Håkan Blomqvist´s blog

Now and then I am asked, both as a professional librarian and AFU co-worker, to suggest interesting UFO titles suitable for beginners who wish to acquaint themselves with the subject. This is no easy undertaking considering the enormous amount of UFO books published since the 1950s. Naturally I recommend a few Swedish titles but usually I am asked what I personally regard as the best international works in the genre and then always one name comes up – Jacques Vallee. He is a combination of intellectual outsider, iconoclast and heretic among the heretics. I don´t agree with all his views but he makes you think, challenging old theories and ufological dogmas.

Jacques Vallee in the 1960s

Jacques Vallee was also the foremost ideological inspiration when Anders Liljegren, Kjell Jonsson and I founded AFU in 1973. We quoted from Passport To Magonia in the first published information sheet from our group. Besides his many books there are several interviews found on the Internet that can be studied by readers with a serious and scholarly mind. Some of these are referenced on the Wikipedia site. More information can also be found at his personal website.

Vallee can be described as a heretic of the third degree. He is a heretic in the eyes of mainstream science because of his serious interest in phenomena regarded as fantasy and irrational nonsense by most academics and skeptics. He is also in many respects a heretic in the ufological community because of his critical views on the extraterrestrial hypothesis, formulated e.g. in Dimensions. A Casebook of Alien Contact: "... I believe that the UFO phenomenon represents evidence for other dimensions beyond spacetime; the UFOs may not come from ordinary space, but from a multiverse which is all around us, and of which we have stubbornly refused to consider the disturbing reality in spite of the evidence aviable to us for centuries. Such a theory is required in order to explain both the modern cases and the cronicles of Magonia - the abductions and the psychic component." (p. 284).

But Jacques Vallee is also a heretic in a deeper and more philosophical sense because of his lifelong interest in Hermetic and esoteric traditions, an interest he shared with his friend and UFO research collegue astronomer Dr. Allen Hynek (1910-1986). This may come as a surprise to many mainstream or traditional ufologists, especially as Vallee and Hynek are regarded as two of the foremost champions of scientific and critical UFO research. These philosophical interests of the duo has become more well known since the publication of Forbidden Science, Vallees`diaries in two volumes and Jeffrey J. Kripal´s Authors of the Impossible (2010). I devote one chapter in my new book Gudarna återvänder. Ufo och den esoteriska traditionento the spiritual search of Vallee and Hynek.

Parallell to his academic studies at Sorbonne and Lille, Vallee read all he could find on subjects like Hermeticism, Alchemy, magic, mysticism and esotericism. When he started he ufological career in the 1960s he continued these studies but kept them in the background. It came a quite a surprise to Vallee that his astronomer friend Allen Hynek shared his lifelong interest in Hermeticism and esoteric traditions. During a car journey in November 1966 Vallee asked Hynek if he was interested in paranormal phenomena before he embarked on a career in astronomy. Hynek revealed that he had been a devoted student of Hermetic, Rosicrucian and esoteric traditions all his life, but he never told his collegues: "They would think I´m crazy". With this background the Hynek and Vallee discussions in the classic The Edge of Reality (1975) can be seen in a different perspective. This is not just two eminent scientists examining the UFO enigma but also two erudite scholars of esoteric traditions comparing notes.

In spite of his warnings of the social consequences of irrational contactee cults in Messengers of Deception, Jacques Vallee is in his philosophy and research both the critical scientist and the searching esotericist. In the two volumes of Forbidden Science this becomes very clear. Here are two quotes:
”Has the future spiritual state of man already been achieved by some individuals? Have certain gifted men already achieved contact, on some plane, with those who may be guiding our psychic evolution?” (Forbidden Science, vol I, p. 80).
”…the history of ufology should be placed within an esoteric context. The UFO problem, the question of parapsychology, are central to this business. Looking for the solution isn´t just a scientific project; it´s a quest, an initiation, an enigma like that of the Sphinx…” (Forbidden Science, vol. II, p.211).

Something of a mystery to me is why Jacques Vallee in his studies of Hermeticism and Rosicrucians never considered the vast Theosophical literature, especially as there is a strong historical connection between Theosophy and the UFO movement. After reading the two volumes of Forbidden Science I wrote a letter to Vallee in December 2010 asking for his views. Unfortunately he never answered. But my question is still valid as I formulated it in the letter: "I was somewhat surprised though that you only mention Rosicrucians, Manly P Hall and Steiner´s Anthroposophy but not the Theosophical literature (Blavatsky, Leadbeater) and Alice Bailey who are more directly of interest when it comes to the UFO enigma. Theosophy is actually contact cases without "saucer technology"".

Reading Jacques Vallee is an intellectual adventure and his tomes are must reading for every serious ufologist. I sympathize with his conclusion stated in the foreword to Dimensions. A Casebook of Alien Contact: "They (UFOs) provide one of the most exciting challenges ever presented to science, to our collective imagination, to human reason."

Usually I don´t write much of a personal nature on this blog, basically because I find it rather boring and a waste of cyberspace to read about other peoples breakfast habits and latest shopping. But as my blog updates have been somewhat irregular lately I will make an exception and present some news from my personal universe. Recently I joined the Lonely Hearts Club Band as my lady Susanne and I have separated. But we are still good friends. Suddenly landing in the world of singles is to be a Stranger in a Strange Land, alluding to Robert Heinlein´s classic sf novel from 1961. So if there are any nice Venusian ladies out there also stranded on this weird planet…

Another man who probably always experienced himself a Stranger in a Strange Land is the magician and psychic Uri Geller. There has been much debate recently on Geller´s secret intelligence work and connections with CIA and Mossad. Especially after the release in 2013 of the BBC2 documentary The Secret Life of Uri Geller and a book with the same title by Jonathan Margolis. The documentary and book by Margolis opens up a whole new dimension to the Geller enigma. Whatever the truth behind the magic shows, Geller obviously has been involved in much more than spoon bending.

If all the fantastic events in the Margolis book are correct it could change the public image of Uri Geller and give the professional skeptics a hard time. I prefer to keep an open mind as to his psychic abilities. There are a few details in the book I find particularly interesting. As a small boy Uri had an extraordinary experience in a garden in Tel Aviv in 1949 or 1950. He is looking for a kitten in the bushes: "I felt something above me and I looked up and saw a ball of light... It was really weird, like a sphere, but nearer to me, above me. It was just hanging there, shining and strobing, then gently and silently drifted down towards the ground. Then after some moments - I don´t remember how long - something struck me. It was like a beam or a ray of light; it really hit my forehead and knocked me back into the grass." (p. 114-115).

What really happened to the young Uri in the garden? Could he have been connected or "tagged" to some outside force in the same manner as reported by several contactees and close encounter witnesses? A connection resulting in unusual psychic abilities. Uri constantly reiterates he don´t know or understand how he how his abilities work: "This is the big difference between me and many other paranormalists. They think that paranormal powers come from within you, whereas I say that´s possible, but I believe that in my case, it could just possibly be coming from outside, from a thinking entity, and that it is the entity which decides what to do. The fact is that here I am after all these years, and I am still in contact with something." (p. 202). The parapsychological researcher Andrija Puharich who wrote a biography on Geller was convinced that extraterrestrials was behind the phenomena. Later Puharich became involved with another psychic named Phyllis Schlemmer. His far out ideas and experiences were documented by Stuart Holroyd in Briefing for the Landing On Planet Earth, of which I wrote a very critical review in 1979.

It is interesting to compare Uri Geller´s ball of light with the experience of the Indonesian Pak Subuh, founder of the Subud movement: "Pak Subuh explained (in talks to Subud members given beginning in the 1940s) that during 1925 he was taking a late-night walk when he had an unexpected and unusual experience. He said he found himself enveloped in a brilliant light, and looked up to see what seemed like the sun falling directly onto his body, and he thought that he was having a heart attack." Maybe a coincidence but UFO-Sweden´s chairman 1976-1979, Thorvald (Bevan) Berthelsen, was a member of Subud. And the first chairman of the Stockholm based Ifologiska sällskapet 1957, C. A. Liljencrantz was a also active in Subud. Had they all been connected or tagged?

UFO-Sweden chairman Thorvald (Bevan) Berthelsen in 1976

When Uri Geller visited Sweden in 1974 he met several members of the then very active Föreningen för Psykobiofysik (Foundation for Psychobiophysics) who had many unusual experiences during his stay. Some of these and a discussion on Geller were documented in the journal Medium för Psykobiofysik.

One of my responsibilities at Norrköping Public Library is arranging academic lectures, inviting Swedish scholars and authors engaged in current cultural and scientific debate. On March 19 I had the pleasure of introducing Susanna Åkerman, Ph.D. historian of ideas and an expert on Hermeticism and Rosicrucianism. She is the author of Rose Cross Over the Baltic. The Spread of Rosicrucianism in Northern Europe (Brill, 1998). Susanna is librarian at the Swedenborg library, Stockholm. Her latest book, Fenixelden. Drottning Kristina som alkemist (The Phoenix Fire. Queen Christina as alchemist) was also the theme of her lecture in Norrköping.

Susanna Åkerman

The Swedish Queen Christina (1626-1689) created quite a scandal when she abdicated her throne and converted to Roman Catholicism in 1654. She spent her later years in Rome. There has been endless speculation and many theories as to her motives for the conversion. In her new book Susanna Åkerman argues that the real reason for Christinas´ conversion was her deep interest in alchemy and the hermetic tradition. She was an avid collector of esoterica and created a large library in Rome on these subjects.

