Dean
Adept Dabbler
The envelope, please.
[RIPPPPP!]
And, in the category "Wild & Woolly Claims About Aliens & Alien Craft," the coveted Lifetime Achievement Award goes to . . .
Ray Stanford!
Friends, the award jury's decision was unanimous.
In terms of duration and sheer quantity of dubious alien-related claims, nobody else could touch Ray Stanford. Ray Stanford has been making wild claims involving communications from aliens, channeling of aliens, encounters with aliens, encounters with alien spacecraft, and purported personally obtained evidences of non-human spacecraft and many details regarding their exotic technology (claims encompassing innumerable movies and still photos, plus physical samples and instrument recordings), since 1955 -- that is 66 years! Many of these claims have been discredited, or have been repudiated or denied or quietly abandoned by Stanford himself, and most of the others shrink drastically or collapse outright when subjected to just a bit of skeptical scrutiny or historical research-- but as the saying goes, those who are ignorant of the past are often condemned to repeat it.
Ray Stanford is now 83 years old, but still very active in promoting a big batch of his alien/UFO-related claims, and he has some takers-- some of whom seem to feel, oddly, that because Ray Stanford has proven to be good at finding dinosaur tracks, they need not delve into the specifics regarding his 60-plus-year record on UFO-related claims.
Some mistakenly believe that most or all of Stanford's wacky claims and activities occurred when he was very young, which is by no means the case. Much of what I say below refers to things Stanford did and said when he was in his mid-30s to 40, and yet other statements that I quote below were made within the past three years.
For a while during the 1970s, Stanford had a fairly high profile on the UFO issue, mostly due to his role as director of Project Starlight International -- an enterprise that had some substance for a few years, but with resources, hardware, and achievements greatly less than Stanford's public claims during that era-- and since then, the retroactive exaggerations, distortions, and purely fictional elements have multiplied. Stanford's UFO media profile peaked with an appearance on the Phil Donahue show in 1978, alongside Dr. J. Allen Hynek, with an estimated audience of six million. But that high profile faded. By a decade ago, and probably long before, Stanford was chafing under the inattention:
Stanford makes it quite clear that he thinks he deserves to regarded, by those in science, government, and the media, as being in the very front rank of experts -- if not the pre-eminent expert-- on UFOs and their technology. Moreover, Stanford has talked publicly about how he intends to bring that about. For example, check out this short clip from Stanford's memorable appearance on Erica Lukes' UFO Classified podcast, March 8, 2019 (also uploaded below). In it, Stanford said in part:
Setting parody aside for a moment here: In my personal opinion, Ray Stanford's body of UFO-evidence claims are a quicksand pit of delusional and/or manipulated misinformation-- and a potential threat to the tentative but growing interest by some mainstream scientists and organizations, such as the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA), and to any journalist, government official, or scientist who steps into the Ray Stanford quagmire.
Still, some may ignore the warning signs and choose to go plunge down the Ray Stanford mineshaft, attracted by some shiny object they think they see down there -- but they will eventually discover that in the UFO mines of Ray Stanford, there is an abundance of fool's gold, and many skeletons.
I should disclose here that when I (Douglas Dean Johnson) was a young fool in the 1970s (i.e., late 1974 to early 1978), I was part of the core group of Ray Stanford's Project Starlight International (P.S.I.), an editor of the Project Starlight International Journal of Instrumented UFO Research, and an editor of publications of the Stanford-centered nonprofit Association for the Understanding of Man (A.U.M.), based in Austin, Texas. So my extensive familiarity with many aspects of Stanford's alien-UFO history-- his speeches, writings, interviews, trance discourses, Internet posts, UFO-related photographic claims, morphing stories, etc., is also deeply informed by those three and one-half years of personal association and firsthand observation. This group photo is from a light-hearted magazine feature article that appeared in Texas Monthly in 1976, titled "Planet X! We're Waiting for You!" A quotation from that article appears at the very end of this post.
SO-- WHY NOT LOOK TO RAY STANFORD
FOR TRUSTWORTHY INFO ON ALIEN STUFF?
So, what's wrong with Ray Stanford as a source of stories or images pertaining to UFO events and aliens? Well, Stanford has, over a period of more than six decades, made an extraordinary number of dubious and profoundly untrustworthy public claims related to UFOs and aliens. It is hard to know where to begin. Perhaps, with his accounts of multiple encounters with the space "brothers" during the 1950s, as narrated in his 1958 book Look Up, and as later reinterpreted in conflicting ways for different audiences.
Look Up was technically co-authored by Ray's identical twin brother, Rex, but with Ray clearly the primary voice. (Rex Stanford later entered into a distinguished career as a psychologist and parapsychologist.) Look Up recites how Ray Stanford received telepathic messages from the extraterrestrial "space people," which he and his young companions obeyed, and had multiple marvelous encounters as a result. (Example, page 14: "In December of 1954, I received a very distinct telepathic message from the space people....During the year of 1955 numerous instances of telepathy occurred.")
It is not possible to even summarize here the many extraordinary events claimed in Look Up, but they included an occasion on October 21, 1956, when a craft is said to have passed "only a few feet up" over the heads of Stanford and his companions, temporarily paralyzing them, before briefly landing nearby. Another reported event occurred on January 5, 1957, when (Stanford wrote) a spacecraft containing Aramda (with whom Stanford later said he had been acquainted for 38,000 years -- see below) and other elevated beings ("a number of evolved Brothers") approached. The beings allegedly hit Stanford and two companions with a sparkly beam ("which I feel sure came directly from the vastly evolved beings inside the space craft and not from a mechanical device"), under which they "seemed to rise in consciousness above earth man's delusion called time...Then the three of us seemed to be swept into a whirlpool of ever-expanding consciousness." And so forth -- the account of the beam and the associated mystical transport that it induced consumes about two pages of the book (pp 28-30).
In May of 1964, NICAP's Richard Hall, concerned about some things he had heard about Stanford (whom Hall had earlier sent to investigate the famous April 24, 1964 UFO sighting by policeman Lonnie Zamora at Socorro, New Mexico), sent Stanford some questions about the claims made in Look Up. Stanford sent Hall a rambling audio-cassette reply, the gist of which was that the UFO encounters described in Look Up had indeed occurred, but greatly downplaying their significance. Stanford said he may have added "embellishment of speculation and subjectivity" to the accounts found in the Look Up -- for example, by misinterpreting his own psychic impressions as messages from the "space people."
One problem with that: At least as late as August 1974, Stanford was wowing the members of the Association for the Understanding of Man with earnest, dramatic accounts of his purported telepathic interactions with the space "brothers" (including Aramda), in those very same 1950s events. I was there when Stanford delivered, at a conference of the Association for the Understanding of Man, a lecture titled "Firsthand Contacts with Extraterrestrial Life," on August 24, 1974. I was an A.U.M. member in good standing, I paid the conference registration fee, and I recorded the lecture on my personal device, as did others present. I would be happy to share the lecture with good-faith researchers.
In the 1974 lecture, Stanford in general embraced and even expanded upon on the "contactee" claims reflected in Look Up. For example, regarding the mystical "beam" experience, Stanford said, "The main group that I contacted, which I call 'The Watchers,' gave us, on the night of January 5, 1957, what I call the ultimate experience...," which he then proceeded to describe in even more elaborate and vivid detail than found in the 1958 account. Stanford was 36 years old in August 1974, so the full-blown contactee-style accounts he offered on that occasion can hardly be dismissed as mere teenage folly.
