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patterns. I have devoted considerable time to collecting, studying, and reconstructing the detailed accounts that were aviable to serious researchers of the previous centuries and to retracing their steps. That they were scholars in theology and natural philosophy, rather than people trained in science, does not bother me. They applied the same principles. They started from stories that were reported to them; they visited the witnesses to form a personal opinion about the report; and when they were safely home, in the peace of their monastery or study, they compared the observation to those they had already gathered. They have pulled ancient books from dusty shelves just as I have. They opened Psellus alongside Paracelsus and Wier to seek the guidance of those who preceded them. It wad 1 con Fi 14 a would have been as easy for them to jump to premature conclusions as it is for us to declare that UFOs are extraterrestrial visitors. They could have claimed the creatures came from the moon or were the denizens of hell. Remarkably, they kept an open mind. And they transmitted to us a surprisingly clear and fresh statement of the things seen in the sky and on the land for centuries, accounts that read like the modern reports of UFOs and alien abductions. One of these researchers, Reverend Kirk, who lived in Scotland in the late seventeenth century, has even left us a list of sixteen concise, precise conclusions about the form of intelligence that controls the phenomenon, and the organization of the entities themselves. He calls that organization the "Secret Commonwealth." The teletype message arrived in Dayton, Ohio, on September 9, 1966, through military channels. The full text, about four pages long, was quite unintelligible without knowledge of the Air Force procedure for the transmission of UFO reports. This particular message had originated at Kelly Air Force Base, Texas, and was addressed to the Air Force Systems Command, Headquarters, U.S. Air Force, and the Secretary. It bore the headline Unclassified Routine and the title UFO Report Is Submitted In Accordance With AFR 200-2. Kelly Air Force Base was sending something very close to a ghost story. The report made reference to two separate incidents, occurring, respectively, on August 6 and September 3, 1966, in a small Texas town. The author of the report is a father of four children. We shall call him Robert. His house is located in a fairly isolated spot, and he has never discussed the incidents with his neighbors. On August 6, the three youngest children (ages six to nine) noticed a dark object shaped like an upside-down cup. Although it was afternoon, the children had not seen the object arrive. (These details, naturally, were not given spontaneously by the children; the story was reconstituted during the investigation.) It was dark, "without color and without lights." Then a square yellow light appeared, like a door opening, and a small creature was seen in the square of light. The entity, three to four feet tall, was dressed in black clothing that reflected a yellow or gold color. The observation lasted several minutes, then the door closed. A low humming sound became audible, and the object took off toward the northeast, rising sharply but at an unexceptional speed. At no time did the object touch the ground: it hovered at a height of about fifteen feet, near a tree, which was found undamaged, about thirty-five feet from the house. The second sighting took place on September 3. Most of the family had gone away, but the oldest daughter had remained in the house with a friend. They were watching television in the afternoon when the set "snowed," then went out. The house was lit up with eerie red and yellow light which appeared to be circling or twirling. They looked outside and saw an object hovering in the same position, by the same tree, as in the first sighting. Its shape, again, was that of an upside-down cup, with a flat disk beneath, like a saucer. It was covered with light and departed shortly afterward. No sign of life was apparent inside or outside the craft. Two days later, Robert was propped up in bed. Through his door and across the hall he could see a dark doorway leading to his sons' bedroom. All of a sudden he saw a small person, three and a half smart enough to recognize that the phenomenon is worthy of investigation and obeys certain fixed The Ghost and The Teletype