The Cover-Up of the "Flatwoods Monster"!

Captain E. Ruppelt

The Cover-Up of the "Flatwoods Monster"!

[Official Duplicity, Standard Operating Procedure...revealed and examined... ]

By Alfred Lehmberg

 

In 1952, Captain Edward J. Ruppelt was the Chief of Project Blue Book at Wright-Patterson AFB in Dayton, Ohio. His unrewarded and unrewarding tenure was the swan song of a trustworthy “public face” on the “official” initiative that was the government’s  “information” on UFOs… UFOs just NOT going away. 

This initiative began with the BEST of intentions, but as the nameless “pecuniary” and “status quo” realities began to impose and intrude from a perhaps "unelected," above? The more it was to become a closed institution of official “misdirection” and “duplicity”! It was revived somewhat by Lt. Col. Robert J. Friend (1958 to 1963), but by then? The damage was done. 

The last two Blue Book chiefs were men of color in what was a highly racist military at the time. This reflects, sadly, the official UFO concern at that moment as it pertained to the public. ...This writer was in the military in 1969, and reports that it was still pretty racist, even then. There are receipts!

Moving on, the United States' brave UFO investigative initiative began as official Agency #1, Project Sign in 1947! It would go south quickly... 

Project Sign! This courageous lot suggested right from the start that these UFOs might be ET (cue the ominous music)! That refreshingly inspiring attitude very suspiciously gave way (predictably) to Official Agency #2, Project Grudge (1949), truly, its name too on the nose. This project included the folks who'd become infamous for adopting that reflexive posture of the debunking faux-skeptical crowd we’ve all come to know and love!

Agency #2, then, finally devolved into our Official Agency #3, Project Blue Book... a gelded record keeper at the last, no operations budget for investigation, and having to beg to rent the odd necessary car. In November of 1951, Ruppelt was appointed the Chief of Project Grudge at its dire end, name later changed to Project Blue Book, as was pointed out, and held that position until September 1953…

Only, back up a minute a bleedin' minute! What in blue blazes was Project Sign looking at (?!?)!? One must wonder about the anxious directives foreshadowing the provocation of its philosophy AND mission change from Sign to Grudge, then impotence going forward? Onward...

Back to Ruppelt, during his career and afterwards, he’d collaborated with pioneer UFO researcher and author Donald Keyhoe on the UFO subject... pervading... and on the  cases of the day... unfolding . We’ve written about Keyhoe before.

During one particular conversation, Ruppelt admitted to Keyhoe the facts about certain “strategies” that the government had directed be used to cover up UFO reports! Wait... what?

No, this is key, and the reader needs to “gird loins” wherever they’ve migrated! See, the entire issue is right here!

The following appeared in Mr. Keyhoe's 1973 book, "Aliens From Space." It comes from an uncontested and documented discussion between these two men; Captain Ruppelt and Donald Keyhoe… Ruppelt informed Keyhoe of the following: 

"We're ordered to hide sightings when possible, but if a strong report does get out, we have to publish a fast explanation—make up something to kill the report in a hurry. We must also ridicule the witnesses, especially if we can't figure a plausible answer." 

 Wait! What?!

“Ordered to hide sightings”? “Fast explanations”? “Kill the report”? “Ridicule the witnesses”? That’s as ethically dodgy as it is morally spotty! …Wait! One might presume that all that is done by our elected officiality and is only in the interest of a lay humanity’s sensibilities and their civil amity… you know, buyin’ food and cars, payin’ mortgages, and just tryin’ to get through their duty’s day… perhaps in the interest of safety and avoiding a disturbance of that peace aforementioned? [cough…].

This writer, 78 and a retired professional soldier who has observed how the cultural corporate clocks have turned… …doesn’t buy it either. We’ll forget for a moment that if we had jumped this imminent, eminent, and eventual ufological hurdle back in 1952… well, this writer, all of us, would have known nothing else.

Too, in a momentary digression not trying to allay fears of an "unknown"… any UFO "Disclosure" will be without regard to “cause of fact” or “consequences” of same, and beyond even the warranted suspicion and even seven decades of this writer’s honest intuition... that lay humanity is more served than disserved by a full-blown ufological disclosure… well, devil take it! A forthcoming officiality and Disclosure is required… or nothing means anything, at all!

Sincerely, the current “manor lords” and “corporate transnationals,” the ruling Epstein class, if the reader will, can perhaps be awash in a sea of upset pricey apple carts a result of failing mergers and lost fortunes… a consequence of these UFO disclosures… cat-birders denied their purloined and over-privileged powers & perks, powers & perks themselves denied by any human sensibility, sentient mores, or responcible ethics… flatly, a fairness restored, in a short phrase… that aforementioned intuition! Still, it remains!

These official ufological cover-ups happen with regularity, are the du jour official response to UFOs even today, and as a matter of course this is without regard to the “reasons,” UFO actualities are covered up… …and for reasons we won’t hair-split here! “Officiality” is doing it, be it resolved, and the evidence comes right from the provenance of the government’s own department, Project Bluebook’s “Standard Operating Procedure”… provided above!

Accused! See? PBB was at America’s official ufological nascency! Duplicitous, disingenuous, and dismissive from its second start… just a shiny “thing” or “mechanism” to explain and rationalize this “UFO thing” to the mooing and complacent public at large…

We arrive at the observation that this “Official Conspiracy” pointed out here was exactly what happened during the cover-up of the "Flatwoods Monster" incident in the years following 1952! Posted! 

Donald Keyhoe, it’s discovered, investigated the Flatwoods affair and wrote about it in his 1953 book, "Flying Saucers from Outer Space. He informs us of the following information through one of his many high-profile contacts in Washington, D.C.,

"I discovered that the Air Force had not ignored the Sutton [Flatwoods] report. To avoid public attention, intelligence had worked through the West Virginia State Police, securing all the details."  Securing all the details of what "officials" should be telling the public, is a sensible read, that is…

He added, "Their check through the state police showed more interest than they had admitted." One wonders why THAT would be! Why lie about how interested you are unless… you’re interested!

You didn't see nothin', boyo!\

On the day after the Flatwoods incident, September 13, 1952, the State Police and Sheriff Bob Carr went to Flatwoods to keep the town in order! It was starting to be overrun by curious visitors and local newspaper reporters.

