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- From: ParaNet.Information.Service@paranet.FIDONET.ORG (Michael Corbin)
- Newsgroups: alt.alien.visitors
- Subject: Wanted: Info On Mib
- Message-ID: <139236.2A68CC79@paranet.FIDONET.ORG>
- Date: 19 Jul 92 01:56:01 GMT
- Organization: Paranet Information Service, Denver, CO (303) 431-8797
- Lines: 273
-
-
- > Where could I find some written information on the so called MIB theory.
- > It
- > sounds interesting, but someone trying to explain something they read,
- > or heard
- > isn't always as reliable as the source, ie a book or something. Thanks
- > in
- > advance for your help.
-
- Compliments of ParaNet.
-
- *****************************************************************
- I M P O R T A N T N O T I C E
- concerning the following text file
- *****************************************************************
- ParaNet makes no endorsement of this material and the views
- expressed herein are not necessarily the views of ParaNet. This
- information is provided as a public service only.
-
- ParaNet Information Service
- P.O. Box 172
- Wheat Ridge, CO 80034-0172
-
- ParaNet(sm): Freedom of Information for a better world!
-
- (C) 1991 ParaNet(sm) Information Service. All Rights Reserved.
- ****************************************************************
- ParaNet File Number: 00171
-
-
-
- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
-
- A REVIEW OF MIBS (Men In Black): A HISTORY
-
-
- " A lot of people of heard of "something" about MIBS without really knowing any
-
- of the details."
-
- "MONSTERS: Giants and Little Men From Mars"
- DELL Publications (paperback) (C) 1975
- Written by: Daniel Cohen
-
- The purpose of this file is to aquaint users with MIBs history, how they are
- related to the coverup allegations, along with associated reference material
- and names of files which contain more current thoughts on the subject. Sysops
- are encouraged to add in the files contained on their systems at the bottom of
- the file, and any other additional reference material which would be useful in
- helping others in their personal research.
-
- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
- Chapter 10 "The Men in Black and Other Terrors"
-
- When the Condon Committee was sampling public attitudes toward UFOs they gave
- this statement to a cross section of the American Public: A government agency
- maintains a Top Secret file of UFO reports that are deliberately withheld from
- the public." THe respondents were supposed to answer TRUE or FALSE. A
- substantial majority, sixty-one percent, thought that the statement was true
- while only thirty-one percent said it was false. Among teenagers, the
- credibility gap was even wider -- 73 percent believed the statement to be true.
-
- General opinion studies conducted by the Condon Committee, and other surveys
- about UFO's came up with the rather paradoxal fact that there were more people
- who believed in a conspiracy of silence about UFOs than believed in UFOs in the
-
- first place.
-
- It has often been said that we Americans today are a bit paranoid; that we
- always tend to believe that something is out to get us, or something is being
- kept from us. It certainly seems that we were a bit paranoid about UFOs.
-
- Most people thought vaguely in terms of an Air Force conspiracy or a CIA
- conspiracy or even of a world-wide scientific conspiracy. It was generally
- acknowledged that the reason behind such a conspiracy was a desire on the part
- of those in power to hide the "truth" fro the public because people would panic
-
- if they knew that we really were being visit by superior creatures from another
-
- world. COnspiracy theorists constantly harkened back to the old "War of the
- WOrlds" broadcast, and the panic it started.
-
- Such a belief, however, is rather too simple for the true connoisseur of
- conspiracies. He has long ago rejected the simple, straightforward Air Force -
- CIA - science establishment - cover-up as too obvious, and really rather
- ridiculous. The conspiracy connoisseur pointed out quite correctlyl that no
- government or group, no matter how powerful, could possibly supress so much
- sensational information for so long -- no earthly group that is.
-
- If the extraterrestrials WANTED to make themselves known then they would land
- in a central place, and all the feeble earthly cover-up would simply be blown
- away. It is out of this sort of background that the legend of the Men in Black
- arose. It concerns strange little men in dark suits who drive around in big
- shiny cars and harass people who claimed to have seen a UFO.
-
- The origin of the Men in Black legend can be pin-pointed fairly exactly. Back
- in 1953 a man by the name of Albert K. Bender was runnong an organization
- called the International Flying Suacer Bureau (IFSB) and editing a little
- publication called "Space Review" that was dedicated to news of flying saucers.
-
- The IFSB had a small membership despite its rather grandoise title, and "Space
- Review" reached at best, no more than a few hundred readers. But they were all
- deeply devoted to the idea that flying saucers were craft from outer soace. In
- common with other ture believers, these saucer buffs were convinced that they
- were in possession of a great truth, while most of the rest of the world
- remained in darkness and ignorance. They felt very important , and thus it was
- with a sense of surprise, even shock, that they opened up the October 1953
- issue of "Space Review" and found two unexpected announcments:
-
- "LATE BULLETIN. A source which the IFSB considers very reliable has informed
-
- us that the investigation of the flying soucer mystery and the solution is
- approaching its final stages."
-
- "This same source to whom we had referred data, which had come into our
- possession, suggested that it was not the proper method and time to publish the
-
- data in 'Space Review'."
-
- The second and more shocking item read:
-
- "STATEMENT OF IMPORTANCE: THe mystery of the flying saucers is no longer a
- mystery. The source is already known, but any information about this is being
- withheld by order from a higher source. We would like to print the full story
- in "Space REview", but because of the nature of the information we are very
- sorry that we have been advised in the negative."
-
- The statement ended with the ominous sentence, "We advice those engaged in
- saucer work to please be very cautious." Bender then suspended the publication
- of "Space Review", and siddolved the IFSB.
-
- The tone of the announcemnets would have been familiar to anyone who had much
- experience with occult organizations. Occultists often claim they are in the
- possession of some great secret which, for equally secret reasons, they cannot
- reveal. Even the appeal, "please be very cautious" was not unique. It made
- those engaged in "saucer work" feel more important . After all, who is going to
-
- bother to persecute you if you are just wasting your time?
-
- SHortly after Bender closed down his magazine and organization he gave an
- interview to a local paper which he asserted the he had been visited by "three
- men wearing dark suits" who had order him "emphatically" to stop publishing
- material about flying saucers. Bender said that he had been "scared to death"
- and that he "acutally couldn't eat for a couple of days." Some of Bender's
- former associates tried to press for a more satisfactory explanation, but to
- all questions he replied either cryptically or not at all.
-
- This state of affairs created soncsiderable confusions amoung the flying saucer
-
- buffs. What were they to think about sucah a strange story> Some were openly
- skeptical of Bender's tale. They said that his publication and organization
- were losing money and the tale of the three visitors who "ordered" him to stop
- publishing was just a face-saving gesture. Yet, as the years went by the "three
-
- Men in Black" began to sound more rspectable and they took on a life of their
- own. Some' were Bender's friends first thought that the Men in Black were from
- Air Force or the CIA, and indeed Bender's original statments do seem to sound
- like government agents. But after a while the Men in Black begun to assume a
- more extraterrestrial, even supernatural air.
-
- Finally in 1963, a full decade after he first told of his mysterious visitors,
- Alber Bender elaborated further in a book called "Flying Sauvers adn the Three
- Men in Black." It was a strange, confused and virutally unreadable book that
- revealed very little in the way of hard facts, but did significantly enhance
- the reutation of the Men in Black as extraterrestrials. The book also
- introduced into the lore "three beautful women, dressed in tight white
- unigorms." Like thei r mail couterparts in black, the women in white had
- "glowing eys."
-
- But even before the publication of Bender's book in 1963, the Men in Black (or
- MIBSs as they are know to insiders) had already been reported to be vising
- others besides Albert Bender. By now they have been reported so often that they
-
- have become an established part of the UFO history. The Men in Black, naturally
-
- enough, wear black suits. They also usually wear sunglasses, presumably to
- disguise their "glowing eyes". Most of them are reported to be short and
- delicately built with olive complexions and dark, straight hair. They are often
-
- described as "Gypsies" or "Orientals". Most MIBS are reported to travel in
- groups of three and usually ride around in shiny new black cars -- often
- Cadillacs. These cars are even supposed to "smell new." SOmetimes the MIBs pose
-
- as investigators from the CIA or some other government agancy. They may flash
- official-looking credentials, but these can never be checked out. Occassionally
-
- the MIBs display badges with strange emblems on them, or have unrecognizable
- symbols painted on their cars. The purpose of the visits seems to be to get
- people who have seen UFOs to stop talking about them, or somehow to confuse and
-
- frighten the witnesses.
