by Anthony Bragalia
The UFO Iconoclast(s)
One of the most acclaimed Naval scientists in U.S. military history has stated unequivocally that the Roswell crash of 1947 was not of a balloon nor was it a hoax. Based on evidence he had seen in an official capacity, the Commander was instead convinced that the crash represents an event with deep implications for all of mankind. Universally acknowledged as the “grandfather” of satellite technology – and a close associate of Dr. Werner von Braun – Commander George W. Hoover has revealed that the truth about Roswell is far stranger that we have ever dared to think.
THE GENIUS COMMANDER
COMMANDER GEORGE W. HOOVER, SEATED (LEFT) WITH FRED DURANT (ROBERTSON PANEL ON UFOS) AND WERNER von BRAUN (SEATED ACROSS)
Commander George W. Hoover was long associated with the U.S. Office of Naval Research (ONR). He was also a space program pioneer and innovator of numerous avionic and astronautical devices. Hoover was highly awarded for his technical achievements including the Aviation Week Laureate Award, the American Astronautical Society’s Space Flight Award, the Legion of Merit and the British Interplanetary Society’s Bronze Medal.
Hoover made enormous contributions to atmospheric balloon research leading to Project Skyhook; the X-15 Jet Aircraft (in developing the D-558-1) and to Werner von Braun’s Project Orbiter (resulting in the launch of Explorer I, the first American satellite.) When retired from service, Hoover was a leading consultant to organizations including NASA (providing human standards development for Apollo) General Dynamics, McDonnell Douglas and Curtis Wright. Hoover was also instrumental in the development of the first advanced flight instrumentation and of the first flight simulators. A highly decorated pilot as well, he personally logged over 5,000 flight hours in over 100 types of aircraft.
Dr. Werner von Braun said of Hoover in the early 1950s, “Everybody talks about satellites, then nobody does anything. George Hoover’s contribution should never be forgotten.” Vice Chief of the Navy, Admiral Harry D. Felt said of Hoover that he offered “the driving spirit, organizing genius, imagination and foresight which set in motion the mighty effort toward the first man-made earth satellite, man’s first step toward space flight.”
HOOVER THE VISIONARY
Hoover was not only a technical genius, but also a scientist with far-ranging interest, including studies in cosmology and philosophy. Hoover also had developed theories on the technical feasibility of lunar and Mars bases with the likes of Harvard astronomer Fred Whipple, Arthur C. Clarke and German scientist Krafft A. Ehricke. Hoover’s interest extended to the subject of UFOs.
Developing evidence shows that Hoover may well have been assisting Fred Durant of the early UFO government study group “The Robertson Panel” as well as on other official UFO studies with others.
His private interest in such things though is demonstrated in a strange “side” episode in his career: In 1957, Admiral N. Furth (who helped lead the Office of Naval Research) had received in the mail in a manilla envelope a copy of the book “The Case for the UFO” by astronomer Morris K. Jessup. The copy made its way to Major Darrell L. Ritter of ONR. Ritter presented George Hoover and Captain Sidney Sherby with a copy of the book. The version of the book sent to ONR, however, had handwritten comments on the top, bottom and margins of the pages. Now known to have been the scrawls of a dubious character named Carlos Allende, the annotations were nonetheless “interesting.” Though clearly amateur, they did in fact speak coincidentally to some of the very areas of technical and theoretical development that George Hoover himself was then engaged. This included notes by Allende about “magnetic fields” “gravity fields” “cosmic rays” and “cloaking technologies.” Because of this, Hoover reviewed the material (in a strictly personal capacity) to see if anything of any value could be culled. Of course there was not, but the strange episode demonstrates that Hoover was one of the Navy’s foremost “outside of the box” thinkers. Hoover reported back that Allende’s wild ideas of naval ship “invisibility” likely found their impetus in routine ship degaussing exercises made at the time.
THE COMMANDER’S NAMESAKE SON: “WHAT HE TOLD ME ABOUT ROSWELL”
GEORGE HOOVER JR.
George W. Hoover Jr. is the namesake son of Commander George Hoover. Hoover Jr. is himself highly accomplished. He is Berkeley-educated and degreed in Engineering Physics with an MBA from UCLA and a JD from Loyola Law. Hoover Jr. is today a Partner with one of the most prestigious and successful patent law firms in the nation. Hoover Jr. holds US Patents in technologies as far ranging as Energy Storage and 3-D Mapping. Prior to this, Hoover Jr. was a Senior Manager in Advanced Control Systems for Hughes Aircraft.
In extended email correspondence with a research associate of mine named Aurimas Svitojus, George W. Hoover Jr. recently revealed some remarkable things about his father, Commander George Hoover:
· Hoover was -in an official capacity – made privy to Roswell crash information in the 1950s or earlier
· Hoover related some of this information to Hoover Jr. as early as the 1960s!
· Hoover told his son “on a number of occasions” the he had personally “seen the evidence about the Roswell crash event that convinced him that it was neither a balloon nor a hoax”
· Hoover Sr. either would not, could not or did not wish to elaborate any further on this with his son, even after several conversations
· Hoover Sr. had “both a personal and a professional interest in UFOs”
George Hoover Jr. confirms that his father spoke of the Roswell crash – by name – as early as the 1960s. This is yet another powerful example of people privately speaking of the Roswell crash well before “all of the hoopla” of media attention in beginning in the 1980s and 1990s.
Hoover Jr. also confirms that his father was “professionally” involved in the study of UFOs while at the Navy. He further confirms that his father knew positively – by personal examination of evidence that he deemed conclusive – that the Roswell crash was not resultant from the crash of a balloon and that it was not a hoax. Just what exactly it was though, Hoover Sr. did not seem to want to tell his namesake son.
