UFOs One Year at a Time: THE LOST YEARS (Pre-1947)

FOO FIGHTERS

ARTICLE FROM WIKIPEDIA

The first sightings occurred in November 1944, when pilots flying over Germany by night reported seeing fast-moving round glowing objects following their aircraft. The objects were variously described as fiery, and glowing red, white, or orange. Some pilots described them as resembling Christmas tree lights and reported that they seemed to toy with the aircraft, making wild turns before simply vanishing. Pilots and aircrew reported that the objects flew formation with their aircraft and behaved as if under intelligent control, but never displayed hostile behavior. However, they could not be outmaneuvered or shot down. The phenomenon was so widespread that the lights earned a name - in the European Theater of Operations they were often called "kraut fireballs" but for the most part called "foo-fighters".

The military took the sightings seriously, suspecting that the mysterious sightings might be secret German weapons, but further investigation revealed that German and Japanese pilots had reported similar sightings.[10] In its 15 January 1945 edition TIME magazine carried a story entitled "Foo-Fighter", in which it reported that the "balls of fire" had been following USAAF night fighters for over a month, and that the pilots had named it the "foo-fighter". According to TIME, descriptions of the phenomena varied, but the pilots agreed that the mysterious lights followed their aircraft closely at high speed. Some scientists at the time rationalized the sightings as an illusion probably caused by afterimages of dazzle caused by flak bursts, while others suggested St. Elmo's Fire as an explanation. The "balls of fire" phenomenon reported from the Pacific Theater of Operations differed somewhat from the foo fighters reported from Europe; the "ball of fire" resembled a large burning sphere which "just hung in the sky", though it was reported to sometimes follow aircraft. On one occasion, the gunner of a B-29 aircraft managed to hit one with gunfire, causing it to break up into several large pieces which fell on buildings below and set them on fire. As with the European foo fighters, no aircraft was reported as having been attacked by a "ball of fire."

January 1878, Denison, Texas Daylight UFO

By B J Booth
The term "flying saucer" was made popular by a journalist covering Kenneth Arnolds's sighting of nine flying disks in June of 1947. The journalist misquoted Arnold, who did not describe the objects as saucer shaped, but describes their strange movement as similar to a saucer thrown on water and bouncing several times: they "flew like a saucer would if you skipped it across the water."
But a Texan farmer, John Martin, used the term "saucer" 69 years earlier to describe the flying object he saw on a hunting expedition in the surroundings of Denison, Texas, on January 2, 1878. In this case also, "saucer" does not refer to the shape, but to the size of the observed object, as its shape was described as that of a balloon. John Martin saw the dark object high in the Southern sky. He first noticed it to be about the size of an orange, that grew in size as it got closer to him. After he had to rest his eyes, it had increased considerably in size and appeared to be going quite fast. When it was over him it was the size of a large saucer and at a great height.
Because this UFO was dark, and not a mysterious light, reflective, or silvery, many scientists believe he saw a solid object against the sky, with the light behind it.
The sighting was reported by the local newspaper Denison Daily News on January 25, 1878, with the title "A Strange Phenomenon." The article was a first-hand report from the farmer, and its full text is:

"From Mr. John Martin, a farmer who lives some six miles south of this city, we learn the following strange story: Tuesday morning while out hunting, his attention was directed to a dark object high up in the southern sky. The peculiar shape and velocity with which the object seemed to approach riveted his attention and he strained his eves to discover its character."

"When first noticed, it appeared to be about the size of an orange, which continued to grow in size. After gazing at it for some time Mr. Martin became blind from long looking and left off viewing it for a time in order to rest his eyes. On resuming his view, the object was almost overhead and had increased considerably in size, and appeared to be going through space at wonderful speed."

"When directly over him it was about the size of a large saucer and was evidently at great height. Mr. Martin thought it resembled, as well as he could judge, a balloon. It went as rapidly as it had come and was soon lost to sight in the heavenly skies. Mr. Martin is a gentleman of undoubted veracity and this strange occurrence, if it was not a balloon, deserves the attention of our scientists."

