If you ask any person on the streets of Tucson where they are from. the chances are high that they are from somewhere else. A frequent state of origin is Michigan for these folks. Illinois would be next on that list. If you ask them why they came to Tucson, the most popular answer is: “The weather. I was tired of shoveling snow.”

One Tucson transplant, however, came for a very specific and unusual reason: tolerance, specifically related to the study of UFOs.

His name was J. Allen Hynek.

The then-74-year-old said in a 1984 interview with the Chicago Tribune: “People are more open-minded in Arizona. There’s more of a willingness to accept new ideas out here than in Chicago, which is a hotbed of inertia.”

Hynek moves to Tucson / Chicago Tribune

J. Allen Hynek hailed from Chicago. He was an astronomer, professor, and UFO researcher. He participated in an advisory capacity in three U.S. Air Force UFO studies: Project Sign (1947-1949), Project Grudge (1949-1952), and Project Blue Book (1952 – 1969). After the projects concluded, he continued to conduct his own independent UFO research.

He was a UFO debunker and even stated that he enjoyed debunking. However, his opinions about UFOs would shift, slowly and gradually over the years, noticeable in the 1950′s. Evidenced by words he wrote in the April 1953 issue of The Journal of the Optical Society of America titled “Unusual Aerial Phenomena”:

“Ridicule is not part of the scientific method, and people should not be taught that it is. The steady flow of reports, often made in concert by reliable observers, raises questions of scientific obligation and responsibility. Is there … any residue that is worthy of scientific attention? Or, if there isn’t, does not an obligation exist to say so to the public—not in words of open ridicule but seriously, to keep faith with the trust the public places in science and scientists?”

The shift would come after examining many cases involving credible witnesses, including astronomers, pilots, police officers, and military personnel. He concluded that some reports represented “genuine empirical observations”.

Friendship with Dr. James McDonald

Hynek did have ties to Tucson, a hotbed of UFO activity, prior to his 1984 relocation. He was good friends with Dr. James E. McDonald, a physicist at the University of Arizona and fellow UFO researcher. Despite their friendship, McDonald had some “sharp words” for Hynek over the years:

McDonald wrote a letter to Hynek in 1970, “castigating him for what McDonald saw as his lapses, and suggesting that, when evaluated by later generations, retired Marine Corps Major Donald E. Keyhoe would be regarded as a more objective, honest, and scientific ufologist.” (Wikipedia). Hynek would later elaborate in an interview in 1985:

“By way of background, I might add that the late Dr. James E. McDonald, a good friend of mine who was then an atmospheric meteorologist at the University of Arizona, and I had some fairly sharp words about it. He used to accuse me very much, saying you’re the scientific consultant to the Air Force, you should be pounding on generals’ doors and insisting on getting a better job done. I said, Jim, I was there, you weren’t you don’t know the mindset.” - J. Allen Hynek in an interview with Dennis Stacy

Close Encounters

In Hynek’s 1972 book The UFO Experience: A Scientific Inquiry. He introduced a means of identifying UFO encounters with what became known as the Close Encounter Classification System.

1st Kind: Sighting of one or more UFOs.
2nd Kind: Sighting of a UFO with associated physical effects (e.g. heat, electrical interference, etc).
3rd Kind: Sighting of an animated being (presumably an alien but not specifically defined as such).

Hynek Close Encounters / Courtesy Openminds.TV

Of course, there was also Hynek’s involvement in the 1977 movie Close Encounters of the Third Kind. He served in advisory role on Steven Spielberg’s film and participated in a non-speaking role near the end of the movie (right).

Death in Arizona

Hynek died less than two years after he moved to tolerant Tucson, on April 27, 1986. He died of a malignant brain tumor in at Memorial Hospital in Scottsdale.

Was Hynek right about more Arizona residents being tolerant and open-minded than certain other states a quarter of a century ago? Yes.

Today, the use of the words “tolerance” and “open-mindedness” might spur a little debate, specifically related to some Arizona-related political topics. Overall, though, away from politics, many residents do subscribe to a more to a “live and let live” mentality, in my opinion. Sure, I might catch a glimpse of a roll of the eyes from someone I meet when I reveal my favorite writing topic.

If someone says to me: That’s great, but I don’t believe in that kind of stuff, that’s fine with me.There are many other topics of discussion. Many of my closest friends don’t believe, or believe in things that I don’t. I don’t believe in all of it. Yet, we have tolerance, open-mindedness, and respects for each others’ beliefs.

