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| The Scar (not to scale) |
Copyright, 2021. Marilyn A. Hudson
Continued....from 'THE SCAR"...
....was first
diagnosed with asthma and it was attributed to the proximity of the
elevator. I remember walking home with
kids from school, cutting through the park and going under the street to cross
Harvey (even though we were not supposed to do that). In later years, I recalled the fear we all
shared but refused to acknowledge as we crept through the tunnel dripping with
water or sluggishly flowing across the concrete bottom of the tunnel, emerged
whole out the other side, and then ran triumphant up the hill to the grassy
verge and home.
I remember
– because memory is so much a part of this catalog of events - that on the 22
of November 1963 the teacher and principal informed the class that the
President had been shot and school was being dismissed. All the students
shouted in happiness; a response I remember things was rather shocking and
crass – later I realized they had missed the social implications, the political
nuances, or cultural fallout of a dead president and were merely excited for a
little holiday.
As 1963
appeared a sighting of a bright orange to red object was reported from Forbes
Airforce Base at Topeka, Kansas. It was at 20 degrees elevation in the SW
moving east with no trail and no sound. It was estimated to be two miles
distant and was observed for 2-3 seconds in a foggy light drizzle. Inside the
report it read that the bright light increased from low level to headlight held
at arm’s reach size. Brightening from orange to red. Inside Airman Russel R.
Newton, FAFB, suggested reflection on the fog. A Lt. Lampert saw a similar
object the year before in a clear pre-dawn sky but did not report it. That August
would be the Wayne County, Ill UFO chase (4 August 1963) where police chased
the object and electromagnetic and radiation presence were investigated by
NICAP and the Air Force. The Air Force explained it as a sighting of Jupiter.
On September 30 in Muleshoe, Texas, a stone’s throw from the New Mexico state
line in the Texas panhandle, report of two shiny objects, round with a
red-orange glow, on a course heading SW were reported.
In January
of 1964 the only grandfather I knew – a step grandfather – died in Nebraska. I
would miss his circuit visits as he left the great northern cold, went to
Georgia to visit a son, and then heading back to Nebraska would come through
Kansas to visit us. He taught me – with gentle patience and willing ear, to
play checkers and we had many a marathon game.
The
mid-years of the sixties were the time of the UFO’s. In 1964 there were
sightings in many locations. Historians recognize several “flaps” – major
sighting events – occurring in 1952, 1960, 1965. These flaps were all part of a
buildup of sightings.
Limiting the list to the area in and around Kansas where I
lived sightings occurred In: Ardmore, Oklahoma (April 9 – insufficient data)
the object showed an apparent “maneuvered course” and a drawing of the same
showed an object with windows, appeared large, resembled an old blimp, appeared
over trees in the west. It made a sharp turn and disintegrated (disappeared?).
The Air Force conclusion was an aircraft pulling a banner but labeled it
“insufficient data”; Sayre, Oklahoma (July, an apparent sighting of ECHO 1 for
6-7 minutes); Oklahoma City (November 6) where a rare 23 pound meteorite was
found after the sighting in the area of suspected landing, rock was considered
odd because of the lack of ‘space residue’ (sent off to a lab for analysis it
revealed a high concentration of silicon; final disposition of sample unknown).
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