Susanna Åkerman lecturing at Norrköping Public Library

Susanna Åkerman has done some groundbreaking and innovative research and presents new data on an old enigma. Surprisingly there has been no reviews of Fenixelden in Swedish media. I assume the Swedish media elite and mainstream intellectuals don´t know how to handle the rather iconoclastic theory presented by the author. To review a book like this you must be something of a scholar on esoteric traditions. When reading Fenixelden I immediately associated the ideas with the classic Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition (1964) by Frances Yates. She asserted that Giordano Bruno was burned at the stake in 1600, not because of his astronomical theories but as a result of his espousing of the Hermetic philosophy.

The last decades has seen a remarkable renaissance for the scholarly interest in esoteric traditions. The subject is not taboo among academics as it was some years ago. Susanna Åkerman´s book is an example of this growing interest and I hope the next step will be a doctoral thesis on the Theosophical movement in Sweden and its cultural influence. The Swedish King Oscar II (1829-1907) was strongly influenced by Theosophy and invited both Henry Steel Olcott and Annie Besant for audiences at the royal castle. There is a treasure trove of interesting data to be found in research on this forgotten aspect of history.

Reviewing the AFU files on Swedish humanoid cases I re-examined the Ivar Naumann report of August 25, 1958. This particular case has always fascinated me because of the unusual and very physical experience of the witness. Ivar Naumann was interviewed in 1972 by Swedish ufologists Anders Wahlström and Jan Lind, who tape-recorded the narrative. Naumann also filled in the UFO-Sweden sighting questionnaire. He was then a 56 year old musician, living in Jönköping.

In the summer of 1958 Ivar Naumann and his wife rented a small cottage at a place called Riset, close to Härja in Västergötland. A few minutes after midnight on August 25 Ivar is sitting alone in the kitchen reading a book. His wife is asleep. "I put the novel away and was about to lit the pipe when I happened to look out the window. I figure was moving towards the outhouse." Ivar assumes it must be the farmer, Oskar, who owns the cottage so he lits the pipe and continue reading. But he has a strong feeling that someone is looking at him. "I turned around and stared straight into a face, not more than 50 centimeters away. Only the window pane separated us. First I thought it was a human being. I had always believed saucers and space people pure imagination.

The figure observed by Ivar Naumann

The figure was very short, like a child of eleven or twelve. The head was covered with a helmet shining with a blue, cold light. It wore a sort of coverall emanating the same blue light. "It was too dark outside for me to notice the skin colour but it was lighter than the helmet and coverall. The eyes appeared somewhat larger than human eyes and were completely black. His gaze had an unexplained effect, it hypnotized me."

Ivar hastily put his clothes on and rush outside. The figure has jumped over a fence and is visible about 100 meters from the cottage. Now a strange chase is taking place where Ivar try to catch up with the unknown intruder. But aftr some running he suddenly finds himself standing in front of a wheat field just gazing. "About 25 meters away a craft was waiting. It was large - about twelve meters - and had the shape of a disc. I felt a peculiar smell and became tired in an unreal way."

Ivar Naumann´s drawing of the craft

The small figure advance towards the craft, climbs up a ladder and disappears inside. Immediately Ivan can hear a buzzing sound like a motor increasing in speed. The three legs under the craft are retracted and it is slowly rising in the air. By know Ivan feels paralyzed and he can´t move at all. Some trees are bending in the wind when the craft accelerates with an enourmous speed and disappears in the sky.When it is gone Ivan can move again and all that is left is a strong smell of ozone.

Back at the cottage Ivan try to tell his wife what has happened but she think he must have had an unusual dream. Next morning Ivan visit the landing site together with the farmer Oskar. They find three deep impressions in the soil with a depth of 30 centimeter and 20 centimeter i diameter. Vegetation was pressed in a circle measuring exactly 12 meters in diameter.

The landing area

This is just one of several hundreds of interesting, and so far, unexplained cases in the AFU report archive. I cannot of course vouch for the authenticity of the case but it is a good example of the type of close encounter reports in the archive I hope the new generation of field investigators will reopen and try follow up, even though many years have passed. Last Saturday UFO-Sweden chairman Anders Berglund visited AFU with this objective in mind. This time to find older reports to present at the UFO-Sweden annual meeting and expo in Östersund, Saturday May 17.

Anders Berglund at AFU studying UFO-reports

In October 1983 AFU received a large and well-preserved collection of books and magazines donated by Mr. C. O. Holmquist, Rockneby, Sweden. Among the different sets of magazine issues dating back to the 1940s were an almost complete set of Round Robin, volumes 2-34 (1946-1978). Round Robin was edited by Meade Layne, who founded Borderland Sciences Research Association (BSRA) in San Diego 1946. This publication is a unique document and a basic source of data on early UFO contactee history. I have for years been trying to find the missing early issues to make the AFU collection complete but so far no luck.

A few weeks ago I found a very informative article, Newton Meade Layne as Fortean, written by independent scholar and Fortean Joshua Blu Buhs on his blog From an Oblique Angle. Joshu also mentioned that he had found a complete set of Round Robin at the California History Room Section of California State Library. I sent an e-mail to the library requesting information about the possibility of receiving photocopies of volume 1 of Round Robin. On March 10, I was informed by Ms. Katleen Correia that volume 1 of Round Robin contains approximately 230 pages and that the library is "unable to provide such extensive photocopying." She referred to various private researchers who could provide the service for a fee. As AFU is a not very rich non-profit foundation I hope some ufologists or forteans in California could give us some help instead?

There is much interesting historical data on early UFO contactees to be found in the early issues of Round Robin. The San Diego area was something of a cradle for the UFO contact movement. And it all started on October 9, 1946 when hundreds of witnesses observered a UFO over San Diego. In the classic Flying Saucer Have Landed George Adamski present his version of what happened:
"I had never given too much thought to the idea of inter-planetary travel in man-made ships. This subject had never entered my mind until late in 1946. I, too believed the distances between planets to be too great for spanning by mechanical constructions. But during the meteoric shower on 9 October 1946 I actually saw with my naked eyes a gigantic space craft hovering high above the mountain ridge to the south of Mount Palomar, toward San Diego. Yet I did not realise at the time what I was seeing. As many of us will remember, people everywhere were asked to watch the heavens that night and count the numbers of meteors falling per minute.

This we were doing at Palomar Gardens. When, suddenly, after the most intense part of the shower was over and we were about to go indoors, we all noticed high in the sky a large black object, similar in shape to a gigantic dirigible, and apparently motionless. I noticed that no cabin compartment or external appendages were visible, but I figured that during the war some new types of aircraft had been developed and that this was one of them. My calculation was that it was up there to study the falling meteors at that high altitude, so I gave no further thought to it, except to wonder why it was so totally dark. While we were still watching, it pointed its nose upward and quickly shot up into space, leaving a fiery trail behind it which remained visible for a good five minutes.

Still thinking nothing of it, we all returned into the house and turned on the radio to a San Diego station where a newscast was being given. All of us were surprised and incredulous as we listened to the announcer say that a large cigar-shaped space ship had hovered over San Diego during the shower and that hundreds of people had seen and reported it. The description tallied with what we had seen."

Another witness to the San Diego UFO was the remarkable trance medium Mark Probert, who became an important member of the BSRA group. Meade Layne called Probert and suggested he tried to get some information from his contacts regarding the strange object. Probert received the message that the object was interdimensional (etheric) and the people on board had for years been trying to contact and wished to meet a committee of scientists at an isolated spot.

Mark Probert on the front page of Ray Palmer´s Mystic Magazine 1955

This was one of the first claims that UFOs represented aliens from another world. Obviously there was also some contact between George Adamski and the BSRA group, as reported in Round Robin, vol. 8, no. 5, Jan-Feb. 1953, p. 11). On January 3, 1953 Mark Probert and Meade Layne visited the Adamski home at Palomar Gardens and a seance was held. About a dozen people were present, among them George Hunt Williamson: "The discussion concerned the recent landing of a Disc and a brief interview between its occupant and Mr. adamski; also recent radio communication with the Disc people or Guardians."

George Adamski at Palomar Gardens

A study of the early BSRA history and the early issues of Round Robin could give many clues to the beginning of the UFO contact movement. Hopefully AFU will soon obtain a complete set of this unique publication.

The classic image of the UFO contactee is a rather naive individual claiming physical or telepathic contact with extraterrestrials and absorbed in spreading a spiritual message of peace and love, combined with dire warnings of coming cathastrophies. But there are a few rare exceptions to this rule in contactee history. One of these exceptions is the extremely complicated physical contact case of the Swedish rock blaster Richard Höglund (1913-1977) which I spent many years investigating and documented in Främlingar på vår jord. Ufokontakter i Sverige (Aliens On Earth. UFO Contacts in Sweden).A summary of this case was presented by Timothy Good in his latest book Earth - An Alien Enterprise (chapter eleven: The Overlords).

Richard Höglund was a reluctant contactee. During his first contact experience he claimed his kidneys had been healed by a group of aliens and because of that he, from the beginning, felt compelled to work for them in various international schemes. Richard travelled to their bases in Bahamas and Mexico during his active involvement with the alien group betweeen 1965-1977. But he differed from the ordinary contactee in that he was very doubtful regarding their true motives and noted that their morals were not very high. Richard was actually afraid of these aliens and didn´t always believe what they told him. "I don´t know if they are Gods or devils", he once told his friend Gösta Johansson. He didn´t dare stop working for them and towards the end of his life he told my ufologist collegue Åke Franzén to beware of this group as they were dangerous. Whatever happened to Richard Höglund circumstantial evidence clearly indicates that he was involved with some secret group, whether a spy organization, international mafia or alien earth based group.

