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just wonder about that. If you realize what people go through when this happens to them. If you really think you have guts enough to come out and tell people. Of course, nowadays it might be a little easier, but in the early fifties it was very, very rough, especially when you are in business and you are trying to act like a reputable citizen and bring up a family and, you know, things like this in your community.” Yes, it must have been tough. And it must have required more than just a little guts for Howard Menger to first come forward with such a story and then later to publicly recant on television. I have talked with several different people who were around High Bridge in 1956-57. One of them is Ivan T. Sanderson who lives nearby and who knew Howard before, during, and after these episodes. Something strange was definitely happening to Menger and the people around him at that time. Did Howard Menger get rich from all this? On the contrary. He lost his sign-painting business and his reputation. In the end he had to flee to another state, where he is just barely eking out a living at his old trade. Howard Menger is not alone. There are many other tormented victims in this incredible drama. One of them was a traveling grain buyer named Reinhold Schmidt. Late on the afternoon of November 5, 1957, Schmidt entered the office of Sheriff Dave Drage in Kearney, Nebraska, and unfolded a tale of contact that was classical in every detail. He said his engine had stalled outside of Kearney, and when he got out of his car to check it, he saw a silver “blimp” in a nearby field. Curious, he walked toward it and was surprised when a kind of staircase opened up and unreeled toward him. A man in conventional terrestrial clothes stepped out to meet him, speaking in perfect German, a language that Schmidt uindarntand understood. Repairs were being made, the man explained, and Schmidt was welcome to look around until the work was completed. Schmidt said there were four people aboard, two men and two women, all apparently normal except for one bewildering detail. They did not seem to walk, he noted; rather they seemed to glide across the floor of the craft as if they were on casters. He described glowing tubes of colored liquids inside the craft, but overall, it was as stark and as simple as the interiors described by other contactees. The four people were not very informative, as usual, but told Schmidt that he would know all about it—and them—eventually. The whole episode sounds very much like the “‘chance’’ encounters reported by the 1897 contactees. After about thirty minutes, Schmidt was asked to leave. The “‘repairs”” 186 / Operation Trojan Horse