The officers “spoke” to the witnesses and reporters throughout the day and then returned to town on Sunday. Throughout the weekend, the West Virginia State Police told (dictated to?) several reporters what they believed to be the contributing factors of the events that occurred in Flatwoods that night. To wit: behold the heavy lifting the word “hysteria” will be required to do!

The following headline appeared in the "Charleston Daily Mail" on Sunday, September 14th, "Braxton Co. Residents Faint, Become Ill, After Run-In With Weird 10-Foot Monster." The article stated, "State Police laughed the reports off as hysteria. They said the so-called monster had grown from seven to 17 feet in 24 hours." That sounded both reasonably patronizing and knowledgably dismissive… when it was neither. It was the Party line!

On Monday, September 15th, newspapers throughout West Virginia and the country reported the "Flatwoods Monster" story after it was picked up by the "United Press" news service.  As can be seen, additional details about the State Police's involvement had been reported in many of those articles; the following are just a few of the many examples.

The headline of the "Wheeling News-Register" newspaper read, "Metallic Odor Indicates Meteor—Officers Shake Heads Over W. Va. Ogre Tale." Again, that sounded reasonably patronizing and knowledgably dismissive… when it was neither, remember!

No, that “party line” was continued! "State Police and a number of residents hooted at the reports as a product of hysteria." The headline article of the "Fairmont Times" read, "Police Say Braxton Monster Product of 'Mass Hysteria." It reported, "Police figured the smelly boogie-man was the product of 'mass hysteria.'" The headline of "The Wheeling Intelligencer” read, "Monster From Space Roaming W.Va. Hills - Police Discount Half-Man, Half-Dragon Figure Seen in Hills as 'Saucer' [wait for it...] Hysteria." The article stated, "Police laughed. They said the so-called monster had grown from seven to 17 feet in 24 hours. The 'flying saucer' officers speculated, might have been a meteor crashing to earth." 

"Nothing to see here, folks..."

The "Springfield News" newspaper headline read, "Space 'Thing' 17 Feet High Has Red Face, Very Bad BO." The article reported, "State Police said a number of residents hooted at the reports as a product of mass hysteria." It also reported, "Authorities said they believed the 'flying saucer' which Mrs. May's sons saw was a meteorite." The reportage just got sillier and sillier, but it kept the talking points, and it followed Ruppelt’s reported script!

Remember, these quotes are but just a few examples littering the media of the time! This information also appeared in numerous other newspapers across the United States! “Mass Hysteria” remained the talking-point go-to meme, but! …From where did that dodgy explanation come but the offices of Blue Book… And who was it giving Captain Ruppelt his UFO marching orders regarding “tamp down” and “witness ridicule”? This writer is looking beyond President Truman…  

Was all this mendacious and disingenuous “official” pushback a mere coincidence, or is it tracking precisely with what Ruppelt reported as standard operating procedure regarding the suppression of UFO stories, to Keyhoe? The latter is more sensible than the former. The former makes no sense at all.

No… the aforementioned debunking encouragements made by the West Virginia State Police’s “dictations” to reporters and dutifully published in the press were actually that tactic implemented by the government… to kill the Flatwoods report! Let us reexamine the statement Captain Ruppelt made to Donald Keyhoe! 

"We're ordered to hide sightings when possible, but if a strong report does get out we have to publish a fast explanation—make up something to kill the report in a hurry. We must also ridicule the witnesses, especially if we can't figure a plausible answer." 

Noted! These dictating “debunking statements” that the State Police made from day one… were the same explanations that Project Blue Book officials used continuously throughout the duration of their cover-up with this case! SOP! Standard Operating Procedure! 

In January of 1953, four months after the Flatwoods event, Mr. Keyhoe phoned the Pentagon and spoke to Air Force public liaison Albert Chop. He was seeking an explanation concerning the Flatwoods case.

Keyhoe explains, "I was told what intelligence believed to be the facts." Here were the Air Force's answers, "First, the glowing object seen by Mrs. May and the boys actually was a meteor; it merely appeared to be landing when it disappeared over the hill." He continued, "Second, the group did see two glowing eyes, probably those of a large owl perched on a limb. Underbrush below may have given the impression of a giant figure, and in their excitement they imagined the rest." One is reminded of a male bovine's steaming excrement!

Example of a typical 10073 Card

Furthermore, the Project Blue Book, "10073 RECORD CARD" recorded the "Flatwoods, West Virginia" incident as case "#2078." They documented the following information in that report, "The West Virginia monster so-called. Actually the object was the well-known Washington area meteor of 12 Sep landing near Flatwoods." Note that!

…See, Feschino noticed something incongruous here, reader! Observe, the Air Force actually had two different conclusions about that alleged [and fulsomely debunked!] "meteor" which "flew over Flatwoods"! Chop told Keyhoe the Air Force believed, "it merely appeared to be landing when it disappeared over the hill" but then, in the Blue Book "10073 RECORD CARD," they report that the meteor made a "landing near Flatwoods." Mendacious SOPs are hard to keep straight!

Regardless, besides "securing all the details" of the "Flatwoods Monster" incident, the West Virginia State Police did have an ulterior motive for their visit to Flatwoods! Their visit to Flatwoods after the incident was actually a two-fold duplicity as the reader may have already seen!

Resolved: The State Police had released deliberate disinformation from the government to the public through the press by laughing at the witnesses and explaining the story off as "mass hysteria" and a "meteor." At that point, the initial debunking phase of the government's plan was implemented and the cover-up of the "Flatwoods Monster" incident had begun. Stage one complete!

Stage two? Subsequently, the effected reporters printed this disinformation in their newspapers, and the discrediting story spread like wildfire after it was picked up by the United Press. As a result, this disinformation was planted into the "Flatwoods Monster" case from the very beginning! Stage two complete!

This was an official mechanism causing the story to be debunked, downplayed, and so non-believable… relegated to the ignorance and superstition of moonshiner hillbillies ensconced ignorantly in their backwoods hollows of West Virginia! The West Virginia State Police would continue to visit Flatwoods, as well as nearby Sutton, monitoring, and one presumes reporting, on the events unfolding in Flatwoods... for an extended period of time! The tamping "lid" was thought on! The toothpaste was on the way to being back in the tube!

