Project Blue Book: Exposed

September 19, 1961: The Strange Case of Barney and Betty Hill

This is not going to be an argument about the legitimacy of the Hill abduction case. It is going to be a look at the Air Force attitude to the subject they were supposed to be investigating. The case file reveals some very interesting attitudes and suggests what was happening in the UFO project in 1961.

For those who are unfamiliar with the case, it began late at night as Barney and Betty Hill were heading home after a vacation. As they drove through the mountains, Betty Hill noticed a bright star near the moon. She was sure that it hadn't been there before, and she was sure that it was getting brighter. Finally, she pointed it out to Barney and he told her he thought it was nothing more than an artificial satellite.

The bright "star" intrigued them both. Several times during the next hour, they stopped. Once or twice they got out a pair of binoculars to try to see any detail behind the light. Betty was now convinced they were looking at something out of the ordinary, but Barney kept insisting that it was nothing more unusual than an airplane or a satellite, or maybe just a very bright star.

During one of the stops, Barney used the binoculars to study the light. He saw red, amber, green and blue lights rotating around it. To Barney it looked like an aircraft fuselage with no wings. He could hear no sound from engines. When he returned to the car, he realized that he was frightened. He didn't want Betty to know that and tried to tell her again the object was nothing more exciting than an airplane flying along the terrain.

The object swooped down and began to pace the car. Betty watched through the binoculars. She demanded that Barney stop the car but he refused for a several minutes. Finally he stopped in the middle of the road and when Betty handed him the binoculars, he got out, leaving the engine running. Now he took a good look at the object, seeing for the first time that it was a large disc. Again he told Betty, "It must be a plane or something."

Although he was afraid, he stepped away from the car and began to walk across the road, toward the object. He kept walking until he was deep in the field where he could see the craft which was hovering just above the trees. Through the binoculars he could clearly see a double row of windows, and behind them were six beings. One, who Barney thought of as "the leader," wore a black leather jacket.

As he watched, five of the six turned their backs and seemed to manipulate controls. The saucer began a slow descent. Fins holding red lights spread along the craft, and something, possibly landing gear lowered from the belly of the object.

Barney now focused on the remaining face behind the windows of the object and was overwhelmed with the feeling that he was going to be captured. He jerked the binoculars from his eyes, spun, and ran back toward Betty and the car. Shouting that they were going to be kidnapped, he threw the binoculars on the backseat and slide beneath the wheel. He slammed the car into gear and roared off as fast as possible. He ordered Betty to watch for the thing, but it had apparently disappeared.

As Barney began to calm and slow, they heard a series of strange electronic beeps. Both seemed to feel drowsy. The beeps came again and they saw a sign that told them Concord was seventeen miles. They continued home, arriving about five in the morning.

Once they reached home, they unpacked before going to bed. Betty took a bath and according to Coral Lorenzen of APRO, who spoke to Betty many times, "for no reason whatsoever, bundled up the dress and shoes she had been wearing and shoved them into the deep recesses of her closet."

Six days after the event, Betty Hill wrote Major Donald E. Keyhoe, a writer and director of the National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena (NICAP), describing what had happened to her and her husband. She also suggested that she was thinking of finding a reputable psychiatrist to perform hypnotic regression to recover memories because Barney was having trouble remembering parts of the story.

In December 1963, more than two years after they had seen the strange light, after Barney began to have stomach trouble, and after he had consulted with two different doctors, he was sent on to Dr. Benjamin Simons, a well-known and highly qualified neurosurgeon who eventually used hypnosis on both the Hills.

Under hypnosis, conducted as part of the therapy session to find a reason for the stomach trouble, Barney Hill told of what happened after they heard the first set of beeping sounds. For some reason, Barney turned down a dirt road and drove up to a roadblock where the engine quit. Several "men" appeared around the car who guided both the Hills through a wooded area to the craft which was sitting on the ground.

Betty Hill later described the beings as having a Mongoloid appearance with broad, flat faces, large slanting eyes, and small, flattened noses. Barney added to the description, saying that the "leader" had very large, almond-shaped eyes that seemed to wrap around to the side of his head. The mouth was a slit with a vertical line on each side. The skin, according to Betty, had a bluish-gray cast to it.