-
- People who worry about MIBs tend to lump all sorts of mysterious visitors into
- the category, even if they don't wear black, have glowing eyes or show any of
- the familiar MIB characteristics. The primary qualification for the Men in
- Black is that they be of unknown origin, and that they appear to act oddly and
- vaguely menancing.
-
- Some of those who write about UFO's and other strange pehomena rather casually
- mention "countless" cases where people have been visited by Men in Black. In
- reality these "countless" cases are difficult to pin down. In fact, there
- really seems to be a rather small number of MIB cases where there are any
- details available at all.
-
- The impression given by the writers is that the publicized cases represent only
-
- "the tip of the iceberg." Beyond these, say the writers, are many "more
- sensational" cases, the details of which cannot be revealed for a variety of
- reasons. In any event solid evidence for a vast number of MIB cases is lacking.
-
- But we are, after all, dealing with beliefs as much as with reality, and
- impression is an important one.
-
- Often the MIB cases that we know of are not quite as sensational as Albert
- Bender's three visitors, but they are unsettling nevetheless. Take the case of
- California highway inspector Rex Heflin. On August 3, 1965, Heflin claimed to
- have taken a series of Polaroid photos of a UFO from his car while parked near
- the Santa Ana Freeway. The pictures were quite clear and they showd an object
- shaped rather like a straw hat apparenlty floating above the ground. These
- pictures got a great deal of publicity, and are still among the most requently
- repreinted UFO photos. Heflin's story was investigated by the Air Force shortly
-
- after it bacome known. It was also looke into by investigators fot the Condon
- Committee durring their inquiry. (The committee investigator produced a pretty
- fair imitation of the photos by suspending the lens cap of his camera in front
- of his car with a thread and photograph it through the car window). In
- addition, a host of unofficial UFO groups tackled the case in their own way.
-
- There was considerable suspicion on the part of official investigators that the
-
- photos had been faked, but this was difficult to prove or disprove without the
- original prints. Being Poaroid photos there were no negative.
-
- Heflin said that he had turned over three of the four originals to a man (or
- two men, the stories differ) who calimed that he represented the North American
-
- Air Defense Command (NORAD). NORAD denied that they had ever sent out an
- investigator or indeed that they had the slightest interst in the photos. The
- mysterious person who is alleged to have taken the phots has never been
- identified.
-
- On October 11, 1967, over two years after Heflin's original sighting, but while
-
- the Condon investigation was going on, Heflin reported another encounter with
- mysterious visitors. A man who said that he was Captain C. H. Edmonds of the
- Space Systems Division, Systems Command, a unit of the Air Force that had been
- involved in the first investigation of his UFO photos, came to his home. During
-
- the interview the man who called himself Captain Edmonds asked Heflin if he
- wanted his original photos back. When Heflin said no, the man was "visibly
- relieved." Inexplicably, the man then began discussin the Bermuda Triangle.
- This is an area near the island of Bermuda where a number of mysterious
- disappearances of airplanes and shops have been reported. These disappearances
- have been linked by some to UFOs, though the connection does not seem very
- convincing.
-
- While this strange interview was going on Heflin said that he saw a car parked
- in the street. It had some sort of lettering on the front door but he could not
-
- make it out. To quote the Condon Report description of the indicent, "In the
- back seat could be seen a figure and a violet (not blue) glow, which the
- witness attributed to instrument dials. He believed he was being photographed
- or recorded. In the meantime his FM multiplex radio was playing in the living
- room and during the questioning it made several loud audible pops." All
- attempts by the Air Foece, various civilian researchers and the Condon
- Committee itself to find "Captain C. H. Edmonds" failed. As far as can be
- determined, no such person has ever existed.
-
- A much more bizarre story was supposedly told by an unnamed family who had
- sighted a UFO. Sometime after the sighting they said tha--
- Michael Corbin - via ParaNet node 1:104/422
- UUCP: !scicom!paranet!User_Name
- INTERNET: ParaNet.Information.Service@paranet.FIDONET.ORG
-
- From: Don.Allen@p1.f81.n363.z1.FIDONET.ORG (Don Allen)
- Newsgroups: alt.paranet.ufo
- Subject: MIB Stuff 1/10
- Message-ID: <1800.2BD51203@paranet.FIDONET.ORG>
- Date: 20 Apr 93 00:57:03 GMT
- Sender: ufgate@paranet.FIDONET.ORG (newsout1.26)
- Organization: FidoNet node 1:363/81.1 - HomeBody, Sanford FL
- Lines: 125
-
-
- * Forwarded from "MUFONET"
- * Originally by Marty Wade
- * Originally to Carlos Steffens
- * Originally dated 17 Apr 1993, 12:21
-
-
- CS> Well, what would you recommend as the most informative
- CS> article/file/book on MIBs?
-
- I don't think any books have been wholly devoted to the subject,
- Carlos, but I'll post the following three articles I've typed up
- into a file for you. Enjoy.
-
-
- A REVIEW OF MIB (MEN IN BLACK)
- A History
- By Linda Murphy
-
- From 'Astronet Review' No. 1 February 1992.
-
- A lot of people have heard of something about "MIBs" without
- really knowing any of the details.
- The purpose of this article is to acquaint readers with MIBs
- history, how they are related to the cover-up allegations, along
- with associated reference material and names of files which
- contain more current thoughts on the subject.
- When the Condon Committee was sampling public attitudes
- toward UFOs they gave this statement to a cross-section of the
- American Public: "A government agency maintains a Top Secret
- file of UFO reports that are deliberately withheld from the
- public." The respondents were supposed to answer TRUE or FALSE. A
- substantial majority, sixty-one percent, thought that the
- statement was true while only thirty-one percent said it was
- false. Among teenagers, the credibility gap was even wider - 73
- percent believed the statement to be true. General opinion
- studies conducted by the Condon Committee, and other surveys
- about UFOs came up with the rather paradoxical facts that there
- were more people who believed in a conspiracy of silence about
- UFOs than believed in UFOs in the first place.
- It has ofen been said that we Americans today are a bit
- paranoid; that we always tend to believe that something is out to
- get us, or something is being kept from us. It certainly seems
- that we were a bit paranoid about UFOs.
- Most people thought vaguely in terms of an Air Force
- conspiracy or a CIA conspiracy or even of a world-wide scientific
- conspiracy. It was generally acknowledged that the reason behind
- such a conspiracy was a desire on the part of those in power to
- hide the "truth" from the public because people would panic if
- they kney that we really were being visited by superior creatures
- from another world. Conspiracy theorists constantly hearkened
- back to the old "War of the Worlds" broadcast, and the panic it
- started.
- Such a belief, however, is rather too simple for the true
- connoisseur of conspiracies. He has long ago rejected the simple,
- straightforward Air Force-CIA-science establishment cover-up as
- too obvious, and really rather ridiculous. The conspiracy
- connoisseur pointed out quite correctly that no government or
- group, no matter how powerful, could possibly suppress so much
- sensational information for so long - no earthly group that is.
- If the extraterrestrials WANTED to make themselves known then
- they would land in a central place, and all the feeble earthly
- cover-up would simply be blown away. It is out of this sort of
- background that the legend of the Men In Black arose. It concerns
- strange little men in dark suits who drive around in big shiny
- cars and harass people who claimed to have seen a UFO.
- The origin of the Men In Black legend can be pinpointed
- fairly exactly. Back in 1953 a man by the name of Albert K.
- Bender was running an oranisation called the International Flying
- Saucer Bureau (IFSB) and editing a little publication called
- Space Review that was dedicated to news of flying saucers.
- The IFSB had a small membership despite its rather grandiose
- title, and Space Review reached at best, no more than a few
- hundred readers. But they were all deeply devoted to the idea
- that flying saucers were craft from outer space. In common with
- other true believers, these saucer buffs were convinced that they
- were in possession of a great truth, while most of the rest of
- the world remained in darkness and ignorance. They felt very
- important, and thus it was with a sense of surprise, even shock,
- that they opened up the October 1953 issue of Space Review and
- found two unexpected announcements: "LATE BULLETIN. A source
- which the IFSB considers very reliable has informed us that the
- investigation of the flying saucer mystery and the solution is
- approaching its final stages. This same source to whom we had
- referred data, which had come into our possession, suggested that
- it was not the proper method and time to publish the data in
- Space Review."
- The second and more shocking item read: "STATEMENT OF
- IMPORTANCE: The mystery of the flying saucers is no longer a
- mystery. The source is already known, but any information about
- this is being withheld by order from a higher source. We would
- like to print the full story in Space Review, but because of the
- nature of the information we are very sorry that we have been
- advised in the negative."