…But, praise be, there was a rub! Feschino explains what happened when credible witnesses Kathleen May, Gene Lemon, and reporter A. Lee Stewart, Jr. appeared on the national TV talk show, "We The People" just four days later on September 19th! Yeah, just when the "monster" story had seemed to be simmering down as a result of the debunking in the press’s tamp-down, the three credible and cogent witnesses blew it all up for the entire planet when they recounted their terrifying "monster" encounter on live television! 

Donald Keyhoe recounts, "It was obvious they [the witnesses] believed the monster was real, and a dozen papers and magazines sent staff writers to Sutton for new angles on the story." As a result, named writers and researchers would become involved! It would then be discovered that the official reports just didn’t add up, pan out, or make sense! Feschino would discover that that was to be the hallmark of his investigation, across the board, after he’d picked up the dropped investigative reins from Sanderson and Barker going forward! 

Oh, and as a closing side note, is it just a coincidence that the "We The People" TV program was cancelled after it was aired the following week on September 26th? The Flatwoods Episode was the penultimate one! This was the most popular program on television, after all! The older reader may remember when the "Smothers Brothers" show was abruptly and inexplicably cancelled... it was bigger than that.

During an early phone conversation that Donald Keyoe had with Albert Chop, he explained what occurred after the Flatwoods episode was aired. He told Chop, "This could get out of hand," and added, "Why doesn't the Air Force squelch it?" Chop answered, "We've already said the object was a meteor." What did he mean by that?! Sounds like an admission to a lie for THIS writer!

Keyhoe replied!"A lot of people don't believe it. And the way it's built up is bad." Keyhoe writes, "'It'll die out,” Chop insisted. Keyhoe responded, "But people will remember it later if something breaks." Keyhoe also adds, "…For the monster story was having a serious effect, in addition to letters from worried Americans."

We The People's Dan Seymour

This television program first aired on CBS television from 1948 until 1949, when there were like two and a half, three channels! Then transitioned to NBC TV and was aired from 1949 through1952. The final program, season 5—episode 13, was the last "We The People" show ever done. 

Did the watchful eye of the government actually pull the plug on this TV show because the "monster" episode revitalized interest in the suppressed story AND scared the hell out of the country? Too, did they begin to reason that an unconstrained media should not be able to tell a story to such a vast audience without some kind of content moderation? This time, it sure seemed to upset their apple cart of deception and duplicity as regards their “Standard Operating Procedure” eh?

See, a seed of doubt about the validity in this deception was planted by a pervasive and unconstrained public media… as it pertains to the contrived, dismissive, and ridiculing publicity surrounding the affair… perhaps growing into what Feschino was able to ferret out, substantially, later on! Sincerely, Feschino’s the only reason we can get up to speed on any of it, at all, now. ...True by watch and warrant. Read on!

Feschino at the infamous tree...

 

Friedman on Feschino...

 ...For that dwindling crowd of nastily noisome naysayers who would dismiss Feschino's "1952 Air War with ET" assertions as a bad science fiction story? Here's the late Stanton Friedman on the subject...

Feschino As Required Key...

Prior Major Players in the Flatwoods Affair, all gone now...

Feschino As Required Key... 

...Or the whole story would have been lost to the hoary mists of official misdirection, nasty naysayers, the usual government cover-ups... and time!

by Alfred Lehmberg

Author and illustrator Frank C. Feschino, Jr. is a skilled artist who studied illustration, commercial art, and photography at Paier College of Art in Hamden, Connecticut. His bona fides were written in academic stone and immaculate… plus, as a student known for a certain perspicacious seriousness, he was highly regarded at this private school.

Trained to his craft by several world-renowned artists including Kenneth Davies, Rudolph Zallinger, Paul Lipp, and John Massimino, he excelled at anatomical drawing and forensic rendering. ...Keep that in mind. 

Feschino’s major course of study at Paier was illustration art. He studied trompe-l'œil style oil painting, acrylic painting, portraiture, anatomical drawing, and advanced pencil drawing techniques. All evidence of this can be found in the many compelling illustrations available, typifying his work. Feschino graduated in 1981, earned his four-year Fine Arts diploma from Paier College of Art, and then continued to hone his film, camera, and artistic skills. 

It was about this time, then, that Feschino began to investigate the "Flatwoods Monster" incident! This was while attending Phillips Jr. College in Florida during the early 1990s. There, he studied Film and Video production. He was trained by noted Hollywood steady-cam camera operator, Richard Davis.

Feschino would continue to research the Flatwoods Case for several more years, even writing a groundbreaking book that chronicles his investigation into that famous UFO close encounter case. Truly, his was an explosion of the whole affair. Even the copyrighting Library of Congress took unusual interest before granting his copyright... a curiously suspicious interest...

It is titled, "The Braxton County Monster—The Cover-up of the Flatwoods Monster Revealed." ...We’ll digress momentarily to inform the reader that this was a purposefully botched publication, all fault to the errant publisher, and is disavowed by Feschino at great personal cost! It contained hundreds of mistakes & mismatches, unapproved editing, and even unwarranted deletions of text, all very suspicious… besmirching, right off the bat, the scholarship and the stunning revelations of Feschino… who was suggesting, for the first time, remember, an associated and documented air war with ET!

 

Feschino and Friedman plus Paper headline blowup

Also? …To besmirch the STERLING reputation of one very eminent ufologist, Stanton Friedman, who had read the Feschino approved manuscript, so knew how it was supposed to be… and who put his reputation on-the-line for Feschino, writing fore and aft in that, what turned out to be, ruined (and ruining!) publication! Friedman would write, fore and aft, in all of Feschino’s subsequent books…

Summing up? Feschino was to have “final say” in the published content. He didn’t, and his story was very nearly destroyed, right there, out of the gate! …Again, all very suspiciously!

…Anyway, an indefatigable Feschino rallied, forthwith, and, suspecting that he wouldn’t get a fair shot in legacy publishing? He self-published the correct manuscript, himself! This book was later re-released into an "Updated and Revised" edition... as his investigation is ongoing.

The point? Ultimately, it was Feschino who investigated and reanimated the Flatwoods case, videotaped the original first-hand witnesses, wrote the reference book, illustrated the cover, did all the interior illustrations, maps… and took all the photos contained within it.

One of the first forensic Feschino renderings...

