The Roswell Incident
Timeline

Tuesday. July 1.1947 
Radars in the Roswell, White Sands, and Alamogordo area track an object that seems to defy convention. Its speeds and maneuvers suggest that it is not a craft manufactured on Earth. Checks of the radar equipment reveal no malfunction that would account for the display 

Wednesday. July 2.1947
At 9:50 P.M. Mr. and Mrs. Dan Wilmot see an oval object, "like two inverted saucers faced mouth to mouth," passing over their house in Roswell, New Mexico. The object, moving at a high rate of speed, is heading northwest. 

Thursday. July 3.1947 
At the White Sands Proving Ground, an attempted launch of a V-2 rocket fails, never getting off the pad. Several people are injured in a spray of acid. 

Steve MacKenzie is ordered to White Sands, where he spends nearly twenty-four hours watching the displays as the object flashes through the New Mexican skies. 

Friday. July 4.1947 
The first of the special flights from Washington arrives. On the plane is Warrant Officer Robert Thomas. Thomas and his companions are in uniform upon arrival, but quickly change to civilian clothes. Thomas wants an on-site briefing as soon as it could be arranged. These men remain at Roswell throughout the retrieval. 

William Woody and his father watch a flaming object, white with a red trail, fall toward the ground north ofRoswell. 

During a thunderstorm near Corona, New Mexico, W W. "Mac" Brazel hears a tremendous thunderclap that sounds like an explosion but is somehow different from the rest of the thunder. Others in the area report the same phenomenon. 

At 11:27 PM. the radar sites continue to watch the object. It seems to pulsate a number of times, then explodes into a starburst. The belief is that the object has now crashed. 

Jim Ragsdale and Trudy Truelove see a bright flash of light and hear a roaring sound that passes overhead. Ragsdale knows that something has struck the ground close to their campsite. 

Saturday, July 5.1947 
Jason Ridgway (name changed), a sheepherder in central New Mexico, finds the remains of a crashed saucer He spends little time on the site and refuses to tell anyone about it until many years later. Ridgway is a friend of Mac Brazel. 

Archaeologists, including W. Curry Holden, working the sites around Roswell stumble across the impact site where the object has crashed. One of them heads to the closest phone to tell Sheriff George Wilcox of the discovery of the remains of a crashed aircraft of some kind. 

Wilcox calls the local fire department to alert them about the crash. One truck, with Dan Dwyer on it, responds to the call. The site is about thirty-five miles north of Roswell. 

The Roswell Fire Department, escorted by members of the Roswell Police Department, makes a run along Pine Lodge Road northwest ofRoswell. These are among the first civilians to stumble across the impact site. 

At 5:30 A.M. the military knowing the approximate location of the saucer crash, move in with a carefully selected team for the recovery of the craft. The soldiers find civilians on the site already. They escort them off while others secure the area. Five bodies are found on the site. The site is cleaned and secured in six hours. 

Following the rain the night before, Brazel inspects the pastures surrounding the ranch house. Riding with him is the young son of the Proctors, William D. Proctor. During the inspection, Brazel discovers a large debris field. Scattered on the slopes and into the sinkhole and depressions are metal, plasticlike beams, pieces of lightweight material, foil, and string. The debris is thick enough that the sheep refuse to cross the field and are driven around it to water more than a mile away. 

Thomas and his crew move out to the impact site. The bodies, originally covered by sheets, are now in lead-lined body bags. Only those with the highest clearance are allowed close to the center of the impact. Guards are posted, facing out, to keep the curious away 

John McBoyle, a reporter for radio station KSWS in Roswell, tries to reach the crash site. He phones to report an object looking like a crushed dishpan. He tells Lydia Sleppy, who works at the parent station in Albuquerque, to hang on. She overhears an argument and then McBoyle tells her to forget it, he has made a mistake. McBoyle is about forty miles north of Roswell. 

Sleppy tries to put a message out on the Teletype. According to Sleppy, the message is intercepted by the FBI in Dallas and she is ordered not to complete the transmission. 

Melvin F. Brown, who is on guard duty at the impact site, is warned to climb into the back of the truck. Although he has been ordered not to look under the tarp, the moment that everyone's back is turned, he does. He finds the bodies of the alien flight crew. They are small, with large heads and skin that is yellow or orange. 

