Forgotten UFO Researcher Ivan T. Sanderson.

There's some interesting reading at the links below about 'forgotten' UFO researcher and zoologist Ivan T. Sanderson and his speculation about UFO origin and machine intelligence - Sanderson also conducted a lot of great research into the USO subject and, as well as having close connections to British Naval Intelligence and the O.S.S., he also experienced his own UFO sighting in New Jersey, 1958 - there's also some intriguing comments made about his work with John Keel, Major Donald Keyhoe and Admiral Roscoe Hillenkoetter and, as it mentions in the documentary, Sanderson thought UFOs 'seem inextricably connected with water'.

Ivan T. Sanderson.

It is a shame that Sanderson, a biologist by profession, wrote only two books on UFOs. It is a greater shame that he is all but forgotten today. His first book, Uninvited Visitors (1967) remains among the most sophisticated analyses yet done on the possible nature of UFOs (Sanderson called them Unexplained Aerial Objects, or UAOs).

Too long to summarize here, Sanderson methodically asked, not what UAOs were, but what they could be. He developed a six page outline of the possibilities. Thus, they could be inanimate or animate. If inanimate, they might be natural, or artificial, each possibility with several subsets. If animate, they could also be natural or artificial. Natural forms might include life-forms indigenous to space, or to atmospheres, or to solid bodies. Artificial forms might be domesticated natural life-forms, genetically created life forms, or biochemically created life forms. And so on.

Sanderson at several points suggested the possibility that the "occupants" of UFOs might be artificial life forms. He was not dogmatic about this, and also entertained the idea that they might be an as-yet unknown life-form indigenous to Earth. Still, the concept of UFOs as a form of artificial intelligence is fertile enough that we might have expected some follow-up.

After all, it’s been 35 years.

UFOs - What Are They?

Documentary with background information on the USO research of Ivan Sanderson and his work with the British Intelligence Services - also a good interview with Bill Chalker about a Water/UFO case in Australia:

Book review from the Australian Police UFO reporting website Police UFO.com of Sanderson's work on the USO subject 'Invisible Residents':

Invisible Residents – The Reality of Underwater UFOs

An almost forgotten gem of UFOlogy...Sanderson reminds us of the hard yet oft-forgotten fact of UFOlogy, which is, most UFOs seem inextricably connected with water - They are very frequently seen entering and leaving water, moving through or above water, and otherwise interacting with water. Sanderson explores all the implications of this, leading him to postulate that most UFOs are actually USOs - Unidentified Submerged Objects, and their pilots, these other intelligences (OINTS), may have evolved alongside of humanity but under the sea.
Amoung the volumes of cases discussed, Sanderson makes at least 9 references to police, particularly to cases in the US and Canada. He too recognised their importance as witnesses. Sanderson examines UFO hotspots around the world, including the infamous Bermuda Triangle and a hotspot off Australia, searching for patterns and clues, and concedes something irregular is taking place in our waters. Even in theory, he admits, deep within the oceans, within the earth, is the perfect place for an inpenetrable secret base.

Drawing from years of investigation and research, reknown Zoologist Sanderson makes a powerful case for the reality of underwater UFOs and underwater bases. Intelligently constructed, written elegantly and with character, Sanderson is a real joy to read. A highly recommended book.

Link

UFO report by Sanderson from Blairstown, New Jersey in 1958 taken from section 6 of the NICAP Evidence Report

UFO Sighting by Zoologist Ivan T.Sanderson.

Shortly after 5:00 p.m., noted Zoologist Ivan T. Sanderson observed a disc- shaped UFO maneuvering over the Delaware Water Gap. The flat disc looped back and forth, appearing sometimes edge-on (as a very thin line), sometimes oval to circular. It vanished once, but quickly reappeared, and continued its rapid gyrations, finally speeding away to the west.

Section VI - Scientists and Engineers

Links:

The Curious Life Of Ivan T. Sanderson

Bio

Great thread! I was thinking about doing a thread about Ivan T. Sanderson just a few days ago. I just finished Uninvited Visitors and loved it. Such an amazing book. It is full of amazing theories about the UAO's, Unidentified Aerial Object, Sandersons term for UFO. I love the idea of intelligent plasma life living in symbiosis with humanity or is that living off of us? The idea that the vibratory noises that people hear in conjunction with ufo sightings might not be just machinery whirring and whinning and rumbling but could be the result of biological processes of a living being, very creative and plausible theories abound in this book. A must read for any interested in UFOS.

