1952: July 1st-7th

UFO|UAP & Entity Sightings Archive

The first week of July 1952 opened with the earliest tremors of what would become the most intense UFO wave of the Cold War era. A radar-confirmed formation raced from New Jersey toward Washington, D.C. within the same hour a physics professor watched a UFO arc back and forth over the capital. Two days later, Navy photographer Delbert Newhouse filmed one of the most analyzed UFO films in history over rural Utah — footage the Air Force would later return to him missing its clearest frames. A Fort Monmouth radar detection, an Alaska base sighting, and a scattering of disc and light reports round out a week that, in hindsight, was only a preview of what the rest of the month would bring.

Date: July 1952
Location: Schenectady, New York
Time: Unknown
Summary: An anonymous witness, his attention drawn skyward by a woman nearby, saw “what looked like a daylight moon lowering itself through the haze.” It hovered for 30 seconds, then rose and disappeared. Minutes later, from a car window, he saw it again — now oblong — hovering over the Alco Company. A gondola appeared to lower from the object, and he could see what looked like “a bunch of Navy officers in Navy white hats,” all wearing large dark glasses, rushing to the windows. [Full Report]
Source: See full report

Date: July 1952
Location: Point Defiance Park, Washington
Time: Unknown
Summary: An alleged abduction case tied to Point Defiance Park. NOTE: the existing standalone’s full case content could not be recovered through available search access during this pass — flagged for direct review rather than summarized from an incomplete source. [Full Report]
Source: See full report

Date: July 1952
Location: Washington (general)
Time: Unknown
Summary: Wilbert Smith of Canada’s Project Magnet confirmed that fragments recovered from UFOs had been analyzed by his research group, including a fragment reportedly shot down (by a USAF jet) from a disc near Washington. Smith stated he was told the disc was about 2 feet in diameter and glowing; a glowing chunk broke off and the pilot watched it glow all the way to the ground, where a ground party recovered it roughly an hour later, still glowing.
Source: Need to Know: UFOs, the Military, and Intelligence, Timothy Good

Date: July 1, 1952
Location: Boston, Massachusetts
Time: 7:25 a.m.
Summary: Two silvery, elliptical UFOs were observed visually near Boston. An F-94 interceptor was sent up to investigate.
Source: Unknown

Date: July 1, 1952
Location: Lexington, Massachusetts
Time: 7:30 a.m.
Summary: Capt. Metcalf observed a milky white object shaped like an “elongated oval,” but “fatter than a cigar,” about 100 ft long — slightly larger than a four-engine airliner — with an indistinct rear resembling either a very short exhaust or a blurred tail, a narrow ridge along the top, and no wings or other aerodynamic features.
Source: Blue Book files

Date: July 1, 1952 (BBU)
Location: Fort Monmouth, New Jersey
Time: 9:30 a.m.
Summary: Objects moved south along the East Coast and hovered near Fort Monmouth for about 5 minutes at 50,000 ft. As radar at Fort Monmouth detected them, they accelerated and headed southwest toward Washington, D.C., where they were confirmed visually. At about noon, a physics professor in Washington reported seeing a grayish UFO hovering and arcing back and forth across the sky.
Source: Ruppelt, pp. 200-202; Dan Wilson

Date: July 2, 1952
Location: Near Tremonton, Utah
Time: Daytime
Summary: Navy photographer Delbert C. Newhouse and his wife, driving across the state, saw 12-14 shiny silver objects milling around in the sky. Newhouse stopped and filmed extensive 16mm footage; both witnesses saw some objects relatively close-up, shaped like one plate inverted atop another. When the film was returned following Navy and Air Force analysis, the frames showing the discs close-up had been deleted. [Full Report]
Source: Margaret Sachs, The UFO Encyclopedia

Date: July 3, 1952 (BBU 1380)
Location: Selfridge AFB, Michigan
Time: 4:15 a.m.
Summary: Unidentified witnesses (possibly civilians) saw 2 big lights, about 20 ft in diameter, fly straight and level at tremendous speed.
Source: Berliner

Date: July 3, 1952 (BBU 1382)
Location: Chicago, Illinois
Time: 11:50 p.m.
Summary: Mrs. J. D. Arbuckle saw 2 bright pastel green discs fly straight and level, very fast.
Source: Berliner

Date: July 5, 1952 (BBU)
Location: Elmendorf AFB, Alaska
Time: Unknown
Summary: Case details did not survive beyond the base name and date; no further content recoverable at this time.
Source: FUFOR Index

Date: July 5, 1952 (BBU)
Location: Hanford Atomic Works, Richland, Washington
Time: 6:00 a.m.
Summary: Four Florida-based Continental Air Lines pilots — Captain John Baldwin, Captain George Robertson, and pilots D. Shanbel and Steven Summers — reported a round, flat flying saucer hovering above the Hanford atomic works, a sensitive scientific installation. Originally logged on this page as two separate entries (one crediting only pilot Baldwin, the other naming all four); merged here as the same incident.
Source: Project 1947; FUFOR Index; Loren E. Gross, UFOs: A History (Jan-May 1952); OSI Records, Blue Book files

Date: July 5, 1952 (BBU 1390)
Location: SSE of Norman, Oklahoma
Time: 7:58 p.m.
Summary: Oklahoma State Patrolman Hamilton, in a State Patrol airplane, saw 3 dark discs (at an estimated 4,000 ft) hover, then fly away, silhouetted against a dark cloud. 15 seconds.
Source: Berliner

Date: July 6-12, 1952 (BBU 1397)
Location: Governors Island, New York (possibly Elizabeth, NJ)
Time: 11:00 p.m.
Summary: Charles Muhr (and possibly a second photographer, Neff) took 4 photographs of an indistinct light, admittedly not seen visually at the time of exposure.
Source: Berliner; FUFOR Index

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

The Quiet Opening of the 1952 Flap’s Most Intense Month

The first week of July 1952 is anchored by the Tremonton, Utah Newhouse film — genuine motion-picture evidence from a trained Navy photographer, officially analyzed and returned with its most critical frames missing, now given its own standalone report for the first time on this archive. The Fort Monmouth radar detection on July 1 is worth watching closely: it’s an early, smaller-scale preview of the radar-confirmed formations that would descend on Washington, D.C. in the back half of the month, at the height of what historians now call the Washington flap.

One structural fix was made this pass: two separate July 5 entries describing a round disc over the Hanford Atomic Works — one crediting only pilot Baldwin, the other naming all four Florida-based pilots aboard — have been merged into a single entry, since they plainly describe the same sighting. The Elmendorf AFB, Alaska entry (July 5) survives only as a bare date and location, with no recoverable summary; it’s preserved honestly as incomplete rather than invented.