Hello, and welcome to Open Mind UFO Radio. I am your host, Alejandro Rojas, and I am with Martin. What you're talking about willis? I have had people say that a lot of a lot they do. I haven't used it, and remarkably it was suggested by a listener that I use it. I've had someone leave a you know, derogative comments on YouTube's after I do shows, like what are you talking about? What you're talking about willis? And then you know, going to the reason they're saying that that's
so funny, that's really funny. So and and I was thinking, you know, maybe people don't even know what that is, because if you're a lot younger, you might not. That's right, So you better tell them what it is. This whole conversation means nothing. Yeah, So what you're talking about, willis was a catchphrase from a little person. I think that's the word you use for them, kind of like Peter Dinklin from Game of Throne. So it was Emmanuel Lewis. I think it's no Gary Coleman,
Gary Coleman, Gary Coleman, that's right. Wow, I met him, actually I hung out with him for a day. So anyway, Yeah, it was this what was it? Different? Strokes was a show? Huh? I think you got it? Mm hmm. So he would always say to his brother, and essentially it was these two black kids that from the city were adopted by this rich white guy who had one daughter, a teenage daughter, and so that was a story on how they get along and everything.
And so the youngest, who was actually an older man but just looked like a little kid because he had that you know thing where he was little, and so he would tell his brother, what you're talking about, willis? That's right? Yeah he was. That's funny. Yeah. I started hearing it, you know during the show times, you know, like where is that coming from? And then I had to watch it to see what everybody was talking about. Going back to the day, people were saying that
to me all the time. Yeah, back in the day when when sayings like where's the beef was big? And that's right. I can't remember the other was JJ Walker used to say, yeah, oh my yeah, he was funny. That was cool. Yeah, So here we are in the
present once again. Yeah, so let me talk about my guest. My guest is Lee Spiegel, and of course we've had him quite a bit, but I love him because he's my buddy, and I'm lucky enough that you know, I don't think he does a whole lot of shows, so and he's got a lot to share, and in particular, so later this week, in fact, in a couple of days, I'm going to be flying out to Wyoming to Devil's Tower where the whole the little that mountain kind of
thing made famous by the movie Close Encounters. And it's just an event to celebrate the fortieth anniversary of Close Encounters the movie, which was also released in theaters and four K also, as you know, for the anniversary of the movie. And Steven Spielberg had this little part at the beginning. But anyway, this event, he's gonna be a lot of fun. So I'll be there, I know. I think Jan Harzan, a guy from who's the
director of mufan, will be there. Travis Walton will be there. Yeah, my buddy, Mark D'Antonio, Debbie Zgomeyer and her brother Chuck Sukowski. They have a book called forty Second Parallel something like that. They didn't write it, but it was written about them and maybe worked into a movie. So yeah, so it's gonna be a lot of fun. I'm gonna be doing two talks, one of them about strange alien cases. That talk, by the way, I'm gonna modify it. I always change my talks before
I do them every time. So but you can see that talk on our video on demand for the UFO Congress. So go check that out. And the reason I say that is because there's a part on Spielberg on that because I'm going to do another talk on Spielberg the Ufologist, and I'm actually gonna take that part out and I'm gonna put all together all my Spielberg stuff because I have a lot over the years, I have some stuff, you know. I was I think the first one to get the full resolution pictures from
the Reagan Library of Steven Spielberg when he went to go see Et. They had a special showing of ET at the White House and there was this some of these pictures out A couple of them before, but they were really low resolution. I don't even know where they came from. But I was able to work with the Reagan Library to get full resolution pictures and I thought that was online. Yeah. So and I've shared him with everybody. I gave him to Grant, because Grant was big on that story. That's how I
learned about it originally, Grant Cameron. He does the presidential UFO's research. So Lee is important. And Lee is related to this because he was hanging out with Heinich and with Jay Allen Heinik and Jack Vallet during the time the movie was being made. And he has spoke and recently with Jacques Valet about the movie, and he spoke up to Heineck of course back then about the movie when it came out. So he's got an interesting perspective on all of
this. And so that's what we're going to be talking about because he has these direct relationships. Jay Allen Heinich was a advisor to the movie. He was also more than the reason why he was an advisor to the Air Force regarding UFOs. He is a well known astronomer. Back then, Jacques Vallet was his assistant who also went on to be a well known scientist and entrepreneur and venture capitalist and computer scientist, and he is the kind of the model.
He was the influence for the main character of the French guy on Coose Encounters, portrayed by famous director Trefu, which is his name. Do you remember? No, Lee and I talk about it, but I just wanted to say it again here because it's a lot of fun to say the word. Well that's important m hm. So while you're looking that up, I'll just say, how do you know I'm looking it up? I can just tell Francois trustful, Francis Franois, Wow, trithle truthful. Yeah. That
is fun to say, isn't it. All the listeners do it with me. Francois through a full This is like French class Francois. Yeah, truffle. Will americanize it now? If you amercoganize it, the spelling is truffle it, oh, truffle, of course. Francis Trufft France is my good buddy, Frank Truffitt. Yeah. Well that's I'm glad you have Leon. He is so much fun. I always enjoy talking to him and I always love listening to him. He's got that great radio voice too, he does.
