Friday 28 February 2020

Newsletter Quote:
“STIGMATA”


Number Six, Spring-Summer 1979
(Project Stigma, Paris, Texas)

Source: Archives For the Unexplained (AFU.se), Norrköping, Sweden

Project Stigma was run by the late animal mutilation researcher Thomas (Tom) R. Adams.

Quote from the newsletter issue:
HELICOPTERS – A SPECIAL REPORT

Project Stigma is currently preparing a special report to consist largely of a catalog of reports ot unidentified helicopters at or near mutilation sites. We have knowledge of over 200 such sightings and we are seeking data regarding those which have yet to be reported. For those who have doubted the likelihood of a link between ‘mystery choppers’ and the ‘mystery choppings’, the report will serve to convincingly illuminate the connection. We would appreciate hearing whether our readers would prefer an 8½  X 11 report (or an 8½ X 11 STIGMATA?) rather than the current 8½ X 7 size. Watch for an announcement regarding the helicopter report and catalog in the upcoming STIGMATA #7.

A CLOSER LOOK

1977 - October

Washington - Snohomish county: We are indebted to Jacob Davidson of Seattle for providing us with a series of consistently fine reports by investigator Jerry Phillips of Everett, Washington. Phillips interviewed rancher and horseman Jack Henning regarding the mutilation of one of his colts.

A vet, Dr. John Carr, was called to the scene and he declared that the colt died from loss of blood via some unknown procedure. There was no blood on the ground and only a small amount in the heart and chest cavity. There were no tracks or signs in the 3-inch grass in the area. It looked ‘as though the colt had been dropped out of the air’. In the same field, 30 to 40 feet of electric fence was down, with two fence posts snapped off at the base. There were no tracks around the fence. Henning left the carcass in the field so he could keep an eye on it. Then, (quoting from Phillips’ report): On the second day a cobweb-like material developed over the open wound. Later the second day a large German shepherd dog was observed coming into the field. When he spotted the dead animal he stopped, smelled the air, made a circle around it and continued on its way. The third day, a coyote which had been seen in the area several times in previous months, came into the field, circled the animal several times, then began eating on the head and neck. He would not go near the rear of the horse. Mr. Henning went out to have a look and found plenty of evidence on the ground and in the grass to show where the coyote had dug his paws in when pulling at the neck hide.....Mr. Henning brought the mare and her other colt out and tried to get them near the dead colt. Neither one would come within 50 feet of it. He tried laying hay next to it and they still would not approach it. Mr. Henning has two labrador dogs…..he turned them loose to see what they would do. They circled the animal, but would not get within 20 feet of it.

Henning told Phillips that he had been working with the surviving colt before the killing and she was fairly gentle. After the mutilation she stood in the barn and quivered. Henning had difficulty even approaching her for a week. The mare was very possessive and protective of her colts, and she would become very upset if anyone even walked between them. There was no evidence that she tried to interfere when the victim colt was in danger that morning. Afterward, ‘she acted as if the colt had never existed’.

1978 – April through August

Missouri – Lincoln County: By now we assume that most readers of this publication are aware of the reports of livestock mutilations, UFO and unidentified helicopter sightings, anomalous odors (and even a June encounter with a 4-ft.-tall ‘ape’) – all in Lincoln County (with some ‘spillover’ into adjoining counties), and especially around the community of Elsberry.

These events received a relatively substantial amount of nationwide publicity. We wanted to refer interested readers to a couple of published accounts regarding these incidents:

International UFO Reporter (1609 Sherman Ave., Suite 207; Evanston, Illinois 60201 – $12.00 per year). This publication and its editors (Dr. J. Allen Hynek and Allen Rendry) are allied with the Center for UFO Studies (CUFOS). The August 1978 issue of the IUR features an account of a UFO sighting in the Elsberry area (p. 3) and a separate article on the UFO and mutilation activity there throughout the summer. The latter article labors to downplay both the UFO activity and the mutilations, not to mention any possible ‘link’ between them. We have been aware of CUFOS’ grimly opaque attitude toward the mutilation phenomenon. A CUFOS staff member once advised one of their many volunteer investigators scattered across the country not to ‘bring cattle mutilations into the picture’. The staffer claims, in his letter to the investigator, that ‘this is a personal opinion’, then insolently directs the investigator to ‘be careful not to relate UFOs with mutilations, when you are speaking as a Center representative, before you have consulted the Center about its opinion in this matter’. We have become weary (and wary) of attempts to refute the validity of classic mutilations (and some of the peripheral phenomena often associated with them) by referring to bits of information excised from the total body of data (of course, we recognize the possibility that CUFOS may simply be the victim of bad information and/or indifferent investigation). The UFO/mutilation link remains valid circumstantially. Beyond that, it cannot be proven or disproven. Meanwhile, we heartily recommend objectivity between and among mature and consenting adults.