- The statement ended with the ominous sentence, "We advise
- those engaged in saucer work to please be very cautious." Bender
- then suspended the publication of Space Review, and dissolved the
- IFSB.
- The tone of the announcements would have been familiar to
- anyone who had much experience with occult organizations.
- Occultists often claim they are in the possession of some great
- secret which, for equally secret reasons, they cannot reveal.
- Even the appeal, "please be very cautious" was not unique. It
- made those engaged in "saucer work" feel more important. After
- all, who is going to bother to persecute you if you are just
- wasting your time?
- Shortly after Bender closed down his magazine and
- organization he gave an interview to a local paper [in] which he
- asserted that he had been visited by "three men wearing dark
- suits" who had ordered him "emphatically" to stop publishing
- material about flying saucers. Bender said that he had been
- "scared to death" and that he "actually couldn't eat for a couple
- of days.". Some of Bender's former associates tried to press for
- a more satisfactory explanation, but to all questions he replied
- either cryptically or not at all.
-
-
-
- This state of affairs created considerable confusions among
- the flying saucer buffs. What were they to think about such a
- strange story? Some were openly skeptical of Bender's tale. They
- said that his publication and organization were losing money and
- the tale of the three visitors who "ordered" him to stop
- publishing was just a face-saving gesture. Yet, as the years went
- by the "Three Men In Black" began to sound more respectable and
- they took on a life of their own. Some of Bender's friends first
- thought that the Men In Black were from the Air Force or the CIA,
- and indeed Bender's original statements do seem to sound like
- [the men could have been] government agents. But after a while
- the Men In Black began to assume a more extraterrestrial, even
- supernatural air.
- Finally in 1963, a full decade after he first told of his
- mysterious visitors, Albert Bender elaborated further in a book
- called "Flying Saucers and the Three Men In Black". It was a
- strange, confused and virtually unreadable book that revealed
- very little in the way of hard facts, but did significantly
- enhance the reputation of the Men In Black as extraterrestrials.
- The book also introduced into the lore "three beautiful women,
- dressed in tight white uniforms." Like their male counterparts in
- black, the women in white had "glowing eyes".
- But even before the publication of Bender's book in 1963, the
- Men In Black (or MIBs as they were known to insiders) had already
- been reported to be visiting others besides Alber Bender. By now
- they have been reported so often that they have become an
- established part of the UFO history. The Men In Black, naturally
- enough,wear black suits. They also usually wear sunglasses,
- presumably to disguise their "glowing eyes". Most of them are
- reported to be short and delicately built with olive complections
- and dark, straight hair. They are often described as "Gypsies" or
- "Orientals". Most MIBs are reported to travel in groups of three
- and usually ride around in shiny, new, black cars - often
- Cadillacs. These cars are even supposed to "smell new". Sometimes
- the MIBs pose as investigators from the CIA or some other
- government agency. They may flash official-looking credentials.
- but these can never be checked out. Occasionally the MIBs display
- badges withstrange emblems on them, or have unrecognizable
- symbols painted on their cars. The purpose of the visits seems to
- be to get people who have seen UFOs to stop talking about them,
- of somehow to confuse and frighten the witnesses.
- People who worry about MIBs tend to lump all sorts of
- mysterious visitors into the category, even if they don't wear
- black, have no glowing eyes nor show any of the familiar MIB
- characteristics. The primary qualification for the Men In Black
- is that they be of unknown origin, and that they appear to act
- oddly and vaguely menacing.
- Some of those who write about UFOs and other strange
- phenomena rather casually mention "countless" cases where people
- have been visited by Men In Black. In reality these "countless
- cases" are difficult to pin down. In fact, there really seems to
- be a rather small number of MIB cases where there are any details
- availabe at all.
- The impression given by the writers is that the publicized
- cases represent only "the tip of the iceberg". Beyond these, say
- the writers, are many "more sensational" cases, the details of
- which cannot be revealed for a variety of reasons. In any event
- solid evidence for a vast number MIB cases is lacking. But we
- are, after all, dealing with beliefs as much as with reality, and
- 'impression' is an important one.
- Often the MIB cases that we know of are not quite as
- sensational as Albert Bender's three visitors, but they are
- unsettling nevertheless. Take the case of California highway
- inspector Rex Heflin. On August 3, 1965, Heflin claimed to have
- taken a series of Polaroid photos of a UFO from his car while
- parked near the Santa Ana Freeway. The pictures were quite clear
- and they showed an object shaped rather like a straw hat
- apparently floating above the ground. These pictures got a great
- deal of publicity, and are still among the most frequently
- reprinted UFO photos. Heflin's story was investigated by the Air
- Force shortly after it became known. It was also looked into by
- investigators for the Condon Committee during their inquiry. (The
- committee investigator produced a pretty fair imitation of the
- photos by suspending the lens cap of his camera in front of his
- car with a thread and photographing it through the car window.)
- In addition, a host of unofficial UFO groups tackled the case in
- their own way.
- There was considerable suspicion on the part of official
- investigators that the photos had been faked, but this was
- difficult to prove of disprove without the original pronts.
- Being Polaroid photos, there were no negatives.
- Heflin said that he had turned over three of the four
- originals to a man (or two men - the stories differ) who claimed
- that he represented the North American Air Defence Command
- (NORAD). NORAD denied that they had ever sent out an
- investigator, or indeed, that they had the slightest interest in
- the photos. The mysterious person who is alleged to have taken
- the photos has never been identified.
- On October 11, 1967, over two years after Heflin's original
- sighting, but while the Condon investigation was going on, Heflin
- reported another encounter with mysterious visitors. A man who
- said that he was Captain C.H. Edmonds of the Space Systems
- Division, Systems Command, a unit of the Air Force that had been
- involved in the first investigation of his UFO photos, came to
- his home. During the interview the man who called himself Captain
- Edmonds asked Heflin if he wanted his original photos back. When
- Heflin said no, the man was "visibly relieved". Inexplicably, the
- man then began discussing the Bermuda Triangle. This is an area
- near the island of Bermuda where a number of mysterious
- disappearances of airplanes and ships have been reported. These
- disappearances have been linked by some to UFOs, though the
- connection does not seem very convincing.
-
-
- While this strange interview was going on, Heflin said that
- he saw a car parked in the street. It had some sort of lettering
- on the front door but he could not make it out. To quote the
- Condon Report description of the incident, "In the back seat
- could be seen a figure and a violet (not blue) glow, which the
- witness attributed to instrument dials. He believed he was being
- photographed or recorded. In the mentime his FM multiplex radio
- was playing in the living room and during the questioning it made
- several loud audible pops." All attempts by the Air Force,
- various civilian researchers and the Condon Committee itself to
- find "Captain C. H. Edmonds" failed. As far as can be determined,
- no such person has ever existed.
- A much more bizarre story was supposedly told by an unnamed
- family who had sighted a UFO. Sometime after the sighting they
- said that they were visited by a very strange individual. Ivan
- Sanderson, who reported the incident in his book "Uninvited
- Visitors", described the individual thus: "almost seven feet
- tall, with a small head, dead white skin, enormous frame, but
- pipe-stem limbs." This oddity said he was an insurance
- investigator and that he was looking for someone who had the same
- name as the husband of this family. He indicated that the man he
- was looking for had inherited a great deal of money. Continued
- Sanderson; "This weird individual just appeared out of the night
- wearing a strange fur hat with a visor and only a light jacket.
- He flashed an official-looking card on entry but put it away
- immediately. Later on when he removed his jacket he disclosed an
- official-looking gold shield on his shirt which he instantly
- covered with his hand and removed."
- The strange visitor asked some personal questions about the
- family, but nothing at all about the UFOs. The creepiest part of
- the whole affair came when the eldest daughter of the family
- noticed that the "investigator's" tight pants had ridden up his
- skinny leg, and she saw a green wire running out of his sock, up
- his leg and into his flesh at two points. After the interview,
- the "investigator" got into a large, black car which contained at
- least two other persons, and seemed to disappear on an old dirt
- road that led from the woods. The car drove off into the night
- with its headlights off.
- In addition to scaring and intimidating people, visits of
- MIBs are also supposed to produce a variety of unpleasant
- physical symptoms. Bender said he suffered from headaches, lapses
- of memory and was plagued by strange odours following the first
- visit of the Men In Black. Others who say they have had similar
- visitations have made similar complaints.
