As early as the middle of April 1947, at the Weather Bureau in Richmond, Virginia, a U. S. Government meteorologist named Walter A. Minczewski and his staff had released a pibal balloon and were tracking its east-to-west course at 15,000 feet when they noticed silver, ellipsoidal object just below it. Larger than the balloon, this object appeared to be flat on bottom, and when observed through the theodolite used to track the balloon, was seen to have a dome on its upper side. Minczewski and his assistants watched the object for fifteen seconds as it traveled rapidly in level flight on a westerly course, before disappearing from view. In the official report on file at the Air Force's Project Blue Book, at Wright-Patterson Field, in Dayton, Ohio, this sighting is listed as Unidentified.
Another early sighting in the official files is the report by Byron Savage of Oklahoma City -- like Arnold, a businessman and private pilot. He had seen an object about six weeks before Arnold, on May 17th or 18th, and his report was one of the first to receive widespread attention in the newspapers immediately after Arnold's report had appeared. The Oklahoma City Times gave it prominent space on June 26th. At the time of his sighting, Savage had been out in his yard it was dusk, and the sky was still light, when he saw an object “come across the city from just a little east of south ... its altitude was very high somewhere around 10,000 feet, I couldn’t be sure. Funny thing about it, it made no noise. I don't think it had kind of internal combustion engine. But I did notice that right after it went out of sight, I heard the sound of rushing wind and air. I told my wife right away, but she thought I must have seen lightning.“ He further described the object as being of “a shiny, silvery color,” and very large -- “bigger than any aircraft we have.” He said it was “perfectly round and flat.” In the Blue Book file he described the object as appearing ellipsoidal in shape as it approached, and completely circular while passing directly overhead, on a course toward the northwest. In this account he said that it appeared “frosty white,” and that its speed was about three times as fast as a jet. It disappeared from view in about fifteen to twenty seconds. Although the sighting details provided by Savage are far more complete than those given for many of the official cases listed by Blue Book as “explained,” this report falls in the category of Insufficient Information.
Another case in the Air Force Blue Book files occurred on May 19th, sometime between twelve thirty and one p.m., at Manitou Springs, Colorado. Seven employees of the Pikes Peak Railway, including Navy veteran Dean A. Hauser, mechanics Ted Weigand and Marion Hisshouse, and T. J. Smith and L. D. Jamison, were having lunch when Weigand noticed a bright, silver-colored object approaching rapidly from the northeast. It stopped almost directly overhead and the group of men watched it perform wild gyrations for a number of minutes. Hauser said that the object, after having approached in a straight line, “began to move erratically in wide circles. All this time it reflected light, like metal, but intermittently, as though the angle of reflection might be changing from time to time.” It was difficult to get a clear idea of its shape, and even viewing it through binoculars did not appear to “bring it any closer.” They estimated its height at one thousand feet. For twenty minutes they watched it climb, dive, reverse its flight course, and finally move off into the wind in a westerly direction. “It disappeared in a straight line in the west- northwest in a clear blue sky,” Hauser reported. At no time did anyone hear any noise. An account of the sighting appeared in the Denver Post of June 28. The next day the Post reported that the witnesses had been interviewed by representatives of the 15th Air Force headquarters and the results of the investigation would be sent on to Washington. The results, perhaps unknown to the witnesses even to this day, were “possible birds.”
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Unlisted in the official AF files, but no less interesting than the preceding case, is Dr. Colden R. Battey’s sighting in the last week of May. Dr. Battey, a physician in Augusta, Georgia, had been fishing ten miles off St. Helena Sound, near Beaufort, South Carolina. At about eleven o’clock that morning he noticed a formation of four disc-like objects flying overhead in a southeasterly direction at a terrific rate of speed. The discs appeared to be spinning on their axes and were at an estimated altitude of about 20,000 feet. They were silvery and appeared “highly polished,” and on their undersides, Dr. Battey could see a “circular rim, or projection, about one-quarter of the way from the edges.” No sound was heard as they flew overhead. The formation sped out of view in less than twenty seconds. Dr. Battey’s report of the sighting did not appear in print until July 6th, when the Augusta Chronicle gave it prominent front-page coverage. INS sent it out on the wires, where it was picked up by numerous newspapers around the country.
Other May sightings reported nearly two months after they had been made include several reports by housewives. Mrs. W. C. Clark, of Memphis, Tennessee, reported in the Commercial-Appeal of July 7th, that she had seen two objects “like tennis balls” fly over her yard around the first of May; and in Newark, New Jersey, Mrs. Rose Slawuta described in the Newark Star-Ledger of the same date how she had seen a “shining elliptical object” with a gold band around it, approaching from the west, on May 10th. The Air Force files contain a sighting from Milford, Iowa, on May 29th, which is listed as a “possible meteor.”