by UFO History Buff & Author, Charles Lear
After Project Blue Book was shut down in 1969, private UFO groups were the only organizations left in the U.S. that would take UFO reports, and the two biggest were the National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena and the Aerial Phenomena Research Organization. Donald Keyhoe was ousted as NICAP’s director just three days before the December 17, 1969, press release announcing Blue Book’s termination, and NICAP quickly became a shadow of its former self while APRO, run by its founders Jim and Coral Lorenzen, remained a formidable and influential organization. That same year, a group of APRO investigators living in the Midwest organized by Walt Andrus as the Tri State Study Group, decided on May 31st to branch off from APRO and operate as the Midwest UFO Network. This was in reaction to the Lorenzens’ move towards a more centralized management strategy seeking to direct all field investigations from their office in Tucson, Arizona. The Lorenzens, particularly Coral, who had a reputation for being contentious (she frequently took out her ire in the pages of the APRO Bulletin, and her earliest targets as far back as 1952 were Albert K. Bender and James W. Moseley) took the Midwestern group’s decision personally and held a grudge for years to come. The Midwest UFO Network soon outgrew its Midwestern boundaries and the name was changed to the Mutual UFO Network in 1973. A rivalry developed between the two, and this resulted in clashes when they happened to converge on a given case, and a prime example of this is the 1981 Cash-Landrum case. Read more
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In the early 1970s, reports of people experiencing periods of missing time started turning up during investigations. A 
1973 was a great year for fans of high-strangeness UFO reports. The most famous of these is the October 11
In the annals of UFOlogy, there are many cases that, like zombies, refuse to stay buried even in the midst of convincing arguments and evidence debunking them. The case of the reported crash of an airship and recovery of its unearthly pilot in Aurora, Texas, in 1897 is a prime example of this. 
The reported sighting on February 4, 1977, of a UFO and creature by students at the Broad Haven Primary School in Pembrokeshire, Wales, was the beginning of a flap throughout the county. The area where reports were most concentrated has been dubbed “The Broad Haven Tringle.” Multiple witnesses were willing to go on record, including with the Ministry of Defense, saying they had seen not only strange craft, but silver-suited creatures as well. One dramatic encounter was recalled by a witness for Episode 3 of the 2023 series, Encounters, produced for Netflix by Steven Spielberg’s company. While this is many years later, the story told by the witness is the same as that told by the witness to an investigator who spoke to her and her mother closer to the event just months later. 
In last week’s 
Last Week, we wrote about a case that Betty Hill looked into and came upon another case she was involved with that intrigued us to the point that we were moved to explore it in detail. Most significantly, it involves reported encounters with Men in Black, one from a witness/experiencer (actually a Man in Dark Blue), and the other from the doctor who worked with him to recover memories using regressive hypnosis. 
Betty and Barney Hill came to the world’s attention when the report that they were abducted in 1961 by occupants of a UFO was taken seriously in the mainstream press. What is not widely known is that Betty turned to UFO investigation after this, and when Barney died in 1969, she became more deeply involved and travelled from conference to conference giving lectures on the subject. Betty’s niece, Kathleen Marden, co-authored the 2007 book with Stanton T. Friedman, Captured!, about her aunt’s and uncle’s experience. In Chapter 25 titled, “Fall From Grace,” Betty’s “commitment to solve the UFO mystery” is described. According to the authors, Betty received cautions and criticisms from members of the UFO community who were concerned that her subjective approach and intense belief were causing her to become the subject of media attention for all the wrong reasons and putting her credibility at risk. Even so, she is credited with participation in cases that have become part of the literature, and this week, we’ll look at one of those. 
As most people who have an interest in the subject of flying saucers/UFOs are aware, the United States Air Force had an official investigation program looking into the phenomenon for over 20 years, starting in 1948, that continued until its termination in 1969. What many might not be aware of is that England also had an early official interest in the subject, and the Ministry of Defense put together an investigation team in 1950 called “The Flying Saucer Working Party.” It lasted less than a year and was disbanded after the group issued a report recommending against further investigation. Continued sighting reports and interest among influential people caused the MoD to reconsider, and in 1952, two divisions of the Air Ministry were tasked with investigating. 