Certainly, in later years, a person may gain a more mature perspective on the experiences of youth, so if Ray Stanford now wants to try to re-cast his 1958 account -- a beam emanating from the very persons of "vastly evolved beings" that induced an elaborately described cosmic-consciousness experience-- into a mere euphoria induced in his brain by a field emitted by a UFO as an inadvertent side effect of its technology (as I have heard Stanford assert, on a podcast), fine -- although if you actually read the account in Look Up and/or listen to his more detailed account in the 1974 lecture, and you want to accept Stanford's current explanation, you might be forgiven for concluding that the amount of "embellishment of speculation and subjectivity" incorporated into the earlier accounts was, ah, considerable. More importantly, to my mind, Stanford's 1964 representations seeking to reassure Richard Hall that he (Stanford) was not a wacky contactee, cannot be squared with his gosh-wow lecture to the A.U.M. faithful, ten years later.
Moreover, three years after that, on June 1, 1977, Ray Stanford channeled a message from another ostensible extraterrestrial ("You may call me a planet keeper"), who provided additional commentary on Stanford's 1957 beam-illumination: "Some of you have puzzled at the mystery of how on the night of the fifth of January, 1957, from a seemingly darkened orb within the sky, a singular yet triple stream of light extended itself downward and reached the hearts of three persons known to you. It was simply a process of consciousness acting really and effectively through structure, through intelligence, upon the very molecules of the atmosphere itself, not only the molecular structure but the subatomic structure, and even beyond that, deeper into the heart of matter and existence. This was literally structure acting upon the intelligence of the atmosphere itself."
Whew! Mr. Planet Keeper went on in that vein for quite some time. Well, I think we can all agree that there is quite a gap between Mr. Planet Keeper's "explanation" of the 1957 beam story, and Stanford's current position that his brain merely temporarily suffered a side-effect from a passing alien craft's technology. You can pick one or the other, or reject both -- but either way, ask yourself, "When the Planet Keeper spoke, who was it who constructed his elaborate explanation?"
STANFORD THE “UNCONSCIOUS” PSYCHIC ORACLE—
CHANNELING THE WHITE BROTHERHOOD
AND ‘THE SOURCE OF THE READINGS” (1960-1978, APPROXIMATELY
By 1960, Stanford had embarked on a "career" as a full-blown trance-channel, which was at the core of how he made his living for most of the following two decades. Initially, he gave trance-readings for a fee.
By 1971, a formal organization had been organized in Austin, the Association for the Understanding of Man (A.U.M) (recognized as a bona fide nonprofit organization by the IRS as of July 1, 1973, and I think legally distinct from earlier Stanford-associated enterprises with the same name, in Arizona).
Although Ray Stanford was officially an employee of A.U.M., the overarching purpose of the entire enterprise was to advance the teachings and projects promoted by Stanford's "psychic readings" -- that is, by voices emanating from the vocal cords of the purportedly unconscious Ray Stanford, presented as originating with members of the "White Brotherhood" (the term had no racial connotation, but related to metaphysical mythology)-- ostensibly autonomous, spiritually elevated entities; and also from "the Source of the Readings," described in official A.U.M. literature as "the unconscious and superconscious mind and spiritual being of Stanford in contact with same of any person or persons or with any areas of knowledge toward which it is directed by suggestion." The official A.U.M. introductory brochure published in 1974 described Stanford as "a psychic of uncommon ability."
Most people who joined A.U.M. (about 1200 at the peak) did so in order to receive the publication's thick Journal, much of which consumed by transcripts of Stanford's trance discourses on diverse subjects (a much smaller number of such "readings" were also published on audio cassettes, or in various books), and because they were interested in the purportedly world-shaking projects underway under the guidance received in those "readings."
The "Brothers" and "the Source" promoted a number of big projects, including Project Starlight International, the Hilaron Accelerator (a planned consciousness-boosting time-travel device "similar to a UFO," discussed below), expeditions to the Middle East to uncover the lost tomb of Imhotep and a trove of hidden Essence scrolls, delivering the Stanfordized version of the "Fatima message" to the world, and so forth. Each of these projects was said by "the Source" and "the Brothers" to be of great importance to the human race, potentially preventing or mitigating impending global catastrophes, including nuclear war. But aside from their world-shaking import, the diverse projects really had only one thing in common-- each "script" had Ray Stanford at its very center, the man of absolutely unique talents who was the essential man in, just maybe, averting global disaster.
As a 1976 Stanford trance reading said, "He entered more than 40,000 years ago, and every incarnation has been pointing to the present time." Of course, the channeled voices stressed, Stanford could only achieve these great purposes with the dedicated support of others, who would be required to overlook certain flaws in the "channel."
Photo courtesy Rodrick Dyke, Archives for UFO Research
RAY STANFORD'S "PROJECT STARLIGHT INTERNATIONAL" SOUGHT TO GET "HARD DATA" ON UFOs, YES-- BUT THE UNDERLYING MISSION, GUIDED BY RAY STANFORD'S TRANCE READINGS, WAS TO ESTABLISH CONTACT WITH ALIEN VISITORS
While the promotion of certain projects by "the Brothers" and "the Source" tended to ebb and flow, these purportedly elevated sources pretty consistently stressed the importance of Project Starlight International (which comported with Ray Stanford's long interest in UFOs, but perhaps not so much with the preferences of the dues-paying membership, most of whom were more interested in the other stuff). The A.U.M. publications from 1974 through 1978 were replete with "psychic readings" and other material hammering away on the theme that Project Starlight International could obtain conclusive proof of the extraterrestrial origin of UFOs-- and also, if faithfully pursued and supported, would lead to direct contact with visiting extraterrestrials (not "the Watchers," but others). It was stressed again and again that this proof and this contact would have a hugely positive impact upon humanity, perhaps even preventing the human race from coming to a bad end.
It would not be difficult to pull many quotations out of the A.U.M. publications to demonstrate what I have just stated. For today, I'll just quote here one example, but to assist ufological historians, I will upload a couple of other examples.
AUM Journal Vol. 2, No. 2 (excerpt uploaded here for historical purposes) contains a transcript of a Ray Stanford "work reading" given on October 21, 1973. A "work reading" was a reading conducted by members of the core group for the specific purpose of guiding the leaders of the organization (including, in theory, Stanford himself) as to what they should be concentrating on at any given time, to admonish and encourage, to answer practical questions, etc. Most such readings were not published, but some were published, at least in part. In this case, the Journal editors wrote in a preface (page 52) that P.S.I. was aimed at "getting significant UFO evidence and toward possible intelligent response from or contact with UFO operators." (italics added for emphasis) The editors felt that publishing the explicit guidance from "the Source" would make its membership feel more comfortable with the fact that "considerable time and energies of A.U.M. have been invested in pursing the purposes of Project Starlight International. . ."
The entire thrust of the published October 21, 1973 discourse by "the Source" was that those involved in P.S.I. must maintain proper focus and persistence, in order to become instrumental in establishing contact between humanity and some of the extraterrestrial visitors. The Source said, "Thus, Project Starlight International can grow to the point where it may be recognized worldwide for its work, its endeavor and even success in the ideals discussed and in communication with extraterrestrial civilizations." (p. 63) (italics in the original here)
Then, "the Source" proceeded to give the group very specific instructions on how Stanford and his P.S.I. team were to proceed on the day that it was promised would come ("if you persist") when an alien craft would land before them at the P.S.I. site in the Texas hill country (near Lake Travis).
So there you have it in a nutshell: Ray Stanford's instructions to the core group, for the day that an alien craft would land and open its hatch: Stop taking pictures (apparently obtaining "hard data" was not, in this circumstance, the first priority), and keep your distance while Ray Stanford and his wife make the approach. Picture taking is to resume only if the aliens give the okay.
(Is it not odd, that the contingency instructions for those engaged in a project purportedly devoted to instrumented UFO research, would include an instruction to cease photography just as the aliens were on the verge of making an appearance? Reading this material now, I wonder in what manner "the Source" contemplated that the aliens would communicate camera-shyness, or the converse.)
