; Phantoms and Monsters: Pulse of the Paranormal

lundi, juin 05, 2017

History of Chicago Strangeness - Part 1


The following reports have been provided by humanoid researcher / author Albert Rosales. It is a 3-part series that concentrates on Chicago strangeness:

Location. Chicago, Illinois
Date: May 9 1909
Time: evening

Two immense balloons, following closely each other and traveling rapidly toward the south, passed over Chicago early this evening. Both balloons carried lights. One of them at least has two men in the basket. The other was too far away to make out, even with the aid of glasses whether or not there was any one onboard.

Where the balloons came from and who were the daring aeronauts, speeding through the air nearly a mile high, is a mystery. The lookout at the United Sates life-saving station at the mouth of the Chicago River was the first one to descry the strange-looking objects in the heavens. The lookout called Capt. Charles Carland of the life-saving crew. The latter brought his field glasses to bear on the balloons. With the aid of these glasses he was able to distinguish the forms of at least two men in one of them.

Source: Kay Massingill in Magonia_exchange@yahoogroups.com quoting Los Angeles Times (1886-1922) May 10 1909

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Location. Chicago, Illinois
Date: fall 1934
Time: afternoon

Miriam Golding and her fiancé had been to an afternoon concert and finding they had ample time before keeping a dinner date with his family, they decided to browse around in a nearby music store. They took the elevator upwards and, once in the store, settled down on stools to study the latest scores and literature. Miriam was paging through a magazine when her fiancé, Stan, nudged her, pointing to the clock. As far as she can be sure they both returned to the elevator but in the crush on the way down they got separated in the crowd. On arriving at what she thought was the main floor she tried to push her way out but was shoved back. The door closed again and they started down. She thought she could hear her fiancé calling her name as the elevator descended below street level. Finally there was that familiar thud which marked the end of the line for old fashioned elevators and the door opened once more. She was going to stay on the ride back up, but an unfriendly operator insisted, “Everybody off!”

Leaving the car she was astonished to find herself in an immense place, a basement surely, but not of a downtown office building. There were boxes and crates stacked everywhere. Grimy, perspiring men were pushing cars or riding little trucks loaded with trunks and baggage. Her eyes searched the place and she discovered, in one corner a large iron staircase like a fire escape. Walking towards it she thought she could see daylight above so she hurried to climb upward. Reaching the top, which was indeed above ground and in broad daylight, she was completely bewildered. There was no sign of the store she had left. Nothing else that should have been there was visible. There was nothing unusual in her surroundings but the place was totally unknown to her. She was in a large railroad station.

Crowds of travelers were hurrying about. There were the usual signs, “to trains, waiting rooms, lunch counters, and tickets.” She was so engrossed with her surroundings that she almost knocked down one poor woman. She apologized, but she hadn’t even noticed her. She could see no signs of arrivals or departures of trains, no timetables, and was curious (an understatement) to know where she was. Just then an announcer’s voice rose above the din to read off a long string of names. However, she had seldom been able to understand railroad announcers and of this she caught not one word. Wandering around confusedly, she finally sighted the Information Booth. There was a long line and she joined in. Standing there she felt decidedly foolish about having to ask where she was, but when she reached the girl and voiced her question, she seemed completely unaware of her existence. This was the last straw and she hurried away. She followed the wall until she saw a “To the street” sign and went outside into the open air. She still had no idea where she was. It was a beautiful day, warm, with a cloudless, blue sky that would have seemed like mid-summer had not the leaves on the great trees along the avenue already turned gold, crimson and orange. There was a new red brick building going up across from the station. It looked like it might be a church. There were many people out on the street too, all looking healthy, pleasant and contented. She smiled at some of the passersby but received only blank stares. She heard friendly voices but couldn’t understand a word. The place seemed so normal that she scarcely was frightened but who in such a situation could be other than confused and perplexed?

Wandering aimlessly along the street, she noticed ahead of her a blond boy, probably in his teens, standing in the center of the walk staring in all directions. Nearing him she stepped to one side to pass but as she did so he smiled eagerly, reached out to touch her arm as if to see if she was real. She stopped and smiled back.

He said haltingly, “I guess they---let you off at the wrong stop too?” Miriam immediately understood that, however fantastic, the same thing had happened to both of them. Their mutual plight created a bond and for want of anything better to do, they continued together down the broad avenue. “This is weird” he remarked, “I was playing tennis back home and went to the locker room to change my shoes. When I came out I was---in that depot.”

