WELCOME to the essays of ‘jimnicholsufo.com’!

It all seemed so easy at first… Even as a Baby-Boomer kid, growing up a along the rustic Ohio back roads of the Sixties, the answer to the ‘Flying-Saucer’ mystery seemed so perfectly obvious. Here were stories and photographs of circular flying machines, physical craft of intelligent design, which could not be accounted for, given our 20th Century understanding of aerodynamics—no wings, no propellers, no turbojets, no rockets! Yet somehow these machines were able to ‘fly’ by means unknown to Earthly physics. So, if they were not built by Earth humans–that meant they must have been built by ‘somebody’ from ‘somewhere’ else! Leaving the unavoidable conclusion that intelligences from other worlds far out in space were responsible for these flying contraptions! Right? Obviously we were not alone in the universe.
Wasn’t that easy? What clarity of perception! What insight! Imagine such a simple common-sense deduction from a kid in junior high. Who needs Ph.D.’s?

And since it was also obvious that whoever piloted these saucers was not making war with humanity, or out to take planet Earth by brutal military conquest, they must be simply random, curious (non-aggressive, if not benevolent) explorers anonymously peeking in on our ways of life.

If we Earthlings had ships to visit other planets, isn’t that what we’d do? I saw such things all the time on TV, like High Adventure with Lowell Thomas. Here was a famous intrepid world explorer who shared his films of expeditions to exotic, remote locations around the world, the Congo, Borneo, New Zealand or the headwaters of the Amazon. And invariably he’d show us the strange life-ways, customs and cultures of the native inhabitants there. Wouldn’t it seem natural for curious visitors from space to do likewise?

 Thus I formed my earliest no-muss-no-fuss ‘theory model’ that handily explained the sensational mystery of UFOs—they were curious explorers visiting from other planets who flew in really COOL ships!

But as time rolled  on, I discovered definitive answers to the ‘flying saucer’ enigma remained stubbornly out of reach.  By the end of my high school years, UFO interests and commercial art ambitions took a back seat to the U.S. Army draftboard! With my brief Army duty I rose to the lofty rank of PFC during a sixteen-month stint as a clerk in a finance office on Okinawa. I never gained a high level security clearance, but I did glimpse a “Top-Secret’ SR-71 spy-plane parked on the tarmac at nearby Kadena, AFB, that was the nearest I came to viewing ‘classified’ hardware during my military experience.

After my discharge from military duties I returned stateside and resettled far from Ohio in Tucson, Arizona in 1972 where I set out to resume my artistic ambitions in earnest. The Sonoran desert is so visually stunning and spectacular, I was at no loss for dynamic scenery to paint, and over the next ten years I developed a crisp, photo-realistic style, rendering landscape paintings in oils and acrylics. However, my original art training had been illustration and after a decade of painting saguaros, mountains and sagebrush I was growing weary of the repetition. Thankfully in 1977 movies like, STAR WARS and CLOSE ENCOUNTERS  hit the big screen firing my imagination to tackle science fiction themes with my artistry.

It wasn’t long before space ships and flying saucers appeared on my canvases, and for a time, my science fiction art was displayed at Tucson’s Flandrau Planetarium.  That bit of exposure earned an illustration commission for me from noted astronomer Dr. William K. Hartmann for a UFO painting used in his book The Cosmic Journey.

 Little did I realize what a harbinger this modest painting was of the unique destiny awaiting me…

Early in 1980 an association with famed UFO investigator Lt. Col. Wendelle Stevens (USAF Ret.), launched me into serious UFO illustration and investigation that has continued to this day. Wendelle’s experience in this line of research reached as far back as 1947 and his days as an active duty Air Force pilot. Over the years Wendelle had accumulated one of the largest archives of UFO photographs and eyewitness accounts from sources around the globe. Tales revealed in this vast file seemed to bear out my ‘curious-visitors-from-space’ theory explanation for the UFO phenomenon, but still that ‘Holy Grail’ of final, absolute proof remained elusive.

