11 May 1950 Sightings
Paul Trent took two photos of a disc-shaped object his wife Evelyn saw over their farm near McMinnville; a local paper and then Life ran them. A Condon study analyst found them consistent with a real distant object but could not rule out fabrication; skeptics call them a hoax.
24 Jul 1948 Sightings
Eastern Air Lines pilots Clarence Chiles and John Whitted reported a glowing, wingless, cigar-shaped object with rows of lit windows passing their DC-3 near Montgomery at about 2:45 a.m. Ruppelt said it prompted the Air Force's 1948 'Estimate of the Situation'; the case was later relabeled a meteor.
24 Jun 1947 Sightings
Private pilot Kenneth Arnold reported nine fast objects flying in formation near Mount Rainier. Press coverage of his account set off the first U.S. wave of flying saucer reports, and the Air Force later carried the case as unexplained.
2 Nov 1957 Sightings
Over about two hours, drivers near Levelland reported a large glowing object and said their engines and headlights failed as it passed. The Air Force attributed the reports to ball lightning; physicist James McDonald later told Congress no storms were near that night.