Pine Ridge Pet Cemetery is a pet cemetery located in Dedham, Massachusetts . Opened in 1907 and operated by the Animal Rescue League of Boston, it is full with nearly 17,000 animals, including dogs, cats, horses, birds, lizards, and rabbits buried there.
124-458: It is the oldest pet cemetery run by an animal welfare organization in the United States. It holds the remains of a number of notable animals, as well as the pets of a number of notable people. Stone walls covered in vines mark the oldest part of the cemetery, which includes a gazebo. The Animal Rescue League of Boston was founded by Anna Huntington Smith in 1899. She bought a tract of land in
248-494: A Pew research poll found that 51% in the United States thought that UFOs reported by people in the military were likely to be evidence of intelligent life from beyond the Earth. In August 2021, Gallup , with a question not specific to military reports, only found that 41% of adults believed some UFOs involve alien spacecraft from other planets. This Gallup poll showed 44% of men and 38% of women believed this. This average of 41% in 2021
372-540: A fallout shelter in the cellar that featured walls of 6-inch reinforced concrete and a lead window cover that could be put in place to shield occupants from fallout resulting from a nuclear explosion . It also housed the Civil Defense Communication Center. In the early 1900s, the ancient Indian burial ground near Wigwam Pond was leveled to make way for athletic fields and a commercial shopping area. The last person known to have been buried there
496-669: A 187-acre (0.8 km ) campus in Riverdale along the Charles River. In 1957, Ursuline Academy moved from Boston's Back Bay to a 28-acre (110,000 m ) parcel in Upper Dedham. The Ursuline nuns who ran the school purchased the property which included a grand manor house designed by Boston architect Guy Lowell . The house, described as "one of the grandest of grand mansions west of Boston, and comparable to what one would see in Newport ,"
620-507: A 1969 USAF document, known as the Bolender memo, along with later government documents, revealed that non-public U.S. government UFO investigations continued after 1970. The Bolender memo first stated that "reports of unidentified flying objects that could affect national security ... are not part of the Blue Book system," indicating that more serious UFO incidents already were handled outside
744-428: A 1996 poll by Newsweek , 20% of Americans believed that UFOs were more likely to be proof of alien life than to have a natural scientific explanation. In December 2017, a new round of media attention started when The New York Times broke the story of the secret Advanced Aviation Threat Identification Program that was funded from 2007 to 2012 with $ 22 million spent on the program. Following this story, along with
868-505: A UFO and reported recovered memories of their experience that became ever more elaborate as the years went by. In 1966, 5% of Americans reported to Gallup that "they had at some time seen something they thought was a 'flying saucer'", 96% said "they had heard or read about flying saucers", and 46% of these "thought they were 'something real' rather than just people's imagination". Responding to UFO enthusiasm, there have always been consistent yet less popular efforts made at debunking many of
992-457: A cage designed to hold prisoners. It has a tall back, an open front, and no top. During the trial, Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis , who was then in Washington, invited Sacco's wife to stay at his home near the courthouse. Sacco's seven-year-old son, Dante, would sometimes stand on the sidewalk outside the jail and play catch with his father by throwing a ball over the wall. Brandeis
1116-468: A daily occurrence with one particularly famous example being the Roswell incident in 1947 where remnants of a downed observation balloon were recovered by a farmer and confiscated by military personnel. UFO enthusiasts in the early 1950s started to organize local "saucer clubs" modeled after science fiction fan clubs of the 1930s and 1940s, with some growing to national and international prominence within
1240-555: A decade. In 1950, three influential books were published— Donald Keyhoe 's The Flying Saucers Are Real , Frank Scully 's Behind the Flying Saucers , and Gerald Heard 's The Riddle of the Flying Saucers . Each guilelessly proposed that the extraterrestrial UFO hypothesis was the correct explanation and that the visits were in response to detonations of atomic weapons . These books also introduced Americans to, as Eghanian puts it, "the crusading whistleblower dedicated to breaking
1364-462: A fake arrest warrant demanding that he appear at the courthouse. The crime was the inspiration for the 1939 film Let Us Live . In 1928, 28-year-old Bettina Masserelli of Dedham robbed a store in Everett, Massachusetts with a male accomplice. When the clerk asked the pair not to take his "bread money," Masserelli told her friend to "sock him." The clerk suffered four broken teeth in the incident and
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#17328555359241488-407: A familiar object." The regulation also said UFOBs were to be investigated as a "possible threat to the security of the United States" and "to determine technical aspects involved." The regulation went on to say that "it is permissible to inform news media representatives on UFOB's when the object is positively identified as a familiar object" but added: "For those objects which are not explainable, only
1612-522: A home on it. When Massachusetts Route 128 was being constructed, Stivaletta convinced then-Transportation Secretary John Volpe to move the road rather than disturb the graves. Volpe's family came from the same small town in Italy as Stivaletta. Town Meeting voted to accept the cemetery in 1998 after being gifted the land from the Stivaletta family. Dedham was represented by a number of women and men in
1736-459: A linen room, and servants' quarters. When he died in 1920 he left the building to his stepdaughter, Katherine . She died in 1967 without any children and willed the land and the estate to the town for "education, civic, social and recreational purposes." At the time "town didn't know quite what to do with it" and "Town Meeting voted to offer it to the Commonwealth." Governor John Volpe took
1860-402: A message about the rising tide of anarchist violence." The trial opened on May 31, 1921, with heavy security. Police were stationed at every entrance of the courthouse and all those entering were searched for weapons. The State Constabulary patrolled outside on horseback and motorcycles and the courtroom was retrofitted with bomb shutters and sliding steel doors that could seal off that wing of
1984-464: A new church at 950 East Street, on the site of the former Endicott School , in 1960. The Riverdale Congregational Church grew out of a Sunday School class held in William Lent's boathouse. Mr. and Mrs. Henry Bingham donated money and land to build the church, which was completed in 1914 and expanded in the 1960s. When the church closed, the church donated their remaining funds in 1992 to be used as
