Phantoms and Monsters

OWU's Legends, Ghosts and History
MUFON CMS: 'Rod' Shaped High Altitude UFO - Connecticut
Fortean / Oddball News - 9/23/2010: Russian Bigfoot, UFOs vs Nukes and Nick Redfern Interview
How to Make a Zombie / Pacify a Voodoo Doll

Posted: 23 Sep 2010 01:29 PM PDT

Image of an apparition captured at Ohio Wesleyan University - John Ciochetty

Sometimes considered one of the most haunted colleges in America, Ohio Wesleyan University certainly has a variety of spirits to choose from. Public Safety Officer, local historian and author John Ciochetty has been documenting paranormal events at the OWU and the surrounding area for almost a decade.

Ciochetty said Elliot Hall, Stuyvesant, Monnett Gardens, the Peace & Justice House, Edwards Gymnasium and University Hall all have ghosts. He said he first became involved with the ghosts on campus when he arrived in 2001.

"I got here and I noticed a lot of things were out of place," Ciochetty said. "I saw an apparition near Elliot Hall and went to the archives where I discovered similar reports."

Ciochetty said the ghost he witness lived when General William Henry Harrison had an outpost near Elliot. He said a fight between two soldiers supposedly resulted in the death of one, who was placed in a tanning vat by the murderer.

Ciochetty said the University Hall hauntings include a hand on the shoulder from a fatherly ghost and a woman chastising children in the hallways. Also present is the little boy who fell from the balcony and died. Ciochetty said this little boy now darts around the aisles of Gray Chapel.

Ciochetty said one of the more famous ghosts at OWU is that of Mrs. Perkins in P&J.

"Once my name was being mentioned, but no one was there," Ciochetty said. "It was very eerie."

He said Mrs. Perkins passed away in room 207, the quad, of P&J. According to Ciochetty, a moderator once called him because she felt a presence in the house when she was by herself. Ciochetty said he has a recording of the voice of Mrs. Perkins.

"I went to a house meeting once and played back the CD," Ciochetty said. "One of the students became visibly upset when he recognized the voice."

Senior Jack Schemenauer, the student in question, said his encounter with Mrs. Perkins happened during his first semester of residence at P&J. Schemenauer said several students were thinking of bringing a medium to contact Mrs. Perkins when he heard her voice late one night.

"I heard someone whisper, 'don't do it,' to me," he said. "So I freaked out and couldn't sleep for the rest of the night."

Schemenauer said he forgot about the incident until Ciochetty came to their house meeting and played the tape much later.

"I freaked the f*** out, teared up and said that was the voice, that was the voice," Schemenauer said.

"Her voice was so creepy. It was really soft and scary at the same time."

Senior Will Condit, another resident of P&J, also had an eerie experience in his house. Condit said he was returning from the library late one night and all of the lights were off when he entered the house and went upstairs.

"I could see the reflection of the computer's blue screensaver on the wall, but then it went blank for one second," Condit said. "It was as if the blue slid off the side of the monitor and was replaced by darkness."

Condit said he then looked down the stairwell and saw something strange.

"I could see some sort of shadowy something at the foot of the stairs," he said. "I watched the shape slide around the edge of the staircase before running to my room." - The OWU Transcript

John Ciochetty notes in 'The Ghosts of Stuyvesant Hall and Beyond':

"One building stands our predominantly as one of the symbols representing the prestige and excellence of an institution often referred to as "The Harvard of the Midwest." This structure can be located on a small hill overlooking West William Street in Delaware, Ohio. In 1931, it was built exclusively for women students. Woman such as Wendie Malick, an Emmy award winning actress of television, film and screen, once resided there.

Stuyvesant Hall

"Stuyvesant Hall was the dream and aspiration of Frank Stuyvesant. His life was extraordinary. His father fought in the American Civil War under the command of Major General William Sherman. During the war, he was captured by Confederate forces and incarcerated. At that time, conditions at prisons were so horrendous that normal healthy men died in captivity or were on the verge of death by the time they were released after the war. Frank's father never regained his youthful vitality and strength by the time he was released. At the age of twelve, Frank was given the task of being the sole provider of his family and had to leave school. He began selling carriages and farm equipment. In the early years of the automobile industry, Frank exhibited superior skills in the area of sales and blew out the competition. His impeccable knowledge of human nature and his desire to meet the needs of the consumer brought him success in the business world as a distributor for the Hudson Motor Company. The accumulation of enormous wealth was the result of his honesty and the strict adherence to the American work ethic.

"Frank and his wife, Mary, met E.G. Guthery, a graduate of Ohio Wesleyan University, and his daughter, Katherine, and through this new relationship, the Stuyvesant's developed an interest in the university. They pondered what to do with their wealth and how it could benefit others. As Frank put it, "The older I grow, the less I find money means to me. I wanted this money to be helping somebody and I wanted that to happen while I could see the results." Frank never achieved true fulfillment. He wished that he had the chance to be able to continue his education. He admired those persons whose collegiate education created an opened door to rich and rewarding experiences in life. He made a decision to use his fortune to assist young men and women at the university.

