Ray Stanford's Carnival of Incredible and Unsubstantiated UFO Claims!

[Justice Fodor]

Ladies and Gentlemen, by popular demand, a return tour for the Ray Stanford Close Up series!

Step right up! The mind-boggling UFO-evidence and alien-contact claims made by Ray Stanford will ASTONISH and AMAZE you-- their number, their diversity, their grandiosity, and their ability to remain suspended in the air for decades without any visible means of support!

Do not miss these selected highlights from the longest-running spectacle in ufology! Meet the 82-year-old man who was contacted by "Space Brothers" in the 1950s, and who has since personally taken (he says) "thousands" of frames of UFO movie and still footage-- images that, under extreme enlargement and other assists, provide positive proof of exotic technology to the discerning eye! Read the Ray Stanford Close Ups now, so you will be ready when Stanford's bulletproof proof is unveiled to the eager public-- and it's bound to happen soon!

Thrill to Stanford's claim, before 6 million Donahue viewers, to possess material "that doesn't seem to be duplicable right now on Earth or in nature"-- manufactured material that Stanford revealed elsewhere to be debris from a gigantic alien space city! Weep at the sad tale of the scientists at Goddard Space Flight Center who stole Stanford's metal scrapings from the alien egg-craft that Lonnie Zamora saw at Socorro, New Mexico, in 1964 (but, be uplifted by Stanford's generous offer to testify before Congress about the alien egg-craft that he knows was captured intact by the Air Force just six days later)!

Be stupified at Stanford's 2019 description of the photo he took of a three-foot-tall, bald, pointy-eared alien, sitting in a spacecraft-- a photo so clear "you can count the fingers on his hand!" Yes, ladies and gentlemen, just imagine counting those fingers on his little alien hand! (Disclaimer: You will have to imagine it, because the photo, taken in 1984, has never been published.)

Learn about Stanford's "Project Starlight International," and the secret story of the behind-the-scenes guidance that "hard science" project received from Aramda-- a member of the extraterrestrial "Watchers," with whom Stanford has been acquainted for "38,000 years." You will be thrilled to actually hear the voice of Aramda, speaking through the borrowed vocal cords of the in-trance Stanford, to the rapt attention of the assembled members of the Stanford-led "Association for the Understanding of Man."

Be flabbergasted at the U.S. Air Force's promise to scramble fighter planes against UFOs anytime Stanford picked up the phone!

Experience the thrill of hearing the very voice of Ray Stanford soliciting funds to build "the Hilaron Accelerator," "a device that in many respects is similar to a UFO," a 25-foot "great big polished copper medicine capsule," that would confer super powers on the person inside, including the power to travel physically back in time! Yes, a time machine, ladies and gentlemen!

Yes, open your minds to all of these marvels, and much, much more -- with verbatim quotes, dates, and best of all, uploaded documents and audio files that put you there!

Carnival Guide Hint: If you're short on time, or can only stand so much edge-of-your-seat excitement at one sitting, skip ahead to Ray Stanford Close Up No. 9, in which Stanford actually responds to some of the material in the earlier threads. It is a high-wire comic act that you won't want to miss!

Ladies and Gentlemen, without further ado, I give you -- Ray Stanford's Carnival of Incredible and Unsubstantiated UFO Claims!

1. Ray Stanford Close Up No. 1:
Ray Stanford and His Ever-Receding Claims of World-Shaking UFO Evidences

2. Ray Stanford Close-Up No. 2:
Ray Stanford and His Super-Power-Inducing Time Machine (AKA "The Hilaron Accelerator")

3. Ray Stanford Close-Up No. 3:
Ray Stanford's Instructions for Greeting the Occupants of the UFO That Would Land (1973)

4. Ray Stanford Close-Up No. 4:
Ray Stanford and his NASA-Goddard UFO-Metal Cover-Up Claim (1964)

5. Ray Stanford Close-Up No. 5:
Ray Stanford's Claim to Have a Piece of a Gigantic Intergalactic Spacecraft (Space Material)(1971)

6. Ray Stanford Close-Up No. 6:
Ray Stanford Close-Up #6 - Audio Excerpts of Stanford Speaking & Channeling Aramda of "The Watchers"

7. Ray Stanford Close-Up No. 7:
Ray Stanford Close-Up No.7: Claims the U.S. Air Force Offered to Scramble Jets at Stanford Requests

8. Ray Stanford Close-Up No. 8:
Ray Stanford Close-Up No. 8: Unearthly Crystal, Alien Pilot, Faraday Rings, and Magnetometer Data

