Most of us recognize fireflies, lightning bugs, or glowworms—which are not worms but beetles. The wingless females must creep on the surface of ground or branch, but the winged males flit through the air. These sparkling creatures form part of the diet of birds and bats, and when carried aloft to be consumed in flight can make one more mysterious, swiftly moving light to frighten the apprehensive. The earth teems with other self-luminous organisms such as frogs’ eggs, which most of us have never seen and would not recognize. Luminous parasites sometimes live in the feathers of birds and make them glow. The plumage of the great blue heron, a North American bird, can emit a pale light sometimes known as the birds’s “lantern” because it is supposed to help him while fishing. Fish or meat when decaying can become infected with luminous bacteria and thus shine brilliantly in the dark. The sea is filled with phosphorescent fish and plants which help perpetuate tales of sea serpents. Some waters in the Caribbean contain so dense a population of phosphorescent algae that a bird, dipping its wings to snatch a meal, will glow for minutes after it soars again into the air. These luminous birds, innocently fishing for dinner, probably account for many reports that flying saucers come and go from underwater[[VI-4]].
Many of the erratically behaving UFOs observed at night over wooded areas, swamps, and marshes have undoubtedly been one of these will o’ the wisps—winged creatures glowing with borrowed fire. Unfortunately proof of this explanation is rarely possible. Before the startled observer can recover his wits the flitting “saucer” has gone, taking with it the evidence of its identity.
Fear of the unknown is not confined to Homo sapiens. A news item published in England a few years ago reveals that the animal kingdom, too, may have its ghosts. Under the headline, Owl Attacks Luminous Man, the article reads:
“A Bournemouth long-distance runner, Ken Baily, was attacked by an owl last night when he was running through the centre of Bournemouth in a luminous track suit. The bird ripped the front of his suit before it flew back into the trees.
“Baily said afterwards: ‘I heard it hooting before it attacked. The suit is luminous so that motorists can see me, but if it attracts owls like this I’d rather take a chance with the traffic.’”[[VI-5]]
Sea Gulls as UFOs
Early in the afternoon of December 10, 1941, three days after the attack on Pearl Harbor, a research technician standing at the fourth-floor window of a laboratory in Boston saw a number of bright objects maneuvering high in the sky and slowly descending over the city. Making a quick guess at their distance, size, and speed, he concluded that the objects were parachutes, the first of a Japanese invasion. Only after they had dropped to the level of a nearby church spire was he able to gain the right perspective, correct his estimates, and identify the objects as sea gulls drifting down with the winds.
A decade later, the public was no longer worried about danger from Japan but was concerned about possible invasion from outer space. Sea gulls flashing in the sun were interpreted not as parachutes but as flying saucers.
Many luminous UFOs have in fact been ordinary living creatures, normal inhabitants of the earth—owls that had acquired a temporary luminosity, sea gulls reflecting the sunlight, flights of birds reflecting the lights of a town. But in trying to identify them, the witness is influenced by the pattern of his time. In 1897 and 1907 the world seemed reasonably secure. Observers of mysterious lights made fairly accurate estimates of their distance and size and compared them to familiar, everyday things—an insect and a carriage lamp. In 1941, three days after Pearl Harbor, the world was at war and the observer’s imagination, stimulated by a hundred rumors of imminent Japanese invasion, transformed cruising sea gulls into parachutes. By 1950, when space travel had become at least a theoretical possibility and scientists were discussing ways to reach the moon, uneasy persons fantastically overestimated the height and size of mysterious lights in the sky and sometimes saw birds as spaceships from another planet.
A well-publicized incident took place on the morning of July 16, 1952, when a Coast Guard photographer at Salem, Massachusetts, happened to glance out of a window and see four bright, egg-shaped objects moving in the sky. Grabbing his camera, he managed to take a picture before the objects were lost from view. According to some saucer enthusiasts, certain reproductions of the photograph show typical UFOs shaped like two saucers arranged face to face, as though joined by a ring at the mid-line[[VI-6]]. The official Coast Guard photograph however, shows merely four bright, fuzzy-edged blurs arranged in a rough V formation. Only imagination could convert these spots of light into spaceships. Many readers of this book have probably seen similar objects gleaming briefly in the sun, mysterious for the moment, and then identified them as gulls or airplanes when a shift in orientation cut down the reflection.