"During the 1920s, freshmen women were residing in military barrack style buildings. There was a definite need for a residence hall strictly designed for women. In 1930, Frank and Mary donated $400,000 dollars to have a dormitory built of colonial brick in a Georgian style of architecture. The structure would house up to 200 women and built in the shape of the letter "E" with a bell tower containing a carillon of chimes which was located in the center. The bell tower set Stuyvesant Hall out from every other building on the university campus. It was the center of attention. The tower and its' fifteen bells were a memorial to Frank Stuyvesant who passed away before he was able to see his dream realized. The bells were produced by the McShane Bell Foundry of Baltimore, Maryland. They could be played from an electric keyboard located on the first floor in the lobby near the office of the headmistress or by hand and foot levers in the tower. The largest bell weighs 2,200 pounds and the smallest weighs 325 pounds. The bells would be rung at precisely 5:30 PM for dinner in the hall's cafeteria and at 9 PM signaling curfew for all women residents. The dormitory would be valued at nearly one million dollars. It was entirely fireproofed with the most up to date furnishings and equipment of its time. The hall was built with Simmons steel.

Ohio Wesleyan University was founded in 1842 by Methodist leaders and Central Ohio residents as a nonsectarian institution. This engraving is of Merrick Hall in 1873.

"In the 1980's, students have witnessed a faceless woman with long flowing hair and wearing a long white dress walk on the ground floor near the laundry room between the hours of 3:30 and 4:00 am. The same apparition was seen again sitting on top of a dresser. When the student asked her to leave, she turned toward him and he noticed that she had no face.

"On December 1, 2000, a young man went to the laundry room around 3:11 am to retrieve some of his clothes from the dryer. He noticed a woman bending over to pick up some of her clothing she dropped on the floor. When he offered to assist her, she turned around and vanished into thin air.

"The most talked about legend on campus revolves around the sealed room on the ground floor. In the 1950's, a young lady occupied a room on the west end of the ground floor beside the laundry room. She was an honor student and stayed to herself most of the time. She did not associate with the other students very much except during her classes and at meal time. During the second month of her third year at the university she began missing classes, which was completely out of her character. Her fellow floor residents wondered if she went home for the semester due to an illness or family matters. No one was seen coming or going from her room for a week. In fact, nothing was heard coming from her room until the residents were woken up by a series of blood curling screams. Everyone came out of their rooms. The headmistress and dormitory officials were dispatched to the scene. Some of the residents called their boyfriends just in case they were needed to break down the door. It was total chaos!! Once entry was made into the room, the young woman was found sitting on the floor next to her bed rocking back and forth mumbling profusely. Various papers, books and clothing were found strung everywhere in the room. After the woman was assisting to her bed by the headmistress, she screamed that "they were out to get her!!" After she was able to compose herself, she explained to everyone that she could not sleep for several nights due to manifestations of apparitions which invited her to join them on the other side. The young woman admitted contemplating suicide several times during the week. A makeshift noose made from linen sheets was found underneath the bed. She withdrew from the university due to medical reasons.

"Since that time onward, any student assigned to the room requested to move to other rooms within the hall or to other dormitories after staying there for two weeks. The main reason for their requests centered on bizarre and unexplained events. As time went on, rumors about ghosts circulated throughout campus. To put these rumors to rest once and for all, one of the university administrators volunteered to stay in the room for an entire evening. Residents observed the administrator enter the room. The room was silent for the entire night. The next morning, at the crack of dawn, the official came out of the room without saying a word. One of the student residents walking down the hall at that time met up with the official. She noticed that the administrator's face was white as a sheet. The official made his way to the headmistress' office for approximately ten minutes and left the building thereafter. A work order was written up for the maintenance department to permanently seal the room."

Ciochetty notes that "for many years, students have attempted to locate the room. It has been speculated that it was located next to the men's shower and bathroom next to the laundry room. Others have theorized that the entrance of the room was covered over by drywall which has made it difficult to find. Some believe that the room no longer exists and that part of it was renovated to make way for the shower and bathroom. It should be told, however, that students have felt the presence of something or someone watching them in the restroom in addition to witnessing black shadowy figures move along the walls.

"Since that time onward, any student assigned to the room requested to move to other rooms within the hall or to other dormitories after staying there for two weeks. The main reason for their requests centered on bizarre and unexplained events. As time went on, rumors about ghosts circulated throughout campus. To put these rumors to rest once and for all, one of the university administrators volunteered to stay in the room for an entire evening. Residents observed the administrator enter the room. The room was silent for the entire night. The next morning, at the crack of dawn, the official came out of the room without saying a word. One of the student residents walking down the hall at that time met up with the official. She noticed that the administrator's face was white as a sheet. The official made his way to the headmistress' office for approximately ten minutes and left the building thereafter. A work order was written up for the maintenance department to permanently seal the room."

