If a nomad wanders off Interstate 75 at the Orange Lake/Irvine exit and heads south, he will inevitably reach the swaddled community of Fairfield, a secret land known only to few where the flora is plentiful and the fauna is rife. The clandestine Annunciation of the Theotokos Greek Orthodox Monastery is there, tucked away on Highway 225, surrounded by thousands of acres of meticulously groomed horse farms, the better to not see you, my dear. A cluster of multi-millionaires dot the outback, polishing the landscape to a bright emerald hue, keeping the endless miles of fencing painted and festooning their entrances with oceans of pansies, leaping seagrass and charming ceremonial grahdoo, as only the wealthiest tycoons are prone to do.
Flying Pie headquarters is there in the middle of it all, right next door to Pathogenes, Inc., the laboratory retreat of wunderkind Siobhan Ellison, vigorously guarded by a platoon of wild security goats. And down the way on county road 316 is the earthy hilltop studio/landing field of local artist Gary Borse, a Robin Hood-like ex-cattleman, who rescues precious gems of acreage from the hands of savages and delivers it back to the commonfolk. True, there are others of his ilk scattered about the landscape, but for reasons soon to become evident, there is only one Gary Borse. You see, Gary sees space people.
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| Ken Arnold: "You're NEVER going to believe this, but...." |
Saucermania
On June 24, 1947, when even Bill was very young, Kenneth Albert Arnold was flying his personal plane, a CallAir A-2, near Mt. Rainier in Washington state, when what to his wondering eyes should appear but a phalanx of bright shiny objects zipping by at crisp speeds in excess of 1200 miles per hour. The skies were completely clear and there was only a mild wind. The nine UFOs flew in a long chain. Ken didn’t have his cell phone camera with him that day so the authorities cast a jaundiced eye at his Kodak Brownie prints and his fantastic tale. Reporters at the Pendleton East Oregonian, however, interviewed Arnold and were impressed at his sober relation of the tale. He was a respected businessman and an experienced pilot. The newspaper ran a story about what Arnold called crafts whose motion was “similar to a saucer if you skip it across water,” and the onset of UFOmania had arrived.
Within days, Arnold was overwhelmed by the effects of the publicity on his private life. “I haven’t had a moment of peace since I first told the story,” he said. Preachers telephoned him, calling the objects harbingers of doomsday. A woman in a Pendleton cafe noticed him and dashed out into the street shrieking, “There’s the man who saw men from Mars!” The extraterrestrial genie was out of the bottle.
“The whole thing has gotten out of hand,” Kenneth Arnold bemoaned. “Half the people look at me as a combination of Einstein, Flash Gordon and screwball. I wonder what my wife back in Idaho thinks?” The Flying Saucer imbroglio had lurched down the runway. There’d be no stopping it now.
In the summer of 1947, New Mexico rancher William “Mac” Brazel discovered a sprawling mess of mysterious debris in one of his pastures. Strange metallic rods, chunks of a plastic-like substance and odd papery scraps of indecipherable origin were lying everywhere. Mac called the sheriff and before you could say Buck Rogers a contingent of soldiers from nearby Roswell Air Force Base rushed in to retrieve the debris. Local news headlines screamed that a “flying saucer” had crash-landed in Roswell but military officials swore on their mothers’ apple strudel it was only a downed weather balloon. The poor weather balloons soon became the go-to culprit for any unexplainable UFO sightings.
Weather balloons, however, have their limitations. On the evening of August 25, 1951, three science professors from Texas Tech were enjoying an evening outdoors in Lubbock when they looked up and saw a semicircle of lights flying above them at breakneck speeds. Over the next few days, dozens of others reported similar sightings. Tech freshman Carl Hart Jr. even snapped a few photos of the Lubbock Lights, which were widely published in U.S. newspapers and Life magazine. The official Air Force conclusion was that the lights were merely birds reflecting the luminescence from Lubbock’s new street lights. Newspapers promptly ran cartoons of birds carrying lanterns.
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| Barney Hill: "It was a one-eyed, one-horned flying purple people-eater!" |
Close Encounters Of The Weird Kind
In the film Close Encounters of the Third Kind, there is a famous scene in which a nearby UFO causes the electronics in an automobile to go blooey. The inspiration for that scene stemmed from an incident in 1957, when dozens of citizens of Levelland, Texas individually reported seeing a rocket or other strange lights that interfered with their own vehicles. Engines died, lights cut out, radios started replaying Orson Wells’ Halloween broadcast of aliens invading New Jersey, War of the Worlds. Even the police saw the mysterious lights. Hard to blame the weather balloons for this one.
The Air Force’s new UFO official deniers at Project Blue Book investigated the case and somehow concluded that the problem was merely an electrical storm and a bit of ball lightning run amok. The Lubbock meteorologists were bumfuzzled, as there was not even a whit of an electrical storm in the area that night.
On September 19 of 1961, things got really frisky in Lancaster, New Hampshire, when Betty and Barney Hill, local civil rights advocates, were allegedly abducted by aliens from the Zeta Reticuli system, as described in great detail in the best-selling 1966 book, The Interrupted Journey. The Hills claimed they were followed by a single flying saucer along rural N. H. roads when suddenly their vehicle began to vibrate and a tingling sensation passed through their bodies. The couple said they entered an altered state of consciousness which left their minds fuzzy. Much later, a series of beeping or buzzing sounds returned them to full consciousness with defective watches, scuffed shoes, ripped clothing and no memories of what had happened in the previous two hours.
