With the current world-wide interest in crop circles and
related effects, a number of researchers have been examining
historical records for possible analogous cases that might shed
light on the present situation. The primary source for this
information is Ted Phillips' Physical Trace Catalogue,
which was published in the late 1970s by the Center for UFO
Studies. This catalogue contains annotated listings of hundreds
of physical traces, many of which have no associated UFO
sightings. Of these, a good proportion were essentially crop
circle singlets, found swirled in fields of grains or grasses.
The UFO connection was implied by investigators, usually without
any supporting evidence.
Now that some cerealogists are studying UGMs (Unidentified
Ground Markings) that exhibit more than "classic" crop
circle characteristics, it may be even more relevant to
re-examine lists of historical UGMs. Cases of "burns"
and "holes" are now being studied as possible evidence
of plasma vortices and/or alien intervention. Regardless of the
theory to which cerealogists might adhere, these historical cases
are interesting to consider with regard to recent crop circle
evidence.
UFOROM (Ufology Research of Manitoba) has a modest
collection of files on UFO reports among its Fortean case files.
For the province of Manitoba alone, there are over 750 UFO
reports on file, and statistical studies have been performed on
this database that have helped shape further research. A number
of these cases involved physical traces, and some of these are
apparent historical crop circle events.
Since 1989, UFOROM has been actively investigating UGMs
in Manitoba and compiling information on North American cases in
response to the British crop circle waves. In 1990, the North
American Institute for Crop Circle Research (NAICCR) was
formed as a sister organisation to UFOROM, with primary
interest in crop circles. An attempt was made to co-ordinate the
activities of North American researchers, with limited success. NAICCR's 1990
Report on Crop Circles and Related Physical Traces was
well-received and did provide researchers with some much-needed
information on North American cases.
Several cerealogists have been attempting to produce
catalogues of historical, modern and recent crop circles,
including physical traces. In order to complement their efforts
and assist them in their endeavours, UFOROM researchers
have combed through their own files and a number of other sources
to compile a listing of UGMs with possible relevance to
cerealogy. Cases have been gleaned from the Phillips catalogue,
UFOzines, a number of books on UFOlogy and related subjects, and
of course personal investigation files.
Due to space limitations, the cases are presented in a brief
listing format, coded in the manner of the NAICCR 1990
report. Original sources are not indicated, but the majority are
from the Phillips catalogue and can be checked easily. Other
cases are documented in UFOROM files and are available for
inspection by researchers. The listing includes cases up to 1990.
PF Notes: I've not reproduced the full database
listing but interested readers can send me a s.a.e. with a 25p
stamp and I'll send you a hard copy. Alternatively send me a high
density disk and I'll send you a copy of the database listing and
my tables and charts in LOTUS123 for Windows format.
On page 4 I've listed the first 60 cases in the UFOROM
database. Readers will be interested to learn that despite the
vigorous claims of the skeptics the UFOROM database
contains "flattened circle" cases from 1920 and 1941 !
The UFO Research Manitoba database presents researchers with
an excellent opportunity to compare historical crop circle cases
with their modern hoaxed counterparts. By adopting a historic
perspective researchers can finally ask questions like:
- how did historical cases compare with the modern outbreak of hoaxes ?
and
- did historical circles exhibit the same size and complexity
as the modern hoaxes ?
These are issues which go a long way to determining whether or
not researchers have the right to argue that Doug and Dave (and
their copiers) merely mimicked a pre-existing phenomenon.
The UFOROM Database actually comes in two versions - one
is a world-wide collection of reports whilst the second version
includes only North American cases. Both versions are being
continually updated so this analysis may already be out-of-date !
I have decided to only analyse the latter version simply because
it seems likely that the North American version has a better
geographical coverage than the world-wide version. However,
readers should recall that Bill Chalker and Keith Basterfield
have recently produced an updated catalogue of Australian
Physical Ground Effect cases and CERES has published many
pre 1975 cases which should be read in conjunction with these
statistics (see CW14 pages 3-7).
Unfortunately, whilst the UFOROM database is a useful
tool for evaluating historical unexplained ground markings it
also presents some difficult statistical problems, because
although we have all heard the old adage about "Lies, Dammed
Lies and Statistics" - this is doubly so for controversial
events like UGMs. In many cases the reality status of the event
can be seriously challenged. It needs to be stressed, for
example, that the UFOROM database almost certainly
contains cases which are undetected hoaxes. Cases like the
Socorro landing (1964) and the Delphos ring (1971) are two
classic UFO cases which are either encounters with unknown
phenomena or blatant hoaxes.