Yeah, So we can catch up on what he's up to, because he's doing some cool stuff right now. He's working with James Fox. But we'll talk more about that the interview. But before that, let's talk about and I should mention, I guess to people because what I'm talking about here is the UFO Rendezvous. If you're not aware, it is and Hewlett, Wyoming, and I'll be and it's September fourteenth to the sixteenth, So you can still just show up there at the base of Devil's Tower there and we'll
have a crazy experience. All that'll be going through my head, I'm sure is the Close Encounters music Do Do Do Do Do Do Do Doo. We took my This is an interesting close Encounter story. I think a bit sad, but you know, I think this happens to the old people like myself. But I took my girlfriend's nod her who's practically my stepdaughter. I mean, we're and we're really close, we're good buddies. But I took her
to Close Encounters. We all went together, and I was so excited for her to see the movie because it's one of my favorite movies, probably the movie I've seen the most. And she didn't like it. Oh, it really hurt our relationship because now I don't like it and I'm never going to talk to her now. Yeah, she's to me. No. I understand her perspective though, because it is weird. Seventies movies were weird, I know about though. They just don't work today like they did, you know,
except for some classics. But I really I watch a movie that I loved years ago, and I'll watch it and go, huh, why did I like that so much? Yeah? I think it's just the way we have just gone through, you know, all the different changes and technolog and all that, and it just and then our levels of have gone up so high our expectations of what we're expecting to see. I can definitely see that.
Yeah, I could too. I mean, the special effects were good for the time, right, but if you see him now, you know, it's like, oh, what's up with that? So yeah, I could see it. And I was a bit sad, but I could totally see it. So now didn't Doug what's his name, Doug Trumbull who works market special effects. Right, Mark works with him like on a regular basis, and Doug Trump is one of my favorite interviews. There's that scene, Yes, he's amazing. There's that scene when the woman with her child is
in the road and the UFO comes flying up the road. That is really well done. It is, And you know what one of the points I like to make some so here are some insights into I talk. But one of the points I like to make I show the scene where this woman who is her son, got abducted and essentially the UFO comes down and the government meets them, and the people come out of the craft, including the sun,
and she's taking pictures of the aliens in the spacecraft. And it's funny to me because it really hit me once then when I was watching it and when I was really into this stuff, that if she sent me those pictures what you believe happened, one, would I believe it? And even if I did, would I even be able to prove anything? That's sad.
It's it's a double edged short, isn't it right, Because I've heard, you know, I've heard the statement said that you know, if the pictures are too good, then it's cgi or you know, no one's gonna believe it, yeah, you know, And then they also say, well, why is it blurry? You know all that, So it just goes to
show that pictures alone are not enough. You need a lot of support, being evidence to go with her, because even in this situation where you know, she really in the movie of course, you know, saw these aliens and had this experience, no one would probably believe her. That's right, that's right, it would be Yeah. I mean I remember talking to Bruce mcabee a couple of years ago and he said something along the lines with the photos like minor, it's the witness. You know, that's where you get
your information. Yeah, that's a good point. Yeah, yeah, because you know, he used to be the Mark d' antonio. He used to be the head photo guy for Moufan and I used to, when I was an investigator, send my stuff to him, and I would be frustrated because he'd be like, no, it could be this, and it could be that, and he's right, you know. That's where I learned from his perspective. I like, if I use the photo as a piece of data, I need to with this photo prove without a doubt that it is something
abnormal. And with most pictures, even if it is something abnormal but it's a light in the sky, you can't do that alone with the photo, and even if you couple it with witness testimony, then it's interesting. But anecdotal information by itself doesn't add up to much either. So even with if photo case, you don't have much unless you have some periphial stuff. But it's like police being involved or radar or on a military base or something like
that. That's right, And I don't know, you know, I mean if what you'd need to actually say this is definitely you know, where is that line crossed when all of a sudden you can say yes, everyone, we can all agree, this is definitely something that doesn't belong here on earth. You know. I wonder what you have to have to actually have science get behind it and say, wow, this is really from somewhere else.
Yeah. Yeah, how far do you have to go or touch or actually a sample like taking off of it while Atlanta, like take a hubcap off or something. Yeah, we don't even know yet. Yeah we don't know. Wow. Yeah, So the news, why don't we move into the news. That's what you're here for, your news guy. So what do you got for us? Well, all the news you can use when it comes to UFOs. Oh nice, I like it. That was an Alejandro Rojas imitation with me a little bit. Yeah, when I do my news
guy voice. Yeah cool, I tried, But anyway, so I'll go with this, say a UFO witness spots a large spherical object. Quote unquote Baron he in Portugal. Thank you for the sound effect. So this hiker in Portugal was taking some photos of an odd object recently. And this happened back in August twentieth of this year. So it was on a hike and these pictures are interesting. Here we go, we were just talking about pictures. There is when you zoom in, it does look a little bit blurry.
But he also says that I think he says it takes off. The object actually took off, you know, because when you first look at it, to me, it looked like possibly like the mylar balloon thing that we often gets mistaken for UFO. But what did you think about this? It was kind of irregular shaped. It looks like it has some fins going on and stuff. Yeah, he called it an irregular shape. And he said
it was essentially, you know, kind of making a steady path. And he at first thought it was a helicopter because he said it looked like a helicopter to him, or the size of a helicopter, which would be pretty large. And if you look at the picture, you know, it kind of substantiates that perspective, it looks pretty big in the photo, so I
thought that was kind of weird. So, yeah, looking at the photo, because he took some great pictures with it, must have been a good camera, and it looks pretty large, so you zoom in, and I assumed it would just be a milar balloon, but it wasn't. Obviously, it is an irregular shape. And he took two photos and it looks the same in both photos, and it almost looks like a U shape with a shiny center, but kind of irregular U shape with a shiny center. So
I couldn't figure out what it was. In the story, I suggest that perhaps my only guess would be possibly a partially deflated my alarm balloon. That's all kind of scrumpled up and crunched up, and maybe part of it is reflecting the sun that's floating through the sky, and a lot of people, a lot of the skeptics out there have jumped on that and said, yep, that's what it is. But I wouldn't something like that float though if it was deflated, you know how. I mean, it would have to
be deflated quite a bit to be in that kind of weird shape. That's a really good point, because that's that's what I wonder, because that's exactly what I wonder is to look like it does, it would have to be very deflated, and in that case would it flow. I think one of the reasons they use my alar for balloons is that it's very light, and
I think alone it can float in the wind. But this seems to be aloft somewhat, so maybe it it's really hard to say, so maybe it was way way up there and then it deflated and it's coming down or something. I don't know, so it could possibly be mostly deflated balloon, but it is kind of an odd one. I think this one's harder to peg than they normally are, right, I agree with you, Hm. Interesting? Interesting. So the other story did you see that? Other one?
