UFO Attacks on Washington D.C

(Due to the time period this happened I am not using UAP, I am using UFO)

In 1947 President Harry Truman, in front of a press conference was asked if he had ever seen any flying saucers, his response was “only in the newspapers”. In 1952 he was not planning to run for another term, probably down to low approval ratings, the Cold War, The Korean War and the 1945 bombings of Japan.  In 1952 he was president for a second term when this happened!

19^th July 1952, Washington National Airport, and Ed Nugent (air traffic controller) spotted seven lights on the screen in front of him. There were no planes scheduled, and he called his manager, Harry Barnes, “flying saucers”. In the tower another controller saw it blip, it was a bright light, and it was hovering, then it took off a high-speed using impossible angles to manoeuvre.  Harry Barnes also saw the lights were moving over the city, and a pilot waiting to take off reported seeing a strange light.

In 1947 President Harry Truman, in front of a press conference was asked if he had ever seen any flying saucers, his response was “only in the newspapers”. In 1952 he was not planning to run for another term, probably down to low approval ratings, the Cold War, The Korean War and the 1945 bombings of Japan.  In 1952 he was president for a second term when this happened!

19^th July 1952, Washington National Airport, and Ed Nugent (air traffic controller) spotted seven lights on the screen in front of him. There were no planes scheduled, and he called his manager, Harry Barnes, “flying saucers”. In the tower another controller saw it blip, it was a bright light, and it was hovering, then it took off a high-speed using impossible angles to manoeuvre.  Harry Barnes also saw the lights were moving over the city, and a pilot waiting to take off reported seeing a strange light.

Harry Barnes called Andrews Air Force base, 10 miles way who said that they had seen nothing. They then called back a short while later to confirm that they had in fact seen lights. They had moved over the city, the Whitehouse and in response two USA Air Force F-94 jets from New York Castle Air Force Base, Delaware were deployed. The reports of lights ended soon after, the last detected lights on the radar were at 05.30.

26^th July at 20:15 that night an air stewardess reported she had seen lights above her plane on a flight into Washington, before that at Andrews Air Base they had seen more of them, and some were travelling at 7,000 miles an hour!

This was all great news for the press, hot sales, and all but probably not good for the top brass handling the situation. The CIA formed a special intelligence department for the subject, and Edward Tauss reported for the group that most of the sightings could be explained. He did however recommend the agency continue to monitor the situation.

29^th July and there were not more reported sightings, the Air Force called a press conference. Air Force Major-General John Samford and Roger Ramsey stated that the visual sightings could be attributed to meteors an shooting stars, that the radar had something called temperature inversion and this was present on both evenings. Captain Ruppelt also spoke of an incident in Japan in 1950, that was put down to a flock of ducks…

So what do you think happened? I find this interesting for sure!

https://youtu.be/OKNkF34KLCk?si=a0pnmP5rFOyzIpEQ

Sources:

Wikipedia

The report on Unidentified Flying Objects – Edward J Ruppert

US Project Blue Book, UFO Investigation (Press minutes)

National Archives Museum (museum.archives.org)

Federation of American Scientists

The New York Times

BBC.com

PBS.org

The Yorktown Memorial Hospital

So Happy New Year to those celebrating. And I just found this in my drafts from 2015. Wow.. so I thought a little tea break read before the party starts would be good.

I hope you like it.

The Yorktown Memorial Hospital is in Texas, USA and has been put on the haunted list for Texas. The caretakers’ reports are cited the most so I am going to go with those for the purposes of this blog.

The caretaker is there for the basic care and maintenance and says that he thinks there are spirits that roam the corridors and various rooms.

The building was used for rehabilitation centre for people that had suffered abuse for drugs and alcohol. It was built in 1950 and closed thirty years later in the 80’s. Mike Hanson is the caretaker and told reporters that he knows there are ghosts there, for a fact, and has explained he has seen a number of objects moving and experienced a full body apparition of a male standing outside the chapel He has also seen glowing red eyes on more than one occasion.

In the nurses station if the lights are on it all seems quite nice and calm but turn the lights off and that changes, he observes people walking around and that many appear to be walking around like normal guests. There are some though that look like they should be in the hospital and there is a blocked off area that has a pane of glass, despite no one getting access to the are there are sounds like rapping and tapping on the pane.

Central Texas Ghost Hunters went in to the place to research the claims and the team is headed up by a woman that worked as a freelance writer, Brandy Runyan, who has made up a professional team that try to take a scientific approach. They took audio recording equipment and caught the sound of organ music whilst in the chapel area.

All in all, sounds like an interesting place to visit and I believe you can contact the hospital if you are interested in conducting your own investigations.

