director of the National UFO Reporting Center looking for Help

seattletimes.nwsource.com...

Davenport, longtime director of the National UFO Reporting Center, a nonprofit clearinghouse and 24-hour hotline for UFO sightings, bought it for $100,000 two years ago to turn into his new headquarters.

Toward the back, shrouded in darkness, sits Davenport's life work: a collection of tens of thousands of reports on UFO sightings. He kept files long before the television show "The X-Files" brought the paranormal to prime time. The information is meticulously labeled and filed in a long row of mismatched metal file cabinets. They form the shape of a miniature city skyline.

He believes that clues lie buried in the hill-sized mounds of paper he has meticulously cataloged, if only the government or a well-funded university would do the research.

"I'm willing to share data," he says. "I'm willing to throw all of it to anyone who wants to know."

Since ATS has the Archives project moving ahead......maybe ATS can help with this.......

I think that's a great idea Ferretman2!! I suppose I can only speak for myself but I would love to take a look at some of those files in my spare time.

This is Peter Davenport's Email address:
[email protected]

It would require a salary for me to move to Washington, but I'd do it.
I'm going to send him an email this morning, offering my services.
Thanks for the heads up!

-WFA

EDIT:
Here is the email I just sent to Peter Davenport...

Mr. Davenport,

It has come to my attention through reading this article in the Seattle Times:
seattletimes.nwsource.com...

That you require assistance examining the files you've collected througout the years. I would like to offer my services to assist you. I understand that you are self funded, which unfortunately is not a position I share. I live in Southern California, in the Los Angeles area. To move to Washington and invest full time in this project, I would require some sort of salary, based at approximately 40-50,000/year USD.

I understand that you might not be in a postition to hire labor, but in the interest of your investigations, I thought it couldn't hurt to offer my services.

I would be happy to submit a resume upon request, however since research in this particular field is most likely what you are looking for, I'll direct you to where my research is located online.
www.abovetopsecret.com...

This is my member profile at ATS, where I examine such evidence as often as time allows. In particular I would direct your attention to the thread on the Battle of Los Angeles, here:
www.abovetopsecret.com...

This thread contains some of my most detailed research and analysis to date. Thank you very much for your time, and I wish you the best of luck in your search for assistance on this project.

-[NAME REMOVED]
(WitnessFromAfar - at ATS)
[EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED]

END EDIT

[edit on 31-3-2008 by WitnessFromAfar]

Peter Davenport seems like a genuine interested person. I remember hearing reports from him on Art Bell's show in the 1990's and he always came across as truly curious. I would help but can't move back to Washington State at this point. If they can be scanned and sent over the internet or even by mail I would help. Seriously a priority mail box could be crammed with duplicates and sent for $9 which I would pay for.

I think this situation highlights one of the problems which is painfully evident when it comes to this subject matter.

There seems to be many individual report archives around the world, many of which are on paper, that need to be brought together in a contiguous resource available on computer as a uniform international database.

This of course would provide a better tool for gauging the depth of the phenomena.

Unfortunately it seems to be left to individuals and poorly funded organisations to collect and sort through data which is inviteably fragmented from other sources.

So I guess the bottom line here is better funding or, a saviour who could gather together enough voluntary workers to achieve this end.

It is a shame but I think none of those two possibilities will happen anytime soon.

this guy would be a FOOL to just hand over all that evidence to anyone.

I hope he's got copies.

ferretman2 You beat me to this idea! I decided to sleep before posting and look what happens, haha.

It would be great if Peter could scan the documents and submit them to ATS for cataloging and further investigation. Human based distributed computing is one of the best ways to get through mass amounts of written data and cross reference them for ease of investigation.

If I weren't in Australia I would definately help in RL.

reply to post by Zeeko


Maybe that's what he needs help with. Scanning everything into computer and/or V-logging every shred of doc he has. If the docs are hill sized.. I'd say he's need mountains amounts of tools and manpower to do such a task. The higher the mountain, the more tools you'll need to bring it down to earth

My only question: Will we get to all of it before THEY do? After we get there, will it be worth picking through?

He's man with one desk and one phone and a stack of reports. I dont know how he's done it by himself for so long.
I dont even think he's got a computerized office.

I think the owners here should jump at this!!!

Heck, i'd jump at it if i knew what to do with it!!!

Well.. since I can't go to Seattle, I can post what I would do if it was me with that amount of data. . I'm hoping that everything is in folders and somewhat of a file system. If not, ouch!! Major work right off the bat.

2). I'd completely secure everything as much as possible in order to keep the integrity of the data/docs if it wasn't done already. Secure, as in, if possible move it all to another location. Keep the location only with trusted few. Simple rule of thumb when it comes to knowing to who to trust and who not to trust is this: Who do you know RIGHT NOW, right at this very second, that you could give your keys to your house for 3 weeks and KNOW everything will be in the same place as you left it? THAT'S trust!
2a). As everything is recorded/scanned/encrypted, it goes to the 'other' location.

Since I don't live too far away, I sent Mr. Davenport an email to see if he was looking for volunteers. My husband and I would love to help him out. So we will see what he says.

I could post him a scanner if need be...