Originally posted by karl 12
There's some interesting reading at the links below about 'forgotten' UFO researcher and zoologist Ivan T. Sanderson and his speculation about UFO origin and machine intelligence - Sanderson also conducted a lot of great research into the USO subject and, as well as having close connections to British Naval Intelligence and the O.S.S., he also experienced his own UFO sighting in New Jersey, 1958 - there's also some intriguing comments made in the articles about his work with John Keel, Major Donald Keyhoe and former CIA Director Roscoe Hillenkoetter and, as it mentions in the documentary, Sanderson thought 'UFOs seem inextricably connected with water'.

Documentary with background information on the USO research of Ivan Sanderson and his work with the British Intelligence Service and the OSS - also a good interview with Bill Chalker about a Water/UFO case in Australia:

Hi karl 12, it’s good to see that you bring this man’s work under the attention of ATS.
Thanks for the interesting video, too bad his files become “missing” as said at. 06:30

As I said earlier, I did buy his book “Uninvited Visitors” the day before yesterday in a second hand bookstore, because you mentioned it in another thread, and I did receive it yesterday in excellent condition.
It’s the hardcover 1st edition from 1967.

I am now reading the excellent book UFOs: Generals, Pilots and Government Officials Go On the Record from Leslie Kean, which I also did buy lately, and as soon as I have finished reading that book I go read “Uninvited Visitors”.
So I have for the time being some very good and interesting information to read about.

Thanks again my friend.

I've always been fascinated by Ivan T. Sanderson, mainly because he lived five minutes from where I grew up in northern NJ. That UFO sighting at the Delaware Water Gap intrigues me because I grew up spending a lot of time there. I bet one of those peaks he drew is Mount Tammany on the NJ side of the river.

Thanks again Karl for bringing to light a subject/person that gets overlooked in this big mess of a field called "ufology"...I was just reading a little about Sanderson last night while re-reading some of Dolan's stuff in his first book "UFO's and the National Security State '41-'73. I'll have to keep an eye out at my local used book store, I've found some real gems there....

Natural forms might include life-forms indigenous to space, or to atmospheres, or to solid bodies. Artificial forms might be domesticated natural life-forms, genetically created life forms, or biochemically created life forms. And so on.

Well that about covers it! I have considered this too, along the same lines and am still left on the fence, in favor of both. I could imagine some type of brilliant bio-luminescent giant jellyfish or squid lighting up the water, and I am sure some of the bio- luminescent plankton have been mistaken as uso. However, it is the emerging and submerging characteristics that make me lean towards artificial. I was trying to think of any species that lives in/under the ocean that also hovers at times, but I can't recall any. So that feature does not seem natural in the ocean scape.
The oceans are so vast and deep that it would seem not too unusual for there to be things we are not familiar with, particularly entities with intelligence, that would rather remain hidden. Do we not have technology to scan the deepest crevices for form and energy anomalies, to at least confirm anything out of place?
I am curious about what percentage of the sightings were above water.

What is the predominant type of energy either concentrated or generated at these "vile vortices?

And yea, why has there been no major expedition to these areas? Are they that bad, even with today's tech, or are they more prohibited from exploration?

I wonder if the occupants of those station wagons were wearing all black?

I was unaware of this person and his work, so thanks for the thread
Never heard of Invisible Residents either, guess I'll be checking that one out this wknd. Was that any inspiration for Cocoon by chance?

spec

Appreciate all the replies and I've been meaning to get back to this thread for a while but haven't had much time, there's certainly been some very interesting points raised and there's some further reading here about Ivan Sanderson's 'underwater parallel civilization' theory as well as other UFO water reports.

Originally posted by spacevisitor

Thanks for the interesting video, too bad his files become “missing”

as said at. 06:30

Hey my friend, looks like those files have been found - Easynow found the link this afternoon.

The archives arrived in Kalamazoo on Friday. Two very hard-working days of shelving and stacking later, punctuated by anomalies "parties" punctuated by sub-sandwiches and pizzas and large quantities of extravagant commentary, our eight person crew we at least got it all off the truck and inside. It's going to take a LOT of archival work, my friends, but it will be worth it---the unloading days themselves were some of the most fun I've had in a very long time.

I want to give you some extremely "early" assessment information. This stuff is EXTENSIVE. It nearly filled a 26-foot U-Haul truck. Secondly, it has survived the rigors of time and mice very well.

Society for the Investigation of The Unexplained: SITU.

Cheers.

Great information, I've not heard of Sanderson before but it seems like this is the real deal.
I also need to get that Leslie Kean book.

reply to post by karl 12


I love Ivan T Sanderson and have read his book invisible residents. He was way ahead of his time. Although I don't believe these are "superterrestrials" we are dealing with, he also espoused the idea of aliens coming from outerspace and taking residence in the ocean. Our technology is better at getting pictures of the moon than it is under the ocean.