Of course, old reports somehow lack in accurate information, and no witness interview is possible to get the missing information or check the witness reliability. But these old reports exist, and even lacking of clear data, they sometimes cannot be easily interpreted in terms of commonplace phenomenon.

Who knows? Maybe some even older report can still surface, where a UFO is described as "saucer" - like in some aspect.

REFERENCES:
"A Strange Phenomenon", article in newspaper Denison Daily News, January 25, 1878.
"The flying saucers are real", book by Major Donald E. Keyhoe, ret., 1950.




The photo above is claimed to be from TIENSTEN CHINA 1942 or TIENJIN, JAPAN 1911. Note the wide avenue and no cars, the people pointing or looking skyward. China had been at war with Japan since 1931, and wracked with civil war. It is possible that there would be no cars on a major street in a Chinese city of that era. As for JAPAN, 1911, it is possible a street in 1911, in the Orient would not have any cars. Who knows where this photo was taken? With the Rikshaws, it looks like China to me. Then again, is this a superimposed photo? Are the people looking up at a World War II bomber or fighter plane that is in trouble? A photo wizard put the UFO in place of the plane? Or is it legit?

The "Battle of Los Angeles," 1942

(From WIKIPEDIA) The Battle of Los Angeles is the name given by contemporary news agencies to a sighting of one or more unidentified flying objects which took place from late February 24 to early February 25, 1942 in which eyewitness reports of an unknown object or objects over Los Angeles, California, triggered a massive anti-aircraft artillery barrage. The Los Angeles incident occurred less than three months after America's entry into World War II as a result of the attack on Pearl Harbor.

Prior to the incident in Los Angeles, the Ellwood shelling, in which the Japanese submarine I-17 surfaced and fired on an oil production facility near Santa Barbara, had occurred on February 23, 1942. Reports indicated that afterwards the submarine was heading south, the general direction of Los Angeles.

Unidentified objects were reported over Los Angeles during the night of February 24 and the early morning hours of February 25, 1942. Air raid sirens were sounded throughout Los Angeles County at 2:25 a.m. and a total blackout was ordered. Thousands of air raid wardens were summoned to their positions. At 3:16 a.m. on February 25, the 37th Coast Artillery Brigade began firing 12.8-pound anti-aircraft shells into the air at the object(s); over 1400 shells would eventually be fired [1]. Pilots of the 4th Interceptor Command were alerted but their aircraft remained grounded. The artillery fire continued sporadically until 4:14 a.m. The objects were said to have taken about 20 minutes to have moved from over Santa Monica to above Long Beach. The "all clear" was sounded and the blackout order lifted at 7:21 a.m.

In addition to several buildings damaged by friendly fire, three civilians were killed by the anti-aircraft fire, and another three died of heart attacks attributed to the stress of the hour-long bombardment.

The incident was front-page news along the U.S. Pacific coast, and earned some mass media coverage throughout the nation. One Los Angeles Herald Express writer[2] who observed some of the incident insisted that several anti-aircraft shells had struck one of the objects, and he was stunned that the object had not been downed. Reporter Bill Henry of the Los Angeles Times wrote, "I was far enough away to see an object without being able to identify it ... I would be willing to bet what shekels I have that there were a number of direct hits scored on the object."

For further reading, visit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Los_Angeles

August, 1911 - Strange Sightings Reported

The August 18, 1911 "Reno (NV) Gazette" carried a brief item tided "Meteor From The Sea Does Strange Stunts." It is said that upon the arrival of the ocean liner "America Maru" in San Francisco from the Orient on August l7th a report was made of a meteor which "climbed out of the sea like a skyrocket, traveled through a great arc and disappeared." The captain, A.C. Stevens, said it had a great fiery head and a long trail and was seen on August 11th.

