Visitor Weblog – Martin Kottmeyer’s musings on Matthew Bowman’s "The Abduction of Betty and Barney Hill"

 VS.

“FAR MORE LOGICAL THAN A DREAM”

Some crucial and private musings on Matthew Bowman’s The Abduction of Betty and Barney Hill: Alien Encounters, Civil Rights and the New Age in America, Yale College Press, 2023, 278pp. 

Bowman’s new model of the Hill abduction is a largely good e-book.  He gives appreciable quantities of latest biographical background about their lives previous to the ufo occasion that made them celebrities within the ufo tradition.  He had entry to the papers surrounding the investigation of the first ufo occasion and this provides many particulars and nuances to what was witnessed.  We all know from Bowman that Barney noticed the ufo entities bathed in a “shadowless blue mild,” a stunning evocative phrase that by no means made it into Interrupted Journey.  He pays extra consideration than most to Betty’s fears that that they had been uncovered to radioactivity from the craft, bringing info that 5 years after the occasion she was writing scientists about her considerations that her recurrent bouts with pneumonia and the way sick Delsey, their canine, was and asking them about “sure radiation risks linked with ufo sightings.”  She additionally indicated that the preliminary name to Pease AFB was prompted by wanting safety over what risks that they had been uncovered to.  He significantly fleshes out the story of Betty’s later obsession with ufos and the way she claimed to have a whole bunch of sightings into the Seventies and past.  Bowman signifies she additionally informed ghost tales and embraced New Age beliefs which he excuses as legitimate reactions to their rejection by institution science and the authorities.

Unusual to say although, Bowman himself brackets the e-book along with his personal rejections – “I don’t consider the Hills have been kidnapped…” (11)  He’s skeptical of the reasons given to the ufo occasion and “the story of the kidnapping appears to me to lack proof past the Hills personal hypnotically recovered reminiscences, a style well-known to be fraught and malleable.  And a narrative of medical examination and interstellar journey appears too easy for the realities the Hills claimed to glimpse.” (223) 

That expression “realities” appears to hold a New Age which means and it’s considerably eye-opening that in the midst of the e-book simply earlier than recounting the goals that Betty wrote down within the days after ufo sighting and her realization of doable radiation publicity, he describes them as “a complete narrative, much more logical than a dream.”(89)

And I can solely time period {that a} disappointing growth for Betty’s goals very a lot appear to be goals to me, surreal and fairly irrational.  She is thrust within the navel with a big needle and experiences ache.  Her examiner is stunned by this and is ready to cease it just by a wave of the hand.  The chief offers Betty a e-book, however his crew factors out that he shouldn’t have finished that and so they take it again.  How may the chief neglect such a major coverage level that they shouldn’t present proof of their secret and legal acts?  And what concerning the enterprise with exhibiting her the star map and asking Betty if she knew the place Earth was on it.  Was this purported to be sarcasm?  A rational individual would make a gesture to point out the place Earth was on it and their dwelling or just inform her that that they had a coverage in opposition to that.  The story will not be logical in any respect.

This brings me to a bigger disappointment.  In trying by means of the notes, I noticed that at one level he cites Brookesmith and Pflock’s Encounters at Indian Head, however I discover it very onerous to consider he learn it.  His textual content doesn’t interact with a number of necessary criticisms showing in that e-book.  Brookesmith’s paper particularly calls for consideration for the evaluation of what Bowman calls the ‘thumbnail arithmetic’ researchers indulged in two months after the drive that led to the declare that there was ‘lacking time’ – the “two misplaced hours” emphasised in Fuller’s subtitle.   Brookesmith factors out that their distance estimate was incorrect – based mostly on an “because the crow flies” quantity that ignores the route was extraordinarily winding and even reverses route at one level.  Let’s additionally reiterate that the Hills themselves didn’t discover the discrepancy on the time once they reached dwelling, one thing that fashionable depictions virtually invariably falsely painting.  Brookesmith’s paper makes different observations that one can hardly consider Bowman would ignore mentioning like the actual fact he, like others Bowman discusses, thought the interracial marriage was a matter for prolonged remark.  Brookesmith additionally factors out the genital warts that Barney reported are a typical STD.

