Copyright 2023, InterAmerica, Inc.
A while back, while reminiscing about the 1966 Ann
Arbor/Dexter “swamp gas” hysteria, I mentioned the concomitant Hillsdale “sighting” –
long thinking that the sighting there took place the same night as the Mannor
sighting, which would be significant and important.
But The Anomalist’s Bill Murphy corrected my blunder, noting
that the Hillsdale UFO was spotted the day after the first-night of foolishness
in AA/Dexter.
(I apparently didn’t read carefully my own posted newspaper photo which appeared in some 1970s reports about the affair. Yes, that internet
paper is mine, fold and all, which I still have.)
This made me reassess the significance of the Hillsdale/Ann
Arbor conjunctive sightings:
If a similar UFO was present in two separate places on the
same night, that would offer some speculations of propinquity of a profound
kind.
But, as it now seems, some college boys decided to get some
attention for their quaint little college in the Hillsdale countryside, and
likely mounted a light-show for the girls in the dormitory adjacent to the
marshy area sited as the landing spot of the flying saucer, thinking (in 1966)
that girls were more likely to be fooled than guys.
The group now mentioned in the Google Alert is not a serious UFO group but students making a documentary of the Hillsdale part of the story hoping to capitalize on
the upcoming anniversary of the Dexter Mannor observation, which was a bona fide
witnessing by him and his son and others, including area citizens and police
officials – state cops, sheriff officers, and local cops.
I gathered information for the Detroit News back then, my eventual
employer, and have a photo of the said UFO, given to me by a (non-romantic)
girl friend – the photo being held by me for authentication and approval to use
publicly.
RR