The item would normally be of minor interest except that meteors do not climb out of the sea. An effort was made to locate more from the San Francisco area from where the report had originated. Confirmation came quickly.

On the same day as the Reno item, the "San Francisco Examiner" carried a story, "Meteors And Moon Rainbows Awe Ship -A Night in Hawaiian Seas Made Brilliant for Passengers on America Maru." This report was a bit more expansive, stating that while passengers were on deck the previous Friday evening, a large meteor shot up out of the ocean, made a complete circle of the sky, and sank again into the water. At the time, the ship was two days out of Hawaii.

It was seen to be about the size of a ten-inch cannon ball and displayed a trail many miles in length. The first third of the trail was as round as a rod and glowing red. The remainder "gradually expanded in graceful proportions."

A half an hour later, the night watchman called for witnesses to view a large lunar rainbow. Shortly after this observation, another meteor rose out of the sea to a height of 20 degrees and sank again. This object was smaller than the first but the trail seemed to break away and precede the head into the sea.

What can be made of this story? I had thought of the possibility of volcanic eruptions, with the ship being two days from the volcanic Hawaiian Islands. The eruptions would hurl flaming rock high into the air, trailing hot debris and giving the appearance of a meteor shooting from the water. However there seemed to be no reports of noise or vibration from such an eruption, or no glow from the horizon from a distant volcano. We also have the "meteor" making a circuit of the sky, hardly a falling rock.

One small detail before closing this account. The Gazette concluded by adding that a copy of the ship's log with a description of the phenomenon "was forwarded to Washington." In all likelihood this was sent to the U.S. Hydrographic Office, which was known to have collected such reports for study.

Another report in the "Reno Gazette" (July 25th) told of the people of Durango, Colorado seeing a large ball about the size of the full moon moving through the sky. It sounds like an especially bright meteor, which can sometimes rival the full moon in brightness. But the report continued, "For several hours the phenomenon lasted. At first it seemed to be traveling toward the earth and gradually grew larger until it developed to a size half again as large as a full moon. Finally, it began to grow smaller and in time disappeared entirely."

The only known phenomenon of such long duration might be a display of aurora. It is a fluid phenomenon though and a single, compact display lasting several hours would be a far-fetched explanation for this report.

Mystery airships, or aeroplanes, continued on for many years after the airship flurries of 1896 and 1897. One report, in the "Winnipeg Free Press" (August 22), tells of an unknown aircraft in the vicinity of North Winnipeg between 1250 and 410 AM on the 22nd. It continually buzzed the city in the dark, leaving residents believing that it was a flyer afraid to land in darkness. It did not appear clearly to witnesses and vanished without having been identified.

(source: http://www.cufon.org/uhr/UHR10.htm)

1897: Aurora, Texas

On April 17, 1897, six years before the first plane was flown by the Wright brothers, an “airship” visited Aurora, Texas. After having been spotted sporadically in the Midwest, the illuminated, cigar-shaped craft was next seen in North Texas—first in Denton, and then in Weatherford, Corsicana, and Stephenville. The editor of the Stephenville newspaper claimed that the airship hovered so close to the town that he was able to yell out a request for an interview, which the extraterrestrial pilot denied.

Moving on to Aurora, the airship reportedly circled the town square, crashed into a windmill, and exploded, leaving behind the pilot’s charred body and a note written in indecipherable hieroglyphics. According to an article published in the Dallas Morning News two days later, the pilot was thought to be “a native of the planet Mars.”

Rumors about the airship persisted, and in 1973, a team of UFO buffs and television crews descended on Aurora to see if they could substantiate the story. Some Aurora elders claimed to remember the close encounter, while most of the town’s 300 residents emphatically insisted that it was an old hoax designed to revive Aurora’s declining fortunes. The incident may always remain a mystery, however, since a district court blocked an effort to exhume an Aurora grave that some believed held the pilot’s body. According to local legend, the grave was marked only by a headstone bearing a cryptic insignia: several small circles drawn inside the Greek letter delta. The stone has since disappeared.