I wrote on Friday? This was Chris Rukowski. Have you had him on your show? I have, yes, Yeah, he's great so Canadian UFL researcher. He's also a science writer, that's what he is by profession. But he's an author. He's written several books, including one recently called When They Appeared The Falcon Lake nineteen sixty seven UFO story. And some of you who are into UFO history. Know this story where there's this guy in Canada
who saw this UFO and he got close to it. Well, it started to take off or something, and they had these events on the side, and these events burnt his chest. So Chris, who is very skeptical by nature, wrote this book with this man's son. So this guy's name was Stepan Michalik, and the guy's son is named Stan and Stan co wrote this book with Chris. So they covered this this case in depth. The reason
that's important is that Chris teaches English. He does these continuing education courses and they asked him, hey, you know, what are their ideas do you think would be interesting for a course? And he said, well, I wrote this book and about this local kind of a UFO thing, and they said that'd be cool do a UFO course. So he's doing this UFO course continuing education course through the Saint James School Division, essentially Saint James asiny Boia.
I'm not sure the second world, but so it's really cool. So he gave me some quotes just talking about what they're going to be, what his perspective is on all of this. And and even though he's he's a skeptic for the most part. He you know, kind of like I. He really feels there's a genuine mystery to the whole UFO phenomena. And I like you and I and and so he's doing this class. So that's kind of cool. That is, you know, going back to this this Canadian
incident. Did they did they consider that? I can't remember what did they consider that? Like radiation burns or was it heat burns? It was heat, wasn't I don't know. It turned into rashes and I think it was heat, but I don't remember that particular detail. Yeah, it's very geometric. There was like a you know, a grid of dots. At first started out like yeah when he went into the hospital. Yeah, we've got a picture of this grid of dots on his chest that you can see.
Yeah, but you know what, you can find out more in the brand new look. When they appeared by Chris Christousi Rostowski ru. I always have a hard time with his last name, Yeah, because it's got that you would think it would be Rakowski. But it's got this tea kind of this. They put a tea in the middle of it. Yeah, nomadic wondering tea. That somehow inserted itself into part of his name. So it's like Rootkowski right, yeah, yep, So this is another good one. Can
I talk about another one? Oh yeah, I can't remember if we talked about this on your show or my show, but essentially it was there's this newdest beach like in in Wales or something like that where people have been seeing UFOs and so that of course made some story in the story, some headlines in the UK tabloids. But and the place is called something Marion Marionid.
It's got kind of a Welsh name and if you know much about Welsh, they have these long, strange kind of groupings of letters and characters that are hard to pronounce. In fact, I've got I think they've got one of the longest city names of any city names or something like that. But move On has decided UFO need a speech were there, and so they actually have
this sign and it's posted in this new article at the Cambrian News. They have this sign posted outside of the beach that has a big move On symbol and it says essentially, hey, if you see UFO, be sure to let us know. Because of these stories of these these UFOs being seen at the beach, So it's kind of funny. Is it really an investigation or do you think it was maybe someone just wanted an excuse to go to visit the beach and put up these flyers that maybe that's the mystery. That's a
true mystery behind this story. So that's kind of fun. That's kind of a funny one. Yeah, So is there any do we have anything else? There's I noticed you have your daily headlines as always. Yeah, a few headlines. There were some green flashes that were seen during the Mexico earthquake that people both that were mysterious and Forbes roa destory on what that was.
Otherwise, Yeah, some other UFO stories, some UFO pictures. So people can go to the daily UFO headline to just go to Open Minds at TV and C in the front page, they'll see the different UFO headlines there. So okay, I also have a kind of a funny story to tell you, you know, Okay, the recent CME, the coronal mass objection that we had, Oh yes, yeah, yeah. In the Russian news, they were saying that UFOs were coming down to Earth and zapping up and storing
the energy out of it that was on the news on Russian news. Yes, huh, isn't that bizarre? That is very very very bizarre. That's interesting. Yeah, this show be listened to by the NSA. Now with those key words we've been talking about. Thanks Martin, I know, sorry, that is it for the day, So thank you very much for joining
us. Martin a pleasure. People can hear more, not just hear him weekly on our show, but they can also hear you on podcast UFO your show and in fact, because I'm gonna be doing this wyoming day, I'm gonna sure I'm gonna have a show next week, so they'll be able to listen to both of us on yours. But other than that, thank you. And right after this break, we'll talk to Lispiegel. I am very happy to welcome back to the show, mister doctor Lee Spiegel. When did
I get my degree? My number one customer pizza delivery customer, Well, thank you. It's always a pleasure to be here with you. Those are our inside jokes because for some reason, whenever Lee calls me, he tries to order pizza and then we call each other doctor. Now, I remember the reason I did because there was a UK paper I think it was a tabloid that called me doctor Alejandro Rojas when it quoted me. But didn't you have something similar like that happen. That's what we call you doctor as well.
