The very strange tale of the Beanpot UFO, the Schoolboy and the MIB

Pull up a bean bag, stoke the campfire, and soak up this strange tale…



THE BASICS





This is Reed Thompson, from Milan, Indiana. He sadly died aged 66 on 7th January 2019. I found his obituary page today which includes one tribute that dared to mention a certain incident from 19th January 1967 when Reed was 14-years-old:

"I remember his great parents Bill & Mary Gray, the Milan Furniture Factory and the famous UFO that Reed photographed in his backyard. That happened on a short school day and I had just left his house to go home when I received a phone call from Reed, really excited!"

Well, that’s a useful, rather LATE third-party verification of Reed’s emotional state after he experienced and photographed one of the most bizarre looking UFOs in ufology - rarely if at all even known to ATS. The story later took a very strange turn, and I’ve stitched events together from various sources listed later (I left out the obituary page out of respect).

While living in Connersville, Indiana, between 3-4pm Reed was home alone after school, watching TV when he heard what sounded like a diesel train engine. There were rail tracks nearby but no train; instead he saw a strange light in the sky 200 yards away as Winter daylight slowly drained away - similar lighting to the recently released Calvine photo (Aug 1990). The UFO was over a house with a red roof, level with a TV antenna and electric wires, before moving behind woodland toward a valley and vanishing - until it returned, moving at a walking pace…

Feeling shaken by this strange event, Reed took a colour photograph (only a b&w version is available; I’ll explain later) of the UFO, standing 5 feet from his window. Attempting a second shot, he accidentally double-exposed the first two, so he ran up to his bedroom window and took one clear pic before the object retreated into woodland. Here’s that baby:






Yes, exactly - what in the bejeezuz is THAT? Measuring 6’ by 8’, it moved 10’ above the ground and made angled turns around trees. Reed ran outside and watched it for 5-7 minutes until it disappeared over a pine and some fir trees, but it’s important to note that the equally strange ‘diesel train’ sound also stopped at that point. A most peculiar aspect is that the level and nature of that sound remained constant throughout, regardless of distance. I have never known a case boasting such a sound before.

As an aside, this description of the sound somehow reminded me of the demonic ending to the classic ‘Night Of The Demon’ (1957), although clearly not as dramatic:





SEEING IS NOT WHAT THE CAMERA IS BELIEVING

An already strange case got odder when Reed’s personal recollection of the UFO as a bright, silver spherical object was in direct contrast to what we see in the photo - basically a beanpot or an open jar.

Reed phoned Indiana State Police, speaking to them for 15 minutes before they sent officer trooper Harris to interview him and his parents for 45 minutes. Due to the time of day, few people were in the neighbourhood, and those few saw and heard nothing, but Reed’s parents were overjoyed by the photo since it vindicated their son’s mind!

Enter UFO investigator Don Worley:





[CONTINUED]

[CONTINUED]



ANALYSES AND FATHERLY GREED

Reed told Worley:

”I was shocked. I felt like I was going to have a heart attack. I knew something was odd, different out there. I thought I must be seeing things. I couldn’t believe my own eyes. It was coming right up between the bird feeder and the locust tree.”

Upon examining the original colour photo, Worley (also now deceased) noted that branches and trees were reflected on the UFO’s left side which had a “glassy, highly reflective surface”. This confirmed it was airborne and beyond Reed’s tampering. More disturbingly, he swears that at the top of the object there is a faint shadow of a being’s head and shoulder - can anyone on ATS spot this in the b&w version? Furthermore, the tree’s limbs near the UFO reportedly died soon afterward.

The US Air Force sent investigators from Dayton, and the University of Colorado’s Robert Lowe also analysed the photographic negative, finding no manipulation.

The boy’s amateurish handling of the camera and conflicting description of the UFO added to Worley’s enthusiasm for the case, dominated by the utterly strange, unique nature of the UFO that defied the ubiquitous ‘saucers’ and ‘cigars’ of 50s/60s lore.

The Aerial Phenomena Research Organization (A.P.R.O.), a UFO research group founded in 1952, asked for the colour photo and negatives, but Reed’s father refused, wanting to squeeze some cash for it from newspapers/magazines, all of whom ironically declined his offer, perhaps because the UFO did not match standard descriptions of the past (as if the press KNOW what an alien ship looks like!).

So, all we have is the b&w version, courtesy (presumably) of Worley. Reed died in 2019, but did the original colour pic die with him? Where is it? In the absence of any photograph at the time of reporting, a sketched version was made for A.P.R.O.’s own publication:



Interestingly, the Dearborn County Register newspaper for March 19, 1992, looking back at the case, apparently reported that two girls from Dillsboro saw a very similar strange UFO on the same day in 1967. I cannot find that article, but if an ATSer could oblige, I’d be grateful.


