Book Description

Max Miller edited a UFO magazine, "Saucers," in the 1950s. Flying Saucers was released in 1957 in a magazine format. It has many photographs and is very well written in a balanced manner. Miller held memberships in the British Planetary Society, the Association of Lunar and Planetary Observers, the Meteoritical Society, Civilian Saucer Intelligence of New Zealand, and the American Rocket Society. Chapter 1: Flying Saucer History - a succinct summary of pre-1947 UFO reports, drawing partly on research into vimanas by Desmond Leslie and Harold Wilkins. Chapter 2: World Opinion - investigates Project Blue Book. Miller states how he attempted to discover its then current statues and how many reports it was receiving, and of how he got no answers. Chapter 3: Space Travel and the UFO - Project Magnet, Project Vanguard, Einstein's Unified Field Theory and gravity research are covered, and there is discussion of the research of Morris Jessup, Aime Michel, Leonard Cramp, and T. Townsend Brown, plus William Lear's arguments on why UFOs exist. Chapter 4: Space Communication and Detection - covers findings of Francis Galton, Tesla, Marconi, and John Otto, who attempted space communication on air on the radio in October 1955. Wilbert Smith provides a lengthy statement on how and why Project Magnet went underground. Chapter 5: Mars, The Mystery Planet - investigates the findings from the likes of John O' Neill, Gerard Kuiper, and Robert Richardson concerning strange things seen on or over Mars. Chapter 6: The Worldwide Enigma - mention is made here of Leonard Stringfield's research, plus a detailed account of a sighting over White Sands in 1949, Operation Mainbrace sightings, British astronomer H. Percy Wilkins' sighting, the 1953 incident where a UFO reportedly damaged a sign board, and angel hair. Chapter 7: Contactee Stories - the 1950s was the era of the contactees, and some of these, such as Truman Bethurum, are discussed. Chapter 8: New Light on the UFO - key points of Edward Ruppelt's "The Report On Unidentified Flying Objects" are discussed. Also included is the report on how U.S. Navy pilots were ordered to "shoot to kill" if UFOs were encountered, in July 1956. There is more on Project Vanguard, a project to send twenty satellites into space to study UFOs, in response to Earth reportedly being under constant surveillance. Chapter 9: The Problems Today - correspondence between Donald Keyhoe and Air Force Major General Joe Kelly is included, in which topics such as Blue Book Report 14 and regulations to prevent public disclosures of UFO incidents. An indispensable publication for anyone wishing to research UFOs.