Researchers should ask themselves the following questions when
trying to interpret the analysis presented here:
(1) How reliable is each individual case ? How much
weight can we place on a case where no photo-graphic proof of its
status is currently available ?
(2) If these historic cases do not include classic crop
circles (which is what the skeptics are claiming), what do they
represent ? Remember it is not scientific to dismiss these
historical cases as hoaxes simply because many/most modern-day
cases are now known to be hoaxes. Neither is it scientific to
simply dismiss the cases without stating precisely what they were
(ie by giving a complete answer to falsify the crop circle
hypothesis).
(3) How homogenous are these cases ? Are all
"flattened ring" cases the same? Are all "burned
circles" identical in nature ? Can we assume that all cases
of the same type are caused by the same causal mechanism ? Is it
legitimate practice to add together events which may be
completely unrelated ?
(4) How much is this database contaminated by
undetected hoaxes ? Given the proven inability of modern day
cerealogists in identifying hoaxes this doesn't auger very well
for historical cases involving "investigators" who
normally interpreted what they discovered in terms of the emotive
alien mythology.
(5) Do these cases constitute a representative sample
of UGM cases ? This problem is important because we have no idea
how representative a sample these cases are. It may be, for
example, that most cases were only included in the database
because they were actually man-made hoaxes where the hoaxers
deliberately contacted UFO organisations or the media in order to
promote their hoaxes. If this is so then any "non
hoaxed" cases would be swamped by the statistical effects of
the hoaxed cases ! Under such circumstances meaningful
statistical analysis would be quite impossible!
(6) Some of these cases actually involve entities. This
surely affects how much weight one can place on the reliability
of the case. It would perhaps be useful to re-analyse the
database by comparing cases involving entities with those that do
not. If there are important differences between the two datasets
this would imply that two separate phenomena have been coalesced
under the UGM label.
The North American UFOROM database contains 407 cases
dating back to 1919. Table 1 and Figure 1 summarise the number of
events by type of trace and decade. There are 23 cases predating
1960 and only 4 of these predate 1950. Flattened circle cases
(FC) and flattened ring cases (FR) account for over one third of
all reported cases up to 1990.
It is interesting to note that if we just examine cases which
sound like historical crop circles (codes BF, BR, CR, BC, FR and
FC) then the UFOROM database contains 243 such cases (60
per cent of the total). Furthermore, if we restrict our selection
to include just Concentric Rings (CR), Flattened Rings (FR) and
Flattened Circles (FC) there are 81 "crop circle" cases
which provably predate Doug and Daves' "first" circles
in "1975". How do the Skeptics explain the existence of
these pre Doug and Dave cases ?
Table 2 and Figure 2 summarise the frequency of
events over time. Interestingly there are three peaks in the data
- during the mid 1950s (point A), during the mid 1960s/mid 1970s
(point B) and 1990 (point C). Why does the database display these
peaks ?
According to Hilary Evans' lecture at the 1993 IUN
Conference (CW19 page 8 )
claims of alien contact in North America peaked in the early
1970s in response to the Apollo moon landings. Could point B on
Figure 2 be the crop circle equivalent - a wave of UGM hoaxes
perpetrated to support the alien myth ? If this scenario can be
supported then what happened to trigger the events at point A ?
According to John Keel the 1950s were a "dark age" for
UFOlogy when the movement went underground and publicity was
rare. Sputnik wasn't launched until 1957 so the space race seems
a poor excuse to trigger the "hoaxes" of the 1950s.
Perhaps this suggests that the exaggerated peaks at B and C hide
a "genuine" non hoaxed anomaly which was more
accurately represented at point A?
In pure statistical terms the most important feature of Figure
2 is that it is probably NOT representative of the true
number of UGM cases occurring in each year. There are many
possible reasons for this conclusion:
(a) there were no UFO groups around prior to the 1950s to collect the data,
(b) even if UGM cases were occurring regularly there
was no emotive UFO mythology to draw attention to the trace and
attract investigators,
(c) UFO reporting is known to be heavily influenced by
media reporting of the subject; and (d) from the early 1980s
onwards it became unfashionable for UFO researchers to
investigate trace cases, as claims of abduction took over as the
primary source of UFO controversy in North America. This led to a
large dip in the number of UGMs reported and investigated during
the mid 1980s (an "abduction deficit"). For this reason
the statistics are potentially very misleading for events in the
1980s. It is also quite possible that cases appearing at point C
on Figure 2 are media generated hoaxes associated with
events in Britain.