- Another eerie thing attributed to MIB types, is the ability
- to look like anyone they want to. Some UFO researchers claim that
- MIBs have been posing as THEM in order to silence potential
- witnesses. John Keel, who has written a number of UFO books ,
- said that he had encountered people who refused to believe that
- he was who he said he was. "Later contactees (those who say they
- are, somehow or other, in contact with the space people) began to
- whisper to local UFO investigators that the real John Keel had
- been kidnapped by a flying saucer and that a cunning android who
- looked just like me had been substituted in my place. Incredible
- though it may sound, this was taken very seriously, and later
- even some of my more rational correspondents admitted that they
- carefully compared the signatures on my current letters with
- pre-rumour letters they had received."
- As we said earlier, each era tries to explain strange
- encounters in terms of its own system of beliefs. I have been
- struch by the similarity of some of these MIB cases with medieval
- tales of encounters with the devil or some of hes demons. The
- devil, for example, was very often described as a man dressed in
- black. The ability to change shape and appear in any form was
- commonly attributed to demons, who were able to take the shape of
- a victim's friends and neighbors and even assume the likeness of
- angels and saints. Many of those who said that they had met the
- devil complained of the same range of physical symptoms reported
- by those who encounered the MIBS.
- The shiny new cars associated with MIBs is reminiscent of the
- Haitian belief in an evil society of sorcerers called "zobops".
- Haitians say that if you see a big, new car going along the road
- without a driver, it's under the control of the "zobops", and you
- had better not try to interfere with it.
- Now, I am not trying to imply that the MIBs are agents of the
- devil, or vice versa, anymore than I would try to say that the
- little green men from Mars were really the fairy folk of past
- generations. It is just that our visions and fears often remain
- the same over the ages, and only our explanations for them
- change.
- Of course, encounters with the devil during the Middle Ages
- were generally more frightening and overpowering experiences than
- current experiences with MIBs. Everbody believed in the devil,
- while today everybody does not believe in the creatures from outer
- space. Mideval society took devil stories in dead earnest, and
- anyone who made such a report might find himself facing a painful
- death at the stake. The worst one can expect from reporting a MIB
- encounter is a certain amount of disbelief and ridicule. In
- general, MIB tales are considered too bizarre even to be reported
- in local newspapers. They are published only in magazines and
- books put out for and by UFO enthusiasts.
- Usually such publications are provately printed and are read
- by only a few hundred. A few books however, have been issued by
- major publishers and have reached a far wider audience. These
- cases are also occasionally discussed on radio and TV talk shows,
- so the information gets around more widely than one might think.
- A lot of people have heard of "something" about MIBs without
- really knowing any of the details.
-
- There is one incident which bared certain similarities to the
- traditional MIB case that did receive very wide publicity. This
- is the story of the "kidnapping" of Betty and Barney Hill. While
- most of the MIB cases do not appear directly to involve a UFO,
- this one does. The couple was driving to their home in
- Portsmouth, New Hampshire, from Canada on the night of September
- 19, 1961. They were on an isolated stretch of road when they
- spotted what they thought was a flying saucer abouve them. Then
- followed two completely blank hours in their lives. They could
- remember nothing from the time they saw the UFO until a time two
- hours later when they found themselves in their car several miles
- down the road from where they had seen the UFO. For months after
- this experience both of the Hills suffered from severe
- psychological distress. Finally they consulted a psychiatrist,
- who hypnotized them, and under hypnosis the Hills revealed a
- strange story of being kidnapped and taken aboard a flying
- saucer.
- The Hills didn't rush out and try to get publicity about
- their experience or write a book about it. In fact, they were
- remarkably quiet. But the incident did ultimately come to the
- attention of author John Fuller, who had already written an
- extremely popular UFO book. With the co-operation of the Hills
- and of their psychiatrist, Fuller produced another best seller,
- "The Interrupted Journey", which was first serialized in the now
- defunct 'Look' magazine.
- Though the book is carefully hedged with qualifications that
- the experience described might be a hallucunation or a dream
- rather than a "totally real and true experience", the distinct
- impression left by The Interrupted Journey on thousands of
- readers was that the experience was a "totally real and true"
- one.
- The people or entities that were supposed to be controlling
- the spaceship that kidnapped the Hills can be squeezed into the
- Men In Black lore. Barney Hill described one of his captors as
- looking like "a red-headed Irishman", hardly a MIB type. But
- another wore "a shiny black coat", with a black scarf thrown
- about his neck.
- Under hypnosis Hill drew a picture of "the leader" of his
- abductors. It is a strange insect like face with a wide, thin
- mouth and huge slanting eyes that seem to go halfway around the
- creatures' head. The eyes were the most frightening part of the
- saucer inhabitant's strange physiognomy. Once during a hypnotic
- session with the psychiatrist Barny Hill cried out in terror,
- "Oh, those eyes! They're in my brain!" Glowing eyes, you will
- recall, are considered some of the key characteristics of the
- typical Man In Black.
- Unlike many of the books written by or about people who say
- that they had encountered the inhabitants of UFOs, The
- Interrupted Journey carries real conviction. One gets the feeling
- that the Hills and Fuller are intelligent, sincere and sane
- people who really believe that what they described is what
- actually did happen.
- So this idea was planted in the minds of thousands of readers
- of The Interrupted Journey: UFOs can land, the extraterrestrials
- can kidnap ordinary people, subject them to a degrading and
- almost brutal examination and then wipe all memory of the
- incident from their minds, leaving behind only an unexplained
- sense of anxiety bordering on panic.
- Well, what does all of this mean? Are we being invaded by
- some weird bunch of extraterrestrials who have in the words of
- the "Shadow" radio show, "the power to cloud men's minds"?
- Frankly the evidence does not support such an alarming
- conclusion.
- Are all the stories hoaxes and hallucinations? Psychiatrists
- could certainly have a field day with many of these accounts.
- Symptoms such as loss of memory, severe anxiety and other
- unpleasant reactions strongly suggest that many of those who
- report such experiences are in a disturbed psychological state,
- though they would claim the disturbance was caused by the
- encounter with the strange visitor. In any event they do not make
- the most reliable of witnesses. Some of the other stories are
- almost certainly sheer fiction, made up either by some practical
- joker or by a writer of sensational books.
- Whether all the stories are real of unreal is not a question
- that we can answer conclusively here. The point is that we
- Americans are building a mythology for ouselves, just as the
- Europeans did with their tales of dragons, ogres and elves, and
- just as all people have done in all parts of the world in all
- ages.
- We have often prided ourselves on being a practical,
- hardheaded, no-nonsense sort of people who were immune to the
- irrational fears and superstitious notions of less clear-sighted
- and realistic folk. This proposition is demonstrably untrue and
- perhaps we are better off for it. Our monsters, our space people,
- even if they don't exist, if indeed they are rather silly, also
- make life more interisting and exciting.
-
- ***:::::::::***
-
- REFERENCES:
-
- Excalibur Briefing, Thomas E. Bearden, Strawberry Hill Press
- 1980.
- UFOs and Their Mission Impossible, Dr. Clifford Wilson, Signet
- Press.
- Flying Saucers on The Attack, Harold T. Wilkins, Ace Books 1954.
- MONSTERS: Giants and Little Men From Mars, Daniel Cohen, DELL
- Publications (paperback) 1975.
-
- *******
-
-
- WHO ARE THE MEN IN BLACK?
-
- From 'The Unexplained' No. 10. Orbis Publishing. 1991.
-
- As UFO sightings increase, so allegedly does the harassment
- of witnesses - by the sinister so-called Men In Black.
-
- Albert Bender, director of the International Flying Saucer
- Bureau, an amateur organisation based in Connecticut, USA, once
- claimed to have discovered the secret behind UFOs. But
- unfortunately, the rest of the world is still none the wiser -
- for Bender was prevented from passing on his discovery to the
- world by three sinister visitors: three men dressed in black,
- known as 'the silencers'.
- It had been Bender's intention to publish his findings in
- his own journal, Space Review. But before committing himself
- finally, he felt he ought to try his ideas out on a colleague.
- He therefore mailed his report. A few days later, the men came.
- Bender was lying down in his bedroom, overtaken by a sudden
- spell of dizziness, when he noticed three shadowy figures in the
- room. Gradually, they became clearer. All were dressed in black
- clothes. "They looked like clergymen, but wore hats similar to
- Homburg style. The faces were not clearly discernible, for the
- hats partly hid and shaded them. Feelings of fear left me... The
- eyes of all three figures suddenly lit up like flashlight bulbs,
- and all these were focussed upon me. They seemed to burn into my
- very soul as the pains above my eyes became almost unbearable.
- It was then I sensed that they were conveying a message to me by
- telelathy."