Originally posted by Scramjet76

I love Ivan T Sanderson and have read his book invisible residents... he also espoused the idea of aliens coming from outerspace and taking residence in the ocean.

Scramjet, thanks for the reply buddy and it's certainly some very interesting speculation as the sheer number of credible reports on SkyFloating's USO thread and sites like WaterUFO.net are pretty mindboggling - Kandinsky's found some great images of the missing files from Ivan T Sanderson which have popped up in Kalamazoo and it looks like there's quite a lot.

Originally posted by Kandinsky

Anyway, here's two images of Sanderson's Archives...

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/358f367692cc.jpg[/atsimg]

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/b378cfb87751.jpg[/atsimg]

Post

Cheers!

Ivan T. Sanderson's other book on UFOs, 'Uninvited Visitors'

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/8d34793d66cc.jpg[/atsimg]

Supported by his own research and documented reports, Ivan T Sanderson delves into the heart of UFO investigation. What could UFOs be? Where do they come from? When did they start coming? What would they want from us?

Even found in USAF libraries

Who knows of Ivan Sanderson? He was a writer, an UFOlogist as well as a paranormal researcher and biologist. One of his books I have is entitled: Uninvited Visitors. The story of how I got this book is amazing in itself. Every Air Force Base (AFB) has its own library. Did you know that?

Well they do. One day I went into the Pease AFB and asked if as a citizen I could take books out. The librarian told me YES, so I was looking for anything on UFOS. There were not many: one by Major Ruppelt and one by Major Keyhole and this book by Ivan Sanderson. Inside the cover of this hard copy book is a stamp, "PROPERTY OF US AIR FORCE LIBRARY CENTER AFL 2502".

So this book came out of Pease Air Force Base and I noticed that it was printed and copyrighted in 1967! So how long did they have it? What is also interesting is when I went to bring it back in a month or two, Pease was going to be transferred to a public airport and the library was closed down! So now I own the book!! But why this book? Why was this book out of so many interesting to the United States Air Force? As I read this book there was not much I could see so damning that the AFB wanted or needed it. Sure Ruppelts, or Keyholes but why Sanderson's?

link

...

The Professor from SITU shares a few of Ivan Sanderson's USO reports -there's also a document at the link regarding an object emerging through the ice in front of several military ships:

SITU,Sanderson, & USOs: a very small peek at the files

"Richard remarked that it would be interesting to see Sanderson's materials for his interest in USOs [undersea or underwater unidentified objects --- "Unidentified Submerged Objects" was I believe the USO intent]. Of course the files are a mess and I'm going back to West Virginia in about two days, so we can't really find out. But it turns out we can take a little peek. Sanderson, like with most of his topical files, created a three-ring notebook dedicated to the USO idea. In fact he had [at least] two of them, that I've found so far. At first glance [and that's all I can do now], it appears that these served as much of the factual basis for his book, Invisible Residents. I've posted a couple of the pages below of what appear to be his original loggings of the cases".

link

All that remains of Ivan T Sanderson and John Keel's attempts at a 'strictly reportorial' UFO book (would loved to have read that one).

Ivan T. Sanderson and John A. Keel: The Book They Never Wrote

In 1967, John Keel and Ivan Sanderson made a serious attempt to write a book together. The subject was UFOs; the year was notable for the unusual number of sightings, and public interest was at its height. A book by these two remarkable writers and researchers was bound to be a success..

Unfortunately, this promising idea was never to be. All that remains is this title page, a brief pitch, and a proposed table of contents. The book was to be “strictly reportorial… completely without faiths, beliefs, and theories.” The table of contents was chronological, from “The Beginning: Prior to 20,000 B.C.” to “The Breakthrough: A.D. 1966.”

link

Originally posted by karl 12
All that remains of Ivan T Sanderson and John Keel's attempts at a 'strictly reportorial' UFO book (would loved to have read that one).

Woulda Coulda Shoulda... Ivan Sanderson left a formidable library of material exploring UFOs and other phenomena. He was one of the real giants, and a very pleasant speaking voice, too.

I would recommend the collected works of William R. Corliss, as well. The data that Corliss amassed will blow you away.

The connection between UFOs and water isn't so exotic once you realise that cities, or large populations, tend to be closer to the shore (water) than in the midlands. A higher population means more witness sightings of UFOs than those living in lesser populated areas, and thus the connection to the water has a simple and obvious explanation. In my opinion of course

ivan is a prooved fraud, check out cbs report on it

Originally posted by Rapidtregal
ivan is a prooved fraud, check out cbs report on it

I haven't really heard much of this guy before, but I did try to search for any claims about fraud in regards to him and could not find any...

Could you provide a link?

Thanks.