For all these reasons the UFOROM database is probably
quite an untrustworthy source of statistical data, although it is
revealing nevertheless. A prime example of this failing is the
issue of pre 1950 UGMs (point A on Figure 2). Because we
know we have a biased sample the alleged lack of UGMs prior to
the 1950s is probably misleading. A trendy counterpart in anomaly
research can be drawn from official statistics of child abuse
(which were initiated in the UK in 1988 by the Department of
Health). If one takes the skeptics' argument at face value it is
possible to "prove" that in Britain there was no such
thing as child abuse prior to 1988 ! If you look through the
existing literature you will find no cases of "child
abuse" listed before the 1930s, when the phenomenon was
first identified and labelled by care agencies. By simply
extending the skeptics' own arguments against crop circles this
"proves" that all child abuse is a hoax !
Table 3 and Figure 3 illustrate the distribution
of UGM cases by type of crop. The most interesting feature of
Figure 3 is that 56.5 per cent of cases occurred in grass.
Readers should recall that many of the classic historical cases
involve concentric rings that occurred in grass (eg Redlynch,
Somerset, 1954; Evenlode, Gloucestershire, 1960; Orebro, Sweden
1972). This is quite an interesting finding because:
(a) hoaxes perpetrated in grass are likely to grow out
relatively quickly compared with hoaxes perpetrated in thick
stemmed crops;
and
(b) according to John Macnish's new book Cropcircle
Apocalypse (page 117) Doug Bower preferred making circles in
wheat because of the pliability of the stem.
15 of the 19 UGM cases from the 1950-59 period occurred in
grass (3 were Unknown, 1 was in Tree cover). Does this suggest
that historical crop circles may have been a genuine anomaly ? If
not then why do so many historical trace cases occur in grass?
Why didn't the hoaxers realise that wheat was a much better crop
to make circles in?
It is interesting to note that cases with the lowest
percentages involving grass were Unknown, Hole and Other. Does
this suggest that these events involved other causal mechanisms
to those involved in the making of circles and rings ? The 100
per cent figures for Enhanced Growth, Vegetation Calcined and
Yellowing of Grass are based on less than 10 cases and must
therefore be treated with caution. It is possible, of course,
that some of these latter cases actually represent unusual fungal
growths and fairy rings rather than crop circle cases, although
to be fair the UFO Research Manitoba team have been very careful
to avoid selecting fairy rings and fungal growths when they
compiled their database. It seems difficult to tell.
Table 4 and Figure 4 examine the percentage of
cases involving earlier UFO sightings. This too is highly
problematic, for it is already known that approximately 95 per
cent of UFO sightings have relatively prosaic explanations and -
as Chris Rutkowski emphasises - the UFO association is often
associated by the investigator rather than by the witness !
Despite these problems 38.6 per cent of the UGMs involved UFO
sightings. Does this merely reflect the prevailing cultural
mythology that circular ground traces represent ground markings
left by circular-shaped spaceships, or do these reports represent
sightings of genuine atmospheric phenomena (eg plasma vortices)
that have been misinterpreted as UFOs ?
Again there is evidence in the dataset that we are not
comparing "like with like", because the percentage of
cases involving UFO reports varies considerably by type of case.
Why, for example, do only 4.5 per cent of Concentric Ring cases
involve UFO reports ? Why do 61.5 per cent of Burned and
Flattened traces involve UFO reports ? Does this suggest that
Concentric Ring cases are created by ordinary whirlwinds whilst
Burned and Flattened traces are caused by plasma vortices ?
In our next issue we will examine further cross-tabulations of
the UFOROM database. Meanwhile readers are welcome to
suggest analyses of this dataset for publication in future issues
of The Crop Watcher. Write to
the Editorial address.
For copies of the draft version of A Catalogue of
Australian Physical Ground Effect Cases write to Keith
Basterfield, GPO BOX 1894, Adelaide, South Australia 5001.
