Donald Keyhoe
Donald Edward Keyhoe (* June 20, 1897, † 29 November 1988) was an American Marine Corps - related ( Major), author of many aviation articles and stories in a variety of leading journals and managers of pioneering flights across the Atlantic - especially Charles Lindbergh. Also known as UFO researchers, he made a name for himself. Jerome Clark writes that Keyhoe was considered in the late 1950s and 1960s by many as the leading figure in the field of UFO research.
Education, professional
Keyhoe grew up in Ottumwa, Iowa on. He attended the Preparatory Academy of the Navy, she graduated in 1919 with a Bachelor of Science - standing, and was shortly afterwards Lieutenant in the Marine Corps. 1922 was injured in a plane accident in Guam his arm, and during the long convalescence period, he began to write. He returned to active duty, but since the injury bothered him constantly, he gave in 1923 to the military service and worked in the surveying department of the U.S. Department of Commerce.
1927 organized Keyhoe a famous flight tour of Charles Lindbergh. This led to the first Keyhoes, 1928 forthcoming book Flying With Lindbergh ( "Fly with Charles Lindbergh "). The book made a sensation and quickly led to Keyhoes career as a freelance writer. He wrote several articles and stories - most of them related to aviation - in a larger number of leading organs of publication.
During the Second World War Keyhoe returned to active military service. He was promoted to Major and worked in the Flight Training Department of the Navy.
First UFO book of history: " Flying Saucers Are Real "
After the famous Kenneth Arnold sighting of nine strange objects frenzied flight on 24 June 1947, the beginning of the public interest in " flying saucers " Keyhoe pursued the matter from a skeptical perspective. In May 1950 - after the U.S. Air Force contradictory statements ( one hand: serious matter, on the other hand: confusion, hysteria, Juxe ) had issued, turned to the publisher of the popular American magazine True ( "True" ), Ken Purdy, to Keyhoe and asked to let him play his relationships in Washington and trying to find out more about the matter.
After Keyhoe had investigated, he could, as he writes, no longer fail to consider the flying saucers as real. Since the shape, maneuvers, speed, and lighting of the saucers presented any known earthly technology in the shadows, he became convinced that they had to be of extraterrestrial origin, and the government was trying to cover up the truth about them. This conclusion was based primarily on that Keyhoe was declared by members of the Pentagon, was nothing, but it was also the insight into the documents refused on the matter.
In the 1950 January issue of the magazine True Keyhoes article appeared there The Flying Saucers and aroused broad public interest. Edward Ruppelt reported that " rumors circulated in the magazine publishers that Donald Keyhoes article is True in one of the most widely read and discussed magazine articles in history."
Keyhoe brought little later the extended article in a book, ' The Flying Saucers Are Real ( " The flying saucers exist " ) out. In this book he argued that the Air Force knew that flying saucers were " interplanetary ", this play is shut to prevent a panic. The book was a bestseller and sold more than half a million times.
Director of NICAP
In early 1957, Keyhoe was offered to take over the directorship of the UFO organization NICAP ( National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena ), and he accepted. The various UFO books he published during his time as NICAP director, contributed significantly to the widespread reputation of this organization. Keyhoe headed it until December 1969, when he - was forced to resign - on the grounds of financial mismanagement and authoritarian behavior. The immediate restructuring measures initiated his successors, which led to a drastic decline of NICAPs importance and influence, excited many with the suspicion that NICAP was infiltrated to destroy the organization and to deprive Keyhoe his instrument to influence the public and the Pentagon.
Later life and death
1973 Keyhoe wrote his last book about UFOs, Aliens From Space. It proposed a large-scale operation that should incite the aliens to land on an airfield to enter into peaceful contact with them. Furthermore, it described his difficulties in obtaining information from government agencies.
Keyhoes contact with UFO researchers faded more and more. Every now and then he lectured on UFO conferences. In 1981, he joined the board of the UFO organization MUFON, but its membership was rather only on paper, as his health had deteriorated. Keyhoe died in 1988 at the age of 91 years. He was buried in the Green Hill Cemetery in Luray ( Virginia).
Publications by Donald E. Keyhoe
- Flying with Lindbergh, 2003 ( reprint ), Kessinger Publishing, ISBN 0-7661-4294-9
- The Flying Saucers Are Real (1950 ), 2006 ( reprint ), Cosimo Classics, ISBN 1-59605-877-3 ( read online )
- Flying Saucers from Outer Space (1953), Henry Holt and Company, NY
- The Flying Saucer Conspiracy, 1955, Henry Holt and Company, NY
- Flying Saucers: Top Secret, 1960, G. P. Putnam & Sons, ASIN B000EB427C
- Aliens from Space: The Real Story of Unidentified Flying Objects, 1973, Signet Press, ASIN B000HYOMMG