9. Ray Stanford Close-Up No. 9: Stanford Swipes at His Critics; Plus Alien Fingers, "A Major Government Operation," and the Stanford-Goddard-NASA Connection
Ray Stanford Close-Up No. 9: Stanford Hits Critics + "A Major Government Operation" and NASA

10. Ray Stanford Close-Up No. 10: Ray Stanford and the photographed, captured alien egg-craft of 1964
Ray Stanford and His Ever-Receding Claims of World-Shaking UFO Evidences

11. Ray Stanford Close-Up No. 11: Was James Fox correct in saying that a "massive discovery"at the National Archives vindicated Ray Stanford about the symbol Lonnie Zamora saw on the Socorro UFO?
Is James Fox right about Ray Stanford being vindicated on Socorro symbol?

My email address is Justice_Fodor -- and it is a Protonmail.com address.

"There's a sucker born every minute." -- David Hannum, banker and hoaxer, 1869 (often mis-attributed to P.T. Barnum)

 

[nivek]

Thanks for joining the threads into a cohesive list, there's some great information here that I'm still looking through as well as very entertaining reading, what a character Ray Stanford is lol...

...

 

[The shadow]

I join Nivek in thanking you for your work into long running fraud!

 

[Rick Hunter]

It's been quite awhile since I delved into any of Stanford's stuff. I'm thinking that back in the AU days, many of us came to agree that some of the early stuff he actually did release was probably legit and he was trying to keep himself on the Ufology front page by talking about all the awesome stuff he was sitting on and wouldn't release due to people disrespecting him and so on.

 

[The shadow]

Planet X! We’re Waiting for You!

For your amusement.

 

[Standingstones]

Chris O’Brien, former co-host of the Paracast, is a long time friend and defender of Ray Stanford. O’Brien says he has seen plenty of photos that Stanford has in his possession. Unfortunately, no one else in this world can look at these photos. Supposedly Stanford is going to take all this “evidence” to his grave. The common person couldn’t appreciate all the evidence that Stanford has accumulated.

Quite a few UFO followers believe that Stanford has been conning people for decades. No one will ever see the “truth.”

 

[Justice Fodor]

Chris O’Brien, former co-host of the Paracast, is a long time friend and defender of Ray Stanford. O’Brien says he has seen plenty of photos that Stanford has in his possession.

Here is something pertinent, drawn from Ray Stanford Close Up No. 10:

Here is how the dynamite-shack photo was described by Stanford enthusiast Chris O'Brien on a UFO forum in August 2015: "I have also witnessed step-by-step the complete process that Ray undertook to clean up and further clarify the images. I was asked not to talk about it, but since he has mentioned them on Martin Willis' show [I believe this probably referred to the "Podcast UFO" of July 23, 2015], I suppose it's now OK to talk about them. The photo was take some months after the Socorro incident and in the foreground is the dynamite shack that was located near the landing site. Off in the distance, at the edge of the photo, just above the horizon, are four small dots that Ray had never noticed before. When they are blown up in size, two of the dots look exactly like the Socorro object -- one even has its landing legs extended. I have Ray's complete analysis process. It will remain unposted until Ray OKs their release."

[Following O'Brien's revelation, the UFO-attentive world waited with baited breath for release of the photo taken by Ray Stanford more than a half-century earlier, at the very site of the famed Zamora sighting, showing two objects that "look exactly like" what Zamora saw -- one even displaying the distinctive landing legs reported Zamora! Finally, after five more years, the great day of revelation arrived:]

On Sept. 15, 2020, during a YouTube live show hosted by Martin Willis, Ray Stanford phoned in (at 1:29) and repudiated all of those previous dynamite-shack-photo claims in about one minute. It turns out that (just as we thought) none of it was real -- what Stanford was "seeing," what Chris O'Brien described in such graphic detail, were just image artifacts-- ostensibly caused by dirt on the original negative, which Stanford had misplaced for years. Recently, Stanford said, he finally found the original negative, and there were no UFO images on it, just some kind of dirt (he refers to cleaning). "So, we can forget that," Stanford nonchalantly concluded.

But then immediately, in trademark Stanford fashion, Stanford provided a new egg-UFO story. It seems that while driving north of Phoenix in 1978, Stanford saw a craft "shaped exactly like the Socorro craft" (but pitch black) rise out of a ravine "within a few hundred feet" of his vehicle, generate some sort of glowing blue-white field, and fly away. Stanford was in a van full of cameras and other instruments, but unfortunately, the rear van door was locked and no photos were obtained.