Material published by A.U.M. in 1973 and later (both printed and audio) contained ample material --both in the discourses by "the Source" and "the Brothers," and in material written directly by Stanford-- on the theme that Project Starlight International had the potential to establish a bridge between humanity and galactic civilizations. Notably, however, the P.S.I.-logo publications, papers, and press releases during the same period contained not a word of about psychic readings or "Brothers" -- even though most of the same people were on the both the A.U.M. and P.S.I. mastheads (with Stanford, of course, at the top of both -- "Editor-in-Chief" of the A.U.M. Journal (the first journal masthead appeared in 1976), and "Director" of Project Starlight International. In the material put out under the P.S.I. logo -- intended mainly for a different audience than the A.U.M. material -- P.S.I. was presented as an enterprise about getting "instrumented data" about UFOs. Setting aside the exaggerations, that was not untrue-- but it was only part of the truth.
RAY STANFORD CHANNELED "ARAMDA OF THE WATCHERS" (WHOM STANFORD "REMEMBERED" SEEING LAND IN A GIANT SPACESHIP 38,000 YEARS AGO) --
OH, AND STANFORD ALSO CHANNELED JESUS CHRIST
At least one of the "Brothers" channeled by Ray Stanford, Aramda by name, was represented as an extraterrestrial, a member of a wise race known as "The Watchers" (not be confused with garden-variety visiting aliens of the type that might come down and open the hatch). Now, Ray Stanford and Aramda-- those two went way back. Not just back to 1957, but 38,000 years! In a lecture (not a trance reading) to an A.U.M. conference on August 22, 1974, which I attended, Stanford (age 36) said this:
(Check out the audio clip with the file name "Ray Stanford 8-22-74 archeology lecture 1 of 2 spacecraft landing 38,000 years ago")
"I remember well the scene, and how it appeared," Ray Stanford said, recalling the descent of the "gigantic" extraterrestrial craft, 38,000 years ago. Keep this in your mind the next time you hear one of Stanford's hyper-detailed accounts of what he purports to remember about a somewhat more recent UFO event.
(I should explain here that Telos, according to Stanford, was a city located, 38,000 years ago, around where the Grand Canyon is now. Among the uploads here are brief excerpts and transcripts, provided for scientific and educational purposes, of "Aramda" speaking through the entranced Stanford. By the way, Aramda on occasion offered some rather specific prophecies about dire future events, and the preparations that A.U.M. members should make for those events, which were published by A.U.M.-- prophecies that, fortunately, proved to be wildly inaccurate.)
Ray Stanford also occasionally channeled "Jeshua" himself (AKA Jesus Christ, "the Lord"), speaking in the first person. Those discourses generally were not published, but as the organization started to come apart in late 1977 and in 1978 (I departed early in 1978, and some others departed in the same general period), Stanford did channel one discourse from "Jeshua" ("the Lord") which was much longer than previous such displays, and this one was published in an A.U.M. newsletter, where it consumed 8 single-spaced typewritten pages. It is uploaded below, for historical research purposes and scientific evaluation-- check it out, it's a real doozy.
Whether or not you think that's pertinent to the Alien Hub sub-forum might depend, I suppose, on whether or not you think Jesus was an alien. I do not believe that, but I've encountered some people who do.
THE ACCELERATOR (TIME-MACHINE) -- OF "ALIEN" ORIGIN?
As I have discussed elsewhere in the past, Ray Stanford for 15 years (1960-1976) intermittently promoted construction of a very expensive device called "the Accelerator," conceived as a 25-foot egg-shaped copper structure that, when wound up with a static charge of 1 to 3 million volts, would make an occupant into "a hyper person, a super person if you prefer," Stanford said -- conferring super-clairvoyance, and the ability to physically teleport into the distant past (yes, friends, a time machine). In 1974, Stanford even projected that he could be giving his psychic readings from within the Accelerator at future A.U.M. conferences, even within a year or two, "depending on when the funds come in."
When this time-machine matter has been raised in more recent years, Stanford has lied, in 1999 asserting on a listserv that A.U.M. "NEVER, EVER collected any money to build the 'Time Machine'...," and claiming (on Erica Lukes' UFO Classified podcast, March 8, 2019) that he had merely done "a bit of joking with somebody in [an audience]" about traveling to the past. However, I have recordings of two lengthy lectures that Stanford gave (while awake, not in trance), in which Stanford touted the remarkable powers that "the Accelerator" (described as "similar to a UFO") would confer on a human occupant. He was quite clear that he meant literal physical transport into the distant past. He did indeed solicit financial support for the A.U.M. Accelerator project, repeatedly, and the Accelerator project was regularly mentioned in A.U.M. newsletters and promotional materials of the era. Check out the uploaded audio clips!
Indeed, in the 1974 speech for which I was present, Stanford exhorted members and donors of the Association for the Understanding of Man, "The Brothers [members of the White Brotherhood] have suggested to us that this Accelerator project is one of the most important projects upon which we could engage."
Stanford set the Accelerator project aside with apparent reluctance in April 1976, when he was age 37, at which time he wrote that "it is not practical to pursue it at this time... the fact is that it may take several million dollars and a number of top-grade professionals to really get that project underway, and it doesn't appear likely that we'll have such resources available until the Association's work is far better known than it is now. If the Association is to undertake scientific projects of that magnitude, then it must command the respect of the scientific community."
For good-faith researchers, I would be happy to provide a recording of an entire lecture that Stanford gave on August 24, 1974, titled "Space, Time, Fields, and the Accelerator," for which I was present.
Now, someone may say, "Well, this is the Alien Hub sub-forum. What does this 'time machine' have to do with aliens, aside from Stanford asserting that the Accelerator was 'similar' to a UFO?" An excellent question! Here is what you must know: Stanford's trance discourses specifically credited the design of the Accelerator to a "Brother" named Hilarion. In a 1974 interview with Psychic magazine (uploaded below), Stanford said that on April 13, 1961, a "Brother" "materialized physically in a brightly lighted room," that he was "over seven feet tall," "was actually glowing," and was accompanied by "a globe of light about eighteen inches in diameter [that] hovered near the ceiling, glowing a diffused white-blue light." Elsewhere in 1974, Stanford said that this materialized "Brother" was in fact Hilarion, that he "materialized" in a "physical body," was "eight feet tall," and wore a pointed helmet. Also, "His body glowed like Moses."
Now, I will grant you that Stanford did not say that Hilarion was an alien. But given these descriptions, it seems to me that one ought not exclude that possibility. If you run into Ray Stanford, please ask him to clarify this point.
STANFORD CLAIMS TO HAVE TAKEN A PHOTO
OF A 3-FOOT ALIEN PILOT, SO CLEAR THAT
"YOU CAN COUNT THE FINGERS ON HIS HAND"
Since we are speaking of aliens here, let's not overlook Ray Stanford's repeated public claims to have taken a 35mm photograph in 1984 of an 3-foot, pointy-eared alien pilot, sitting in his alien craft, so clear "you can count the fingers on his hand" -- a claim that he has publicly reiterated at least as recently as 2019.
Stanford says he took the photo during a complicated UFO event that he purportedly witnessed from outside his then-home in Austin, Texas, on October 15, 1984. According to the story, Stanford saw a "mother ship" at a distance he later determined to be 90 miles, of which he took a movie. After running out of movie film, Stanford started shooting 35mm still shots with a 12x telephoto lens. There were smaller objects operating in conjunction with the mother ship, one of which (he says) suddenly darted to within about one mile of Stanford's position. Somehow, according to Stanford, this entire 90-mile shift was captured on a single 35mm still-camera image!
Even more amazing, Stanford claimed to have extracted data from this single still image that proved that the smaller object had traveled at "either two-thirds or three-quarters of the speed of light in the atmosphere" as it moved closer to him. (Regarding this photo, Stanford commented, "People say, is this just a blur?,” to which Stanford's answer is: No.)