OWU's Legends, Ghosts and History

MUFON CMS: 'Rod' Shaped High Altitude UFO - Connecticut

Posted: 23 Sep 2010 01:56 PM PDT

Above - the enlarged and enhanced images. Below - the original screen captures

MUFON CMS - 9/21/2010 - Connecticut - (unedited): I often watch sunrise,when it is not obscured by clouds. Today was a particularly clear morning. I glanced out the window & saw what I first assumed was a spider web but it seemed very far off. I moved to another room to get another view, I could tell that this was very far off and likely in the stratosphere. It remained directly above the sunrise. I also thought it was a contrail. However it did not dissipate in the manner which a contrail even a "persistent" contrail have in the past.

I observed this through a window of the second floor of my home. The screen had been removed and I was filming while physically holding my camera outside.

For the most part, it was difficult to see without looking through the camera because of the brightness of the sun. However, at around 10:00, it was visible with the naked eye. It almost seemed to project itself forward or backward in order to move but stayed at an angle. It appeared to be extremely large/long. Sometimes it appeared a a row of balls and other times it appeared smooth, a couple of times, I witnessed it change to an orange/red color, which seemed to flow through the rod-like structure. video Footage and digital photographs were taken on a Sony Handycam with 20X optical zoom, A digital Finepix camera and a Cannon Rebel camera with a 300mm lens.

There was one other witness to this, which was my husband, he also watched this for several minutes and does not agree that this was any of the things I initially thought it was.

Additionally, it appeared that there was a lot of "activity" around this rod-like structure but I am unsure of the nature of these quick moving objects. Some did seem to be coming out of the structure. I was very overwhelmed by the whole thing and would have rather that something would happen to reveal that there was a simple benign explanation for what we were seeing and would have preferred that it would have just gone away. Regardless, I could not take my eyes off of it, until it was finally gone.

Click for video

Date of sighting: 9-21-2010
Location of sighting: Connecticut, US

In this video loads of white orbs are shooting into and out of this semi cloaked craft, awesome, but to see them better pause and speed up every so often.

I often watch sunrise,when it is not obscured by clouds. Today was a particularly clear morning. I glanced out the window & saw what I first assumed was a spider web but it seemed very far off. I moved to another room to get another view, I could tell that this was very far off and likely in the stratosphere. It remained directly above the sunrise. I also thought it was a contrail. However it did not dissipate in the manner which a contrail even a "persistent" contrail have in the past.

I observed this through a window of the second floor of my home. The screen had been removed and I was filming while physically holding my camera outside.

For the most part, it was difficult to see without looking through the camera because of the brightness of the sun. However, at around 10:00, it was visible with the naked eye. It almost seemed to project itself forward or backward in order to move but stayed at an angle. It appeared to be extremely large/long. Sometimes it appeared a a row of balls and other times it appeared smooth, a couple of times, I witnessed it change to an orange/red color, which seemed to flow through the rod-like structure. video Footage and digital photographs were taken on a Sony Handycam with 20X optical zoom, A digital Finepix camera and a Cannon Rebel camera with a 300mm lens.
There was one other witness to this, which was my husband, he also watched this for several minutes and does not agree that this was any of the things I initially thought it was.

Additionally, it appeared that there was a lot of "activity" around this rod-like structure but I am unsure of the nature of these quick moving objects. Some did seem to be coming out of the structure. I was very overwhelmed by the whole thing and would have rather that something would happen to reveal that there was a simple benign explanation for what we were seeing and would have preferred that it would have just gone away. Regardless, I could not take my eyes off of it, until it was finally gone.

NOTE: Below is a video about the 'rods' phenomenon. Frankly. 99.9% of these 'rods' are flying insects caught on slow speed cameras. But occasionally a high altitude dark or light colored 'rod' will be seen. This Connecticut report is interesting since the enhanced screen captures depict something other than an insect or thin cloud formation. Also, there seem to be smaller anomalies in the vicinity of this rod-shaped object. I was able to capture one of these anomalies from the original footage and enlarge it. The witness stated they saw quick moving 'activity' around the object...Lon

Clcik for video

MUFON CMS: 'Rod' Shaped High Altitude UFO - Connecticut

Fortean / Oddball News - 9/23/2010: Russian Bigfoot, UFOs vs Nukes and Nick Redfern Interview

Posted: 23 Sep 2010 10:10 AM PDT

New Bigfoot Expedition Underway in Southern Siberia

itar-tass - A fourth science expedition has left for Mountain Shoria (a territory in Southern Siberia, east of the Altai Mountains) earlier on Wednesday in search of any traces of the abominable snowman. Taking part in the expedition will be the director of the International Center for Hominology, Igor Burtsev, deputy president of the public association Kosmopoisk, Vasily Dovgoshei, History Doctor Valery Kimeyev and other experts.

As Igor Burtsev, a participant in several previous expeditions, has told Itar-Tass, the search will last for about ten days. The experts are determined to find irrefutable evidence the Bigfoot (also known by the names of Sasquatch and Yeti) does exist.

"During the previous expedition a year ago I saw markers (half-broken branches) the creature uses to mark the controlled territory," Burtsev said.