1870? WORLD'S OLDEST UFO PHOTO?

I honestly do not see how you get a UFO out of this. It could be absolutely anything. The only "documentation" is the word of an anonymous seller on Ebay.
If this was indeed originally a "stereo" photograph, that means someone had some very specialized equipment conveniently on-site when this thing showed up. I am not a debunker, but one really doesn't have to be to look askance at this thing. I wouldn't be surprised if some mundane explanation eventually turns up. I would need a lot more than we presently have to accept this at face value. Heck, it doesn't even HAVE any face value. If I had never heard the backstory, such as it is, I could look at this picture every day for the rest of my life and never once think UFO. Dog poop on a snowdrift, maybe.
I would not be surprised if some mundane explanation eventually turns up. I would need a lot more than we presently have to accept this at face value.
And, as if all of this were not enough of a leap of logic, now someone is seeing swastikas. Perhaps this is a Nazi time machine ferrying Jack the Ripper into the future to kill Jack Kennedy...--Chuck Miller




"Photos from Erich Von Daniken's book, My World in Pictures. They show the model of the 'aircraft' found in 1898 in an ancient Egyptian tomb. There are fourteen similar models in Egyptian museums."
(Translated by Lena Turpin)

Oroville Daily Register 12-3-1896

Air Ship at Forbestown

Harry P. Stow was in town yesterday from Forbestown and said that one of his most reliable and trustworthy men at the Goldbank mine, Thos. E. Goyne, was positive that he saw the airship on Sunday evening.
It was a little after 7 o'clock when Mr. Goyne saw the bright light carried at the bow of the "aerial" and after watching it a moment observed that it to rose and fell and did not remain stationary like a star. He ran into his house and called Mrs. Anson, who came out to satisfy herself and she was so convinced that she called the Rev. Mr. Kiest, who studied the floating light attentively.
Then Mr. Goyne ran down into the town and in a few moments half the people in Forbestown were straining their eyes and craning their necks noting the position and the movements of the mysterious moving light. It seemed to have a wave-like or oscillating movement and this was observed by fully 100 people. r. Stow did not see the light himself, but said the gentleman who first observed it felt confident that it was the mysterious visitor that has been floating over Sacramento Valley.

1742, December 16, from an account by a Fellow of the Royal Society, England:

I was crossing St James park when a light rose from behind the trees and houses, from the south and west, which at first I thought was a rocket of large size. But when it rose 20 degrees, it moved parallel to the horizon, but waved like this (the speaker drew an undulating line) and went on in the direction of north-by-east. It seemed very near. Its motion was very slow. I had it for about half a mile in view. A light flame was turned backwards by the resistance the air made to it. From one of burning charcoal. That end was a frame like bars of iron, and quite opaque in my sight. At one point on the longitudinal frame, or cylinder, it issued a train in the shape of a tail of light more bright at one point on the rod or cylinder; so that it was transparent for more than half of its length. The head of this strange object seemed about a half a degree in diameter and the tail near three degrees in length.

1893, North China Sea:

In February of 1893, the ship, H.M.S. Carolina was sailing in the North China Sea, when a report from an officer of unusual light activity in the sky came to the attention of Captain J.N. Norcross. The officer told Captain Norcross that the lights appeared sometimes in a huge mass, others spread out in unusual patterns. He said that they resembled Chinese laterns set between the masts of a ship. The next night these strange lights reappeared but with a reddish glow and eminatting small amounts of smoke.

UFOs One Year at a Time: 1968

CLUJ, ROMANIA- 1968In the morning of August 18, 1968, Emil Barnea, a 45 year old construction technician, which had been an officer in the army, known for his integrity, and his girlfriend Zamfira Mattea, aged 34, employee in a charity organization, were taking a walk and went towards the wood of Hoia-Baciu, near the city of Cluj in Romania. They were accompanied by two other people, a man and a woman, who remained anonymous becasue they wanted their privacy respected.