“Where is home?” asked Miriam

“Why, Lincoln Nebraska, of course.” He sounded puzzled.

“But I started this---trip---in Chicago!” she told him.

They walked on, discussing everything they had ever heard or read of time travel, teleportation, other space dimensions, but neither of them knew much of this sort of thing and they didn’t get far. After a while the street became less crowded. Ahead the road sloped downhill. Soon the town was behind them. They were in open country and ahead they saw the deep blue water of a lake or ocean. It was a welcome distraction and they raced down the hill, out onto the sandy beach where they flopped down on some large rocks to catch their breath. It was really lovely there, warm and fresh. The sun was dipping toward the water on the horizon now, so they assumed west was out that way. As they watched the sun drop they noticed a large sandbar not too far out. She thought she heard voices coming from there. Suddenly, she heard someone calling her name and as she grew accustomed to looking into the bright sunlight, she saw with great surprise that one of the girls on the sandbar was her fiancé’s sister. There were others with her and they all waved and shouted again. Miriam’s new found friend jumped up in excitement, “But this is wonderful!” he said. “Maybe there is some kind of---connection or---link.” He searched for the right words and as he talked he scrambled out of all his clothes but his tennis shorts. “I am going out there!” he exclaimed. “They see us! They know you! It’s not far. I can make it in a few minutes!”

He dived into the waves and swam off. With an inner excitement she watched him go. He shouted back occasionally and swam on. The figures remained on the bar and their voices still reached her. But as he swam a queer thing happened, try as he might he could get no nearer to the sandbar. Then gradually the bar seemed to grow more distant. Finally he turned and swam back to shore where he dropped onto the sand in total discouragement. There seemed nothing to say; when they looked out again the bar had disappeared. There was no fog, no obscuring mist, the sun was quite low in the sky but it was still very light. However the sandbar had vanished. Miriam couldn’t imagine what they would have done next but suddenly she was enveloped in darkness. She felt as if she floated in space and then she was back on the stool in the music store! The magazine was still spread out before her. A clock was striking and the clerks were tidying up the counters preparatory in closing. She looked around for her fiancé fully expecting to see him there too. However he was not in sight. She decided the best thing to do was go straight to his home. This time she walked down the stairs. When she got to her destination her fiancé opened the door. He certainly looked relieved. He said he’d lost her on the elevator.

After stepping out in the main floor he had been unable to locate her. Thinking she had gotten off on some other floor he had waited a while then finally decided to go on home. The rest of the family was in the dining room and they followed them without further discussion. On entering she was more than a little surprised to see Stan’s sister with the same friends she had seen on the sandbar.

Source: Fate September 1956 Vol. 9 No. 9

Comments: Could there be instances in which unsuspected people somehow ‘fall off” into another dimensional plane and at times never make their way back into ‘our’ dimension?

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Location. Chicago Illinois
Date: April 8 1954
Time: 1633

Mrs. Lelah H. Stoker of North Sheridan Road had returned to her apartment from the library, when she observed a very brilliant white, parachute-like object, with a suspended human form skimming over the water in all directions, level with her window, about 1km away. She called two neighbors, William Baruszak, a vice-resident of Western United Dairy, and his wife. Mr. Baruszak saw a large object floating about 100m off shore, which he took to be an experimental balloon and did not take much notice. At 16:45 Lelah called the coastguard, but as the searching seaplane neared the area, the object descended and seemed to condense in size, landing among sporadic foliage along the shoreline. From the object a small, but well-proportioned humanoid figure, dressed in a green one-piece suit, with a tight-fitting headdress alighted, walked up and down the frontage behind the low stone wall, and blended in with the grass. After the aircraft left, the object reflated and hovered over the water, and the occupant, who was now suspended in the air, re-entered the craft, which took off at high speed eastwards, without noise. During a tilt, Lelah noticed two parallel bars on the underside of the spherical umbrella. Investigated by Army Intelligence.

