Avoiding a War of the Worlds: Don't Shoot Them Down!

"Cutting loose your guns might be suicide." 

Major Lewis Norman, as quoted by Donald Keyhoe 

in Flying Saucers from Outer Space, 1953.

Art by Norm Saunders from the 1962 Topps trading card series Mars Attacks
card #4: "Saucers Blast Our Jets."

In 1952, there were rumors and speculation that the Air Force had ordered pilots to fire on flying saucers. Some people were afraid of the consequences, and thought we might anger a technologically advanced civilization and provoke a war we could not win.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer, July 29, 1952

Jet pilots are operating under a 24-hour nation-wide "alert” to chase the mysterious objects and to ‘shoot them down” if they ignore orders to land.

Long Beach Independent, July 30, 1952

 Lebanon Daily News, July 31, 1952.

Perfect Souls from Outer Space

Mangan may have been right. In the 1952 documentary short, The Flying Saucer Mystery, the author of one of the best-selling UFO books of all time was interviewed. Frank Scully of Behind the Flying Saucers said we shouldn't shoot at saucers since the aliens might be "perfect souls" never sullied by the serpent in the Garden of Eden. They would therefore be immortal (and presumably invincible), so to attack them would be "idiotic."

Frank Scully clip from The Flying Saucer Mystery, 1952

For more information on the "1952 Flying Saucer 'Shoot Down' Stories," see David Rudiak's page, http://roswellproof.homestead.com/ShootDown_INS_72952.html

The Ufologists That Time Forgot: Wade Wellman

Manly Wade Wellman, Jr. was born November 13, 1939, the son of a giant, the noted fantasy and science fiction author Manly Wade Wellman. His father's work included contributing to magazines such as the legendary Weird Tales alongside H.P. Lovecraft,  C.L. Moore and Robert E. Howard. The son, instead of using his full name,  he went by Wade Wellman, perhaps to try to create his own identity and step out of his father's shadow.

Weird Tales, Nov. 1943

A Rising Star

1958, from his senior year at Chapel Hill High School

In the early 1960s as a college student, Wade Wellman had a serious interest in UFOs, and was an active member of the National Investigations Committee On Aerial Phenomena, (NICAP). He was passionate about the topic and corresponded as an advocate to promote Congressional hearings into the study of UFOs, writing to people and institutions such as US Congressmen and Time magazine.

NICAP's UFO Investigator, Oct. 1961

The Daily Tar Heel, the student newspaper for the University of North Carolina carried Wellman's series of articles on UFOs which included key case information and a discussion of the credible- and incredible literature on the topic- which he was very critical of. 

The Daily Tar Heel, Sept. 21, 1960

A Cyclopean amount has been written on flying saucers since the first modern reports in 1947. The balance of this is crackpot writing which gets most of the attention and deserves none of it. There is, for instance, George Adamski, who claims to have flown with people from Saturn. Or Frank Scully, who says the saucers are ships from Venus. Or Gerald Heard, who, in an undeservedly famous book entitled Is Another World Watching, credits the saucers to super bees from Mars. And, of course, there are always the perennial claims of personal contact with people or semihuman monsters from other worlds — and, perhaps worst of all, the ridiculous term "flying saucers," a hindrance to any real study. 

Yet, despite the flood of nonsense which seems deliberately calculated to rob the subject of thoughtful attention, there are innumerable people who have seen real UFO's (Unidentified Flying Objects) and who won't be duped by the crackpot writers, or by the hollow USAF denials, or by the sneer: "He says he saw a flying saucer." 

Archive of The Daily Tar Heel, with Wade Wellman's UFO columns.

Wellman took the topic seriously, and also wrote about the effort by NICAP and others to petition the US government to investigate the UFO matter more thoroughly. In a postscript to the series,  he wrote an article about his first visit to NICAP's office and his meeting with the director, Donald Keyhoe and assistant, Richard Hall.

