Adamski, Allingham, and UFO Propinquity
George Adamski was a blatant charlatan, but one with charisma and some inventive flying saucer photographs and stories.
Flying Saucer Pictorial, Max Miller’s 1967 magazine, provided a segment of a Kodachrome 16 mm film that Adamski took, and which shows, as the magazine has it, two objects in the sky.
But the real object, that isn’t noted, is indicated at the arrow point in the reproduction here:
Then there is this shot of Adamski’s (in)famous flying saucer, which we all have seen somewhere, sometime:
What is interesting to me, is that Cedric Allingham (aka British astronomer, Patrick Moore) faked a flying saucer photo for the book Flying Saucer from Mars (which is being republished and will be reviewed by Nick Redfern), the fake saucer an almost identical replica of Adamski’s saucer:
How or why did Allingham/Moore do that? Perhaps Christopher Allen [CDA] can enlighten us, as he was one of the people who exposed Moore’s quirky hoax.
And finally, this juxtaposition of a photo by Adamski with one of the Trent/McMinnville UFO photos shows an almost identical flying disk. The Trent sighting and photo took place in 1950; while Adamski said his sighting and photo took place in 1951:
Note that Adamski’s “ship” has an engineering flaw: the craft has a slight chink in its rim, on the left side of the image. (Apparently, Mr. Adamski’s scissors slipped when he created the cut-out.)
What’s the point being made here, if there is one?
Adamski was imaginative and, as noted, inventive, to the extent that others, Allingham/Moore et al. emulated his creations.
Why Adamski’s chicken-brooder saucer became so iconic is beyond the scope of this writer, but it is interesting that Adamski’s concoctions (stories and photos) caught the imagination of the public, and still does, in some quarters.
One might conclude that Adamski was the progenitor of the ET idea that has infiltrated and consumed most followers and devotees of the UFO phenomenon, Stanton Friedman, among them.
And that’s my point: Adamski, as fraudulent as he was, created the flying saucer/UFO agenda [UFOs are ET craft] that we are stuck with to this day, at least some of us are……
RR
posted by RRRGroup at
Tuesday, August 30, 2011
18 Comments:
"But the real object, that isn’t noted, is indicated at the arrow point in the reproduction here:"
What am I supposed to be seeing?
Regards,
Don
By
Sourcerer, at Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Don:
There's a distinct flying saucer image in the photo, which is faint on our computers, so maybe it can't be seen on other computers.
I'll try to blow up that portion of the photo and insert it.
(I'll send you a larger version via e-mail nonetheless.)
RR
By
RRRGroup, at Tuesday, August 30, 2011
I'm re-reading the new edition of the Allingham book now. It's probably 25 years since I last read it, and it's still a classic bit of Contactee genius - which isn't necessarily a complement!
I don't think there's any truth to the story at all, but the irony is that it is a readable book, and may well have provoked people to get further into Contactee writings when it was first published - which I'm sure was NOT the intention of the author!
By
Nick Redfern, at Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Yes, Nick, what was the intention of the author?
CDA, can you help with this?
It's a lot of work just to be silly.
RR
By
RRRGroup, at Tuesday, August 30, 2011
I first read it as a teenager. It sounded reasonable at first, but then...
Moore was an up and coming young writer and astronomer at the time. He was also a practical joker and decided to outdo Adamski. Hence the photo of the Martian (Adamski had not provided one of his Venusian). I assume Moore also wanted the dosh, and it became a best-seller in the UK.
He had some editorial help with the text and of course it was all kept secret to the chosen few (very few) for decades. I do not know who took the photos but it was certainly not Moore. The whole tale was inspired by the Leslie-Adamski book of 12 months earlier.
The photos bear an obvious similarity to Adamski's, though nobody knows their origin.
'Cedric Allingham' was a fictitious person, and his biography on the book cover is a clever makeover.
And that, as they say, is that.
By
cda, at Tuesday, August 30, 2011
As for Kraspedon, wasn't he later exposed as a fraudster (in some other field of activity)?