But wait, there is more: That quick smaller object had a dome. The very same single 35mm image, according to Stanford, shows the alien pilot sitting inside the dome -- so clearly that "you can count the fingers on his hand," Stanford asserted. (In a 2009 Radio Misterioso interview, Stanford also said this alien pilot is "three or three-and-one-half feet tall, and has a bald head and pointed ears.")
One of Stanford’s friends revealed on a forum, several years ago, that Stanford has named the perceived diminutive extraterrestrial “Gort.” Personally, I feel it is past time for “Gort” to be afforded the wide recognition that he/she/it surely deserves.
For now, I'm afraid, you may not see the image. The most you can do is listen to one of Ray Stanford's descriptions of it. Here is a link to a 5-minute excerpt from Ray Stanford's appearance on Erica Lukes' UFO Classified on March 8, 2019, in which he discussed the alien-pilot photo. Listening to it, you may gain some insights into Stanford's approach to UFO photo analysis.
I highly recommend, in fact, that you listen to the entire 1.75 hour UFO Classified interview, which is available here.
THE AMAZING DISAPPEARING SOCORRO EGG-CRAFT
AND ITS AMAZING DISAPPEARING LANDING GEAR
There are so very many Ray Stanford photographic claims -- and so little validation. Why, at the very site of the famous Lonnie Zamora encounter with an anomalous egg-craft at Socorro, New Mexico, in 1964, Stanford took, he said in a 2015 podcast appearance, "a wonderful photograph in which...people will be able to see, in broad daylight...the Socorro object [egg-shaped UFO], with its landing gear deployed." Several of Stanford's most fervent promoters visited his home, and they too saw the remarkable image of the egg-craft, complete with that very distinctive landing gear, just as described by policeman Lonnie Zamora, and they spoke with great enthusiasm on forums and podcasts of what they had seen-- for years. Some others who expressed skepticism about the claims were roughly handled by the Stanford acolytes. Yet, in 2020 it was revealed that it was all just debris on the negative! No egg-craft. No landing gear. Nothing there at all. (Check out the uploaded audio file, "Ray Stanford call-in to a Martin Willis YouTube...Sept. 15, 2020.")
But there are always more Ray Stanford photographic claims-- they are virtually without number. Stanford claims to have taken "thousands" of frames of movie film of UFOs, which after a lot of enlargement and "cleaning up," to his imaginative eye reveal all sort of marvelous alien technological effects-- plasma sheaths, plasma beams, Faraday rings, manifest distortions of the fabric of space-time, etc., etc. For many of these claimed events, not even derived digital images have ever been published, but those that have emerged -- well, to the uninitiated such as myself, they generally look like blobs of hyper-enlarged grain structure (often from tiny Super 8 movie frames), digitally "cleaned up" and manipulated in various ways, and interpreted through a lens of subjectivity, imagination, delusion, textbook pareidolia, and morphing stories. Typically, the original films and negatives are kept strictly under Ray Stanford's exclusive control, with loyal petitioners and stenographers occasionally allowed private viewings; those promoting the images usually rely heavily on Stanford's derived images, his interpretations, and his morphing stories.
And Ray Stanford is nothing if not a teller of stories.
IN 1978, RAY STANFORD TOLD SIX MILLION
"DONAHUE" VIEWERS HE POSSESSED A SAMPLE OF MATERIAL THAT "DOES NOT SEEM TO BE DUPLICABLE RIGHT NOW ON EARTH;" A.U.M. MEMBERS WERE TOLD THAT IT WAS PART OF A GIANT, EXPLODED ALIEN SPACE CITY
Hey, just one more Ray Stanford story, for today. In 1978, Stanford appeared on the Phil Donahue show, with Dr. J. Allen Hynek. The program at that time had an estimated audience of 6 million. Stanford said on the show, "Project Starlight has in its possession, we're trying to get some further tests done on it, some glassy material of unprecedented crystalline quality, that doesn't seem to be duplicable right now on Earth or in nature -- that may be -- it fell at hypersonic velocity from space -- could be evidence of UFOs, but we're not sure yet."
Stanford had previously revealed to the members of the Association for the Understanding of Man (in a 1971 newsletter, displayed below) that this sample, which he called "the Space Material," "consists of a quite mysterious nonnatural material with a crystalline structure unlike any other known on Earth. Also, it shows additional evidence of technological processing." The A.U.M. newsletter went on:
Multiple "Brothers," speaking "through" the "unconscious" Ray Stanford, including good old Aramda, had a good deal to say about "the Space Material." For example, a purported entity who styled himself "One Who Serves" explained that the giant spherical spacecraft was a product of a civilization called the "Su-Madraians" [that's pronounced sue-ma-DRAY-ans], that it was "grown" not built, that the material "has properties that will be most unusual in their capabilities or influence, even to the mental and to the physical bodies of man...at times still [it] may cause a snapping or a movement at a minor level of conditions of the spatial matrix which it occupies," and so forth. He explained further that the "immense" craft "entered your three-dimensional universe" 100 light years from earth. Regrettably, "by a malfunction within the equipment, approximately 60 percent of the externalized surfaces of the city shifted in phase of spatial matrix ninety degrees, while the remaining approximately 40 percent failed to make the spatial matrix shift of precisely ninety degrees...," and of course that is never good, so kaboom! Hundreds of years later, fragments moving "74,000 approximate miles, by nautical, per hour in reaching the earth..." landed in and around San Antonio. There was much more -- that "One Who Serves," he was quite a story teller, too, wouldn't you say? But I digress.
Anyway, Stanford has been talking about this purportedly manufactured non-terrestrial "Space Material" (as he calls it) for over 50 years now -- but I think that we are still waiting for those lab results!
MAKE YOUR VOICES HEARD!
So, there you have it. Dear readers, do you agree that Ray Stanford has earned this Wild & Woolly Claims About Aliens & Alien Craft Lifetime Achievement Award? Please share your thoughts! If you think the awards jury has been unfair to Ray Stanford, or that there are other contenders out there whom are more deserving, you should state your position without flinching.
But I warn you in advance -- I have much, much more material to bring forth in support of Ray Stanford's qualifications for this award. When you've heard it all, I think you will come to agree: There is nobody else who even comes close.
-- Douglas Dean Johnson
@ddeanjohnson on Twitter
"This isn't a game; it's a dangerous undertaking. That's one reason we wear name-tags out there [at the Project Starlight rural site]-- should we be killed, people will at least be able to identify us." -- Ray Stanford, director of Project Starlight International, quoted in the February 1976 issue of Texas Monthly, "Planet X! We're Waiting for You!," by Stephen Harrigan
[RIPPPPP!]
And, in the category "Wild & Woolly Claims About Aliens & Alien Craft," the coveted Lifetime Achievement Award goes to . . .
Ray Stanford!
Friends, the award jury's decision was unanimous.
In terms of duration and sheer quantity of dubious alien-related claims, nobody else could touch Ray Stanford. Ray Stanford has been making wild claims involving communications from aliens, channeling of aliens, encounters with aliens, encounters with alien spacecraft, and purported personally obtained evidences of non-human spacecraft and many details regarding their exotic technology (claims encompassing innumerable movies and still photos, plus physical samples and instrument recordings), since 1955 -- that is 66 years! Many of these claims have been discredited, or have been repudiated or denied or quietly abandoned by Stanford himself, and most of the others shrink drastically or collapse outright when subjected to just a bit of skeptical scrutiny or historical research-- but as the saying goes, those who are ignorant of the past are often condemned to repeat it.
Ray Stanford is now 83 years old, but still very active in promoting a big batch of his alien/UFO-related claims, and he has some takers-- some of whom seem to feel, oddly, that because Ray Stanford has proven to be good at finding dinosaur tracks, they need not delve into the specifics regarding his 60-plus-year record on UFO-related claims.