NICAP was the conservative end of the saucer spectrum, but Wellman also wrote for the UK's Flying Saucer Review, which was far more tolerant of the kind of Contactee "crackpots" that he and NICAP thought were keeping the UFO topic on the marginal fringes. Wellman's articles were much more grounded, and despite his youth, his work was appearing alongside writers like John Keel and Jacques Vallée. His FSR articles included:

Extra-Solar UFOs, March-April 1962
The UFO Sledgehammer, Jan-Feb, 1963
Phobos and Deimos, May-June 1963
The Psychology of Scepticism, Sept-Oct. 1963
Two Types of Scepticism, May-June 1965 
Sense and Speculation, Sept-Oct. 1965

Another thing that shows Wellman's earnestness about to the UFO topic was his contentious correspondence with the notorious UFO skeptic and debunker, Harvard Astronomer, Dr. Donald Menzel. Among the UFO correspondence in Menzel's files, Wellman's letters are there alongside names like Hynek, Sagan and Keyhoe.

American Philosophical Society, Menzel's UFO papers

According to Michael Swords, the exchange was a running debate by mail, one of "barely controlled civility." Swords says, "Wade Wellman and Donald Menzel resorted to introducing their letters to one another with 'Dear Duck' and 'Dear Weedy, referencing Wellman smoking pot, after a few exchanges---Menzel started this 'upmanship' by the way." Wellman thought Menzel was in denial of the extraterrestrial reality. In his article, on Menzel, "The UFO Sledgehammer" in the Jan-Feb, 1963, Flying Saucer Review, Wellman wrote, 

"It seems regrettable that so great an astronomer cannot leave the door open wide enough to back out gracefully when the full truth emerges. If our first landings on the moon run up against alien bases, Dr. Menzel may find his position slightly embarrassing."

Menzel and Wellman shared another interest besides UFOs; their love of fantastic fiction. Menzel contributed the cover for the issue of Galaxy magazine that also featured Wellman's poem, "The Martian Surface." It was a collaboration of sorts. When Menzel introduced it elsewhere, he wrote, "The following sonnet, written at my suggestion by Wade Wellman, interprets Martian life as we may expect to find it."

Galaxy, Sept. 1969

Graduating college seems to have cut into Wellman's UFO research time, but also he had other interests including, literature, writing poetry, space exploration, vampires, fantasy and science fiction. His 1963 thesis for the University of North Carolina, was titled '"Literary Treatments of the Vampire." Wellman graduated from UNC in 1964 with a Master of Arts degree, and in 1965 he was an instructor in English at the University of Wisconsin–Stevens Point. In 1967, he was an English instructor at Boise College in Idaho, and he published a 131-page collection of his poetry, November Wind, from Golden Quill Press.

An awkward visit to the UK

In late 1966, Wellman visited the UK, and part of his trip there was for the purpose of examining UFO files. At his site devoted to writer John Keel, Doug Skinner published some information on Wellman's visit to the UK home of Charles Bowen of the FSR:

Many readers of The Mothman Prophecies will remember a disturbing “Man In Black” named “Tiny,” who visited a family in New Jersey in 1967. (It’s in Chapter 8, if you want to look it up.) John sent a detailed report of this encounter to other researchers shortly after it happened... One of these researchers, Charles Bowen (the editor of Flying Saucer Review), wrote back to say that Tiny reminded him of an unpleasant UFO buff who had visited him the year before.

Bowen's letter to Keel about the visit states: "In November I received a letter from Wade Wellman who announced that he was flying over to England to do research in the British Museum (checking on a manuscript about vampires!)." Wellman arrived on Dec. 10, 1966, and Bowen found the large young man to be very strange, both in appearance and behavior. "He often broke into poetry... reciting it as though he had learnt it computer fashion. He drank the best part of a bottle of my Martini & got himself well sloshed — & ranted on about poor misunderstood Hitler etc. etc... I thought he was a schizo." The next day, when Wellman finally got around to asking to see FSR's UFO files, Bowmen lied, saying they were at his office in order to get rid of him.

Apparently Wellman had not been able to afford the trip himself and it was financed by his parents. Sadly, this episode seems to show that there were serious problems early in his adult life.

Flying Saucers Farewell

The end of the 1960s was a rough time for the UFO business. As Don Berliner explained, in 1967, NICAP had about 14,000 members, but trouble was coming. Assistant Director Richard Hall left NICAP, and the negative conclusions by Dr. Edward Condon's University of Colorado study on UFOs paved the way for the closure of Project Blue Book.

Regarding Wellman's warning about finding alien bases on the moon, we don't know how he reacted to this cartoon, but it appeared in the newspaper above an editorial that set him off.