It was years later before Betty and Barney Hill recalled the details of the bizarre event which occurred over the course of their abduction, and then only after being subjected to hypnosis by a Boston psychiatrist. They spoke of gray beings with large eyes, a disc as big as a house, an odd pregnancy test and the erasure of their memories. For most UFO believers, this was a smidge over the top. They were willing to accept the possibility of interstellar flight, of strange visitors from another planet, even of preliminary conversation, ala the musical notes in Close Encounters. But alien abductions---sorry folks, would you please step into the room to the right, the one with the door that reads “Lunatic Fringe.” Galactus would like to speak to you.
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| Gary Borse in his Fairfield bailiwick |
We're Just Wild About Gary
One sunny day, when little Gary Borse was but a pup playing in his sandbox, he was suddenly distracted by a soundless white light racing across the sky at breakneck speeds. The object might as well have said welcome to the club, Gary, because he was officially a member from that day on.
Gary Borse was not obsessed with flying saucers, but he liked reading about them as he was growing up. He enjoyed the night sky and learned the constellations, celebrated the arc of a descending shooting star, but he also had people to see, places to go, business to conduct. He evolved into a talented painter but a wary one; a career in art is often a ticket to the poorhouse. Gary moved to Fairfield, Florida, bought and later sold a tack and feed store, purchased a sweet 55 acres of hilltop real estate and began to learn the cattle business. Things went well and he was happy in his little aerie. On a clear day, he could see forever.
In 2015, while walking his dog one evening, there was a disturbance in the atmosphere. Gary’s dog became unsettled and began barking. A short distance away, three bright lights appeared behind the trees. As if startled to be discovered, the lights suddenly began moving, quickly merging from three to two and then a single beam which fled off through the jungle. Gobsmacked, Gary began studying flying saucers again, and why not? A man has to discuss property rights with interlopers.
Close Encounters Of The Fifth Kind
In the past five years, Gary Borse has revved up his UFO engine, spending more and more time on the subject. He is a firm devotee of Steven Macon Greer, an author of several books on ETs and a guru of the first kind. “Close Encounters of the Fifth Kind” is the third documentary film which has been made about Greer’s shenanigans, following “Sirius” in 2013 and “Unacknowledged” in 2017. Unacknowledged is sort of an extraterrestrial manifesto which seeks to draw you in and provide you with a down-the-rabbit-hole experience. As you watch the footage, scan the hidden government documents and hear the testimonials, you may find yourself on the precipice of belief. For many previous nonbelievers, the film was a conversion experience. Some of us, however, would like to see a little more stew in the pot. But what do we know, we somehow missed Close Encounters of the Fourth Kind?
CEOTFK treats alien visitation as a given, which is a stretch. It totally takes for granted that a technologically advanced, mystically benevolent world of extraterrestrial beings light years beyond ours in consciousness and development decided to show up in 1947 to save us from nuclear ruin. Taking this as an undeniable fact, “Close Encounters of the Fifth Kind” builds a case that dark elements of the United States “security state” have kept the cat tightly wrapped in the bag. Greer’s hypothesis gets a lot of help from the real security apparatus of the U.S., which has come up with some hysterically funny and illogical explanations for UFO sightings. What are they afraid of, the public wants to know? And if it’s obvious the feds are lying, does that mean the Steven Greers of the world are right?
Greer has the right persona for his role. He is very articulate, has scads of information at his disposal and a cockiness that lends his statements a sniff of authority. He is now the unofficial go-to guy for alien visitation lore, a role he delights in and profits from. Does he really believe all he says? Are those merely crocodile tears he sheds when he speaks of all the people on his team who have allegedly committed suicide or been assassinated? Steven Greer appears sincere and intelligent but also a bit narcissistic and his tale is so extreme it will be loved by some and immediately ridiculed by others. We’ve seen and read of too many incidents to believe UFOs are a figment of thousands of imaginations, however. Perhaps they are interdimensional travelers or unannounced U.S. defense craft or actual ETs out for a lark. That they are everything Steven Greer suggests seems a bridge too far.
Come On Down!
Gary Borse is unconcerned with naysayers. “I don’t care what people think. Pre-Covid, I had groups up to my place several times a month for three years and have probably shown a hundred people evidence that ETs are real. We use scientific equipment. We provide visitors with personal experiences they never imagined they could have. I feel that ETs will respond to overtures of welcome, will manifest to people who are willing to give them the benefit of the doubt. Our sessions here have left people flabbergasted, weeping. But you have to come here with an open mind, a willingness to believe. We talk the talk but we also walk the walk. We put our cards on the table. If you insist this is all impossible, fine. Less than a century ago, going to the moon was laughable, only crackpots considered it viable. The proof is in the pudding and our pudding is available to anyone looking for the truth. Come on down!”
Tinkerbell said it first: “The world is made of Trust, Faith and Pixie Dust. You’ve got to believe!”
That’s all, folks….
bill.killeen094@gmail.com
