Harassed Rancher Who Located 'Saucer' Sorry He Told About It
W. W. Brazel, 48, Lincoln county rancher living 30 miles south of Corona, today told his story of finding what the army at first described as a flying disk, but the publicity which attended his find caused him to add that if he ever found anything else short of a bomb, he sure wasn't going to say anything about it.
Brazel was brought here late yesterday by W. E. Whitmore, of radio station KGFL, had his picture taken and gave an interview to the Record and Jason Kellahin, sent here from the Albuquerque bureau of the Associated Press to cover the story. The picture he posed for was sent out over AP telephoto wire sending machine specially set up in the Record office by R. D. Adair, AP wire chief sent here from Albuquerque for the sole purpose of getting out his picture and that of sheriff George Wilcox, to whom Brazel originally gave the information of his find.
Brazel related that on June 14 he and an 8-year old son, Vernon, were about 7 or 8 miles from the ranch house of the J. B. Foster ranch, which he operates, when they came upon a large area of bright wreckage made up of rubber strips, tinfoil, a rather tough paper and sticks.
At the time Brazel was in a hurry to get his round made and he did not pay much attention to it. But he did remark about what he had seen and on July 4 he, his wife, Vernon and a daughter, Betty, age 14, went back to the spot and gathered up quite a bit of the debris.
The next day he first heard about the flying disks, and he wondered if what he had found might be the remnants of one of these.
Monday he came to town to sell some wool and while here he went to see sheriff George Wilcox and "whispered kinda confidential like" that he might have found a flying disk.
Wilcox got in touch with the Roswell Army Air Field and Maj. Jesse A. Marcel and a man in plain clothes accompanied him home, where they picked up the rest of the pieces of the "disk" and went to his home to try to reconstruct it.
According to Brazel they simply could not reconstruct it at all. They tried to make a kite out of it, but could not do that and could not find any way to put it back together so that it could fit.
Then Major Marcel brought it to Roswell and that was the last he heard of it until the story broke that he had found a flying disk.
Brazel said that he did not see it fall from the sky and did not see it before it was torn up, so he did not know the size or shape it might have been, but he thought it might have been about as large as a table top. The balloon which held it up, if that was how it worked, must have been about 12 feet long, he felt, measuring the distance by the size of the room in which he sat. The rubber was smoky gray in color and scattered over an area about 200 yards in diameter.
When the debris was gathered up the tinfoil, paper, tape, and sticks made a bundle about three feet long and 7 or 8 inches thick, while the rubber made a bundle about 18 or 20 inches long and about 8 inches thick. In all, he estimated, the entire lot would have weighed maybe five pounds.
There was no sign of any metal in the area which might have been used for an engine and no sign of any propellers of any kind, although at least one paper fin had been glued onto some of the tinfoil.
There were no words to be found anywhere on the instrument, although there were letters on some of the parts. Considerable scotch tape and some tape with flowers printed upon it had been used in the construction.
No strings or wire were to be found but there were some eyelets in the paper to indicate that some sort of attachment may have been used.
Brazel said that he had previously found two weather observation balloons on the ranch, but that what he found this time did not in any way resemble either of these.
"I am sure that what I found was not any weather observation balloon," he said. "But if I find anything else besides a bomb they are going to have a hard time getting me to say anything about it."
Rancher Mack Brazel was interviewed sometime during the evening of Tuesday, July 8, 1947, at the office of the Roswell Daily Record by both a Record reporter and a reporter for the Associated Press (Jason Kellahin). Brazel's photo was also taken by an AP photographer (Robin Adair) and wired out early the next morning at 6:00 am. (This was the first wirephoto ever transmitted from Roswell and merited a separate story in the Daily Record.)
The Record printed a rather lengthy story on the interview the next afternoon (click here to view). However, several hours before Brazel was interviewed, Gen. Ramey over in Fort Worth had been busy killing the story by declaring the flying disk to be a weather balloon. By the time the AP story and photo got out early the next morning, the story was largely dead, and only a small percentage of newspapers outside of New Mexico carried either the photo or anything on Brazel's interview. The complete Kellahin AP article was printed in a number of New Mexico newspapers and one of the Austin and El Paso papers (click here to view) Elsewhere, the stories were fragmentary and few and far between. The few non-regional Brazel AP stories that I could find out of over 400 newspapers surveyed are reprinted below (click here to view).
Misc. Associated Press Stories
The following are fragmentary articles on the Brazel press conference found elsewhere in the nation's press. There wasn't much interest in the story outside of New Mexico and very few papers carried anything on it. A few papers, as noted, carried Brazel's wirephoto.