Some mistakenly believe that most or all of Stanford's wacky claims and activities occurred when he was very young, which is by no means the case. Much of what I say below refers to things Stanford did and said when he was in his mid-30s to 40, and yet other statements that I quote below were made within the past three years.
For a while during the 1970s, Stanford had a fairly high profile on the UFO issue, mostly due to his role as director of Project Starlight International -- an enterprise that had some substance for a few years, but with resources, hardware, and achievements greatly less than Stanford's public claims during that era-- and since then, the retroactive exaggerations, distortions, and purely fictional elements have multiplied. Stanford's UFO media profile peaked with an appearance on the Phil Donahue show in 1978, alongside Dr. J. Allen Hynek, with an estimated audience of six million. But that high profile faded. By a decade ago, and probably long before, Stanford was chafing under the inattention:
"Frankly, at age 73 [in 2011], and as the most seasoned researcher into these phenomena alive today, I tire of book authors who are so cowardly of the mystery that they dare only present readers with reports from persons with military stripes and metals, or with a Ph.D. behind the observers name."-- Ray Stanford, in a book review posted on Amazon.com, May 4, 2011
Nowadays, Ray Stanford does not shy away from openly proclaiming his self-perceived unique importance in understanding UFO phenomena, and he is sometimes taken seriously by unwary listeners who are dazzled by his fast-talking verbal facility and his obvious intelligence, or who make false assumptions based on Stanford's bona fide successes in finding fossils, and who don't bother to look at Stanford's ascertainable and dismal history on the subject matter of UFOs and aliens.Stanford makes it quite clear that he thinks he deserves to regarded, by those in science, government, and the media, as being in the very front rank of experts -- if not the pre-eminent expert-- on UFOs and their technology. Moreover, Stanford has talked publicly about how he intends to bring that about. For example, check out this short clip from Stanford's memorable appearance on Erica Lukes' UFO Classified podcast, March 8, 2019 (also uploaded below). In it, Stanford said in part:
I hope to get this incredible evidence, that is so important to physics, and also to technological development, I hope to get it before people that really have clout...When I let it out, it's going to be way beyond the so-called UFO groupie crowd. It's going to hit at a major level, just like the [fossil] discovery at Goddard did. I won't settle for anything less.
Setting parody aside for a moment here: In my personal opinion, Ray Stanford's body of UFO-evidence claims are a quicksand pit of delusional and/or manipulated misinformation-- and a potential threat to the tentative but growing interest by some mainstream scientists and organizations, such as the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA), and to any journalist, government official, or scientist who steps into the Ray Stanford quagmire.
Still, some may ignore the warning signs and choose to go plunge down the Ray Stanford mineshaft, attracted by some shiny object they think they see down there -- but they will eventually discover that in the UFO mines of Ray Stanford, there is an abundance of fool's gold, and many skeletons.
I should disclose here that when I (Douglas Dean Johnson) was a young fool in the 1970s (i.e., late 1974 to early 1978), I was part of the core group of Ray Stanford's Project Starlight International (P.S.I.), an editor of the Project Starlight International Journal of Instrumented UFO Research, and an editor of publications of the Stanford-centered nonprofit Association for the Understanding of Man (A.U.M.), based in Austin, Texas. So my extensive familiarity with many aspects of Stanford's alien-UFO history-- his speeches, writings, interviews, trance discourses, Internet posts, UFO-related photographic claims, morphing stories, etc., is also deeply informed by those three and one-half years of personal association and firsthand observation. This group photo is from a light-hearted magazine feature article that appeared in Texas Monthly in 1976, titled "Planet X! We're Waiting for You!" A quotation from that article appears at the very end of this post.
SO-- WHY NOT LOOK TO RAY STANFORD
FOR TRUSTWORTHY INFO ON ALIEN STUFF?
So, what's wrong with Ray Stanford as a source of stories or images pertaining to UFO events and aliens? Well, Stanford has, over a period of more than six decades, made an extraordinary number of dubious and profoundly untrustworthy public claims related to UFOs and aliens. It is hard to know where to begin. Perhaps, with his accounts of multiple encounters with the space "brothers" during the 1950s, as narrated in his 1958 book Look Up, and as later reinterpreted in conflicting ways for different audiences.
Look Up was technically co-authored by Ray's identical twin brother, Rex, but with Ray clearly the primary voice. (Rex Stanford later entered into a distinguished career as a psychologist and parapsychologist.) Look Up recites how Ray Stanford received telepathic messages from the extraterrestrial "space people," which he and his young companions obeyed, and had multiple marvelous encounters as a result. (Example, page 14: "In December of 1954, I received a very distinct telepathic message from the space people....During the year of 1955 numerous instances of telepathy occurred.")
It is not possible to even summarize here the many extraordinary events claimed in Look Up, but they included an occasion on October 21, 1956, when a craft is said to have passed "only a few feet up" over the heads of Stanford and his companions, temporarily paralyzing them, before briefly landing nearby. Another reported event occurred on January 5, 1957, when (Stanford wrote) a spacecraft containing Aramda (with whom Stanford later said he had been acquainted for 38,000 years -- see below) and other elevated beings ("a number of evolved Brothers") approached. The beings allegedly hit Stanford and two companions with a sparkly beam ("which I feel sure came directly from the vastly evolved beings inside the space craft and not from a mechanical device"), under which they "seemed to rise in consciousness above earth man's delusion called time...Then the three of us seemed to be swept into a whirlpool of ever-expanding consciousness." And so forth -- the account of the beam and the associated mystical transport that it induced consumes about two pages of the book (pp 28-30).
In May of 1964, NICAP's Richard Hall, concerned about some things he had heard about Stanford (whom Hall had earlier sent to investigate the famous April 24, 1964 UFO sighting by policeman Lonnie Zamora at Socorro, New Mexico), sent Stanford some questions about the claims made in Look Up. Stanford sent Hall a rambling audio-cassette reply, the gist of which was that the UFO encounters described in Look Up had indeed occurred, but greatly downplaying their significance. Stanford said he may have added "embellishment of speculation and subjectivity" to the accounts found in the Look Up -- for example, by misinterpreting his own psychic impressions as messages from the "space people."
One problem with that: At least as late as August 1974, Stanford was wowing the members of the Association for the Understanding of Man with earnest, dramatic accounts of his purported telepathic interactions with the space "brothers" (including Aramda), in those very same 1950s events. I was there when Stanford delivered, at a conference of the Association for the Understanding of Man, a lecture titled "Firsthand Contacts with Extraterrestrial Life," on August 24, 1974. I was an A.U.M. member in good standing, I paid the conference registration fee, and I recorded the lecture on my personal device, as did others present. I would be happy to share the lecture with good-faith researchers.
In the 1974 lecture, Stanford in general embraced and even expanded upon on the "contactee" claims reflected in Look Up. For example, regarding the mystical "beam" experience, Stanford said, "The main group that I contacted, which I call 'The Watchers,' gave us, on the night of January 5, 1957, what I call the ultimate experience...," which he then proceeded to describe in even more elaborate and vivid detail than found in the 1958 account. Stanford was 36 years old in August 1974, so the full-blown contactee-style accounts he offered on that occasion can hardly be dismissed as mere teenage folly.
Certainly, in later years, a person may gain a more mature perspective on the experiences of youth, so if Ray Stanford now wants to try to re-cast his 1958 account -- a beam emanating from the very persons of "vastly evolved beings" that induced an elaborately described cosmic-consciousness experience-- into a mere euphoria induced in his brain by a field emitted by a UFO as an inadvertent side effect of its technology (as I have heard Stanford assert, on a podcast), fine -- although if you actually read the account in Look Up and/or listen to his more detailed account in the 1974 lecture, and you want to accept Stanford's current explanation, you might be forgiven for concluding that the amount of "embellishment of speculation and subjectivity" incorporated into the earlier accounts was, ah, considerable. More importantly, to my mind, Stanford's 1964 representations seeking to reassure Richard Hall that he (Stanford) was not a wacky contactee, cannot be squared with his gosh-wow lecture to the A.U.M. faithful, ten years later.