Well. I don't know if it was because of me, but but I frequently like to call and say hello to our mutual friend nuclear physicist Stan Friedman. And every time I call, like I did a couple of nights ago, and every time he answers the phone, and the way he answers the phone is he doesn't just pick it up and say this is Stan Friedman. No, he just picks up the phone and goes hello. And so I always say I'm sorry, is this doctor Friedman? And then he goes,
no, I'm not a doctor. We always do that, Yeah, because he gets mistaken to be a doctor because he is a scientister, has been often, but he's very quick to point out he has a master's degree, but he's not not a PhD. Yeah, I don't remember. I think I think you were the person who first started calling me a doctor,
and I always liked it. It just fits right. It sounds great, doctor Lee Spiegel, doctor Spiegel. So we are actually here to talk UFOs and in particular we're going to talk about Close Encounters and Spielberg and some of that because of this great event that I and unfortunately you won't be there, but it's this weekend. It's September fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth in Hewlett, Wyoming, which is right under the shadow of Devil's Tower, which of
course was made famous. Well it was already pretty famous as a national park, I guess, but I made even more famous by the Close Encounters movie. Have you ever been there? No, I never have. I love the look of it. I think it was genius on whoever the set designer was who came up with that location to play out the final the final scenes
of the movie Close Encounters. It's just a perfect thing and it certainly lends itself to oh, I don't know, mashed potatoes, as the character in the movie, Roy Neary created at the supper table a mashed potato version of Devil's Tower. Now in the movie, you know, yeah, the main character gets obsessed with the heel and after he has this UFO encounter. But one of the things that you know, it's probably the movie I've watched the most, and I did watch it re released in four K on the big
screen recently, and that was super awesome. But I almost feel like the main character. I feel compelled and for some reason I cannot get away from the UFO topic is as hard as I may try at times, as frustrating as it may be. I mean, and I think you feel the same. Is that true? You know? I don't think I've ever said this
before publicly, but I will say this now. As much as I loved the movie, loved it when I saw it the first time and then several times after, there's a part of the movie that has always bothered me, really deeply bothered me, and I still can't get around this. I guess it worked for the movie for the main character, played by Richard Dreyfus, but she's in this movie. The main character basically walks out on his wife and kids, and that always bothered me big time. And I've never been
married, I don't have a wife, I don't have kids. But still there was something I don't oh, something about that part of the movie that seemed almost taboo to me, unless, of course, and you may know this better than me, have there been instances where people have become so obsessed with UFOs and the possibility that were not alone, that they would take drastic steps like this and just walk away from their families. What do you think.
I don't know about that, but it is very like if that's happened, or if there's people who would do it. But there is a parallel that I'll draw in a second. But first I want to talk about Spilberg because it's very funny you say this, because Spilberg feels the same way. He said that. He was even threatening and the public said, don't do it, to change the movie, to re release it like he did with Et, and to change the end to where he doesn't go on the ship.
And he said, because when I wrote that and made the film, I was single, and now that I'm a father and I'm married, there's no way I would ever walk out on my wife and kids. So I didn't want the character to do that. So he was saying he was going to change the movie and change the end. The public said, heck, no, you better not change it. We like it the way it is, so we ended up not changing it. But he did have that same
feeling. But I was going to say, the parallel is, although kind of getting back to how I feel compelled to be involved in this field, and I know you do as well. There are certainly people like ourselves who are so obsessed with our interests that we do jeopardize our relationships by getting involved with this stuff. I know that our mutual friend Ben Hansen, I know he gets in trouble for the long conversations that you and he have about UFOs, and I get in trouble as well. So I mean that seems to
be a thing. Uh. You know, I've discovered as the years have passed that I'm a little more I'm a little more guarded about giving out my own personal opinion on things like UFOs, anything dealing with the paranormal subjects that you and I have both have both dealt with over the years. You have to be kind of careful because you don't want to You don't want to put people off if if they if they tend not to believe in something, and
that it could possibly disrupt their belief system on some level. Uh. And yet you want to give them information as well to help them come to a place where they can make up their own minds. My my attitude has always been with all the things that I've done and the stories that I've written, I've always just tried to present stories and cases and people's experiences and basically say to the audience, look, here's a lot of facts. There's a lot
of information. I'm not telling you that I necessarily believe this, but I want to give you enough stuff that you can go out on your own and search for any kind of answer that will work for you, that will help you in your life. And that just seems to be the better way for me to do it, because I have many people say to me, well, what do you think of this? And you know, are we being are we being visited? And why why don't they land on the White House
lawn? And no, they can't possibly be here because because they can't get here from another planet or another solar system. I hate these kinds of questions. Well, I mean I really do. But what really motivates you and this to keep even with you know, like you said, those people, the way they act and the way they react to comments, to motivate you to keep you know, working in you know, on UFOs, it's not like it, you know, it's something that makes a lot of money or
it gets a lot of fame or is necessarily helpful to your career. So what is it that motivates you from from the very beginning, which for me in my adult life, this all started in nineteen seventy three for me when when I was born. That's a year. Oh boy, we're really dating
ourselves out. Well, well, then the year you were born, Alejandro, was the year of one of the big UFO flaps that they called in the United States, And for some reason, it was on the news, because that's how I heard about it, and it caught my attention, And I mean from two fishermen in Pascagoula, Mississippi, who claimed that they were fishing and taken on board some kind of a craft by beings all the way to Ohio where a four man helicopter crew encountered a UFO that they almost collided
with. To cases like that, going from the ridiculous and crazy to the totally credible that somehow just caught my attention and I just wanted to know more about this, and so I started literally, I started reading some books, because there have always been books. The literature on UFOs has has never died,
whether whether there's books or magazines or newsletters. The thing is, you know, if you're just starting off in this business, you've got to be really careful because you don't know what to believe or who to believe there.
And I remember, back when I started reading about this stuff, I knew that there were people that were considered Charlatan's and hooksters and snake oil salesmen, uh, just to get people to buy their books and buy their t shirts and you know, come to their weekend retreats and pay money and watch those strange lights in the sky. Uh. So there's always been that there still
is. But because of the choices that I made of the things that I thought I would like to do or see, and because I was fortunate enough to meet a variety of individuals who could help me take those steps to be credible, I've been really fortunate that I believe that I have. I'm not going to say I know the truth about UFO is because I don't really think anybody does. I've come to believe that, But I've learned so much from
so many people who I consider really credible that that keeps motivating me. There's something definitely out there, and I may not know the answers in my lifetime, but there's enough of it out there that why should I give it up?