Glenn Dennis, the mortician working at the Ballard Funeral Home in Roswell, receives a call from the base mortuary offlcer, who asks him about small caskets. 

In Roswell for a conference, C. Bertram Schultz, a vertebra paleontologist, drives north from the city on Highway 285. To the west he sees a number of guards along the highway. Schultz isn't interested in driving to the west, so he doesn't stop, nor is he bothered by the guards. 

The Roswell base mortuary offlcer calls again. He asks Glen Dennis questions about what various chemicals would do to blood and tissue. He also wants to know the procedures for preparing a body that has lain out in the elements. Dennis suspects a fatal crash involving a VIP. 

Glenn Dennis receives a call from downtown Roswell, where an airman had been injured. The funeral home where Dennis works also operates the ambulance service. Dennis drives the injured airman to the base, is waved through the gate, and stops at the rear of the hospital. Parked behind it, at the loading dock and in front of the emergency room, are three ambulances. In the rear Dennis sees small, canoelike devices and strange debris of some sort. 

The bodies arrive at the base and are taken to the hospital for examination. Dr. Jesse Johnson pronounces them dead. Two doctors who are not assigned to the base but who have arrived on one of the special flights begin the preliminary autopsy. 

Brazel, taking a few scraps of the material, heads to the home of his closest neighbors, Floyd and Loretta Proctor. He shows them "a little sliver" of material that he can neither burn nor cut. The Proctors suggest he take it into town to show the sheriff. 

Inside the base hospital at Roswell, Dennis is confronted by two officers. A red haired captain tells Dennis that he has seen nothing and heard nothing; if he opens his mouth, they will be picking his bones out of the sand. 

Military bases along the West Coast have fighters on standby in case the flying disks are seen. A few bases in Oregon and Washington have planes equipped with gun cameras on airborne alert. 

Sherman Campbell of Circleville, Ohio, reports to the sheriff that he has what he thinks is an explanation for some of the flying disk sightings. He has found a weather balloon on his farm. It is metallic, with a kitelike appendage on it. The device is displayed at the local newspaper office and then returned to Campbell. Jean Campbell (Romero), Campbell's daughter, reports that it is kept in a barn for years afterward. 

Later that evening, Brazel removes the large, circular piece of the debris from the range. Brazel either loads it into the back of his truck or drags it along behind. He stores it in a livestock shed about three miles nqrth of the crash site. 

The bodies are sealed into a long crate, which is taken to a hangar. It is left there overnight with spotlights playing on it while MPs stand guard around it. They never approach it. 

Melvin Brown, along with other soldiers, is ordered to stand guard outside the hanger. Brown's cornmanding officer approaches and says, "Come on, Brownie, let's have a look inside." But there is nothing to see because everything has been packed and crated, ready for shipment. 

Sunday, July 6, 1947 
Brazel gets up early, completes his chores, and then drives into Roswell, about seventy-five miles away He stops at the office of Sheriff George A. Wilcox. Contrary to published reports, Wilcox is excited about the find and suggests the military at the Roswell Army Air Field be notified. 

At 11:30 A.M. Dennis finally locates his friend, the nurse, who agrees to meet him for lunch. He drives out to the base to meet her at the officers' club. 

While waiting for the military officers to arrive, Wilcox dispatches two of his deputies to the ranch. They have only the directions given by Brazel, but both men are familiar with the territory; and Wilcox believes they will be able to find the debris field. 

William Woody and his father try to drive out toward the area where they'd seen the object coming down, but the roads are blocked. The side roads off Highway 285, from Vaughn and to the west, are guarded by military police who allow no one to pass. 

Frank Joyce, a reporter and announcer for radio station KGFL, calls the sheriff and asks if anything interesting is happening at the office. Wilcox refers him to Brazel. 

Colonel William Blanchard, commanding officer of the 509th Bomb Group, orders Jesse A. Marcel, the air intelligence officer, to investigate. Marcel immediately drives to the sheriff's office. Marcel interviews Brazel, examines the pieces of the material that Brazel brought in, and decides he had better visit the ranch to examine the field for himself. 

Marcel, taking some of the debris with him, returns to the base and reports to Blanchard what he has seen. Blanchard, convinced that he is in possession of something highly unusual, perhaps Soviet, alerts the next higher headquarters. No one mentions any type of balloon. 

