Roswell and The Golden Helmets

In reading Kevin Randle’s new Roswell book, I found a number of asides (many among the plethora of footnotes, where one usually finds insightful gems in scholarly books),

One that caught my eye was the implanted note in James Ragsdale’s account of the supposed Roswell bodies he came upon, July 4^th, 1947, during a hedonistic outing with a lady friend of his:

Randle write, “Using quotes lifted from the January 26, 1993, interview with Ragsdale and conducted by Don Schmitt, McAndrew wrote: Testimony attributed to Ragsdale, who is deceased, states that he and a friend [Trudy Truelove] were camping one evening and saw something fall from the sky. The next morning, when they went to investigate, they saw a crash site.”[Page 112]

The McAndrew cited by Kevin is James McAndrew, the “author” of the Air Force’s book The Roswell Report: Case Closed [Barnes & Noble, NY, 1996, Page 1]

McAndrew included part of a Ragsdale affidavit:

“One part [of the craft] was kind of buried in the ground and one part of it was sticking our [out] of the ground.” “I’m sure that [there] was bodies… either bodies or dummies.”

Kevin goes on to explain how McAndrew’s attempt to use Ragsdale’s “dummies” identification falls flat.

Ragsdale included this in his affidavit, used by McAndrew:

“In his affidavit, Ragsdale would provide more description of the alien creatures he claimed to have seen. He said, ‘The bodies of the occupants were about four feet or less tall, which strange looking arms, legs and fingers. They were dressed in a silver type uniform and wearing a tight helmet of some type. This is positive because I tried to remove one of the helmets, but was unable to do so. Their eyes were large, oval in shape, and did not resemble anything of a human nature.’” [Page 114, Randle]

Yet later, it seems that Ragsdale elaborated on the above:

“There had been some very interesting and exciting information offered in Jim Ragsdale’s tale of seeing the object fall from the sky to the point where he had seen the bodies in the distance. Later he would claim there were sixteen of them wearing helmets made of solid gold which is a tip off. Gold is a soft, heavy metal that is unsuited for helmet. The Air Force would use his descriptions of the bodies as a way to prove their anthropomorphic dummies theory, never realizing that if Ragsdale was making up his tale, then their explanation failed at that point.” [Page 197, Randle, bold print mine]

Now there’s the interesting item: “helmets made of solid gold.”

Ragdale said he buried the helmets he recovered but couldn’t find them when he went back to retrieve the things.

Ragsdale was an uncouth man, a truck driver inclined to partying and frivolity. You can read more about him via these links:

http://www.roswellfiles.com/Witnesses/ragsdale.htm

http://www.williampbarrett.com/CrossRos/

But what caused him to claim the alleged bodies he found were crowned with “solid gold helmets”?

Gold helmets figure in some mythologies:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helmet_of_Co%C8%9Bofene%C8%99ti

The Tarnhelm, a gold helmet giving the wearer the ability to change form or become invisible. used by Alberich in Wagner’s Der Ring des Nibelungen:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mythological_objects#Headgears

And in this famous painting by Rembrandt:

Ragsdale wouldn’t know, I surmise, the mythological tales and very likely never saw the Rembrandt painting.

So, why the fabricated reference by him?

Wouldn’t a common man “find bodies” with military-like helmets, popular in movies, comics, and seen in many newsreels of World War II soldiers?

Why gold?

I find the observation and inclusion of such an arcane item to be fascinating.

(Ancient Astronaut theorists could make much of this I bet.)

Ragsdale’s Roswell attributions are bogus, seemingly, but precious in some odd way.

RR

Kevin Randle's new Roswell book....yes, Roswell

Kevin Randle’s new book -- Roswell in the 21st Century: The Evidence as it Exists Today – is a must read for UFO newbies and also the entrenched members of the UFO community, no matter how disenchanted with Roswell or how well-versed they think they are about the Roswell saga.

(Kevin's estimable effort will be available from the publisher as an e-book, July 15th, 2016.)

Mr. Randle has provided broad insights and discriminate minutiae in the first 200 pages of his 332 page “polemic” fleshing out his book with 132 pages of Appendices covering related topics: MJ-12, the so-called Aquarius Project, The Plains of San Agustin Controversy, the Ramey memo, et cetera, et cetera.

There is an extensive (!) bibliography, for those who might like to collect the Roswell and UFO detritus extant.

The Roswell slides affair gets a working over, Mr. Randle offering, as he does with his Roswell input, much that has never been publicly addressed.

I’m not a Roswell aficionado, but have a few books about the incident, and have commented sporadically about Roswell, mostly denigrating the tale.

But this new book makes me sit up and take a better view of the 1947 episode(s).

Everyone, and I mean everyone, who has had a say or stake in Roswell, over the years and ongoing, gets an “examination” by Mr. Randle, as does everything about Roswell that has been aired, published, or discussed in the UFO community and public arena.

Even if you say “Ick, no more about Roswell please,” you owe yourself the chance to find out why some see Roswell as an ET event, and why others do not.

This book will give you the wherewithal to debate or debunk Roswell, as you see fit.

It’s my new standard for Roswellian information.

[Image, above, from classicufo.com]

RR