Donald E. Keyhoe

Donald Edward Keyhoe ( June 20, 1897 - November 29, 1988 ) was an American Marine Corps member (major), author of a number of aviation articles and stories in a variety of leading magazines, and manager of pioneer flights across the Atlantic - especially by Charles Lindbergh . He also made a name for himself as a UFO researcher. Jerome Clark writes that Keyhoe was considered by many to be a leader in the field of UFO research in the late 1950s and 1960s.

Training, job

Keyhoe grew up in Ottumwa , Iowa . He attended the Navy's Preparatory Academy, graduated in 1919 with a Bachelor of Science degree and shortly thereafter became a lieutenant in the Marine Corps. In 1922 his arm was injured in an airplane accident in Guam , and he began to write during the long recovery period. He returned to active duty, but since the injury bothered him constantly, he gave 1,923 military service and worked in the surveying department of the US Department of Commerce .

In 1927, Keyhoe organized a famous air tour by Charles Lindbergh. This led to Keyhoe's first book Flying With Lindbergh , published in 1928 . The book quickly caused a sensation and led to Keyhoe's career as a freelance writer. He wrote a variety of articles and stories - most of them aviation-related - in a large number of leading publications.

During the Second World War Keyhoe returned to active military service. He was promoted to major and served in the Navy's flight training department.

First UFO book in history: "Flying Saucers Are Real"

After the famous Kenneth Arnold sighting of nine strange, speeding objects in flight on June 24, 1947 and the beginning of public interest in the "flying saucers", Keyhoe followed the matter from a skeptical perspective. In May 1950 - after the US Air Force had issued contradicting statements (on the one hand: serious matter; on the other: confusion, hysteria, juxe), the publisher of the popular American magazine True , Ken Purdy, turned to Keyhoe and pleaded him to let his ties run wild in Washington and try to find out more about the matter.

After Keyhoe researched, he writes that he could no longer avoid seeing the flying saucers as real. Since the shape, maneuvers, speed and lighting of the saucers eclipsed any known terrestrial technology, he came to believe that they must be of extraterrestrial origin and that the government was trying to cover up the full truth about them. This conclusion was based primarily on the fact that Keyhoe was told by members of the Pentagon that there was nothing in the matter, but at the same time he was denied access to the documents.

In the January 1950 issue of True magazine , Keyhoe's article The Flying Saucers Exist and attracted widespread public interest. Edward Ruppelt reported that "there were rumors among magazine publishers that Donald Keyhoe's article in True was one of the most widely read and discussed magazine articles in history."

A little later, Keyhoe brought out the expanded article in book form, The Flying Saucers are Real (New York 1950). A revised edition was also published in German in 1954, Der Weltraum moves closer to us (original title Flying Saucers from outer Space ). In that book, he argued that the Air Force knew the flying saucers were "interplanetary," but downplayed it to prevent panic. The book was a bestseller and sold more than half a million times.

Director of NICAP

In early 1957, Keyhoe was offered the directorate of the UFO organization NICAP ( National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena ), and he accepted. The various UFO books that he published during his time as NICAP director contributed significantly to the widespread reputation of this organization. Keyhoe headed it until December 1969, when he was forced to resign on the grounds of financial mismanagement and authoritarian behavior. The restructuring measures immediately initiated by his successors, which led to a drastic decline in NICAP's importance and influence, aroused the suspicion among many that NICAP had been infiltrated in order to destroy the organization and deprive Keyhoe of his instrument of influence over the public and the Pentagon .

Later life and death

In 1973 Keyhoe wrote his last book on UFOs, Aliens From Space . It proposed a large-scale operation designed to incite the aliens to land on an airfield in order to make peaceful contact with them. It also described its difficulties in obtaining information from government agencies.

Keyhoe's contact with UFO researchers dwindled more and more. Now and then he still gave lectures at UFO conferences. In 1981 he joined the board of the UFO organization MUFON , but his membership only existed on paper because his health had deteriorated. Keyhoe died in 1988 at the age of 91. He was on the Green Hill Cemetery in Luray ( Virginia buried).

Publications by Donald E. Keyhoe

• Flying with Lindbergh, 2003 (reprint), Kessinger Publishing, ISBN 0-7661-4294-9
• The Flying Saucers Are Real (New York, Fawcett, 1950), 2006 (reprint), Cosimo Classics, ISBN 1-59605-877-3 (read online)
• Space is moving closer to us, Berlin, Blanvalet Verlag , 1954, original title Flying Saucers from Outer Space (1953), Henry Holt and Company, New York
• The Flying Saucer Conspiracy, 1955, Henry Holt and Company, NY
• Flying Saucers: Top Secret, 1960, GP Putnam & Sons
• Aliens from Space: The Real Story of Unidentified Flying Objects, 1973, Signet Press

References

1. ^ Jerome Clark , The UFO Book: Encyclopedia of the Extraterrestrial . Visible Ink, 1998, ISBN 1-57859-029-9 .
2. ^ Edward J. Ruppelt , The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects . Victor Gollancz Ltd, London 1956.
3. ^ Ann Druffel , Firestorm - James McDonald's Fight for UFO Science . Wild Flower Press, Columbus 2003, p. 467 ff.
4. ↑ Charles William Bahme: PennWell Books (ed.): Fire Officer's Guide to Disaster Control , 1992, ISBN 0912212268 , pp 463. .

literature

• Jerome Clark : The UFO Book: Encyclopedia of the Extraterrestrial . Visible Ink, 1998, ISBN 1-57859-029-9
• Ann Druffel : Firestorm: Dr. James E. McDonald's Fight for UFO Science . Wild Flower Press, 2003, ISBN 0-926524-58-5