Pat Oliphant cartoon as published in the Dubuque Telegraph Herald, Jan. 17, 1969

The Iowa newspaper, the Dubuque Telegraph Herald, Jan. 17, 1969, carried an opinion piece by William Hines, "UFO Buffs Launch A Paperback Barb." Hines' key points:

• If a person is absolutely certain that John F. Kennedy's assassination was the work of a conspiracy, or that the earth is flat, or that flying saucers come from outer space, no study however scientific and no report however official will ever persuade him to the contrary. 

•  The other day (Donald) Keyhoe called a news conference at Washington's National Press Club to trumpet his objections to the Condon report and –  ever so incidentally – to plug a paperback book just published by a colleague.

•  Keyhoe's dissent to the Condon report was the usual farrago of insinuation allusions and almost -truths that reporters have grown accustomed to at NICAP press conferences.

• Leave the Keyhoes to the boob tube, the paperback shelves and the barbershop reading racks, and keep them out of the science classroom. Then perhaps we will all muddle through somehow after all.

The article caught Wellman's eye. He saw it as a "furious attack on Donald Keyhoe," and his scathing reply was printed four days later.

Dubuque Telegraph Herald, Jan. 21, 1969

Things didn't go Wellman's way. Don Berliner on how the Condon report heralded the end of an era:

"...public interest dissolved. NICAP's membership rolls shrank, the bank balance dwindled and operations had to be cut back. In the summer of 1969, with the membership already down below 8,000, there was a 50 percent cut in staff... The closing of the Air Force investigation seemed to have killed public interest." 

Donald Keyhoe, under pressure from the board of directors, resigned from NICAP.

Fantasy and Science Fiction

Wellman's UFO writing had trailed off in the 1960s, but into the 1970s, he wrote poetry, essays and stories for fantasy and science fiction magazines, much of it in the dark spirit of Weird Tales, while other poems looked to the wonders of outer space. His best-known work is the collaboration with his father on a series of Sherlock Holmes science fiction stories that pit the detective against H.G. Wells' Martian invaders from The War of the Worlds. In the resulting 1975 book, Sherlock Holmes' War of the Worlds, Wellman explained how the project came to be:

I suddenly began to ask myself—wondering, indeed, why I had never thought of it before—how Holmes might have reacted to H. G. Wells's Martian invasion. I determined to write a story on this subject and, since I am primarily a poet, felt obliged to ask for assistance. My father agreed to collaborate, suggesting that another Doyle character, Professor Challenger, be included. Our collaboration, "The Adventure of the Martian Client," was published in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction for December, 1969.

The magazine introduced Wellman as "a published poet who is presently professor of English at Clarke College (Iowa)." The first story was followed in March 1972, by "Venus, Mars, and Baker Street," and a third in May 1975, "Sherlock Holmes Versus Mars." With those three stories and some additions and revisions, it was published in September of 1975 by Warner Books.

Sherlock Holmes' War of the Worlds had mixed reviews, and the Wilson Library Bulletin called it a "collision of Baker Street and outer space," but the premise alone captured the imagination of many readers around the world. The book was translated and published abroad,  and more recently, reprinted as The Further Adventures of Sherlock Holmes: War of the Worlds in 2009. The book made a lasting impression. It can be said that The War of the Worlds was the first UFO story, so it's fitting that Wellman called in the ultimate detective to investigate on the case.

His Last Bow

Wade Wellman seems to have dropped out of Ufology about the time NICAP withered, but he was heard from again about twenty years later, in a call to CUFOS. Jerome Clark, UFO historian, wrote, 

"I spoke with him on the phone once, probably in the early 1990s, when I was at the Center for UFO Studies office in Chicago researching my UFO Encyclopedia. Wellman called... He told me he was living in Milwaukee and working... I knew who he was — he wrote some essays for FSR, and I was aware he was Manly Wade’s son — and I recalled Charles Bowen’s story, which he’d related to me not long after the notorious encounter. So I was on my guard. Wellman seemed normal enough, however. I don’t recall much of the substance of the conversation, except that one point he expressed admiration for Donald Keyhoe’s prose."

There's more than a hint that Wellman suffered from some mental health and chemical dependency problems, but it's not clear just when it all began. The 1960s were a tumultuous time that included a lot of young people radically experimenting with drugs and sex, and it's worth noting that few stories about dark poets have happy endings. Wade had a troubled relationship with his parents, and reportedly, treated them horribly. Apparently, the Wellmans loved Wade and continued to support him financially, but disapproved of his personal life. 