2108-630: A new trial or a stay of execution. On August 23, 1927, the two were electrocuted in the Charlestown jail. The "executions sent hundreds of thousands of protesters into the streets of six continents." The American embassy in Paris was surrounded by tanks to fend off rioting mobs and demonstrations in Germany ended with six deaths. In Geneva "over 5,000 protesters destroyed all things American: cars, goods, even theaters showing American films." Frankfurter would write
2232-427: A phenomenon could, in fact, occur". The research was "being conducted with the thought that the flying objects might be a celestial phenomenon," or that "they might be a foreign body mechanically devised and controlled." Three weeks later in a preliminary defense estimate, the air force investigation decided that, "This 'flying saucer' situation is not all imaginary or seeing too much in some natural phenomenon. Something
2356-612: A professor of philosophy and religion at the University of North Carolina, says that what is seen on a screen, "if it conforms to certain criteria, is interpreted as real, even if it is not real and even if one knows it is not real" and that "screen images embed themselves in one's brain and memories" in ways that "can determine how one views one's past and even determine one's future behaviors". The most notable cases of UFO sightings in France include: UFOs have been subject to investigations over
2480-405: A quorum. Dedham High School began playing Norwood High School in an annual football contest in 1920. Over the years, there have been several notable incidents. In 1946, thousands of fans swarmed the field for about 20 minutes after a Norwood touchdown pass was brought back on an offensive interference penalty. During the closing minutes of the game, the crowd threw stones and other objects at
2604-481: A resident used a friendly representative in a neighboring community to introduce and pass a bill in the General Court. A charter was adopted later in the century, and amended again in the 21st century. The Department of Public Works was created in 1933. The first fire chief was appointed in 1920. Prior to that there was a four-member Board of Fire Engineers who had charge over fires. Hurricane Carol knocked down
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#17328555359242728-625: A rope made of bedsheets and escaped. A few weeks later, she was spotted in a car in Dedham again and the Dedham Police Department began a wild car chase through the streets of town. During the chase, she leapt from the moving car and fled on foot. Police eventually found her hiding behind a stone wall. In 1904, the East Street home of Henry Bradford Endicott , the founder of the multimillion-dollar Endicott-Johnson Shoe Company , burned to
2852-526: A scathing critique of the case entitled "The Case of Sacco-Vanzetti: a critical analysis for lawyers and laymen." It would first be published in The Atlantic Monthly and then as a hardcover book. The brothers Millen, Irving and Murton, alighted from the Yankee Clipper at Readville station on On April 14, 1934, to a crowd of thousands booing and hissing them. A caravan of 40 cars took them from
2976-645: A scholarship for a member of the graduating class of Dedham High School who attended the Riverdale School. As of 2001 , the building was used by the Calvary Baptist Church. Unidentified flying objects An unidentified flying object ( UFO ), or unidentified anomalous phenomenon ( UAP ), is any perceived airborne, submerged or transmedium phenomenon that cannot be immediately identified or explained. Upon investigation, most UFOs are identified as known objects or atmospheric phenomena, while
3100-467: A series of sensationalized Pentagon UFO videos leaked by members of the program who became convinced that UFOs were genuine mysteries worth investigating, there was an increase in mainstream attention to UFO stories. In July 2021, Harvard astronomer Avi Loeb announced the creation of his Galileo Project which intended to use high-tech astronomical equipment to seek evidence of extraterrestrial artifacts in space and possibly within Earth's atmosphere. This
3224-537: A small number remain unexplained. While unusual sightings have been reported in the sky throughout history, UFOs became culturally prominent after World War II , escalating during the Space Age . Studies and investigations into UFO reports conducted by governments (such as Project Blue Book in the United States and Project Condign in the United Kingdom ), as well as by organisations and individuals have occurred over
3348-442: A threat to national security. Officials were concerned about the "risk of false alerts", of "falsely identifying the real as phantom", and of mass hysteria caused by sightings. In 1947, Brigadier General George F. Schulgen of Army Air Corps Intelligence, warned "the first reported sightings might have been by individuals of Communist sympathies with the view to causing hysteria and fear of a secret Russian weapon." In November 2011,
3472-476: A trail, occasional formation flying, and "evasive" behavior "when sighted or contacted by friendly aircraft and radar", suggesting a controlled craft. It was therefore recommended in late September 1947 that an official Air Force investigation be set up. It was also recommended that other government agencies should assist in the investigation. Project Sign's final report, published in early 1949, stated that while some UFOs appeared to represent actual aircraft, there
3596-464: A wicker carriage. Pulling the carriage was Beppo, a donkey that formerly worked at a park in Lexington that had closed. Students from the nearby Riverdale School were often invited to the facility, which included a visit to the bungalow Smith and her husband lived in. They would then feed the horses apples and sugar before being treated to ice cream and a sing-a-long. At the school itself, a "bird table"
3720-529: Is Halley's Comet : first recorded by Chinese astronomers in 240 BC and possibly as early as 467 BC as a strange and unknown "guest light" in the sky. As a bright comet that visits the inner solar system every 76 years, it was often identified as a unique isolated event in ancient historical documents whose authors were unaware that it was a repeating phenomenon. Such accounts in history often were treated as supernatural portents, angels , or other religious omens . While UFO enthusiasts have sometimes commented on
3844-432: Is LESS to these stories than meets the eye". People have always observed the sky and have sometimes seen what, to some, appeared to be unusual sights including phenomena as varied as comets , bright meteors , one or more of the five planets that can be readily seen with the naked eye , planetary conjunctions , and atmospheric optical phenomena such as parhelia and lenticular clouds . One particularly famous example