Marcel returns to the sheriff's office with the senior counterintelligence agent assigned to the base, Captain Sheridan Cavitt. They escort Brazel back to his ranch and examine the debris field. 

Acting on orders from Major General Clements McMullen, deputy commander of the Strategic Air Command, Blanchard obtains, from the sheriff's office, more of the debris. It is sealed in a courier pouch and loaded on an airplane to be flown on to the Fort Worth Army Air Field, where it is given to Colonel Thomas DuBose for transport on to Washington, D.C. 

After Marcel and Cavitt leave with Brazel, the two deputies return to say they did not find the debris field but observed a burned area in one of the pastures. There the sand has been turned to glass and blackened. It looks as if something circular has touched down. 

At the Fort Worth Army Air Field, DuBose and Colonel Alan D. Clark, the base commander, meet the aircraft from Roswell. Clark receives the plastic bag with the debris and walks to the "command" B-26 to fly it to Washington, D.C., and General McMullen. 

Because of the distance to the ranch over roads that are less than adequate, Brazel, Marcel, and Cavitt do not arrive until after dark. They stay at the "Hines" house (an old ranch house close to the debris field), eat cold beans, and wait for daylight. Marcel runs a Geiger counter over the large piece of wreckage Brazel has stored in the cattle shed. He detects no sign of radiation. 

Monday, July 7,1947 
At 2:00A.M. a special flight leaves for Andrews AAF in Washington, D.C. Some of the debris and the bodies are on that flight. 

Brazel takes the two military officers out to the crash site. It is three-quarters of a mile long and two to three hundred feet wide. A gouge starting at the northern end of it extends for four or five hundred feet toward the other end. It looks as if something has touched down and skipped along. The largest piece of debris is recovered at the southern edge of the gouge. 

The debris is as thin as newsprint, but incredibly strong. There is foil that, when crumpled, unfolds itself without a sign of a wrinkle, I beams that flex slightly and have some symbols on them, and material resembling Bakelite. 

Marcel and Cavitt walk the perimeter of the field and then range out looking for more details or another crash site, but find nothing else. Finally they return and spend the remainder of the day collecting debris. They load the rear of Marcel's car and then the jeep carryall driven by Cavitt. About dusk they begin the trip back to Roswell. 

Lieutenant General Nathan E Twining, the commander of the Air Materiel Command, the parent organization at Wright Field, Ohio, and the next higher headquarters for both the Alamogordo Army Air Field and the Kirtland Army Air Field, changes his plans and flies into Alamogordo. 

General Carl Spaatz, commander of the army air forces, on "vacation" in the Pacific Northwest, tells reporters that he knows nothing about the flying disks or the plans of various local units to search for them. 

Intrigued by the story Joyce has told him about the telephone interview he'd conducted with Brazel, Walt Whitmore, Sr., wants to learn more. Whitmore, who knows many of the ranchers and is familiar with the area, drives out to find Brazel. 

Brazel, now in the company of Walt Whitmore, Sr., has been asked to stay the night in Roswell. 

Tuesday. July 8.1947 
At 2:00 A.M. Marcel stops at his house on the way to the base. He awakens his wife, Viaud Marcel, and son, Jesse, Jr., to show them the material. Over the next hour they examine the debris on the kitchen floor. Marcel, Sr., says it was a flying saucer. Marcel is not breaking regulations since nothing has yet been classified. With the help of his son, Marcel loads it into the car to be taken to the base. 

At 6:00 A.M. Marcel and Cavitt visit with Blanchard in his quarters and tell him what they have seen. 

Blanchard calls the provost marshal and orders him to post guards on the roads around the debris field, denying access to anyone without official business. Easley is directed to locate Brazel and have him escort the MPs to the crash site. 

Blanchard calls Eighth Air Force headquarters and advises them of the new find. By this time no one believes the material is from a Soviet device. 

Eighth Air Force relays the message up the chain of command to SAC headquarters. 

