This time on Great Lakes Lore, Samantha and Aaron tackle their first modern UFO case. They’ll introduce the broader topic of UFO sightings and the government response to them in the 1950s and 1960s and then dive into looking at the 1966 wave of sightings in southeast Michigan that garnered national attention and led, eventually, to huge changes in how the US military dealt with UFOs.
A UFO Primer- 3:45 Sightings and Reporting- 9:51 NICAP and the Robertson Panel- 13:05 Project Blue Book and J. Allen Hynek- 15:22 The Dexter and Hillsdale Sightings- 22:09 Midway Break- 34:38 The Investigation- 39:17 The Findings- 45:26 The Reaction- 49:30 The Consequences- 52:43 Questions and Wrapping Up- 55:57
Sketch by Dexter police officer David Severance. Image courtesy of the Bentley Library.
Cartoon sent to Ann Arbor News Editor by a 1966 reader. Image courtesy of the Bentley Library.
Letter from 14-year-old Gregory Gulyas. Image courtesy of the Bentley Library.
Can the shipwrecks that plague to eastern end of Lake Ontario be attributed to normal dangers on a lake of that size, or do they speak to something more mysterious? Samantha tackles the maritime history and Aaron the…stranger explanations in this episode on the Lake Ontario Triangle. You might just find that the answer lies somewhere in the middle.
Time stamps Intro- 1:06 The Allure of Maritime Mysteries- 2:07 So Many Triangles- 5:13 The Marysburgh Vortex- 8:29 The Quinlan’s Strange Attractions- 13:33 The Bavaria- 18:21 The Picton- 28:43 Midway Break- 36:46 Vanishing Aircraft are More Boring than Vanishing Ships: 39:32 Everything from Lost Cities to Cattle Mutilations- 43:32 UFOs- 46:42 Sam Encounters Commander X for the First Time- 48:00 Explanations (rational and otherwise)- 52:26 Concluding Questions- 59:56
Aaron and Samantha travel back to the nineteenth century to explore the mystery airships that were spotted throughout the country in 1896/97. What started as a trio of lights above Sacramento, California, grew to reported sightings of actual ships that moved from the west coast to the Great Plains and into the Great Lakes States. Samantha and Aaron look at various sightings, possible explanations, and touch on the history of aviation. Fasten your seatbelts, it’s a wild ride.
Time Stamps
The Gilded Age- 1:10
California-8:25
Wisconsin- 12:34
Midway Break- 22:08
Michigan- 29:35
Lanark, Illinois- 39:10
Aurora, Texas- 49:42
The History of Aviation- 53:30
Wrap-Up and Outro- 56:30
In this episode, Samantha and Aaron step back from examining actual pieces of lore in order to share their own personal paranormal experiences. They examine the reasons why eye-witness testimonies of supernatural phenomena need to be handled with care, the ways their own experiences influence the way they interpret those from others, and how their training as historians has prepared them to analyze sources.
Time Stamps History of Paranormal Research- 2:20 Analyzing Sources- 13:46 Personal Stories- 15:55 Legend or Lie- 39:47 Interpreting the Paranormal- 44:06 The Desire to Have an Encounter- 54:07
Sources For this episode we relied on a lot of articles to help us explain some of the thoughts we had about why people believe in the paranormal, what can influence that belief, and the power of biases. In case you’d like to look at these, we’ve divided them into helpful categories.
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