The Haunted Yorktown Memorial Hospital

https://www.facebook.com/yorktownhospital/

Draugar

In Old Norse they are an undead creature, the Old Norse meaning of the word is revenant. The creatures live in their graves, often guarding the treasure that was buried with them. They are not like ghosts, they have a physical body and abilities that they would have carried in life. There is a clear distinction for those that live in the sea or land as either Sea-draguar or landdraugar.

They possess superhuman strength and can, at will, increase their size. They bring with them the unmistakeable stench of death and they will look swollen, blackened and are generally revolting to look at. In mythology they also keep some semblance of their intelligence, perhaps to ensure they can do their best at guarding their treasure or optimise how they wreak havoc on the living, namely taking revenge on those that have wronged them in life.

According to folklore these beings have a variety of ways to despatch of their victims too, so they can crush them with their enlarged forms, devour the flesh or perhaps swallow them whole when they are large. Some will kill them via driving them mad or maybe even drink the victim’s blood.

They prefer to be active at night but are not restricted like many other revenant styles, but some are immune to weapons and only a hero with the right sort can take them down. Final despatch appears to be preferred by beheading the creature, burning it and then finally dumping the ashes in the sea.

After a person has died the most common indication they will become one is that the corpse is not in a horizontal position, it may be found sat upright indicating that they want to come back. Mean or nasty people are most likely to become one and those who have unfinished business, someone so evil they have a serious impact on those around them.

Preventions include grave binding, a stone with an inscription that will keep them in place or an open pair of iron scissors over the chest of the corpse. Some have tied big toes together, or driven needles through the soles to stop them being able to walk. The coffin should be rotated at least three times when carried to confuse their sense of direction. An effective method is also called the Corpse Door, a special door was built and the corpse carried through feet first, it was surrounded by people to stop it seeing where it was going. The door was then bricked up to prevent any return.

A variation to the creature is also the Haugbui, a mound dwelling creature, where the dead body lives on within its tomb. It cannot leave its burial place but those that enter are free game. The haugbui is usually found in the Norse saga’s and said to swim alongside boats to sail and pick off the men as the boats are semi-submerged.

The barrow-wights in Middle-Earth are based on the legend; they linger around their gold after death.

They are featured in the game The Elder Scrolls V, they are usually those from someone who is of legend and speak in an ancient dragon language.

You can find ‘Draug’ in the game The Secret World, they wander ashore in the fictional Solomon Island, New England.

For World of Warcraft players you can find the Vrykul Race around Northrend, they are heavily influenced by the draugr, and there are two sorts commonly seen. You can spot undead vargul or their blueskinned warriors.

Dr John R Drish House

The house is now more simply known as Drish House and is located in Tuscaloosa. Alabama, USA. The building is on the National Register of Historic places and was first recorded by the Historic American Buildings Society in 1934. The building was started in the centre of a 450 acre plantation, by this point Drish was widowed and had married Sarah Owen McKinney in 1835. The marriage shows up on ancestry.com under All Alabama, Marriage Index, 1800-1969. The couple are listed under the Tuscaloosa area.

The home original incarnation was was attributed to the influence of architect William Nichols, the home’s plasterwork was largely completed by skilled slave artisans, like most of the plasterwork in the area of that period. The house was extensively remodelled in the Italianate-style prior to the American Civil War, mixing it with its Greek Revival Style too.

John Drish died in 1867, he had reportedly died from a fall down a stairway, I found reference to his death as complications from the fall, Richard Southall (Haunted Plantations of the South) and says that viewing and the funeral took place in the home. There is another part to this saying that Sarah lit candles in his honour and kept them alight whilst he lay in state, after the funeral she then extinguished them with an order that they should be lit again when she died.

Www.nps.gov has a featured article on the place and says the building was known as Monroe Place, it was also a working farm and he was a very wealthy man. He is recorded on the document about the property as having been a drunkard and a gambler. Drish seemingly drowned his sorrows and diminished his wife’s wealth by poor management and further alcoholism. It’s worth noting there seems to be no actual evidence of his drinking problems and the full record of his death.

It is anecdotal perhaps from Robert Little, it is recorded by him that he had been suffering from some form of delirium and leapt from his bed, several of the slaves (please note this is from the articles I read, and I am not sugar-coating language) there attempted to hold him down. He escaped and rushed down the stairs, ‘uttered a terrible cry and fell dead midway down’. He had made his will 13^th July, 1867, a few weeks before his death. It seems he may already have known about his serious health issues and limited time left; he had penned it before dying at the very least.

After his death it was found that he did not have the money to pay the claims against the estate, his extensive real estate had to be sold and even the house was sold from under Sarah, but the wording of his will meant she was the “dower” and allowed to live at the estate until her death.