According to the Betty, Barney kept his eyes closed during most of the time they were on the craft. Some researchers have suggested that this is why his tale was never as rich in detail as that told by his wife. He did, however, mention a medical examination and that he was put on a table that was too short from him.

Betty described her examination, saying that unusual instruments touched her body in various places, that samples of skin and fingernails were taken and hair was pulled from her head. A long needle was pushed into her navel. She screamed at the "examiner" and the "leader" passed a hand over her eyes, stopping the pain.

Betty communicated with the "leader" though there is no real indication that they spoke out loud. She had the impression that the "leader" was keeping the rest of the crew away from her. She was also told that she didn't have to worry about Barney, he would be all right. During the discussion, she asked where they came from, and the "leader" showed her a map but asked Betty where the sun was. When Betty failed to identify it, he told her that the map would do her no good.

Betty was then escorted from the ship and joined Barney in the car. There was the second series of beeps, and they "awakened" traveling down the road, nearing Concord.

The hypnotherapy by Dr. Benjamin Simons took several months. When it was over, Simons said that he thought the Hills were recounting a fantasy. He believed that Betty had originated the tale and shared it with Barney by telling him of her dreams. Simons believed this because Barney's account was less detailed than Betty's.

There is one additional fact. The letter that Betty wrote detailed much of the story. Later, investigators reported that Barney often sat in listening as Betty told of the experiences with them. While it may be said that Barney and Betty didn't discuss the case between themselves, Barney was always there when Betty was talking about the sighting. He certainly had plenty of opportunity to learn the details of Betty's dreams if that was, in fact, the source of the abduction portion of the sighting.

The star map that Betty saw on the craft became one point of corroboration. Marjorie Fish, an Ohio school teacher spent years trying to find a pattern in the stars that matched that drawn by Betty under hypnosis. She created a three dimension model of our section of the galaxy and then examined it from all angles, searching for a match to that particular pattern. Her first attempts failed, but in 1972 after six years of intensive work, she finally discovered a pattern that matched what Betty Hill had drawn.

Fish discovered that the main stars in the map were Zeti I and Zeti II Reticuli, star systems about 37.5 light years from Earth. The map showed what might be interpreted as lines of communication. Heavy lines between the closest stars and lighter lines between those farther away. A single line connected the sun into the mix, suggesting that the sun was a relatively unimportant star.

Walter Webb, at one time APRO's consultant in Astronomy, wrote an analysis of Marjorie Fish's work. He was impressed by the fact the lines on the map, as developed by Fish, connected stars that were exclusively the type defined as suited for life. A random pattern of stars would not generate that sort of subtle, yet corroborative evidence. Webb also wrote that "The pattern happens to contain a phenomenally high percentage of all the known stars suitable for life in our solar neighborhood."

What was interesting, according to Webb, was that Fish had believed that dozens of patterns would emerge. Instead, after six years of work, she found only a single pattern that met all the criterion she had arbitrarily established. If the map was accurate, if Betty Hill remembered the map correctly, and if the details of the abduction weren't just vivid and frightening dreams, then a good clue had been found about the location of one group of alien visitors.

The Air Force never really investigated the case according to the Project Blue Book files. Although there is a file, it is clear that the material is from magazine articles and letters. Little of it suggests any sort of Air Force investigation. But what is more important is the tone of those documents concerning the Hill case.

One of them began with, "The Hill case is closed, and has zero priority." But after that opening statement, it is clear the beliefs of the writer had taken over. In fact, there is a tone of hostility in the document that comes through even in its written form.

According to the document, an obvious response to the magazine article that was based on The Interrupted Journey by John Fuller,

"1. Foreign does NOT mean foreign to Earth, it means Foreign to the United States.

"2. FTD is directed by AFSC at Andrews AFB, NOT the CIA. The CIA does not investigate UNIDENTIFIEDS.

"3. Name ONE scientist or "astrophysicist" studying this case.

"4. NICAP is not a "scientific" group.

"5. Walter Webb Astronomer? Yes, No?

"6. Is Hill emotionally mature?

"7. Note that they witheld (sic) information and waited two days. They reported only that there was a bright star moving toward them in a northerly direction.