And so it goes with Ray Stanford -- a claim to possess extraordinary UFO evidences is made public, becomes more elaborate in each telling over a period of years, receives endorsements from people invited to Stanford peep shows -- and then collapses, or is withdrawn, or is discredited, or just is allowed to fade away-- only to be replaced by a new extraordinary claim, or three.

 

[wwkirk]

On Sept. 15, 2020, during a YouTube live show hosted by Martin Willis, Ray Stanford phoned in (at 1:29) and repudiated all of those previous dynamite-shack-photo claims in about one minute. It turns out that (just as we thought) none of it was real -- what Stanford was "seeing," what Chris O'Brien described in such graphic detail, were just image artifacts-- ostensibly caused by dirt on the original negative, which Stanford had misplaced for years. Recently, Stanford said, he finally found the original negative, and there were no UFO images on it, just some kind of dirt (he refers to cleaning). "So, we can forget that," Stanford nonchalantly concluded.

But then immediately, in trademark Stanford fashion, Stanford provided a new egg-UFO story. It seems that while driving north of Phoenix in 1978, Stanford saw a craft "shaped exactly like the Socorro craft" (but pitch black) rise out of a ravine "within a few hundred feet" of his vehicle, generate some sort of glowing blue-white field, and fly away. Stanford was in a van full of cameras and other instruments, but unfortunately, the rear van door was locked and no photos were obtained.

What a shameless performance by Stanford! I used to have respect for him, but I see him now as just another, among many, UFO hucksters.

 

[The shadow]

Here is something pertinent, drawn from Ray Stanford Close Up No. 10:

Here is how the dynamite-shack photo was described by Stanford enthusiast Chris O'Brien on a UFO forum in August 2015: "I have also witnessed step-by-step the complete process that Ray undertook to clean up and further clarify the images. I was asked not to talk about it, but since he has mentioned them on Martin Willis' show [I believe this probably referred to the "Podcast UFO" of July 23, 2015], I suppose it's now OK to talk about them. The photo was take some months after the Socorro incident and in the foreground is the dynamite shack that was located near the landing site. Off in the distance, at the edge of the photo, just above the horizon, are four small dots that Ray had never noticed before. When they are blown up in size, two of the dots look exactly like the Socorro object -- one even has its landing legs extended. I have Ray's complete analysis process. It will remain unposted until Ray OKs their release."

[Following O'Brien's revelation, the UFO-attentive world waited with baited breath for release of the photo taken by Ray Stanford more than a half-century earlier, at the very site of the famed Zamora sighting, showing two objects that "look exactly like" what Zamora saw -- one even displaying the distinctive landing legs reported Zamora! Finally, after five more years, the great day of revelation arrived:]

On Sept. 15, 2020, during a YouTube live show hosted by Martin Willis, Ray Stanford phoned in (at 1:29) and repudiated all of those previous dynamite-shack-photo claims in about one minute. It turns out that (just as we thought) none of it was real -- what Stanford was "seeing," what Chris O'Brien described in such graphic detail, were just image artifacts-- ostensibly caused by dirt on the original negative, which Stanford had misplaced for years. Recently, Stanford said, he finally found the original negative, and there were no UFO images on it, just some kind of dirt (he refers to cleaning). "So, we can forget that," Stanford nonchalantly concluded.

But then immediately, in trademark Stanford fashion, Stanford provided a new egg-UFO story. It seems that while driving north of Phoenix in 1978, Stanford saw a craft "shaped exactly like the Socorro craft" (but pitch black) rise out of a ravine "within a few hundred feet" of his vehicle, generate some sort of glowing blue-white field, and fly away. Stanford was in a van full of cameras and other instruments, but unfortunately, the rear van door was locked and no photos were obtained.

And so it goes with Ray Stanford -- a claim to possess extraordinary UFO evidences is made public, becomes more elaborate in each telling over a period of years, receives endorsements from people invited to Stanford peep shows -- and then collapses, or is withdrawn, or is discredited, or just is allowed to fade away-- only to be replaced by a new extraordinary claim, or three.

During my time at at paracast I asked COB about the photos. He said he had seen the pictures. They showed several egg shaped craft one with landing gear extended . That Ray would release the photos when he felt the world was ready for the truth.
So COB is a liar. There are no photos.
There never was any..
I used to respect COB..not anymore...

 

[The shadow]

What a shameless performance by Stanford! I used to have respect for him, but I see him now as just another, among many, UFO hucksters.

Yeah..Ray is just one of many in the UFO hall of shame.