Richard Höglund in Nassau, Bahamas

Gösta Johansson with a drawing of the first type of aliens encountered by Richard Höglund

Symbols on a metal plate given to Richard Höglund by the aliens

Another reluctant contactee is Enrique Castillo Rincón from Costa Rica. His experiences are documented in UFOs. A Great New Dawn for Humanity (1997). In the preface he states: "I am not a mystic nor a religious fanatic... Neither have I considered myself a "chosen one" to save humanity, and I detest those "contactees" who pretend to have been appointed by some divinity to carry some message to the suffering and almost disgraced human race...Over twenty years have passed and I still don´t know why I was contacted. Was it plain chance?... Why was an individual belonging to the "sandwich-class" (middle-class), such as myself, assigned such an "ungrateful" task as this one, which has meant jeers, calumnies, epithets, and nick-names against my person and my dignity?" (p.xiii-xiv)

The experiences of Enrique Castillo Rincón differs from those of Richard Höglund in that they are basically of a positive nature but Rincón is still very puzzled of what it all meant and who the aliens actually were. One of the chapters of his book is named "The Venusians - are they Venusian?". As with Höglund the contacts are very physical and involves the classic aliens among us theme. Enriques meet a businessman, Cyril Weiss, of Swiss nationality and they become friends. Later he encounters this man aboard a UFO as he actually belongs to an advanced group of extraterrestrials trying to help Earth. Enrique is given this information: "From antiquity, we have contacted other men, belonging to various cultures. We have influenced their thinking through what you call "Masters". But not only on this planet, also on others; we have contributed to their scientific, cultural and spiritual development. Besides, some of us have been "born" here, or incarnated, if you prefer, since ancient times... We do not explore your planet, because we have had bases here for thousands of years... We belong to an organization that gives assistance to the Planet, and we have always been present." (p. 59, 61, 63) Anyone acquainted the esoteric tradition as represented by H.P. Blavatsky or Alice Bailey will immediately recognize the ideas and philosophy given by the aliens. Enrique is also taken to a secret spiritual retreat in the Andes.

The organization mentioned by the aliens is working like a secret intelligence group on Earth. Enrique is given secret code keyes to be used to identify agents of the organization but also as a protection against "the opposition". Whether it is the "opposition" or a real intelligence group, in 1974 Enrique is contacted by three foreign-looking individuals offering to take him to Washington D.C., all expenses paid, for a test in "regressive hypnosis". He accepts the invitation: "Outside, two men were waiting with a luxurious, dark-coloured Cadillac. I started feeling like a star in a suspense movie." (p. 113) After this visit to Washington D.C. and interrogation Enrique has several doubts: "What were the true identities of those obscure agents who could take me and return me to Bogota, with arrangements made with a complete network of people, all so well coordinated? What were their true motivations?" (p. 119) Compare this visit with the Olden Moore case of 1957, documented by NICAP in The UFO Evidence or the rather fantastic claim of psychic Ingo Swann in his book Penetration.

Based on my experiences on contactee research in Sweden I regard it as a definite possibility that there are some form of "aliens" operating behind the scenes on this planet. To seriously consider such a "wild conspiracy theory" is perhaps not in line with mainstream scientific ufology but I am more concerned about the truth than keeping a facade of respectability. Whether this theory is valid or not can only be answered by more openminded investigation. Finally Enrique Castillo Rincón had this to say regarding his contact experiences: "It is my belief that I am the only contactee in the world who does not have a mission to accomplish.They never, I repeat, never made me responsible for such an assignment. It was I who decided at the right moment to tell the world about what had happened... I became the investigator of my own experiences and compared mine to those of other very famous and well-known contactees." (p. 133)

Today I wish to extend my heartfelt congratulations to my old friend and UFO collegue, Clas Svahn, on his 56th birthday. To a Swedish audience Clas needs no further introduction as he is wellknown as journalist on the daily Dagens Nyheter, amateur astronomer, lecturer and author of several books on UFO and Fortean phenomena and was the UFO-Sweden chairman between 1991-2013. He has for many years been the frontman and driving force in the Swedish UFO movement and his extensive knowledge of the subject coupled with professionalism and enthusiasm has changed the public image of UFO phenomena as a subject for serious inquiry.

Clas Svahn

Clas started his ufological career as a 16 year old in 1974 when he founded the local UFO-group UFO-Mariestad. He has done extensive field investigation and documentation on hundreds of UFO cases resulting in books like Mötet i gläntan (1995) - a thorough documentation of the controversial Gösta Carlsson close encounter and contact case. But he has also written books on Fortean phenomena, crop circles, conspiracy theories, strange coincidences, cults and sects.

Clas has also been a board member of AFU since 1984. His contributions to the archive has been tremendous by the many donations to AFU that he has secured from all over the world.

Clas visiting AFU in 1990

In my view one of the most important contributions Clas has made to UFO research has been the formulation of the ideological basis for serious ufology, named The Third Way Ufology: Neither sceptical denial nor uncritical belief but information and discussion based on thorough investigation and documentation. This is the only a tenable position from a scientific and logical viewpoint and also the official ideology of the national organization UFO-Sweden. In 1990 Clas was awarded Klokpriset (the Wisdom Price), by the magazine Sökaren, for his important contribution to UFO research,

Clas with the Wisdom Price

Clas as chairman of UFO-Sweden in 2009

Clas, I hope you will have a really nice birthday, celebrated by family and friends.

May the force be with you for many years to come.

Recently I discovered a very interesting article, Visions of the Impossible, published in the Chronicle of Higher Education. It was written by Jeffrey J. Kripal, professor of religious studies at Rice University, Houston, Texas. He is, in my view, one of the most fascinating religious scholars and intellectuals of today. Take a look at the very extensive collection of articles and other data on his homepage at Rice University. I first discovered the writings of Jeffrey J. Kripal when reading Authors of the Impossible. The Paranormal and the Sacred (2010). One of the few books written by an academic scholar giving a accurate and open minded presentation of the research and ideas of Charles Fort and Jacques Vallee. A sequel was Mutants & Mystics. Science Fiction, Superhero Comics and the Paranormal (2011).

Visions of the Impossible challenges the materialist and reductionist worldview so prevalent among mainstream intellectuals and academia and the taboo of taking paranormal experiences seriously or relating personal observations of an unexplained nature. Many scholars are simply afraid that serious interest in or mentioning personal paranormal experiences may damage their academic image and career. Kripal presents scathing criticism and funny remarks about the present “flatland models of human nature”: “We are constantly reminded… that we are basically walking corpses with computers on top – in effect, technological zombies, moist robots, meat puppets… We have conscious intellectuals telling us that consciousness does not really exist as such.”

The many and varied paranormal experiences, and I would add some UFO observations to the list, simply has no place in a materialist worldview. So official and mainstream science simply ignores all the reports or regard them as mere anecdotes and misidentifications. Kripal has a different view: “I suggest a way out of our present impasse: We should put these extreme narratives, these impossible stories, in the middle of our academic table. I would also like to make a wager, here and now, that once we put these currently rejected forms of knowledge on our academic table, things that were once impossible to imagine will soon become possible not only to imagine but also to think, theorize, and even test.”

Such a bold and heretic suggestion was of course met with severe criticism and many examples of invectives from the hardline sceptics and materialists. In his sequel article Embracing the Unexplained, Kripal answers some of his critics: “Somehow, in roughly the same period, I managed to be an “offense” to both materialist ideologues and fundamentalist censors. The materialists painted me as a science-bashing religionist, while the fundamentalists portrayed me as a religion-bashing pervert and reductive materialist." Further discussion of how to intellectually handle paranormal phenomena is presented in Seriously Strange. Thinking Anew About Psychical Experiences, a collection of essays edited by Sudhir Kakar and Jeffrey J. Kripal (2012). Paranormal phenomena cannot be fit into the reigning models of science or orthodox religion but instead of being brushed aside as insignificant or delusional they should be seriously studied. Kripal: "It thus cries out to be interpreted, to be theorized, to be incorporated into new forms of knowledge and human possibility."

When you like Kripal have discovered, by personal experience and extensive research, that paranormal phenomena are real and that there is a "ghost in the machine", that consciousness is more than simple brain activity you face the real challenge of trying to find a paradigm or working hypothesis that incorporates this new form of knowledge. Like myself, many researchers and scholars have found the esoteric tradition or ancient wisdom, to be the intellectually most interesting and challenging alternative worldview. In the academic world there has also been a remarkable renaissance and renewed interest in "Western Esotericism", which can now be studied at the universities in Paris, Amsterdam and Exeter. This indicates a slow but culturally significant paradigm shift from materialist reductionism to a new science of the multiverse.

The fascinating iconoclast journalist and fortean John Keel came to the same conclusion after a lifetime of investigating unexplained phenomena. In his last book The Eighth Tower (1975) he concluded: "Today many scientific disciplines are moving in the same direction, not realizing they are mapping a very old country. In a few years, perhaps even in our own lifetime, all sciences will suddenly converge at a single point, and the mysteries of the superspectrum will unravel in our hands. We will finally understand - truly understand - the forces that have directed our destinies throughout history." (p. 216)

Basically the esoteric tradition says that we live in a multiverse, inhabited by many, by present day science, unknown forms of life. And if there is a multiverse there must of necessity be a "science of the multiverse", as exact as any academic discipline. The challenging corollary to this idea is that then there must somewhere exist "scientists of the multiverse". It is this idea that has been made into something of a travesty by many cults and sects. But suppose that behind all the nonsensical popular occultism there really are a group of adept scientists of the multiverse. This is indicated in the more academic presentations of the esoteric tradition by authors like Alice Bailey and Henry T. Laurency. Bailey gives this illustration: "They will stand forth as living examples of goodwill, of true love, of intelligent applied wisdom, of high good nature and humour, and of normalcy. They may indeed be so normal that recognition of what they are may escape notice." (Bailey, The Externalisation of the Hierarchy, p. 699).

Serious interest in the esoteric tradition is growing, both among academic scholars and the public. I notice this at my daily work as librarian at Norrköping Public Library. So last week I wrote a short article on esotericism for the library homepage and built a small exhibition of books relating to this theme. The cultural elite will probably regard the ideas as heretic. And so they are and have always been - a challenge to both materialist science and orthodox religion.

