a year before the first UFO sighting in
the U.S. There were many different descriptions for the reported
objects. They were usually seen in the hours of darkness and almost
always traveling at extremely high speeds. They were shaped like a
ball or projectile, were a bright green, white, red, or yellow and
sometimes made sounds. Like their American cousins, they were always
so far away that no details could be seen. For no good reason, other
than speculation and circulation, the newspapers had soon begun to
refer authoritatively to these "ghost rockets" as guided missiles,
and implied that they were from Russia. Peenemunde, the great German
missile development center and birthplace of the V-l and V-2 guided
missiles, came in for its share of suspicion since it was held by the
Russians. By the end of the summer of 1946 the reports were
widespread, coming from Denmark, Norway, Spain, Greece, French
Morocco, Portugal, and Turkey. In 1947, after no definite conclusions
as to identity of the "rockets" had been established, the reports
died out. Now in early January 1948 they broke out again. But Project
Sign personnel were too busy to worry about European UFO reports,
they were busy at home. A National Guard pilot had just been killed
chasing a UFO.

On January 7 all of the late papers in the U.S. carried headlines
similar to those in the Louisville _Courier_: "F-51 and Capt. Mantell
Destroyed Chasing Flying Saucer." This was Volume I of "The
Classics," the Mantell Incident.

At one-fifteen on that afternoon the control tower operators at
Godman AFB, outside Louisville, Kentucky, received a telephone call
from the Kentucky State Highway Patrol. The patrol wanted to know if
Godman Tower knew anything about any unusual aircraft in the
vicinity. Several people from Maysville, Kentucky, a small town 80
miles east of Louisville, had reported seeing a strange aircraft.
Godman knew that they had nothing in the vicinity so they called
Flight Service at Wright-Patterson AFB. In a few minutes Flight
Service called back. Their air Traffic control board showed no
flights in the area. About twenty minutes later the state police
called again. This time people from the towns of Owensboro and
Irvington, Kentucky, west of Louisville, were reporting a strange
craft. The report from these two towns was a little more complete.
The townspeople had described the object to the state police as being
"circular, about 250 to 300 feet in diameter,"