"8. 'Two Years later?' … Evaluated in 1961 (Info supplied to Herbert S Taylor in 1963)

"9. Records? indicate a intensive [investigation?] Come on. We did not even bother to contact the Hills personally." Need I point out that this is exactly the problem. American citizens reported to the Air Force their UFO sighting and the Air Force attitude was to ignore it.

"10. No one else saw the same object the Hills did, Who are the others.???

"11. Sought psychiatric help. Does this indicate emotional maturity?" Actually, that is exactly what it does indicate. Barney Hill saw the psychiatrist after consulting doctors for an unrelated medical problem.

"12. What are the conclusions of the Psychiatrist?

"13. Who was the accredited scientific investigator who heard the tapes?

"14. Final evaluations made at Wright Patterson on the data submitted from Pease [Air Force Base] and other information from their own investigation into the matter." I thought that, according to this same letter, "Records? indicate a intensive [investigation?] Come on. We did not even bother to contact the Hills personally."

"15. The time motion sequence is missing in all reports. Such directions as 'to the right' 'up' ect (sic) have no validity. Only directions reported in azimuth and elevation have value.

"16. The files are maintained at Wright Patterson, not Pease AFB."

The obvious anger of the writer comes through on the written page. He is doing little more than attempting to assassinate the character of Barney Hill by suggesting emotional immaturity. There is nothing in the case to suggest that either of the Hills are emotionally immature. Believing that they had seen a flying saucer does not make them immature. It might suggest that they were unable to identify a natural object, one of the planets, for example, but that is all it suggests. At the end of the statement collected by Major Paul Henderson at Pease in the days that followed the incident, he wrote in apparent contradiction of the above, "Information contained herein was collected by means of telephone conversation between the observers and the preparing individual. The reliability of the observer cannot by judged and while his apparent honesty and seriousness appears to be valid it cannot be judged at this time."

This is, in itself quite revealing. It suggests that the Hills, or in this particular case, Barney, was a sincere and honest man who was reporting what he believed to be a flying saucer. The officer listened, collected the data, and did nothing else. Please note, the Air Force investigators did nothing else.

At no point in this case am I going to argue either for a conclusion of extraterrestrial intervention or of a solution of a natural occurrence simply because it is not relevant to my point. The Air Force, in September 1961, was charged with the investigation of UFO sightings. The Hills reported just such a sighting but it wasn't investigated. Instead, like so many other sightings, it was swept away once the "possible" or "probable" explanation was discovered.

On September 27, 1961, Project Blue Book officers reported, "The Barney Hill sighting was investigated by officials from Pease AFB. The case is carried as insufficient data in the Air Force files. No direction (azimuth) was reported and there are inconsistencies in the report. The sighting occurred about midnight and the object was observed for at least one hour. No specific details on maneuverability were given. The planet Jupiter was in the South West, at about 20 degrees elevation and would have set at the approximate time that the object disappeared. Without positional data the case could not be evaluated as Jupiter. There was a strong inversion in the area. The actual light source is not known. As no lateral or vertical movement was noted, the object was in all probability Jupiter. No evidence was presented to indicate that the object was due to other than natural causes."

This paragraph speaks volumes about the investigation. Before we look at that, however, we must remember one fact. Project Blue Book had a single mission. They were to investigate sightings of UFOs. Officers at other bases, as one of their additional duties, were tasked with collecting data about UFOs and forwarding those reports, in accordance with Air Force regulations, to Project Blue Book.

I point this out only to stop the argument that the Air Force had better things to do that listen to the tales told by Barney and Betty Hill. In this circumstance, that is exactly what they were tasked to do. Listen to Barney and Betty Hill.

That said, let's look at the Air Force statement. They complain because no azimuth was given. Who'se fault is that? Certainly not Barney Hill. Had the Air Force desired that information, they could have determined it. Maybe someone would have had to drive to the Hill residence, or, maybe they could have asked the Hills to come in for additional interrogation. After all, Barney Hill had already demonstrated that he would cooperate with the Air Force authorities because he had called with his sighting report.