The regular morning staff meeting is moved up to 7:30 A.M. Blanchard discusses the new find and its possible disposition. Attending the meeting are Marcel and Cavitt; Lieutenant Colonel James I. Hopkins, the operations officer; Major Patrick Saunders, the base adjutant; Major Isidore Brown, the personnel officer; and Lieutenant Colonel Ulysses S. Nero, the supply officer There is reason to believe that Lieutenant Colonel Charles W Horton, Lieutenant Colonel Fernand L. Andry; Lieutenant Walter Haut, and Master Sergeant Lewis Rickett may have also been there. 

Whitmore, his wire-recorded interview wkh Brazel completed, takes Brazel out to the military base. 

At 9:00 A.M. Cavitt and Rickett, having returned from assignment in Carlsbad, drive a staff car to the impact site, followed by MPs. They are stopped by the guards who are still posted. When they arrive, they see that a small containment of debris remains which Rickett is allowed to examine. 

Whitmore of KGFL receives a phone call from Washington. He is told not to air the interview with Mac Brazel. If he does, the station will lose its broadcast license. 

Blanchard and members of the staff confer by phone with higher headquarters. Brigadier General Roger Ramey orders Marcel to Fort Worth. 

Military officers begin to interrogate Mac Brazel. He is taken to the guest house. 

At 11:00 A.M. Walter Haut finishes the press release he'd been ordered to write and is preparing to take it into town. He takes it first to one of the radio stations. By noon he has given a copy of the release to both radio stations and to both daily newspapers. 

Sheriff Wilcox, wondering what happened out at the crash site, sends two more deputies out. This time they run into the cordon thrown up by the rnilitary and are turned back. The army is letting no unauthorized personnel onto the crash site. 

At 2:26 P.M. the story is out on the AP wire. The story announces: "The army air forces here today announced a flying disc had been found." 

The phones at the base start ringing. Irritated at his inability to get a line out, Blanchard orders Haut to do something about all the incoming calls. Haut says there is nothing he could do about incoming calls. 

Robert Shirkey, standing in the operations building, watches as MPs begin carrying wreckage through to load onto a C-54 from the First Air Transport Unit. To see better, he has to step around Colonel Blanchard. 

At 2:30 PM. Blanchard decides it is time to go on leave. Too many phone callers into the base are asking to speak with him. He, along with a few members of his staff, drive out to the debris field. Those left at the base are told to inform the reporters that the colonel is now on leave. 

At 2:55 PM. the AP reports in a "95," just under a bulletin in importance, that a flying disk had been found. 

At 3:00 P.M. Marcel is told that he is going to Fort Worth with the wreckage. Only a few packages are loaded onto the plane. One, a triangular package about two feet long, is wrapped in brown paper. The other three are about the size of shoe boxes. They are so light that it feels as if there is nothing in them. The special flight, a B-29, takes off for the Fort Worth Army Air Field. 

Calls come into Roswell from all over the world as the press release hits the various news wires. 

Reporter J. Bond Johnson of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram is instructed to drive to the base. His editor tells him a flying saucer is coming from Roswell. 

Marcel is in Ramey's office with some of the debris. The general wants to see where the debris was found. Marcel accompanies him to the map room. Once Ramey is satisfied, they walk back to the general's office, but the debris is gone. In its place is a ripped-apart weather balloon with debris scattered on the floor. 

At 3:53 PM. Roger Ramey announces that the flying disk has been sent on to Wright Field near Dayton, Ohio. 

More men arrive at the debris field and are assigned to assist in cleaning it. Soldiers with wheelbarrows move across the field, tossing in the debris. When the wheelbarrows are filled, the soldier take the debris to collection points. The debris is then loaded into covered trucks to be driven into Roswell. 

At 5:30 PM. a solution for the mystery is offered by Major E. M. Kirton who tells the Dallas Morning News that a balloon is responsible for all the excitement. 

Warrant Officer Irving Newton is ordered from the weather office at the Fort Worth Army Air Field to Ramey's office. Newton, in front of a small number of reporters and officers of the Eighth Air Force, identifies the wreckage on the office floor as a balloon. He is photographed and then sent back to his regular duties. 

At 6:17 PM. the FBI sends a Teletype message to FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover telling him that a balloon is responsible for the reports. It is on its way to Dayton for examination by army air force experts. 

At 7:30P.M. the AP breaks into its last message with a bulletin telling the world that the Roswell flying disk is nothing more than a balloon. 

