The mystery airship or phantom airship was a phenomenon that thousands of people across the United States claimed to have observed from late 1896 through mid 1897. Typical airship reports involved nighttime sightings of unidentified flying lights, but more detailed accounts reported actual airborne craft similar to an airship or dirigible. Mystery airship reports are seen as a cultural predecessor to modern claims of extraterrestrial-piloted UFO's or flying saucers.
Reports of the alleged airship crewmen and pilots usually described them as humanoid, although sometimes the crew claimed to be from Mars. It was widely believed at the time that the mystery airships were the product of some inventor or genius who was not ready to make knowledge of his creation public.
It has been frequently argued that the mystery airship sightings could not have represented genuine dirigibles as no officially documented test flights of long-range powered airships or airplanes of any kind in the United States from the period are known to exist and "it would have been impossible, not to mention irrational, to keep such a thing secret." Although several experimental airships had been manufactured and tested prior to the 1896–97 reports (e.g. Solomon Andrews made successful test flights of his Aereon in New Jersey in 1863 and Frederick Marriott successfully demonstrated his small airship Avitor Hermes Jr. in California in 1869), the technology of the day could not possibly have produced airships with the capabilities that people were reportedly seeing in 1896–97. Reece and others. note that contemporary American newspapers of the "yellow journalism" era were more likely to print manufactured stories and hoaxes than are modern news sources, and editors of the late 19th century often would have expected the reader to understand that such stories were false.
Initially, most journalists of the period did not appear to take the airship reports very seriously; however, as the sightings continued, several newspapers covered the story with genuine wonder and interest, while others were more skeptical and even hostile. Some newspapers denounced the entire airship story as nonsense and openly mocked and ridiculed the witnesses and believers, dismissing them as drunks, fools or liars. After the major 1896–97 wave ended, the entire airship story quickly fell from public consciousness and was all but forgotten for nearly seventy years. During the mid 1960s, the airship phenomenon began to receive renewed interest as reports were gradually rediscovered in the archives of old newspapers by contemporary UFO investigators who suggested the 1896–97 airship waves might represent earlier precursors to the modern era of UFO sightings that began in the United States during the late 1940s.Reece (2007), page 14.
Background
A number of popular science fiction novels dealing with airships and their secretive inventors were published in the years before the airship sightings. Especially popular among American audiences were the Frank Reade stories by Luis Senarens, which began in 1882 and frequently centered on airships. The wildly successful Frank Reade Library ran to 191 stories. Senarens' acquaintance Jules Verne borrowed the conceit of a secretive inventor who had developed a powerful airship for his novel Robur the Conqueror, which was published in the US in 1887. The airship stories of the prolific science fiction author Robert Duncan Milne were also serialized in San Francisco newspapers during the 1890s.
The late 19th century was a period of intense technological innovation, including the invention of the telephone and automobile. Widespread publications about both lighter-than-air and heavier-than-air flight in the late 19th century gave rise to a common belief that the development of a successful airship was imminent.
On November 17, 1896, the very same day the first sighting of the mystery airship occurred in Sacramento, California, the Sacramento Bee printed what claimed to be a telegram from a New York inventor stating that he was flying his airship from New York to California and would arrive there within two days.
Earlier sightings In July 1868, The Zoologist carried a report from a local newspaper in Copiapó, Chile, regarding a "gigantic bird" with "brilliant scales" that made a metallic sound had been seen flying over the town. Charles Fort, in his 1931 book Lo!, discussed this report along with various other reports of aerial apparitions from the 19th and 20th centuries. Fort observed that "inhabitants of the backwoods of China" might "similarly describe one of this earth's airships floating over their farms" (curiously, the 1896–97 airship reports were barely mentioned in Fort's works, although at that time he was writing for some of the same newspapers that were covering the airship stories and almost certainly was aware of the enormity of the 1896–97 airship wave). Discussing the Copiapó report in 2001, Loren Coleman called it an example of "reports of weird aerial constructions" on the boundary between machines and animals that "just do not make sense"..
On July 29, 1880, two witnesses in Louisville, Kentucky saw a flying object described as "a man surrounded by machinery which he seemed to be working with his hands" with wings protruding from his back. Merely a month later, a similar sighting occurred in New Jersey. It was reported in The New York Times that "it was apparently a man with bat's wings and improved frog's legs... the monster waved his wings in answer to the whistle of a locomotive."
Airship Wave of 1896–1897 The best-known of the mystery airship waves began in California in 1896. Then, early in 1897, reports and accounts of similar sightings came from other areas, generally moving eastward across the country. Although the majority of witnesses reported seeing only a light or group of lights moving across the night sky, some accounts during the airship wave claim that occupants were visible on some crafts, and encounters with the pilot or crew were occasionally reported as well. These occupants often appeared to be human, though their behavior, mannerisms and clothing were sometimes reported to be unusual. Sometimes the apparent humans claimed to be from the planet Mars.