It's totally fascinating. So getting back to the movie, So the movie for people who don't know, and then we'll get it because you're kind of getting into, you know, some of these relations that you have, and they're related to the movie and related to some really important stuff regarding this field. But just spoilers. You know, if you haven't seen the movie, if you're you're old like Lee and I, you know, you've probably seen it many times. If you're really young, at least relatively, you might
not have seen it at all. So you've got to go see it. But so this guy has a sighting, A bunch of people have a sighting. There's a flap, kind of a UFO flap. The government makes fun of it, but some people, including the main character, is compelled to find out more. And for some reason, he's got this image of the mountain in his brain and like you said, he starts to make it out of mashed potatoes, and then a bunch of crazy stuff happens that's so crazy
his family leaves him. Meanwhile, a little kid's abducted, which is a great part to it. The government meanwhile, even though they're saying there's nothing
to it, are actually doing a lot of stuff in the background. This French guy modeled after Jacques Vallet is in charge of, you know, trying to figure out what's going on, and they kind of figure out that the the aliens want to meet them by Devil's Tower, so they pretend like there's this this catastrophe of of like anthrax that was released or something, so people
all have to leave. The big UFO comes down and the Richard Dreyfe's character and the mother of the kid who is abducted are able to sneak in and observe all of this. A lot of people come back once the craft lands, including the child, and Richard Dreyfus decides with others to go off onto
the spaceship and with essentially is the gist of the story. But you know, one of the consultants is Jay Allen Heinek for the for that he was listed as the advisor, who of course was the Air Force the consultant. He was a well known person and he was a scientist, So maybe you could talk more about jail and Heineck and you knew him and When did you meet him? I met him in nineteen seventy five when I started working on a UFO documentary and audio documentary vinyl recording for CBS, and I had put
a list of people who I had read about and heard about. I mean, even when I was a kid, whenever there was any kind of UFO news on TV, you know, back in the days when we only had a black and white TV at home, if there was anything about strange things in the sky, the Air Force would always bring in this guy, doctor Heinik, with the beard and his pipe, and he would always explain it away as either swamp gas or misidentification of the planet Venus or weather inversions.
And I remember thinking, oh, I don't know what those words mean, weather in versions, but the guy sounds like he's authority, so maybe I should believe him. And I never could have imagined Alejandro that years later I would have the kind of relationship with him where he was like to me,
he became a grand the grandfather that I never knew. I never knew either of my grandparents, but Alan Heinek kind of took me under his wing like that, and it was amazing to get to know this man because you could tell that he was happy to have left the Air Force after twenty two years of going around the country and explaining UFOs and debunking things. And he had no problem saying, hey, the Air Force doesn't know how to do science.
They're explaining things away that they shouldn't be explaining too many cases that had just left as unknowns, and then just trying to just brush it all under the carpet. And he hated that, hated that totally until you finally walked
away from the Air Force and said I'm out of here. But after twenty two years and so he was one of the first people that I interviewed for my record album because I wanted to get his take on the things that he had learned, the things that he was told to do, his current opinion on what UFOs or what some UFOs might turn out to be or might point us in a different direction for science. It was amazing to get to know
him. And when I told him that I was considering trying to bring the subject and do a presentation about it at the United Nations, he jumped all over that. He sent me this letter that I still have and he said, please, I want to be there at the un with you. I want to talk to the nations of the world, just to let them know what I think about all this. It was amazing to me to know him. And you know, I'll watch Close Encounters almost as many times as you
have, just to see him at the end of the movie. Yeah, so he is in the end. Of course, I'm gonna be talking about
Spielberg and I'll be showing that clip this weekend at the event. But if people go see the movie that's out right now for the anniversary, it's towards the end and right when you know, the spaceship land and there's these pilots coming out who are missing from like World War Two, and then you see this scientist coming from the back and a blue jacket and he kind of pushes himself through the crowd and then puts his pipe in his mouth and strokes his
beard there and that that's him did and that was common right, He had pretty much the same facial hair and that pipe and everything. Right. Yeah, it was amazing And I can still remember what it was like listening on the news to how when in nineteen I believe it was nineteen sixty six when he was sent by the Air Force to Michigan to explain some of the UFOs there, and he said that it might have been caused by swamp gas.
