SUR CETTE PAGE :
Appletreewick Revisted!
- SURESNES - MME A - UNE DAME POUR QUI LES SPECTACLES DU CIEL SONT SOUVENT CEUX D'UNE AUTRE DIMENSION,?
- INTERVIEW WITH ARTHUR C. CLARKE (en anglais)
- UFO Crash in North Texas, 1891 (en anglais)
- Lettre à l'éditeur et au rédacteur en chef du Stephenville Empire-Tribune comme protestation contre la mise à la porte d'Angelia Joiner pour avoir couvert l'observation
d'ovni de Stephenville.
- Observation d'ovni avec des effets physiques au Brésil, 20 janvier 2008
- Stanton Friedman : Lettre ouverte au Dr David Morrision. Mufon Journal Janvier 2008
- La photo de Monsieur Tony Hartono, ingénieur, qui le 22 septembre 1975 a pris la photo d'un ovni alors qu'il était à bord de la plateforme l'Arjuna,
située au large, côte Ouest de Java ( Indonésie)
- L'étude d'Anne Duflot : Impact initiatique du phénomène OVNI;
- Abduction , le cas d'Hélène Guiliana _ 11 JUIN 1976 - CHATUZANCE LE GOUBET - Drome
Appletreewick Revisted!
Nigel Mortimer - 1st May, 2008
In the heady days of the 1980’s there were a number of ‘classic’ UFO photographic cases reported to the group I represented then, Connect UFO Investigations in West Yorkshire, England. One of these, although extensively investigated at the time by myself and others from the IUN (Independent UFO Investigations Network), has lain away from public scrutiny for the past two decades. The photograph itself is an amazing example of the kind of phenomena that frequents the north of the country to this day, but behind it, there lies a bizarre and even stranger story.
I am writing this on May Day 2008, shortly before the anniversary of the day ( May 30th) when the photograph was taken at the North Yorkshire village of Appletreewick in 1983.
The location is steeped in myths and folklore. The tradition of Morris Dancing goes back to pagan routes and celebrates the phallic pro-creational worship of the nature gods from ancient times. Although mainly for entertainment these days, groups of men dancing around a pole on this specific day of the year, reflects a recognition of early man’s communion with nature and energies that we are yet to fully understand.
The Craven Arms public House was owned and run by Jane in 1983, and the only significantly unusual thing about the pub at that time, was it already had a smoking ban inside the building, some twenty three years before our current government restrictions – some foresight by Jane!
There had already been a spate of UFO sightings around the Appletreewick region in the weeks before the photograph was taken. I had been, myself, personally involved in one of these, which involved my family too. OBOL (Orange Balls of Light) phenomena had been reported at a camping site to the south of the pub only four days earlier –the description of these UFOs reported as some similar to that which appeared in the photograph later in the week.
Close Encounter in Addingham
In March of 1983, a very strange occurance took place in the Mortimer household!
It was now mid-morning, the following day from an uneasy night out investigating
at the newly re-discovered Backstone Circle on Ilkley Moor; to the south of Appletreewick.
I had been sleeping in bed for several hours, and upon wakening, I heard the voice of Susan (my wife at the time) as she left the house to go out shopping. Closing the garden gate, I heard her speaking. I heard another voice; this one excited and at the same time, somewhat adjatated. In urgent conversation, I heard Mr. Sparcer of Green Lane say,
" My mother was woken up in the early hours of this morning at about 3.30am, after hearing a loud droning noise....did you hear it too?” He continued,
“I got up myself to see what all the commotion was, and I couldn't believe what I was looking at! It was a large oval object with loads of smaller lights that gave-off a strange orangey- red glow which flooded down onto your rooftop. It was no aircraft I've ever seen before, I'm sure of that..."
He went on, " whatever it was, it moved away as soon as I looked at it, towards Beamsley Beacon, (north-west of Addingham) and suddenly there was no sound coming from it. All was very quiet indeed."
Seemingly, this was the same OBOL that I had observed on my way down from the
moors earlier that morning, but what was it now doing over my very rooftop? My wife listened with half-interest, quickly making her excuse to catch the bus, and obviously putting any talk of UFOs and such things to the back of her mind for the rest of the day, probably the safest place for such things in an uncertain mind? No, she would wait until later, when she could talk to me about it and try to rationalise an answer to this madness. By then, our children would be safe in bed and out of earshot; Susan not wanting them to be worried that ET had paid a visit to the Mortimer household!
