Gerald Ford calls for UFO hearings
After the March 1966 Michigan sightings, House Minority Leader Gerald Ford demanded a congressional inquiry into UFOs.
1966 CE · 38.89, -77.01 · status: official
The account
In March 1966 a wave of sightings around Dexter and Hillsdale, Michigan, drew national press. When Air Force consultant J. Allen Hynek suggested that some of the reports might be swamp gas, the explanation was ridiculed. Ford, whose home state it was, issued press releases and wrote to the chairmen of the House Armed Services and Science and Astronautics committees asking for hearings, and the Armed Services Committee held a short open session with Air Force witnesses in April 1966.
The sceptical view
Hynek later said his swamp-gas remark was meant for only a few of the reports and that his caveats were ignored; the hearing produced no new evidence, only a new study.
Connections in the atlas
- Gerald R. Ford: After the March 1966 Michigan sightings and the ridiculed ‘s
- House Science and Astronautics UFO symposium
- J. Allen Hynek
- Condon Report
- Project Blue Book closes