And almost immediately after that, Michigan Congressman Gerald R. Ford came out with these statements saying, no, no, I don't agree with Olkaheinech that you know, you can't come to my state and start calling people liars, and so I'm going to demand a congressional investigation. And he got it. It was such an interesting time of watching the power play between these people, and then you know, then people will se well after after Gerald Ford became president,
why did he suddenly shut up about UFOs? Ah? Gee, there's an interesting possibility. Why did he what happened in Congress? Explain that? Because I don't think people A lot of people know about that. They they tried to get as many eyewitnesses as possible for my album. I interviewed the man who was the chair of the Congressional Committee, Congressman J. Edward Rausch, and he said, basically, people want to know about UFOs when you when you when you tell someone you know, I don't know what it is,
and I want to know what it is. You owe it to your constituents to do whatever you can to come up with an answer. And I don't I don't remember how long the congressional hearings lasted, but but basically, as was with the case of Project Blue Book itself, the Air Force investigation, uh the I believe the congressional hearings ended with basically some people saying, no, we don't think there's anything to it that could merit any further scientific
research on it. And then it quickly went away, just like that, sort of like the result of the un initiative that you were a part of. Yeah, it's like you know, when you're up against the big boys, and in my case it was the big boys were the United States of America, my own country, and the then Soviet Union. They basically they didn't want Well there's one more big boy though, because America, we learned,
didn't care too much. But there was one group in particular, and we have a mutual friend who eventually worked for this group who you found out, and they even had your name, worked very hard to shut down your whole initiative, right the well, well I give you a United Kingdom. Well, well, you know the funny thing about that was at the time, in nineteen seventy eight, when I was working behind the scenes to gather information, documents, pictures, eyewitnesses, speakers to bring them to the UN
to do a real presentation. I didn't know at the time that the UK was trying to get my presentation shut down before it even ever happened. It took thirty years before I found out about this. And at the time I was working as a writer for the Huffington Post. And as you know, periodically the UK was releasing previously classified documents from their own archives from the Ministry of Defense, and they used to release these in batches. I mean, I wrote about it, You wrote about it. You know, all of
us who are interested, we're getting these documents released. And I remember one of the people, a mutual friend of yours of mine, Nick Pope, used to run the UK's UFO office for three years in the nineteen nineties. So all UFO reports that kind of came to the Ministry of Defense apparently went through Nick's hands and he had to read them and decide, and he was under he was under orders to do whatever he could to put down these stories, to ridicule them, to make them go away. Let's not get the
public interested in the stuff. And so I'm going to stop you right there, and this will be a good cliffhanger because we have to go to break. So of course we do air this on KGRA and we take some commercial breaks. So for those of you listening the k g r A, you know, listen to the commercials. Go patronize those people because it helps keep k g r A on the air. And for you podcasters, you'll just
hear a slight musical break and we'll be right back with Lispiegel. All right, we are back and you were listening to Open Mind UFO Radio, and my guest is journalist Lee doctor Lee Spiegel. Sorry, I must forgot to call you doctor some some people. Yeah, people are going to get the wrong impression and then everybody's going to be calling you doctor Lee Spiegel. Will be my fault. But you weren't just talking about our friend Nick Pope and
how him and his buddies were trying to thwart your efforts. Well well, and I'll come back to that point because he later and later he has apologized to me about this, But I I was working on uh we had the UK had just released some new documents to the public, and so I started looking at them and I realized that there were documents from the late nineteen seventies.
Now, my United Nations presentation was in nineteen seventy eight, and I started looking at these documents, and one by one by one, I'm reading these things that had just been released by Great Britain, and it seemed very clear that in nineteen seventy seven and seventy eight there was a strong attempt by the UK to stop my UFO event at the UN in New York in nineteen
seventy eight. I mean, there were actual documents and quotes, and the documents said things like, we don't think that it would be a good idea for the United Nations to take on the subject of UFOs, because it wouldn't be good for the UN's reputation to be dealing with something like this. And I went, wait a minute, what So I took some of these documents to my editor at Huffington Post and I said, look, look at these
documents. They're talking about thirty years ago trying to stop my presentation at the United Nations. Now this story has become personal to me. Can I write this story in the first person and not in the third person. And my editor said, yeah, go do it, and so I just completely reorganized my thoughts and turned it into into like my story countering the UN story. And I found all these quotes, and I thought to myself, I should
call Nick Pope and I should ask him what he knows about this. And I called Nick and as soon as he got on the phone with me, he said, oh, I know why you're calling me. I said, oh, you do, do you? He said, Look, let me just tell you that when you did your United Nations presentation in nineteen seventy eight, I was only thirteen years old, so you can't blame me. And
he will always confirm that story. He said, Look, for what it's worth, I will now offer you a sincere, unofficial apology on behalf of my country for what we did to you or what we tried to do to you in nineteen seventy eight. I mean, what a story. I couldn't believe it that it took thirty years so this to come to my attention. And what did they mean that it wouldn't be good for the UN's reputation. What's the problem, everybody? Why would it be good. Those files were
interesting, the efforts that they were going to squash the whole thing. But yeah, you know, during that period of time. Of course, I think Close Encounters came out in seventy seven, and because of this, you actually got to meet Spielberg. So maybe I think you've told this story on the podcast before. For a lot of this Lee has gone at length about the whole un thing with I on the podcast. But let's revisit that because
I want to follow up with some newer information about this. But you all you got invited to because of the un event right to go visit Spielberg with some of the Close Encounters people. Essentially, well, while Spielberg was working on the movie, I guess it was probably near the end of production and they were getting ready to release the movie in nineteen seventy seven. It was
the big holiday movie for that year. I had already started talking to doctor Jay Allen Heinek about my idea to do something at the United Nations, and he was very excited about that. So apparently behind the scenes, a little even behind my back. But I didn't mind that because Heinick had a relationship
with Spielberg because of the connection with the movie. Apparently, Heinick told Spielberg that he Heinick was going to be part of this United Nations event coming up in nineteen seventy eight, and I guess he must have told Spielberg or someone in the Columbia Pictures publicity department, and literally I was at home in New York and I got a call from Columbia Pictures asking if I would be available to come out to California and to meet with Steven Spielberg, doctor Heinik and
doctor Vala, and I said, yeah, I think so, but what are we meaning about? And they said, well, we understand you're getting ready to do a United Nations presentation on UFOs and Steven would like to sit with you guys and see if the's anything that he or the studio can do to support that or to help you with that. And I said, yeah, I'm going to be there. In fact, by the end of the conversation, my bags will be packed. I'm ready to come to California.