Moreover, three years after that, on June 1, 1977, Ray Stanford channeled a message from another ostensible extraterrestrial ("You may call me a planet keeper"), who provided additional commentary on Stanford's 1957 beam-illumination: "Some of you have puzzled at the mystery of how on the night of the fifth of January, 1957, from a seemingly darkened orb within the sky, a singular yet triple stream of light extended itself downward and reached the hearts of three persons known to you. It was simply a process of consciousness acting really and effectively through structure, through intelligence, upon the very molecules of the atmosphere itself, not only the molecular structure but the subatomic structure, and even beyond that, deeper into the heart of matter and existence. This was literally structure acting upon the intelligence of the atmosphere itself."
Whew! Mr. Planet Keeper went on in that vein for quite some time. Well, I think we can all agree that there is quite a gap between Mr. Planet Keeper's "explanation" of the 1957 beam story, and Stanford's current position that his brain merely temporarily suffered a side-effect from a passing alien craft's technology. You can pick one or the other, or reject both -- but either way, ask yourself, "When the Planet Keeper spoke, who was it who constructed his elaborate explanation?"
STANFORD THE “UNCONSCIOUS” PSYCHIC ORACLE—
CHANNELING THE WHITE BROTHERHOOD
AND ‘THE SOURCE OF THE READINGS” (1960-1978, APPROXIMATELY
By 1960, Stanford had embarked on a "career" as a full-blown trance-channel, which was at the core of how he made his living for most of the following two decades. Initially, he gave trance-readings for a fee.
By 1971, a formal organization had been organized in Austin, the Association for the Understanding of Man (A.U.M) (recognized as a bona fide nonprofit organization by the IRS as of July 1, 1973, and I think legally distinct from earlier Stanford-associated enterprises with the same name, in Arizona).
Although Ray Stanford was officially an employee of A.U.M., the overarching purpose of the entire enterprise was to advance the teachings and projects promoted by Stanford's "psychic readings" -- that is, by voices emanating from the vocal cords of the purportedly unconscious Ray Stanford, presented as originating with members of the "White Brotherhood" (the term had no racial connotation, but related to metaphysical mythology)-- ostensibly autonomous, spiritually elevated entities; and also from "the Source of the Readings," described in official A.U.M. literature as "the unconscious and superconscious mind and spiritual being of Stanford in contact with same of any person or persons or with any areas of knowledge toward which it is directed by suggestion." The official A.U.M. introductory brochure published in 1974 described Stanford as "a psychic of uncommon ability."
Most people who joined A.U.M. (about 1200 at the peak) did so in order to receive the publication's thick Journal, much of which consumed by transcripts of Stanford's trance discourses on diverse subjects (a much smaller number of such "readings" were also published on audio cassettes, or in various books), and because they were interested in the purportedly world-shaking projects underway under the guidance received in those "readings."
The "Brothers" and "the Source" promoted a number of big projects, including Project Starlight International, the Hilaron Accelerator (a planned consciousness-boosting time-travel device "similar to a UFO," discussed below), expeditions to the Middle East to uncover the lost tomb of Imhotep and a trove of hidden Essence scrolls, delivering the Stanfordized version of the "Fatima message" to the world, and so forth. Each of these projects was said by "the Source" and "the Brothers" to be of great importance to the human race, potentially preventing or mitigating impending global catastrophes, including nuclear war. But aside from their world-shaking import, the diverse projects really had only one thing in common-- each "script" had Ray Stanford at its very center, the man of absolutely unique talents who was the essential man in, just maybe, averting global disaster.
As a 1976 Stanford trance reading said, "He entered more than 40,000 years ago, and every incarnation has been pointing to the present time." Of course, the channeled voices stressed, Stanford could only achieve these great purposes with the dedicated support of others, who would be required to overlook certain flaws in the "channel."
Photo courtesy Rodrick Dyke, Archives for UFO Research
RAY STANFORD'S "PROJECT STARLIGHT INTERNATIONAL" SOUGHT TO GET "HARD DATA" ON UFOs, YES-- BUT THE UNDERLYING MISSION, GUIDED BY RAY STANFORD'S TRANCE READINGS, WAS TO ESTABLISH CONTACT WITH ALIEN VISITORS
While the promotion of certain projects by "the Brothers" and "the Source" tended to ebb and flow, these purportedly elevated sources pretty consistently stressed the importance of Project Starlight International (which comported with Ray Stanford's long interest in UFOs, but perhaps not so much with the preferences of the dues-paying membership, most of whom were more interested in the other stuff). The A.U.M. publications from 1974 through 1978 were replete with "psychic readings" and other material hammering away on the theme that Project Starlight International could obtain conclusive proof of the extraterrestrial origin of UFOs-- and also, if faithfully pursued and supported, would lead to direct contact with visiting extraterrestrials (not "the Watchers," but others). It was stressed again and again that this proof and this contact would have a hugely positive impact upon humanity, perhaps even preventing the human race from coming to a bad end.
It would not be difficult to pull many quotations out of the A.U.M. publications to demonstrate what I have just stated. For today, I'll just quote here one example, but to assist ufological historians, I will upload a couple of other examples.
AUM Journal Vol. 2, No. 2 (excerpt uploaded here for historical purposes) contains a transcript of a Ray Stanford "work reading" given on October 21, 1973. A "work reading" was a reading conducted by members of the core group for the specific purpose of guiding the leaders of the organization (including, in theory, Stanford himself) as to what they should be concentrating on at any given time, to admonish and encourage, to answer practical questions, etc. Most such readings were not published, but some were published, at least in part. In this case, the Journal editors wrote in a preface (page 52) that P.S.I. was aimed at "getting significant UFO evidence and toward possible intelligent response from or contact with UFO operators." (italics added for emphasis) The editors felt that publishing the explicit guidance from "the Source" would make its membership feel more comfortable with the fact that "considerable time and energies of A.U.M. have been invested in pursing the purposes of Project Starlight International. . ."
The entire thrust of the published October 21, 1973 discourse by "the Source" was that those involved in P.S.I. must maintain proper focus and persistence, in order to become instrumental in establishing contact between humanity and some of the extraterrestrial visitors. The Source said, "Thus, Project Starlight International can grow to the point where it may be recognized worldwide for its work, its endeavor and even success in the ideals discussed and in communication with extraterrestrial civilizations." (p. 63) (italics in the original here)
Then, "the Source" proceeded to give the group very specific instructions on how Stanford and his P.S.I. team were to proceed on the day that it was promised would come ("if you persist") when an alien craft would land before them at the P.S.I. site in the Texas hill country (near Lake Travis).
At the present time, according to the consciousness of those gathered, there are only two present that we can authorize to be active -- if you persist, we will say -- when that occasion occurs or arises to approach when the signal is given, once a craft has come and the beings have made themselves known. That is the one through whom we speak [Ray Stanford] and the one called Mary Kathryn [Stanford's wife in 1973; they divorced in 1985]. Understand that we may speak of those times which are far away, or those which are near. . . . [italics in original]
When the craft comes, when such craft are seen, clearly, and known as such, it is satisfactory to film without flash equipment or auxiliary lighting equipment, even to the point that they have landed, even to the point of an opening of a hatch; but at that point, such [photography] is to cease, unless or until permission has become obvious from those with whom association or communication has been made [the aliens]. (page 65)
So there you have it in a nutshell: Ray Stanford's instructions to the core group, for the day that an alien craft would land and open its hatch: Stop taking pictures (apparently obtaining "hard data" was not, in this circumstance, the first priority), and keep your distance while Ray Stanford and his wife make the approach. Picture taking is to resume only if the aliens give the okay.
