nor I had the guts to confess to our hoax. We kept quiet and hoped the Air Force or AEC would be unable to identify us.
     A few years ago, my son, reading a book on UFOs, came across this incident as one of the case histories of UFO sightings from Air Force records. He recognized it as a hoax, and surmised that some unknown Oak Ridge scientists probably perpetrated it.
-Alan D. Conger, Professor of Radiobiology, School of Medicine, Temple University 

Conger's accomplice was Dr. Kimball C. Atwood III, senior biologist at the ORNL. Most UFO balloon hoaxes are perpetrated by mischievous kids, not Ph.D.s working at US government facilities.
 Up close, the UFO must have looked something like this.

But at a distance, the sun's reflection from metal foil would have been the most visible feature. The foil also provided something for the radar to find, serving as an improvised radar wind target of RAWIN. On radar, the foil strip registered as a solid object, and it was due to this the hoax worked well enough for the Air Force to scramble planes to catch the UFO.

Radar operator, circa 1950.

Dr. Congers did not remember the precise date of the incident, so it's difficult to match Air Force records. There is a possible match in Project Blue Book's files in this one from December of 1950:  18 Dec. 1950, Oak Ridge, Tenn. 

This episode and its exposure seems to have been the extent of Professor Conger's involvement in the UFO controversy.

In an interesting trivial footnote to the story, Conger's hoaxing accomplice, Kim Atwood, had a son who has written articles on medical quackery for the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry's Skeptical Inquirer magazine.

"Kimball C. Atwood IV, M.D. is an anesthesiologist at the Newton-Wellesley Hospital in Newton, Massachusetts. He is Assistant Clinical Professor at the Tufts University School of Medicine and Contributing Editor of the Scientific Review of Alternative Medicine." 

CSI is the den for UFO debunkers like Robert Sheaffer, James Oberg, Joe Nickell, and the late Phil Klass.

Thanks to Roger Glassel for locating the magazine article with Dr. Conger's confession.

Flying Saucers, the Atomic Bomb and Doomsday: The Outer Limit (Part 1 of 5)

The Outer Limit: A Prelude

The War of the Worlds by H. G. Wells was first published in 1897, and it is perhaps the most famous and influential science fiction story of all time. Fantasy stories usually involve regular people facing extraordinary experiences, often in a tale of their journey to a strange land. Wells was one of those authors who flipped the premise, by having the strangeness make the journey, intruding into our everyday world. His story is about an alien landing, the beginning of an invasion by conquerors. The Martians have no interest in communicating with humans, who they see as pests that must be exterminated before they can inhabit the Earth. Without meaning to, the Martians unite mankind.

“Did they grasp that we in our millions were organized, disciplined, working together? Or did they interpret our spurts of fire, the sudden stinging of our shells, our steady investment of their encampment, as we should the furious unanimity of onslaught in a disturbed hive of bees?... Never before in the history of the world had such a mass of human beings moved and suffered together.”

The 1938 CBS broadcast of Orson Welles and the Mercury Theatre's adaptation of The War of the Worlds became the most famous radio drama of all time, and due to its documentary-like presentation some listeners thought a real war had come to the USA. The real thing would come just a few years later with the bombing of Pearl Harbor drawing the States into the Second World War.

The Atom Bomb: A Study of Atom Power, 1945

"Is it a blessing, or will it smash humanity?"

War of the World

The atomic bomb was seen by some people as a tool to bring peace. In the closing days of World War II, shortly after the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, a survey conducted by Gallup Poll in late August 1945, showed that 69% of the US public felt the atomic bomb was a "good thing." However, afterwords there were those with some rising serious concerns about its destructive potential.

"The public, having been warned of the horrible nature of atomic warfare, has done nothing about it, and to a large extent has dismissed the warning... I say that nothing has been done to avert war since the completion of the atomic bomb, despite the proposal for supranational control of atomic energy put forward by the United States in the United Nations." - Albert Einstein,  The Atlantic, November 1947

Before Doar and Saucers

Harold Sherman and his messiah from Mars, Numar, The Green Man.