Wade's father died in 1986, and his mother Frances died in 2000. In a tribute to Manly Wade Wellman, fantasy fiction scholar Steven R. Trout wrote that, "Manly’s own son Wade seems likely to have been a disappointment to him, as David Drake reports he was living in a 'charity hostel' because of substance abuse issues at the time of his mother’s death." 

A Postscript

When the first Holmes vs the Martians story appeared in the Dec. 1969 Fantasy and Science Fiction, it included an epilogue by Wade Wellman, "A Postscript by the Junior Collaborator." He described how he concieved the idea for the story, but his final two paragraphs touched on the UFO topic.

The depth and magnitude of Wells's idea is increasingly relevant as the years go by. It seems to me that the UFO's may well represent a technology as far above human civilization as we are above the communities of jungle animals. Their observations of the earth might be likened to a zoological team observing zebras in the jungle. Again, a human being watching a UFO hover in the air may be in the position of a baboon watching a hovering helicopter. I strongly suspect that this is the case. But, whatever the reality behind the UFO's may be, I feel that our emergence into space must inevitably, at some time, bring us into contact with "minds that are to our minds as ours are to those of the beasts that perish," to quote again from Wells's own text. We must not refuse this challenge, but even so I am disturbed by the efforts now being made to signal other worlds. Years ago an unnamed space scientist was quoted as saying that, to certain alien races, we might be "the finest beef animals." He knew his H. G. Wells, and that his warning was unheeded is a reproach to the poor alertness of his colleagues.

In any case, the conquest of space and the UFO surveillance are the beginning of events which will broaden our horizons tremendously, whatever their final outcome. It is for this reason that every thinking person should study Wells's original idea and apply its significance and implications to our own time.

-WADE WELLMAN  

The later version published introducing the Holmes book dropped all references to UFOs.

Wellman had recommended the writing of Otto O. Binder (science fiction, comic book and UFO author) in his angry 1969 reply to the Dubuque Telegraph Herald, and Binder dedicated his 1972 historical fiction novel, The Forgotten Colony, "To Wade Wellman for the new light he shone on Benedict Arnold and his military genius."  Binder remembered him again in another book. Mankind: Child of the Stars was a 1974 non-fiction book exploiting the "Ancient Astronauts" fad. It carried an introduction by Erich Von Daniken, with his name appearing on the cover above that of the authors, Max H. Flindt and Otto O. Binder. A poem by Wellman opens the book, possibly his last published words on the UFO subject.

To the Authors 

We search with humbled thoughts and reeling brains 

For stellar footprints, cosmic legacy, 

For signs of visitors from distant lanes 

Who bred this race in dim prehistory, 

And wonder if these watchers of the earth, 

These strange observers from a stranger port, 

Evolved us from the brutes to foster mirth, 

Created us in fancy and in sport. 

The mighty structures of a dateless age 

That hold their stories thoughtfully concealed 

May still become an open lamplit page 

In which these riddles show themselves revealed; 

And we, who strive to open and to rob 

The secrets, face the laughter of the mob. 

                                                      – WADE WELLMAN

Radio, Television & The Outer Limit Legacy (Part 3 of 5)

Flying Saucers, the Atomic Bomb and Doomsday: The Outer Limit (Part 1 of 5)
The Outer Limit by Graham Doar: The UFO Parable (Part 2 of 5)

In our previous installment, we looked at the original story of "The Outer Limit" by Graham Doar, and how it presented the arrival of flying saucers, as a turning point in mankind's future. Shortly after the story saw print it was adapted for broadcast, first on radio.

The Many Lives of The Outer Limit: Radio and Television

Radio once served the same purpose that television later would, to electronically deliver broadcasts of news and entertainment to millions of people's homes. Many radio producers were able to make their shows more attractive to audiences by featuring movie stars in the cast of their shows. Between 1950 and 57, there were two different scripts adapted from "The Outer Limit," with at least five different productions of it for radio, most of them in popular dramatic programs aimed at a general audience. 

Escape, February 7, 1950 was produced and directed by William N. Robson, adapted for radio by Morton Fine and David Friedkin. Frank Lovejoy starred as Major Bill Westphal (usually transcribed as Westfall). The story begins with a briefing in preparation for of the test flight of the RJX1, with Hank, the Colonel, stressing the potential danger to the pilot's life. The stakes are high, and Bill's a family man with a wife and twin boys at home. The military and technical details add to the story's credibility and tension.