"Mountain Shoria is a perfect place for yetis. It is a sparsely populated, mountainous area, where there are many caves, it is relatively warm and there are sources of pure fresh water. In the mountain rivers fish is in abundance and hunting in the forests must be really good. I reckon the Bigfoot likes to go fowling. In the woods I have found several artifacts to confirm my theory of mine. This time I plan to find the Bigfoot's shelter and even try to contact the creature."

The head of the Tashtagol District, Vladimir Makuta, says that the first mention of Bigfoot's presence in Mountain Shoria dates back to 1980. The creatures seem to have gone especially active over the past three years.

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LHC 'may have replicated conditions that existed after Big Bang'

dailymail - Scientists say the Large Hadron Collider may be on the verge of its first scientific breakthrough.

The $10billion atom smasher under the Swiss-French border appears to have recreated at a small level the matter that existed in the first moments of the universe.

Scientists say colliding particles seem to be creating 'hot dense matter' that would have existed microseconds after the Big Bang and might hold the key for understanding how the liquids, gases and solids of our universe were created.

The LHC in a tunnel at CERN. Scientists may have recreated conditions moments after the Big Bang

The Hadron Collider's CMS detector is reported to have seen 'new and interesting effects' which show the paths that particles take after impact.

Raju Venugopalan, a senior scientist at the U.S. Brookhaven National Laboratory in New York, said Wednesday that physicists 'are very excited' by the European lab's results.

CERN says the correlations bear similarities to studies with larger particle structures conducted at the U.S. Brookhaven National Laboratory in New York, and that they reveal how some particles are 'intimately linked in a way not seen before in proton collisions.'

'We are very excited,' said Raju Venugopalan, a senior Brookhaven scientist. He said that the data showed 'for the first time' that protons have quantum properties that can be enhanced in collisions.

Scientists say the effects they are observing are 'obscure.' But they are possibly a key piece in CERN's ultimate quest of answering the great questions of particle physics, such as the presumed existence of antimatter and the Higgs boson.

The Higgs boson is sometimes referred to as the 'God particle' because scientists theorise that it gives mass to other particles and thus to all objects and creatures in the universe.

The laboratory's spokesman, James Gillies, said the experiments showed the Large Hadron Collider 'is starting to deliver' after a patchy start that included costly repairs and upgrades.

'Up to now, we were remeasuring old physics,' he said. 'Now we're moving to new and better things.'

Even if the latest data fail to produce immediately useful knowledge, the tests show the collider's unprecedented capacity for discovery, said Joe Incandela, a senior CERN scientist.

Venugopalan said CERN's results show how extremely 'tiny and normally short-lived quantum fluctuations of protons are frozen in place.' This is because of Einstein's special relativity and generates remarkable results, he said.

The LHC, a 17-mile looped tunnel which creates mini-Big Bangs by smashing together particles, is currently colliding particles at around half its maximum energy level -- 7 million million electron volts, or 7 TeV.

It plans to increase this to 14 TeV from 2013, coming closer to the conditions in which the universe was created 13.7 billion years ago.

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Woman Cut In Half To Clear Out Cancer

winnipegfreepress - Manitoban Janis Ollson and family are in magazine ads for the esteemed Mayo Clinic for a very good reason: she's the first person surgeons cut in half, removed much of a cancerous midsection, then put back together with a happy ending.

On Friday, the Balmoral, Man., woman was at her daughter's school to talk to students about Sunday's Terry Fox Run, and how funds raised for cancer research are keeping people like her alive.

Janis Ollson's first surgery to remove the cancer, her leg, part of her pelvis and lower spine took 20 hours, 12 specialists and 20 units of blood. She spent a week out of it and then had a second surgery to put her back together. That took eight hours and more than 240 staples. The surgeon put her back together, attaching the bone to her spine with pins and screws, close to her centre, almost like a pogo stick.

Since her groundbreaking surgery, three other patients have had it. Only one has survived, a young woman in Ohio. Ollson mentors her from afar and benefits from having someone to talk to who gets her daily reality.

"There was no one else like me until she came along... It makes me proud to be a survivor and doing so well I can help others."
No one's dissing Canada

Manitoba Health covered Ollson's expenses at the Mayo Clinic.

She's grateful for the Canadian health-care system and that it collaborated with the Mayo Clinic to save her life.

"We could've easily lost everything we owned if we had to pay for this ourselves."

The Ollsons agreed to be featured in an ad for the Mayo Clinic that appeared in Maclean's, Readers Digest and other mags only if it didn't "diss" Canada, Ollson said.

"It wasn't like they were trying to get us as Canadians to advertise to other Canadians that the Mayo is better than Canada. We wouldn't support anything like that."

Three years ago, the 31-year-old was pregnant with her second child and had been suffering years of horrible back pain when Canadian doctors diagnosed her with bone cancer, chondrosarcoma.

Sarcoma experts in Toronto said they'd literally have to cut her in half to get at the untreatable cancer, remove her leg, lower spine and half her pelvis.

The problem was they didn't know how to put her back together again.

They certainly didn't know how she would have a decent quality of life. They consulted with the Mayo Clinic and the Rochester, Minn., doctors decided to try something new.

