John Philip Bessor
1947-1952
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NOTE |
On June 25, 1947, Kenneth Arnold launched the modern UFO era when he claimed to see objects flying like skipped discs in Washington State. On July 8, 1947. Fortean researcher John Philip Bessor quickly developed an idea, based on hints in the works of Charles Fort, that UFOs were a kind of poltergeist-like being from another reality, possibly another dimension. He presented his hypothesis by letter to the Air Force in July 1947 and offered variants on it into the 1950s, after the Saturday Evening Post surprised him by publishing his 1947 letter in a 1949 article offering some of the crackpot ideas the Air Force had encountered. He later became a prolific UFO writer for magazines such as Fate and a frequent contributor of bizarre conspiracy theories to letters columns of various media. Below are his initial claims about interdimensional space poltergeists, a speculative idea later favored by Skinwalker Ranch researchers.
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Bessor’s Letter to the Air Force, July 11, 1947
Sidney Shalett, "What You Can Believe about Flying Saucers," Saturday Evening Post, May 7, 1949.
Another wide area through which Project Saucer investigators have had to plow is the rich, intangible field of hallucinations, hoaxes and mass hysteria. For example, a man from Zelienople, Pennsylvania — who said he was “strictly scientific” in his thinking — wrote to the Air Force: “I am prepared to state that careful study and research has absolutely CONVINCED me that these 'Objects X' are creations of realms above or beyond our sphere; are, if you please, GHOST objects or craft, propelled by paranormal teleportion (the telekinesis of the poltergeist manifestation). . . . They are controlled by intelligent, ghostlike, invisible beings or animals bearing, I believe, very little likeness to human beings.”
Letter to the Editor, Saturday Evening Post, July 2, 1949.
He Believes in Saucers
I appreciate Sidney Shalett quoting my "disc" theory in What You Can Believe About Flying Saucers, May 7. [...] The Command has recently assured me that Mr. Shalett's appraisal of it was his own. . . . The only mass hysteria in evidence was manifested by those (since proven in error) who insisted that the "saucers" had no basis in fact. I found, to my satisfaction, by the process of correlation and elimination, that the "discs" are, apparently, extra-terrestrial objects, intelligently controlled by entities more like octopuses, in mentality, than humans. . . . [They] materialize into view more profusely during (cyclic?) recurrences of periods of climatic disturbances, and dovetailing with the meteorological. . . . The 1870s, ‘80s and '90's saw a rash of aerial phenomena. They portend no calamity, and the chatter of the cultists who talk of "masters" and "elder races" can be reasonably dismissed as abstract conjecture. . . .
John P. Bessor, Zelienople, Pa.
I appreciate Sidney Shalett quoting my "disc" theory in What You Can Believe About Flying Saucers, May 7. [...] The Command has recently assured me that Mr. Shalett's appraisal of it was his own. . . . The only mass hysteria in evidence was manifested by those (since proven in error) who insisted that the "saucers" had no basis in fact. I found, to my satisfaction, by the process of correlation and elimination, that the "discs" are, apparently, extra-terrestrial objects, intelligently controlled by entities more like octopuses, in mentality, than humans. . . . [They] materialize into view more profusely during (cyclic?) recurrences of periods of climatic disturbances, and dovetailing with the meteorological. . . . The 1870s, ‘80s and '90's saw a rash of aerial phenomena. They portend no calamity, and the chatter of the cultists who talk of "masters" and "elder races" can be reasonably dismissed as abstract conjecture. . . .
John P. Bessor, Zelienople, Pa.
Bessor’s Letter to the Air Force, July 13, 1949
John Philip Bessor
Zelienople Pa.
13 July 1949
Project Saucer Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Dayton, Ohio
Gentlemen: – I hope sincerely, you do not think I am boring you with my occasional and small contributions.
I felt very badly about Shallet’s mentioning my little theory regarding the “saucers”. He certainly had not asked my permission, and I really believe it gave the reader the impression that one takes his life and reputation in his hands to dare write you in confidence, lest he be held up in absolute public ridicule. My “reply“ to Shallet in the Saturday Evening Post’s “Letter” section was, due to deletion and butchering, made quite impotent, -- perhaps in keeping with the joking attitude that the Post writer Shallet inaugurated in his fiasco in titled “What You Can Believe About the Flying Saucers”. Paxton made my “dovetail” into “dovetailing” and made it appear that I had forgotten to begin one sentence with “Then--”. Actually, a sticker for accuracy, I had checked and rechecked my letter before I submitted it to the Post.