By 1991 my growing notoriety as a UFO illustrator earned me an invitation to co-host a weekly TV UFO talk-show produced in Tucson by Ted Loman.  Here, dropped in my lap, was yet another fortuitous opportunity to further expand my investigation horizons–interviewing researchers and eyewitnesses from all over the world. After a few weeks into the show, and the  initial shock of stage fright wore off , I rather enjoyed the notion of sharing the revelations of UFO research with a mass audience. Very innocently I assumed the whole world would welcome the opportunity to understand this incredible phenomonon, but as a TV co-host, I soon discovered a related phenomenon far more bizarre than any flying saucer or creepy alien could ever hope to be…

In the face of perhaps the premiere discovery of the Millennium, I discovered, to my astonishment, a virtually impenetrable stonewall of governmental obstruction, media hostility and general public apathy to potentially the most important discovery in all human history—actual proof that we share this universe with other intelligent creatures! Could it be that the strangest creatures in the universe are not extraterrestrials…but the humans of planet Earth?

To my dismay, I learned that in the process of trying to get to the bottom of the UFO enigma–one can never get to the bottom of the UFO enigma! Both government and social resistance to the notion of extra-terrestrials is ‘high strangeness’ more outrageous than the UFO enigma itself. Either by accident or design, this issue remains perpetually fogged by constant muddle of confusion and controversy. It works like an efficient physics axiom—“for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction”—in other words, for every piece of UFO ‘information’ there is equal and opposite ‘disinformation’, that effectively nulls any research with ‘plausible deniability’.

For example:
The 1947 Roswell UFO crash = weather balloon.
George Adamski’s 1950’s ‘Venusian’ encounter = lunatic crackpot.
1960’s UFOs in Michigan woods = swamp gas.
‘Billy’ Meier’s Pleiadian UFO photos = models, a hoax.
Ed Walter’s Gulf Breeze UFO photos = faked.
Bob Dean’s NATO UFO ‘Assessment’ document = never existed.
England’s ‘crop circles’ = hoaxed by Doug & Dave.

No proof, ergo no UFOs!

 

No matter how credible the eye-witness, or how compelling the evidence in any UFO sighting report, it constitutes NO PROOF in the face of Pentagon or national media assessments. In legal terms this is the equivalent of conviction without due process… Even the late Dr. Alan Hynek, former advisor with Air Force Project Bluebook, finally broke ranks with the military UFO investigation program by objecting to its deliberate study of selective evidence and predetermined conclusions such as those filed by the Condon Committee in 1967. He could see that rather than a sober, honest examination of the reported phenomenon, the committee was a premeditated white-wash and insult to the American public.
 Hynek stated, “The assumption here is clearly that UFOs are all misrepresentations of natural things and that the entire work of the committee was to learn and memorize the varieties of natural stimuli for UFO reports… Scientific method!” Hynek complained. “What kind of scientific investigation is it that assumes the answer before starting?” The government posture was then, and remains to this day, that nothing out of the ordinary exists!

The late Carl Sagan, noted astronomer and author, was for many years an outspoken, high profile critic of UFO research, much to the dismay to those of us seeking legitimacy of such research. Yet, his brilliant novel and subsequent movie, Contact with Jodie Foster, clearly revealed Sagan’s compassionate consideration for the ET issue. In a nutshell drama, he vividly portrayed the full kaleidoscope of electrifying social issues that the sudden reality of ETs could provoke: military paranoia, religious hysteria and the general public uproar of a society ill-prepared to cope with such an eventuality. Clearly Carl had given much more serious thought to this issue than he had ever acknowledged professionally. And though his story, Contact, certainly did not excuse the need for excessive secrecy, he at least gave us a glimpse of the reasons why.

And to further explore those reasons for secrecy became my greatest focus of interest. It seemed clear to me that further research into any particular UFO case was a waste of time. Instead, I’ve become more fascinated by the psychology of ‘denial’ itself, regarding the extraterrestrial issue—so rather than a UFO researcher, I see myself as a ‘phenomena watcher’, one trying to grasp the motives and meanings behind the social obstructions hindering serious UFO investigation. And to be sure, this has proven to be an equally fascinating avenue of study unto itself!

So I offer the collection of essays and articles contained in this website as some of the possible answers to this enigma. Be advised, I do not offer this information as definitive conclusions, but simply as the extent of my research thus far.

Also, I wish to acknowledge the dedicated and diligent efforts of the many researchers quoted herein. The secrets they reveal are all hidden in plain sight! All assembled materials that I have quoted are from sources in public domain. As well, I make no claim to the absolute veracity of the material shared herein. I only offer it as an, ‘alternative myth’ to the consensual daily ‘reality’ we’ve all come to believe. Whatever is true will eventually be revealed over the natural course of history…

Considering this, I cordially invite you to browse my random ramblings, always keeping in mind–the quest for answers still continues…

James H. Nichols

“The Incredible Tomorrow” by James Nichols