Ollson became the first person to receive a "pogo stick" rebuild, with her one good leg fused to her body with the reshaped bone from the amputated leg.

Three years later, she is alive and kickin' -- snowmobiling and grocery shopping -- with her husband and two kids on their half acre in Balmoral.

"Where we live, we use ATVs and snowmobiles. I use my ATV to take my daughter to school... There really isn't a whole lot that stops me," she said.

"I don't like to be left out."

Today, she's cancer-free, although she lives with the knowledge it could return at any time.

She uses a prosthetic pelvis and leg, wheelchair, crutches or walker, depending on what she's doing and where she's going.

"I have no problem getting around. If I need to, I'll crawl (up stairs) or scooch like a kid," she said.

"I don't want people to think 'we can't invite the Ollsons because they can't get in here with a wheelchair.' "

"I want to live life to its fullest."

In 2007, her life nearly ended.

"I had pain in my lower back with the first pregnancy. I just thought it was the pregnancy, as did my doctors." She had to stop working when she was eight months pregnant because of the pain.

"After my daughter was born, I still struggled, but it seemed to get better...

"A few years later, I got pregnant with my son. The pain started to increase. I was waddling and hurting by three months."

At five months, the pain was so intense she couldn't work at her office job.

The non-smoker, who wouldn't take any medications or even dye her hair during her first pregnancy, was at the maximum dose of Tylenol 3 during that agonizing second pregnancy.

"Nothing was working."

At seven months, the pain was so bad she couldn't drive. Her suffering was so severe, she asked her doctor if her baby could be delivered prematurely.

"That wasn't a rational thought for me," she said. "By that point, I was quite desperate for some type of relief."

She was told there was nothing more they could do.

"I went back home feeling very alone and misunderstood. I didn't think people believed me. I knew it was a whole lot worse than anyone thought."

She tried a machine that uses electrical pulses to deal with the pain, as well as hot packs and cold packs. She tried sleeping sitting in her kitchen with her head on the table. "Sitting was better than lying."

In February 2007, the pain kept her awake all night. The next morning, she had to crawl across the kitchen floor to get daughter Braxtyn a drink.

Ollson realized she'd hit her breaking point: "I can't take another day, another minute. I'm done."

Her husband took her to hospital in Winnipeg and she refused to leave until she was admitted. A specialist and residents saw her and concluded she had pregnancy sciatica -- caused by pressure on the sciatic nerve. They prescribed morphine to dull the pain enough for her to sleep.

No one suspected she had a form of bone cancer that rarely affects young women -- until she awoke and talked to a neurologist, mentioning in passing she could no longer stand on her tippy toes on her left side.

"It was a huge red flag" for the specialist, she said.

Immediately, she had an MRI and although she was told the results would take a few days, a doctor was in her hospital room to talk about the results the same day. She and her husband were told there was "something" on her lower spine, but no one could say if it was cancer.

Then came an excruciating two-day wait.

Finally, her obstetrician delivered the news: It was probably sarcoma.

But no one could be sure of that without a needle biopsy, which couldn't be done while she was pregnant.

Two weeks later, after her healthy son, Leiland, was delivered by C-section Feb. 21, 2007, the needle biopsy was performed. But that was inconclusive, even with sarcoma specialists in Toronto and at the Mayo Clinic weighing in. It was only after she travelled to Toronto for a biopsy that it was confirmed: a chondrosarcoma, the size of a Pizza Pop, one of the largest the experts had ever seen.

Chemotherapy and radiation couldn't help. The cancer had spread through several bones, her pelvis, lower spine and into a lot of muscle tissue. Her only chance for survival was to remove it.

But removal, specialists said, might not be the best option. The Toronto specialist said he could remove the tumour but didn't know if she could be put back together. Without a lower spine, half her pelvis and a leg, there was nothing to attach her remaining healthy leg to.

"I was in complete shock. I felt like I was going to throw up," she said.

A young man with a similar sarcoma decided not to have it removed so he could live like a normal person until it killed him, the doctor told her.

"Once you have kids, that's not an option," Ollson said.

The Toronto doctor said he'd consult with Mayo Clinic experts.

"He said, 'We'll see if we can come up with a plan so you can see your children grow.' "

Back home in Manitoba, her relatives were devastated. Ollson focused on her new baby and family, waiting to learn if she could be "salvaged" and worrying the deadly sarcoma was growing.

Then she got a life-saving phone call. Mayo Clinic doctors asked her to come to the clinic in Rochester, Minn., for the experimental surgery, which had only been tried on cadavers.

"The plan was to remove the tumour, splitting my pelvis in half and removing the left half and left leg and lower spine," she recalled.

Basically, the doctors would cut her in half, remove her midsection and put her back together using the bone from the amputated leg.

Ollson was thrilled.

"Somebody had a plan. It wasn't hopeless."

Family and friends held a social and raised $20,000 to cover the family's travel and living expenses for the 52 days she spent at the Mayo Clinic. The surgeries were a success.

