Case file · Sighting
Lawyer George D. Collins claims a secret inventor
A week after the Sacramento sighting, San Francisco lawyer George D. Collins told reporters that the airship was real and belonged to a wealthy client from Oroville, an inventor about to patent it.
1896 CE · 37.79, -122.40 · status: claim
The account
The San Francisco Call ran the interview on 23 November 1896. Collins soon denied having said it, and no inventor or craft was ever produced; the rival Examiner mocked the whole story.
The sceptical view
No patent, craft or client ever surfaced. The episode shows how the press, not witnesses, drove much of the 1896 wave.