But, the two children were holding secrets of their own, and both Susan and I had no idea just how involved they were already in what had occurred whilst I had been out at Backstone Circle.
Sara, then our five year old daughter awoke from her sleep a little earlier at 3.15am, she opened her eyes and jumped with a start! Looking through the half-opened bedroom door, she found it difficult to keep her eyes open, as if she was being forced to slip back into slumber? Raising her hand to cover her face and peeping through protective fingers, Sara stared at the ghostly humanoid figure that was ascending the
stairs, reaching the top, and then vanishing into thin air! The heavy sleepiness finally overcame her, and she gave in.
Susan returned home and we all had tea together. The children kept quiet, and Sara was as normal as ever. For the children's sake, we had decided to put the whole experience behind us, for it seemed that this thing was becoming too close for comfort, and the last thing I wanted, was to impose my 'obsession with UFOs' onto the innocence of her youth.
This was made difficult, in that the local press had run a front-page piece describing reports of the UFO being seen by a number of other people up and down the Wharfe Valley around the time of our own experiences.
One of these had been seen within fifteen minutes of my own sighting of an OBOL as I came down off the moor. It seemed to have been the same object I had seen, and no matter how we tried to turn away from it, the family found itself the focus of something which became increasingly intrusive!
The following night at about 1900hrs, Sara was back in her bed again.
As if to play out some kind of repeat sequence, events began to unfold once more, and silently, the darkened figure appeared at the top of the stairs a second time, less than nine feet from her bedroom. Expecting it to vanish as before, she fought with her senses as the form floated just above the floor towards her, getting closer, close enough to see that this entity was a female! Now, she got the impression that the first
had been a male, due to the stern looking features compared to this more elegant apparition. Both had been wearing what she took to be a tight-fitting, black, one-piece diving suit, a cowled hood over the head and the whole of the face exposed.
Others have described something similar, some witnesses are very frightened, yet others feel secure -inwardly knowing that whatever they are gazing upon, it seems to mean them no harm. These feelings are very apparent during the experience and throughout the observation, as if the witness is meant to acknowledge them and take note of how they are feeling.
Many reports indicate that in particular with OBOL sightings, there is this strange, almost personal interaction, something that would suggest that rather than the UFO being an object, it acts and causes a reaction we would associate with an encounter with another person!
In 1981, around the Wharfe Valley region, not many miles from where the late
David Barclay (author of UFOs –The final Answer) had his encounter with an OBOL, another witness to this phenomenon, Steve Hart, was travelling home on public transport. Close to Addingham, he noticed hanging in the sky over the local moorlands , a large orange ball of light. Suddenly, as he watched it, an intense feeling
of sorrow and dread overcame him which lasted as long as he had the object in sight. When Steve later arrived home in Leeds, he was devastated to learn that his grandmother had passed away. She had died at the same time that he had been watching the OBOL so the encounter that Steve Hart had, and its associate 'coincidence' of his grandmothers death at the time of the experience, is puzzling.
What is even more amazing is that this very same thing happened again, at almost the same location, and this time the OBOL was caught on film!
The end of 1983 became increasingly difficult for all of the
family. We knew that we shared something, an awareness of things that should not take place, so we tried to ignore this, but it just would not go away. Sara and her brother Ben, were seeing figures in the house that would mimic the looks, and movements of Susan and myself; on one occasion Sara watched as one impersonator of her mother, dressed exactly the same, walked right through a wall unit in the living room, while Susan was busy working upstairs! We all felt that we were being
watched, even when there was nobody physically there! The pressure became too much. My involvement was effecting my working life, and everyday chores became pointless to me –there was something bigger behind all this. Connect investigations was born through a desperation to find out just what was going on! Within months, I received through the post, the Appletreewick photograph……
Investigating Appletreewick
A crowd had gathered outside the pub to watch, as the Leeds based Morris Dancers began to entertain at 2.30pm. Jane brought her camera with her to film the dancers, and ‘sensed’ that something had moved across the viewfinder with a rapid motion, but to her eye, nothing was seen apart from the dancing Morris men. She felt a sudden ‘vaccum’ like displaced air around her, only for a second, then everything was as normal. It seemed that nobody else had noticed this, and the dancers continued without any break. When Jane had the photograph developed, she was amazed to see something unusual to the left of the dancing group, which looked to be a large orange coloured ball of light.