AND THEN THINGS GOT EVEN STRANGER

It seems it’s not just us and the World who want the original colour photo and negative…



Some time later, Reed informed Worley that he had suffered missing time during the incident, as well as recurrent nosebleeds. Yet that is nothing compared to a day in April 1973 when two strange thin, ugly, long-haired men, dressed in tan jump suits and heavy gloves visited Reed’s auto parts store in Milan. There were customers inside who remember nothing, and Reed claims his shepherd dog ran to a corner, whining “in terror”.

This MIB info comes from James Todd’s book ‘The Secrets Of The Men In Black’ (2013) for whom I cannot speak and can only relay, but you may want to take it with a hefty pinch of salt. Or Not.

Apparently, a local news reporter (I cannot find his original article, either, I’m afraid) described the two men as “plastic facers” who demanded the colour photo and negative “immediately”. Reed retorted that it was in a bank vault and no-way-jose could they have it, to which they replied they would take it anyway.

Reed’s friend Craft went outside to examine the men’s 1969 bright yellow Buick LeSabre, but through the tinted glass he could see no seats or even a steering wheel. One of the men brushed Craft’s elbow, and Craft died two years later, two autopsies unable to find the cause of death.

Reed drove to a welding shop, the two men parking behind him and shadowing him to the door, but when Reed opened it, a “blue arc-welding flash” occurred and the two men, as well as their vehicle, vanished.

Although not mentioned in his obituary page, Reed then claimed to have multiple abduction experiences which involved ‘grey alien faces’, puncture and scoop marks, as well as general bad luck.

It’s arguable that Reed Jumped The Shark once he had grown up, and was pushing the limits of believability and embellishing his childhood case like Jim Penniston on steroids. But I shall leave it to you to decide. Moreover, like Calvine, we need to see the original colour photograph and negative from 1967, but many tumbleweeds will probably drift past before they are available.

You can put out the campfire now.


SOURCES:

www.nicap.org...

www.thinkaboutitdocs.com...

www.ufoinsight.com...

The Secrets Of The Men In Black (2013) - extract

a reply to: ConfusedBrit

S & F Great thread! 👏🏽

I’m no camera expert, but the part about Reed taking both b&w and color photos doesn’t seem right. Did cameras have the ability to switch back and forth in 1967? What got me thinking about that is the photo comes off looking like a sketch drawing. Maybe I’m wrong.

Heck yeah, this is the Real stuff i still come to ATS hoping to see, thank you! Always such good quality work!

Love the weird UFO, love the discrepancy in the witness description, beautiful high strangeness. I'm wondering which version the girls who also witnessed it described?

Been thinking a lot lately about the way the phenomenon 'toys' with people, for lack of a better word, and this seems to fit right into that. How much later years shark jumping is desperation to keep the story going, and how much of it could be having your brain melted by an inconceivable phenomenon?
idk but i've missed ATS making me think about such things

The MIB involvement in a bunch of cases is fascinating.

I take it with a grain of salt though , there is still a big chance that they are designed to sweeten up stories.

a reply to: ConfusedBrit

Very well written thread.

Cheers

It looks like it is a variation of the Kecksburg bell.

With film it can be printed in color or B&W if you have filters if it's color film. But no instant switching between the two.

But hey, we all know it´s only swamp gas, the Venus, balloons, mass halucinations, black military projects etc... xD

There are so many credible eye witness reports over the decades, from people who got nothing than trouble after speaking in public about what they witnessed, many of them even knowing that they maybe will be seen as crazy UFO nuts when they talked about it but did and do it nevertheless. I am not talking about these "disclosure" popstars who know everything but can´t say and show anything. But about average people like you and me from all places around the world.

Yesterday, on r/UFOs, i heard the report of the director or whatever of movies like Dumb and Dumber, didn´t even know his name before. It was a video and i believed him after seeing and listening and recognizing what and how he told it, how he remembered and how scared he and buddy were. I mean, why should he tell about this if it didn´t really happen, he will not get more money now, makes more movies now or whatever but many people will think he is nuts now. And he knew that before telling his experience in front of a cam and mic. Just as one example of maybe millions around the world.

