Simulcast on YouTube, Facebook & Twitch – Saturday, October 31st, 6:00-8:00 PM EDT (-4GMT)
Russia’s USO Secrets: Unidentified Submersible Objects in Russian and International Waters
Paul’s YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/ParanormalResearchPaulStonehill/videos
Paul Stonehill is a published author, lecturer, and researcher of Eurasian (including the Caucasus Mountains, Ukrainian, Russian, East European, Central Asian, and Far Eastern) paranormal phenomena. His articles have been translated and published in several languages. After the demise of the USSR, his articles were also published in Russia, Ukraine, and Central Asian republics. In October of 1993, OMNI Magazine featured a story about Paul’s work, and the research center he had created back in 1991 (Russian Ufology Research Center). Paul has appeared in such shows as Ancient Aliens, Sightings; U.S., German and Japanese productions. His areas of expertise are: paranormal phenomena in the Eastern Europe, Russia, Central Asia, and China (PRC); Russian history; warfare in the former USSR; cross-cultural training. Paul grew up in the United States but is fluent in Russian and knows Ukrainian. He has consulted and was interviewed for several TV programs (Discovery, TNT, History Channel, Sightings, and others), as well as numerous radio shows. He began research of Soviet and Russian UFOlogy and paranormal phenomena in his youth, back in the USSR. Paul’s published books include: The Soviet UFO Files (1998, in English, Czech and Dutch); Paranormal Mysteries of Eurasia (2011) And co-written with Philip Mantle Expediente Soviet UFO (in Spanish); UFO Case Files of Russia; Mysterious Sky: Soviet UFO Phenomenon ; Russia’s Roswell Incident; Russia’s USO Secrets. The books have been published in 7 languages, and more translations are planned.
The 1975 book by John Keel, “The Mothman Prophecies,” is a complex book. The book’s through line centers on events in Point Pleasant, West Virginia from Nov. 15, 1966 to Dec. 15, 1967. These involved UFOs, sightings of a winged humanoid with glowing red eyes dubbed “The Mothman” and the collapse of the Silver Bridge, which spanned the Ohio River. But, the book is about so much more than that. It can be read several times and, depending on the reader’s perspective, be a completely different experience each time. It contains contactee stories, abductee stories, MiB encounters, Grinning Man encounters, a nighttime bedroom invader in a checkered jacket, strange metallic voices on the telephone, paranoia, poltergeists and prophecies. The reader can dive in repeatedly and come up with a tale that is interesting enough on its own to warrant further research. The tale involving Jaye P. Paro, Apol and Princess Moon Owl is one of those.
John Keel was a New York City resident and freelance writer who traveled the world looking for stories. During the period covered in “The Mothman Prophecies,” he was dividing his time, investigating strange events in both Point Pleasant and Long Island. The Long Island tale begins in the book with Keel’s investigation of reports of strange visitors by residents living on Mount Misery. Mount Misery is the highest point on Long Island at 400 ft and, put simply, is a big pile of gravel left behind by the last glacier that stopped by around 20,000 years ago. One resident there told of being visited by four men, three of whom looked “like Indians.” They politely told her that her land belonged to their tribe and they meant to reclaim it. She was “frightened” by their feet. They had no car and would have had to walk through mud to get to her house and yet they had none on their shoes. Keel was running into many similar stories of people who didn’t seem to quite fit in. He was becoming convinced that the people being described were extraterrestrials from another planet, or ultraterrestrials from another dimension.
In the world of UFOlogy, some stories continue on, even after they’ve been convincingly debunked. This is often due to a particular story’s entertainment value and, it should be remembered, many UFO stories exist in an area between fiction and fact. If we were to assign this area a genera name, perhaps “true science fiction” might be appropriate. The idea that a fantastic story could be true, makes the story that much more interesting and suspension of disbelief is something everyone engages in when they want to be entertained. One such story, a biographical tale under the byline, Fred Reagan, appeared in the May 1953 issue of Action magazine. It could be held up as an example of what many paranormal enthusiasts call, “high strangeness.” However, it seems to be what folklorists call, “a tall tale.”