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3968-515: Is certainly familiar to historians of religion, a domain of human existence marked by deep divisions over interpretations of belief", and science too has found itself engaged increasing amounts of "boundary work" (which is "asserting and reasserting the borders between legitimate and illegitimate scientific research and ideas, between what may and what may not refer to itself as science") with regard to UFO questions. Eghigian points out our current "stark divide did not happen overnight, and its roots lie in
4092-511: Is really flying around." A further review by the intelligence and technical divisions of the Air Materiel Command at Wright Field reached the same conclusion. It reported that "the phenomenon is something real and not visionary or fictitious," and there were disc-shaped objects, metallic in appearance, as big as man-made aircraft. They were characterized by "extreme rates of climb [and] maneuverability", general lack of noise, absence of
4216-580: The AAAS , James E. McDonald said he believed science had failed to mount adequate studies of the problem and criticized the Condon Report and earlier studies by the USAF as scientifically deficient. He also questioned the basis for Condon's conclusions and argued that the reports of UFOs have been "laughed out of scientific court". J. Allen Hynek, an astronomer who worked as a USAF consultant from 1948, sharply criticized
4340-611: The Brazilian Air Force 's 1977 Operação Prato (Operation Saucer). France has had an ongoing investigation (GEPAN/SEPRA/ GEIPAN ) within its space agency Centre national d'études spatiales (CNES) since 1977; the government of Uruguay has had a similar investigation since 1989. On October 31, 2008, the National Archives of Brazil began receiving from the Aeronautical Documentation and History Center part of
4464-840: The Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), FBI , CIA, National Security Agency (NSA), as well as military intelligence agencies of the Army and U.S. Navy , in addition to the Air Force. Following the large U.S. surge in sightings in June and early July 1947, on July 9, 1947, United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) intelligence, in cooperation with the FBI, began a formal investigation into selected sightings with characteristics that could not be immediately rationalized, such as Kenneth Arnold's. The USAAF used "all of its top scientists" to determine whether "such
4588-753: The Falcon Lake incident in Manitoba and the Shag Harbour UFO incident in Nova Scotia. Early Canadian studies included Project Magnet (1950–1954) and Project Second Storey (1952–1954), supported by the Defence Research Board . U.S. investigations into UFOs include: In addition to these, thousands of documents released under FOIA also indicate that many U.S. intelligence agencies collected (and still collect) information on UFOs. These agencies include
4712-494: The Great and General Court of Massachusetts. In April 1909, Town Meeting voted to appropriate $ 60,000 to build a new Quincy School and $ 6,000 for furnishings, fittings, and grading. The original school, it was said at the time was "only held together by the last coat of paint [and had] clearly outlived its usefulness." The new school was completed on budget and built at the intersection of Greenhood, Quincy, and Bussey Streets. It
4836-556: The Kenneth Arnold incident . "Unidentified flying object" (UFO) has been in-use since 1947. The acronym, "UFO" was coined by Captain Edward J. Ruppelt , for the USAF. He wrote, "Obviously the term 'flying saucer' is misleading when applied to objects of every conceivable shape and performance. For this reason the military prefers the more general, if less colorful, name: unidentified flying objects. UFO". The term UFO became widespread during
4960-585: The Riverdale section of town to be a place where the working horses of Boston could rest or, if needed, be euthanized. Smith built an electrified stall on the property, which she called "the House of the Blessed Release," that would kill the horse whenever it happened to wander into it. If a horse could be saved, it was given a few weeks of rest and then returned to its owner along with a warning to take better care of
5084-488: The White House released an official response to two petitions asking the U.S. government to acknowledge formally that aliens have visited this planet and to disclose any intentional withholding of government interactions with extraterrestrial beings. According to the response: The U.S. government has no evidence that any life exists outside our planet, or that an extraterrestrial presence has contacted or engaged any member of
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5208-443: The '80s and '90s "the floodgates opened, and with them a new generation of UFO advocates". Leaders among them were the artist Budd Hopkins , horror writer Whitley Strieber , historian David Jacobs , and Harvard psychiatrist John Mack . They all defended the "veracity of those claiming to have been kidnapped, examined, and experimented upon by beings from another world", writes Eghigian, as "new missionaries who simultaneously played
5332-484: The 1898 bathhouse that burned down in 1923. It was set aside for women and girls to use on Tuesday and Friday afternoons. Land purchased in the late 1940s by Joseph Stivaletta, a local developer, was once home to the Temporary Asylum for Discharged Female Prisoners . He discovered 11 small, oval stones made of marble marking the graves of children and, rather than disturb them, set the land aside and did not build
5456-409: The 1950s, at first in technical literature, but later in popular use. Unidentified aerial phenomena" (UAP) first appeared in the late 1960s. UAP has seen increasing usage in the 21st century due to negative cultural associations with "UFO". UAP is sometimes expanded as "unidentified anomalous phenomenon". While technically a UFO refers to any unidentified flying object, in modern popular culture
5580-554: The 1980s and 1990s, UFO stories featured in such pulp "true crime" serials as Unsolved Mysteries while the 33 Volume Time-Life series Mysteries of the Unknown which featured UFO stories sold some 700,000 copies. Kloor writes that by the late 1990s, "other big UFO subthemes had been prominently introduced into pop culture, such as the abduction phenomenon and government conspiracy narrative , via best-selling books and, of course, The X-Files ". Eghigian notes that, by this point,
5704-551: The 20th century saw great growth come to the town. It played host to the Sacco and Vanzetti trial, saw the Endicott Estate and a number of schools constructed, a great deal of economic development, and growth in the number of services provided by the Town. A bill establishing a representative town meeting was established in 1928, and then amended in 1948. It was almost amended again when
