50 years ago, mysterious events took place in the
English town of Warminster that served as the impetus for the legend of a
phenomenon called “The Thing.” An event will be held later this year marking
the 50th anniversary of UFOs and other weirdness in Warminster.
The Warminster Journal article from January, 1964 that
started it all.
Although UFOs are part of the Warminster phenomena, it
all started with a weird noise. According to a story in theWarminster
Journal printed in January, 1965, early in the morning of Christmas day,
1964, a housewife heard a strange sound on her way to church. She left at about
6:30 in the morning, and soon after heard a “crackling” noise. The sound got
more and more loud and seemed to pass over head. However, nothing could be
seen.
The woman, who wished to remain anonymous for fear of
being ridiculed, said the sound was like branches being pulled over gravel
along with a faint hum.
A website called UFO Warminster chronicles the strange occurrences
of the area, and it lists the anonymous housewife as Marjorie Bye in its
timeline of strange events. According to the site, there were other witnesses
that day. One man heard pounding on his roof, while a woman named Mildred Head
apparently reported, “Our ceiling came alive with strange sounds that lashed
our roof… as if twigs were brushing the tiles… ended up with a noise [like]
giant hailstones.”
Little did the townsfolk know, this was only the
beginning of a number of weird occurrences that would take place over the
coming years.
One of the strangest stories comes from a news clipping from August, 1965 that, according to
UFO Warminster, may have been the Warminster Journal, but they are
unsure. The article reads like the plot of a 50s sci-fi movie. The story is
about a Warminster town hall meeting that was arranged to discuss “The Thing.”
The council chairman invited Mr. David Holton, a local scientist, to attend the
meeting. Holton had been investigating the mysterious happenings, and was asked
to share his findings.
The movie The Thing From Another World came out in
1951, but may have been the inspiration for the name for the Warminster
phenomenon.
In dramatic fashion, Holton said he would rather
destroy his dossier than read it aloud to the crowd. He did not feel a town
hall was the right way to go about an investigation. He told the paper, “This
is a serious matter and must not be thrashed out in a half-hearted way by local
people in front of newspaper men and television.”
The article goes on to describe some of the
strangeness that had gone on since the first Christmas day occurrence. They say
people had heard a crackling in the sky that “killed pigeons in flight,
peppered dormice with holes and stuns animals, partridges and pheasants. Some people
say they have been knocked down by the force.”
The article also claims that Mr. Horton warned the
townspeople weeks ago “that the happenings indicated that people in Warminster
would soon be seeing objects in the sky.”
Sure enough, soon after, “the Vicar of Heytesbury, the
Reverend Graham Phillips, and his family, reported seeing a glowing,
cigar-shaped object over the south of town form the vicarage in the village.”
Arthur Shuttlewood, a journalist for the Warminster
Journal, is credited with making “The Thing” famous. He reported on the
events and eventually wrote BOOKS
about it as well.
about it as well.
However, according to a BBC article by Kevin Goodman, one of the
founders of the UFO Warminster website, “The Thing” first received national
attention when a UFO photograph hit the news.
The image was captured by a man named Gordon
Faulkner in 1965. Faulkner shared the image with Shuttlewood who then gave it
to the Daily Mirror. The Daily Mirror printed it
in September of 1965, and Warminster’s “Thing” became famous. Goodman writes,
“Within weeks, thousands of people began to converge on the town to see this
strange phenomenon for themselves.”
The Warminster UFO photograph captured by Gordon
Faulkner in 1965. Is this “The Thing?”
Warminster’s notoriety as a UFO hot spot was sealed
when BBC West produced a documentary on the whole affair in
1966. The documentary can be seen in Goodman’s BBC article.
Goodman says frequent sightings of “The Thing”
continued until the early 1970s, then they began to decline.
Another documentary on “The Thing” was made in 1990,
and can be seen below.
It was 50 years ago this month that the first news
article on the hapless housewife who was terrorized by “The Thing” appeared in
the Warminster Journal. According to an article by the Western
Daily Press, a group of UFO researchers have decided to celebrate the 50th
anniversary with a conference. It will be held at The Old Bell Inn in
Warminster in August, 2015. You can read more about it on their Facebook page.
With any luck, “The Thing” will make an appearance. If
it does, it sure does have a lot of explaining to do.
ABOUT ALEJANDRO ROJAS
Alejandro Rojas is a radio host for Open Minds Radio,
editor and contributing writer for Open Minds magazine as well as OpenMinds.tv.
For several years Alejandro was the official spokesperson for the Mutual UFO
Network as the Director of Public Education. As a UFO/Paranormal researcher and
journalist, Alejandro has spent many hours in the field investigating phenomena
up close and personal. Alejandro has been interviewed by media organizations
around the world, including the largest cable and network news agencies with
several appearances on Coast to Coast AM.
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