And that's exactly what happened. And that was the first time that I actually met Jacques Vallet because he came in. He came in to the Los Angeles and he was already living in the San Francisco area. Alan Heinek was flown in from Illinois, and I came in from New York, and we all three of us, were brought to the studio, brought it to Steven's office, and there we were sitting around talking about UFOs and I just wanted to
beg somebody there to pinch me because it didn't seem real to me. But I didn't want to come off as being totally nerdy like that, so I kept it to myself. He was probably a kid back then, right you too, though? Yeah? Well that you know that was That was nineteen early seventy eight, So I was. I was just under thirty years old, and Steven and I are about the same age. Uh and and and literally he was most well known for I believe three things. At that point,
A made a TV movie with Dennis Dennis Oh what's his name? He used to be on dunsw No, No Dennis. He played the deputy. He played McLeod, the Dennis before os. Okay, anyway, he he played a regular driver who was followed by this menacing duel a duel exactly. Yeah, Dennis Weaver was his name. Yeah, and so I think that was one of the first things that Stephen did, in addition to a night Gallery episode that Stephen did, and then came Jaws and then came Close Encounters.
So his name was was coming certainly up the ranks of Hollywood, and
so I certainly knew who he was. I was already a fan of his, and so it was it was great to talk to him for the period of time that we were there, and he eventually had the studio provide me with any kinds of visual materials that I needed, whether it was pictures or posters or diagrams or drawings that we could use at the United Nations that he had used in production for the movie, and they sent us stuff that I didn't use at the United Nations. And you have like a unique posters.
How you got that this poster that you have, I do was it was during that time, it was still when the movie was about to be released that I was. I became friendly with one of the people at Columbia Studios in New York, and they asked me if I wanted a couple of posters that they had printed up that originally were going to be used as a publicity for the movie, and it basically was like a dark night, a lonely road, and traveling above the road was this was like one of the UFOs
from the movie. And the only words above the UFO in the sky were the words we are not alone. And I guess for some reason the studio thought that wasn't catchy enough, and so they made a similar poster, but they added more texts to it, like we are not alone. A close encounter of the first kind is blah blah blah, close encounter of the second kind, blah blah blah, close encounter of the third kind. So they
filled the poster up with more texts and more words. And I took a few of the posters just because they offered them to me, and I've got one hanging in my bedroom now at home. I'm very proud of it. It's not going to be offered on eBay anytime soon. I like your version actually better. It's cool because it's simple, and yeah, I think you would agree the saying we are not alone is powerful. Yeah, and we are not alone in the UFO the road and at the very bottom simply close
encounters of the third kind. And you believe that, right, and I think you believe we are not alone. Oh, of course, yeah, I have no problem with that. I mean I really don't. There really is. I believe too much evidence. And the hard core skeptics and the debunkers will say, no, there's no evidence. It's all anecdotal, it's all hearsaying, it's all people making stuff up. But you know what it's not. It's much more than that. When you talk to people who have
had encounters with something that is totally extraordinary. And I'm not talking about something that landed in the one's backyard and picked up a few soil samples and went back up into the air where that might have happened. I was much more compelled in nineteen seventy three at your birth Alejandro, first of all, and in October of seventy three the story of the Army helicopter that almost collided with
the UFO. It grabbed me by the throat so hard that and it was such an amazing close encounter that and witnesses on the ground saw it happened as well. When the helicopter landed, the Army let the crew go ahead and tell their story. And I first saw the commander of the helicopter. Larry con on the Old Dick Cabot Show, and he told this story, and I went, wait a minute, really, this can't be true. But it was, and it was just something that the army couldn't they couldn't explain
away. I don't know how debunkers could have thought that it was the crescent Moon or the planet Venus. This thing that came at the helicopter like a like a missile locked onto the aircraft. Uh. And then it stopped. Instead of hitting the helicopter, it hovered directly above the copter and they could and it shone a green light. Inside the cockpit of the helicopter. All four crew members saw this thing, and because of the reflection of the light,
they could all see that it was a cigar shape. It had no no forward wings, no back wings, no tail, just a dark cigar shaped And as they sat there, all of a sudden, the helicopter started rising up very quickly, as if a tractor beam had locked onto it by the cigar shaped thing that was above them. It lifted up their helicopter several thousand feet in the air in a matter of seconds. Then there was a bump and a jolt and they were released and the UFO took off, and
that's when the helicopter went and landed. And I wanted the captain of the helicopter, Larry Coin, on the UFO documentary record that I produced in nineteen seventy five, but I also wanted him as one of my speakers at the United Nations in nineteen seventy eight. And I asked him if he would come to the UN and tell his story, and he said, I'd love to, but you're going to have to get permission from my commanding officer back in
Ohio. And I said, okay, give me the guy's number, and I called Captain Coin's commanding officer, explained who I was and how I wanted Captain Coin to come to the United Nations, And to my huge surprise, the officer said to me, okay, we will allow Captain Coin to join you and to speak at the United Nations, but on one condition, and I said, name it. He cannot appear there in uniform. He must
wear civilian clothes. He can appear as a civilian. And I said, so you're saying if I buy him a suit, he's okay to come to the UN. Said yep, that's all we ask, and that's exactly what happened. So it was amazing to me. And so stuff like that is seeing being there listening to his testimony again, watching how you could literally hear a pin drop at the un when he was giving his testimony. That says to me, excuse me, but we're not alone. I don't care where
these things come from. I don't care who's piloting them. I don't care. All I know is that there's something extraordinary going on here, and I'd like to know more about it. Now. I whant to change the topic. I'd touch on something else before we're done here, and that is I have been told by Don Schmidt, who worked with Heinik. You know early on what Heinek's reaction was to the Close Encounter movie. Did he ever share his opinions with you? He he never really liked how some of the things
were portrayed. I think because of all the years that Allen spent actually getting down and deep in the soil and going to places like Socorro, New Mexico, and really investigating places where you have may have landed and left traces behind, and how people describe certain things that happened. I think that he felt that that Spielberg may have taken more liberties with the movie than he would have
enjoyed. I believe I believe that Jacques Bevrolet feels the same way. There's a you know, there's a definite feeling about how you give the public what Hollywood wants you to give them, or you give the public what you think the public wants to see. I've always thought, and I've always said this, that you don't have to over embellish things about UFOs. The subject itself is already sensational, so you don't have to create scenarios within a movie to
make it. See is a movie, so it's got to be dramatizic. It's hard to you can't go over every case. So I think they're in trying to encapsulate, Yeah, the whole idea and kind of some of the things people report, which I think they did good, although I can see their points. And you did touch on this a bit, but yeah, you said that Valet had actually recently what is recent, like is last week or something you had talked about this and he shared the same He was a
bit disappointed as well. Uh, I think that they that they both Valet and Heinik felt that you don't have to over embelloce something. Just just keep it the way it is, keep it truthful. If anything, make a documentary, but it's Hollywood, and Hollywood wants to make a lot of money. I get that. I'm okay with that. But I mean, listen, I love the movie as much as you did. You know, there's so much about it. I love the characters, I love the special effects.