Oakland (CA) Tribune, July 9, page 1
Rancher is Sorry He Talked So Much
Roswell, N.M. July 9 (AP) W. W. Brazel, the rancher credited for a time with finding the Nation's first flying disc, is sorry he said anything about it. He was amazed at the fuss made over his discovery.
"If I find anything else short of a bomb, it's going to be hard to get me to talk," he told the Associated Press here early this morning."
Brazel's discovery was reported late yesterday by Lieut. Walter Haut, Roswell Army Air Field public relations officer, as being one of the flying saucers that have puzzled and worried residents of 43 states the past several weeks.
ROSWELL, N.M., July 9. (AP) W. W. Brazel, the rancher credited for a time with finding the nation's first flying disk, is sorry he said anything about it.
The 48-year-old New Mexican said he was amazed at the fuss made over his discovery.
"If I find anything else short of a bomb, it's going to be hard to get me to talk," he said Wednesday.
Brazel's discovery was reported late Tuesday by Lieut. Walter Haut, Roswell army airfield public information officer, as being one of the flying saucers that have puzzled and worried residents of forty-three states the past several weeks.
Later, however, Brig. Gen. Roger Ramey, commanding general of the Eighth Air Force of which the Roswell field is a component, said Brazel's find was merely a weather radar target.
But Brazel wasn't making any claims. He said he didn't know what it was.
ROSWELL, N.M., July 9. (AP) W. W. Brazel, 48, rancher credited for a time with finding the nation's first flying disk, is sorry he said anything about it and is amazed at the fuss made over his discovery, he told a reporter today.
Brazel's discovery was reported late yesterday by Lt. Walter Haut, Roswell army airfield public relations officer, as being one of the flying saucers whose gyrations thru the skies have puzzled residents of 44 states in recent days. Brig. Gen. Roger Ramey, commanding general of the 8th air force at Fort Worth, Tex., later said Brazel's find was merely a weather radar target.
Brazel said he didn't know what it was. He described his find as consisting of large numbers of pieces of paper covered with a foil-like substance and pieced together with small sticks like a kite. He made the find June 14 on his ranch, 30 miles southeast of Corona, N.M.
A New Mexico rancher, who, in all innocence, indirectly started a world-girdling rumor yesterday that the United States Army had a flying disk in its possession, summed it all up in awed tones today:
"Lord, how that story has traveled!"
The rancher, W. W. Brazel, 48 years old, of Roswell, N. M., told the Associated Press:
"I asked the sheriff to keep it kinda quiet."
Sheriff George Wilcox "kept it quiet" all right, reporting Brazel's find which turned out to be a harmless high-altitude weather balloon only to officers at the Roswell Army Air Field. But a public relations officer announced that the Army had a flying disk and made headlines briefly around the world.
Lieut. Warren Haught [sic], the public-relations officer, said flatly: "The many rumors regarding the flying disk became a reality . . . when the intelligence office of the 509th (Atomic) Bomb Group of the Eighth Air Force, Roswell Army Air Field, was fortunate enough to gain possession of a disk."
Within a few hours, however, Brig. Gen. Roger M. Ramey, commander of the Eighth Air Force, with headquarters in Fort Worth, Tex., debunked the P.R.O.'s story.
Papers publishing just the Brazel photo with no Brazel story
San Antonio Express, July 10 (Morning)
Caption:
"DISCOVERER"W. W. Brazell [sic], 48-year-old New Mexico rancher, found the "flying disc" which turned out to be a weather balloon such as is commonly used by 80 weather stations in the U.S.
HE FOUND ITW. W. Brazell [sic], 48, rancher near Roswell N.M., found the "flying disc" that turned out to be a weather balloon.
Louisville Times, July 9
Caption: W. W. Brazel.Found Weather Balloon
Associated Press Story
The following newspapers from either the immediate New Mexico area or Midwest carried the complete (or nearly complete) Jason Kellahin Associated Press article about Brazel's interview. I have been unable to find this article elsewhere. In about half the papers, Kellahin was given a byline. Oddly, none of these papers carrying the AP Brazel story carried Brazel's photo, also sent out by the AP from Roswell.
Albuquerque Tribune, July 9, 1947, page 2, edited article
NM RANCHER SORRY HE SAID ANYTHING ABOUT "DISC FIND"
Austin (TX) Statesman, July 9, front page, top, edited article
The Fuss It Caused!
