by UFO History Buff & Author, Charles Lear
1973 was a great year for fans of high-strangeness UFO reports. The most famous of these is the October 11th case from Pascagoula, Mississippi, where Charles Hickson and Calvin Parker said they were taken aboard a craft by elephant-skinned humanoids with crab-claw like hands. After their story hit the papers, an article appeared in the October 18, 1973, edition of The Pensacola News ( part 1, part 2 ) headlined “Pickup by UFO Reported.” According to the article, a “Pensacola businessman” (later identified as an electrician) reported an encounter of his own, and his story was even more dramatic than Hickson and Parker’s. UFO investigators at the time seem to have mostly ignored it, as it doesn’t appear in periodicals of the day such as The APRO Bulletin or Flying Saucer Review. This might have been due to the continued focus on the Pascagoula case and the extreme nature of the claim by the man in Pensacola.
According to the article, the report by Clarence Ray Patterson, 2106 W. Godfrey Street, headed “the list of hundreds of UFO sightings in Northwest Florida-South Alabama, law enforcement officials said today.” While it is said that many of the reports could be attributed to a weather balloon, helicopter maneuvers, and atmospheric testing by the Air Force near Eglin AFB with clouds of yellow, blue, red, and green gasses, Patterson’s reportedly “could not.”
Patterson’s story comes from Pensacola Police Sergeant Lucien Mitchell, who is quoted describing Patterson and his report. He is said to have told Mitchell that he was coming back to Pensacola from Mobile, Alabama, on Highway 10 and was near the Loxley, Alabama, exit when he had his encounter. On his police report, “the first known written report filed here on UFO sightings,” he wrote that he noticed a hovering “unidentified spaceship” over his pickup truck. Mitchell said “He continued to say that this object hovered over his pickup truck and then pulled the vehicle inside the spaceship.”
Patterson is said to have told Mitchell that around six creatures then took him out of the truck. Mitchell said “The description given of the creatures was vague, however, it was similar to other reports, such as the Mississippi incident where the two fishermen were pulled inside a spaceship.” The creatures are said to have been “described as short, with claw-like arms,” but it’s not made clear if this was the description from the Mississippi incident or from Patterson.
According to the article, Patterson said that the creatures seemed to be reading his mind as they examined him and kept him onboard for about 30 minutes. It is said that during that time, they travelled “from Loxley to State Road 297 in Escambia County,” where he was released. Quoting from the article: “He said he was released unharmed, then drove to Pensacola where he immediately notified city police.”
Mitchell described Patterson as becoming “very emotional” and crying. He said “He told me I thought he was some kind of nut and that he would refuse to tell his story again to anyone.” Mitchell added that Patterson was nervous and said at the beginning of the interview that nobody would believe his story. Mitchell and other officers reportedly said that Patterson was not under the influence of alcohol or drugs.
It seems there was a full-on flap, not only in Pensacola, with “numerous complaints about unidentified flying objects” received by the police and sheriff’s office there, but also in Alabama, Georgia, and Mississippi. Most of the sightings are attributed to the balloons, maneuvers, and testing mentioned above. The situation in Mobile, Alabama, is described as being “worsened,” when a local TV station announced it was setting up cameras on the Mississippi border on interstate 10 to catch UFOs “on the advice of an alleged psychic.” Quoting from the article: “More than a thousand cars followed the TV crew and a massive traffic jam ensued.”
Patterson’s report wasn’t completely ignored by investigators. It’s mentioned in 1973 – Year of the Humanoids (page 20 of the pdf) by David Webb published by the Center for UFO Studies in 1976 and in The 1973 UFO Chronology posted on the website of the National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena. The same summary is in both publications:
Clarence Patterson and his pickup truck were sucked up into a huge, cigar-shaped object with a green light. He was pulled out of the truck by about six robot-like beings who seemed to read his mind. The next thing he remembered, he was back on the highway, going about 90 mph in the truck. He may have been on board for up to 30 minutes. A sulphury smell was noted during the sighting.
The sources given in the NICAP chronology are “Ref. 5, First hand investigation, UFOE II, Section VIII.” “Ref. 5” is Webb’s report and “UFOE II is referring to the 2000 book by Richard Hall, The UFO Evidence – Volume 2: A Thirty-Year Report. As for “first-hand investigation” it seems that the investigator was NICAP Site Coordinator Fran Ridge.