Culture and science
Scientific studies, academic projects, panels and surveys. 281 events, newest first.
Media1975
Arizona State University librarian Larry Kusche checked the records behind famous Bermuda Triangle disappearances one by one. His Harper and Row book found many losses happened in storms, outside the area, or had ordinary explanations, and it is widely credited with debunking the legend.
Government26 Mar 1974
Physicist Edward U. Condon, a Manhattan Project veteran who was investigated by the House Un-American Activities Committee in 1947-1949, died in Boulder, Colorado.
Photo: National Institute of Standards and Technology, Public domain
Skinwalker Ranch1974
Utah State University plant scientist Frank Salisbury published The Utah UFO Display: A Biologist's Report, on reports from the Uintah Basin that teacher Joseph Junior Hicks had collected since the 1960s. Salisbury interviewed witnesses himself from 1968.
Media1974
At a ceremony marking an upgrade of the Arecibo radio telescope in Puerto Rico, scientists beamed a short pictorial radio message toward the globular cluster M13, about 21,000 light-years away. The SETI Institute notes a reply is unlikely ever to come.
Photo: Arne Nordmann ( norro ), CC BY-SA 3.0
Close encounters1973
Astronomer J. Allen Hynek, former scientific consultant to Project Blue Book, started the Center for UFO Studies, initially run from a room in his Evanston home. He led it as scientific director until his death in 1986; it continues as a research library and archive.
Photo: United States Government, Public domain
Sightings1973
After several hundred calls about strange lights around Piedmont in early 1973, Southeast Missouri State physics professor Harley Rutledge led his own team to investigate. He issued a paper that year and expanded it into a 1981 book. No government inquiry took place.
Photo: Drowzy at English Wikipedia, Public domain
Close encounters1972
Northwestern astronomer J. Allen Hynek, long a scientific consultant to the Air Force's UFO projects, published The UFO Experience: A Scientific Inquiry. It sorted reports into close encounters of the first, second and third kind, a scheme later echoed in Spielberg's 1977 film.
Photo: United States Government, Public domain
Media1972
Cornell University Press published 'UFO's: A Scientific Debate', edited by Carl Sagan and Thornton Page. It collects papers from the American Association for the Advancement of Science symposium on UFOs held in Boston on Dec. 26-27, 1969.
Photo: Unknown author, Public domain
GovernmentSep 1971
The U.S. National Academy of Sciences and the USSR Academy of Sciences jointly held a symposium on communicating with extraterrestrial civilizations at Byurakan Observatory in Soviet Armenia. Carl Sagan, Frank Drake and Francis Crick took part; Sagan edited the 1973 proceedings.
Photo: Rita Willaert, CC BY 2.0
Government13 Jun 1971
University of Arizona atmospheric physicist James E. McDonald, who had spent his last years analyzing UFO reports as a scientific problem, died on June 13, 1971. His American Meteorological Society obituary said the work brought him into conflict with certain scientists and he found few allies.
Photo: United States Government, Public domain
Close encounters26 Dec 1969
The American Association for the Advancement of Science sponsored a two-day UFO symposium at its Boston meeting. Its papers appeared in 1972 from Cornell University Press as 'UFO's: A Scientific Debate', edited by Carl Sagan and Thornton Page.
Photo: NASA/JPL, Public domain
Government17 Dec 1969
Air Force Secretary Robert Seamans Jr. announced the end of Project Blue Book, citing the Condon study and its review by the National Academy of Sciences. The Air Force said no case it had studied showed a threat to national security or evidence of extraterrestrial vehicles.
Photo: United States Air Force Archive, CC BY-SA 4.0
Sightings28 Sep 1969
Just before 11 a.m. a fireball broke apart over Murchison, Victoria, and residents heard a series of loud booms. They gathered fragments of a rare carbonaceous meteorite, in which scientists reported extraterrestrial amino acids in Nature in 1970.
Photo: Daderot, CC0
GovernmentJul 1969
Lynn E. Catoe of the Library of Congress compiled 'UFOs and Related Subjects: An Annotated Bibliography', listing more than 1,600 items, at the request of the Air Force Office of Scientific Research to support the University of Colorado UFO study.
Photo: Carol M. Highsmith, Public domain
Close encounters31 May 1969
Walt Andrus and chemistry professor Allen Utke founded the Midwest UFO Network as a regional network of field investigators. As it spread beyond the Midwest it was renamed the Mutual UFO Network, keeping the MUFON acronym; Guinness lists it as the largest civilian UFO investigative group.
MediaApr 1969
In a review essay titled 'The Condon Report and UFOs', Blue Book science consultant J. Allen Hynek argued that the report's own unexplained cases did not support its conclusion that further UFO study was not worthwhile, and faulted its case selection and methods.
Photo: Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Public domain
Government1969
An Air Force-funded University of Colorado study led by physicist Edward Condon was made public. It concluded that further UFO study was unlikely to advance science, and the Air Force later cited it when closing Project Blue Book.
Photo: National Institute of Standards and Technology, Public domain
GovernmentJan 1969
An Air Force-requested National Academy of Sciences panel chaired by Gerald Clemence reviewed the University of Colorado UFO study and judged its scope and methods sound, agreeing that further UFO study deserved no high priority. The Air Force cited this review when it closed Project Blue Book.
Photo: G. Edward Johnson, CC BY 4.0
GovernmentJan 1969
A chapter of the Air Force-funded Condon report, by astronomer Franklin Roach, reviewed what Mercury and Gemini crews saw in orbit. It found most sightings explainable but judged three unexplained: two by James McDivitt on Gemini 4 and one by Frank Borman on Gemini 7.
Photo: National Institute of Standards and Technology, Public domain
Government27 Nov 1968
An internal RAND Corporation paper by George Kocher, marked for RAND use only, reviewed UFO reports and proposed a central report-receiving agency, a network of scientists, and a fresh look at existing sensor records. RAND said its views were tentative.
Photo: Cbl62, CC BY-SA 3.0
Government29 Jul 1968
The House Committee on Science and Astronautics held a one-day symposium on UFOs chaired by Rep. J. Edward Roush. Six scientists, including J. Allen Hynek, James McDonald and Carl Sagan, presented views, and further papers were added to the printed record.
Photo: US Congress, Public domain
Government12 Mar 1968
Atmospheric physicist James McDonald told a Canadian Aeronautics and Space Institute symposium that UFOs were a serious scientific problem, criticized Project Blue Book as inadequate, and called for well-funded international research.
Photo: United States Government, Public domain
Government29 Feb 1968
Pravda ran 'What? Flying Saucers Again?' by astronomer Ye. Mustel and two other senior Soviet scientists, saying UFO reports had natural explanations and no facts supported their reality. U.S. government translators and the Condon report recorded it.
Government8 Feb 1968
Edward Condon dismissed staff scientists David Saunders and Norman Levine from the Air Force-funded University of Colorado UFO study after a 1966 memo by coordinator Robert Low reached physicist James McDonald. Look magazine's May 1968 account made the dispute public.
Photo: National Institute of Standards and Technology, Public domain
Media1968
Swiss writer Erich von Daniken's first book, published in German in 1968 and in English as 'Chariots of the Gods?', argued ancient monuments showed alien visits. It launched the 'ancient astronaut' genre; scientists rejected his claims as contrary to historical and scientific evidence.
Photo: Stephen Jackson, Public domain