CIA’S FRED DURANT ON ROSWELL AND HOOVER
This author reached out to Fred Durant to see if any more information could be obtained on this. Durant is the former Secretary of the CIA’s UFO study group “The Roberston Panel” of 1952, resulting in what is sometimes called the “Durant Report.” Fred Durant and George Hoover were very close for a very long time, including when both were at the ONR.
Durant is now 94 years old and living in North Carolina. He is still well-spoken and sharp, but very guarded. He was extraordinarily evasive with me in both emails (sent through his assistant, as Durant is now nearly blind) as well as in phone conversation. Durant still speaks like a spook. The former CIA Agent qualified his responses to me several times and prefaced his answers with seemingly well-rehearsed phrases common to those in Intelligence: “I have no reason to believe” and “To my knowledge.”
When asked about what Durant felt about the true nature of the Roswell crash, Durant replied, “To my knowledge, all investigations of Roswell were concluded years ago.” Later he stated “to my knowledge, the story of the Roswell crash was one of misidentification of a Mogul balloon.” Finally on the matter he said, “I do not believe that any evidence of unknown phenomena was obtained.”
Durant spoke fondly of Hoover and confirmed to me that he worked with him and had known him well. He also agreed that Durant was trustworthy and he added that Hoover “sold his concepts well” at the Navy. He also lauded Hoover as playing a role in the development of early space flight and satellite technology.
However, when I asked Durant why Hoover would say that Roswell was not a balloon and not a hoax, he replied, “I have no reason to believe the posthumous claim that George Hoover was aware of any factual information about the Roswell incident.” When I told Durant that Hoover’s own namesake son said differently, Durant wanted to know “where Hoover’s papers are kept.” He simply did not want to hear what Hoover’s own family and others were saying about this, and seemed more concerned about locating any extant professional or personal papers of Hoover’s. Durant, even at 94, proves rather clearly that some of these men take the Oath of Intelligence to their graves.
HOOVER REVEALS THE ROSWELL SECRET
In 1995 George W. Hoover Sr. left his testament for history with an associate of the History Channel. Some of Hoover’s hints about Roswell that he had made to his own son were later corroborated in private, off-the-record conversations that Commander Hoover had with researcher William J. Birnes PhD, JD.
This included a visit by Birnes and others to Hoover’s home in Pacific Palisades, CA. Birnes had sought out Hoover for information on a design issue for a technical “cockpit display project” that Birnes was working on at the time. The talk at some point turned to UFOs. In correspondence with this author, Birnes detailed his experience with Hoover to me and indicated that Hoover was lucid, articulate and serious.
Commander George Hoover had finally revealed what he really knew about Roswell. He explained the truth as he had learned it all those decades ago:
· UFOs are not the “biggest secret” – it is the entities behind them that was of most concern
· Roswell was in fact a crash event of “visitors from somewhere else”
· The entities were “not so much interplanetary as much as they were literally also time travelers.” They are extra-temporal.
· The visitors are clearly “from the future.” There is reason to believe that they may even be “us” from a future Earth.
· These “future humans” have the ability to “manipulate reality around us.”
· The government feared the intentions and abilities of the “visitors”
· These visitors are able to use the power of consciousness in extraordinary ways to morph reality
· We human beings are far more powerful in potential than we ever dreamed that we are. We don’t yet comprehend our extraordinary future capabilities.
· The visitors remain at essence though “corporeal” and “physical” – and secret attempts at reverse-engineering the visitor’s crash material were made
· Incredibly, Hoover admitted that he himself was engaged in such technology transfer as a Naval Intelligence Officer with Top Secret clearances
Hoover appears to have been fairly sparse in his comments to Birnes (just as Hoover was with his namesake son) but his insight still speaks volumes. We learn that the truth about UFOs is held in secret. Roswell really happened. The visitors manipulate time and matter, perhaps as future humans. The role that can be played by fields of consciousness upon technology -and upon reality itself- is difficult to comprehend. And there have been efforts at replication of the crash debris by the U.S. Navy. When Birnes’ interview of Hoover was related to his son Hoover Jr., the son replied that he was unaware that his father had said this, but neither did he discount it.
Readers will know of this author’s previous work linking Battelle Memorial Institute with the US Navy and the development of “shape-recovery” alloys inspired by the Roswell debris. Readers will also remember that this author reported on the US Navy’s bizarre Mind-Over-Matter experiments on the “memory metal” Nitinol conducted by Nitinol’s co-inventor, Dr. Frederick Wang of the Office of Naval Research (ONR.)
The connection is rather astounding and it now comes full circle:
ONR’s Commander George Hoover confirmed that the US Navy was engaged in the reverse-engineering and technology transfer of the Roswell material. He also said that the “mind” matters. Battelle’s metallurgist (and secret government UFO researcher) Dr. Howard Cross worked closely with the US Navy, including in providing valuable information on Titanium and Titanium-Nickel alloys (the basis for memory metal.)
ONR’s Fred Wang was inspired by Battelle’s earlier work to create the Roswell-like morphing metal called Nitinol. Wang was also confirmed to have been involved in Mind-Over-Matter experiments to morph Nitinol with psychic influence. (See Roswell -Battelle article series archived on this site.)
HOOVER’S MESSAGE TO MANKIND
Hoover died at age 83 in 1998. In his decades of service to our country, the Commander helped to provide to mankind the vision to go beyond our planet Earth. He aimed to take us high and far to the stars. This is because Hoover knew that we can be so much more. We have the potential to be at once an Interstellar and a Hyper-Dimensional race. We will one day manipulate and morph the very fabric of space-time and matter itself. We too will traverse the vast cosmos in an instant. When that day comes, the Navy Man tells us, we will no longer fear the Alien. We will realize that we are the Alien.