-
- Bender's visitors confirmed that he had been right in his
- speculations as to the true nature of the UFOs - one of them was
- actually carrying Bender's report, and provided additional
- information. This so terrified him that he was only too willing
- to go along with their demand that he close down his organisation,
- cease publication of his journal at once, and refrain from
- telling the truth to anyone 'on his honour as an American
- citizen.'
- But did Bender really expect anyone to believe his story? His
- friends and colleagues were certainly baffled by it. One of them,
- Gray Barker, even published a sensational book, 'They Knew Too
- Much About Flying Saucers'; and Bender himself supplied an even
- stranger account in his 'Flying Saucers and the Three Men' some
- years later, in response to persistent demands for an explanation
- of what had occurred from former colleagues.
- He told an extraordinary story, involving extraterrestrial
- spaceships with bases in Antarctica, that reads like the
- far-fetched contactee dream-stuff; and it has even been suggested
- that the implausibility of Bender's story was specifically
- designed in order to throw serious UFO investigators off the
- track.
- However, believable or not, Bender's original account of the
- visit of the three strangers is of crucial interest to UFO
- investigators, for the story has been parelleled by many similar
- reports, frequently from people unlikely to have heard of Bender
- and his experiences. UFO percipients and investigators are
- apparently also liable to be visited by men in black (MIBs); and
- although most reports are from the United States, similar claims
- have come from Sweden and Italy, Britain and Mexico. Like the UFO
- phenomenon itself, MIBs span three decades, and perhaps had
- precursors in earlier centuries.
-
- VISITATIONS
-
- Like Bender's story, most later reports not only contain
- implausible details, but are also inherently illogical: in
- virtually every case, there seems on the face of it more reason
- to disbelieve that to believe. But this does not eliminate the
- mystery - it simply requires us to study it in a different light.
- For whether or not these things actually happened, the fact
- remains that they were reported; and why should so many people,
- independently and often reluctantly, report such strange and
- sinister visitations? What is more, why is it that the accounts
- are so mimilar, echoeng and in turn helping to confirm a
- persistent pattern that, if nothing else, has become one of the
- most powerful folk myths of our time?
- The archetypal MIB report runs something like this: shortly
- after a UFO sighting, the subject - he may be a witness, he may
- be an investigator on the case - receives a visit. Often it
- occurs so soon after the incident itself that no official report
- or media publication has taken place: in short, the visitors
- should not, by any normal channels, have gained access to the
- information they clearly possess - names, addresses, and details
- of the incident, as well as those involved.
- The victim is nearly always alone at the time of the visit,
- usually in his own home. The visitors, usually three in number,
- arrive in a large, black car. In America, it is most often a
- prestigious Cadillac, but seldon a recent model. Though old in
- date, however, it is likely to be immaculate in appearance and
- condition, inside and out, even having that unmistakable 'new
- car' smell. If the subject notes the registration number and
- checks it, it is invariably found to be a non-existent number.
-
-
- The visitors themselves are almost always men: only very
- rarely is one a woman, In appearance, they conform pretty closely
- to the stereotyped image of a CIA or secret service man. They
- wear dark suits, dark hats, dark ties, dark shoes and socks, but
- white shirts: and witnesses very often remark on their clean,
- immaculate turn-out, all the clothes looking as though just
- purchased.
- The visitors' faces are frequently discribed as 'vaguely
- foreign', most often 'oriental', and slanted eyes have been
- specified in many accounts. If not dark-skinned, the men are
- likely to be very heavily tanned. Sometimes there are bizarre
- touches: in one case, for instance, a man in black appeared to be
- wering bright lipstick! The MIBs are generally unsmiling and
- expressionless, their movements stiff and awkward. Their general
- demeanour is formal, cold, sinister, even menacing, and there is
- no warmth or friendliness shown, even if no outright hostility
- either. Witnesses often hint that they felt their visitors were
- not human at all.
- Some MIBs proffer evidence of identity; indeed, they
- sometimes appear in US Air Force or other uniforms. They may also
- produce identity cards; but since most people would not know a
- genuine CIA or other 'secret' service identity card if they saw
- one, this of course proves nothing at all. If they give names,
- however, these are invariably found to be false.
- The interview is sometimes an interrogation, sometimes simply
- a warning. Either way, the visitors, even though they are asking
- questions, are clearly very well-informed, with access to
- restricted information. They speak with perfect, sometimes too
- perfect, intonation and phrasing, and their language is apt to be
- reminiscent of the conventional villains of crime films.
-
- MENACING ENCOUNTERS
-
- The sinister visits almost invariably conclude with a warning
- not to tell anybody about the incident, if the subject is a UFO
- percipient, or to abandon the investigation, if he is an
- investigator. Violence is frequently threatened, too. And the
- MIBs depart as suddenly as they came.
- Most well-informed UFO enthusiasts, if asked to describe a
- typical MIB visit, would give some such account. However, a
- comparative examination of reports indicates that such 'perfect'
- MIB visits seldom occur in practice. Study of 32 of the more
- reliable cases on file reveals that many details diverge quite
- markedly from the archetypal story: there were, for instance, no
- visitors at all in four cases, only subsequent telephone calls;
- and, of the remainder, only five involved three men, two involved
- four, five involved two, while in the rest there was mention only
- of a single visitor.
- Although the appearance and behaviour of the visitors does
- seem generally to conform to the prototype, it ranges from the
- entirely natural to the totally bizarre. The car, despite the
- fact that in America it is by far the commonest means of
- transportation, is in fact mentioned in only one-third of the
- reports; and as for the picturesque details - the Cadillac, the
- antiquated model, the immaculate condition - these are, in
- practice, very much the exception. Of 22 American reports, only
- nine even include mention of a car; and of these, only three were
- Cadillacs, while only two were specified as black and only two as
- out-of-date models.
- On the other hand, such archetypal details tend to be more
- conspicuous in less reliable cases, particularly those in which
- investigators, rather than UFO percipients, are involved. The
- case that comes closest to the archetype is that of Robert
- Richardson, of Toledo, Ohio, who in July 1967 informed the Aerial
- Phenomena Research Organisation (APRO) that he had collided with
- a UFO while driving at night. Coming round a bend, he had been
- confronted by a strange object blocking the road. Unable to halt
- in time, he had hit it, though not very hard. Immediately on
- impact, the UFO vanished. Police who accompanied Richardson to
- the scene could find only his own skid marks as evidence; but on
- a later visit, Richardson himself found a small lump of metal
- which might have come from the UFO.
- Three days later, at 11 pm, two men in their twenties
- appeared at Richardson's home and questioned him for about 10
- minutes. They did not identify themselves, and Richardson - to
- his own subsequent surprise - did not ask who they were. They
- were not unfriendly, gave no warnings, and just asked questions.
- He noted that they left in a black 1953 Cadillac. The number,
- when checked, was found not yet to have been issued.
- A week later, Richardson received a second visit, from two
- different men, who arrived in a current model Dodge. They wore
- black suits and were dark-complectioned. Although one spoke
- perfect English, the second had an accent, and Richardson felt
- there was something vaguely foreign about them. At first, they
- seemed to be trying to persuade him that he had not hit anything
- at all; but then they asked for the piece of metal. When he told
- them it had gone for analysis, they threatened him: "If you want
- your wife to stay as pretty as she is, then you'd better get the
- metal back".
-
-
- The existence of the metal was known only to Richardson and
- his wife, and to two senior members of APRO. Seemingly, the only
- way the strangers could have learned of its existence would be by
- tapping either his or APRO's telephone. There was no clear
- connection between the two pairs of visitors; but what both had
- in common was access to information that was not freely and
- publicly available. Perhaps it is this that is the key to the MIB
- mystery.
-
- ************
-
- [On the page is also a boxed article titled; IN FOCUS
- THE MAN WHO SHOT A HUMANOID, reproduced
- below.]
-
- One inclement evening in November 1961, Paul Miller and three
- companions were returning home to Minot, North Dakota, after a
- hunting trip when what they could only describe as 'a luminous
- silo' landed in a nearby field. At first they thought it was a
- plane crashing, but had to revise their opinion when the 'plane'
- abruptly vanished. As the hunters drove off, the object
- reappeared and two humanoids emerged from it. Miller panicked and
- fired at one of the creatures, apparently wounding it. The other
- hunters immediately fled.
- On their way back to Minot, all of them experienced a blackout
- and 'lost' three hours. Terrified, they decided not to report the
- incident to anyone. Yet the next morning, when Miller reported
- to work (in an Air Force office), three men in black arrived.
- They said they were government officials - but showed no
- credentials - and remarked unpleasantly that they hoped Miller
- was 'telling the truth' about the UFO. How did they know about
- it? 'We have a report,' they said vaguely.