There is a steady stream of visitors to AFU, representatives from various groups and organizations, librarians and achivists, university students, ufologists from Sweden and other countries and people interested in different aspects of the paranormal. Yesterday I booked an AFU presentation for the very active local spiritualist and new age group Norrljus. They visited AFU in 2010 but many new members have joined interested in UFO and paranormal so a renewed visit was decided.

Member of the Norrljus society visiting AFU June 1, 2010

The present treasurer, Eva Dahlquist, also had some sad and alarming news to share. Norrljus are forced to leave their premises in Norrköping because the rent has suddenly been more than dubbled. As a small and nonprofit society their economic resources are of course very limited. But that is of no interest to the robber barons who are the property owners. Isn´t neoliberalist capitalism wonderful! Norrljus will now be shut down in its present form and they will try a restart with new name and different premises this autumn.

Former chairman of Norrljus Rose-Marie Lundbäck

The fate of Norrljus made me very mindful of the shaky situation we at AFU are living with on a daily basis. A more than doubled rent for our ten premises would be a disaster. There is really only one solution to this dilemma: we need more sponsors making small but regular economic contributions, by month or year. We now have around thirtyfive sponsors donating 50 SEK or more each month. If we could find one hundred more sponsors around the world contributing 100+ SEK each month AFU would be on the safe side. It´s not the really large donations that matter (although of course wellcome) but the small and regular contributions. If you wish to support AFU and keep the worlds largest UFO and Fortean archive/library going and developing visit our Your Sponsorship site.

Another way to support AFU is buying surplus books and magazines from the AFU Shop. There you will find hundreds of rare items for sale.

Our ambition is to continue make AFU a world heritage for material of UFO, Fortean and paranormal phenomena. Although more and more books, magazines and other data are being digitized and is aviable on the internet we believe it is important that somewhere in the world there is a repository where the original physical documents can be found. I hope that many of our friends out there around the globe can help us make this dream come true.

Between 1979-1985 I corresponded with Riley Crabb, director of Borderland Sciences Research Foundation (BSRF) and editor of The Journal of Borderland Research 1959-1985. Riley became sort of a mentor in my research and study of UFOs, paranormal phenomena, Theosophy and the many offshoots of the esoteric tradition. We didn´t always agree but I valued his extensive knowledge and experience in many borderland areas and he sometimes printed my articles in his always interesting and controversial journal. I was very surprised when I learned that in 1986 there were only 450 subscribers worldwide to the BSRF journal. At that time we hade around 3000 subscribers to UFO-Aktuellt, published by UFO-Sweden.

Riley Crabb 1913-1994

There was one domain where Riley and I definitely clashed in opinions, the writings and theories of John Keel and Jacques Vallee. As a young ufologist in the 1970s I was deeply inspired by Keel and Vallee and could never really understand why Riley Crabb didn´t appreciate the merits of these authors and constantly criticized their writings in the BSRF journal. In a letter to me March 23, 1980 he writes: "John Keel has been discussed at length in the Journal in the past. He is a wilderness crying for a voice, and I´ve told him so. His writings, like those of Jacques Vallee, leave one hopeless. Their general conclusion is that the Flying Saucer phenomenon is beyond understanding; it´s the creation of malevolent forces here on the earth; there´s nothing we can do about it... There is no inspirational lift from Keel and Vallee, and there can´t be because the two men aren´t even metaphysical kindergartners, they are metaphysical illiterates."

This in my view was a very onesided view of the groundbreaking research and writings of Keel and Vallee. How come that an esotericist like Riley Crabb couldn´t see that these authors expanded our horizon and looked beyond the materialist/reductionist interpretation of the UFO phenomenon? True, non of them were esotericists in the Theosophical tradition but at least Vallee was well versed in Hermeticism and other esoteric traditions. Neither was Keel the metaphysical illiterate portrayed by Crabb, something I mentioned in a recent blog. We never resolved this issue and after much discussion Riley Crabb gave up and wrote in a undated letter 1981: "But if you find comfort and inspiration in the writings and conclusions of these two men, by all means stay with them."

Riley Crabb became interested in borderland sciences when in 1934 he discovered the large library in the Theosophical Society in Minneapolis. Together with his wife Judy he lived thirteen years in Hawaii and was for three years president of the Honolulu Lodge of the Theosophical Society. During his stay in Hawaii he also studied pagan magic at first hand from native kahunas. Mr. and Mrs. Crabb moved to California in 1957 where Riley worked as a visual information specialist for the U.S. Navy´s Pacific Missile Range, Pt. Mugu, California. Having been a member of Meade Layne´s BSRA since 1951 he decided in 1959 to give up his job and took over as director of BSRA, later Borderland Sciences Research Foundation (BSRF). A position he held until 1985.

I´ve always admired his ambition and motto presented in the first editorial July-August 1959 under the headline, About the New Editor: "Since coming to the mainland my lectures have been concerned with the problem of relating Flying Saucer data, and phenomena, to the teachings of the Mystery Schools. I believe you´ll agree this is no easy task. If I have one goal in life it is un uncompromising search for Truth, whatever that might be, and wherever it may lead."

The Journal of Borderland Research is a treasure trove of unusual data and theories. Riley Crabb always presented interesting and challenging views on many subjects. Maybe he was a little too naive or open minded when accepting channeled information from various sources but he still printed (may-June 1981) my very critical review of Briefing For the Landing on Planet Earth, by Stuart Holroyd. More and more I have come to appreciate his political leftwing comments in the journal. Comments he often received harsh criticism for. But he was very well aware of the dangers from the ever growing Corporatocracy and would have loved Confessions of an Economic Hit Man by John Perkins. A book that should be studied by all people interested in world politics and economic history.

For many years Riley Crabb tried to awaken leading theosophists to the importance of the UFO phenomenon, without much success. Looking back on these efforts in a letter to Flying Saucer Review editor Gordon Creighton on August 5, 1990 he wrote: "It is now obvious to me that one of my major reasons for being here in New Zealand is to try to awaken the leaders of the Theosophical Lodges to the realities of other inhabited planets and of advanced beings from them, quoting their own earliest literature... when I quoted the early literature on space travel to Joy Mills, one of the leading American Theosophists at Krotona, Ojai, California, she replied that the references were "allegorical", hah!! She also quoted Jung on UFOs in his book, that the space craft were images in the race mind".

Riley´s wife Judy died on July 12, 1985. It is heartbreaking to read his last letter to me April 6, 1985 where he gives a very realistic picture of all the daily practical problem he is confronted with while nursing his dying wife. But life soon changed to the better. Riley Crabb moved to New Zealand after his wife´s death where he found a new love and married Phyllis Hall. They continued theosophical and borderland work together and he also published some booklets from NZ, like Theosophy on the Space Age. He died in 1994.

The following case came to my attention in October 1996 when I received the original document from Christian Fester, M.D. His wife was Siw Fester, who experienced an extraordinary close encounter and landing case on August 21, 1983, which I mentioned in an earlier blog entry. Christian Fester lectured on his wife´s UFO encounter to Norrköpings UFO-förening on October 14, 1996.

Christian Fester during a interview in 1996

Christian and Siw Fester had received the written document in 1988. They were sent by Erich Svensson, brother of the witness Arne Svensson. In 1996 I contacted Erich Svensson to gather some more data on the case. Unfortunately I didn´t at the time pursue the documentation any further but I regard the case of special interest as it happened in 1943, before the UFO era. The original witness died in the beginning of the 1990s.

In a phone conversation October 20, 1996 Erich Svensson related the following details regarding his brother. Arne documented his experiences in a manuscript written shortly after it had happened. He kept the manuscript hidden in a secret place in a drawer as he didn´t want to be laughed at during his lifetime. In the 1970s Arne finally revealed the secret to his brother, tears streaming when he told of the incident that had affected him so deeply. "You can thank God it didn´t happen to you", he told Erich. Arne was a big och physically strong man born in 1913. He worked as a clerk at a paper mill in Örebro, Sweden. This was his only UFO experience.

Copy of the original Arne Svensson document

During the Second World War Arne Svensson was stationed at the Swedish-Norwegian border between 1941-1944. He was attached to the I 3 military unit of Örebro with regular guard duty at the border between Sweden and Norway at a place named Röjdåfors, about 40 Swedish kilometers north of Torsby, in the province Värmland. The incident occured sometimes in August 1943.

Arne begins his guard duty att 10 P.M. The former guard report that all is quiet. "Standing at the post I become aware of a faint sound that I couldn´t identify. It encreased very fast in strength, the tone becoming unbearably strong. I put the rifle towards a rock and put my fingers in the ears. Suddenly I notice a dark object in the sky, looking like two saucers put together. It is coming right towards me very fast, emitting what looks like intensive welding flames. The craft stops in midair and I notice small windows around the central part, emitting a bluewhite light. The bottom of the craft opens up and a small round object comes out sinking towards the ground. Flames are emitted from a central belt on this object, like som form of steering mechanism."

Original drawing of the craft by Arne Svensson

Arne is blinded by the strong light. His eyes feel like there is gravel beneath the eyelids. With tears running, fear and terror engulf him. He tries to shout, with no success, neither can he telephone his military unit or run. Arne cannot move and he feels nauseated and dizzy. There is a smell like sulphur in the air. "I feel an intensive pain in my left arm and behind the tears I notice that the bracelet is emitting a strong light. I succeed in yanking off the wristwatch. There is a faint light, a strong swishing sound and all becomes peaceful. Time and space disappear. I can hear the next guard like a voice far away: "Go home and go to bed. You are not well"".