I’ve a paper within the Indian Head e-book that spells out these illogical facets of the dream I discussed above.  Although I don’t object to Bowman referring to my earlier work as giving a foul science fiction interpretation to Betty’s goals, I had expanded my evaluation to incorporate exhibiting how a number of the odd parts of the examination – the nail clippings (hardly a traditional medical process), pores and skin scrapings, and the so-called being pregnant take a look at appear to particularly echo issues seen within the investigation of radioactive fallout.  This connects as much as Betty’s concern of radiation publicity which strains as much as how goals usually mirror the continuing anxieties an individual is feeling.

That paper additionally consists of my rebuttal to Jerry Clark’s typically hallucinated criticisms in opposition to “The Eyes That Spoke” which Bowman echoes in describing my rhetoric as having a supposedly triumphant high quality.  It’s Clark himself who locations issues in a warring body – be aware level 4 in “The Eyes Still Speak” – my very own perspective was the correct one among thrilled discovery.

Bowman additionally recycles Kathleen Marden’s more moderen commentary that “The Bellero Protect” doesn’t even have giant slanting eyes; as a substitute bony ridges round its eyes lengthen alongside the facet of its head.”  How this eliminates the resemblance appears considerably nebulous to me.  Baker’s sketch consists of bone construction across the eyes.   ,
Junior additionally appears to have that bony ridge:
 

Extra on to the purpose, although, there nonetheless stays that the wraparound look of the eyes evident in Barney’s sketch in Interrupted Journey and use of the wraparound eyes expression in speaking to the Lorenzens will not be deserted.  It was that resemblance that led me to analysis the matter of the airing of “The Bellero Protect” to see if it was even doable for there to be an affect.

0Had Bowman learn Encounters at Indian Head, he ought to have identified that Clark’s remarks had been responded to. Although Bowman elsewhere appears to stick to a type of journalistic objectivity and steadiness, not telling either side right here reinforces the sense he merely by no means learn the e-book. (He by no means mentions Betty’s look at this notably important symposium straight spawned by the Hill’s story.)  I really feel Bowman additionally ought to have remarked on if he thought the radiation fears have been as related to the goals as I argued, each right here and in Brookesmith & Pflock’s e-book:

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MY BETTY HILL FILE:
Karl Pflock and Peter Brookesmith, eds., Encounters at Indian Head: The Betty and Barney Hill UFO Abduction Revisited,  Anomalist Books, 2007, 309pp.
“Betty Hill’s Medical Nightmare,”  Magonia Month-to-month Complement #12  February 1999  pp. 1-3.

“The Eyes Nonetheless Communicate,” The REALL Information, 6, #5  June/July 1998   pp. 1, 6-9.

“Suppressing a Smile,” The REALL Information 13, #1; January/February 2005, pp. 1, 3, 13-14.

Might 15, 2023: Betty Hill’s “Junior”

August 10, 2020: Inka Dinka Clue
 
January 28, 2022: 5 Errors Made by Betty Hill in a 1998 Interview

[Roughly the time Jerry asked Betty about “The Bellero Shield.” Her memory was demonstrable fallible.]
February 10, 2017: Betty Hill was not prescient about amniocentesis
Bowman leaves her declare uncontested on web page 160 that that large needle is “now in on a regular basis use in large metropolis hospitals.”
“Probing Exosemination,” The REALL Information, 10, #3, March 2002, pp. 1, 3-5, 7

[Barney Hill made the first anal probe claim!  Curiously Bowman, though quoting Webb on the matter, doesn’t celebrate his priority status.]
September 12, 2019: Why the Betty and Barney Hill Alien Abduction Expertise Does NOT Contain Folie Á Deux

February 8, 2020: Hocus-Pocus and the Significance of Eye Contact
https://www.fb.com/picture.php?fbid=2519739104935005&set=a.1392021771040083&kind=3&theater
Contains photos of the Bellero Protect alien and Barney Hill’s sketch.
Probably there are others I’m forgetting…

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