She had lived a wealthy life and for the last 15 years of it lived in genteel poverty with her clothing, furniture, china and silver. Her step-daughter, Catherine Drish King, lived with her until at least the 1870 consensus. Eventually Catherine moved out and Sarah died in 1884.

The contents of her home were sold at public auction, it seems that she had made no will out. It also meant that the family had no knowledge for her funerary wishes. Again this is anecdotal but they missed the previous request about the candles from the details I could find online. Once she had been buried the mansion lay empty for several years, the owner – Ezekiel Abner Powell – sold the property soon after her death and it was sold to the Tuscaloosa Coal, Iron and Land Company.

One of the founding members of the company purchased it as a family home, from there on it passed hands several times. The house was used as a school from 1906 until 1925, Jennison School. It was then a parts warehouse for a wrecking company. 1940 saw it purchased by the Southside Baptist Church, it remained with them and threatened demolition in 1994 and then released to the Heritage Commission of Tuscaloosa County.

In 2012 it may have finally got its future secured, in 2016 the renovations finished opening its doors for weddings and various events.

The sites ghost stories and hauntings are featured in ’13 Alabama Ghosts and Jeffrey’ and in the short story ‘Death Lights in the Tower’. The short story talks about a family moving into the home and experiencing supernatural events. Wikipedia and the events history section show a summary of people seeing third-storey tower on fire when there is not one present and ghostly lights from the house in general.

The tower fire may have its roots from the fact it did set alight a few months after Sarah’s death. There was no one living in the mansion at the time. The neighbours reported the fire as the light was so bright it was seen from several miles away. The fire brigade went out to find no sign of fire and no damage suggesting there had been one. Over the next few years, the reports came in a few times and upon arrival there was the same result.

The stories of fake fires then became known, and people would pass by regularly, the story of fire was then replaced with the sighting of Sarah Drish at the front of the mansion or from the third-floor window of the tower. The closure of the school in 1935 evolved the story further, there were more reports of lights, candle-lights were said to appear, and the suggestion is that it is Sarah’s candles lit for her husband.

Summary – I found no date to support the haunting data or some of the facts around the requests about funerary arrangements. “In 2008 – paranormal investigators were able to go inside and look for any signs of a haunting. The investigators were able to capture a few abnormalities, enough to satisfy the claims.” There seemed to be no linked evidence or anything about how the claim was satisfied. I think unless more comes to light I cannot give any conclusion.

Trans-Allegheny Lunatic Asylum

This fantastic building was listed in 1990 as a National Historic Landmark, formerly known as Weston State Hospital. It operated from 1864 until 1994 and was built on the fairly-well known Kirkbride plan.

Construction began in 1858 and the local newspapers reported “seven convict negroes” were amongst the first arrivals to work on the project. When the American Civil War broke out construction was stalled. Eventually the project came to fruition and the first patients were admitted October 1864, construction then continued until 1881.

In the period it was constructed it is worth noting that, sadly, black people were still segregated and in 1873 they build separate rooms for black patients. It was supposed to be another self-sufficient venture with a farm, dairy, waterworks, cemetery and gas as well.

It started with an ideal for 250 patients but by 1880 there were 717 and at its peak in the 1950’s there were 2,600 people crowded into the building. In 1935 a fire was started by a patient and a wing was rebuilt, clearly the place was struggling on many levels.

The population had declined by the 1980’s but it was discovered that those who could not be controlled were locked in cages. The Trans-Allegheny Lunatic Asylum is now closed and used as a tourist attraction. The new owners offer historical tours and paranormal tours, it is popular in part due to the many rumours of hauntings there. TAPS, Ghost Adventures and other popular shows have filmed and investigated there.

So what are the paranormal reports? On the first floor many have reported being pushed, hearing sounds and people say they have encountered the ghost of ‘Ruth’ on the hallways, though I have no idea who Ruth is/was.

On the second floor in Ward Two people have encountered shadowy figures, near the area a man was stabbed 17 times and died; nearby two patients committed suicide via curtain poles and some EVP’s captured have clear enough warnings of ‘Get Out’.

The third floor has nurses quarters and some say they have been nurses walking the halls. There were violent female patients there on the floor and some report the sounds of their disembodied voices. Adding to the accounts was that some believe, and report to have experienced, a man named Dean who haunts where he murdered a nurse, Elizabeth, and in another nearby hall that they have caught EVP’s of someone called Big Jim too.

On the fourth floor Ward R is reportedly the creepiest and where the ghost of Lily can be contacted. There was a report of a black dog there but this makes very little sense to me. Supposedly there is another ghost known as the ‘creeper’ because it crawls and slinks around. – ghostresearch.org