Arne gets a sick leave for three days. His doctor cannot find anything wrong with his condition except a few small burns around his left arm and the middle finger on the right arm. Arne goes back to the place where it happened and finds the rifle loaded standing towards a tree. But he has a hard time getting the cartridge from the rifle because part of it is covered with small dots like welding sparks. Eventually he also locates his missing wristwatch. It had stopped at 10.13 P.M and the watch-case is also covered with what looks like welding sparks. The bracelet is totally black. Later a watchmaker complains: "What the hell have you done with this watch. It is welded inside and there is nothing I can do." Unfortunately this wristwatch is gone, according to Erich Svensson.

For several days Arne scrutized the place where he had been that fateful night. About 500 meters from the command post all vegetation was burned in a square of 30 x 30 meters. There was also the same smell of sulphur at this place, though somewhat weaker.

Arne Svensson concludes his written document with these words: "I have seen German and Swedish airplanes and in the 1920s I saw the dirigible Italia. There is nothing in shape or speed that can be compared with this unknown.
Are we observered from somewhere else?
Do we have visitors from other planets?
You who is now reading this will maybe dismiss all with a smile and say phantasy.
Maybe you have the answer, which I am convinced will come in the future.
Today we are sitting in a tent in the woods of Värmland listening to news about the Germans from a small box (radio) placed in the straw.
What will happen in the unknown future. I have tried to describe an experience that has convinced me that we have visitors from somewhere else, in spite of what scholars say."

In his letter to me in 1996 Erich Svensson comments that his brother was a down to earth man and very trustworthy. He is convinced that the document is an honest description of what actually happened. What I do find somewhat extraordinary is that Arne is convinced already in 1943 that this was an interplanetary craft instead of some secret German airplane. This mystery will remain as both Arne and his brother Erich are dead since many years. What we have left is the story of an intriguing encounter with an unknown craft.

In the magazine collection at AFU we have a complete set of Pursuit, published between 1967-1989 by the Society for the Investigation of the Unexplained (SITU). This organization was founded by Ivan T. Sanderson, well known biologist who devoted much of his life to Cryptozoology and other Fortean subjects. The original name of the organization was the Ivan T. Sanderson Foundation, founded in 1965, but it changed into SITU in 1967. An excellent and very informative site is A Tribute to Ivan T. Sanderson by Richard Grigonis.

Pursuit is a treasure trove of Fortean data and discussions of all aspects of unexplained phenomena. While perusing some older issues I found an interesting article, Fortean vs. Orthodox Science, presenting the, unfortunately still unsolved, basic problems facing UFO and Fortean investigators. It was written by Robert J. Durant and published in vol. 7, no. 2, April 1974. Durant begin his article with the sociological fact well known to all ufologists and Forteans: "... there is a great range of physical phenomena that has been reported, and reported time and again for centuries, often in every part of the globe, but that orthodox science ignores." From an academic perspective this is not entirely true. UFOs and paranormal phenomena are studied by orthodox science but then usually in disciplines like history of ideas, history of religions, folklore and psychology. Within these disciplines scientists stay on the safe side of the fence not adressing the really interesting ontological question regarding the reality and origin of all these unexplained phenomena.

There are three reasons for this situation according to Durant:
1. UFO and fortean events are generally of short duration and they occur sporadically. "How is one to approach the study of events for which there is little evidence other than an eyewitness report? To be sure, there is a great deal of secondary or circumstantial evidence to back up the eyewitness reports. I refer here to footprints, feces samples, photographs in the case of ABSMs, and to the various deformations of the ground and surrounding foliage in the cases of UFO landings, as well as all of the EM effects, movies etc., that form the UFO evidence. But the scientist is neither trained nor accustomed to process anecdotal or circumstatinal evidence."

2. "Fortean events very often are most difficult, if not impossible, to classify in any established scientific pigeon hole. Here we would list falls from the sky, the physical phenomena that are popularly but, we think, falsely, designated "psychic" phenomena, the "flying saucers" and so forth. This taxonomic difficulty has had an effect that at times has been humorous and at other times pitiful." Durant mention the classic situation regarding UFOs. As the best selling books claimed they were spaceships, everyone thought it was a task for the astronomers to come up with an answer. But as I have stated many times, to have an astronomer comment on a close encounter UFO case is as interesting as having an ornithologist comment on nuclear physics. The only person whos view is of value is the field investigator who has done a thorough and critical study and documentation of the case. Being a critic is not enough. You must have knowledge and empirical data.

3. Fortean events makes them unappealing to the scientific community because they present an enormous challenge to established theories. "It has to do with that almost universally expressed human frailty, the closed mind,. It is the blind refusal to even consider any alleged fact or event or theory that conflicts with a predetermined viewpoint." Durant mention that many scientists who joined SITU insisted on anonymity.

As a scientist to openly advocate the serious study of UFO, Fortean and paranormal phenomena within academe is to be a heretic. You have then entered the domain of Forbidden Science as presented by Jacques Vallee and stand all the chances of becoming the Giordano Bruno of your cultural epoch.

Another article thas has some relation to Durant´s discussion is Paranormal Phenomena: Should Psychology Really Go Beyond the Ontological Debate? by Jean-Michel Abrassart, published in Journal of Exceptional Experiences and Psychology vol.1, no. 1, 2013. Since it could be detrimental to the academic career to clearly state a belief in the authenticity of paranormal phenomena many psychologists stand safely aside from the ontological debate. Abrassart advocates more bravery or transparency among researchers:
"I advocate that psychologists studying alleged paranormal phenomena should at least be able to state what their own beliefs are on the topic they are studying... If we can imagine that a committed Christian can legimitately study personal prayer, why not a medium studying mediumship?"

When it comes to the serious study of UFO, Fortean and paranormal phenomena we clearly need heretical scientists, a pathfinder force of daring and iconoclastic scholars not trapped in the flatland paradigm of a materialist and reductionist worldview.

This humanoid close encounter case has become a classic in Swedish ufology. It was documented by one of the first active field investigators in Sweden, Sven Schalin. Unfortunately we have never been able to trace the original witnesses which of course reduces the credibility of the case. But I still think it is worth a presentation because of several unique details in the story.

Sven Schalin

Sven Schalin lecturing at the UFO-Sweden annual conference, Jönköping 1974

The incident occured on the evening of August 23, 1967 in Kolmården, a small community close to my hometown Norrköping. The witnesses were two teenagers around 15 years of age, "Peter" and his girlfriend "Fia". Sven Schalin heard of the incident from a workmate to Fia´s father on August 25 och visited the family of Fia on August 26. Here he interviewed Fia´s parents and the also the teenagers. A couple of days later he paid a second visit and did a more thorough interview with Peter and Fia. The witnesses wanted to remain anonymous because of the high strangeness of what had happened.

It was a little past 8.00 p.m. on August 23 when Peter and Fia was strolling on a small road close to an industrial plot in the small community. The sun had just set and it was twilight. Suddenly the teenagers notice a red light over the trees in a nearby forest. The light is not very bright, has no special shape and there is no sound as it descends rather fast towards the ground in front of the forest. Peter and Fia become apprehensive as they have a feeling of being observed and they decide to leave the spot and head for home.

On their way home they notice that the red light once again has risen and hovers above the forest. Close to home they feel safer and they decide to follow another road to find out what has happened to the light. Once again the notice the red light but it disappears from the forest and is gone. Peter and Fia arrive at an uninhabited cottage and to their surprise small yellow lights are hovering and moving around the place. In one of the windows the notice that the lights are also inside the cottage and there is a distinct sound like someone pounding on wood. While watching these lights the teenagers discover that the red light has appeared once again and is coming in lower than before and "landing" not far from a brook nearby.

Peter and Fia are now rather frightened and return home at a fast pace on the same road. Close to home a small round light suddenly appears in front of them, not more than three meters from the ground and and at the same distance. Like a flashlight hanging in the air. A very sharp whistling sound is heard from nearby and fast and light footsteps are coming closer. Suddenly a figure jumps up from behind the bushes or it rather seems to float up not more than ten meters from Peter and Fia.

The figure is not more than 130 centimeter in height, wearing dark clothing. As it is rather dark they can´t at first observe the face and Fia get the idea that it could be a friend of hers playing some trick and she takes a few steps closer wherein the figure rases the arms and looks straight at Fia. The movements are jerky and unnatural. Peter immediately realize that something is wrong. He grabs Fia shouting "watch out, he is not human". The figure carries some form of object in the left hand which it points to the teenagers. The object is obviously heavy as the humanoid have to use the right arm as support. There is some sort of light visible on the top of the object. Very frightened the teenagers turn around and run home telling their parents and sisters what had occured.

The humanoid had a head out proportion to the body that was skinny. Some sort of hood seemed to cover part of the head. Eyes were dark and Peter experienced the gaze as intensive and nasty. Mouth and nose appeared like an X. The humanoid looked bow-legged and had some wire around the ankles that for a short moment shone with a bright white light. It appeared both tough and somewhat frightened, shivering.

Ufologist Sven Schalin could find no natural explanation for the case. He regarded the witnesses as sincere and serious when recounting the experience. Peter´s mother confirmed that the teenagers were shocked when coming home and Peter didn´t want to go outside after dark for some time. This was an unusual behavior on his part. The day after the incident strange "footprints" were found at the spot where the humanoid had been observed.

Artist Lennart Moberg with an illustration of the incident

Provided this case is valid what do we have here? A visitor from the multiverse, a robot used by aliens from somewhere, a leprechaun, a sportive nature spirit materializing and playing tricks on unsuspecting teenagers?

I often return to the 1975 classic The Edge of Reality by the two giants of ufology, Allen Hynek and Jacques Vallee. The discussions and brain storming in this book are intellectually stimulating and often remarkably radical and open minded. On page 252 Hynek and Vallee try to develop a theory for the many humanoid cases involving different types of entities:
Vallee: "How can they breath our air? How come there are men, ordinary men with them? There are cases in France where witnesses have seen two dwarves coming our of a landed object, and one man with them."
Hynek: "... these damn things adjust pretty well to our planet. This is an important point that is often overlooked. The chances that conditions on a "home planet" would be almost exactly like those on earth are pretty small... Of course, if these reported cretures are really robots, that would solve this problem."