Source: Ted Bloecher in MUFON UFO Journal 159, p. 9 citing Project Blue Book Files

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Location. Near Chicago Illinois
Date: early February 1965
Time: dawn

Walking along the shore of Lake Michigan about sunrise, Harvey Keck aw a saucer about 6 ft high resting on a 4-legged landing gear, near it was a 5 ft “robot or being, stocky in build and similar to the entity reported by Reeves in Florida;” the being’s skin was tanned, eyes set far apart, and he had a pointed chin. His head was encased in a glass-domed helmet.

Source: Humcat quoting Newspaper source

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Location. Great Lakes Naval Base, near Chicago, Illinois
Date: September 1973
Time: evening

Instructor R. K. Gunnery/School Grade E-4, while delivering a sealed envelope to the Commandant in a Quonset hut was surprised to see a saucer 30 ft in diameter and 10 ft in height resting on a wooded platform. Description: Silvery blue and shimmering, it tapered like a teardrop with a flange running along its topside from one end to the other and there were no windows. R K believed this saucer to be the one shot down on its third pass over a Navy vessel by a missile. The saucer crashed in 350 ft of water between Hawaii and the mainland. It was retrieved by a Glomar Explorer, and shipped to Hawaii and then Chicago.

Source: UFO Crash List (Original Source missing from my files)

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Location. Chicago, Illinois
Date: October 29 1973
Time: morning

The witness awakened and got ready for work and left his apartment building on Whipple Street in northwest Chicago. He didn’t have a car then, so he had to take a bus to the rapid transit station at Addison, where he took the train for downtown. When he got off at Madison and took the stairs up to the street, it dawned on him that the reason few people were around was because he had forgotten to set his clock back for the ending of Daylight Savings Time. He was about to get to his office an extra hour early. He walked west on Madison toward the Chicago River…it was the first time he had gone that way to work. Normally he got off at the L and rode it to Washington, taking him about five blocks closer to work, but for some reason he took the more distant route, a strange new route with almost no people on the street, an unseasonably warm autumn day---it made him feel rather odd. About half way, he looked ahead at a man walking toward him. As he got closer, things began to feel rather ethereal. He was tall, well over six feet and he had no head or facial hair. He wore a strange silvery green uniform without lapels, buttons or openings. It was skin tight and appeared to be one piece, closed at his neck. As he got abreast of the witness he smiled warmly and looked at him with piercing, greenish-blue eyes. The witness felt a powerful spiritual attraction to him. He waited for what he assumed was just a second or two and quickly turned to see where he was going, but he had vanished. Stunned, he walked back to the nearest door, but it was locked. He tried every door for a quarter block but they were all locked. Then he noticed more people on the street. A little unhinged, he continued on to his office building at Canal and Madison. When he arrived at his office on the fifth floor, his secretary said, “Wow, you’re never late.” He had arrived at just after nine, when he should have arrived at seven, as he always did. He had lost two hours. The witness is convinced he encountered a “benevolent humanoid, but has never being hypnotically regressed to explore what really happened to him on that date.

Source: Direct from confidential source

Comments: Unexplored abduction event?

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Location. Chicago, Illinois
Date: August 1976
Time: 22:30

Following reports that a young blonde woman in a white flowing dress was locked in Resurrection Cemetery, Police Sergeant Pat Homer was sent to the scene. He could see nothing in the cemetery but found railing bars bent apart with human-like handprints on them.

Source: Fairley and Welfare 1985 p127, citing Richard T. Crowe

Comments: Resurrection Mary?

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Location. Chicago, Illinois
Date: late 1977
Time: night

A police officer saw 8-10 figures dressed like monks moving about in a churchyard. He challenged them but got no reply, so he gave chase, armed with a shotgun, up a hill. When he reached the top, a short time after the figures they had disappeared.

Source: Fairley and Welfare 1985, p126, citing Richard T. Crowe

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Location. Chicago Illinois
Date: August 29 1979
Time: 2200

The 47-year old witness living southwest of the city watched a huge blimp like structure passing over her house at treetop level, through the luminous yellow hull, apparently transparent; four different types of 3-foot tall humanoids could be seen, (not described). The object made a loud humming and roaring sound as if left the area. No other witnesses were located.

Source: IUR Vol. 5 #1

Humanoid Encounters Series - Albert S. Rosales

Phantoms & Monsters: Unexplained Encounters

Phantoms & Monsters: Mysterious Encounters

Phantoms & Monsters: Bizarre Encounters

Phantoms & Monsters: Strange Encounters

Phantoms & Monsters: Cryptid Encounters