As things now stand, I am a martyr to my convictions, and only time may vindicate me. Believe you me, I as firmly hold today as I did when I first wrote you in July 11, 1947, that the “saucers” are extra-terrestrial “ghost-objects” propelled by telekinetic energy and caused to remain stationary in mid-air by levitation. Excuse the title of the magazine (I hate the esoteric) but FATE, 139 N, Clark Street, Chicago 2, Illinois, will print my article “The Mystery of Borley Rectory” tentatively scheduled to appear in the November 1949 issue. I have, in that article, summarized Harry Price’s findings to the paranormal influence manifested in the Borley Rectory’s hauntings, and you will see why I believe absolutely in the etheric.
You may keep the enclosed material.
Sincerely,
John Philip Bessor
Zelienople Pa.
13 July 1949
Project Saucer Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Dayton, Ohio
Gentlemen: – I hope sincerely, you do not think I am boring you with my occasional and small contributions.
I felt very badly about Shallet’s mentioning my little theory regarding the “saucers”. He certainly had not asked my permission, and I really believe it gave the reader the impression that one takes his life and reputation in his hands to dare write you in confidence, lest he be held up in absolute public ridicule. My “reply“ to Shallet in the Saturday Evening Post’s “Letter” section was, due to deletion and butchering, made quite impotent, -- perhaps in keeping with the joking attitude that the Post writer Shallet inaugurated in his fiasco in titled “What You Can Believe About the Flying Saucers”. Paxton made my “dovetail” into “dovetailing” and made it appear that I had forgotten to begin one sentence with “Then--”. Actually, a sticker for accuracy, I had checked and rechecked my letter before I submitted it to the Post.
As things now stand, I am a martyr to my convictions, and only time may vindicate me. Believe you me, I as firmly hold today as I did when I first wrote you in July 11, 1947, that the “saucers” are extra-terrestrial “ghost-objects” propelled by telekinetic energy and caused to remain stationary in mid-air by levitation. Excuse the title of the magazine (I hate the esoteric) but FATE, 139 N, Clark Street, Chicago 2, Illinois, will print my article “The Mystery of Borley Rectory” tentatively scheduled to appear in the November 1949 issue. I have, in that article, summarized Harry Price’s findings to the paranormal influence manifested in the Borley Rectory’s hauntings, and you will see why I believe absolutely in the etheric.
You may keep the enclosed material.
Sincerely,
John Philip Bessor
Bessor’s Letter to Fate
Letters to the Editor, Fate, May-June 1951
Saucer Animals?
Your Flying Saucer theory was interesting but not new. I evolved it in 1946, after studying Fort's books. Presented it to the USAF July 7, 1947. Haberer of their press and radio section wrote me that it was "one of the most intelligent theories we have received." Briefly, the saucers represent a form of supernormal phenomena - are a sort of "poltergeist-animal'' capable of materialization. Possible propellant: teleportation. I believe they normally inhabit the stratosphere and are forced to fly lower due, possibly, to some cosmic disturbance in space. Not human-form; not people. The official release of April, 1949 quoted part of my theory.
J. P. Bessor St. Thomas, Pa.
Your Flying Saucer theory was interesting but not new. I evolved it in 1946, after studying Fort's books. Presented it to the USAF July 7, 1947. Haberer of their press and radio section wrote me that it was "one of the most intelligent theories we have received." Briefly, the saucers represent a form of supernormal phenomena - are a sort of "poltergeist-animal'' capable of materialization. Possible propellant: teleportation. I believe they normally inhabit the stratosphere and are forced to fly lower due, possibly, to some cosmic disturbance in space. Not human-form; not people. The official release of April, 1949 quoted part of my theory.
J. P. Bessor St. Thomas, Pa.
Bessor’s Letter to Life Magazine, 1952
Letters to the Editor, Life, April 28, 1952.
Sirs:
...For five years I have held the theory that these aerial objects represent a highly attenuated form of intelligent “animal” life of extra-terrestrial origin—possibly stratospheric or ionospheric; propulsion apparently akin to teleportation, possibly flight by sheer will or thought. The frequent undulating motion in flight is analogous to the weaving trajectory of observed poltergeist-projected objects. Strange, luminous creatures inhabit the depths of our seas, why not similar creatures of highly rarefied matter in the heights of our heavens, and as diverse in size and shape as living things on earth?
JOHN PHILIP BESSOR
Fort London, Pa.
...For five years I have held the theory that these aerial objects represent a highly attenuated form of intelligent “animal” life of extra-terrestrial origin—possibly stratospheric or ionospheric; propulsion apparently akin to teleportation, possibly flight by sheer will or thought. The frequent undulating motion in flight is analogous to the weaving trajectory of observed poltergeist-projected objects. Strange, luminous creatures inhabit the depths of our seas, why not similar creatures of highly rarefied matter in the heights of our heavens, and as diverse in size and shape as living things on earth?
JOHN PHILIP BESSOR
Fort London, Pa.