 

[Justice Fodor]

During my time at at paracast I asked COB [Chris O'Brien] about the photos. He said he had seen the pictures. They showed several egg shaped craft one with landing gear extended. That Ray would release the photos when he felt the world was ready for the truth.So COB is a liar. There are no photos. There never was any...I used to respect COB..not anymore...

That may be a bit harsh, with respect to Chris O'Brien. Stanford's usual approach on his UFO photos is to greatly enlarge objects (or possible objects) that take up small portions of a negative (and some of the negatives themselves are very small, as small as Super-8, which is less than a quarter-inch by a fifth-inch). He sometimes also plays with contrast, color, etc., "cleaning up" the image in their terminology. In the greatly enlarged grain structure, Stanford thinks he sees things -- plasma fields, plasma spikes, Faraday rings, and all sorts of other exotic things, including in one case a three-foot alien pilot with pointy ears. Then Stanford teaches other people to "see" those things too. Then those who have "seen" go out and talk about what they think they've seen on podcasts, in books, etc. -- all this without the elementary first step of having the original negative, or if not available the first-generation print, subjected to forensic laboratory examination by a technically competent analyst who is totally independent of Stanford and his stories. I mean laboratory examination of the actual original, and examinion to what extent (if any) it is consistent with "the story" and the later overlays of interpretation. Which Stanford would not allow anyway, because reality-testing (on UFO evidence) is not part of the Stanford game. Why spoil things by checking, when people like O'Brien, Christian Lambright, Erica Lukes, and others will shovel out your claims year after year just on your story-telling, and on manipulated derived images displayed at special Stanford-orchestrated peep shows?

So O'Brien was not "lying." I have no doubt he thought he saw the egg-craft, complete with landing gear just like that reported by Lonnie Zamora. Yet no such craft was ever really there on the negative-- it was entirely the product of Stanford's subjectivity, artifice, and inter-personal manipulation.

Those who who have invested in various of Stanford's stories and images, without insisting on even a basic level of independent objective validation, and who have accepted Stanford's versions of episodes in his past without checking his claims against contemporary documents and interviews, and witnesses, should regard the saga of the dynamite shack photo as a cautionary tale. Alas, some of these people have as yet clearly learned nothing.

 

[Double Nought Spy]

I'm sure Chris is no liar. He's been sucked in by a clever con artist. Chris makes much of Stanford's discovery of dinosaur tracks as an example of his genius-level powers of observation and interpretation. In that context, someone like Chris can be led to see what Stanford sees, though I would have expected better of Chris. Con artists are slick, though, and can sometimes fool people you never thought would fall for such crap. There is no telling how much of his own shtick Stanford might actually believe, so it's possible he's merely yet another delusional old fart.

Thanks, JF, for digging deeply into Stanford's past claims and his career as a guru so we don't have to. The more I learn about him, the more I hear his voice in those interviews, the more he sounds like a garden variety kook.

 

[Rick Hunter]

Chris's book on cattle mutilations was extremely good and I think he is an intelligent guy. He isnt infallible, and his association with Stanford really shows it. Chris needs to just quietly admit this was a fail and cut ties with Stanford.

 

[The shadow]

Chris made a mistake with his association. I now think that suggestions played a big part of it.
Chris is not a victim.. rather a stooge in a larger game.
We owe JF a debt for his work bringing the scam of an old man to light.

 

[Double Nought Spy]

Chris made a mistake with his association. I now think that suggestions played a big part of it.
Chris is not a victim.. rather a stooge in a larger game.
We owe JF a debt for his work bringing the scam of an old man to light.

Well you gave a pile of money to a deadbeat con artist. Maybe you should have looked at his past in some detail. Does that make you a stooge? Point is, we all get taken in one time or another. I paid both LMH and Strieber money for access to their "research" for a few years. I don't like to admit it, but it's true. Chris has done a huge amount of solid work over the last thirty years, let's not forget. Falling for Stanford's BS does not negate that any more than Vallee's latest book ruins the work he did fifty years ago.

 

[dr wu]

Never heard of him...found this and it sums it all up.............
Planet X! We’re Waiting for You!

 

[Dean]

found this and it sums it all up.............
Planet X! We’re Waiting for You!

Hey, I had not read that article (from Texas Monthly, February 1976) in quite a long time. Obviously, it was a feature piece, good-natured and sympathetic towards its subject matter. The talented feature writer, Stephen Harrigan, was not expected to probe very deeply into any of Stanford's claims-- the primary purpose was to entertain and amuse, with informational content secondary. Within those parameters, it was a decent piece.

