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UFOs and the Media
Vincennes Morning Commercial
April 16, 1897
Early Airship Rumors Flew in Vincennes Sky
From The Valley Advance, Vincennes, Indiana, March 18, 1980
Vol. 16, No. 28,
Unidentified flying objects are nothing new for the people
of Vincennes. In 1897 a mysterious airship passed over the
city twice on the night of Friday, April 16. According to
the Vincennes Morning Commercial, the airship first appeared
about nine o’clock, traveling along the extreme eastern
portion of the horizon: A sphere of golden light was first
seen in the vicinity of the Union Depot, from down in the
city. Those near the ship claimed they could clearly see the
dark lines of its car, although no passengers were observed.
Many reputable citizens witnessed the flight. From his home
on Burnett’s Heights, Sam Judah said he could plainly see
the ship with its fluttering wings, its movements resembling
a side wheeler steam-boat, sailing through the air with
incredible velocity.
From his doorway, where he had gone to look at his
thermometer, Col. Ewing saw the light, which he at first
thought was a falling star, but as it moved so slowly, soon
became convinced that it was the inevitable airship. Ewing
watched it for about four minutes.
Anton Simon noticed a ball of fire, moving in a
north-westerly to southeasterly course, which he later
realized was an airship.
Victor Schonfeld, somewhat of an expert observer, having
made airships and balloons, a life-long study, and having
even made several ascensions in his time, testified that
this was a genuine airship.
Among many others who saw the airship were Col. M.P. Ghee,
Thomas Eastham, Judge DeWolf, Will Mason, Scott Emison,
Jesse Foulks, all highly reputable witnesses.
The airship first passed rapidly overhead in a southwesterly
direction. An hour and a half later, it was seen again,
passing over the northern portion of the city, traveling in
a northwesterly direction:
The last time it seemed to pass directly over the
fairgrounds (present-day Gregg Park) and traveled more
slowly than in its first swift passage straight over the
city.
It is thought that the navigator turned his flying machine
around and started back, or that the ship landed near the
city and started back.
Some say voices could be heard in the airship, and one
gentleman, who saw it from Burnett’s Heights says he could
see a man moving about in the ship and that he appeared to
be adjusting the machinery.
The Commercial concluded: Other cities have seen the airship
and now Vincennes is strictly ‘up to date'.
In fact, the Vincennes encounter was only one of some 200
sightings made by thousands of people in 19 states, during
our nation’s first UFO flap of 1896-1897.
In his article, Close Encounters of the Earliest Kind, in
the December, 1979 issue of American Heritage magazine, Ron
Genini described the beginning of the flap in (where else?)
California, in November of 1896. There were elements of hoax
in some of the accounts, but many people believed they saw
something. Many of the eyewitness accounts agreed that a
traveling light or airship moved against the wind at an
altitude of from 50 to 2,000 feet. It was cigar- or
egg-shaped, with wing-like propellers or fan-like wheels
revolving rapidly . . . and a doubly powerful arc light at
its bottom center.
Soon, hoaxters got into the act, claiming to have ridden the
flying machine, or to have talked with its crew, or even to
have invented it. When some of these hoaxes were exposed,
newspapers became skeptical, questioning the veracity or
sobriety of witnesses, and making the airship the butt of
jokes. After the excitement died down on the West Coast, the
airship reappeared in the skies of the Midwest and South in
April, 1897. In the first chapter of his book The UFO
Controversy in America, David Michael Jacobs details the
many sightings over Chicago, St. Louis, Milwaukee, Omaha,
Kansas City, Dallas, and many other cities and towns.
Colored or intensely bright white lights were the most
characteristic feature of the airship descriptions; in many
other particulars the descriptions agreed with those from
California--a cylindrical, or cigar-shaped body with a
propeller or propellers.
As Jacobs points out, the first modern airship or dirigible
was built in France in 1898, but there is no record of any
American inventor producing an airship at this time. And the
speeds attributed to the mysterious airship--estimated at up
to 200 miles per hour--far exceeded anything possible at the
time. Again, there were some hoaxters, and again the
newspapers were skeptical.
In Vincennes, the evening Western Sun, having been scooped
by the morning paper, wrote a kind of tongue-in-cheek
parody:
The Air Ship Sails the Azure Depths like a Tongue of Light;
It Floats through Space Leaving Multitudes of Worshipping
People on the Earth Beneath-- Supposed to Contain Five
Passengers and to be Enroute to Jacksonville, Fla.
The Sun described the effects upon the supposed
superstitious inhabitants of that aristocratic colored
suburb known as ‘Idaho,’ who were scared to death.
A few days later the airship lent itself to advertising:
The airship seems to be an assured fact. But it is not
attracting so much attention as the slashing prices that are
being made on hardware and bicycles at Scott & Sons. Millers
Drug Store on Main Street used the airship to draw attention
to its ice cream and sodas.
There was not another sighting flap until 1946.
The chief difference was that while people in 1896-7 thought
that the UFO’s were man-made objects, in the modern ear the
tendency is to believe that they are not of this earth.
A winged ship in the sky was how the San Francisco Call
described a mysterious airship seen at Sacramento on Nov.
17, 1896. The illustration closely matches the description
of one seen over Vincennes in April, 1897.
FLYING MATTRESS? -- With wings like mattress ticking, a
California airship is depicted shining its light earthward.
Also shown is a four-man crew in a canopied cockpit. Singing
to the accompaniment of a phonograph supposedly could be
heard coming from the craft.
 
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