Pursuit (R.F.D. 5 – Gales Ferry, CT 06335 – subscription/membership for one year is $10.00; Pursuit is the journal of the Society for the Investigation of the Unexplained). ‘Mutilations: The Elsberry Enigma’ by editors R. Martin Wolf and Steven N. Mayne appears in the Winter 1979 edition. This is more like it: a simple recounting of the evidence, anecdotal and otherwise, gathered by the authors during their investigation in the Elsberry area. And where conclusions are not warranted, they are not drawn. The article includes a chronological listing of extramundane events (beginning with a mutilation in 1975) and details on diverse Fortean occurrences. The interesting thing is, Project Stigma has since become aware of many other unusual events in the Lincoln County area which are not recounted in the Pursuit article, thanks primarily to the investigations of David Perkins, Cari Seawell and Bill McIntyre. There is more to be heard, and read, regarding the Lincoln County happenings.

1978 - December

South Carolina - Orangeburg County: Around 8:00 PM on Wednesday, December 6th, farmer Richard Fanning, accompanied by his wife and another couple, drove out to feed Fanning’s several hundred hogs. As they approached the bog pen, all four saw a circle of light along with four smaller lights (two red, two green) hovering over nearby treetops. The four were frightened by the noiseless apparitions and decided that the hogs could be fed later. As the witnesses drove from the scene, they were followed by the large white light and the red and green lights for about 300 yards. Suddenly ail five lights returned to hover over the area of the hog pen. After three or four minutes, all of the lights went out.

Fanning did not return to feed the hogs until Friday morning, December 8th. Be found one hog ‘standing up dead. I kicked him and he fell over’. Fanning told reporter Roberta G. Boman of the Times and Democrat (Orangeburg, SC) that a second dead hog lay nearby with its jawbone removed. He told Boman that ‘the body was sort of like sponge, with all the weight gone, kind of like jelly (Fanning said the hog, normally weighing 200 lbs., weighed no more than approximately 50 pounds). In my opinion, no animal got that hog.’

Fanning went on to exclaim that ‘I was scared, and I'm not scared of many things. I go hunting and fishing a lot. Never seen anything like it. It’s the weirdest thing I’ve ever seen in my life. I’m an outdoorsman, and I wouldn’t have said nothing unless the other three people saw it too.’ (Our thanks to Leonard Stringfield for advising us of the Fanning case.)

MUTES IN THE MEDIA

*** Sandler International Films of Hollywood, California has been gathering new material to be used in updating ‘UFOs Past, Present and Future’, a documentary film which was originally released in the mid-1970’s. The Sandler crew has filmed interviews in Colorado and New Mexico as part of a segment on animal mutilations to be included in the new film. It is understood at this writing that the film is to be distributed via syndication to television stations across the country, beginning in the fall of 1979. The ‘on-camera spokesman’ or narrator for the new film is Dr. Jacques Vallee, author of the controversial new book, Messengers of Deception (see STIGMATA #7).

*** At press time, ABC-TV News has, for several weeks, been filming an investigative report on animal mutilations, to be aired (possibly in two parts) on the ‘20-20’ news-feature program in the early summer (‘20-20’ will apparently be seen weekly on Thursday nights during the summer). Project Stigma investigators conferred with correspondent Dave Marash and his crew in early May, and we were impressed with their sincerity and in-depth approach. Assuming the story is aired, watch for impressive eye-witness accounts of UFOs and mystery helicopters in mutilation-prone areas.”


Wikipedia article: “Elsberry, Missouri”:


Related posts:















realtvufos.blogspot.com/search?q=“Cow+Mutilations”











Elsberry, Missouri
(Google photo)














Satellite photo of Elsberry, Missouri (tageo.com)
(tageo.com photo)