5828-503: The Air Force issued a statement to the effect that the book was outdated and cadets instead were being informed of the Condon Report 's negative conclusion. Controversy surrounded the report, both before and after its release. It has been observed that the report was "harshly criticized by numerous scientists, particularly at the powerful AIAA ... [which] recommended moderate, but continuous scientific work on UFOs." In an address to
5952-631: The Arnold incident, reported that over 25% of the U.S. public "believed unidentified flying objects could be from outer space". The cultural phenomenon showed up within some intellectual works such as the 1959 publication of Flying Saucers: A Modern Myth of Things Seen in the Sky by Carl Jung , a Swiss psychiatrist and psychoanalyst who founded analytical psychology. Starting in 1947, the U.S. Air Force began to record and investigated UFO reports with Project Sign looking into "more than 250 cases" from 1947 to 1949. It
6076-525: The CIA Director (DCI) in December read that "the reports of incidents convince us that there is something going on that must have immediate attention ... Sightings of unexplained objects at great altitudes and traveling at high speeds in the vicinity of major U.S. defense installations are of such a nature that they are not attributable to natural phenomena or any known types of aerial vehicles." The matter
6200-896: The Chilean Committee for the Study of Unidentified Space Phenomena, supported even by the Chilean Scientific Society. Currently, the organization changed its denomination to SEFAA and its a department of the DGAC (Chile) which in turn depends on the Chilean Air Force . In Canada, the Department of National Defence has dealt with reports, sightings and investigations of UFOs across Canada. In addition to conducting investigations into crop circles in Duhamel, Alberta , it still considers "unsolved"
6324-520: The Condon Committee Report and later wrote two nontechnical books that set forth the case for continuing to investigate UFO reports. Ruppelt recounted his experiences with Project Blue Book, a USAF investigation that preceded Condon's. According to a 1979 New York Times report, "records from the C.I.A., the F.B.I. and other Federal agencies" ("about 900 documents—nearly 900 pages of memos, reports and correspondence") obtained in 1978 through
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#17328555359246448-491: The East Dedham firehouse's 80 foot bell tower on August 31, 1954. It flew across the station and landed on 219 Bussey St, the house next door, where Maria Guerriero was feeding her one-year-old son, Joseph. It also crushed three cars parked on Bussey St. A firehouse was constructed on Westfield Street, near High Street, in 1906. The lower level had horse stalls, a stable room, a hose wago, and engine room, and an opening to
6572-548: The Freedom of Information Act request, indicate that "despite official pronouncements for decades that U.F.O.'s were nothing more than misidentified aerial objects and as such were no cause for alarm ... the phenomenon has aroused much serious behind‐the‐scenes concern" in the US government. In particular, officials were concerned over the "approximately 10%" of UFO sightings which remained unexplained, and whether they might be Soviet aircraft and
6696-494: The Harvard Medical School initiated a review of his position which allowed him to retain tenure. However, after this review, as the review board chairman Arnold Relman later put it, Mack was "not taken seriously by his colleagues anymore". Claims of alien abduction have continued, but no other clinicians would continue to speak of them as real in any sense. Nonetheless, these ideas persisted in popular opinion. According to
6820-497: The Norfolk County Sheriff's office went out to workplaces, club meetings, concerts, and elsewhere to bring in additional potential jurors. One man, ultimately selected, was brought from his wedding dinner. The Quincy man had to postpone his honeymoon until after the trial. At one point the prosecution presented a cap that was found at the crime scene and which they contended to be Sacco's. When Sacco's lawyers had him try
6944-457: The UFO problem had become "far more interesting to ponder than to actually solve." Interest was particularly fevered in the 1990s with the publicity surrounding the television broadcast of an Alien autopsy video marketed as "real footage" but later admitted to be a staged "re-enactment". Eghigian writes that "there had always been outlier abduction reports dating back to the '50s and '60s" but that in
7068-476: The US in over 50 years. Another Congressional hearing took place on July 26, 2023, featuring the whistleblower claims of former U.S. Air Force (USAF) officer and intelligence official David Grusch. A Harris Poll in 2009 found that 32% of Americans "believe in UFOs". A National Geographic study in June 2012 found that 36% of Americans believe UFOs exist and that 10% thought that they had spotted one. In June 2021
7192-409: The animal. In addition to horses, which were the main focus of the facility, kennels for dogs and cats were also built. As motors took the place of horses, the facility eventually changed its focus to cats and dogs instead. The cemetery was built adjacent to the animal refuge. The facility instituted a visitors' day every year beginning in 1908. Guests took a tour of the property while being pulled in
7316-534: The best known government studies are the ghost rockets investigation by the Swedish military (1946–1947), Project Blue Book, previously Project Sign and Project Grudge , conducted by the USAF from 1947 until 1969, the secret U.S. Army/Air Force Project Twinkle investigation into green fireballs (1948–1951), the secret USAF Project Blue Book Special Report No. 14 by the Battelle Memorial Institute , and
7440-687: The cap on, however, it was found to be much too small for his head. Several years later, in May 1926, Frankfurter would travel to the Dedham courthouse to make a motion for a new trial after another man, also in the Dedham Jail, confessed to the crime. The motion was denied by Judge Webster Thayer in October and in the next 10 months the Supreme Judicial Court , a federal judge and three Supreme Court Justices, including Brandeis, each denied motions for either
7564-465: The century. By most accounts, the popular UFO craze in the US began with a media frenzy surrounding the reports on June 24, 1947, of a civilian pilot named Kenneth Arnold who described seeing "a group of bat-like aircraft flying in formation at high speeds" near Mount Rainier that he said were "moving like a saucer would if skipped across water" which led to headlines about "flying saucers" and "flying discs". Only weeks after Arnold's story
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#17328555359247688-444: The claims, and at times the media was enlisted including a 1966 TV special, "UFO: Friend, Foe or Fantasy?", in which Walter Cronkite "patiently" explained to viewers that UFOs were fantasy. Cronkite enlisted Carl Sagan and J. Allen Hynek , who told Cronkite, "To this time, there is no valid scientific proof that we have been visited by spaceships". Such attempts to disenchant the zeitgeist were not very successful at tamping down