You and I have have come become very friendly with the king of the special effects of that movie, Douglas Trumbull. I mean, what do you got about Doug Trumbull too, is that he's a big ufo guy, and of course he did the special effects for Close Encounters. But I interviewed him. He said he didn't even know that Heinich was a consultant. He didn't know he could have spoken to Heinich. He came up with all the stuff by himself, with no input from Heineck at all. And he regrets it
because he loved he would have loved to have talked with him. So funny thing. But I guess you know, and I think you and I would agree. I mean, I could I can see their point of view. I was shocked when I heard that Heinich didn't really like the movie. H not as surprised because of Heineck's perspective when you told me Vallet felt similar.
But I can see their perspective because if it was us, if it was you or I a case that we had done, like, for instance, if they decided to do a movie about your whole un experience, they would dramatize it. You know, you would definitely have a love interest who who knows it, maybe Stanton Friedman's character they had turned into a woman who would then fall in love with you and you guys would run off into the night or something. But I could see, so I can see their perspective.
But then again, yeah, it was a great movie and it's something that certainly inspired me. And we've only got like a minute left. But well, you know, I'm very grateful to know you and to know that you are one of those people who I admire because you don't you don't screw around with having to make stuff up for the stories that you write. That's why, that's why I've always enjoyed stealing from you, because you're so credible. With the things that you do, so thank you for that. Well,
ditto, ditto. So, yeah, we are pretty much out of time, but you are still active in the UFO field, although you're not working for a huff to Post anymore. And I guess do you Is UFO still
on your agenda at least for your near future? It is. I am currently working on what I hope is going to be a very telling, interesting UFO documentary with the great filmmaker James Fox, who has already created what I believe are two of the best UFO films ever, two films called out of the Blue and I know what I saw, and so I'm now working on his third UFO documentary. I'm going to be writing the script for this, and I couldn't be happy of doing this with him. Well, good luck.
I agree. I think a lot of people would agree. He's got the best, some of the best documentaries out there on the topic. So and I know others are really excited for his new project, and now doubly so now knowing that you're working on it. Thank you. I appreciate that, Alejandro. All Right, Well, thanks for joining us, and I'm sure we'll be talking to you soon. In fact, I think you're the guests who's been on the show the most. That's because I'm an MD.
I have the doctor exactly exactly. All right, we'll talk to you later, Doctor Spiegel, Thank you, Doctor Rojas. Thank you so much to Les Spiegel for joining us once again on Open Minds UFO Radio. It's always fun to have him on. Well, he's just so knowledgeable. He's been involved with so many things over the years, and especially right now, I mean with it comes to close encounters. You know, just what was going on during that time with the un the stuff that he was involved with,
Spielberg's genuine interest in UFOs, it's all really exciting. And of course then Lee having worked with Heinich and Valet and even recently gotten to talk with Valet about close encounters, so really really exciting stuff. Now, some of these stories such as Heinich sending Lee to go and destigate this UFO with police and everything, and where he saw this large triangular UFO, the whole un thing and what happened there. We've got podcasts with Lee where we go over all
of that. So go look into our archives and pull out those podcasts. You will not be disappointed if you are not aware of those situations and you want to know more, so go check those out otherwise. Also, you know, when it comes to Spielberg and UFOs, like I was talking about, I have a big chunk in my talk about the strange alien cases. So you guys can go look at that. Go to Ufocongress dot com and you'll be able to find our video on demand section there and you'll be able
to watch those. You can also find that at the open Minds dot tv website, so you can see some of that. Otherwise you're just going to have to come to Wyoming and hear more. I've got a lot of really great stuff on Spielberg and some of his UFO interests, so I'm super super exout it. Another thing that I am really, really really excited about is
the UFO Congress. So we are posting speakers practically every week. We're posting new speakers as we get everything confirmed and arranged and so and all their information back. So go to Ufocongress dot com to check out some of the speakers we're going to have this year. We're going to have some really cool speakers stuff that you haven't seen before. That's going to be fresh and new to
this field. That's what's fun about the Congress is we like to bring information to the four that otherwise people would not know about that I think you all are going to be really excited about. Go to Ufocongress dot com to keep up to speed on that. Otherwise, all the news that you heard Martin and I talking about at the beginning of the show and you can find at openminds dot tv. So be sure to go there, check out our new stories, and then also check out, you know, the daily headlines like
we talk about often, you'll see those on the front page. But also if you go to the articles drop down menu, you can go to daily UFO headlines or look at UFO sidings, UFO videos, all the different stories that we've written about. I want to remind you too, you can't find out about the UFO Rendezvou n Wyoming that we've been talking about at the Openminds dot tv page on the events tab. And then also you can of course
go to their website which is simply Devil's Tower ufoerndezvou dot com. The hardest part about it is spelling Rendezvous. Otherwise, I want to thank Caleb Hanks for the opening and close music. I want to thank KGRA and thank you for the listeners on KGRA listening right now, and then I also want to of course thank you the listeners, Audios, moo chucos, you mu