- 'They seemed to know everthing about me; where I worked, my
- name, everthing else,' Miller said. They also asked questions
- about his experiences as if they already knew the answers. Miller
- did not dare tell his story for several years.
-
- *****End*****
-
- AGENTS OF THE DARK
-
- From 'The Unexplained' No. 39.
-
- Rarely - if ever - do the threats of the mysterious Men In
- Black, following a close encounter, come to anything. So what
- could be the purpose behind their visits?
-
- In September 1976, Dr Herbert Hopkins, a 58 year-old doctor
- and hypnotist, was acting as consultant on an alleged UFO
- teleportation case in Maine, USA. One evening, when his wife and
- children had gone out leaving him alone, the telephone rang and a
- man identifying himself as vice-president of the New Jersey UFO
- Research Organisation asked if he might visit Dr Hopkins that
- evening to discuss certain details of the case. Dr Hopkins
- agreed; at the time, it seemed the natural thing to do. He went
- to the back door to switch on the light so that his visitor would
- be able to find his way from the parking lot, but while he was
- there, he noticed the man already climbing the porch steps. "I
- saw no car, and even if he did have a car, he could not have
- possibly gotten to my house that quickly from any phone," Hopkins
- later commented in delayed astonishment.
- At the time, Dr Hopkins felt no particular surprise as he
- admitted his visitor, The man was dressed in a black suit, with
- black hat, tie and shoes, and a white shirt, "I thought, he
- looks like an undertaker," Hopkins later said. His clothes were
- immaculate - suit unwrinkled, trousers sharply creased. When he
- took off his hat, he revealed himself as completely hairless, not
- only bald but without eyebrows or eyelashes. His skin was dead
- white, his lips bright red. In the course of their conversation,
- he happened to brush his lips with his grey suede gloves, and the
- doctor was astonished to see that his lips were smeared and that
- the gloves were stained with lipstick!
- It was only afterwards, however, that Dr Hopkins reflected
- further on the strangeness of his visitor's appearance and
- behaviour. Particularly odd was the fact that his visitor stated
- that his host had two coins in his pocket. It was indeed the
- case. He then asked the doctor to put one of the coins in his
- hand and to watch the coin, not himself. As Hopkins watched, the
- coin seemed to go out of focus, and then gradually vanished.
- "Neither you nor anyone else on this plane will ever see that
- coin again," the visitor told him. After talking a little while
- longer on general UFO topics, Dr Hopkins suddenly noticed that
- the visitor's speech was slowing down. The man then rose
- unsteadily to his feet and said, very slowly; "My energy is
- running low - must go now - goodbye." He walked falteringly to
- the door and descended the outside steps uncertainly, one at a
- time. Dr Hopkins saw a bright light shining in the driveway,
- bluish-white and distinctly brighter than a normal car lamp. At
- the time, however, he assumed it must be the stranger's car,
- although he neither saw nor heard it.
-
-
-
- MYSTERIOUS MARKS
-
- Later, when Dr Hopkins family had returned, they examined the
- driveway and found marks that could not have been made by a car
- because they were in the centre of the driveway, where the wheels
- could not have been. But the next day, although the driveway had
- not been used in the meantime, the marks had vanished.
- Dr Hopkins was very much shaken by the visit, particularly
- when he reflected on the extraordinary character of the
- stranger's conduct. Not surprisingly, he was so scared that he
- willingly complied wdith his visitor's instruction, which was to
- erase the tapes of the hypnotic sessions he was conductiog with
- regard to his current case, and to have nothing further to do
- with the investigation.
- Subsequently, curious incidents continued to occur both in Dr
- Hopkin's household and in that of his eldest son. He presumed
- that there was some link with the extraordinary visit, but he
- never heard from his visitor again. As for the New Jersey UFO
- Research Organisation, no such institution exists.
- Dr Hopkins' account is probably the most detailed we have of
- a MIB (Man in Black) visit, and confronts us with the problem at
- its most bizarre. First we must ask ourselves if a trained and
- respected doctor whould invent so strange a tale, and if so, with
- what conceivable motive? Alternatively, could the entire episode
- have been a delusion, despite the tracks seen by other members of
- his family? Could the truth lie somewhere between reality and
- imagination? Could a real visitor, albeit an impostor making a
- false identity claim, have visited the doctor for some unknown
- reason of his own, somehow acting as a trigger for the doctor to
- invent a whole set of weird features?
- In fact, what seems the LEAST likely explanation is that the
- whole incident took place in the doctor's imagination. When his
- wife and children came home, they found him severely shaken, with
- the house lights blazing, and seated at a table on which lay a
- gun. They confirmed the marks on the driveway and a series of
- disturbances to the telepnone that seemed to commence immediately
- after the visit. So it would seem that some real event occurred,
- although its nature remains mystifying.
- The concrete nature of the phenomenon was accepted by the
- United States Air Force, who were concerned that persons passing
- themselves off as USAF personnel should be visiting UFO
- witnesses. In February 1967, Colonel George P. Freeman,
- Pentagon spokesman for the USAF's Project Blue Book, told UFO
- investigator John Keel in the course of an interview:
- "Mysterious men dressed in Air Force uniforms or bearing
- impressive credentials from government agencies have been
- silencing UFO witnesses. We have checked a number of these
- cases, and these men are not connected with the Air Force in any
- way. We haven't been able to find out anything about these men.
- By posing as Air Force officers and government agents, they are
- committing a federal offence. We would sure like to catch one.
- Unfortunately the trail is always too cold by the time we hear
- about these cases. But we are still trying."
- But were the impostors referred to by Colonel Freeman, and Dr
- Hopkin's strange visitor similar in kind? UFO sightings, like
- sensational crimes, attract a number of mentally unstable
- persons, who are quie capable of posing as authorised officials
- in order to gain access to witnesses; and it could be that some
- supposed MIBs are simply psuedo-investigators of this sort.
- One particularly curious recurrent feature of MIB reports is
- the ineptitude of the visitors. Time and again, they are
- described as incompetent; and if they are impersonating human
- beings, they certainly do not do it very well, arousing their
- victims' suspicions by improbable behaviour, by the way they
- look or talk, and by their ignorance as much as their knowledge.
- But, of course, it could be that the only ones who are spotted
- as impostors are those who are no good at their job, and so
- there may be many more MIB cases that we never learn about
- simply because the visitors successfully convince their victims
- that there is nothing to be suspicious about, or that they should
- keep quiet about the visit.
-
- UNFULFILLED THREATS
-
- A common feature of a great many MIB visits is indeed the
- instruction to a witness not to say anything about the visit,
- and to cease all activity concerning the case. (Clearly, we know
- of these cases only because such instructions have been
- disobeyed.) One Canadian UFO witness was told by a mysterious
- visitor in 1976 to stop repeating his story and not to go
- further into his case, or he would be visited by three men in
- black. "I said, 'What's that supposed to mean?' 'Well,' he said,
- ' I could make it hot for you... it might cost you certain
- injury." A year earlier, Mexican witness Carlos de los Santos
- had been stopped on his way to a television interview by two
- large black limousines. One of the occupants - dressed in a
- black suit and 'Scandanavian' in appearance - told him: "Look,
- boy, if you value your life and your family's too, don't talk
- any more about this sighting of yours."
-
- However, there is no reliable instance of such threats ever
- having been carried out, though a good many witnesses have gome
- ahead and defied their warnings. Indeed, sinister though the
- MIBs may be, they are notable for their lack of actual violence.
- The worst that can be said of them is that they frequently
- harass witnesses with untimely visits and telephone calls, or
- simply disturb them with their very presence.
- While, for the victim, it is just as well that the threats
- of violence are not followed through, this is for the
- investigator one more disconcerting aspect of the pnenomenon -
- for violence, if it resulted in physical action, would at least
- help in establishing the reality of the phenomenon. Instead, it
- remains a fact that most of the evidence is purely hearsay in
- character and often not of the highest quality; cases as
- well-attested as that of Dr. Herbert Hopkins are unfortunately
- in the minority.
- Another problem area is the dismaying lack of precision
- about many of the reports. Popular American writer Brad Steiger
- alleged that hundreds of ufologists, contactees and chance
- percipients of UFOs claim to have been visited by ominous
- strangers - usually three, and usually dressed in black; but he
- cites only a few actual instances. Similarly, John Keel, an
- expert on unexplained phenomena, claimed that, on a number of
- occasions, he actually saw phantom Cadillacs, complete with
- rather sinister Oriental-looking passengers in black suits; but
- for a trained reporter, he showed a curious reluctance to persue
- these sightings or to give chapter and verse in such an important
- matter. Such loose assertions are valueless as evidence; all
- they do is contribute to the myth.