7812-424: The courthouse in case of an attack. The cast iron shutters on the windows were designed and painted to match the wooden ones on the rest of the building. The courtroom was so protected that "the trial would be conducted in a far more formidable cage than the simple prisoner's cage that surrounded Sacco and Vanzetti during their trial." The "cage" in which the defendants sat was "more like a fancy Ferris wheel car" than
7936-464: The dedication ceremony on June 8, 1952. The Commonwealth took much of the Town Forest in the 1950s to construct Massachusetts Route 128 . The state returned 71 acres in the median to the Town in 1972 for use of hikers and picnickers. Swimming, fishing, boating, and ice skating were popular activities on Mother Brook. In 1925, the Town built a bathhouse on what is today Incinerator Road to replace
8060-708: The distances involved." On June 25, 2021, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence released a report on UAPs. The report found that the UAPTF was unable to identify 143 objects spotted between 2004 and 2021. The report said that 18 of these featured unusual movement patterns or flight characteristics, adding that more analysis was needed to determine if those sightings represented "breakthrough" technology. The report said that "some of these steps are resource-intensive and would require additional investment." The report did not link
8184-585: The documentation of the Brazilian Air Force regarding the investigation of the appearance of UFOs in Brazil . Currently, this collection gathers cases between 1952 and 2016. In 1968, the SEFAA (previously CEFAA) began receiving case reports of the general public, civil aviators and the Chilean Air Force regarding the sightings or the appearance of UFOs in Chile , the initial work was an initiative of Sergio Bravo Flores who led
8308-518: The existential terror of nuclear war to foreign enslavement to loss of bodily control". American entertainment has explored both "hostile aliens" as well as the "benevolent, world-expanding encounters" seen in films such as Steven Spielberg 's Close Encounters of the Third Kind and E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial . In her research on the relationship of media to UFO beliefs, Diana Walsh Pasulka ,
8432-498: The fact that ATIC [Air Technical Intelligence Center] will analyze the data is worthy of release, due to many unknowns involved." A public research effort conducted by the Condon Committee for the USAF and published as the Condon Report arrived at a negative conclusion in 1968. Blue Book closed down in 1970, using the Condon Committee's negative conclusion as a rationale, thus ending official Air Force UFO investigations. However,
8556-418: The ground. The fire department was not able to get to the estate in time as they were dealing with three other fires simultaneously, including one at the fire house. Henry cleared the ashes away and built a new homestead on the 15-acre (61,000 m ) parcel. The three-story building he constructed has nine bathrooms, eight bedrooms, a library, a music room, a ballroom, a mirrored parlor, a butler's kitchen,
8680-420: The headstone. She also asked for her remains to be cremated and placed next to the cat. The cemetery refused the request, however, and she was buried at Mt. Auburn Cemetery instead. 42°15′51″N 71°11′03″W / 42.2641°N 71.1842°W / 42.2641; -71.1842 History of Dedham, Massachusetts, 1900%E2%80%931999#New neighborhoods The history of Dedham, Massachusetts in
8804-467: The human race...no credible information to suggest that any evidence is being hidden from the public's eye.... The response further noted that efforts, like SETI and NASA's Kepler space telescope and Mars Science Laboratory , continue looking for signs of life . The response noted "odds are pretty high" that there may be life on other planets but "the odds of us making contact with any of them—especially any intelligent ones —are extremely small, given
8928-437: The hypothesis that UFOs are extraterrestrial spacecraft and responded to the "onslaught of credulous coverage" in books, films and entertainment by teaching his students to apply critical thinking to such claims, advising them that "being a good scientist is not unlike being a good detective". According to Fraknoi, UFO reports "might at first seem mysterious", but "the more you investigate, the more likely you are to find that there
9052-463: The kind of evidence required to solidly support such claims has not been forthcoming. Scientists and skeptic organizations such as the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry have provided prosaic explanations for UFOs, namely that they are caused by natural phenomena, human technology, delusions, and hoaxes. Beliefs surrounding UFOs have inspired parts of new religions even as social scientists have identified
9176-505: The last fifty years, the mutual antagonism between paranormal believers and skeptics has largely framed discussion about unidentified flying objects" and that "it often gets personal" with those taking seriously the prospect that UFOs are extraterrestrial in origin dismissing those who consider UFOs to be worth studying as "narrow-minded, biased, obstinate, and cruel" while the skeptics brushed off "devotees" as "naïve, ignorant, gullible, and downright dangerous". Such "mudslinging over convictions
9300-564: The last time on March 16, 1962. The building was demolished in April 1962 after a new town hall was built on Bryant St. The police took up temporary residence in the new town hall for a year while a new police station was built on the Memorial Hall property. On April 29, 1963, the Police Department moved into their new headquarters on the corner of High and Washington Streets. It included
9424-493: The longest ongoing government-sponsored investigation. About 22% of the 6,000 cases studied remain unexplained. The official opinion of GEPAN/SEPRA/GEIPAN has been neutral, stating on their FAQ page that their mission is fact-finding for the scientific community, not rendering an opinion. They add they can neither prove nor disprove the Extraterrestrial Hypothesis (ETH), but their Steering Committee's clear position
9548-537: The mania. Keith Kloor notes that the "allure of flying saucers" remained popular with the public into the 1970s, spurring production of such sci-fi films, as Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Alien , which "continued to stoke public fascination". Meanwhile, Leonard Nimoy narrated a popular occult and mystery TV series In Search of... while daytime talk shows of Mike Douglas , Merv Griffin , and Phil Donahue featured interviews with alien abductees and people who credulously reported stories about UFOs . In