Humanoid and contact cases involving human looking aliens interacting with small entities have been reported for a long time and from many countries. An interesting fact is that human aliens working together with small robots was mentioned already in 1955 by the controversial George Adamski. Here are a few relevant quotes:
"Also in this room was a robot instrument which I was cautioned not to describe. I had noticed a miniature version of this robot in the Scout." (Inside the Space Ships, 1955, p. 60).
"Each pilot room has a robot. these, working singly or together, can fully govern the course of the ship, as well as warn us of any approaching danger." (Ibid. p. 77).
"True, they have robots to do much of the heavy work that once was done by manual labour." (Flying Saucers Farewell, 1961, p. 85).

In my blog I have often referred to George Adamski and some of the other 1950s contactees. I would not be surprised if some time in the future a few of them will be vindicated. Not in the way anticipated by the naive believers and cultists but from a entirely different direction presenting their experiences in a new perspective. The recently deceased Danish Adamski co-worker Hans C Petersen claimed to have discussed the robot issue several times with Adamski. In an article, The Sinister Forces From Space, he presents a somewhat more complicated view of the problem: "... the americans have constructed their own flying saucers, and that they fly just as if they were real space vehicles. Also, that they use the same propulsion system as do the visitors, and that these man-made vehicles are manned with robots - small grey men - all alike and produced alike in american research centers, as copies of the creatures found in the "crashed" saucers from outer space." (UFO Contact Newsletter, no. 1, 1993).

Hans C Petersen

The creation of very advanced robots is today not a science fiction idea. Research is going on around the world, especially for military and commercial use. And what is done publicly has probably already been tested in secret black projects by various known and unknown military intelligence organizations and the intelligence arm of global companies.

There have been several humanoid encounter cases in Sweden where the robot or bio-android interpretation seem reasonable. Take a look at the Ivar Naumann case of 1958 and the Norrtälje humanoid observered in 2008.

Ivar Naumann case 1958

Norrtälje 2008

A fascinating case where bio-androids are mentioned is the abduction experience of Amauri Rivera of Puerto Rico. He was abducted from his car by dwarfish entities in May 1988. When he regained consciousness Amauri found himself in an unknown room together with 15 people, all Hispano-Americans. Magdalena Del Amo-Freixedo documented what happened next in an article published in Flying Saucer Review, vol. 39, no. 1, Spring 1994: "Facing them was a tall, dark man of human appearance. His hair was long, down to the shoulders, and his complexion dusky. He would, says the witness, have passed anywhere unnoticed. This man said that he was human, just like them, who had come here from another planet in our galaxy. On either side of him there was a dwarf, similar to those we have already described. Almost all of those present in the chamber gazed with horror at the two creatures... He (the man) seized hold of its (dwarf) face with one hand and turned it to right and left, at the same time saying that they should have no fear of these entities, as they were biological robots created by them for certain kinds of work, and that they were quite inoffensive."

A rather different story is told by the neuropsychiatrist Dr. Shafica Karagulla och her research companion Dr. Viola Petit Neal, both well versed in the esoteric tradition as evidenced by their book Through the Curtain (1983). A close friend of Shafica Karagulla was Ingo Swann who passed away in February 2013. Ingo Swann is best known for his remote viewing experiments and his controversial book Penetration. Karagulla was something of a mentor to Swann and he has this interesting comment on her knowledge: "She also knew how almost all of the world´s intelligence agencies operated - those agencies known to exist, AND those which exist but are not known or even admitted to by anyone and don´t even have names... You see, Shafica was to become one of my three major advisors regarding international affairs of the type that never get mentioned in the media, science, academe, or mentioned even by conspiracy enthusiasts". (Ingo Swann, Remote Viewing. The Real Story (1996), chapter 40, Shafica Karagulla).

After a very strange experience in a Hollywood supermarket where Ingo and a friend observed and received unusual psychic "vibrations" from a woman with black hair and eyes covered by purple sunglasses, Ingo and his friend decided to mention this encounter to Shafica Karagulla. During a dinner they discuss ET civilizations infiltrating Earth and Viola Petitt Neal comments:
"There are a lot of THEM, you know, and many are bio-androids."
Shafica Karagulla: "They´re dangerous, you know, and they realize that Earth psychics are their only enemies. Be careful Ingo, be careful." (Penetration, chapter The Event in Los Angeles).

Delving deeply into these aspects of the UFO enigma is hardly recommended to the faint hearted. Paranoia can easily become your next door neighbor. Still, the original Vallee question is valid: "How come there are men, ordinary men with them?"
Will the real alien please stand up.

The American ufologist and contactee Carol Honey (1928-2007) is today largerly forgotten in the annals of UFO history. He was an aerospace engineer and accomplished hypnotist who for seven years was George Adamski´s right-hand man. But he also claimed personal physical contact and close co-operation with a group of space people secretly operating behind the scenes. Unfortunately very little research and documentation has been published regarding his contact experiences but I find him an intriguing and enigmatic figure in the early contactee scene.

Carol Honey

Much data on Carol Honey can be found in George Adamski. the Untold Story by Lou Zinsstag and Timothy Good, (1983). But information om Honey´s personal contacts with space people are a bit more difficult to trace. Bits och pieces of data are scattered in his publication Cosmic Science Newsletter, later changed to Science Publications Newsletter (S.P. Newsletter), published between 1962-1966. Timothy Good and Lou Zinsstag met and interviewed Carol Honey on November 19, 1979. Timothy has kindly sent me a transcript of the interview. To my great surprise they never asked about Honey´s personal contacts but concentrated on his co-operation with George Adamski. On two separate occasions, in 1979 and 1986, I wrote letters to Carol Honey with the hope of receiving more data on his experiences but he never answered.

In a letter to Flying Saucer Review, March-April 1959, Carol Honey mention that his interest in UFOs began after observing a "huge UFO flying behind an airliner". He moved to California and started investigating witnesses and contactees but was disappointed when finding so many mystic channelers among the contactees. But things changed when he met Adamski: "I visited George Adamski at his home in November of 1957. I fully expected to hear the same type of story as I had been hearing. Instead I got a real surprise. Here was a story down-to-earth and not involving seances, trances and other such things as I had run into before." On a lecture tour with Adamski, Carol Honey had his first encounter with space people at a cafe in Oregon.

George Adamski in Denmark 1963

Here are a few relevant quotes from various articles by Honey regarding his contacts:
"I worked with Mr. Adamski personally for almost four years before I had my first contact. It was entirely unexpected when it occurred. Mr. Adamski didn´t know it occurred until some time afterward." (Cosmic Science Newsletter, June 1962, p. 1)

"While it is possible that more than one group was here on earth at the same time, those I worked with was comprised of only six individuals, each with a separate and distinct objective to accomplish. Certain United States leaders and scientists were working with them and one of those who knew what was going on was President Kennedy... Those living among us were supplied with funds by Howard Hughes and some of the reverse engineering was done at Hughes Aircraft Company. I personally had meetings with intelligence personnel of the United States who wanted certain information I had about the spacepeople." (Mrs O`Leary´s Cow, publication no. 302, November 2003, pp. 4-5)

"I was with Adamski when he had one of his contacts with ETs, to use the term som many use today and my own meetings were with physical humanoid people who periodically visited our planet when it was necessary to complete an assignment or help fulfill whatever job they were assigned to do at the time... This is not a claim that I am the only one having a legitimate ET contact. I am merely the person chosen years ago to lead the group among us here today and supply answers to combat the false ideas that abound today. Most people in the group are proceeding quietly and unobserved in their efforts to continue the public education." (Skeptical Analysis, publication no. 293, August 2003, p. 10).

Answer to a question from ufologist Lucius Farish: "Some spacepeople have scars from accidents, many do not... I have met one highly evolved spaceperson who had a bad scar so on this point I speak from personal experience. " (S.P. Newsletter, June 1963, p. 18).

"Six months before Mr. Adamski turned over his work to me, I was told by the spacepeople, during a face to face physical contact, that I had been chosen to succeed Mr. Adamski in his work. Sic months later I got the statement above from Mr. Adamski direct. Mr. Adamski was not present at that contact, or at any others..." (S.P. Newsletter, October 1963, p. 1).

Like many of Adamski´s co-workers Carol Honey left the partnership in 1963 when Adamski´s behaviour and claims became increasingly irrational. Edith Nicolaisen, founder of the Swedish publishing company Parthenon in 1957, and publisher of Adamski´s books, asked Carol Honey about his views and experiences in a letter February 10, 1968. Honey answered in a reply March 29, 1968: "George Adamski went off the beam before he died and many statements he made has destroyed much of the good he did previously. I can only back up the information in his first three books and most of this I can´t back up with physical evidence. I have had personal experiences myself which proved a lot of things to me but I will not make them aviable to a skeptical public."

Edith Nicolaisen

With only these sources and data it is very difficult to estimate the reliability of Carol Honey´s claims. He express a healthy skepticism when it comes to channeled information from spacepeople and is well aware of the psychological interpretations of these experiences. Many of his articles are scientifically oriented and down to earth, unusual in the contactee field. But when it comes to articles on religion and philosophy his lack of knowledge and scholarly erudition becomes obvious. There are some funny remarks on this issue in his newsletters:
"I have never read any books on philosophy (except Adamski´s Cosmic Philosophy), so I am unfamiliar with the way others use certain terms." (June 1962).
"Since the spacepeople have evolved far past the philosophical flounderings of earth, I feel it is unnecessary for me to waste time reading or studying the individual books here on earth." (July 1962).