Westphal's ship is launched and all goes well until he sees something, "maybe a flying disc, a big one, and it's spinning like a top!" His ship loses pressure, and is being pulled towards the disc when he blacks out. When he awakens he hears two voices of his two alien captors, Captain Xeglon and the Commander (name Zzyl used only in the credits).

 Xeglon asks Bill, "Can you understand me? Are we in contact?" They tell him their space ship is powered by the harnessed power of a thousand suns, and in order to demonstrate their advanced technology, take him far out into space and temporarily paralyze their captive with "a screen of force." Xeglon tells him, "You are aboard Space Patrol ship SJ23. I am Captain Xeglon of the Galactic Guard... the guardian of the galaxy, the guardian of the universes, the instrument of the Brotherhood of Worlds has set up in defense against civilizations such as yours." 

Bill is unable to see the aliens, and comes to understand that the communication is with telepathy. Xeglon tells him that their ship's ray had stopped his flight, and that his plane had been repaired and would be returned to him. He explains they detected residue from atomic bombs and traced it to the Earth, and the Galactic Council has quarantined the planet. They sealed it of with a force screen that would explode when it accumulated enough atomic bomb particles. "The Commander tells him that "We have finally outlawed war throughout space, including the Earth. ... If you continue to make atomic bombs... making war with them, exploding them, it would upset the balance of the entire universe, throwing all space into chaos." He tells Bill it is his duty to warn the Earth that "If you start an atomic war, the Earth will be completely destroyed." 

Their huge ship contains Bill's plane, and they launch it back into Earth's atmosphere.

Upon his return, Bill asks for the crew to check plane with a Geiger counter for radiation. Hank orders Bill to talk to Major Donaldson, the psychologist. Returning from a commercial break, we hear Bill wrapping up his story to Donaldson, who does not seem to believe the story of "men from Mars."
Bill becomes agitated and tells them that "one more bomb" will cause destruction of the Earth. Hank orders Bill to settle down and has the psychiatrist give him a sedative to allow him to sleep.
They leave him and Donaldson discusses how he will treat Bill's delusions, but in this version it is Hank that delivers the zinger. "When you treat him... consider this: How did he keep that plane in the air for ten hours – for ten hours, Major, when he had fuel to last him only ten minutes?”

After the story, the announcer says that, "Actual flight details were authenticated by rocket test pilot, Gene May, Sgt. Hartley Caldwell of the Air Force section of Armed Forces Information Office, and the Douglas Aircraft Corporation."

Comments:
The Escape story adds some details to the story:
The UFO uses a ray to disable Bill's plane, and apparently draw it inside.
During his abduction, the aliens uses a screen of force to paralyze Bill. 
Telepathy is named as the method of mental communication.
Earth is a danger to the universe. A-bombs will "upset the balance of the entire universe."
"The Brotherhood of Worlds" sounds a bit like the space version of the United Nations.
The aliens voices, Xeglon and Zzyl, have an imperious tone, and sound a bit like snobs from space. 

The Fine-Friedkins script for Escape was used for several other versions:

Beyond Tomorrow, April 13, 1950 Once again, William N. Robson produced and directed, and Frank Lovejoy starred as Major Bill Westphal.

Movie actor William Holden starred in the 1954 Suspense adaptation.
Pictured here as his role as a test pilot in the 1956 film, "Toward the Unknown."

Suspense, February 15, 1954, directed by Elliot Lewis. The newspaper description: 

SCIENCE FICTION? William Holden, as jet test pilot Bill Westphal, will take an experimental ship up into "The Outer Limit" and return ten hours later to tell a tale which no one will believe on radio's Suspense program Monday (7 p.m., CBS). The story was adapted by Morton Fine and David Friedkin for radio production from a famous Saturday Evening- Post science fiction story by Graham Doar.

Suspense, March 17, 1957 William N. Robson, again, producing and directing.
(Suspense 1957) Newspaper description:

Lovejoy Plans Trip. Frank Lovejoy, noted radio- screen star, portrays Major Bill Westphal, pilot of a perilous jet flight into "The Outer Limit" on CBS Radio's Suspense Sunday  (3-30 p.m.). When he returns from a test flight with a terrifying warning that demands immediate attention, the Major finds his frantic efforts to report a message of doom blocked by the incredulous earth people he tries to save.