Ramey, with the identity of the wreckage established, announces to the world that the officers at Roswell had been fooled by a weather balloon. Ramey also appears on Fort Worth-Dallas radio station WBAP. 

An unscheduled flight from Boiling Field (Washington, D.C.) arrives. Lewis Rickett meets it at Roswell and gives the crew a sealed box with wreckage in it. He is required to get a signature before he can surrender it. 

At 10:00 PM. ABC News "Headline Edition" tells the audience that Roger Ramey has identified the Roswell wreckage as a weather balloon. 

At 11:59 PM. one of the photographs taken by J. Bond Johnson is transmitted to New York on the news wire. 

Wednesday, July 9,1947 
Morning newspapers trumpet the story that the "flying saucer" found near Roswell is a weather device. Some quote Ramey while others quote "informed" sources, including senators in Washington. 

Clean-up on the various sites resumes at sunup. The military is trying to get everything picked up before any more civilians stumble across the field. 

At 8:00 A.M. members of the First Air Transport Unit begin loading crates into C-54s. They load three or four aircraft with an intermediate destination of Kirtland. From there they are to be taken on to Los Alamos. Armed guards watch the loading of the aircraft. 

Jud Roberts along with Walt Whitmore, Sr., attempt to drive out to the debris field but run into the military cordon and are turned back. 

According to Roswell Army Air Field head secretary Elizabeth Kyle, the telephones at the base are still tied up by the incoming calls. 

More of the wreckage is brought into the base and is now being taken to be boxed into crates of various sizes and shapes. 

Bud Payne, a rancher in the Corona area, is chasing a stray cow As he crosses onto the Foster ranch, a jeep carrying soldiers roars over a ridgeline and bears down on him. He is carried from the Foster ranch. 

At 12:00 PM. the crate that has been sitting in the empty hangar guarded by the MPs is moved out to bomb pit number one. Nothing other than weapons has ever been stored in the bomb pit. 

In Roswell Floyd Proctor and Lyman Strickland see Mac Brazel under escort by three military officers. He ignores both of them, something that he wouldn't have done under normal circumstances. 

At lunch the nurse tells Dennis she is sick and wants to return to the barracks. In the course of the meal, she has provided Dennis with an account of what has happened and given him a drawing of the alien bodies. 

Under military escort Brazel is taken into town and into the offices of the Roswell Daily Record. There he gives reporters, including R. A. Adair and Jason Kellahin from Albuquerque, a new story. Now he claims to have found the debris on june 14. He also says he has found weather observation devices on two other occasions, and what he found is no weather balloon. 

Ramey's weather officer; Irving Newton, says the weather balloon is a special kind. "We use them because they go much higher than the eye can see. 

An officer from the base sweeps through Roswell picking up copies of Haut's press release, including those at the two radio stations. (Art McQuiddy said that a military officer had retrieved the copies of the press release written by Haut.) 

Late in the afternoon, a flight crew at the skeet range is told they have a special flight coming up. The squadron operations officer; Edgar Skelly, tells the aircraft commander to keep everyone together. 

The aircraft loaded by Robert Smith and other members of the First Air Transport Unit takes off for Albuquerque. The crates will eventually reach Los Alamos. All the crates are marked with stencils saying TOP SECRET. 

Members of the flight crew pulled from the skeet range quickly preflight their aircraft. Once that is accomplished, they taxi out to the bomb pit. The only places on the base where the bomb pit can be observed are the tower and portions of the flight line. 

A sealed, unmarked wooden crate is brought out and loaded into the bomb bay of the B-29, tail number 7301. Six armed MPs guard it, never allowing it out of their sight. 
At Fort Worth a number of officers meet the aircraft. One is a man the bombardier recognizes as a mortician with whom he went to school. 

When the crate is unloaded and taken from the flight line, Jesse Marcel is driven up to the aircraft. He and the crew are told to return to Roswell. There was no briefing given to them at fort Worth. It is clear now that this flight was a diversion. The bodies had already been sent to Andrews. 

At 6:00 PM. Joseph Montoya returns to the base to catch the courier flight to land. He wants to get out of Roswell and forget what he has seen. 

Mac Brazel calls on Frank Joyce, this time with a new story, significantly different from the one he told on Sunday. When Joyce points that out, Brazel responds that it "would go hard on him" if he didn't tell the new story. 