I saw something by myself, together with my mom, when i was a child and we even looked with my binoculars at that thing and "observed" it for nearly an hour (at broad daylight on a summer day) till i got bored and left, too young to get the idea that that cylindrical and pitch black thing hovering there motionless for at least nearly an hour, maybe was an UFO. Two guys i know, they really have absolutely nothing to do with CT or UFO stuff, one of them told me how they were riding with their bikes around the Max Planck Institute that had a corn labyrinth on a field at the side at that time and suddenly a silent huge disc came from that labyrinths direction and shot away completely silent into thin, straight about their heads and then swoosh, gone. He told me that they both were shocked and decided to tell nobody about it because they were afraid to be seen as UFO weirdos.

So myself, my mom and people i know saw something that wasn´t normal, hovering or flying around. Makes me believe that many, many people saw something but never told anybody about it or even realized what they saw. Then you have the people who only tell it to people they trust but not in public and then all the people who talk in public about what they witnessed, count them all together over the decades. Makes me really believe that almost everybody at least knows one person who saw something that was out of the norm, whatever or whoever it was. But maybe never talked about it, at least not in public.

But there is enough evidence out there, collected over the decades, it can´t be that all of the witnesses are crazies, weirdos, attention seekers and i even don´t believe that we have enough swamp gas and balloons on earth to create all these UFO incidents with credible eyewitnesses radar recording etc xD. It doesn´t at least need any pop-star like hyped disclosure priests to make me believe what i and others saw over the decades.

Well this is a fun story and we'll probably never solve it now.

These stories got more attention back in the day because there were many more newspapers with proper journalists back in the 60s. Nowadays local newspapers that still exist usually consist of a journalist who sits at a computer and trawls the internet for stories.

But I have to be honest and say it looks like a fisherman's keep net stuck in a tree, maybe blown into the air. You can even see the light coming through it.

Similar to this (albeit with finer netting).




The full story from the Dearborn County Register is contained in this UFO News Clippings PDF

With part 1 on page 2 and part 2 on the following page.

a reply to: ConfusedBrit

Never heard about that case before, but I did some enhance of the org picture.
And do not tell I am the only one that see a face, halo and wings ?

files.abovetopsecret.com...


files.abovetopsecret.com...

a reply to: DerBeobachter

But there is enough evidence out there, collected over the decades, it can´t be that all of the witnesses are crazies, weirdos, attention seekers and i even don´t believe that we have enough swamp gas and balloons on earth to create all these UFO incidents with credible eyewitnesses radar recording etc...

I don't think the existence of UFOS is in doubt. But it's the interpretation of what they are and conclusions people jump to that lack definitive the proof. Otherwise they'd no longer be UFOs.

a reply to: ConfusedBrit

Thank you for such a superbly written, and well thought out post, was really refreshing to read!

I had not heard of this case before, but will definitely take a deeper look into it now.

Absolutely brilliantly done friend, thanks again!

Awesome post S&F, Fascinating Story... i love these old accounts and sightings, ive been deep diving into alot of old reports and sightings over the past year and reconnecting it to new information and work from academics, re-listening to these story's and sightings really hits for me right now given science and government are revealing more and more, what i find chilling is it was exactly these types of sightings and storys etc etc that i discredited and ignored for decades as nutjobs and BS

Now when i read or watch them im genuinely getting goosebumps and my decades long interest and fascinations of the subject is excited and wowed all over again, ive never seen this picture in my life and id thought id seen them all *shrugs*

Thanks Man, Good to see great post like this on UFOs again on ATS

originally posted by: ConfusedBrit

Apparently, a local news reporter (I cannot find his original article, either, I’m afraid) described the two men as “plastic facers” who demanded the colour photo and negative “immediately”. Reed retorted that it was in a bank vault and no-way-jose could they have it, to which they replied they would take it anyway.

Maybe that's what happened to the color photograph.

Excellent old school case and thread, CB! Thanks for taking the time to put it together.

Thanks for the kind comments from ATSers. I adore stories like this.

originally posted by: mirageman
Well this is a fun story and we'll probably never solve it now.

If the author of the MIB book is to be believed, the negative might be sitting in a bank vault as we type.

But I have to be honest and say it looks like a fisherman's keep net stuck in a tree...

The full story from the Dearborn County Register is contained in this UFO News Clippings PDF

Well, I did throw out a fisherman's net, asking for help finding the article. So, many thanks!

The strangest element of the saga could be the diesel train engine sound that continued unabated until the UFO vanished. I mean, why would a hoaxer even dream up such a BIZARRE detail, let along choose an 'empty jar' shape for a UFO instead of the standard disks/cigars of the period?

Great fun, though, innit?

A great thread and one I have read about before. Far far more exciting than the usual political / Trump bollox threads.
This is the reason I joined ATS in the first place