Dad's Stories: The UFO

SAMMY AND THE FLYING SAUCER!

When I was about fourteen-years old I worked part-time at Benson's Grocery Store in Meridian, Texas, delivering groceries. Customers would come into the store on a Saturday, shop for their groceries and then request they be delivered to their homes later in the day. Around 5pm, we would put the groceries in a an old WWII vintage Jeep and deliver them to the customer's homes. All of the part-time workers liked to get out of the store and make these deliveries. On this particular Saturday, it was my turn.

It was a beautiful Saturday afternoon around the middle of summer in 1952. Driving along in the little Jeep, my mind was on anything but work. One of my delivery stops was at a small ranch just outside of town. I can still locate the small ranch house on the Whitney highway about a mile past the railroad tracks, on the right. I don't recall who owned the place. It was a typical, small nondescript ranch with a few cows and goats.

I drove the Jeep to the front gate and stopped. I opened the gate and drove up the narrow gravel road leading up to the small ranch house. As I stopped the jeep to get out, I noticed a very loud and strange noise reverberating throughout the entire area. It was an odd sound and the only thing I could relate it to was a small one cycle engine that was used to augur grain into a silo. It was a very peculiar sound. Rat tat tat tat, Rat tat tat tat, or something similar. Only in this instance it was much louder and I could actually feel the percussion of the sound beating against my arms and face. For some mysterious reason I became very uneasy, maybe even afraid.

I got out of the jeep and looked all around. As my gaze swept to the cattle pens and an old windmill near the barn, I noticed that the animals weren't disturbed in the least. This puzzled me somewhat, but led me to believe that the sound was something they were accustomed to. While standing next to the Jeep, I sensed that the strange sound was emanating from a source overhead. I slowly looked up and immediately saw a strange object that was shaped like a fat cigar. It's color was a dull gray and it's outer covering was a type of metal that didn't reflect the sunlight.

To my knowledge no one in our area had seen nor reported spotting such a phantom craft. I immediately felt that I was in a threatening situation. My pulse began to race and I could feel the adrenaline flowing through my body. My entire being was conditioning itself for fight or flight. Nevertheless, I went about the task at hand. I went to the back of the Jeep and removed a basket of groceries and quickly walked through the back door and into the kitchen. I took the groceries out of the wire basket and placed them on the kitchen counter. Next I carefully stored the milk and eggs in the refrigerator.

I turned around and walked back outside with my face toward the ground. Once outside, I immediately felt the percussion of the loud sound still coming from above. Making myself look up into the sky was like lying in your bed in the dark and turning over to look out a window you’d heard a sound coming from. Forcing myself to look upward I carefully studied the strange object in the sky. There were no windows or openings of any kind that I could see. No sharp edges to define its outline. It moved slowly from side to side. It appeared to be four to five hundred feet up in the sky. I would estimate its size as roughly seventy-five feet from tip-to-tip and about thirty feet from front to back. The hair on my arms and nap of my neck stood up as I struggled to make some sense of what I was looking at.

Suddenly the loud noise stopped and along with the side-to-side motion. There was a silence you could almost feel. Then the object crept slowly forward and then suddenly zoomed out of sight. The odd thing about it was that it vanished in silence. There was no sonic boom are swooshing sound, as you might expect. To say that I was scared would be an understatement. Trembling I climbed back into the jeep and fumbled around to get the key in the ignition to start the Jeep's engine. Once the engine started I slammed the Jeep in gear, spinning the tires on the gravel road and turned it around and headed for the gate.

My first impulse was to get to town as quickly as possible and report the incident to the Sheriff's department. My foot pressed the gas pedal all the way to the floor. When I came to the railroad tracks I didn't slow up one bit. I felt the Jeep leave the road and crash back onto the asphalt with groceries flying all around inside the speeding vehicle. My sole intent at this point was to get back to people and normalcy.

It took me about ten-minutes to get back to town. By that time my nerves had settled down considerably and I had second thoughts about reporting the incident. I figured they would only think I was crazy or on something. I finished my deliveries and I returned to the store. I didn't mention the incident to anyone.

I seldom if ever have dwelled on this occurrence, or attempted to figure out what it could have been. At no time was I transported, nor did I see any of the ranch animals being transported. There were no little green men. No, it was not a helicopter or airplane, because it hovered overhead as it slowly rocked back and forth in the sky. Later I did wonder if the sound might have adversely effected me in some way. But I must say, that is not the case. At least not to my knowledge.
I have never seen anything like the object I saw that Saturday afternoon. After this one incident, I have never seen anything in the air that even remotely looked like a like UFO. I have looked at pictures and drawings of flying saucers and noticed that some do have the same shape as the object I saw.

One thing I know for certain, I really saw exactly what I've written here. Because of the ridicule people receive from the press and others after reporting a UFO, I can see where most people would be reticent to talk about their sightings. I'm convinced that some people who say they've see an alien spacecraft or U.F.O. are lying and promoting a hoax. However, there must be others like myself who have actually seen some type of mysterious object in the sky that is so unique it defies logic. I can truly sympathize with these people. I realize that their secret will probably die with them.

I understand someone doubting this story, but there is really no point in someone interrogating me about it, as I've told everything I know to the best of my recollection. One thing for sure, it is the truth. What I saw was real -- I can attest to that. In retrospect, I'm only glad I did not become physically effected by whatever or whoever it was. I don't want to ever experience something like that again.