Do you believe? (Cue The X-Files whistling theme music now.) Do you want to believe?
In what? you might ask.
In life on other planets, of course. With scientists estimating 8.8 billion (that's billion with a B) Earth-like habitable planets in our galaxy the Milky Way alone, Vegas would give you great odds on there being life on at least one of those planets. That's just possible habitable planets; there are many billions more not estimated to be habitable--by our standards, at least. Who's to say our standards for habitation are the only possible standards anyway?
Now just attempt to imagine, if there are an estimated 8.8 billion habitable planets in our galaxy alone, how many there could possibly be in the entire never ending universe. (I don't think I can say entire in the same description as never ending.) Try this one for size: scientists can only seem to agree on an acceptable range of estimation and it is at least 100 billion to 200 billion or more galaxies in the observable universe.
That is awesome in the true definition of the word.
And why am I bringing this up?
The answer is simple: I believe there is intelligent life out there somewhere in the universe and I would like to share an incident with you that happened over a century ago in a small town, well before the infamous Roswell, NM, incident. What surprised me is it doesn't seem as though a whole lot of people seem to know about it.
17 April 1897. Aurora, Texas. What is known as the Aurora Airship.
In what? you might ask.
In life on other planets, of course. With scientists estimating 8.8 billion (that's billion with a B) Earth-like habitable planets in our galaxy the Milky Way alone, Vegas would give you great odds on there being life on at least one of those planets. That's just possible habitable planets; there are many billions more not estimated to be habitable--by our standards, at least. Who's to say our standards for habitation are the only possible standards anyway?
Now just attempt to imagine, if there are an estimated 8.8 billion habitable planets in our galaxy alone, how many there could possibly be in the entire never ending universe. (I don't think I can say entire in the same description as never ending.) Try this one for size: scientists can only seem to agree on an acceptable range of estimation and it is at least 100 billion to 200 billion or more galaxies in the observable universe.
That is awesome in the true definition of the word.
And why am I bringing this up?
The answer is simple: I believe there is intelligent life out there somewhere in the universe and I would like to share an incident with you that happened over a century ago in a small town, well before the infamous Roswell, NM, incident. What surprised me is it doesn't seem as though a whole lot of people seem to know about it.
17 April 1897. Aurora, Texas. What is known as the Aurora Airship.
This picture to the left is of the original newspaper article that appeared following the incident in the Dallas Morning News.
As with the Kecksburg, PA, incident, there were a multitude of witnesses to what they referred to as an "airship" as it streaked across the sky early that morning. The opening of the article seems to reference the fact that this airship wasn't a whole big surprise, stating "the airship which has been sailing across the country."
This statement leads me to believe there had been sightings of it before the date of the crash on Judge Proctor's farm, where the airship struck the tower of the windmill and exploded. Indeed, the author of the article, Mr. Haydon, writes of the airship's flight trajectory and states it sailed directly over the town's public square, basically in full view of the people, as it flew over Aurora. And not at a high altitude, either. The airship is described as flying low.
Why would this sight of an airship in the sky in 1897 startle and astound people?
This incident occurred easily over six years before the Wright brothers took their historic first controlled, sustained flight on 17 December 1903 at Kitty Hawk, so there could not have been any flying vessels cruising through the skies in 1897 because we hadn't invented them yet. Or should I say there couldn't have been any Earthly flying vessels cruising over Aurora, Texas, early that April morning?
Several documentaries have been made about the Aurora, Texas, airship as well as a 1986 television movie called The Aurora Encounter. The film has only the most tenuous connection with the facts as we know them concerning this incident.
As with the Kecksburg, PA, incident, there were a multitude of witnesses to what they referred to as an "airship" as it streaked across the sky early that morning. The opening of the article seems to reference the fact that this airship wasn't a whole big surprise, stating "the airship which has been sailing across the country."
This statement leads me to believe there had been sightings of it before the date of the crash on Judge Proctor's farm, where the airship struck the tower of the windmill and exploded. Indeed, the author of the article, Mr. Haydon, writes of the airship's flight trajectory and states it sailed directly over the town's public square, basically in full view of the people, as it flew over Aurora. And not at a high altitude, either. The airship is described as flying low.
Why would this sight of an airship in the sky in 1897 startle and astound people?
This incident occurred easily over six years before the Wright brothers took their historic first controlled, sustained flight on 17 December 1903 at Kitty Hawk, so there could not have been any flying vessels cruising through the skies in 1897 because we hadn't invented them yet. Or should I say there couldn't have been any Earthly flying vessels cruising over Aurora, Texas, early that April morning?
Several documentaries have been made about the Aurora, Texas, airship as well as a 1986 television movie called The Aurora Encounter. The film has only the most tenuous connection with the facts as we know them concerning this incident.
| After the crash of the airship, in the twisted wreckage, the townspeople claim to have discovered the diminutive body of the lone passenger, presumably the pilot. He, assuming it was a he, did not survive the crash. The townspeople, in a display of Christian kindness, took it upon themselves to hold a funeral service for the pilot and bury him in the Aurora Cemetery, as is noted on the picture of the official plaque to the right. Once upon a time, the child-size grave under the tree was allegedly marked by a small headstone. When people began to show too much attention or come to visit, it was apparently removed so the grave site remained unknown to outsiders. Another version says the small grave marker was stolen in the mid-1970s. While watching several documentaries, I find it striking how the few people who remember where the headstone was located can lead researchers to the spot and GPR (Ground-Penetrating Radar) shows what appears to be a small grave in that precise location. |  |
There are those who claim it was debunked as a hoax, that the article was written as a joke, but the proof of that is as scarce as the evidence of a real spaceman crashing in Aurora. Mr. Haydon is long dead so we can't ask him about his motives. And permission to excavate the grave site has been repeatedly denied. One potential explanation I've come across concerns an epidemic of cholera during the time period causing deaths and since these victims are buried in the cemetery, the town is loathe to stir up the soil. From my research, it seems the outbreak was spotted fever, a tick-borne infection with Rocky Mountain spotted fever being the most lethal, and not cholera. I don't know which spotted fever caused the outbreak, but I can understand the desire to not stir up the burial ground after the outbreak victims were buried, even if it is over a century later.
So who is to say who is buried beneath the bent limb of that old tree in the Aurora Cemetery? I'd still like to visit, just because I want to do so.
Now, I'm not trying to change your beliefs. Either you believe life exists elsewhere in the universe or you don't, and nothing I can present to you will sway you one way or the other. I simply want to make you think, and if you're going to think it might as well be about something as interesting as this.
So who is to say who is buried beneath the bent limb of that old tree in the Aurora Cemetery? I'd still like to visit, just because I want to do so.
Now, I'm not trying to change your beliefs. Either you believe life exists elsewhere in the universe or you don't, and nothing I can present to you will sway you one way or the other. I simply want to make you think, and if you're going to think it might as well be about something as interesting as this.
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