After much rehabilitation, she put her mobility to the test this May, walking down the aisle of their church on husband Daryl's arm, on her way to the altar to renew their vows on their 10th anniversary. She used just a cane and a prosthetic leg with a microprocessor. She says she's leaned on Daryl, her high school sweetheart, throughout the ordeal.

"He's the glue. It's been a lot for him to endure."

Ollson says she's never dwelled on "why me?"

"We don't know when it started... It's not known why anybody gets it. There's no cause for it, no genetic link," said the woman with no cancer in her immediate family.

"There's some purpose to all this whether I know it or not," she said.

Click for video

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Press Release: U.S. Nuclear Weapons Have Been Compromised by UFOs

Witness testimony from more than 120 former or retired military personnel points to an ongoing and alarming intervention by unidentified aerial objects at nuclear weapons sites, as recently as 2003. In some cases, several nuclear missiles simultaneously and inexplicably malfunctioned while a disc-shaped object silently hovered nearby. Six former U.S. Air Force officers and one former enlisted man will break their silence about these events at the National Press Club and urge the government to publicly confirm their reality.

One of them, ICBM launch officer Captain Robert Salas, was on duty during one missile disruption incident at Malmstrom Air Force Base and was ordered to never discuss it. Another participant, retired Col. Charles Halt, observed a disc-shaped object directing beams of light down into the RAF Bentwaters airbase in England and heard on the radio that they landed in the nuclear weapons storage area. Both men will provide stunning details about these events, and reveal how the U.S. military responded.

Captain Salas notes, "The U.S. Air Force is lying about the national security implications of unidentified aerial objects at nuclear bases and we can prove it." Col. Halt adds, "I believe that the security services of both the United States and the United Kingdom have attempted—both then and now—to subvert the significance of what occurred at RAF Bentwaters by the use of well-practiced methods of disinformation."

The group of witnesses and a leading researcher, who has brought them together for the first time, will discuss the national security implications of these and other alarmingly similar incidents and will urge the government to reveal all information about them. This is a public-awareness issue.

Declassified U.S. government documents, to be distributed at the event, now substantiate the reality of UFO activity at nuclear weapons sites extending back to 1948. The press conference will also address present-day concerns about the abuse of government secrecy as well as the ongoing threat of nuclear weapons.

WHO: Dwynne Arneson, USAF Lt. Col. Ret., communications center officer-in-charge

Bruce Fenstermacher, former USAF nuclear missile launch officer

Charles Halt, USAF Col. Ret., former deputy base commander

Robert Hastings, researcher and author

Robert Jamison, former USAF nuclear missile targeting officer

Patrick McDonough, former USAF nuclear missile site geodetic surveyor

Jerome Nelson, former USAF nuclear missile launch officer

Robert Salas, former USAF nuclear missile launch officer

WHAT: Noted researcher Robert Hastings, author of UFOs and Nukes: Extraordinary Encounters at Nuclear Weapons Sites, will moderate a distinguished panel of former U.S. Air Force officers involved in UFO incidents at nuclear missile sites near Malmstrom, F.E. Warren, and Walker AFBs, as well as the nuclear weapons depot at RAF Bentwaters.

WHEN: Monday, September 27, 2010

12:30 p.m.

WHERE: National Press Club

Holeman Lounge

Event open to credentialed media and Congressional staff only

SOURCE Former U.S. Air Force Officer Robert Salas, and Researcher Robert Hastings

NOTE: this information is about a week old but I didn't want to post until we got closer to the presentation. Should be interesting....I hope C-SPAN covers it live.
Lon

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Interview With Nick Redfern: FINAL EVENTS and the Secret Government Group on Demonic UFOs and the Afterlife

Mike Clelland interviews Nick Redfern on what he calls "the strangest book I've ever written."

Fortean / Oddball News - 9/23/2010: Russian Bigfoot, UFOs vs Nukes and Nick Redfern Interview

How to Make a Zombie / Pacify a Voodoo Doll

Posted: 23 Sep 2010 08:49 AM PDT

The following is an excellent article by Lee Speigel that describes the zombie and voodoo culture of Haiti. I have also added a previous post referencing a voodoo doll that caused problems at a university.

AOL - by Lee Speigel - The undead are all around us, and have been for decades.

Zombies are in our mass consciousness, invading art, literature, entertainment and even education. But at the heart of this fear-mongering revolution is a single question: Is it all pure fiction, or are there in fact real zombies?

For filmmakers in Hollywood, zombies are half-dead figures that lumber toward you with arms outstretched, stinking of rotting flesh. But in Haiti, could zombies be unfortunate victims who have been forced into slavery while under the influence of highly potent drugs?

While movies depict zombies as flesh eaters who spread their affliction like an illness, the voodoo culture and religion of Haiti has its own recipes for making a zombie -- a term derived from the word "Nzambi," meaning "spirit of a dead person" to the Bacongo people of Angola.

A leading theory holds that a voodoo priest, or bokor, is able to concoct a poison that can render a victim weak and appear dead.

"It's not what we see in Hollywood, of course. Strictly speaking, a zombie is a reanimated corpse that's been brought back to life to serve as a slave for a voodoo priest or priestess," said Brad Steiger, one of the most prolific authors of books dealing with unexplained phenomena.