The Green Man was a 1946 novel by psychic Harold Sherman that introduced Numar, a peaceful messiah-like messenger in a spaceship from another planet with the power to make our technology stand still. In 1979, Sherman described his inspiration: 

"I had a series of visions wherein I saw Space Beings, possessed of high intelligence, visiting our Earth in space ships of different shapes and sizes, for the purpose of exploration and eventually to fill our skies with large space vehicles, coming in force, hopefully on a friendly mission to help Mankind save itself from self-destruction."

In the 1947 sequel, The Green Man Returns, Numar comes back to deliver "A New Plan of Living which will solve our earth’s problems and bring about true brotherhood," which would end war and the associated threat of atomic bombs.

On Oct. 9, 1946, there was a report of Kareeta, a spaceship visiting the Earth, piloted by Etherians, peaceful visitors who didn't land because "they're afraid of the reception they'll get." The Borderland Sciences Research Associates had established telepathic communication and later disclosed that "at every great crisis . . . or just prior to the collapse of civilization, they make an extended survey here for their own information and historical records."

Weeks before the birth of the age of flying saucers, BSRA member and Fortean Vincent Gaddis wrote in the May/June 1947 issue of Round Robin about extraterrestrials, the Shaver Mystery, and how ancient spiritual entities from space might intercede to protect us from World War III: 

"Among those who can think there is a growing sense of worry and fear. That our culture is nearing a breaking point... There is a gathering of Powers, a search for places of safety, the building of two great armed camps. There have been many prophecies... In 1937 a remarkable prophecy was received in America from high spiritual beings and sent to Dr. Alexander Cannon, in London. who reproduced it in his book, The Power of Karma... This revelation tells of a 'great migration of celestial beings' ages ago, who came to this planet from outer space..."

Worries about the A-bomb grew in people's minds, and the best hope for world peace seemed to be the United Nations. When flying discs hit the news in 1947, some people suspected connections between atomic power and the flying saucers. Others thought flying saucers were a sign that the world was ending.

Medford Mail Tribune, June 27, 1947

A musical warning: (When You See) Those Flying Saucers by Cy Coben-Charlie Green, performed by The Buchanan Brothers, Oct. 27, 1947,  RCA Victor 20-2385-A

"...Many people think the saucers might be someone’s foolish dream

Or maybe they were sent down here from Mars

If you’ll just stop and think you’d realize just what it means

They’re more than atom bombs or falling stars

And though the war may be through there’s unrest and trouble brewin’

And those flying saucers may be just a sign

That if peace doesn’t come it will be the end of some

So repent today, you’re running out of time

When you see a saucer fly like a comet through the sky

You should realize the price you’ll have to pay

You’d better pray to the Lord when you see those flying saucers

It may be the coming of the Judgment Day"

At that time, only the mystical fringe that had already believed we were being visited by extraterrestrials gave serious consideration to flying saucers having an outer space origin. Among them, some took it as a sign, that our ancient gods were back, and here to help.

"Will the ancient gods... come back in time to avert an atom war?"
From "Son of the Sun." by Millen Cooke (as Alexander Blade) illustrated by James Settles. 
Fantastic Adventures Vol.9. No.7. November 1947. 

One World or None

The 1948 novel, The Flying Saucer by Bernard Newman was about an alien invasion prompting the United Nations to unite the world against a common outside enemy.  The invasion was a fake, a conspiracy by scientists who were committed to bring peace to the world and remove the threat of atomic war.

Everyone has heard of the UN, United Nations... But what is the UW? 