Most noteworthy, let us not forget that it was crack illustrator Frank Feschino, Jr. who actually sat down with the "Flatwoods Monster" witnesses in their homes like family and did unhurried police-style renderings of the so-called "monster"… all this setting the record straight... or straighter! 

Feschino... and the May family, all deceased now.
Sans Feschino, their story would have died with them.

It was Feschino who revealed or otherwise discovered WHAT the witnesses actually saw that night! ...That it was NOT an entirely living, breathing, if supernatural "flesh-and-blood monster," one even more dismissible than what had been portrayed, as such, for several duplicitous decades!

The famous drawing of the so-called "monster" from 1952, we'll recall, depicts a giant figure fitted in a silly garment outfit, covered in a hood with a tunic-type top, and wearing a long-pleated sweet-sixteen skirt, then tricked out with long skeletal arms and sharp claws. This was all “Public Domain” bupkis. A mislead! A distraction! A deflection! There would be other such!

Infamous "We The People" 1952 rendering!

Feschino was told by the witnesses that this original drawing of skirts, arms, and claws was absolutely wrong and the "thing" they saw didn't look like that, at all! They were rushed and pressured in its execution at the TV station and had little input on the finished product. Feschino would correct precisely that!

See? …And on the contrary, they informed Feschino that the nearly 12-foot-tall figure they saw was some kind of a metal "Space Suit" device that resembled a rocket, and that it was topped with a large helmet shaped like an ace of spades! That was the report from the start.

In likely reality, folks, the "Flatwoods Monster" was probably a machine functioning as some kind of silent… the witnesses don’t mention a “motive” sound, at all, suit! We digress, but imagine the raucous roaring sound of the amount of "leaf blowers" required to keep that huge thing aloft in a maneuvering hover, the cloud of dirt-road dust and debris thrown up in that blast… yet the witnesses, all seven, don’t even mention that… where they have clearer descriptions of everything else! It would have been mentioned, one reasonably suspects. No, from what remains, it had to have been a hovercraft or vehicle… some kind of encounter suit… but a quiet one apart from its reported sound of a strange electrical or "frying fat" sizzle. What a strange propulsion this thing must have had!

The Flatwoods Monster, REVEALED!

…This could be likened to a “manned” probe? ...The boggled mind struggles to wrap itself around SOMETHING!

On Sept. 19, 1952, first-hand witnesses Kathleen May and Gene Lemon went to New York to recount their frightening story to a nationwide TV audience on the popular NBC talk show, "We The People," and, as we have written beforehand, an artist hired for the TV episode talked for mere moments to Mrs. May and Lemon backstage in the studio before their interview. They “collaborated,” drawing an illustration of the "monster" to accompany the program, right there on the spot, from scratch! What could go wrong?!

Lemon and May

Sadly, as has been written, this less-than-salient artist, aspiring to wow the “woo-factor,” one can surmise, “misinterpreted” the witnesses' descriptions of the so-called "monster" …so drawing it incorrectly. This inaccurate drawing of the figure was then shown to a nationwide TV audience during May and Lemons' interview… so was then inculcated, reader, cemented into the minds of a credulous National audience…(and its researchers!) that “this,” this "skirted claw monster," was the true likeness of the "entity" in question. It would discourage, corrupt, and mislead other investigators for decades!

See? As a result of the initial artist's gross misinterpretation, the so-called "Flatwoods Monster" was portrayed INCORRECTLY,  and in a manner subsequently rejectable as a West Virginia tale of dismissible folklore, moonshine and hillbillies, so utterly discountable by the authorities. …Then Feschino was to take an interest, quite simply devoting his life to it! There was now a new sheriff in town!

Put more simply honing the point, were it not for the decades of Frank Feschino's singular research dedicated to this case... and the crafting of his forensic illustrations... those illustrations accurately portraying the so-called "Flatwoods Monster," finally... Well, we would all still be in the dark… stuck in that inaccurate mindset of 1952 and a fog of government cover-ups outlined in Feschino’s books! Almost lost... The Flatwoods monster… AND? (cue the ominous music!) ...That associated and pesky “air war with extraterrestrials” he exposed... All would be lost to the cloying fogs of mirthful myth and lurid legend.

A. Lee Stewart

Back in 1952, Mr. A. ‎Lee Stewart, Jr. was the co-owner and photojournalist for "The Braxton County Democrat" newspaper located in Sutton, West Virginia, as we’ve outlined before. Shortly after the "Flatwoods Monster" incident occurred on the night of September 12, 1952, he received a call from a West Virginia State Trooper in reference to Mrs. May's plea for help concerning her tumultuous encounter. We’ve written, as regards this, before…

Remember that at the time, both the state police and local police were out on previous calls (More UFO calls!) and so were unable to get to her home. Mr. Stewart, however, knew the State Police well, professionally, and had worked with them on numerous occasions. 

With his pro-grade camera always at his side, Stewart assisted the troopers at crime and accident scenes by taking photos for them! He'd do this while also covering the stories for his newspaper. Subsequently, A. Lee Stewart, Jr. was empowered by the State Police that night to respond to Mrs. May's call! Stewart was the first person of authority, then, to reach her home after the incident!

Our intrepid Mr. Stewart drove to the house and walked into a chaotic scene! Stewart organized the chaos and even led an armed posse of locals onto the Fisher Farm in search of the "monster"! That's some grit!

 

He was the first person to talk to the witnesses that night! He interviewed them over the weekend and had the boys, under some harsh third-degree duress, and separately, draw pictures of the "monster." Shortly after he left the house that night, he broke the "Monster" story to "The Charleston Gazette" newspaper. He’d be back. There was an astonishing story a'foot, and he was an old-school journalist!

His breaking story appeared in "The Charleston Gazette" in an article dated, Sunday, September 14, 1952. The headline read, "Did It Ride Meteor? Boys Spot Appalling Creature Near Flatwoods, Link It To Passage of Fiery Object in Skies." Reporter A. Lee Stewart, Jr. was credited with the byline, "Special to the Gazette," which was the information he had given to the newspaper. Feschino reports to have all these papers and articles…

The series of events unfolding in Flatwoods that night was accurately explained in his article, and the huge figure at issue was called, a "Thing," the "object," an "Appalling Creature" and "the Monster."