Live and let live.

Hynek chose to live the last years of his life in Arizona for this very reason.

On February 1, 1950, a fiery object shot quickly west through the Tucson skies. A B-29 took off in pursuit of the object, but the plane could not catch up to the object.

This is one of the most bizarre cases in Tucson history, documented by the Tucson Daily Citizen (before the paper became the Tucson Citizen).

FLYING SAUCER OVER TUCSON?

B-29 FAILS TO CATCH OBJECT

February 2, 1950, Tucson Daily Citizen

Flying saucer? Secret experimental plane? Or perhaps a scout craft from Mars? Certainly the strange aircraft that blazed asmoke trail over Tucson at dusk last night defies logical explanation. It was as mystifying to experienced pilots as to groundlings who have trouble in identifying conventional planes.

Cannonballing through the sky, some 30,000 feet aloft, was a fiery object shooting westward so fast it was impossible to gain any clear impression of its shape or size. . . .

At what must have been top speed the object spewed out light colored smoke, but almost directly over Tucson it appeared to hover for a few seconds. The smoke puffed out an angry black and then be came lighter as the strange missile appeared to gain speed”

The radio operator in the Davis-Monthan air force base control tower contacted First Lt. Roy L. Jones, taking off for a cross-country flight in a B-29, and asked him to investigate. Jones revved up his swift aerial tanker and still the unknown aircraft steadily pulled away toward California.

Dr. Edwin F. Carpenter, head of the University of Arizona department of astronomy, said he was certain that the object was not a meteor or other natural phenomenon. . .

Switchboards Swamped

Switchboards at the Pima county sheriff’s office and Tucson police station were jammed with inquiries. Hundreds saw the object. Tom Bailey, 1411 E. 10th Street, thought it was a large airplane on fire. [A later check showed no planes missing.] He said it wavered from left to right as it passed over the mountains. Bailey also noticed that the craft appeared to slow perceptibly over Tucson. He said the smoke apparently came out in a thin, almost invisible stream, gaining substance within a few seconds.

The next day, the Air Force gave the most ridiculous explanation for the incident. Tucson Daily Citizen reporter, Asa “Ace” Bushnell, interviewed witnesses for an article to be run following day, called: “Sky Mystery? Tucson People Differ Widely”. Following the interviews, Bushnell inserted the following sub-headline in response to the “official explanation”:

What’d you mean only vapor trail?

As though to prove itself blameless for tilting hundreds of Tucson heads skyward, the U.S. Air Force yesterday afternoon spent hours etching vapor trails through the skies over the city.

The demonstration proved conclusively to the satisfaction of most that the strange path of dark smoke blazed across the evening sky at dusk Wednesday was no vapor trail and did not emanate from any conventional airplane.

The Wednesday night spectacle was entirely dissimilar. Then, heavy smoke boiled and swirled in a broad, dark ribbon fanning out at least a mile in width and stretching across the sky in a straight line. Since there was no proof as to what caused the strange predark manifestation, and because even expert witnesses were unable to explain the appearance, the matter remains a subject for interesting speculation.

There is strong evidence that this story was deliberately kept off the press wires. The Associated Press and other wire services in Washington had no report. Requests for details by Frank Edwards, Mutual newscaster, and other radio commentators ran into a blank wall. At the Pentagon I was told that the Air Force had no knowledge of the sighting or the vapor-trail maneuvers.

San Antonio Spurs star Manu Ginobili created a stir earlier this month, due to a highly publicized UFO sighting he reported. The glowing lights in the skies over L.A. that he spotted have now been identified.

According to TMZ.com, a team of skydivers carrying powerful flares were in the air at the same time as the NBA player’s sighting. The team was identified as the Red Bull Air Force skydivers. Although the team employs a calendar on their website, it does not appear to be kept up to date.

This incident is similar to other sightings in recent months, later to be  identified as skydivers carrying flares. El Paso, Texas was the location of a sighting on October 15th. The mystery was solved when the Golden Knight skydivers came forward to claim responsibility. In Phoenix, Arizona, skydivers were offered up as an explanation for a mass sighting over the city on October 23rd. The Air Force later offered ‘military flares’ as the official explanation.

Other recent sightings of lights in the sky have been identified as LED adorned hobby crafts (e.g. Centreville), LED Kites (e.g. St. Paul), the planets Venus, Saturn or Jupiter (e.g. Washington).