Rancher Credited With Finding First 'Saucer" Now Sorry He Mentioned It
Carlsbad (N.M.) Daily Current-Argus, July 9,page 2, complete article
'Flying Disc' Turns Out To Be Weather Balloon
Des Moines (Iowa) Tribune, July 9, p. 2, complete article
Rancher's Sorry About Disk Story
El Paso (TX) Times, July 10, front page, complete article
Rancher Who Found 'Disc' Amazed At Army Reaction
Hobbs (N.M.) Daily News-Sun, July 9, front page, complete article
His Disk Is Dud; Army Explanation Debunks Reports
Jefferson City (Missouri) Post-Tribune, July 9, p. 1, complete article
'How That Story Travelled'
Says New Mexico Rancher Who Found Purported Flying Disc
Las Cruces (N.M.) Sun-News, July 10, page 2, edited article
Rancher Who Was Thought to Have Found Disc, Sorry He Mentioned It
Las Vegas (N.M.) Daily Optic, July 9, front page, complete article
RANCHER WANTS TO FORGET ALL ABOUT DISK; TELLS OF FINDING RADAR TARGET ON RANCH LAND
Portales (N.M.) Daily News, July 9, front page. complete article
NM 'Flying Saucer' is Weather Balloon; Roswell Rancher Sorry He Mentioned It
Raton (N.M.) Daily Range, July 9, front page, complete article
Roswell Rancher Sorry He Ever Mentioned Finding Flying Disc
Sedalia (Missouri) Democrat, July 9, p. 1, Sedalia Capital, July 10, p. 9, complete article
Sorry He Said Anything About 'Discs'
New Mexican Amazed At the Fuss Over His Discovery
Springfield (Missouri) Leader Press, July 10, p. 1, complete article
'Finder' of Flying Disc A Little Mortified Now
Silver City (N.M.) Daily Press, July 9, front page, complete article
DISCOVERED 'DISC' PROVES FALSE ALARM
Tucumcari (N.M.) Daily News, July 9, front page, complete article
New Mexico Rancher Sorry Now That He Said Anything About It
By Jason Kellahin
ROSWELL, July 9 (AP) -- W. W. Brazel, the New Mexico who was originally thought to have found the nation's first "flying disc" is sorry he said anything about it.
The 48-year-old New Mexican said he was amazed at the fuss made over his discovery.
"If I find anything else short of a bomb it's going to be hard to get me to talk," he told the Associated Press yesterday.
Brazel's discovery was reported Tuesday by Lt. Warren Haught [sic], Roswell Army Air Field public information officer, as definitely being one of the "flying discs" that have puzzled and worried citizens of 43 states during the past several weeks.
The statement was later discounted by Brig. General Roger Ramey, commanding general of the Eighth Air Force of which the RAAF is a component. Gen. Ramey said Brazel's discovery was a weather radar target.
But Brazel wasn't making any claims. He said he didn't know what it was.
He described his find as consisting of large numbers of pieces of paper covered with a foil-like substance, and pieced together with small sticks much like a kite. Scattered with the materials over an area about 200 yards across were pieces of gray rubber. All the pieces were small.
"At first I thought it was a kite, but we couldn't put it together like any kite I ever saw," he said. "It wasn't a kite."
Brazel related this story:
While riding the range on his ranch 30 miles southeast of Corona, on June 14 he sighted some shiny objects. He picked up a piece of the stuff and took it to the ranch house seven miles away.
On July 4, he returned to the site with his wife and two of his children, Vernon, 8, and Bessie, 14. They gathered all the pieces they could find. The largest was about three feet across.
Brazel said he hadn't heard of the "flying discs" at the time, but several days later his brother-in-law, Hollis Wilson, told him of the disc reports, and suggested it might be one.
"When I went to Roswell I told Sheriff George Wilcox about it" he continued. "I was a little bit ashamed to mention it, because I didn't know what it was."
"Asked the sheriff to keep it kinda quiet," he added with a chuckle. "I thought folks would kid me about it."
Sheriff Wilcox referred the discovery to intelligence officers at the Roswell Army Air field, and Major Jesse A. Marcel and a man in civilian clothes whom Brazel was unable to identify went to the ranch and brought the pieces of material to the air field.
"I didn't hear any more about it until things started popping," said Brazel. "Lord, how that story has traveled!"
Brazel said he did not see the thing before it fell, and it was badly torn up when he found it.
This photo of Mack Brazel was taken by A.P. photographer Robin Adair during Brazel's interview with Kellahin and the Roswell Daily Record. It was wired out by Adair the following morning at 6 a.m., according to one of the stories in the Daily Record, the first ever wirephoto from Roswell.