…But here’s the substantive rub! There was, STILL, no physical description given of the “Monster” or what the figure actually looked like! That would be a mystery until Feschino took an interest!

Later that day, a follow-up article on the incident appeared in "The Charleston Daily Mail." It contained information from reporter Stewart, as well as information from a Gazette reporter, an additional man who had driven up to Flatwoods to cover the story. 

This reporter also added information to the article, and reported, "Braxton Co. Residents Faint, Become Ill After Run-In With Weird 10-Foot Monster." It gave a description of the "Monster" and stated, "Having the shape of a man, blood-red face, bright green body, protruding eyes, and hands extended forward and appeared to give off an eerie light." It also added, "It had a black shield affair in the shape of an ace of spades behind it." 

Although this description of the figure was not entirely correct and didn't give a good visual image of its true appearance, the article did contain a small detail! It reported the huge figure was "metallic." 

METALLIC! Reported from the start!

On Monday, September 15th, The Charleston Gazette ran another article, "Braxton Monster Left Skid Tracks Where He Landed. (Special to The Gazette)." This was yet another article that contained additional information that A. Lee Stewart, Jr. had given them as he continued to interview the witnesses over the weekend. The headline read, "Braxton Monster Left Skid Tracks Where He Landed."

Most importantly, this article gives a more accurate description of its true appearance for the first time! The article states, "The Phantom of Flatwoods: Left tracks from six to eight feet apart. Wore a suit of green armor. Looked like a mechanical man. Was 10 feet tall, four feet wide. Had a blood-red face. Sported a black spade-like cowl, which extended a foot or more above its head. It had claw-like 'toy' hands too. And orange-green eyes the size of silver dollars, according to Mrs. May, a 32-year-old beautician who saw the 'thing.'" 

As a result of Stewart's exceptional reporting, the description he received from Mrs. May about the "monster's" true appearance was finally known and put into print! Sadly, Mrs. May's information was never seen in the press again! The monster would continue to wear a skirt for decades!

Meanwhile, the United Press news service had already picked up the Flatwoods story over the weekend, and on Monday, September 15, 1952, the Flatwoods story broke nationwide. That lit the fuse! The story went off like a bomb, worldwide!

The Flatwoods incident appeared in newspapers all over the country, but it only addressed the figure as a "monster" of indeterminate shape! As a result, the newspapers carrying the story ran with the "monster" angle, and their stories continued to portray it as a duplicitous “flesh-and-blood” entity. One can see the reason for the use of "inculcated" and "cemented," above...

Overnight, Flatwoods was put on the map as reporters, journalists, and investigators swamped the tiny town looking for information and interviews about the huge "monster" from Flatwoods. Since Mr. Stewart was the johnny-on-the-spot reporter who had interviewed the witnesses and broken the story, he was sought out and overwhelmed by the countless reporters and investigators seeking information about the incident!

Subsequently, "The Braxton Democrat" newspaper office in Sutton was also swamped and became the news hub where newspaper reporters from around the country met while covering their stories. 

Ivan Sanderson

Later that week, the "North American Newspaper Alliance" syndicate caught wind of the story and contacted world-renowned biologist, zoologist, and author Ivan T. Sanderson about the incident. They asked him to go to Flatwoods and write a news story about the affair! Shortly after, Sanderson left New York for Flatwoods with his assistant Eddie Schoenenberger to investigate the story.

Upon arriving in Sutton late that Friday morning, September 19th, they dropped their luggage at a motel and then repaired to Flatwoods. After arriving in town, Sanderson met five of the boys who saw the "Flatwoods Monster" and interviewed them. He was then escorted onto the Fisher Farm to the encounter site where he inspected the area for the remainder of the day.

Meanwhile, even he had interviewed some of the boys, Sanderson did NOT get to meet Mrs. May, Gene Lemon, or A. Lee Stewart, Jr. when he arrived in Flatwoods that Friday! They had already left town and were away on their journey to New York to be interviewed for the NBC talk show "We The People" later that night at 8:30 p.m. Again, Sanderson never met with the adult first-hand witnesses!

Sanderson and his investigation team...

On the following day, Sanderson and Schoenenberger went back to Flatwoods and conducted further interviews with the boys throughout the morning. They were also joined by members of the Charleston chapter of the National Speleological Society, and others, who Sanderson had called the night before to assist him with his work. This writer surmises that when Sanderson called, one came.

Sanderson also met with Gray Barker, who was in town investigating the case, as well. Barker, a native West Virginian, was born in Riffle, Braxton County, but was a current resident of Clarksburg where he was employed. He also went to Flatwoods to investigate the incident and was on assignment to write an article for FATE Magazine.

Gray Barker

Barker arrived in Flatwoods late Friday night and went into town Saturday morning. While in Flatwoods, Barker stated he "...spent 3 days subjecting these 7 people [Flatwoods witnesses], and other residents of the area to rigorous questioning." He added, "I had worked three days running down leads the story involved." Throughout the weekend, Gray Barker interviewed many of the locals as well as the boy witnesses, and he did manage to have at least 3 of them draw a sketch of the so-called "monster."

In his own writings, Barker states that he relied heavily on the testimony of 14-year-old Neil Nunley for most of his information. During his investigation, he also chased down other leads that weekend, going to other locations where objects were sighted on September 12th, and he interviewed those witnesses. 

On Saturday morning, Sanderson continued to examine the farm with his colleagues. They surveyed the area, mapped out the farm, obtained samples from the encounter site, and they took photos. Sanderson then departed Flatwoods with his assistant, Eddie Shoenenberger, following the leads of additional sightings reported in Braxton County the same night. We’ve written about those, too.

They traveled southwest of Flatwoods and investigated the locations where fiery objects were reported to have crashed. They were joined there by Gray Barker. 

Throughout the day, they interviewed witnesses, investigated the crash locations, and then wrapped up their investigations late Saturday afternoon. Gray Barker drove back into town while Sanderson and Schoenenberger drove down to Charleston to investigate the other September 12th sightings reported in the press! 

They spent most of Sunday interviewing various people. Meanwhile, Barker stayed in the area and continued to chase down new leads! He interviewed people throughout Sunday, by his report, then departed Braxton County, driving back to his home in Clarksburg.