Brand X

The other adaptation of the script was made for as part of a series specialized in science fiction, but strangely, they downplayed the alien encounter in the story.

 Dimension X, April 8, 1950, was part of a science fiction series, so they jazzed things up a bit and moved the story into the future, 1965. Van Woodward produced and Edward King directed Ernest Kinoy's adaptation, which added a few science fiction flourishes, and extra drama, including having the pilot's pregnant wife giving birth to their son while he's missing. The military aspect was downplayed a bit, and the ranks for the two main characters were dropped. The pilot in this version is named Mr. Steve Weston and played by Joseph Julian, and his boss is Mr. Hank Hansen. 

There's no mention of flying saucers; the alien ship is just described as egg-shaped and smooth. Like in the original story, we don't have a scene depicting the alien encounter, and only hear the pilot describe his experience. Hank says, "Steve, this whole thing's been a devil of a strain on you. I'm going to call Major Donaldson from the Army base, ask him to sit in."

Donaldson submits Steve to questioning under "narco-psychometry," saying, "Under proper drugs I can put you back in this, uh, ship - by suggestion. Then we can get a playback record of your memory pattern on the audio circuit... an accurate memory picture of what your mind reports." He has Steve count backwards and the process resembles hypnotic regression.

Steve says the Intergalactic Patrol has outlawed war. Their detector picked up an atomic explosion on Earth, and they've quarantined it. "They've isolated the Earth, 'cause we don't know how to control ourselves yet. Until we learn, we'll be a menace to the whole universe!" Xeglon is not named, and the material from his report is not incorporated. This version adds extra tension of an atomic bomb test scheduled for midnight, which prompts Steve to threaten to blow up the base unless the bomb test is canceled. Hank puts in a frantic call to abort the test, but it was just a ruse on a dead line to pacify Steve. 

The ending is the same, but the destruction of the Earth could be seconds away. Like in the Doar's original, the psychiatrist Donaldson gets the last line, "It's outside my field, but I'm curious. How did he keep that ship in the air for ten hours - with only ten minutes' fuel?

Comments: By removing the report or any mention of Xeglon, there's a stronger shadow of a doubt in the listener whether the alien encounter was real.

A transcript of the radio play by Ernest Kinoy can be found at Generic Radio Workshop Script Library.

(Musical Trivia:  The Theremin is noted for becoming the sound of science fiction in "The Day the Earth Stood Still," but it was being used a year earlier in 1950 "Rocketship X-M," and earlier still by Albert Berman here on the NBC radio show, "Dimension X." )

X-1 (X Minus 1), November 16, 1955 used the Ernest Kinoy script, with Daniel Sutter directing and Steve Weston was again played by Joseph Julian.

Television

Around the same time, the new medium of television was in its infancy, but two teleplay adaptations of the story were also broadcast; on CBS in 1951, and on NBC in 1953:

Donald Davis

Out There was one of the first science fiction TV shows aimed at an adult audience, a half-hour show created by Donald Davis, and its debut episode adapted Doar's story. The teleplay was by Elihu Winer, and it aired on CBS, October 28, 1951. Robert Webber played the pilot, Captain Bill Hurley, and this version includes a scene or two that features the pilot's wife. As with the Escape adaption on radio, the alien encounter was depicted. Commander Xeglon was portrayed by Wesley Addy, who was well versed in classics from Shakespeare and often mistaken for English. With that choice of actor, I'm guessing they went for an imperious tone for Xeglon's warning about Earth's doom from "The Councillors." Sadly, the series only lasted 12 episodes, is not available on video, and not much is known about it.

Robert Montgomery Presents (Your Lucky Strike Theatre) was a popular hour-long live dramatic program featuring original stories and adaptations. "The Outer Limit" adaption was written by Richard Battle and aired on NBC,  January 26, 1953. In this version, the pilot is played by Jackie Cooper and renamed Captain Peter Graves, who serves under Colonel Hank Daggers. The psychiatrist character is named General Klein, but he plays a reduced role in this version.

Reviewer Steven H. Scheuer's "Exciting science fiction yarn given a tinge of authenticity through the testing of a space jet-plane. Lots of technical mumbo-jumbo enhances realistic aspects and suspense."