In his recent book, "Real Zombies, the Living Dead and Creatures of the Apocalypse" (Visible Ink Press), Steiger explores the history of reported zombies in the real world.

"I have an account of a man from Miami who went to Haiti and was dancing with a very lovely Haitian lady, and he felt a little prick on his arm and didn't think anything of it. Next thing he knew, he woke up, was still in his suit and tie, but he was soiled and dirty and was holding a hoe in somebody's field.

"But he regained consciousness and managed to make it back to Miami. But this sort of thing still goes on with unscrupulous priests and priestesses. Generally, we're talking about a religion that is followed by 80 million people worldwide."

One man who took a "hands on" approach to the zombie culture is anthropologist Wade Davis. In 1982, Davis infiltrated the secret societies of Haitian voodoo, resulting in his 1985 eye-opening, international best-selling book (and subsequent movie) "The Serpent and the Rainbow" (Random House).

Davis investigated the most famous documented case of a reported real-world zombie, Clairvius Narcisse, who, in 1962, was pronounced dead in a Haitian hospital and later buried.

After 18 years, Narcisse showed up alive and told his story of having been drugged, buried, removed from a grave and put into slavery on a plantation with other men who allegedly shared the same fate.

"We have this case of Narcisse. From all scientific evidence, he was dead, and he came back into the realm of the living," Davis told AOL News. "Precisely because the scientists involved didn't believe in magic, there had to be a material explanation."

Davis explains that the Narcisse incident drew the attention of researchers back to "a series of reports found throughout the popular and academic literature of the reputed existence of a folk poison said to bring on a state of apparent death so profound that it could fool a physician."

Haitian bokors eventually gave Davis samples of the "zombie poison," which led him to zero in on a drug called tetrodotoxin -- the often deadly poison of a puffer fish.

"Tetrodotoxin turns out to be a very big molecule that blocks sodium channels in the nerves, bringing on peripheral paralysis, dramatically low metabolic rates and yet consciousness is retained until the moment of death," said Davis.

After a bokor has placed the tetrodotoxin into someone's body, and that person is pronounced dead and subsequently buried, the bokor reportedly unearths the body and applies a chemical paste to keep the unfortunate victim in a zombified, trancelike state.

Presumably, this "undead" person is then used as the bokor's slave labor.

Davis suggests it makes sense that some unscrupulous priests in Haiti would take advantage of such a poison.

"They identified in their environment a natural product -- in this case, a fish -- that had the capability of bringing on a state of apparent death.

"When I collected samples of the poison at several locations and found that these fish were the one consistent ingredient, it struck me that there was really something going on here."

That said, Davis doesn't believe there's an assembly line creating zombies in Haiti.

"What I always suggested in my work was that zombies, as an idea, by definition, exist in Haiti.

"All religion is defined by how people deal with the finality of death and the mystery of what lies beyond," said Davis. "Any phenomenon that walks that line and dances along that edge between life and death is fascinating to us."

Kim Paffenroth, a professor of religious studies at Iona College in Rochester, N.Y., has a slightly different perspective on the religious significance of zombies.

"I was 12 years old when the first 'Dawn of the Dead' film came out, so I had that adolescent male fascination with these things," said Paffenroth, the author of several books on the Bible and theology, including "Gospel of the Living Dead: George Romero's Visions of Hell on Earth" (Baylor University Press).

"And when, as an adult, I became interested in religious studies, I started looking at how the darker Christian themes of sin and evil are expressed in literature, art, film and television, and then the zombie stuff sort of made sense to me in a new way."

Paffenroth has an interesting take on why many people believe that zombies (among other ghouls, like vampires) signal a coming Armageddon to our world.

"It's a pretty perennial fear of the fragile nature of civilization. Every time there's an oil spill or a stock market crash, people get anxious, and, if anything, I think these more supernatural ways of dealing with it are a little safer outlet."

Paffenroth sees zombie films as a kind of heavy-handed critique of American society.

"I now realize, as I look at some of the fans out there, they look at zombie movies and they see the message as: 'Well, I need to own more guns, because then I'll be safe.' I can see where, on the surface, that's what the movies are saying, but it's kind of a really literal way to read it."

In his investigations, Steiger has come up with a theory about why zombies are generally depicted in end-of-the-world scenarios.

"A lot of people think the Apocalypse is just around the corner and many of us have been brought up to believe that the dead will raise from their graves on Judgment Day, which is why I think the zombie has reached this incredible surge."

Agree or disagree, it's undeniable that zombies are in the midst of a resurgence, the likes of which hasn't been seen since they emerged from the ground in George Romero's classic 1968 black-and-white thriller "Night of the Living Dead."

Whether they're starring in the popular 3-D "Resident Evil: Afterlife" film, playing the lead roles in AMC's upcoming series "The Walking Dead" or even fighting for the right of free speech, zombies are definitely in vogue.