At 8:00 PM. the flight crew is back. Again, they were not debriefed, but are told that they have flown the general's furniture to Fort Worth. They are cautioned not to tell anyone, including their famalies, what they have done. As far as everyone is concerned, the flight has not taken place. 

Upon his return, Marcel confronts Cavitt in the intelligence office. Marcel wants to the reports flied in his absence, but Cavett refuses. Marcel points out that he is the senior officer but is told the orders came from Washington. If he has a problem, to "take it up with them." 

The Las Vegas Review-Journal, along with dozens of other newspapers, carries a United Press story. "Reports of flying saucers whizzing through the sky fell off sharply today as the army and the navy began a concentrated campaign to stop the rumors." The story also reports that AAF headquarters in Washington "delivered a blistering rebuke to officers at Roswell." 

Thursday, July 10, 1947
As he reads the morning newspaper, Bill Brazel learns about his father's activities in Roswell. He realizes that no one will be at the ranch and makes plans to get down 
there to help. 

At the debris field and impact site men are working to get everything cleaned up. They want nothing left and no signs of their presence. 

Military personnel return to Sheriff Wilcox's office and ask for the box of debris he has been storing for them. Wilcox surrenders it without protest. 

Mac Brazel is being held in the guest house on the base. The officers there are still trying to convince him that he is not to say anything about what he has seen. They are also trying to keep him out of the way of reporters. He is given a physical by doctors at the base hospital. 

Sheriff Wilcox calls on Glenn Dennis's father, telling him that his son has gotten himself into trouble out at the base. The sheriff had been visited by a sergeant who wants to ensure Glenn's silence. 

Major W. D. Prichard from Alamogordo claims that a unit from his base in Roswell launched balloons around June 14. That, according to the article reported in the Roswell Daily Record, is undoubtedly what Brazel had found. 

Friday, July 11, 1947 
The debriefings of all the participants are under way. Participants are taken into a room in small groups and told that the recovery is a highly classified event. No one is to talk about it to anyone. Everyone is to forget that it ever happened. 

When he tries to contact his nurse fnend, Glenn Dennis is informed that she has been transferred from the base and that no one knows where she has gone. 

Members of the military warn those civilians around Roswell who know something of the events that they can never talk about what happened. In some cases, the witnesses are threatened with death should they speak to anyone. 

Saturday, July 12, 1947 
Bill Brazel and his wife, Shirley, arrive at the ranch, but no one is around. Brazel begins his work, first surveying the ranch to see what needs to be done. He sees no evidence of a continued military presence. The trucks, jeeps, soldiers, and cordon are gone. 

This weekend no aircraft with gun cameras search for the flying disks. No aircraft on standby wait for orders to take off. In fact, all aircraft are ordered grounded to prevent further searching. 

Tuesday, July 15, 1947 
Mac Brazel returns from Roswell. All he will say about his experience is that his interrogators kept asking him the same questions over and over again and that Bill is better off not knowing what happened. Besides, Mac has taken an oath that he will never reveal, in detail, what he saw. By now most of the world has forgotten that a flying saucer supposedly crashed in New Mexico. 

Late July 1947 
A deeply upset Mac Brazel tells the Lyman Stricklands what happened in Roswell. Through he complains bitterly about his treatment there, he honors his oath of secrecy and says nothing about what he found. 

Bill Brazel finds one of the pieces of foil-like material his father had described. Brazel shows this bit of debris to Sallye Strickland (later Tadolini). 

August 1947 
Mac Brazel and ranch hand Tommy Tyree spot a piece of wreckage floating in the water at the bottom of a sinkhole. Neither man bothers to climb down to retrieve it. 

September 1947 
Lewis S. Rickett is assigned to assist Dn Lincoln La Paz from the University of New Mexico. La Paz's assignment is to deternaine, if possible, the speed and trajectory of the craft when it hit. According to Rickett, they discover a touchdown point five miles from the debris field where the sand has crystallized, apparendy from the heat, and they find more of the foil-like material. La Paz, who apparently does not know that bodies were recovered, concludes that the object was an unoccupied probe from another planet. 