By
cda, at Tuesday, August 30, 2011
I'm not sure any formal admittance on anyone's part was ever fully forthcoming re authorship, but if it was designed to demolish the credibility of the Contactee movement, why didn't the author come forward later demonstrating how he fooled everyone?
I could understand why someone might have done that. But it seems kind of baffling to have just created the story with (seemingly, at least) no actual future goal in mind, such as a "Gotcha!" kind of thing.
By
Nick Redfern, at Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Thanks, Rich. There is something there, but I don't know if it is in the film or on it. Interesting. Let me know if you come across an actual print.
Regards,
Don
By
Sourcerer, at Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Thanks, Christopher...
It's a funny side-bar and interesting, silly tale...the kind you Brits are fond of.
And, as you say, that's it.
RR
By
RRRGroup, at Tuesday, August 30, 2011
"..Adamski was the progenitor of the ET idea.."
Not Keyhoe? What about Meade Layne?
Regards,
Don
By
Sourcerer, at Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Don:
Keyhoe was known to cognoscenti; Layne to quidnuncs.
Adamski was the darling of media and UFO aficionados, and some U.S. agencies, as Redfern notes.
RR
By
RRRGroup, at Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Keyhoe's magazine article was not unknown to the press. I'd give him a clear edge, both chronologically and in popularity. Keyhoe's ETH was on the front page of your daily paper before Adamski flipped fiction for fact and had Orthon emerge from the saucer like Venus on the half-shell.
Was he or any of those in his group associated with Meade Layne at some time? No one beat Layne to the ETH re: the saucer wave, afaik.
Is there some good to come out of considering Adamski to be an originator, to have been iconic in the public sphere? I can actually see something charming about that. But I don't think it is true.
Regards,
Don
By
Sourcerer, at Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Don:
Yes, for those who were in the know, Keyhoe and Layne were the go-to guys.
But it was Adamski's photo that captured the ET essence for the public and those who glommed on to the flying saucer mystic.
The photo is iconic, is what I meant, and Adamski by association.
Keyhoe was the guy who caught my attention, along with his books, but it's those photos by Adamski that reeled me in, and many others.
I know you want to give credit where credit is due, but the ET idea (Venus, Orthon, et cetera) were the factors that started almost everyone down the ET garden path, and this long before Roswell emerged as the ET catalyst.
RR
By
RRRGroup, at Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Rich, understood. When I hear "contactee" I see Klaatu and his saucer, not Orthon and Adamski's.
Regards,
Don
By
Sourcerer, at Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Don:
I'm still seeing Klaatu and Gort!
(The 1951 version)
RR
By
RRRGroup, at Tuesday, August 30, 2011
If I were choosing the most iconic UFO photo of all time, I think I would have to go with the Trent photo(s). There is something about them that is wistfully and unspeakably beautiful. That doesn't mean that I think they aren't hoaxes. I still love them.
Jeff Ritzmann and I were pondering the Adamski craft. While I have heard the chicken brooder suggestion before, I have never seen a photo of a brooder that reminded me of the one piloted by Adamski's cute space brothers.
Jeff had suggested that the saucer might be a part from a vacuum cleaner and I found an Electrolux that had and end piece that looked somewhat like the basic shape (but not identical).
Love to hear if anyone else has anything to add.
By the way, the second most iconic photo might be the Heflin ones. These also evoke a sad loneliness, suggesting that an answer to the great mystery was almost to be found but alas, we were once again too late and the ship is leaving.
I am convinced that these are likely fakes. The much ballyhooed "analysis" of these photos was nothing of the sort. It was more of an apology and didn't deal with photographic matters at all. It also ignored the very damning problems with the photos and glossed over the holes in Heflin's story.
Best,
Lance
By
Lance, at Tuesday, August 30, 2011
By the way, very much interested in Nick's upcoming work on the Hunrath Wilkenson story.
Lance
By
Lance, at Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Lance:
I hope to get the research and writing completed by sometime early next year.
If it takes a bit longer, that's ok, as I have uncovered some very good new material, with lots of previously unseen twists and turns in the story.
In fact, it's fast becoming one of the strangest stories I've ever investigated - and I've investigated some weird ones!
By
Nick Redfern, at Wednesday, August 31, 2011
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