The West Yorkshire UFO Research Group (as part of Connect) conducted an investigation later that year into this photographic case, involving Kodak. After an extensive study, they proclaimed that 'whatever the object was, it was there when the photograph had been taken. You can see branches from the tree in the foreground, yet the OBOL covers part of the hillside behind it. Interestingly, directly below its position, investigators found the site of an ancient well. Above this position, the branches of the tree had been damaged by heat, and vegetation growth around the well looked to be ‘feeble’ compared to the same some meters away from where the phenomena had been photographed.
I have found that this OBOL phenomena seems to be linked with the many ancient sites (mainly megalithic) that abound the moorlands in the Appletreewick region and none more-so than at Ilkley Moor, and I propose that these places, stone circles, ancient wells, etc, hold a key to how such phenomena manifest in our reality.
A death in the Afternoon
Later that day, Simon Grey (pseudonym), the Morris dancer seen below the OBOL, headed home to Leeds. In a re-run of Steve Hart's experience, he too found bad news awaiting him there. He learnt that at the very same time the photograph had been taken, his brother had suddenly died of a heart attack!
It would seem that these OBOLs are aware of our human affairs. Maybe they know what is about to happen and have the ability to tune-in to our human feelings? Was this pure coincidence or is something else happening here?
Whatever these OBOLs are, they seem to have an impact on our lives. I know this from personal experience. Many people who encounter such, become different in ways not expected. They change, and through that process, often become more aware of other possibilities. They begin to question life and their purpose. I feel that this change is intended, and whatever the truth behind the OBOLs, the facts behind the Appletreewick photograph seem to be far more stranger than what is actually depicted in the picture itself?
Nigel Mortimer - May 2008
WEBSITE: www.return.to/IlkleyMoor
Email: sharlek@blueyonder.co.uk
Please note: Appletreewick Photograph is copyright Connect NM 1994. Permission granted to reproduce for UFO DATA only. Reproduction autorisée par UFO DATA
Mme A. Une dame pour qui les spectacles du ciel sont souvent ceux d’une autre dimension ?
La dame de Suresnes
Une drôle de dame, sans nul doute. Avec son époux, ces personnes modestes habitent un appartement dans un quartier calme de Suresnes, non loin du Théâtre Jean Vilar, aux abords d’un groupe scolaire.
Apparemment, depuis très longtemps, cette dame a des perceptions très étranges, qu’elle note immédiatement. Dessins et commentaires précis sont consignés sur des feuilles volantes au format 21X29,7. La plupart de ces dessins forment la matière de ce « rapport ». On voudra bien pardonner quelques fautes d’orthographe non corrigées.
( Les dessins illustrant le début des témoignages ci-dessous ont été exécutés le plus fidèlement possible, d’après les croquis du témoin, lorsque ceux-ci n’ont pas pu être scannés ).
L’ensemble de ce document a été relu, corrigé, et la présente version approuvée, par le témoin, ainsi que son époux, pour ce qui le concerne.
Rédaction, présentation, par G. Deforges.
« Dès l’âge de 8 ans, je fis un rêve , dont je me souviens encore…. : des êtres atterrissaient sur les toits des immeubles, ou des maisons.
Ils étaient comme des nains. Je leur disais : « saute par la fenêtre, tu ne vas pas te faire du mal ».
« Dès l’âge de 8 ans, je fis un rêve , dont je me souviens encore…. : des êtres atterrissaient sur les toits des immeubles, ou des maisons. Ils étaient comme des nains. Je leur disais : « saute par la fenêtre, tu ne vas pas te faire du mal ».
« Alors que je me trouvais en colonie de vacances, à Châlons sur Saône, mon regard fut attiré par une forte lumière qui se manifesta dans le ciel.
Mon regard fut attiré par cette chose, alors que le rideau de la fenêtre du dortoir où je me trouvais était à moitié tiré. J’avais 7 ou 8 ans. Je n’ai pas de souvenir très précis là-dessus, mais je sais que, depuis toujours, depuis que je m’interroge sur les choses de l’existence, j’ai toujours su qu’on n’était pas seul dans l’univers.
Mes premières lectures sur ce sujet datent de 1976. Ce premier livre m’a marquée : « Les OVNIS et les extraterrestres », de Yves Naud, ( Ed. Famot). »
« Ma deuxième expérience se situe alors que je demeure au 17, avenue J.Jaurès, à Suresnes. Nous sommes alors en 1981.C’est tout près du croisement avec l’avenue D. Vaillant, face au bassin, en face il y a la statue. Assez haut dans le ciel, je vois un objet ayant cette forme précise » :
« Cet objet se tient immobile pendant une dizaine de secondes. Nous sommes en début d’après-midi. Tout à coup, l’objet exécute un écart à droite, puis à gauche.,
puis bascule, pointe en l’air, prenant la forme d’un fuselage d’avion, sans ses ailes, puis monte tout droit dans un nuage. Il disparaît complètement à ma vue. »
Couleur : Vert pâle, uniforme.