In Captain Marvel Adventures #98, dated July 1949, the super hero sees a flying saucer and decides to solve the mystery. Following it to its home planet he's surprised to learn, "Holy Moley! Our Galaxy has a government!" The United Worlds "was formed 1000 years ago to eliminate all war, crime and evil in the galaxy." Earth has been denied membership, but the UW eventually has a change of heart after demonstrations of CM's heroics, but he says, no; the Earth has yet to earn its membership.

The United Nations seemed stymied in keeping the peace on Earth, and with the A-bomb in play it it would be terrible. In times of trouble, people often look to help from above, and in the age of flying saucers, there were some new possibilities.

The Twilight Zone between Flying Saucers and Science Fiction

Science fiction magazines had come into bloom in the 1920s, full of visitors from other worlds, spaceships and almost every other concept that later surfaced in connection with UFOs. Not everyone read SF magazines, but almost everyone read the newspaper, listened to the radio and went to the movies. In the 1940s, the best-known science fiction to the average person was from the comic strips, Buck Rogers, Flash Gordon and Superman, but most would also have remembered the notorious Martian invasion from the The War of the Worlds. Those stories introduced the basic science fiction concepts to an audience of millions of all ages. The science fiction magazines reached a much smaller but devoted audience, and one publication was doing something different. 

In 1944, Ray Palmer introduced the Shaver Mystery to the readers of Amazing Stories, presenting it as a genuine case of extraterrestrials having an active presence on Earth. Palmer also encouraged readers to write in with reports of their sightings of strange things seen in the sky. It was the magazine's policy that alien visitors had come here, and that the space ships were real. 

Ad for FATE magazine, Amazing Stories, dated May 1948.

When saucers arrived in 1947, Palmer offered them as evidence that they were connected, proving Shaver's stories were true. Together with publisher Curtis Fuller in 1948, he launched Fate a magazine on the occult, and the the cover feature of the first issue was, "The Truth about Flying Saucers." The notion of ET saucers was being put out, but the mainstream thought of it as kid stuff, that men from Mars belonged in the funny pages with Buck Rogers. Two magazine stories were about to go a long way towards changing that perception.

Graham Doar's short story, "The Outer Limit" debuted in The Saturday Evening Post dated December 24, 1949. It hit the newsstands shortly before the January 1950 issue of True magazine, which carried Major Donald Keyhoe's famous article, "The Flying Saucers Are Real." The following newspaper article discusses both stories.

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Dec. 27, 1949, Page 1

After covering Keyhoe's claims, they turn to Doar's story:

It's probably a coincidence that last week's Saturday Evening Post featured a flying saucer story – indexed as fiction – which indicated that the world would end with a bang. In "The Outer Limit," Graham Doar tells how a pilot flying and experimental rocket at five times the speed of sound encountered and was sucked into a flying saucer manned by intelligent beings who warned him that because of the atomic explosions observed from their world they had surrounded Earth with a force field having the effect of a planetary quarantine. Set off any more atomic bombs, they cautioned him, and Earth would explode like a nova.

What set Doar's story apart was that it took A-bomb fears, science fiction ideas and coupled them together with flying saucers for perhaps the first time, certainly a first for a mainstream magazine. What makes Doar's story notable is not only the content, but also its incredible exposure. Aviation historian Curtis Peebles wrote in a Magonia article:

While The Saturday Evening Post had a massive circulation, ‘The Outer Limit’ reached a much wider audience than just the magazine’s subscribers. ...Doar’s story “may be the most often used science fiction story in radio.” ‘The Outer Limit’ was dramatised five times on radio and twice on television.

The tale would have been perfect for The Twilight Zone, but it hadn't been created yet.  There's a lot more to be said about the story, and we'll take a detailed look at "The Outer Limit" and how it introduced concepts that would come to be central to the public's perceptions of UFOs. The subsequent installments will cover:

The Outer Limit, the original short story
The Outer Limit, as adapted for radio and television
The Outer Limit Legacy, its influence on ufology
The Outer Limit Legacy, its influence on science fiction films

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