The weather was splendid, and the four decided to stop and have lunch under the sun in a small clearing of the wood, close of the road from Cluj to Bucharest.

Emil Barnea went to seek seasoned wood for a campfire. There was no wind, and the only sounds were the birds singing.

He then heard his girlfriend calling to invite it to come see something which intrigued her. It was 01:23 p.m.

Barnea came back from the clearing and looked at what her girlfriend indicated to him: above the clearing where they were, there was a round craft in the sky, rather large, of metallic appearance, which reflected the sunlight as if it were silver plated. The machine slowly flew above the wood, without any noise.

Barnea then rushed towards his bag of which he extracted his camera, he estimated the lighting and the distance and took a first photography. As the machine went always rather slowly, it had more than enough time to take a second shot.

He noticed variations of luminosity of the craft, and its fluctuating flight.

At this time, the craft suddenly accelerated, going up, and Barnea had just the time to take two more photographs before the machine was too far away to be seen. His fourth photograph was never publicly published because the other couple appeared on it, and they really did not want to be identified. This fourth photography was nevertheless shown by Emil Barnea to ufologists Florin Gheorghita and Ion Hobana later, it shows the machine who had become very small in relative size and as lost in a sort of cloud.

The four witnesses had followed all the maneuvers of the machine, which had lasted approximately two minutes, and then stood quite some time in awe and not knowing what to say. At the end of a few days, the shock which this incident had caused them had dissipated. At the end of one week or two, the film roll in Emil Barnea's camera was finished, and he developed it and made some prints. he was hesitant as of what to do about the observation and of the photographs, knowing that people talking of flying saucers were generally ridiculed.

(From UFO Phenomenon at Close Sight)

FEBRUARY 28, 1968

At 7:45 p.m., February 28, the three-man crew of an Eastern Air Lines ferry flight from St. Louis to Miami saw a string of unknown lights that caused the pilot "to take evasive action." Traveling at 18,000 feet, Captain Robert F. Reilman, Flight Officer A. J. Farmer and Safety Officer Rick Morrison first noticed "a red flashing light" at their altitude. In his report to NICAP, the pilot said the light was at their 11:30 position about halfway between Jacksonville and Orlando, Florida. "Who's this at our 11:30 position?" Capt. Reilman asked a nearby control center. The center replied that they had been in communication with a plane 15 miles away. "Well, this guy isn't 15 miles away," the pilot replied.

"He's at 11:30, has one flashing red light and three - now four red lights strung out - one red light turned to green." At this point, Capt. Reilman "prepared to take evasive action." The center radioed back that they had spotted no targets on their radar scope. "Come on," Reilman responded, "he's going right by us at our 9:00 position." The center still replied that they had no targets and that no balloons were in the vicinity. "I dropped the subject and proceeded to Miami," the Captain concluded. Pacings of ground vehicles have often badly frightened the witnesses, showing that official debunking and denials have not abated fears of UFOs. If anything, they have increased such fears, since many citizens believe the facts are kept from them.

source: http://www.nicap.org/newlook/section_III.htm

Plaine des Caffres, La Réunion, France-- July 31, 1968:

http://ufologie.net/htm/plainedescafres1968.htm

On July 31, 1968, at approximately 9 hours in the morning, Luce Fontaine, a creole, a "drunk cowboy" according to sources making fun of the event and a farmer married to a shcoolteacher according to other sources, 22 years old, was gathering grass for his rabbits in a small clearing, at the center of an acacias wood at the location"Le Tampon" in the Plain of Cafres, Reunion island.

He said to have seen there, during about fifteen seconds, an object of oval shape, with a translucent center and dark blue ends, stationed four or five meters above him at a distance of 25 meters. The machine measured some 5 meters broad and 2 meters 50 height.

Of blue and white color, the object emitted a raw whitish light compared with that of an welder. Sorts of large feet of metal were above and below the machine:

Drawing in J.P. Lavilgrand's report.

