Carl%20Sagan%20-%20The%20Demon%20Haunted%20World

THE DEMON-HAUNTED WORLD
200-inch reflector of the Carnegie Institution of Washington and
the California Institute of Technology. Adamski styled himself
Professor Adamski of Mount Palomar Observatory. He published
a book - it caused quite a sensation, I recall - in which he
described how in the desert nearby he had encountered nicelooking
aliens with long blond hair and, if I remember correctly,
white robes who warned Adamski about the dangers of nuclear
war. They hailed from the planet Venus (whose 900° Fahrenheit
surface temperature we can now recognize as a barrier to Adamski's
credibility). In person, he was utterly convincing. The Air
Force officer nominally in charge of UFO investigations at the
time described Adamski in these words:
To look at the man and to listen to his story you had an
immediate urge to believe him. Maybe it was his appearance.
He was dressed in well worn, but neat, overalls. He had
slightly graying hair and the most honest pair of eyes I've ever
seen.
Adamski's star slowly faded as he aged, but he self-published
other books and was a long-standing fixture at conventions of
flying saucer 'believers'.
The first alien abduction story in the modern genre was that of
Betty and Barney Hill, a New Hampshire couple, she a social
worker and he a Post Office employee. During a late-night drive
in 1961 through the White Mountains, Betty spotted a bright,
initially star-like UFO that seemed to follow them. Because
Barney feared it might harm them, they left the main highway for
narrow mountain roads, arriving home two hours later than they'd
expected. The experience prompted Betty to read a book that
described UFOs as spaceships from other worlds; their occupants
were little men who sometimes abducted humans.
Soon after, she experienced a terrifying, repetitive nightmare in
which she and Barney were abducted and taken aboard the UFO.
Barney overheard her describing this dream to friends,
co-workers and volunteer UFO investigators. (It's curious that
Betty didn't discuss it with her husband directly.) By a week or so
after the experience, they were describing a 'pancake'-like UFO
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