9672-687: The material and the mental dimensions [of UFOs] are incredibly important to get a sense of the full picture". As Adrian Horton writes "from The X-Files to Men in Black , Close Encounters of the Third Kind to Star Wars to Marvel , Hollywood has for decades provided an engrossing feedback loop for interest in the extraterrestrial: a reflection of our fears and capaciousness, whose ubiquitous popularity has in turn fueled more interest in UFOs as perennially compelling entertainment tropes not to be taken seriously". Horton observes that these "alien movies have generally reflected shifting cultural anxieties, from
9796-452: The most common reason for dismissal bringing their opposition to the death penalty. One man, a sugar dealer, tried to pretend that he was deaf in an attempt to get out of serving on the jury. When he was discovered, by answering a question posed by the judge, the Sacco and Vanzetti were sent into fits of laughter. After 500 potential jurors were interviewed, but only seven selected, deputies from
9920-607: The narrative similarities between certain religious symbols in medieval paintings and UFO reports, the canonical and symbolic character of such images is documented by art historians placing more conventional religious interpretations on such images. Some examples of pre-contemporary reports about unusual aerial phenomena include: In the Pacific and European theatres during World War II , round, glowing fireballs known as " foo fighters " were reported by Allied and Axis pilots. Some explanations for these sightings included St. Elmo's fire ,
10044-501: The new moniker "unexplained aerial phenomenon" (UAP) to avoid associations with past sensationalism . On 17 May 2022, members of the United States House Intelligence Subcommittee on Counterterrorism, Counterintelligence and Counterproliferation held congressional hearings with top military officials to discuss military reports of UAPs. It was the first public congressional hearing into UFO sightings in
10168-506: The next day. The accident prompted a stone wall to be erected which prevented another car from hitting the house in 1973. A group of arsonists tried to burn the house down on July 4, 1967. Powderpost beetles were exterminated from the house in the 1970s. In 1922, the Noble and Greenough School moved from Boston to Dedham. They purchased the Nickerson Castle and turned the estate into
10292-501: The officials. The Dedham Police Department had to escort them off the field after the game. In 1956, seven boys from Norwood High School threw bottles of blue and white paint, the school colors, through the windows of Dedham's School Department administration building to celebrate their team's win the day before. While they admitted to the paint, they denied being involved with the smashing of 22 windows at Dedham High School on Thanksgiving Day. The historic Sacco and Vanzetti trial
10416-405: The oldest wooden house in the United States. On August 18, 1964, a 17-year-old Dedhamite who lived down the street was driving and missed a left hand turn from Whiting Avenue onto East Street. It was raining, and the pavement was wet. His car ended up in the east wing of the house, with the rear bumper flush with the wall. The 1957 sedan remained in the house overnight until it could be removed
10540-543: The ongoing interest and storytelling surrounding UFOs as a modern example of folklore and mythology understandable with psychosocial explanations . The U.S. government currently has two entities dedicated to UFO data collection and analysis: NASA's UAP independent study team and the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office . During the late 1940s and through the 1950s, UFOs were often called " flying saucers " or "flying discs" based on reporting of
10664-403: The paddock in the rear. The second story had a sleeping room, a company room, a lavatory, a bath, and a hay and grain room. The building housed horse drawn steamer engines. It went out of service sometime in the 20th century, but still exists as a private residence. Firefighters began wearing uniforms in 1906. After the department purchased its first police motorcycle in 1923, Abe Rafferty
10788-518: The phenomenon include the MUFON , a grassroots organization whose investigator's handbooks go into great detail on the documentation of alleged UFO sightings. Air Force Regulation 200-2 , issued in 1953 and 1954, defined an Unidentified Flying Object ("UFOB") as "any airborne object which by performance, aerodynamic characteristics, or unusual features, does not conform to any presently known aircraft or missile type, or which cannot be positively identified as
10912-483: The planet Venus , hallucinations from oxygen deprivation , and German secret weapons (specifically rockets ). In 1946, more than 2,000 reports were collected, primarily by the Swedish military, of unidentified aerial objects over the Scandinavian nations, along with isolated reports from France, Portugal, Spain, Italy, and Greece. The objects were referred to as "Russian hail" (and later as " ghost rockets ") because it
11036-473: The postwar decades, in a series of events that—with their news coverage, grainy images, celebrity crusaders, exasperated skeptics, unsatisfying military statements, and accusations of a government cover-up—foreshadow our present moment". UFOs have been taken up by religious studies scholars in various scholarly books. Jeffrey Kripal, chair of the Department of Religion at Rice University , has said that "both
11160-579: The proposal to recommending indefinite postponement. As a result, the garage continued to be used for storage. At the 1972 Annual Town Meeting, the Library Trustees made a new pitch for two of the Estate's 26 acres, including the garage. This time, Town Meeting appropriated $ 68,000 to convert the garage to a branch library. The 20th century saw a number of near disasters come to the Fairbanks House,
11284-484: The public Blue Book investigation. The memo then added, "reports of UFOs which could affect national security would continue to be handled through the standard Air Force procedures designed for this purpose." In the late 1960s, a chapter on UFOs in the Space Sciences course at the U.S. Air Force Academy gave serious consideration to possible extraterrestrial origins. When word of the curriculum became public, in 1970,
11408-604: The robbery and murder, a Dedham selectman recommended that the Dedham Police Department buy a submachine gun. The trial attracted national attention, and crowds of hundreds, including schoolchildren, waited outside the Norfolk County Courthouse each morning. Several times, people mistakenly walked into the Dedham Historical Society , thinking it was either the jail or the courthouse. When Roscoe Ates tried to get in, courthouse personnel served him with
11532-415: The role of investigator, therapist, and advocate to their vulnerable charges". Eghigian says that Mack "signaled both the culmination and end of the headiest days of alien abduction". When Mack began working with and publishing accounts of abductees—or "experiencers", as he called them—in the early 1990s, he brought a sense of legitimacy to "the study of extraterrestrial captivity". By the late 1990s, however,