And while there are some who speculate that a real zombie outbreak on Earth would be doomed to failure, there's at least marginal evidence that some form of zombie-ism exists and is taken seriously in Haiti (not to mention the creative minds of filmmakers).

So, the next time you find yourself alone in a field or a dark alley, it would probably be prudent to look over your shoulder -- you never know when you'll be menaced by something that's fairly easy to outrun.

Lee Speigel - Writer, reporter, and paranormal expert Lee Speigel is the former host of NBC Radio's "The Edge of Reality." He's hosted nearly 1,500 programs on unexplained phenomena, and previously worked at Westwood One Radio and ABCNews.com. He is the only person to produce a presentation at the United Nations on the subject of UFOs.

NOTE: here is a link to another great article - Into the Zombie Underworld. Lon

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How to 'Take Out' a Voodoo Doll

religiondispatches.org - A scholar of the religion known as Vodou (or Voodoo, if you're Anglo) tells how she saved a small cloth ritual object from desecration by a gang of spooked professors.

I am now the guardian of a Vodou doll that has wreaked havoc at my university. I first learned of him last week, when a colleague in the art history department sent me a mysterious message. Could she bring him by so I could take a look at him? She did not disclose where he came from or how he ended up over at art history instead of my own department, religious studies.

Both my research and personal interest were piqued, and I invited them over for Friday—but on that morning I ran into some difficulty. My husband's car would not start; the doll would have to wait. I called my colleague and suggested a Monday meeting. She took the news a bit ominously, mentioning that other faculty had been having "bad luck" since his arrival in their lives.

Monday morning I waited with eager anticipation for my colleague's arrival. I must confess that I was ready to wow her with my expertise of Afro-Caribbean religion. I must also admit I was expecting an elaborate doll, one worthy of inspection by professors of the fine arts. Instead, I was handed a Kodak slide tray box containing a medium-sized cloth doll, along with a bag of candy corns. His eyes are two slits of white thread, his pants, hat, and scarf are red, his shirt a light purple. He looks like something you would buy at a tourist stand. In fact, as I gazed at him, that is where I assumed he came from.

But no. He was discovered by workmen. The computer in one of the university's classrooms had been crashing, and no one could fix it. Finally a tech person came and took the computer out of its cabinet. There he was, wedged behind it. The computer was fixed.

My colleague did not want to leave him to perform any more mischief so he was brought to her department. Faculty were not pleased; a modernist in the department said to "get rid of him." Others joined in to demand his exit. As a way of appeasing him, someone gave him an offering of candy corn. And then he came to me. He had nowhere else to go. It was either I take him, or the plan was to dig a hole, pour some rum and gunpowder on him, and bury him. The idea of PhDs sitting around plotting the burial and destruction of a doll makes me smile even now. I thought that sort of irrational superstition only happened in religious studies—apparently, we are not alone.

Vodou dolls and zombies are associated with the Hollywood popularization and vilification of Vodou, a rich African Diaspora religion that is too often reduced to witchcraft and sorcery. As a scholar that works on Afro-Caribbean religion, I cannot tell you how many times I get calls from journalists wanting me to denounce Vodou, describe it as satanic, list it as a possible explanation for a case of torture or ritual death.

When I teach students about Vodou they are intrigued and often fearful; field trips to Vodou house temples evoke an excitement that no visit to a church ever provokes. When I teach Catholicism, I do not get inundated with emails from undergrads asking to meet a priest. When I teach about Vodou (and consequently Santería), I get flooded with desperate emails asking me to reveal the name of a "good" Vodou priest that can give them a spiritual consultation or help them with a "spell." I do not associate Vodou with superstition, but too often I find it reduced to superstition or "black" magic.

I have searched long and hard for the origins of Vodou doll mythology. La Regla de Palo Monte, whose origins are Bantú (sub-Saharan African), is an Afro-Cuban religion. The name Palo comes from practitioners' use of branches and trees. While the various religions described as Reglas de Congo have their origins in the Congo region, in Cuba they have been decidedly influenced by Yoruba religion. Palo Monte ritual centers around the Nganga. In Bantú religion nganga refers to priests or ritual leaders; however, in Cuba it came to refer to the cauldron used in Palo Monte ritual practices. This cauldron carries relics, most often a skull, of a deceased person with whom a priest has entered a ritual contract. Also, some paleros were known to make figures to attack enemies, such as their slave masters. This is perhaps the origin of the contemporary mythology behind the pop-culture Vodou doll. The collapse of two African religious traditions—one Cuban, one Haitian—does not surprise me.

The doll who sits in my office is not the type of doll you stick needles in. I am not even sure he is a Vodou doll. And yet, his black cloth skin and his scarf evoked feelings of fear and mistrust among a group of university professors. The mythology of evil surrounding Vodou, surrounding black religion, remains. I have nestled him between an image of the Mayan god Maximon and an image of the Yoruban orisha Bablú Ayé. I decided he would feel at home with other marginalized and often misinterpreted religious figures.

He has been with me now for twenty-four hours. I am happy to say, as a type this reflection, that my computer is working fine.

How to Make a Zombie / Pacify a Voodoo Doll

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