Both Sanderson, and to a lesser degree, Barker, did thorough enough jobs while investigating the Flatwoods incident and the other UFO events that occurred on the night of September 12, 1952. They were the pioneers in this case and helped to put Flatwoods on the map, while covering the "Flatwoods Monster" incident…

Only, full stop! The reason for this essay is not the who, what, when, why, and where's of Sanderson’s and Barker's involvement in this case! The writer is not here to split hairs about their investigations in Braxton County that weekend! They did what they did, and it was FINE! It was a beginning, even if a doomed one. 

Their investigations, such as they were, have been covered in all of their writings and repeatedly told (parroted, purloined and plagiarized?) by numerous other writers and “Barker adherents” for decades... and to this day. 

No, this writer is here to raise a question concerning a key point that Barker and Sanderson never were able to derive after their exhaustive investigations! That point, reader, is a true and accurate portrait of the appearance of the so-called "monster." Let this writer explain!

As a result of his investigation and interviews with the boys, Ivan T. Sanderson did conclude the huge figure the witnesses saw on the Fisher Farm was not a "monster." On September 25, 1952, "The Pittsburgh Press" newspaper ran Sanderson's story about his Braxton County investigation. It was datelined, "SUTTON, W.Va. Sept.24." The headline of this "North American Newspaper Alliance" article read, "SAUCER REPORTS VALID, EXPERT SAYS - 12-Foot, Glowing 'Monster' was a Machine, Science Writer Says."

Sanderson's Report...

Sanderson concluded the following about the figure in question called the "Flatwoods Monster." He stated plainly that it "...was not a man, or a monster. It was some sort of machine like a diving bell." 

Here, Mr. Sanderson states that the so-called "monster" was actually a "machine." In reference to the "black, spade like cowl, which extended a foot or more above the head," and was mentioned in Stewart's article ten days before, Sanderson added that it had "a circular transparent window in front of it." This black cowl was likely an outer helmet encasing a red inner helmet.

Summing up! A. Lee Stewart's article accurately described the giant figure, "looked like a mechanical man" and likewise, Sanderson said "It was some sort of machine like a diving bell." Sanderson was also correct in his assessment that it "was not a man, or a monster." 

Furthermore, Sanderson also wrote a detailed account of his Flatwoods investigation in his 1967 book, "UNINVITED VISITORS." It appears in the chapter, "A THING ON THE GROUND."

He made the following statement about the "monster" encounter near the tree writing, "It was caught in the act by seven human beings, but, being 'fixed' in a pressurized suit, when it 'saw' that it had been observed, it headed back to its ship." Although Ivan T. Sanderson's descriptions of the 12-foot-tall figure are correct and accurate; he never fully comprehended what it actually looked like!

Moreover, Mr. Sanderson's book, "UNINVITED VISITORS," did NOT contain any illustrations of the "monster" from his investigation in Flatwoods that weekend. Yet, the private files of his investigation do contain 2 color drawings of the "monster" that were never published in his writings!

Sadly, one of those illustrations is an original depiction of the "monster" and it is, of course, portrayed incorrectly. This drawing looks like a kindergartener drew it and portrays the "Flatwoods Monster" as a block-shaped figure with a pear-shaped head sitting on top of it! Wrong! 

The other color illustration is a modified drawing of an incorrect garment-wearing, clawed "monster" drawing that was drawn and used during the September 19, 1952 TV talk show, "We The People." It also replicates the drawing and even shows the man standing to the right of the "monster" for size comparison! Wholly derivative of the false original... as the "inculcation" and "cementing" of that falsehood is itself illustrated.

                  

This "WE The People" episode was aired from an NBC studio in New York at 8:30 p.m. It featured interviews with witnesses Mrs. May and Gene Lemon. They retold their frightening story to a live nationwide audience that night. As a visual aid to be used during the episode, a large drawing of the "monster" was used to accompany them.

Before the show aired, an artist sat backstage, as described above, with May and Lemon! The artist talked to them while drawing the figure they described to him. Sadly, as outlined above, the artist totally misinterpreted their descriptions! He portrayed the figure as a scary "space monster." He illustrated it as a magically floating figure with a pointed cloth hooded over its head, wearing a long-pleated dress, and having long skinny arms and claws. This inaccurate drawing became the standard portrayal of the figure and has been seen across the world for many decades.

We’ll remember that a forgotten key figure, who also appeared on the program that night was the aforementioned  A. Lee Stewart, Jr. from the Braxton Democrat. He went to New York with Mrs. May and Gene Lemon, sat on stage with them during their interviews, and actually wrapped up the program, himself, by talking about his involvement in the incident!  

We note that there were other drawings of the so-called "monster" appearing in print and attached to Sanderson's name! One such article appeared in a small 1956 privately published newsletter called, "INFINITY" and dated, "Oct.-Dec. 1956."

The full title of this newsletter was "Barlow Studios International INFINITY NEWSLETTER," which was published quarterly in Waterbury, Ct. and edited by "Haughton Barlow." This newsletter featured an article giving a synopsis of the "Sutton Monster" aka. the "Flatwoods Monster" and a partial interview with Ivan T. Sanderson. Contained within this article are two amateurish drawings of the Flatwoods figure that look nothing like the figure itself.

Even by 1956, it is obvious that no one knew what the "monster" had actually looked like and was still showing silly drawings of it. Moreover, as a side note, even though this publication had a limited distribution for the time, the "monster" article was found by Project Blue Book officials and actually appears in the case file "#2078" for "12 SEP 1952." This indicates that officials at Blue Book were closely monitoring the Flatwoods case even after four years and were still recording it! 

When Gray Barker's article appeared in the January 1953 issue of FATE Magazine, it was titled, "The Monster and the Saucer." The article describes the "monster" on the title page, "The huge shape with the weirdly glowing eyes" and illustrates a black and white ink drawing of a pointy-headed Black man with his arms sprawled out! This is as far away from the truth as one could imagine. See, no one had any idea, but the first-hand witnesses... and Feschino had yet to pull that out of them!

Later, Barker published a small private booklet, "FLATWOODS, W.VA. 'MONSTER' - A Full Report " that is dated, "September 1953." He writes, "The cover of this issue illustrates the 'Monster' in quite an imaginative way, and is used only because it is the best art available at the time. That Cover is based on a drawing by artists [an artist] for the 'We The People' telecast on which two of the witnesses appeared.”