I find it odd that Carol Honey never found or studied the more intellectual works in the esoteric tradition, Blavatsky, Leadbeater, Sinnett, Bailey. Perhaps his experiences among the 1950s California channelers and mystics made him skeptical to all such claims. If he, like Desmond Leslie, had studied the more academic writings in esotericism his perspective and knowledge would have been different. He could as an example have found his skeptical views on channeling confirmed and esoterically explained in Telepathy by Alice Bailey (p.75-77, 1966 edition). In this area he didn´t follow his mentor, George Adamski, who was well informed on Theosophy and the Ancient Wisdom. Carol Honey made a personal mix of metaphysical ideas combined with views from some psychics he supported, like Edgar Cayce.

During the later part of his life Carol Honey wrote hundreds of articles on various subjects that he distributed free of charge to anyone interested. Some of these were published in Flying Saucers 50 Years Later, privately published in 2002. I have found very few of his articles on the internet but one good example of Honey´s ideas is Fraud In Metaphysics, Occultism And Mysticism. Another is UFOs, What they Are Not. Of interest is also an undated interview, Hunting the Truth.

If Carol Honey really met some unknown individuals claiming to be spacepeople, were they telling him the truth or was "spacepeople" a cover to hide their real identity?

Summertime for me symbolizes sunshine, book reading and the traditional trip to the city of the Sun - my birthplace Karlstad. But this summer has been very special. My lovely lady Margaretha (Persian name meaning pearl) and I made the trip together and on July 8th we got engaged in Karlstad while the Sun (Sola i Karlstad) blessed us with several days of perfect weather. Karlstad was the natural choice for us as we were both born in this beautiful city.

Margaretha and the statue Sola i Karlstad

Margaretha and I spent three days in Värmland and visited Mårbacka, birthplace of the famous Swedish author Selma Lagerlöf. As I have mentioned in several blog entries Selma Lagerlöf was interested in and influenced by the esoteric tradition and read several books by theosophist Annie Besant. This influence is clearly visible in many of her novels.

Selma Lagerlöf 1848-1940

A aspiring author? Margaretha at Mårbacka

This summer I have read the latest book from the pen of the very prolific author Nick Redfern: Close Encounters of the Fatal Kind. This time he presents a historical overview of the strange deaths and disappearances of ufologists and other individuals involved in the underground world of ufology. Many of the cases mentioned can probably be explained in very mundane terms but Redferns documents a few really intriguing deaths. Pat Price was a gifted remote-viewer who in the 1970s was enlisted by the CIA to psychically spy on the Soviet Union and other potential enemies of the United States. Price also claimed to have uncovered alien bases in several countries around the world. Redfern documents the rather strange circumstances regarding Price´s untimely death in Las Vegas on July 14, 1975.

In the 1950s it was basically Christian fundamentalists who regarded UFOs as manifestations of evil entities. Today we have a completely different situation noted by Redfern: "Within the field of UFO research, there is an entire sub-culture that believes the flying saucer enigma is definitely demonic in origin and nature." (p. 154) Very influential in this field was Flying Saucer Review editor Gordon Creighton who, inspired by Anthroposophy and Islam, introduced the theory of Jinns as an explanation for the behavior of UFO entities.

Nick Redfern keeps an open mind as to what really happened in the cases mentioned in the book. Sometimes his theories and speculations are a bit far out but as we really don´t know what lies behind the various UFO phenomena perhaps his warning in the end should be considered: "To UFO witnesses, investigators, abductees, researchers, and just about anyone and everyone thinking of immersing themselves in the world of the flying saucer, I say this: tread very carefully, lest your tread no more. Ever."

Finally a few words about a most interesting book I am currently reading: Eranos. An Alternative Intellectual History of the Twentieth Century by Hans Thomas Hakl. Since 1933 leading intellectuals have gathered annually at the Eranos Meetings in Switzerland to discuss religion, philosophy, spirituality, esotericism, psychology and the cultural trends in society. Here we find influential thinkers like Carl Gustav Jung, Mircea Eliade, Martin Buber, Paul Tillich, Joseph Campbell a.o. During the first years esotericist Alice Bailey was one of the frequent lecturers.

Not much has been written about Eranos, possibly because many of the ideas presented and discussed were heretic and not in line with "scientific" and rationalist thinking as noted by Hakl: "At Eranos, I believe, the trail was blazed for an "alternative intellectual history of the twentieth century", running counter to the domineering claims of materialism and positivism, those sterile parents of a mathemathical, technical, and predominantly economic worldview which is out of touch with humanity and in which the "gods" are finally dead." (p. xii)

The title alludes to the old folk song by Pete Seeger - Where Have All the Flowers Gone?. I came to think of this famous song when studying the history of the Swedish Theosophical Society (Adyar). In 1925 there were 44 local lodges in cities all over Sweden, even in, at that time, rather small towns like Boden, Eslöv, Kungsbacka, Säffle,Uddevalla. Theosophy can almost be regarded as a form of people´s movement in 1920s Sweden, with a deep cultural impact. These and other interesting data on the Theosophical Society in Sweden I have found in an unpublished manuscript, Fakta samlade ur Teosofisk Tidskrift 1890-1968 (Facts gathered from Theosophical Magazine 1890-1968). This is an impressive documentation amassed and typewritten by Mr. Göran Söderqvist, board member and archivist for the Swedish Theosophical Society (Adyar).

Göran Söderqvist

Göran Söderqvist´s documentation would be excellent and important data for any academic scholar writing a doctoral thesis on Theosophy in Sweden. As I have mentioned several times in this blog I find the lack of scholarly research on this subject quite remarkable, especially since academic interest in what is named Western Esotericism has experienced a renaissance during the last decades. A few academic essays have been written at Swedish universities but no in depth research resulting in a doctoral thesis.

Today the Swedish Theosophical Society have only two lodges and six local representatives, according to the society homepage. The decline in lodges and membership is often debated among active Theosophists. The decline started after the crisis when Jiddu Krishnamurti in 1929 renounced his role as World Teacher and rejected Theosophy as a valid world view. Instead he started promoting a form of confusing advaita mysticism which is still published in many Theosophical journals. Sweden is no exception and the result is a unhappy mixture of esotericism and mysticism which can hardly appeal to the intellectual student. This could be one of the reasons for the decline in membership and lodges.

I commented on this problem in the mailing list theos-talk in 2013:
"In my view, one of the great riddles of the Theosophical movement is how so many Theosophists can still promote the teachings of Krishnamurti. I can well understand the frustration of Geoffrey Hodson when confronted with the peculiar form of Advaita mysticism of JK. An intellectual quicksand that gets you nowhere and with no relation to Esoteric Science. Blavatsky with her forthright manner and vulcanic temperament would probably have given JK a harsh reprimand if they had lived during the same age. And Laurency, with his Blavatskyan temperament, is very critical and clear in his analysis of JK. Unfortunately this essay is only in Swedish. Finding books by Krishnamurti in Theosophical bookshops is like finding books promoting atheism in a catholic bookshop while the nice and naive manager of the shop doesn´t understand the difference between the two radically different world views. A sad state of affairs."

Various esoteric sources are quite clear in their assessment of Krishnamurti. Here a few quotes:
"Krishnamurti´s Advaitism, which is not to be confounded with the recognized form of that noble philosophy, will, I fear, lead his followers nowhere except perhaps to hypocricy and self-delusion" (Cyril Scott, The Initiate in the Dark Cycle, 1992 ed., p. 139).

"Krishnamurti is a warning example of the risks involved in the forced cultivation of latent qualities... His later production indicates that he lapsed to the stage of the mystic, and from there to life-blind fictitiousness, rather reminiscent of Zen Buddhism, according to which one experiences “true reality” by emptying one’s consciousness of all its content acquired throughout one’s incarnations. In that procedure one is supposed to attain to nirvana or annihilation. Is there any crazy idea that people will not swallow?" Henry T. Laurency, Knowledge of Life Three, 6.10)

According to Alice Bailey the Krishnamurti episode was an experiment that backfired (Alice Bailey, Discipleship in the New Age, vol two, 1980 ed. p. 171). Laurency is of the opinion that Charles Leadbeater and Annie Besant overestimated Krishnamurti´s capacity and forced him to a intellectual and spiritual overtraining. Theosophy as a movement could still continue to have a progessive cultural impact if Theosophists abandon the mysticism of Krishnamurti and continue promoting the Esoteric Tradition as a science, as exact as any academic discipline. They must also be more open to and understand the continuity of the tradition in the writings of Alice Bailey and Henry T. Laurency. If not the Theosophical Society will in the future only be of interest to scholars of history of religion and academic esotericism.

The great cultural influence of Theosophy in Sweden will hopefully be recognized, studied and documented by academic scholars in the near future. Theosophy has influenced royalty, artists, writers, scientists, politicians, philosophers and intellectuals during an important and revolutionary phase in Swedish history. One small part of this impact I have documented in my book Gudarna återvänder. Ufo och den esoteriska traditionen. (Return of the Gods. UFOs and the Esoteric Tradition). The Swedish UFO movement was actually founded by active members of the Theosophical Society (Adyar). From a global perspective their is still much research to be done in this direction.

On this exceedingly hot and humid day I decided to visit and photograph all of the AFU premises to get a sort of state of the archives. AFU consists of ten premises but I visited nine of these as the tenth is simply a repository for various office supplies and furniture. The total area is 459 square meters and shelf capacity more than 2.000 meters. Our dream of course is one single facility. Now there is a constant time consuming and laborious transfer of material between the premises. On our AFU site you can find basic data on the premises including photos but there is a constant change going on so if you join me for this tour you will find the present state of the premises with a few thoughts and plans added.

Headquarters.
We now have 23 people working at AFU with various tasks and projects. Six of our staff are stationed at the main office. This is also the premise for AFU and UFO-Sweden board meetings and where guests are first introduced to the archive, our history and work.