- And so we come back once again to the possibility that there
- is nothing more to the phenomenon than myth. Should we perhaps
- write off the whole business as delusion, the creation of
- imaginative folk whose personal obsessions take on this
- particular shape because it reflects one or other of the
- prevalent cultural preoccupations of out time? At one end of the
- scale, we find contactee Woodrow Derenberger insisting that the
- "two men dressed entirely in black" who tried to silence him
- were emissaries of the Mafia; while at the other, there is
- theorist David Tansley, who suggested that they are psychic
- entities, representatives of the dark forces, seeking to prevent
- the spread of true knowledge. More matter-of-factly, Dominick
- Lucchesi claimed that they emanated from some unknown
- civilisation, possibly underground, in a remote area of Earth -
- the Amazon, the Gobi Desert or the Himalayas.
- But there is one feature that is common to virtually all MIB
- reports, and that perhaps contains the key to the problem. This
- is the possession, by the MIBs, of information that they should
- not have been able to come by - information that was restricted,
- not released to the press, known perhaps to a few investigators
- and officials but not to the public, and sometimes not even to
- them. The one person who does possess that knowledge is always
- the person visited, In other words, the MIBs and their victims
- share knowledge that perhaps nobody else possesses. Add to this
- the fact that, in almost every case, the MIBs appear to the
- witness when he or she is alone - in Dr Hopkin's case, for
- example, the visitor took care to call when his wife and
- children were away from home, and established this fact by
- telephone beforehand - and the implication has to be that some
- kind of paranormal link connects the MIBs and the persons they
- visit.
-
- TRUTH - OR PARANOIA?
-
- To this must be added other features of the phenomenon that
- are not easily reconciled with everday reality. Where are the
- notorious black cars, for instance, when they are not visiting
- witnesses? Where are they garaged or serviced? Do they never get
- involved in breakdowns or accidents? Can it be that they
- materialise from some other plane of existence when they are
- needed?
- These are only a few of the questions raised by the MIB
- phenomenon. What complicates the matter is that MIB cases lie
- along a continuous spectrum ranging from the easily believable
- to the totally incredible. At one extreme are visits during
- which nothing really bizarre occurs, the only anomalous feature
- being, perhaps, that the visitor makes a false identity claim,
- or has unaccountable access to private information. At the other
- extreme are cases in which the only explanation would seem to be
- that the witness has succumbed to paranoia. In "The Truth
- About the Men In Black", UFO investigator Ramona Clark tells of
- an unnamed investigator who was confronted by three MIBs on 3
- July 1969. "On the window of the car in which they were riding
- was the symbol connected with them and their visitations. This
- symbol had a profound psychological impact upon this man. I have
- never encountered such absolute fear in a human being."
- The first meeting was followed by continual harassment.
- There were mysterious telephone calls, and the man's house was
- searched. He began to hear voices and to see strange shapes.
- "Black Cadillacs roamed the street in front of his home, and
- followed him everwhere he went. Once he and his family were
- almost forced into an accident by an oncoming Cadillac.
- Nightmares concerning MIBs plagued his sleep. It became
- impossible for him to rest, his work suffered and he was scared
- of losing his job."
- Was it all in his mind? One is tempted to think so. But a
- friend confirmed that, while they talked, there was a
- strange-looking man walking back and forth in front of the
- house. The man was tall, seemed about 55 years old - and was
- dressed entirely in black.
-
-
- CASEBOOK
-
- The Odd Couple.
-
- On 24 September 1976 - only a few days after Dr. Herbert
- Hopkin's terrifying visit from a MIB - his daughter-in-law
- Maureen received a telephone call from a man who claimed to know
- her husband John, and who asked if he and a companion could come
- and visit them.
- John met the man at a local fast-food restaurant, and
- brought him home with his companion, a woman. Both appeared to
- be in their mid-thirties, and wore couriously old-fashioned
- clothes. The woman looked particularly odd; when she stood up,
- it seemed that there was something wrong with the way that her
- legs joined her hips. Both strangers walked with very short
- steps, leaning forward as though frightened of falling.
- They sat awkwardly together on a sofa while the man asked a
- number of detailed personal questions. Did John and Maureen
- watch television much? What did they read? And what did they
- talk about? All the while, the man was pawing and fondling his
- female companion, asking John if this was all right and whether
- he was doing it correctly.
- John left the room for a moment, and the man tried to
- persuade Maureen to sit next to him. He also asked her "how she
- was made", and whether she had any nude photographs.
- Shortly afterwards, the woman stood up and announced that
- she wanted to leave. The man also stood, but made no move to go.
- He was between the woman and the door, and it seemed that the
- only way she could get to the door was by walking in a straight
- line, directly through him. Finally the woman turned to John and
- asked: "Please move him; I can't move him myself." Then,
- suddenly, the man left, followed by the woman, both walking in
- straight lines. They did not even say goodbye.
-
- ***End***
-
-
- * SLMR 2.1a * ...I'm mad. I've always been mad...
-
- --
- Don Allen - via ParaNet node 1:104/422
- UUCP: !scicom!paranet!User_Name
- INTERNET: Don.Allen@p1.f81.n363.z1.FIDONET.ORG
-
-
-
- From: John_-_Winston@cup.portal.com
- Newsgroups: alt.alien.visitors
- Subject: Re: Wanted: Info on MIB
- Message-ID: <62232@cup.portal.com>
- Date: 17 Jul 92 00:36:44 GMT
- References: <1992Jul16.013041.5827@news.unomaha.edu>
- <62200@cup.portal.com> <1992Jul16.182152.27028@nntpd2.cxo.dec.com>
- Organization: The Portal System (TM)
- Lines: 11
-
- Here's some information about MIBs. I probubly have posted this before
- but someone may have not read it. MEN IN BLACK.
- In the past a certain number of people often come around and ask people
- who would see space craft all sorts of questains, Then after they got
- the information they would threaten them with everything in the book
- if they ever talked about it to anyone. They sometimes would even
- kill the person if they didn't shut up. They were called the Men in Black
- because they wore dark suits and drove dark colored cars. I recently
- got some information about these people. They are from the Sirius Star
- System although most of the good type beings from that system such as
- as Kadar refer to these Men in Balck's planet as a rather unsightly
- planet and from their frame of reference they do not claim them to be
- their own, but they must acknowledge that they are even within their
- dimension, located within the Sirius system. Our government is
- cooperating with Sirians now and the question was asked; What is the
- power that makes the entire government have to go along with them?
- They have weapons sources (I must be circumspect) that are believed
- by the powers that be on this planet (Earth) to be absolutely dominating.
- In other words the government believes that it is looking down the
- barrel of a very big gun. The Sirians are in the second dimension
- soon to go into the third dimension. We are in the third soon
- to go into the fourth. The Sirians are trying to keep us from going
- into the fourth dimension. The negative Sirians are involved in these
- cattle mutilations because of their desirae to create a species that
- can perpetuate itself in the harshest of conditions. The people from
- Zeta Reticuli aren't doing the mutilations but the primitive Zeta
- Reticulians which are from what we would now consider to be from the
- past(please don't ask me to explain that because I can't JW.) are
- helping the Sirians. One of the beings that was interviewed while he was
- asleep is called B'Zal. You talk about a tough dude. He would make the
- worse person on Earth look like Mr. Robert (on the kids TV show).J.W.
-
-
-
- From: John.Powell@f816.n107.z1.FIDONET.ORG (John Powell)
- Newsgroups: alt.paranet.ufo
- Subject: MIB Stuff
- Message-ID: <1897.2BD90259@paranet.FIDONET.ORG>
- Date: 24 Apr 93 03:07:00 GMT
- Sender: ufgate@paranet.FIDONET.ORG (newsout1.26)
- Organization: FidoNet node 1:107/816 - The Wrong Num, Jersey City NJ
- Lines: 52
-
- Tom, I forgot whether or not I'd sent you this earlier...
-
- -+---------------------------------------------------------------------------
-
- Excerpts from _Alien Intelligence_ by Stuart Holroyd. Everest House,
- 1979, ISBN 0-89696-040-4.
-
- Since the start of the modern era of reported UFO activity,
- which is generally considered as dating from the 1947 sighting by
- American businessman and amateur pilot, Kenneth Arnold, many people who
- have claimed sightings of UFOs or contact experiences with their
- occupants have reported subsequent visits from rather sinister gentlemen
- whose behavior has been distinctly odd. These reports have emanated
- from different countries and from individuals quite unaware that their
- experiences were not unique, and they have details in common that add up
- to a rather convincing case for the reality of the visitors.