Historian Mike Dash described and summarized the 1896–1897 series of airship sightings, writing:
The total number of reported sightings during the 1896–97 airship wave was in the thousands; based on newspaper reports, the total number of witnesses may have exceeded 100,000.
California, 1896
The initial wave of airship sightings took place primarily in California from November 17 through December 1896, with a few isolated sightings in January 1897. There were also some reports of the airship in the Arizona Territory, Nevada, Oregon, Washington and British Columbia during November and December. Many newspaper accounts described the sightings as part of a transcontinental flight by the airship's inventor.
A mystery light was first seen over the capital city of Sacramento on the evening of November 17, 1896. Several citizens observed a strange light moving slowly from east to west across the sky at an estimated elevation of . Due to a heavy overcast that evening, very little detail could be observed; most of the several hundred witnesses reported seeing only a light source but a few said they could discern a vague, dark body behind the bright light. A witness named R.L. Lowery claimed that he heard a voice from the craft issuing commands to increase elevation to avoid hitting a church steeple. Lowery added "in what was no doubt meant as a wink to the reader" that he believed the apparent captain to be referring to the tower of a local brewery, as there were no churches nearby. Lowery further described the craft as being powered by two men exerting themselves on bicycle pedals. Above the pedaling men seemed to be a passenger compartment, which lay under the main body of the craft. A bright headlamp was mounted on the front end. Some witnesses reported the sound of talking or singing as the light passed overhead. The November 18, 1896, editions of local newspapers including the Sacramento Bee and the San Francisco Call all published accounts of the sighting. The newspapers ran such headlines as "A Wandering Apparition", "Claim They Saw a Flying Airship", "That Mysterious Light" "Saw the Mystic Flying Light", "Strange Craft Of the Sky" and "What Was It?" The November 27, 1896, edition of the Stockton, California, Evening Mail featured one of the earliest accounts of an alleged alien craft sighting. Colonel H.G. Shaw claimed that while driving his buggy through the countryside of Lodi near Stockton, he came across what appeared to be a landed spacecraft. Shaw described it as having a metallic surface which was completely featureless apart from a rudder, and pointed ends. He estimated a diameter of and said the vessel was around in total length. Three slender, , apparent extraterrestrials were said to approach from the craft while "emitting a strange warbling noise." The beings examined Shaw's buggy and then tried to physically force him to accompany them back to the airship. The aliens were said to give up after realizing they lacked the physical strength to force Shaw aboard. They boarded their ship, which lifted off the ground and sped out of sight. Shaw believed that the beings were Martians sent to kidnap an earthling for unknowable but potentially nefarious purposes. This has been seen by some as an early attempt at alien abduction; it is possibly the first published account of explicitly extraterrestrial beings attempting to abduct humans and force them into their spacecraft. The strange light reappeared over Sacramento on the evening of November 21, 1896. Among the observers were Sacramento's deputy sheriff and district attorney. Witnesses described the light as being twice as bright as a typical arc light or locomotive headlamp. Later that evening, the light was also seen over Folsom, San Francisco, Oakland, Petaluma, Santa Rosa, Sebastopol and several other cities and was reportedly viewed by thousands of witnesses, including the domestic staff of San Francisco Mayor, Adolph Sutro. As it flew over Cliff House and Seal Rocks, the bright light reportedly frightened the sleeping seals, causing them to frantically dive into the ocean. On the evening of November 22, two Methodist ministers near Knights Ferry, reportedly observed a "fiery object" resting on the ground. As the two men approached the object, it suddenly took off, flying away in a shallow climb. The November 28, 1896, edition of the San Francisco Call reported that Professor H.B. Worcester of the Garden City Business College and his Thanksgiving dinner guests observed a flying light that he estimated was traveling between sixty and one hundred miles per hour. A farmer named John Bawl, who lived a short distance from the professor, also claimed to have seen the airship a short time later. On November 29, 1896, over one hundred residents of Tulare witnessed a spectacular sighting: "[They] assert they saw the now famous airship that has been wandering around in different sections of the state...It came down quite a distance, then went up and took a straight shot for Hanford. Red, white and blue lights were seen in succession, but no part of the ship was seen...many people watched it as long as it was in sight."
California cities reporting sightings during November and December, included Anderson, Auburn, Red Bluff, Redding, Arbuckle, Woodland, Yolo, Chico, Marysville, Camptonville, Grass Valley, Biggs, San Leandro, San Jose, Hayward, San Luis Obispo, Acampo, Lathrop, Livermore, Lodi, Crows Landing, Manteca, Modesto, Merced, Stockton, Turlock, Visalia, Fresno, Delano, Bakersfield, Redlands, Santa Clara, Santa Cruz, Santa Barbara, Riverside and Los Angeles.