Harrigan identified me correctly in the article: at the time (I was 25 years old)-- I was "an AUM staffer and an editor of the Project Starlight International journal." ["AUM" refers to the Association for the Understanding of Man, a nonprofit organization (now long defunct) of which Stanford was technically an employee, but in practice the trance-psychic-oracle and boss. Project Starlight International (PSI) was an endeavor under the AUM umbrella.]

To my mind -- 45 years older and I hope much wiser -- the article remains worthwhile in several respects, in addition to its entertainment value. For one thing, it captures a little taste of Ray Stanford's self-dramatizing pretentiousness, as in the quote, "This isn’t a game; it’s a dangerous undertaking. That’s one reason we wear name-tags out here--should we be killed, people will at least be able to identify us.” I think we young guys laughed about that quote for months--but not in Stanford's hearing, of course. I assure you that we never drew hazardous-duty pay for the evenings we spent on that hilltop site, scanning the skies (and we young guys were there much, much more than Stanford himself). I'm not sure anybody ever actually wore a name tag except Stanford, but I could be mistaken on that point. We actually wore the white jump suits because Stanford thought they made us look scientific. If memory serves, we wore the white jumpsuits mostly when reporters or other guests were on site-- they got dirty easily.

The article as it currently appears on the Internet no longer includes the photo layout that appeared in the magazine. Here is one of them. That's me in the right rear, wearing the binoculars.

 

[The shadow]

Well you gave a pile of money to a deadbeat con artist. Maybe you should have looked at his past in some detail. Does that make you a stooge? Point is, we all get taken in one time or another. I paid both LMH and Strieber money for access to their "research" for a few years. I don't like to admit it, but it's true. Chris has done a huge amount of solid work over the last thirty years, let's not forget. Falling for Stanford's BS does not negate that any more than Vallee's latest book ruins the work he did fifty years ago.

Your right. I was conned. Like so many others. As COB was conned. Not only by Ray but also the same gentleman that conned me. We have all made mistakes. I just hope to learn and grow from them.

 

[Rick Hunter]

Well you gave a pile of money to a deadbeat con artist. Maybe you should have looked at his past in some detail. Does that make you a stooge? Point is, we all get taken in one time or another. I paid both LMH and Strieber money for access to their "research" for a few years. I don't like to admit it, but it's true. Chris has done a huge amount of solid work over the last thirty years, let's not forget. Falling for Stanford's BS does not negate that any more than Vallee's latest book ruins the work he did fifty years ago.

Whitley Strieber is a tough nut to crack. I think he may fall into the same category as Phillip Corso. He may have witnessed some bona fide things, but adds to it a thick coat of exaggeration and his own conclusions.

 

[dr wu]

Hey, I had not read that article (from Texas Monthly, February 1976) in quite a long time. Obviously, it was a feature piece, good-natured and sympathetic towards its subject matter. The talented feature writer, Stephen Harrigan, was not expected to probe very deeply into any of Stanford's claims-- the primary purpose was to entertain and amuse, with informational content secondary. Within those parameters, it was a decent piece.

Harrigan identified me correctly in the article: at the time (I was 25 years old)-- I was "an AUM staffer and an editor of the Project Starlight International journal." ["AUM" refers to the Association for the Understanding of Man, a nonprofit organization (now long defunct) of which Stanford was technically an employee, but in practice the trance-psychic-oracle and boss. Project Starlight International (PSI) was an endeavor under the AUM umbrella.]

To my mind -- 45 years older and I hope much wiser -- the article remains worthwhile in several respects, in addition to its entertainment value. For one thing, it captures a little taste of Ray Stanford's self-dramatizing pretentiousness, as in the quote, "This isn’t a game; it’s a dangerous undertaking. That’s one reason we wear name-tags out here--should we be killed, people will at least be able to identify us.” I think we young guys laughed about that quote for months--but not in Stanford's hearing, of course. I assure you that we never drew hazardous-duty pay for the evenings we spent on that hilltop site, scanning the skies (and we young guys were there much, much more than Stanford himself). I'm not sure anybody ever actually wore a name tag except Stanford, but I could be mistaken on that point. We actually wore the white jump suits because Stanford thought they made us look scientific. If memory serves, we wore the white jumpsuits mostly when reporters or other guests were on site-- they got dirty easily.

The article as it currently appears on the Internet no longer includes the photo layout that appeared in the magazine. Here is one of them. That's me in the right rear, wearing the binoculars.

Hmmm...those look like pics from the photo shoot of Jethro Tull's album called 'A'.