He found himself inside a dimly lit room surrounded by strange beings. They were around three feet tall and resembled “huge stalks of metallic asparagus.” He lost consciousness. When he came to, a metallic voice spoke to him through a speaker. Using broken English, the voice apologized for the collision, saying it had been an accident. It explained they were here to observe our primitive civilization and that their mission was peaceful. The voice further told him that they’d examined him and found a cancerous tumor, which they “adjusted.” He was instructed not to talk about the incident, as no one would believe him.
In the early years of the flying saucer mystery, the U.S. Air Force was the only organization doing any sort of significant investigation. Then, in 1952, a number of private groups were organized and the first citizen investigators went into the field and endeavored to solve the mystery for themselves. The first of these to rise to global attention was the International Flying Saucer Bureau, founded by Albert K. Bender. They put out a quarterly publication called Space Review, and were taken seriously by their fellow enthusiasts. They didn’t last long, however, as Bender put an end to his creation in 1953 after telling his followers he had solved the mystery. He later informed them he’d been visited by three men wearing black suits and homburg hats, who’d threatened him into keeping silent about his discovery. The mythos of the Men in Black entered flying saucer lore and the Bender Mystery became a subject that is still being debated today.
Albert K. Bender was born on July 16, 1921 in Duryea, Pennsylvania. What the “K” stood for seems to be part of the mystery. He served stateside as a dental technician in the U.S. Army Air Forces from June 8, 1942 to Oct. 7, 1943. He was stationed at Langley Field, Virginia. After his service, he moved to Bridgeport, Connecticut with his mother and stepfather. His mother died shortly thereafter.
The 1956 book by Edward J. Ruppelt, “The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects” is a must-read for anyone interested in the subject. Capt. Ruppelt was the first director of Project Blue Book after leading a massive re-organization effort to revitalize the investigation while it was still operating as Project Grudge. He was the person who came up with the designation, Unidentified Flying Object, or UFO, which was pronounced “yoofo”, for what were popularly known as flying saucers. His book recounts his time with the project under both names and provides an insider’s view of what were then classified activities. There are two editions of the book with two different endings. The second edition was published in 1960 and Ruppelt included recent cases as a means to update the book. This edition has three more chapters tacked on that have a decidedly more negative tone than the original preceding chapters, where Ruppelt displays an open-minded view. This has led some to wonder if Ruppelt was pressured by the Air Force, which was then following the 
The state of Michigan is best known to UFOlogists as the swamp gas state. This is because of Project Blue Book scientific consultant, J. Allen Hynek. He came up with the explanation that swamp gas was responsible for sightings that were reported there. That was way back in 1966. It caused a furor that led Michigan representative and House Minority Leader, Gerald Ford, to call for a hearing in Congress. The case is based on multiple witness testimonies, which include those of police officers, and is well represented in UFO literature. However, there is a more recent, and less well-known case that not only has multiple witnesses, but radar confirmation and a 911 dispatch tape as well.
On the night of March 8, 1994, meteorologist Jack Bushong was manning the National Weather Service office in Muskegon. He received a call from an Ottawa County dispatcher who’d been dealing with multiple reports of mysterious lights in the sky. The dispatcher wanted to know if there was anything on radar to confirm the reports.
Much has been written about the 1952 Flatwoods Monster encounter in Braxton County, West Virginia. It is a bizarre tale that received national press coverage at the time and it is still celebrated today as part of West Virginia’s weird history. You can have your picture taken in one of five giant Flatwoods Monster chairs located in various areas around Braxton County and you can visit the Flatwoods Monster Museum in the town of Sutton. With all of the focus on the monster itself, certain aspects of the case tend to be overlooked. For one thing, this was the very first report of a creature associated with a U.F.O. For another, the case was looked into by some of UFOlogy’s very first private investigators.