From: Martin Shough <parcellular.nul>
Date: Fri, 6 Feb 2009 20:05:36 -0000
Archived: Fri, 06 Feb 2009 15:16:34 -0500
Subject: Re:  Military Fliers - Flying One-Man Platforms


>From: Jerome Clark <jkclark.nul>
>To: <post.nul>
>Date: Fri, 6 Feb 2009 10:45:52 -0500
>Subject: Re: Military Fliers - Flying One-Man Platforms

>>From: Martin Shough <parcellular.nul>
>>To: <post.nul>
>>Date: Fri, 6 Feb 2009 11:26:53 -0000
>>Subject: Re: Military Fliers - Flying One-Man Platforms

>>>From: Terry Colvin <fortean1.nul>
>>>To: UFO UpDates - Toronto <post.nul>
>>>Date: Thu, 5 Feb 2009 23:56:40 +0700 (GMT+07:00)
>>>Subject: Military Fliers - Flying One-Man Platforms

>>This is an old mystery that has made me scratch my head for
>>years - the curious nexus of synchronicities that connects
>>1897-1909 mystery airship reports, mediaeval chronicles and the
>>"Aldeburgh platform" seen over Suffolk in 1916 (date recollected
>>in the 1960s by the elderly witness, whose name incidentally was
>>Whiteland, not Whitehead ).

>>What is the connection? To refresh Listers' memories, in brief:

>>A Texas newspaper in 1897 published an account of an airship
>>that had been seen by people on their way home from church. It
>>was too high to see more than a strange shape with lights but it
>>was trailing an an anchor on a rope which caught on a railroad
>>track, and a man "small in size" in a light blue uniform or
>>"sailor suit" shinned down the rope, cut it, and the thing
>>sailed away. The churchgoers recovered the anchor and it went
>>on display in the local blacksmith's shop.

>>The 13thC Irish 'Speculum Regale' has an account of a ship in
>>the sky whose anchor caught in the porch of St Kineras church,
>>Cloera. A man came down the rope looking as though "swimming"
>>in the air and the churchgoers tried to grab him but the bishop
>>said to let him go. He scurried back up and cut the rope. The
>>anchor was kept and displayed in the church.

>This isn't much of a mystery, Martin. A few April 1897 papers
>noted the medieval legend. Shortly thereafter, some enterprising
>Texas correspondent incorporated the tale into a contemporary
>airship sighting.

>Business as usual, in other words, for the freewheeling
>'journalism' of the period.

Hi Jerry

I entirely accept that the Houston Post story reflects a
journalist's recognition of some resonance between the 1897
airships and the mediaeval cloudships. I'd supposed this was
possible, and I'm interested that you say there were specific
references made to the mediaeval stories in April 1897. I hadn't
seen these sources.

Nevertheless, the fact that it occurred to journalists to notice
and exploit this resonance between modern and mediaeval stories
of manned ships in the air trailing anchors/grapples (the Merkel
story is not the only one of that sort from 1897) still
interests me, because it does not really, by itself, satisfy my
curiosity about the synchronistic "mystery" I mentioned, and
indeed even remains - despite the availability of a
deterministic account - an instance of it.

This synchronism has several other elements connected via the
Aldeburgh platform affair to the dangling 'observers' below
Zeppelins, the nearby Zeppelin crash, and the absurdly anchor-
shaped fragment of Zeppelin debris preserved in the porch of the
local St Peter's church. A direct causal influence either from
mediaeval chronicles or Texas newspapers seems harder to
envisage in this case.

Of course I can't quantify the unilkelihood, or even
meaningfully convey why I find this so peculiar, let alone
suggest what it might signify. But it's one of those several
absurd features of the UFO mythology that make my scalp prickle
instinctively and that I like to mull over from time to time
when in a superstitious frame of mind.


Regards

Martin Shough