(Is it not odd, that the contingency instructions for those engaged in a project purportedly devoted to instrumented UFO research, would include an instruction to cease photography just as the aliens were on the verge of making an appearance? Reading this material now, I wonder in what manner "the Source" contemplated that the aliens would communicate camera-shyness, or the converse.)
Material published by A.U.M. in 1973 and later (both printed and audio) contained ample material --both in the discourses by "the Source" and "the Brothers," and in material written directly by Stanford-- on the theme that Project Starlight International had the potential to establish a bridge between humanity and galactic civilizations. Notably, however, the P.S.I.-logo publications, papers, and press releases during the same period contained not a word of about psychic readings or "Brothers" -- even though most of the same people were on the both the A.U.M. and P.S.I. mastheads (with Stanford, of course, at the top of both -- "Editor-in-Chief" of the A.U.M. Journal (the first journal masthead appeared in 1976), and "Director" of Project Starlight International. In the material put out under the P.S.I. logo -- intended mainly for a different audience than the A.U.M. material -- P.S.I. was presented as an enterprise about getting "instrumented data" about UFOs. Setting aside the exaggerations, that was not untrue-- but it was only part of the truth.
RAY STANFORD CHANNELED "ARAMDA OF THE WATCHERS" (WHOM STANFORD "REMEMBERED" SEEING LAND IN A GIANT SPACESHIP 38,000 YEARS AGO) --
OH, AND STANFORD ALSO CHANNELED JESUS CHRIST
At least one of the "Brothers" channeled by Ray Stanford, Aramda by name, was represented as an extraterrestrial, a member of a wise race known as "The Watchers" (not be confused with garden-variety visiting aliens of the type that might come down and open the hatch). Now, Ray Stanford and Aramda-- those two went way back. Not just back to 1957, but 38,000 years! In a lecture (not a trance reading) to an A.U.M. conference on August 22, 1974, which I attended, Stanford (age 36) said this:
"[O]ne night a gigantic craft -- and I remember well the scene, and how it appeared -- a gigantic craft, probably at least 200 feet tall . . .landed at Telos, and it was an expedition from outside the Earth."
(Check out the audio clip with the file name "Ray Stanford 8-22-74 archeology lecture 1 of 2 spacecraft landing 38,000 years ago")
"I remember well the scene, and how it appeared," Ray Stanford said, recalling the descent of the "gigantic" extraterrestrial craft, 38,000 years ago. Keep this in your mind the next time you hear one of Stanford's hyper-detailed accounts of what he purports to remember about a somewhat more recent UFO event.
(I should explain here that Telos, according to Stanford, was a city located, 38,000 years ago, around where the Grand Canyon is now. Among the uploads here are brief excerpts and transcripts, provided for scientific and educational purposes, of "Aramda" speaking through the entranced Stanford. By the way, Aramda on occasion offered some rather specific prophecies about dire future events, and the preparations that A.U.M. members should make for those events, which were published by A.U.M.-- prophecies that, fortunately, proved to be wildly inaccurate.)
Ray Stanford also occasionally channeled "Jeshua" himself (AKA Jesus Christ, "the Lord"), speaking in the first person. Those discourses generally were not published, but as the organization started to come apart in late 1977 and in 1978 (I departed early in 1978, and some others departed in the same general period), Stanford did channel one discourse from "Jeshua" ("the Lord") which was much longer than previous such displays, and this one was published in an A.U.M. newsletter, where it consumed 8 single-spaced typewritten pages. It is uploaded below, for historical research purposes and scientific evaluation-- check it out, it's a real doozy.
Whether or not you think that's pertinent to the Alien Hub sub-forum might depend, I suppose, on whether or not you think Jesus was an alien. I do not believe that, but I've encountered some people who do.
THE ACCELERATOR (TIME-MACHINE) -- OF "ALIEN" ORIGIN?
As I have discussed elsewhere in the past, Ray Stanford for 15 years (1960-1976) intermittently promoted construction of a very expensive device called "the Accelerator," conceived as a 25-foot egg-shaped copper structure that, when wound up with a static charge of 1 to 3 million volts, would make an occupant into "a hyper person, a super person if you prefer," Stanford said -- conferring super-clairvoyance, and the ability to physically teleport into the distant past (yes, friends, a time machine). In 1974, Stanford even projected that he could be giving his psychic readings from within the Accelerator at future A.U.M. conferences, even within a year or two, "depending on when the funds come in."
When this time-machine matter has been raised in more recent years, Stanford has lied, in 1999 asserting on a listserv that A.U.M. "NEVER, EVER collected any money to build the 'Time Machine'...," and claiming (on Erica Lukes' UFO Classified podcast, March 8, 2019) that he had merely done "a bit of joking with somebody in [an audience]" about traveling to the past. However, I have recordings of two lengthy lectures that Stanford gave (while awake, not in trance), in which Stanford touted the remarkable powers that "the Accelerator" (described as "similar to a UFO") would confer on a human occupant. He was quite clear that he meant literal physical transport into the distant past. He did indeed solicit financial support for the A.U.M. Accelerator project, repeatedly, and the Accelerator project was regularly mentioned in A.U.M. newsletters and promotional materials of the era. Check out the uploaded audio clips!
Indeed, in the 1974 speech for which I was present, Stanford exhorted members and donors of the Association for the Understanding of Man, "The Brothers [members of the White Brotherhood] have suggested to us that this Accelerator project is one of the most important projects upon which we could engage."
Stanford set the Accelerator project aside with apparent reluctance in April 1976, when he was age 37, at which time he wrote that "it is not practical to pursue it at this time... the fact is that it may take several million dollars and a number of top-grade professionals to really get that project underway, and it doesn't appear likely that we'll have such resources available until the Association's work is far better known than it is now. If the Association is to undertake scientific projects of that magnitude, then it must command the respect of the scientific community."
For good-faith researchers, I would be happy to provide a recording of an entire lecture that Stanford gave on August 24, 1974, titled "Space, Time, Fields, and the Accelerator," for which I was present.
Now, someone may say, "Well, this is the Alien Hub sub-forum. What does this 'time machine' have to do with aliens, aside from Stanford asserting that the Accelerator was 'similar' to a UFO?" An excellent question! Here is what you must know: Stanford's trance discourses specifically credited the design of the Accelerator to a "Brother" named Hilarion. In a 1974 interview with Psychic magazine (uploaded below), Stanford said that on April 13, 1961, a "Brother" "materialized physically in a brightly lighted room," that he was "over seven feet tall," "was actually glowing," and was accompanied by "a globe of light about eighteen inches in diameter [that] hovered near the ceiling, glowing a diffused white-blue light." Elsewhere in 1974, Stanford said that this materialized "Brother" was in fact Hilarion, that he "materialized" in a "physical body," was "eight feet tall," and wore a pointed helmet. Also, "His body glowed like Moses."
Now, I will grant you that Stanford did not say that Hilarion was an alien. But given these descriptions, it seems to me that one ought not exclude that possibility. If you run into Ray Stanford, please ask him to clarify this point.
STANFORD CLAIMS TO HAVE TAKEN A PHOTO
OF A 3-FOOT ALIEN PILOT, SO CLEAR THAT
"YOU CAN COUNT THE FINGERS ON HIS HAND"
Since we are speaking of aliens here, let's not overlook Ray Stanford's repeated public claims to have taken a 35mm photograph in 1984 of an 3-foot, pointy-eared alien pilot, sitting in his alien craft, so clear "you can count the fingers on his hand" -- a claim that he has publicly reiterated at least as recently as 2019.