Glenn Dennis learns that his nurse friend has been killed. A letter returned as undeliverable indicates the addressee is deceased. Nurses at the Roswell base tell him that she was killed in an aircraft accidentwhile stationed in London, England. 

November 1947 
Arthur Exon, assigned at Wright Field, flies over the debris field and the impact site. The tracks of the trucks and jeeps are still visible, as is the gouge. 

September 1948 
Rickett, while in Albuquerque, meets with La Paz. La Paz remains convinced that an unoccupied probe from another planet crashed in New Mexico the year before. In his secret dealings with various government projects La Paz has found nothing to cause him to change his mind. 

October 1948 
Rickett meets with John Wirth, another CIC agent. Rickett asks Wirth about the status of the material recovered at Roswell and is told that they had yet to figure it out. According to Wirth, they hadn't been able to cut it. 

Summer 1950 
From time to time in the two years following the crash, Bill Brazel has found "scraps" of the craft. His father confirms this, saying, "That looks like some of the contraption I found." Bill Brazel, in Corona, mentions his discoveries. The next day Captain Armstrong and three others from the Roswell base arrive and ask for the material. Armstrong reminds Brazel that his dad cooperated with them. It is the younger Brazel's patriotic duty to give it up. Brazel can't think of a good reason to deny it to them and surrenders it. 

Boyd Wettlaufer discusses the crash of an alien spacecraft with Dr. Lincoln La Paz. 

1952 
Major Ellis Boldra, an engineer stationed at Roswell, discovers samples of the debris locked in a safe in the engineering office. In the course of his experiments, he tries to burn and melt it with an acetylene torch and to cut it with a large variety of tools. Although extremely thin, the metal resists his efforts. When crumpled, it quickly returns to its original shape. 

1961 
UPI stringer Jay West is working in Alamogordo, in the area of White Sands Missile Range, when the base public information officer confides he has found a file that mentions the Roswell crash. The file includes a map. The PlO obtains a topographical map of the crash site. He and West make several trips out to try to locate the site. The maps show the debris field and then, to the east, a second site. 

1969 
As Americans walk on the moon, Melvin F. Brown tells his family that he has seen the wreckage of an extraterrestrial craft and the bodies of the crew. He assisted in the recovery; taking the bodies into Roswell. 

1972 
Inez Wilcox tells her granddaughter Barbara Dugger of the involvement of the Chaves County sheriff in the events of 1947. She says her husband, Sheriff Wilcox, was informed that one of the beings survived the crash. Mrs. Wilcox says rnilitary personnel used death threats to keep the family from talking about the events. 

1978 
Pappy Henderson confides in his close friend John Kromschroeder that he flew wreckage from a crashed saucer out of Roswell and to Dayton, Ohio. He shows Kromschroeder a fragment of the debris and tells his friend that he saw alien bodies. 

Jesse Marcel is interviewed by a number of researchers, including Leonard H. Stringfield and Stanton Friedman. Marcel tells them that he is sure the wreckage is 
nothing from earth. Later, Marcel grants interviews to various news organizations, but those reports do not gain wide dissemination. 

December 1979 
Reporter Bob Pratt interviews and later publishes his interview with Jesse Marcel in which Marcel "admitted that he was the intelligence officer who had recovered the parts of a flying saucer." 

1980 
Syndicated television program "In Search Of" airs an episode about UFO coverups and interviews Marcel. In the course of that interview, Marcel again insists the material he saw had no earthly origin. 

January 1980 
Charles Berlitz and William L. Moore publish The Roswell Incident, the first attempt at a comprehensive analysis of the events at Roswell. In the course of his research, Moore located and interviewed more than seventy witnesses who had some knowledge of the event. 

1982 
After reading a story about the events at Roswell in a tabloid newspaper, Pappy Henderson tells his wife, Sappho, that everything in the story was true. He knows from his own personal involvement. He is surprised that the story is being released and, moreover; that it is accurately reported. He says even the descriptions of the bodies are accurate. 

October 1988 
Jim Parker's son sees a strange pickup truck on the ranch where the debris was found in 1947. Parker and his son chase it down and discover two men sitting in a U.S Air Force pickup with a camper on the back. Inside are maps of the local area. The men are in their late twenties or early thirties and apparently of low rank. They claim they are surveying the area to put in a radar site to monitor low-flying aircraft.