He continues, "It is the purpose here to report in greater detail, what I found out for Fate." The cover of this booklet replicates the incorrect garment-wearing, clawed "monster" drawing used during the 1952, "We The People" show. Again, wrong!

Barker explains, "THE MONSTER" and writes, "Towering over their heads, was a vast shape of something like a man. The face everyone agreed was round, and blood red. No one noticed a nose or mouth, only eyes, or eye-like openings, from which projected 'greenish-orange' beams of light." Barker continues, "Around the 'face' and reaching upward to a point (see cover) was a hood-like shape, dark in appearance." Barker then talks about the lower torso, "The [sic] also saw clothing-like folds around the body." 

In closing, he writes, "Was it a robot, controlled mechanically?" and adds, "...Or was it a man, or 'thing' in a spacesuit." These statements by Barker were probably made in reference to the description of the "eyelike openings,' from projected 'greenish-orange' beams of light."

Furthermore, Gray Barker also wrote about his Flatwoods investigation in his 1956 book, "They Knew Too Much About Flying Saucers." It appears in Chapter 2 of the book and is titled, "Flatwoods, West Virginia." Here, Barker writes, "Three years have passed since some people were almost scared out of their wits in Flatwoods." He closes the chapter, "The excitement has about died down, but West Virginians in the reach of radio singer Cindy Coy still love to hear the inevitable ballad composed by announcer Don Lamb." The name of this song is "The Phantom of Flatwoods.”

Still, Gray Barker never knew what the "monster" looked like, aside from the simple drawings that were made by WTP and the young boys. This becomes even more apparent when he published his 1956 UFO magazine booklet, "Saucerian Bulletin" issue #21.” The front cover shows the same old rehashed incorrect 1952 drawing of the "monster" and is superimposed over the path area, near the Oak tree where the encounter occurred.  The back cover is the same photo of Barker standing next to the Oak tree. Again, it is obvious that Barker never knew what the so-called monster looked like, either, as his published works never gave an accurate illustration of what the "Flatwoods Monster" actually looked like! 

Barker never knew what it was... 
and didn't connect the Air War with ET
angle as a cause...

The point, reader? These investigators, Fabulist Barker, credited only by the credulous, or First-drawer Professional Sanderson, credited by the planet as a world-travelled investigator, never sat down with any of the witnesses to do police-style rendering while conducting interviews with them… because they were NOT forensic artists and never in contact, moreover, with the adult first-hand witnesses, as has been pointed out! It was a forensic ARTIST that was required to blow the lid off, a forensic artist in an unrushed interview with the first-hand and cooperating witnesses! Forensic illustration is not art, per se, before it is evidence recovery.

 

One of many such stories!

Feschino would be that forensic artist! It was HE, after all who, in pulling that information so painstakingly from the witnesses, revealed the “Flatwoods Monster” at all ...AND its straight-line connection to an AIR WAR with ET during 1952’s “Summer of Saucers.” 

Before Feschino: folklore, confusion, and mockery. After Feschino: coherent narrative, consistent witness testimony, and accurate rendering. The late Stanton Friedman, as a result, with a host of nameable others, thought so, too! ...Accept no substitutes. Read on…

Frank C. Feschino Jr.

Scroll this page for positive reviews of Feschino's effort and initiative... and other stuff.

A Veteran’s Lament...

We can STILL turn this setting sun to a rising one! It sets on MAGA...
November LOOMS for a new Constitutional & democratic day!

 

I’m 78, and I Do Not Recognize My Country Anymore...

A Decorated Veteran’s Legitimate Lament and a Citizen’s Warning (By Alfred Lehmberg)

I’m 78, and I do not recognize my Country any longer? Let's give this pause.

Reluctantly put, there’s too much pain in that sentence. Remains, I’m not going to dismiss it, dilute it, deny it, or pretend it’s just a passing mood. When someone says “I do not recognize my Country any longer,” that’s not politics being heard—that’s the profoundest grief disconsolately expressed in sincerity sans all whinery.

Grief? Yeah. It’s the grief of someone who has lived through enough cycles of American primroses, promises, and periodic American failures to know the difference between "up" and "down." 

As a career soldier with a Bronze Star and a Summa-graduate public school teaching credential, I’ve done naught but lived a life in the unflinchingly abject service of our United States, my fellow humans! My dues were paid! I’ve earned the abundant right to bang my gums in its legitimate criticism now! I'm entitled, where entitlement is STILL an honored word!

See... what I’m feeling is the wholly unnecessary collision of my current country’s self-inflicted atrocities and it's unethical, unwise, and illegal pecuniary proclivities, earnest crimes and erstwhile corruptions with what is more likely right and true. I'm 78, have read a contrary book, and know stuff. To start?

1. The country I’ve served!

For MOST of my in-service life, I’ve lived inside an America that demanded competence, discipline, chain-of-command integrity, and a shared sense of mission. I saw the version of the Nation where people had to show up, had to perform, had to be held accountable… had to TAKE responsibility! What’s happened to all that?! Look no further than the MAGA GOP!

2. The country I’m observing now and cannot serve!

I’m seeing institutions wobble impotently due to intentional unethical impositions on their valid and entitled charters! I’m seeing leadership that presents as performative hypocrisy instead of aspirations to some responsible best practice! I’m seeing military families begging for help while carriers stay at sea for 500 days, unfed and without beds or toilets… provoking despair to the point of sailor-suicide! I’m seeing political actors treating governance like an effin’ lowly rated reality show of no consequence... but their own unethical griftage and immoral profit! I’m seeing civic norms erode and disintegrate under the weight of a faux-“president’s” baseless outrage cycles and clueless algorithmic hysterias! …And for no reason at all but the senseless celebration of one narcissistic and morbidly obese grifting traitor sans the smallest hint of character or the remotest sense or competence! ...Our president.

…And I’m seeing ordinary people—the forgotten ones who actually keep the country running, at all—exhausted, confused, suffering social betrayal… and scared. Then made irrational, provoked by a billionaire-inflated and fulsomely mendacious corporate legacy media to be their worst selves… for that purpose and to that end! Division and divisiveness... for the cash and power of the unelected "fewest" and least deserving of us!

This mismatch creates cognitive dissonance, a kind of “societal vertigo.” It’s not madness. It’s not weakness. It’s a rational response to a nation in unconstitutional flux... a result of societal RAPE!