Stanford says he took the photo during a complicated UFO event that he purportedly witnessed from outside his then-home in Austin, Texas, on October 15, 1984. According to the story, Stanford saw a "mother ship" at a distance he later determined to be 90 miles, of which he took a movie. After running out of movie film, Stanford started shooting 35mm still shots with a 12x telephoto lens. There were smaller objects operating in conjunction with the mother ship, one of which (he says) suddenly darted to within about one mile of Stanford's position. Somehow, according to Stanford, this entire 90-mile shift was captured on a single 35mm still-camera image!
Even more amazing, Stanford claimed to have extracted data from this single still image that proved that the smaller object had traveled at "either two-thirds or three-quarters of the speed of light in the atmosphere" as it moved closer to him. (Regarding this photo, Stanford commented, "People say, is this just a blur?,” to which Stanford's answer is: No.)
But wait, there is more: That quick smaller object had a dome. The very same single 35mm image, according to Stanford, shows the alien pilot sitting inside the dome -- so clearly that "you can count the fingers on his hand," Stanford asserted. (In a 2009 Radio Misterioso interview, Stanford also said this alien pilot is "three or three-and-one-half feet tall, and has a bald head and pointed ears.")
One of Stanford’s friends revealed on a forum, several years ago, that Stanford has named the perceived diminutive extraterrestrial “Gort.” Personally, I feel it is past time for “Gort” to be afforded the wide recognition that he/she/it surely deserves.
For now, I'm afraid, you may not see the image. The most you can do is listen to one of Ray Stanford's descriptions of it. Here is a link to a 5-minute excerpt from Ray Stanford's appearance on Erica Lukes' UFO Classified on March 8, 2019, in which he discussed the alien-pilot photo. Listening to it, you may gain some insights into Stanford's approach to UFO photo analysis.
I highly recommend, in fact, that you listen to the entire 1.75 hour UFO Classified interview, which is available here.
THE AMAZING DISAPPEARING SOCORRO EGG-CRAFT
AND ITS AMAZING DISAPPEARING LANDING GEAR
There are so very many Ray Stanford photographic claims -- and so little validation. Why, at the very site of the famous Lonnie Zamora encounter with an anomalous egg-craft at Socorro, New Mexico, in 1964, Stanford took, he said in a 2015 podcast appearance, "a wonderful photograph in which...people will be able to see, in broad daylight...the Socorro object [egg-shaped UFO], with its landing gear deployed." Several of Stanford's most fervent promoters visited his home, and they too saw the remarkable image of the egg-craft, complete with that very distinctive landing gear, just as described by policeman Lonnie Zamora, and they spoke with great enthusiasm on forums and podcasts of what they had seen-- for years. Some others who expressed skepticism about the claims were roughly handled by the Stanford acolytes. Yet, in 2020 it was revealed that it was all just debris on the negative! No egg-craft. No landing gear. Nothing there at all. (Check out the uploaded audio file, "Ray Stanford call-in to a Martin Willis YouTube...Sept. 15, 2020.")
But there are always more Ray Stanford photographic claims-- they are virtually without number. Stanford claims to have taken "thousands" of frames of movie film of UFOs, which after a lot of enlargement and "cleaning up," to his imaginative eye reveal all sort of marvelous alien technological effects-- plasma sheaths, plasma beams, Faraday rings, manifest distortions of the fabric of space-time, etc., etc. For many of these claimed events, not even derived digital images have ever been published, but those that have emerged -- well, to the uninitiated such as myself, they generally look like blobs of hyper-enlarged grain structure (often from tiny Super 8 movie frames), digitally "cleaned up" and manipulated in various ways, and interpreted through a lens of subjectivity, imagination, delusion, textbook pareidolia, and morphing stories. Typically, the original films and negatives are kept strictly under Ray Stanford's exclusive control, with loyal petitioners and stenographers occasionally allowed private viewings; those promoting the images usually rely heavily on Stanford's derived images, his interpretations, and his morphing stories.
And Ray Stanford is nothing if not a teller of stories.
IN 1978, RAY STANFORD TOLD SIX MILLION
"DONAHUE" VIEWERS HE POSSESSED A SAMPLE OF MATERIAL THAT "DOES NOT SEEM TO BE DUPLICABLE RIGHT NOW ON EARTH;" A.U.M. MEMBERS WERE TOLD THAT IT WAS PART OF A GIANT, EXPLODED ALIEN SPACE CITY
Hey, just one more Ray Stanford story, for today. In 1978, Stanford appeared on the Phil Donahue show, with Dr. J. Allen Hynek. The program at that time had an estimated audience of 6 million. Stanford said on the show, "Project Starlight has in its possession, we're trying to get some further tests done on it, some glassy material of unprecedented crystalline quality, that doesn't seem to be duplicable right now on Earth or in nature -- that may be -- it fell at hypersonic velocity from space -- could be evidence of UFOs, but we're not sure yet."
Stanford had previously revealed to the members of the Association for the Understanding of Man (in a 1971 newsletter, displayed below) that this sample, which he called "the Space Material," "consists of a quite mysterious nonnatural material with a crystalline structure unlike any other known on Earth. Also, it shows additional evidence of technological processing." The A.U.M. newsletter went on:
Although not told to the public at large, our members might be interested to know that the [Ray Stanford psychic] readings have confirmed that the "Space Material' is the product of an advanced technological civilization in space; and actually is a piece of a gigantic spacecraft, which disintegrated in space several years ago. Pieces of the craft were scattered throughout the solar system and one sizeable chunk fell... on San Antonio, Texas, in 1969.
Multiple "Brothers," speaking "through" the "unconscious" Ray Stanford, including good old Aramda, had a good deal to say about "the Space Material." For example, a purported entity who styled himself "One Who Serves" explained that the giant spherical spacecraft was a product of a civilization called the "Su-Madraians" [that's pronounced sue-ma-DRAY-ans], that it was "grown" not built, that the material "has properties that will be most unusual in their capabilities or influence, even to the mental and to the physical bodies of man...at times still [it] may cause a snapping or a movement at a minor level of conditions of the spatial matrix which it occupies," and so forth. He explained further that the "immense" craft "entered your three-dimensional universe" 100 light years from earth. Regrettably, "by a malfunction within the equipment, approximately 60 percent of the externalized surfaces of the city shifted in phase of spatial matrix ninety degrees, while the remaining approximately 40 percent failed to make the spatial matrix shift of precisely ninety degrees...," and of course that is never good, so kaboom! Hundreds of years later, fragments moving "74,000 approximate miles, by nautical, per hour in reaching the earth..." landed in and around San Antonio. There was much more -- that "One Who Serves," he was quite a story teller, too, wouldn't you say? But I digress.
Anyway, Stanford has been talking about this purportedly manufactured non-terrestrial "Space Material" (as he calls it) for over 50 years now -- but I think that we are still waiting for those lab results!
MAKE YOUR VOICES HEARD!
So, there you have it. Dear readers, do you agree that Ray Stanford has earned this Wild & Woolly Claims About Aliens & Alien Craft Lifetime Achievement Award? Please share your thoughts! If you think the awards jury has been unfair to Ray Stanford, or that there are other contenders out there whom are more deserving, you should state your position without flinching.
But I warn you in advance -- I have much, much more material to bring forth in support of Ray Stanford's qualifications for this award. When you've heard it all, I think you will come to agree: There is nobody else who even comes close.
-- Douglas Dean Johnson
@ddeanjohnson on Twitter
"This isn't a game; it's a dangerous undertaking. That's one reason we wear name-tags out there [at the Project Starlight rural site]-- should we be killed, people will at least be able to identify us." -- Ray Stanford, director of Project Starlight International, quoted in the February 1976 issue of Texas Monthly, "Planet X! We're Waiting for You!," by Stephen Harrigan
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