John A. Keel WHY UFOS

viewed by thousands. A few days before that sighting(April 9) the Chicago papers had carried articles ridiculingthe reports that were coming in from other sections of thecountry. Maybe the bearded "inventor" decided to put on ashow for the skeptical Chicagoans.In my outline of the flap of March 8, 1967, in Chapter 1of this book, you will note that case No. 16 was reported inEldora, Iowa, a small town of about 3000 souls smack inthe middle of Iowa. On April 9, 1897, they also hadsightings in this unlikely place! In fact, if we compare the1897 flap with the things that are going on now, we findthat the sightings have been concentrated in many specificareas for many years. The area around Dallas, Texas, isone. Michigan is another. There was a well-publicized flapin Michigan in March, 1966, around Ann Arbor andHillsdale. There were sightings in Ann Arbor on Aprii 17,1897. Michigan had, in fact, 30.5 percent of all the sightingsused in our 1897 study. There is still constant UFO activityin that state, despite the dearth of publicity.In 1897, when people saw actual objects, they describedthem as being cigar-shaped or being large dark forms withlights attached. No flying saucers turned up in the reports Ihave collected. But the night-time observations then wereexactly the same as they are now: bright lights with coloredlights flashing around them, often moving in an erraticfashion but apparently controlled. It is possible that theairship was nothing more than a decoy—a cover for thereal activity that was taking place in 1897. Certainly theseobjects did not consist of one or two clumsy balloonsshuffling across the country.On the night of Saturday, April 17, 1897, alone, therewere reported sightings in seven scattered towns and citiesin Michigan. That same night, twelve towns in Texas, far,far from Michigan, had sightings, as did Waterloo, Iowa,and St. Louis, Missouri. There were hundreds, if notthousands, of people involved in some of these sightings.We cannot dismiss them all, nor can we explain them.Texas had more than 20 percent of all the sightings in 1897,and that state has had continuous sightings for the pasttwenty years.Iowa, Illinois, Michigan. South Dakota, Texas, andWashington, D.C., had sightings on April 15, 1897. About25 percent of all the 1897 sightings occurred at approximately9 P.M.; 20 percent at 8 P.M.: 20 percent at 10 P.M.;15 percent at midnight. Others were scattered in the early-