In the center of the craft, behind the translucent part, Luce Fontaine saw two characters of the humanoid type, of approximately 90 centimetres in height, dressed from the feet to the head of a kind of bumpy cosmonaut suit, which he called the "Michelin babas" since they resembled the famous mascot of the tires manufacturer. The two beings carried sorts of helmets which partially masked their face.

At the end of a few seconds, the two beings seemed to realize the presence of Luce Fontaine, they turn their back to him and the machine disappears in a few seconds in a dazzling flash of light and a hot air blast.

Luce Fontaine, according to various local journalistic sources, is presented sometimes as "a farmer considered as sober and honest", or "a cowboy who was returning of a party where alcohol abunded." The accounts do not specify if it is him who spontaneously went to find the Gendarmes to report what he saw or if the gendarmes came to challenge the man about a spread story, in any event, the Gendarmes of the island noted his statement to them as:

"I saw during about fifteen seconds an object of ovoid shape stationed at four or five meters above the ground. The object emitted a light like that of an electric welder. It had four to five meters in diameter and approximately two meters and a half in hieght. It was blue and white in its upper and lower parts. I was incomodated by the powerful light, but I could nevertheless distinguish, behind a blue screen, two characters who seemed to me to measure approximately 90 centimetres. The two characters were in an astronaut's suit."

"They resembled two "Michelin Babas", one of them was showing his back whereas the other faced me. When these two kind of cosmonauts saw me, there was a white flash and the apparatus flew away."

His interrogation by the Gendarmerie, within the framework of the investigation directed by Gendarmerie Captain Maljean, of Saint-Pierre, did not end in the publication of a commonplace explanation nor in the exposure of a hoax and the reports are not classified.

After the investigation by the Gendarmerie, it was the director of the departmental service of fire and help, Captain Léopold Legros, who had some knowledge as regards nuclear power, chemistry and biology, who realized that Luce Fontaine's hat and trousers were radioactive in proportions higher than the natural rates. He had used the detection equipment of Gillot airfield to that effect.

Legros then inspected the sighting's premises and also detected an abnormal radioactivity there, on six specific points aligned three by three on the ground. In addition, Luce Fontaine had a bleeding nose during the eight days which followed his observation, but there was no other noted consequence on his health.

J.P. Lavilgrand, of Daint-Denis de la Reunion, was the first "civilian" ufologist to learn about the case and he published a report, followed by a report by Mr. Albany of the GEPA ufology group. Captain Legros told J.P. Lavilgrand about the radioactivity measured on the site:

"In a radius of five meters around the point flown over by the UFO, eight points of radioactivity caught our attention. On grass tufts, on stones, we detected up to 60 milliRöntgens."

These measurements are not alarming, but quite abnormal. J.P. Lavilgrand furthermore pointed out that the measurements were made 10 days after the events, and that the abundant seasonal rains might have washed up the ground. He also noted the statement of Luce Fontaine, as follows:

"I was at kilometer 21 in a small clearing in the center of a wood of acacias. Bent towards the ground, I collected grass for my rabbits that morning, when I suddenly saw in the clearing a kind of oval cabin 25 meters away of me, hovering at 4 or 5 meters of the ground. Its ends were dark blue, the center was clearer, more transparent, a little like the windshield of a 404 car. Above and below, there was like two feet of brilliant metal glass."

"In the center of the cabin, two individuals, stood with their backs turned towards. That of left turned the head and thus faced me. He was upright, small, 90 cm approximately, wrapped feet to head in a kind of suit like the Michelin man. The one at my right-hand side simply turned the head towards me, but I nevertheless had time to glimpse on his face, partly masked by a kind of helmet."

"Both then turned their backs at me, and there was a flash as violent as that of the electric spark of a welding machine. All became white around me, a strong heat came, then like a blow of air, and a few seconds later there was nothing any more."