But! …Here’s the part I was not telling myself! I do still recognize our country—just not the version I believed it should be! Only, I’m recognizing:

• The fragility that was always there? A national naiveté that corporations were our friends and responsible government was the enemy?
• The "cracks" that we just papered over? We let Nixon go and got Reagan. We let Reagan go and got Bush 2.0! We let Bush go and got #45! We let #45 go and got #47! Our complacent disrepair provided for all our CURRENT woes.
• The institutions that were never as strong as they looked until pushed upon by the wholly unconscionable and soulless unscrupulous?
• The people who were always struggling but never visible, forcibly deported sans their Constitutional "due process"?
• The devolved and corrupted political class that was always MUCH more self-interested than public-actualized?

 

I’m not losing my country or my mind. I’m losing the illusion that it was EVER stable, eh? I realize now that it was only ever hangin' by an effin' thread! That hurts. It hurts especially for someone like myself who’s built their life around service, duty, and this seemingly mythic National continuity of a Constitutional existentiality. This citizen soldier remembers the before-fore time...

…So, here’s the truth I won’t sugarcoat! The country is not gone! It’s not dead! It’s not irretrievable! The horror is not irreversible! 

It’s changing, violently and chaotically—but change does not HAVE to be erasure! Every era of American history has had moments where people are saying exactly what I just said (and what a sentient majority is feeling) regarding “Country recognition: 1776, 1861, 1933, 1968, 2001, 2020… all chaotic hinge points of our tumult’s hope and despair!

…And yet the country kept mutating, reinventing, stumbling ...but staggering forward. Too?! We did the right thing more often than not...

I’m living through one of those hinge points. We all are! ...But stop! We can still do the right and proper thing!

Let me ask something grounded? When you say you don’t recognize your country (if you don't... and if you don't you should get whacked with a wet pine board!)—is it the institutions, the culture, the leadership, or the people that feel unfamiliar?

Your answer can tell me which part of the fracture you’re actually grieving...

My answer regards the leadership… A “Leadership”... feckless, hypocritical, and so then allowing for the criminal, so infecting all the rest: a people, their culture, and the institutions to which we are all sensibly invested...

What I just said—“Leadership… feckless, hypocritical, and so then allowing for the criminal…”—is not hyperbole, not hysteria, not some late‑night doom spiral of a doddering boomer! It inhabits every minute of even legacy news! 

No, it’s the sober, if bitter, assessment of someone like myself, who has lived inside systems where leadership mattered, where incompetence got people killed, and where hypocrisy was a risible luxury no one could afford! Foundationed reality! 

Currently? Nothing means anything!

Let me speak plainly! You’re reacting to a collapse of standards, fellow humans, not a collapse of the country. They don’t have to be the same thing! Many REMAIN to hold a lauded standard!

What I’m calling “feckless” is the new American political class—performative, self‑protective, allergic to accountability! An "Epstein Class," if the reader will, terrified of telling any truth at all when the truth might cost them a news cycle or a cash grab! These are leaders terrified of your garden-variety Social Democrat. ...And why? See, both sides DON'T! Look it up!

What I’m calling “hypocritical” is the “bipartisan” rot of people who preach duty, sacrifice, and honor… while quietly exempting themselves from all three!

…And what I’m calling “allowing the criminal” is the part that stings the most: leadership refusing to confront wrongdoing because doing so requires courage, clarity, and tumultuous but reasonable consequences, boy howdy! Epstein is the patent exposure of ALL of this, explaining precisely why it’s still under a GOP rock against ALL law, right now!

I’m not imagining this. I’m not exaggerating it. I’m naming it as I call it out!

I came from a world where leadership was a survival skill! In Army aviation, a bad leader wasn’t an inconvenience—he was a hazard. A clear and present danger. A liar wasn’t a nuisance—he was a threat to man and expensive machine! A coward wasn’t a joke—he was a liability! I torpedoed (had relieved!) “leaders” like these three times while on active duty, myself!

I lived in a reality where competence was non‑negotiable, hypocrisy got people hurt, “criminal” meant something real and punishable, not okey-doked and partisan, and leaders were expected to lead, not perform… Lives were ALWAYS on the line.

Now? I’m watching a political class treat leadership like a corporate brand, not a responsibility to be revered. ...Of course I don’t recognize it!

…But here’s the deeper truth I’m circlin’: I’m not grieving the country. I’m grieving the too glad abdication of those we’ve “entrusted” to steward it! I’m watching institutions shrug at gross misconduct never tolerated in the Democrats. I’m watching leaders normalize unconscionable behaviors that in the before-fore time would have ended careers! I’m watching accountability dissolve into bigoted and ignorant tribal loyalties serving only the unworthy. I’m watching sensible “guardrails” bend under pressures they were never designed to withstand. We have to fix that... 

This isn’t “the country falling apart.” It’s the people in charge refusing to hold a line to bind it together. …And I, of all people, know what happens when no one deigns to hold the line. Well, I deign!

Let me tell you something directly, without softening it: my anger is aimed at the leaders who have failed, yet are carried still, the institutions that enabled them with crossed arms, the public that tolerates them because it gives them permission to be their worst selves... and the consequences I see inexorably coming for our willful ignorance, our regrettable complacency, and our seeming cowardly surrender to these artless and ineffectual things! Enough becomes too much.

See… it’s not the country I mourn so much as the people who allowed (and are ALLOWING!) the worst to happen! They did this by voting against their best interests (when they knew better!), and in the service of the absolute worst persons on the planet… the aforementioned “Epstein Class.” This is a class providing for every illustration of the point, and abundantly, that… “fascist stupidity has HAD its deleterious and greedy run”! 

MAGA is not payin’ off as effusively advertised, just like the GOP not payin' off since Eisenhower! That’s a political pipe LONG in need of some sincere and serious reamin’, boy howdy! The left is flawed, reader, but correctably so… Resolved! The right, on the other hand, is full-on and fulsome FUBAR... beyond all retribution, recovery, or reconciliation! Flush and brush! Posted!

Remaining STILL! We can have the courage that we’ll do the RIGHT thing this time, too, like we always HAVE! We know what’s correct and true! We know "best practice"! Let’s do THAT as November looms. Read on!