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Men In Black

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Who do you think these guys are? What are your opinions?

I'm kinda torn between members of a secret Government agency that we don't know about and alien hybrids.

This photo was taken in the mid-60's, wasn't it? The person could have been MIB, however lots of folks still dressed that way at the time so I think it is far more likely to just be a guy hanging out in a doorway.
 
The earliest version of what's now considered a 'men in black (MIB)' incident occurred in 1947. It occurred in relation to the Maury Island Incident:

http://www.mufon.com/maury-island-incident---1947.html

One of the two reporting witnesses (Harold Dahl) claimed he was visited by a man in a black suit who advised him to keep quiet about the incident. This alleged visit was never substantiated beyond Dahl's claim, which was made long after the fact. However, there were actual events involving visits, investigations, and warnings ...

Within a month of the alleged incident Dahl and his boss (not a witness himself) were visited by Kenneth Arnold (the original 'flying saucer' witness, who'd transitioned into the first dedicated UFO researcher). Two USAAF officers who'd flown in also met with them while Arnold was there. Dahl allegedly gave some evidence to the USAAF officers, who departed and were killed when their plane crashed

Owing to the plane crash and deaths, the USAF and the FBI got involved with formal investigations. Their initial conclusion was that the Maury Island incident was a hoax which had resulted in the deaths of two officers.

Those were the days of J. Edgar Hoover and his dress code - meaning that any FBI agents Dahl met were wearing dark business suits.

The FBI, at least, warned Dahl that if he'd shut up about the alleged UFO incident there'd be no referral for prosecution on charges of fraud.

So there you have it - all the elements of the MIB mythos, originating in one known incident.

By the time another couple of decades had passed the UFO community of interest had grown, fed on itself over and over, and began getting paranoid to the point conspiratorial repression had become part of the canon. It was in this later timeframe that today's MIB mythos was born, reflecting elements that dated back to the earliest highly-publicized UFO sightings / mania.

I don't doubt that folks reporting UFO incidents received contacts and / or personal visits. These would have included official Project Blue Book investigators, law enforcement personnel, self-anointed UFO experts, and anyone else who had an interest.

I strongly doubt all the reported such visits actually occurred or that those visits that did occur involved agents operating for a single organization under a single agenda.

Agree with you 100%, except for the fact that many accounts describe MIB who are almost certainly not human, and doing a very poor job of pretending to be. They have wires running out of their skin, don't understand how the most basic of tasks such as how to drink a glass of water or eat with a spoon, and often have a bizarre fascination with common objects such as clocks. Some MIB perform "magic tricks", such as making a coin vaporize. Their automobiles are often missing essential parts such as steering wheels and can perform feats such as driving at night without headlights or gliding over rough terrain as if the wheels are not touching the ground.
 
Agree with you 100%, except for the fact that many accounts describe MIB who are almost certainly not human, and doing a very poor job of pretending to be. ...

The accounts to which you allude are far more recent, and many of them don't even relate to UFO incidents or investigations.

The notion of 'Men in Black' has mutated into a general meme or folkloric motif as decades have passed, and many of the so-called MIB encounters reported nowadays are more appropriately categorized as (e.g.) Slender Man / Shadow Man / deep conspiracy tales rather than UFO-related incidents.

It's a classic case of a stereotype originating within one subject matter area mutating into a template that gets (mis-?)applied to one or more other subject matter areas.
 
i’d like to see a ufo & then have an MIB encounter , I THINK :)
 
He could have been an accountant, Neil!
:)

Carole

This is the best theory I have heard about the MIB. I can't believe I missed it for so long.

I heard a very intriguing account from an East Yorkshire UFO group member (or connection) about a more recent MIB experience. I will try my best to find it.
 
This is a really interesting and sincere documentary - of phenomena in Yorkshire, England - for the MIB element i had in mind go straight to 48:00

 
Gray Barker's 1956 book They Knew Too Much About Flying Saucers - arguably the founding text of the MIB mythos - seems to have fallen out of copyright as it's now available as a free download on Archive.org in various formats:

https://archive.org/details/GrayBarkerTheyKnewTooMuchAboutFlyingSaucers

Among other rather strange tales, the book recounts Albert Bender's encounter with the three MIBs - human in appearance but who Barker suggests might be "space people" - who intimidated him into shutting down his International Flying Saucer Bureau (which despite the grandiose name only had a few hundred subscribers).

Bender himself later elaborated on the tale in his 1962 book Flying Saucers and the Three Men (edited and published by Barker). Now the three MIBs were unequivocally aliens posing as humans, with seemingly paranormal powers. They took Bender to their Antarctic base and explained that they were merely visiting the Earth in order to mine an undisclosed substance from our sea water!

Barker himself was an interesting character and allegedly something of a prankster. There are a couple of articles on him by journalist John Sherwood that are worth a read:

https://www.csicop.org/author/johncsherwood
 
Gray Barker's 1956 book They Knew Too Much About Flying Saucers - arguably the founding text of the MIB mythos - seems to have fallen out of copyright as it's now available as a free download on Archive.org in various formats:

https://archive.org/details/GrayBarkerTheyKnewTooMuchAboutFlyingSaucers

Among other rather strange tales, the book recounts Albert Bender's encounter with the three MIBs - human in appearance but who Barker suggests might be "space people" - who intimidated him into shutting down his International Flying Saucer Bureau (which despite the grandiose name only had a few hundred subscribers).

Bender himself later elaborated on the tale in his 1962 book Flying Saucers and the Three Men (edited and published by Barker). Now the three MIBs were unequivocally aliens posing as humans, with seemingly paranormal powers. They took Bender to their Antarctic base and explained that they were merely visiting the Earth in order to mine an undisclosed substance from our sea water!

Barker himself was an interesting character and allegedly something of a prankster. There are a couple of articles on him by journalist John Sherwood that are worth a read:

https://www.csicop.org/author/johncsherwood


Many thanks, I have downloaded that to my phone and will peruse it at my leisure later.
 
Gray Barker's 1956 book They Knew Too Much About Flying Saucers - arguably the founding text of the MIB mythos - seems to have fallen out of copyright as it's now available as a free download on Archive.org in various formats:

excellent! read it once, long ago. Looking forward to rereading with decades of other reading under my belt.
 
This is a really interesting and sincere documentary - of phenomena in Yorkshire, England - for the MIB element i had in mind go straight to 48:00


It's so strange that an MIB approach recorded in the 50's updates so readily to Yorkshire in the modern day.
 
Gray Barker's 1956 book They Knew Too Much About Flying Saucers - arguably the founding text of the MIB mythos - seems to have fallen out of copyright as it's now available as a free download on Archive.org in various formats:

https://archive.org/details/GrayBarkerTheyKnewTooMuchAboutFlyingSaucers

Among other rather strange tales, the book recounts Albert Bender's encounter with the three MIBs - human in appearance but who Barker suggests might be "space people" - who intimidated him into shutting down his International Flying Saucer Bureau (which despite the grandiose name only had a few hundred subscribers).

Bender himself later elaborated on the tale in his 1962 book Flying Saucers and the Three Men (edited and published by Barker). Now the three MIBs were unequivocally aliens posing as humans, with seemingly paranormal powers. They took Bender to their Antarctic base and explained that they were merely visiting the Earth in order to mine an undisclosed substance from our sea water!

Barker himself was an interesting character and allegedly something of a prankster. There are a couple of articles on him by journalist John Sherwood that are worth a read:

https://www.csicop.org/author/johncsherwood
Graylien!!!
So good to see you back! We were so worried about, you know.
 
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