Jackie Cooper was a real pilot, a Navy Reserve Captain.
Photos from the 1955 film Mister Roberts.

The story is framed with scenes on the observation deck of the RCA building where Peter Graves tells a man and his son his incredible story. "Well, it started when the Air Force picked me to fly their new eight-rocket astro; and my job was to take it up and try to crack the outer limit itself."

Teleplay script excerpts as presented in the 1955 textbook,  Prose and Poetry for Appreciation from the  L.W. Singer Company:

The captain is asked to describes the ship he saw, but is met with disbelief:
SCHILLER.  What was this ship? What did it look like? How was it powered?
PETER.  It was — egg-shaped. Perfectly smooth...
SCHILLER.  Like a — flying saucer?
PETER.  Not — unlike the descriptions we've received of — of — flying saucers.
BALL.  Captain, are you a reader of comic books?
PETER.  No, sir, not regularly.
KLEIN.  Captain, you say these — beings — they put ideas in your head and among those ideas was one concerning the distance they had come? 
PETER.  Yes, sir.

In the show, the extraterrestrial encounter was not directly depicted, we just the the pilot's description of the message they gave:
"PETER.  Atomic power, sir. Atomic bombs — stop making them — and using them. That was the warning. They knew all about atomic power — the utility as well as the danger. They have outlawed the use of atomic energy as bombs and they're on the lookout for explosions. Whenever their detectors pick up a trace of one — they send a patrol. They came here. They found what they were looking for — and they quarantined us.

He describes how the alien's doomsday device for Earth would be activated:
"An envelope, a layer of something — I'm not sure. But it's out there — about a hundred miles out! — and miles thick. It surrounds us and it's there to stay. Whenever an atomic bomb is exploded anywhere on this earth and the mushroom cloud of radioactive particles rises."

In this version the pilot is not believed and is kicked out of the service. Instead of his colonel and the psychiatrist, the closing lines are delivered by the boy and his father who've heard his tale.

PETER.  They discharged me — I don't blame them — what else could they do? I went to the newspapers, and they said I was crazy — nobody would print it. 
BOY.  They said you were crazy, sir? 
PETER.  That's right. Everywhere it was the same story. I went to my Congressman — the United Nations.  Nobody believed me.
JONES.  (laughing). Well— if it happened a few years ago as you say — how come we're still here? 
PETER.  The layer's not full yet. 
JONES.  (smiling). Oh. Well— it sure is a is a good story. 
PETER.  Yes, a good story — and some day I'm hoping somebody will believe it. Before it's too late. 
JONES.  Yes — well, thank the man for the story, Son. It's time to get home for supper. 
BOY.  Thank you — thank you for the story, sir. 
PETER.  Good night, boy. (He leaves.)
BOY.  Was that a true story, Dad? 
JONES.  No, of course not. He just made it up.  
BOY.  Well, if it wasn't true what he said happened to him then where was he for those two hours when he didn't have any fuel or oxygen? 
JONES  (puzzled). Oh — somebody— somebody made a mistake, I guess. Yeah — somebody made a mistake.

Comments: Like the Dimension X radio adaptation, this teleplay does not feature the material dealing with Xeglon, and there are no scenes depicting the alien contact. The audience is left wondering about the reality of the pilot's claims, but apparently some viewers found it convincing. According to the IMDb listing, "In the closing, Robert Montgomery notes that they received some phone calls during the telecast asking if this was a true story. He assured the audience that it was complete fiction." Sadly, this episode, too, is not available on video.

This episode of Robert Montgomery Presents was noticed by the US Air Force and mentioned in Project Blue Book's files, in a graph looking a correlation between UFO publicity and sighting reports.

https://www.fold3.com/image/11885063/

The various broadcast adaptations of "The Outer Limit" were surprisingly faithful to the original story, but differed in a few details and narrative choices. In some versions, the alien scenes were portrayed as a flashback, with actors providing the warning of doom, but in others we get merely the pilot's description of what he claimed happened. In all versions the colonel and psychiatrist think the alien ultimatum is a delusion, but the miraculous return of the pilot and plane suggest that it might all be true.

In our next installments, we'll look at
Ufology & The Outer Limit Legacy (Part 4 of 5)
Hollywood & The Outer Limit Legacy (Part 5 of 5)

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