Instead, the officer, in this case Major Henderson, forwarded incomplete data to Project Blue Book. There, they decided they didn't have enough data to solve the puzzle, so they stamped it with insufficient data, said they thought it was Jupiter, and closed the case. Apparently no one thought to pick up the telephone and see if the missing data could be recovered so that they would be able to solve the case.

Now, more than thirty-five years later, we have had books written about the Hill case. It is considered one of the best and is responsible for bringing the whole of the abduction phenomenon into the mainstream. Both Barney and Betty Hill were seen as honest individuals who were telling, frankly, an incredible story. It is clear that they had not invented the tale consciously. They were not involved in some elaborate hoax to push themselves into the spotlight. They believed what they said.

But let's think about what the Air Force could have done, especially since it was their job to do it. They could have taken the Hills back to the road and had them point out where they had seen the object. An officer could have used a compass to determine the direction to the object from the road, and he could have determined the elevation, two facts that the Air Force didn't have.

Had that been done, wouldn't the Air Force have been able to say the UFO sighting was the result of Jupiter, if Jupiter was in the right position to cause the sighting? Had the Air Force done that, wouldn't a number of questions about the case been resolved? Instead of having more than thirty-five years of speculation, wouldn't we have been able to suggest a plausible explanation for the sighting rather than slapping the insufficient data label on it. And, wasn't it the job of the Air Force to find solutions rather than just label cases.

In 1955, a sixty-one year-old elementary school teacher reported much the same thing as the Hills. She watched an object for about an hour and a half as it seemed to pace her car. She believed that the object was tracking her and was afraid that she would be captured.

The official Blue Book file showed that "One pear shaped obj, similar to light bulb, seemed to be intense blue light. Light appeared in front of observer's car. Observer stated obj was seen on all sides of her car, and believed obj was interested in capturing her and her car. Obj left with approach of dawn, disappearing behind mountain range to east."

Under comments it was noted, "Ascribe report to psychological causes of witness."

It was also noted that the witness was "apparently sincere. No publicity was givin (sic) in local papers. Observers belief that object was interested in capturing her and auto and was persistent enough to stay for 1 and one-half to 2 hrs, leaving only with approaching dawn. Observer is apparently intelligent but possibility of paranoiac symptoms."

This case is important because it foreshadows the Hill sighting by six years. It suggests that something other than a "viewing" of a particularly bright planet or star has happened. But the Air Force didn't bother to investigate farther. They had an answer. The woman was paranoid. We all know that UFOs don't pace cars or capture people. Those who believe such things are obviously paranoid.

Had the Air Force searched their own files, as I did, they would have found this case which suggests something might be happening. Suddenly the Hills, believing they were being followed by a UFO isn't so strange. In fact, if we examine the history of UFO sightings, we find that it is a pattern that is repeated a number of times. Military and airline pilots had reported that strange craft paced their aircraft and people driving the highways had suggested UFOs had followed them. What this demonstrates is not a psychological problem, but a reported occurrence that seemed to have been by missed the Air Force investigators.

But we do see a pattern in the Air Force investigation. The school teacher was paranoid and therefore additional investigation was not required. The Hills were crazy, had even sought psychiatric help, and therefore additional investigation was not required. We see in the Hill file the one officer's notes about emotional maturity. He hammered that point home believing that Barney Hill was not emotionally mature.

Even if we reject the idea of alien abduction, here was a case that deserved to be reviewed. The Air Force paid lip serve to the regulations, interviewed Barney Hill on the telephone and then used the lack of investigation as proof that there was nothing to the case. After all, if it was an important case, there would have been more of an investigation by the Air Force.

What we also see, in this case is the anger with which some officers approached their mission. They didn't want to be chasing flying saucers because everyone knows those things aren't real. Rather than answer the questions about the case, rather than take the time and put in the effort to learn the facts, they rejected the story as told because, to them, it was incredible. This is one of those cases that can't be true and therefore it is not true.

Again, the case itself, in this one instance, isn't important. It is the attitude of the officers who investigated it. They couldn't be troubled with doing the job they were required to do by Air Force regulation. In the end, they were able to label the case, and that is all that that they really cared about. It didn't count against them because it didn't land in the "unidentified" category. All we have to do is ignore the fact that with a little effort, they might have been able to put the right label on the case. That, it seems, was too much trouble for them.