11656-504: The sightings to extraterrestrial life. The Uruguayan Air Force has conducted UFO investigations since 1989 and reportedly analyzed 2,100 cases of which they regard approximately 2% as lacking explanation. In March 2007, the French space agency CNES published an archive of UFO sightings and other phenomena online. French studies include GEPAN/SEPRA/ GEIPAN within CNES (French space agency),
11780-499: The silence over the alien origins of unidentified flying objects". Media accounts and speculation ran rampant in the U.S., especially in connection to the 1952 UFO scare in Washington, D.C. so that, by 1953, the intelligence officials ( Robertson Panel ) worried that "genuine incursions" by enemy aircraft "over U.S. territory could be lost in a maelstrom of kooky hallucination" of UFO reports. A Trendex survey in August 1957, ten years after
11904-504: The station to the Dedham jail . When they stopped at the corner of High and Washington streets to ask traffic Officer John Keegan for directions to the jail, Keegan jumped on the running board of the lead car to direct them personally. The pair, along with Abraham Faber, had robbed a bank in Needham and killed several police officers, including Francis Oliver Haddock and Forbes McLeod . After
12028-402: The study of UFOs in the past 21 years that has added to scientific knowledge" and that further time investigating UFO reports "cannot be justified". From the 1960s to 1990s, UFOs were part of American popular culture's obsession with the supernatural and paranormal . In 1961, the first alien abduction account was sensationalized when Barney and Betty Hill underwent hypnosis after seeing
12152-962: The term UFO has generally become synonymous with alien spacecraft . The term "extra-terrestrial vehicle" (ETV) is sometimes used to separate this explanation of UFOs from totally earthbound explanations. Studies show that after careful investigation, the majority of UFOs can be identified as ordinary objects or phenomena. The 1952–1955 study for the USAF used the following categories: "Balloon; Astronomical; Aircraft; Light phenomenon; Birds, Clouds, dust, etc.; Insufficient information; Psychological manifestations; Unknown; and Other". The most commonly found identified sources of UFO reports are: An individual 1979 study by CUFOS researcher Allan Hendry found, as did other investigations, that fewer than one percent of cases he investigated were hoaxes and most sightings were actually honest misidentifications of prosaic phenomena. Hendry attributed most of these to inexperience or misperception. Astronomer Andrew Fraknoi rejected
12276-558: The title to the 25 room estate in a ceremony on December 7, 1967, and intended to use it as a governor's mansion. It soon became apparent that it would be cheaper to build a brand new mansion than to remodel the estate to Volpe's wife's "lavish taste" and "crazy notions" than to renovate the Endicott Estate and in 1969 the Commonwealth gave the estate back to the Town. In 1971, the Finance Committee's recommendation to Town Meeting
12400-422: The walk became more difficult and she would sometimes take a taxi. She kept a pail and a brush in the caretaker's barn and scrubbed the headstone at every visit. In her will, she left $ 200 to the cemetery so that the practice would continue. Not knowing about the bequest, but knowing of Moore's devotion to her cat's final resting place, the staff had decided long before she died to continue the practice of scrubbing
12524-605: The years that varied widely in scope and scientific rigor. Governments or independent academics in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Japan, Peru, France, Belgium, Sweden, Brazil, Chile, Uruguay, Mexico, Spain, and the Soviet Union are known to have investigated UFO reports at various times. No official government investigation has ever publicly concluded that UFOs are indisputably real, physical objects, extraterrestrial in origin, or of concern to national defense. Among
12648-410: The years without confirmation of the fantastical claims of small but vocal groups of ufologists who favour unconventional or pseudoscientific hypotheses, often claiming that UFOs are evidence of extraterrestrial intelligence , technologically advanced cryptids , demons , interdimensional contact or future time travelers . After decades of promotion of such ideas by believers and in popular media,
12772-461: Was Sarah David, the wife of Alexander Quapish . The Recreation Department was begun in the 1930s with an effort to build and staff three playgrounds around town. By the 1960s there were 10 playgrounds. The first Recreation Commission was elected in 1941. In 1951, the Town of Dedham purchased a three acre plot from the Paul estate for $ 2,625 and built Paul Park on it. Several hundred people attended
12896-430: Was a prudent move to consolidate the other branches, and that a library would serve all age groups within the town. Neighbors of the Estate also objected to a teen center, but supported a library. Town Meeting debated the competing proposals for more than three hours, and ultimately rejected both. Though they had initially supported it, at Town Meeting the Finance Committee changed their recommendation from supporting
13020-435: Was also offered outdoors. The 12 jurors were sequestered at the courthouse for the entirety of the six-week trial. They slept on cots in the courthouse's gran jury room and bathed in the basement of the jail. To celebrate the 4th of July, they were brought to Scituate, Massachusetts and given a lobster dinner. To get a full jury, courthouse officials had to go to extraordinary lengths. Over 600 men were interviewed, with
13144-478: Was appointed the first motorcycle officer. By 1936, there were 18 officers. In December 1973, the Dedham Police Department investigated the sighting of several unidentified flying objects over town. A young couple on a date had their car followed by UFO while they drove through Dedham. The department was located on the first floor of Memorial Hall until Town Clerk John Carey locked the doors for
13268-692: Was built by Francis Skinner for his new wife Sarah Carr, in 1906. Today, the mansion once known as the Federal Hill Farm has "the richest and most elaborate residential rooms in Dedham" and serves as a convent for the sisters who run the school. In 1907, the Methodist congregation built a new church in Oakdale Square at the corner of Oakdale Avenue and Fairview Streets. St. Luke's Lutheran Church expanded their chapel in West Roxbury in 1917 before building
13392-595: Was called off after the Robertson Panel's negative conclusions in January 1953. Project Sign was dismantled and became Project Grudge at the end of 1948. Angered by the low quality of investigations by Grudge, the Air Force Director of Intelligence reorganized it as Project Blue Book in late 1951, placing Ruppelt in charge. J. Allen Hynek , a trained astronomer who served as a scientific advisor for Project Blue Book,
