An old Ballad about a UFO sighting

Jerome (Jerry) Clark, who turned to music in his geezer years, provided a ballad (two actually) that referenced a UFO it seems, in this 1985 copy of the International Reporter:

I’ve scanned the page (14) in large scale for those with lame computers so the content can be read. As you can see, the ballad is from the 18^th Century (circa 1716 apparently):

I find such items interesting (like as those in Aubeck/Vallee’s Wonders in the Sky and Aubeck/Shough’s Return to Magonia).

Even though some of the old sightings are disputed – all of them cannot be – I think the “reports” are intriguing, without an ET patina or the accretions that have crept into some of the “modern sightings” (Roswell, Rendelsham, et al.).

RR

Irrelevant UFO Tales?

I read a several part comment from David Rudiak at Kevin Randle’s blog [kevinrandle.blogspot.com] about the Kecksburg event, which was discussed by Kecksburg “expert” Stan Gordon on Kevin’s X-Zone Boardcast [sic] program recently.

(I think Kevin meant to type X-Zone Broadcast.)

David provided one of his extensive commentaries, fraught with details and “facts” that only he can bring to the UFO table.

But did I care? Nope.

Kecksburg is one of those UFO incidents, like Roswell, Socorro (my favorite, misinterpreted UFO case), Shag Harbor (to be discussed in the next X-Zone show), and Rendlesham, that cause me to nod off when I see anything about them online or in a TV program.

While, arguably, Socorro and maybe Roswell, can tell us something about the UFO phenomenon or its mythology (as skeptics see it). Kecksburg, Shag Harbor, and the Rendlesham episode(s), corrupted by egregious witness fabrication, cannot.

Those UFO accounts (Kecksburg, Shag Harbor, and Rendlesham), coupled with the Cash-Landrum incident and a number of other UFO stories, have caused ennui in many UFO circles.

Why? They are boring, and without exciting or sensational cachet.

Who cares what the Kecksburg thing was? It profiled nothing exotic or intriguing.

Rendlesham, likewise, is a snore, the contrived insertions by those who say they were there, mucking up a weird but, when examined, not very interesting UFO tale.

Shag Harbor? A thing plops in the water and then scoots off. So? Hayden Hewes and Don Ledger have kept the story on life support, when it should have been snuffed out long ago.

The stories take us nowhere. Even if they turn out to be as reported.

There comes a time (and that time came long ago) when the wheat needs to be separated from the chaff.

[Image above from micahackerman.com]

RR