AFU headquarters

Digitizing and clippings

Close to our headquarters we have the premise for digitizing, where also some of our staff work with the many and varied clippings collections, UFO, Fortean and paranormal clippings. We have so far digitized 140.000 clippings from the CFI collection (Charles Fort Institute), 27.000 Swedish clippings and many Swedish UFO magazines. Also thousands of letters from correspondence files.

Part of the digitizing premise

Clippings collections

Final storage premise

Some time ago we used this facility for the large CEI (Centro de Estudios Interplanetarios) donation from Barcelona. But now all the books from this collection have been catalogued and incorporated in the main UFO/Fortean library. Today we use most of this facility as a final storage premise.

Final storage premise

Magazines, personal and organizational files

Our magazines collection is growing with leaps and bounds as donations are coming in a steady stream from all over the world. We now have around 50.000 copies of magazines. Personal and organizational files are also growing fast. Ordering these documents is a time consuming enterprise.

Magazine archive

Organizational files

Incoming collections

This premise would give anyone a headache with shelves full of more or less unsorted collections donated to AFU. My collegue Anders Liljegren who often works in this premise has a truly stoic temperament and simply says: Well, you just take one thing at a time. Presently Anders is trying to put in order the very disorganized Flying Saucer Review archive.

Incoming collections

The Hilary Evans Library

The basic part of this library consists of the enormous and valuable collection donated by Hilary Evans in 2010. Here you will find religion, philosophy, psychology, parapsychology, spiritualism, sects and cults, esoterica and folklore. Recently the shelf capacity has been increased as this library is also growing very fast.

The Hilary Evans Library

The UFO/Fortean library

This is our oldest library facility housing books on UFOs and Forteana. We try to collect three copies of every book published on these subjects, from all countries, languages and editions.

The UFO/Fortean library

Finally we have two premises that actually belong to UFO-Sweden but are administered by the AFU staff. The UFO-Sweden magazines store and shop and close to this premise the UFO-Sweden book store and shop.

UFO-Sweden magazine store and shop

UFO-Sweden book store and shop

While touring the AFU premises today I felt both glad and proud that we after 40+ years have succeeded in building the largest UFO/Fortean archive/library in the world. But I also experienced frustration of not having enough time for all projects that should be implemented. Here are stored such vast quantities of intriguing material and data. Will there in the future be qualified scholars, cultural heretics and intellectual iconoclasts who will benefit from these collections for their research? There are many scientific and religious fundamentalists out there who already have the answers to the existential riddles and questions posed by the data in AFU. Let them read this daily prayer.

This weekend several members of the UFO-Sweden board gathered at the AFU premises in Norrköping for discussion and planning of various projects. On Saturday UFO-Sweden chairman Anders Berglund and Johan Gustavsson, head of the reporting central met with Tobias Lindgren to lay the groundwork for Project Kolmården in the summer of 2015. A group of field investigators from UFO-Sweden will then concentrate their research efforts on a small area north of Norrköping where a lot of UFO activity has been reported for many years, especially in the 1970s and 80s. Field investigators will actually go from house to house in search of UFO or Fortean phenomena witnesses. This will be in combination with an intense media campaign to inform local residents of the UFO-Sweden project.

Anders Berglund searching for UFO reports in the Kolmården area

A contemplative Johan Gustavsson planning the Kolmården Project

From left: Johan Gustavsson, Tage Bång, Anders Berglund, Tobias Lindgren, Anders Skoglund, Christoffer Mossberg

This is not the first time for such a UFO-Sweden project. Similar studies were initiated in Värmland 2002 and 2004 and also the so called Mien Project in Småland 2007. The result was most rewarding with many new UFO reports documented.

Anders Persson documenting a UFO report during Project Värmland 2002

Clas Svahn presenting the days work at the Mien Project 2007

Beginning August 30th a second expedition to lake Nammajaure will take place with a renewed attempt to find the ghost rocket that landed and sank in this northern lake in July 1980. Here is Clas Svahn´s announcement of the expedition:

"In a couple of weeks I will lead an expedition to Lake Nammajaure where a Ghost Rocket landed and sank in July 1980. Seen by two excellent witnesses in broad daylight during its flight over them, down to the lake and the landing.

The lake is situated in a remote area within a National park and we will carry all instruments, tents and personal packings through the woods.

This is UFO-Sweden's second attempt to find the strange ”rocket”. The first search was made in 2012 but now we are returning with better instruments and an expert on ground penetrating radar plus a TV documentary team that has followed me and UFO-Sweden since nearly five years.

Please take a look at our information page.

And if you are interested in helping us to make this within our small budget, all contributions are very welcomed."

My own AFU initiative this weekend has been a few hours work doing the final arranging of the Sven Magnusson archive. Sven Magnusson was editor of the Swedish magazine Sökaren from 1964-2008. Articles covered every conceivable subject within the UFO, paranormal, spiritual and new age field but usually the quality of the material printed was of high quality and Sven succeded in attracting the best minds and writers on these taboo subjects. His international correspondence file is a who´s who of active writers and researchers from the 1960s onward. Here a few names: Rupert Sheldrake, Ian Stevenson, Charles Tart, Hans Bender, J.B. Rhine, D. Scott Rogo, Allen Hynek, John Keel, Jerome Clark but also contactees like Daniel Fry and Ray & Rex Stanford.

Sven Magnusson in 1977

For anyone interested in borderland research and philosophy Sökaren is still a treasure trove of interesting articles and data. Sven Magnusson was a good friend and collegue and I am glad to have made his acquaintance. A wise and bold writer always challenging the reductionist, materialist world view with new intriguing data from the forbidden sciences.

Sven Magnusson 1930-2008

Anomalist Books continue to publish interesting and high quality writings in the UFO, Fortean and paranormal field, classics as well as new titles. The latest is a tome that most probably will be regarded as seminal by academic scholars, Forteans and esotericists: Seeing Fairies by the late Marjorie Johnson. This Nottingham lady celebrated her 100th birthday in 2011. Unfortunately she didn´t live to see the English edition of her book as she died in 2011.

Among folklorists and Swedish ufologists it has been customary to claim that in the old days people experienced fairies or little people but today they encounter space people. After reading Seeing Fairies it becomes obvious that this claim is simply not valid and must be reevaluated. People still encounter fairies but are perhaps even more reluctant to openly tell of these experiences than UFO witnesses. The social stigma is too great. Johnson´s book is a documentation of 400 authentic reports of fairies from the archives of the Fairy Investigation Society. Reports cover the period from around 1900 until the 1990s. The foreword is written by historian Dr. Simon Young describing Marjorie Johnson as an "intelligent, dedicated and passionate woman".

Of special interest to UFO and Fortean field investigators is that Simon Young has brought the sleeping Fairy Investigation Society (FIS) to life. It was originally founded in 1927, open only to "believers" in fairies but has now been refounded with a somewhat altered ideological footing: "The refounded FIS will be open, instead, to anyone who is interested in fairy lore, believers or otherwise: it is hoped that membership will strech from hardened folklorists, through Forteans, to the outer fringe of modern "fairies" and fairy mystics". This is an excellent, open minded approach reminiscent of the third way ufology of UFO-Sweden, formulated by the former UFO-Sweden chairman Mr. Clas Svahn. After reading Seeing Fairies I enrolled as a member and am looking forward to the database on fairy sightings and encounters to be launched in 2015.

That there is a close connection both historical and in regard to phenomena between encounters with UFO humanoids and fairies has been obvious since the publication of Jacques Vallee´s classic Passport To Magonia in 1969. Many books have since been published following in the Vallee footsteps. UFO-Sweden has published sightings of leprechauns in various publications as field investigators now and then stumble on witnesses who recount not only UFO observations but encounters with the little people. I presented one of these very intriguing reports, the Helge Eriksson case, 1931, in a former blog entry. An interesting article from a different perspective, Encounters With Immaterial Beings, can be found in the German magasin Journal for Spirituality and Transcendental Psychology.

Among the 400 reports documented in Seeing Fairies there are several cases of special interest to ufologists: multi-witness reports, time loss, abductions, luminous phenomena in connection with fairies. An index and some statistics would have been useful. The close connection between the Esoteric Tradition and fairies is well documented in Marjorie´s book. She herself had several encounter with the little people and she makes frequent references to esotericists like Charles Leadbeater, Geoffrey Hodson, Alice Bailey and Flower Newhouse. The best and most detailed taxonomy of non-human entities from an esoteric viewpoint is the theosophical classic The Astral Plane (1896) by Charles Leadbeater, an excellent companion volume to Seeing Fairies regardless of your favourite multiverse paradigm.

Finally some quotes from Marjorie Johnson´s foreword to her book: "Certain people refuse to believe in fairies because they remain invisible to them, so they think they must be figments of the seer´s imagination... Our eyes can take in only a limited number of vibrations, so there must be countless beings around us who are invisible to us because they are on a different wavelengths, and that might apply to some of the inhabitants of other planets... I hope my readers will keep an open mind, and then they might experience some of the fairies´ radiant carefree joy, and perhaps regain that sense of wonder that is sadly lacking in the lives of so many people in the world today."

Heretic among the heretics

Stranger in a strange land

Christina, Queen of Sweden and esotericism

The humanoid that got away

Round Robin and contactee history

Reluctant contactees

Congratulations Clas

Paranormal phenomena and the esoteric paradigm

One hundred sponsors

Riley Crabb, UFOs and Theosophy

A close encounter during the war

Fortean vs. orthodox science

The Kolmården humanoid case

Aliens and bio-androids

The enigmatic Carol Honey

Summertime, books and a pearl

Where have all the lodges gone?

AFU premises, plans and a prayer

UFO-Sweden projects and planning

Seeing fairies