13516-508: Was considered so urgent that OS/I drafted a memorandum from the DCI to the NSC proposing that the NSC establish an investigation of UFOs as a priority project throughout the intelligence and the defense research and development community. It also urged the DCI to establish an external research project of top-level scientists, now known as the Robertson Panel to analyze the problem of UFOs. The OS/I investigation
13640-498: Was dedicated on June 4, 1910. Within the two-story building were ten rooms. It measured 79' by 140' and was made of brick with sandstone trimming. The interior was outfitted with hard pine. The new school was used until 1982 when declining enrollment and Proposition 2½ forced its closure. Town Meeting authorized the sale of the property to a developer in 1982, but only after off-duty police officers and firefighters were able to find and bring enough Town Representatives to reach
13764-432: Was followed closely by the publication of Loeb's book Extraterrestrial , in which he argued that the first interstellar comet ever observed, 'Oumuamua , might be an artificial light sail made by an alien civilization. Two government sponsored programs, NASA's UAP independent study team and the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office were charged in part by Congressional fiat to investigate UFO claims more fully, adopting
13888-465: Was held in the Norfolk County Courthouse in 1921 under heavy police guard. The two were Italian-born American anarchists, who were arrested, tried, and executed for the killings of Frederick Parmenter, a shoe factory paymaster, and Alessandro Berardelli, a security guard, and for the robbery of $ 15,766.51 from the factory's payroll on April 15, 1920. Many believe that they "were the innocent victims of political and economic interests determined to send
14012-418: Was initially skeptical of UFO reports, but eventually came to the conclusion that many of them could not be satisfactorily explained and was highly critical of what he described as "the cavalier disregard by Project Blue Book of the principles of scientific investigation". Leaving government work, he founded the privately funded CUFOS , to whose work he devoted the rest of his life. Other private groups studying
14136-511: Was locked in a coal closet where he was told he was lucky to still be alive. At the trial, the clerk was able to identify Masserelli, a singer, by her "marked attractiveness" and her "sweet voice." She was found guilty and sentenced to 15 years in the women's prison in Framingham . She was the first woman convicted of armed robbery in Massachusetts. While in prison, Masserelli climbed down
14260-470: Was not enough data to determine their origin. The Air Force's Project Sign was created at the end of 1947, and was one of the earliest government studies to come to a secret extraterrestrial conclusion. In August 1948, Sign investigators wrote a top-secret intelligence estimate to that effect, but the Air Force Chief of Staff Hoyt Vandenberg ordered it destroyed. The existence of this suppressed report
14384-402: Was not the only member of the nation's highest court to be involved with the case. Felix Frankfurter , then a law professor at Harvard , "did more than any individual to rally "respectable" opinion behind the two men, saw the case as a test of the rule of law itself." At one point, the trial moved outdoors, to Norfolk Street behind the courthouse, so the getaway car could be viewed. Testimony
14508-464: Was not universal in the CIA, however, as fellow NICAP official Donald E. Keyhoe wrote that Vice Admiral Roscoe Hillenkoetter , the first director of the CIA, "wanted public disclosure of UFO evidence". Official U.S. Air Force interest in UFO reports went on hiatus in 1969 after a study by the University of Colorado led by Edward U. Condon and known as the Condon Report concluded "that nothing has come from
14632-407: Was replaced by Project Grudge up through 1951. In the third U.S. Air Force program, from March 1952 to its termination in December 1969, "the U.S. Air Force cataloged 12,618 sightings of UFOs as part of what is now known as Project Blue Book ". In the late 1950s, public pressure mounted for a full declassification of all UFO records, but the CIA played a role in refusing to allow this. This sense
14756-515: Was reported in 1947, Gallup published a poll asking people in the United States what the "flying saucers" might be. Already, 90% had heard of the new term. However, as reported by historian Greg Eghanian, "a majority either had no idea what they could be or thought that witnesses were mistaken" while "visitors from space were not initially among the options that anyone had in mind, and Gallup didn't even mention if anyone surveyed brought up aliens. Within weeks, reports of flying saucer sightings became
14880-561: Was revealed by several insiders who had read it, such as astronomer and USAF consultant J. Allen Hynek and Capt. Edward J. Ruppelt, the first head of the USAF's Project Blue Book. Another highly classified U.S. study was conducted by the CIA's Office of Scientific Investigation (OS/I) in the latter half of 1952 in response to orders from the National Security Council (NSC). This study concluded UFOs were real physical objects of potential threat to national security. One OS/I memo to
15004-492: Was set up with seeds, crumbs, and suet to feed the birds. After Martha Moore's cat, Freddie, died in 1918, she visited the grave every Saturday for the remaining 28 years of her life. The widow, whose husband died in 1880, lived at the Hotel Bellevue on Beacon Hill, Boston . She took the trolley to Dedham each week no matter the weather, walking the final mile to the cemetery. In her final years, as she approached 90 years old,
15128-427: Was thought the mysterious objects were possibly Russian tests of captured German V1 or V2 rockets , but most were identified as natural phenomena as meteors. Many scholars, especially those arguing for the psychosocial UFO hypothesis , have noted that UFO characteristics reported after the first widely publicized modern sighting by Kenneth Arnold in 1947 resembled a host of science fiction tropes from earlier in
15252-545: Was to appropriate $ 61,000 to convert the nine car garage into a library. They also recommended that Town Meeting not adopt a competing article from the Youth Commission that would have turned the garage into a youth center at a cost of $ 16,000. The Finance Committee did recommend, however, that the Recreation Department open a teen center and that a director be hired for it. The Finance Committee argued that it
15376-433: Was up from 33% in a 2019 Gallup poll with the same question. Gallup further found that college graduates went in 2019 from being the least likely educational group to believe this to being on par in 2021 with adults who have no college education. An October 2022 poll by YouGov only found that 34% of Americans believe that UFOs are likely to involve alien life forms. Historian Greg Eghigian wrote in August 2021 that "over
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