"I then approached the place where the machine had been; there was no trace. This object measured 4 or 5 meters in diameter and 2 meters 50 of height approximately. It was of bluish color, white on the higher and lower parts. I told all that to my wife and to the gendarmes, all believed me immediately."

The story was published in the local press, under the heading: "Flying saucer in the Plain of Cafres? Radioactivity slightly higher than the normal noted on clothing of the single witness, a farmer named Luce Fontaine who claims: "Two Michelin men were in the apparatus"." It then came to the press in mainland France, with numerous articles in newspapers like "Centre-Matin", "Le Courier de l'Ouest", "l'Alsace", "Nice Matin", "Le Provençal", "L'Alsace ", "Nice Matin", "Le Provençal": obviously, the fact that the Gendarmerie had investigated, and the traces of radioactivity, made the journalists more comfortable on whether the event was worthy to be reported.

On the very spot of the observation, one of the most famous night clubs of La Reunion was later built, and called "The Flying saucer", and the story is now as much the subject of the gibes in the island as a minor classic of the ufologic literature:

The Flying Saucer: a discotheque in the outer limits It is the last house on the road of the Plains. In 1958, a named Luce Fontaine, cowboy, returning from a party where there was large amounts of alcohol, saw an unidentified flying object crash on its current site. The myth of the "Flying saucer" was born. Today and for forty years, inhabitants of the four corners of the island and all generations have perpetuated the myth while shaking their hips on java, tango and techno music. A dance hall not like any others, where couples form and split, and forget their daily concerns.

Several more times, and notably a few years later in 1975, the Michelin men and their flying saucer came back to visit the island of La Réunion.

ABOVE: Incident at Redlands, California (4 Feb 1968)
http://www.nicap.org/redlands.htm

 This case concerns the reported sighting by some
twenty observers of an object with seven lights on the bottom,
which appeared as jets, and a row of eight to ten lights on top
which were alternating in color.  The object was reported to have
proceeded at a low altitude (estimated about 300 feet) in a
northeasterly direction for about a mile, to have come to a stop
and to have hovered briefly, jerked forward, hovered again, then
to have shot straight upward, stopped, hovered again, then wavered
to the northwest, gained altitude, and then to have shot off to
the northwest with a strong burst of speed.  It was under
observation for about 5 minutes.  The object was estimated to have
been at least 50 feet in diameter.  The estimates of 300 feet
altitude and 50 feet must be considered jointly; only the apparent
diameter can be judged, of course, but on the assumption of a
given distance the estimate of 50 feet was arrived at.  Clearly,
if the object had been several miles away, the unchanged apparent
diameter would lead to an unbelievably large object.

Claremont, New Hampshire-Dome-Shaped Object Hovers 10 ft above Ground

source:
http://www.nicap.org/newlook/section_VI.htm

Early on the morning of July 30, 1968, a couple (names on file at NICAP) finished working on their new house in the Robert's Hill district of Claremont, New Hampshire and were preparing to retire. Some lights in the field back of the house, apparently about 200 feet away, attracted their attention and they went to the window to see what was going on.

To their astonishment, they saw a dome-shaped object hovering about 10 feet off the ground. The underside of the object was illuminated, and the light covered an area about 20 feet in diameter on the ground. Since they were in a fairly isolated area with no telephone (they had just moved into the house), the couple became frightened. They could hear a buzzing sound, like a transformer, coming from the object. The time was about 2:30 a.m.

Mr. and Mrs. John Meloney of the New Hampshire NICAP Subcommittee investigated the report in close cooperation with the Claremont police. In their interview with the couple, they learned that the UFO had remained over the field until about 4:30 a.m. Then the humming became very loud, the light grew to high intensity and the UFO moved away at a low angle upward to the west and disappeared. In the garage, the family dog whined loudly as the UFO departed. Two separate groups of witnesses have been located by the Subcommittee. The reports seem to indicate beyond a reasonable doubt that something unexplained was in the area.