-
- The men are generally described as dark or olive-skinned, rather
- oriental-looking, of short stature, and frail build, and are usually
- dressed in black, sometimes in ill-fitting or out-of-fashion clothes.
- There are generally two or three of them and they seem to travel in
- large black cars. Some people who have been visited by 'men in black'
- have noted the numbers on the cars' license plates, but when poice have
- checked these they invariably found that they are non-existant as
- registered license numbers. Other people have reported that the
- visitors have appeared and vanished with unaccountable abruptness. They
- have used a variety of ruses to command a hearing, masquerading as
- government agents, journalists, military or air force personnel, or
- representatives of insurance companies, for example. Sometimes they
- simply ask a lot of questions, many of them puzzlingly irrelevant, and
- then go away, but sometimes they communicate quite unequivocal warnings
- of dire consequences if a person does not keep quiet about his UFO
- experience. More than one investigator has been effectively silenced or
- intimidated by the sinister visitors. UFO cultists who believe that the
- world's governments are in cahots to suppress information on the
- subject, have spread the idea that the 'men in black' are CIA agents,
- but this hypothesis is difficult to maintain in view of the evidence for
- their world-wide appearances, the uniformity and peculiarity of their
- looks, and the strangeness of their conduct.
-
- -+---------------------------------------------------------------------------
-
- Thanks, take care.
- John.
- -
- <Absence of Evidence is not Evidence of Absence>
-
-
- --
- John Powell - via ParaNet node 1:104/422
- UUCP: !scicom!paranet!User_Name
- INTERNET: John.Powell@f816.n107.z1.FIDONET.ORG
-
-
-
- Date: Thu, 14 Mar 91 11:13:59 EST
- Reply-To: FORUM FOR UFOLOGY <UFO-L@brufpb.bitnet>
- Sender: FORUM FOR UFOLOGY <UFO-L@brufpb.bitnet>
- From: Charles <mcgrew@klinzhai.rutgers.edu>
- To: Charles McGrew <mcgrew@darkstar.rutgers.edu>
- In-Reply-To: Your message of Wed, 13 Mar 91 15:01:27 EDT
-
- Hi,
-
- OK, here's a bit of stuff for UFO-L -- on MIB's. From Brad
- Steiger's disorganized opus "Mysteries of Time & Space"
- Prenntice-Hall, 1974, ISBN 0-113-609040-0 (some of the book first
- appeared in "Saga" and "Male" magazine -- that should give you some
- context of the 'hardness' of this info, but it is grist for the mill).
-
- In September, 1953 Albert K. Bender had figured out parts of the
- origin of flying saucers, and sent his theory off to a "trusted
- friend". Soon thereafter three men dressed in black appeared, with
- his letter in hand. They told him 'the real story', and he became
- ill.
-
- Bender, apparently to "save mankind", kept the details to himself
- and gave up UFO research. Parts of this story were retold in Gray
- Barker's "They knew too much about flying saucers" (1956) [without the
- part of 'revealed truth'], and said that several other people (in
- Australia and New Zealand) had also been visited.
-
- Bender decided to tell all in his 1962 "Flying Saucers and the
- Three Men", which (Steiger says) was disappointing, in that it didn't
- tell much (that anyone wanted to know, anyway). Alien bases in
- Antartica (which Bender saw by Astral Projection), and so on.
-
- However, others continued to stick to the MIB story, saying that
- Bender had in fact been silenced. "Bender was a changed man after the
- MIB visited him. It was as if he had been lobotomized." He suffered
- headaches that he said were caused by 'them'.
-
- Steiger says that "large numbers" of UFO-ologists have been
- harassed by *somebody*. A number of them (none named, unfortunately)
- had had photographs and negatives of UFO's confiscated by people
- claiming "government affiliation" (curious term, that) - "usually
- three, usually dressed in black". [BTW, if you ever get a visit from
- MIB, what they're asking you to do is a violation of search and
- seizure laws.]
-
- In an issue of "Saucer Scoop" (as usual, Steiger doesn't give an
- issue number) John Keel is quoted as saying that MIB are professional
- terrorists who go from place to place making sure that too much isn't
- found out about the UFO phenominon. Keel says that MIB victims appear
- to be subjected to "some sort of brainwashing technique that leaves
- him in a state of nausea, mental confusion, or even amnesia lasting
- for several days". Keel goes on to charge that local police/FBI/etc.
- must be in on it, because they refuse to investigate MIB.
-
-
- Col. George Freeman (Blue Book) was quoted by Steiger as being
- quoted by Keel (do you get the drift here of Mr. Steiger's
- "journalistic" zeal?) as saying that MIB cases were investigated by
- Blue Book, and that they weren't connected to the Air Force in any
- way. Steiger goes on to detail how four bogus USAF officers
- (Men-In-Blue, I guess :-) told witnesses in NJ that they "hadn't seen
- a thing" in 1967, and that they shouldn't tell anyone what they saw.
-
- ... Steiger goes on to give sketchy details of several other MIB
- visitations (though several are of encounters with a single man, not
- three), claiming to be NORAD officers, from the "UFO Research
- Institute", and (my favorite) "a government agency so secret he
- couldn't give its name". Also, telephone and mail harassment and
- messages from TV's and radios are mentioned. The MIB know where
- you're going, where you've been, and what you've been doing, and will
- tell you such things to convince you to be quiet.
-
- From there, Steiger goes off the deep end, claiming that MIB are to
- be found throughout history, as "Trickster", "Poltergeist" or
- "Sorcerer" figures. Well, I didn't say this was a good source, now
- did I?
-
- A comment on clothing: I've seen various things about the material
- the MIB supposedly wear -- its made of a plastic-like substance, a
- rubbery substance, and in Steiger's book the material is described by
- "Major Joseph Jenkins, Retired, Field Investigations Director for the
- UFO Research Institute of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania" in 1968 as
- "reminding him of the quilted uniforms (by Korean/Chinese troops) in
- the Korean war".
-
- Comments on appearance: I've seen all sorts of descriptions of
- MIB's physical appearance -- here's another that I haven't seen
- before: "Jim" (no date, no last name): "He was cadaverous... he
- looked like those WWII photographs of someone in a concentration camp.
- But he seemed alert enough."
-
- Charles
-
-
- From: murrayb@crfm.gen.nz (Murray Bott)
- Newsgroups: alt.alien.visitors
- Subject: Re: Men in Black
- Message-ID: <36988.2009224001@crfm.gen.nz>
- Date: 19 Jul 92 10:16:28 GMT
- Reply-To: murrayb@crfm.gen.nz (Murray Bott)
- Distribution: alt
- Organization: Household UNIX, Auckland, New Zealand
- Lines: 42
-
-
- In Brad Steigers book "Mysteries of Time and Space" (Sphere Books,paperback
- edition,published 1977 page 193.) Steiger writes
-
- > In 1956 Gray Barker told the Bender story-minus the
- >detailed revalations the men in black (MIB) had given
- >Bender about the UFO enigma__in They Knew Too Much
- >About Flying Saucers. In the same volume he related that
- >Edgar R Jarrold, organiser of the Australian Flying Saucer
- > Bureau, Harold H Fulton, head of Civilian Saucer Inves-
- >tigation of New Zealand, and Ufologist John H Stuart,
- >also a New Zealander,had received visits from
- >mysterious strangers in black and had subsequently dis-
- >banded thei organisations and their research
-
- This paragraph contains some distortions and basic error of facts. The book
- "The Knew Too Much About Flying Saucers" by Gray Barker does contain some
- material which has helped to artifically create a Mystery
- Certainly with regards to Harold H Fulton he did not ever receive any visit
- by strangers in black, nor did he ever receive any threats to close or cease
- his research
- He continued his research until his death in 1986 and was New Zealand
- Director for the Mutual UFO Network (MUFON) from 1973 until this time
- Fortunately a large portion of his files survive and are now in my
- possesion
-
- As far as New Zealander John Stuart is concerned,I have not ever established
- contact with him (He appeares to have passed away in very recent years) I do
- have on file his photostat copies of his correspondance with Grey Barker
- (received from another source)
-
- In light of the ongoing discussion on this by some (on this Net and perhaps
- elsewhere) I will be checking some background in other areas and may at some
- time in the future post an article on this net (if neccassary) although this
- is likely to be some weeks or even months away
-
- Regards
-
- --
- Domain : murrayb@crfm.gen.nz
- Voice : 64-9-6315825
- Snail : PO Box 27117, Mt Roskill, Auckland 1030, New Zealand
-