Description par le témoin :
« Donc nous sommes à Suresnes. « Dans la journée. Ciel légèrement nuageux. Phénomène vu à l’œil nu, puis observé à la jumelle depuis le balcon de notre ancien logement.
L’objet, ( voir représentation ci-dessous), me semble très éloigné et à très haute altitude.
Il m’apparaît comme étant au-dessus de Paris. Cet objet est d’aspect rectangulaire. A bout de bras, il a la taille de la moitié d’un ticket de métro. Il est immobile pendant un quart d’heure à trente minutes. Il est de couleur vert pâle. Puis cet objet va se déplacer horizontalement sur sa gauche, revenant ensuite à sa position initiale, mais en changeant de forme. Il a maintenant l’aspect d’une ogive, d’une fusée, dont les cônes opposés ont une forme légèrement concave. Il est devenu une espèce de fusée blanche, légèrement lumineuse, et a démarré une montée vers le ciel à une vitesse fantastique, atteignant un nuage dans lequel elle disparaît. Il y a à ce moment un effet d’une brillance argentée. »
« Aux alentours de cette observation, ( avant ou après, je ne m’en souviens plus), pendant quelques petites minutes, j’ai ressenti comme si mon cerveau « se vidait ». Plus aucune pensée d’aucune sorte. Je n’avais jamais éprouvé cela. »
Premier juin 1986
Vue du Mont Valérien, vers Suresnes.- ( Ce témoignage est confirmé par le mari de la dame. Il me certifie qu’il a partagé cette observation, en tous points.)
« Une boule rouge, stationnaire pendant deux ou trois minutes. Puis se déplaçant vers la droite et diminuant très vite de taille pour ne plus devenir qu’un point à l’horizon.
Nous avons un instant supposé que cette lumière émanait d’une grue de chantier, devant nous. Mais l’altitude de cette lumière, son intensité, étaient telles que nous avons bien vu que cela n’avait rien à voir avec les grues. Cela a été encore plus évident lorsque nous avons vu cette lumière s’élever, s’éloigner en diminuant d’intensité. »
1990, le 8 septembre. - Vers 23h. Ciel étoilé. - (Voir le dessin ci-dessous).
Objet 1 :
Intérieur des ailes rempli d’un scintillement innombrable de petites lumières jaune-pâle, cela dans chaque aile. Cette aile double est animée d’un balancement alternatif, gauche-droite. Sa vitesse est celle d’un avion de ligne. Elle se dirige d’est en ouest.
Objet 2.
Celui-là suit l’aile double. Aucun bruit.
Voir le dessin ci-dessous, réalisé par le témoin.
1990, le 11 septembre. 1 H du matin. Ciel complètement étoilé. Représentation par le témoin , depuis une fenêtre de son appartement, à Suresnes.
1991, le 8 septembre.
Ciel nocturne sans nuage. Représentation par le témoin :
Nous sommes maintenant en 1992. Une nouvelle observation., alors que le témoin attendait la venue de ses parents. Cette vision se concrétise un peu à l’est du site du théâtre J.Vilard.
Dés 1993, Mme. A. est le témoin d’une nouvelle observation.
Chaque fois qu’il en est ainsi, elle se précipite sur ses crayons pour représenter ce qu’elle a vu. Cela contribue aussi à évacuer le stress que ces apparitions provoquent en elle.
Voici cette nouvelle observation . Le témoin tient à me préciser quelque chose d’important pour elle, qui l’a beaucoup frappée : cette « boule » très lumineuse est animée d’une espèce de pulsation, et dans les phases de diminution, elle devient d’un « blanc neutre », comme si elle se « pompait » de l’énergie lumineuse.
Est-ce terminé pour autant ? Pas du tout, voici la suite….
C’était donc, ici, le 26 juin 1994, la nuit. Le témoin observe, depuis la fenêtre de sa bibliothèque, le mouvement parfaitement synchrone de toutes ces boules qui se dirigent vers le nord, à une vitesse qu’elle juge supérieure à celle d’un avion.
Et les témoignages se succèdent, les représentations sont toujours aussi saisissantes.
« Forme indéterminée, vaguement ronde, mais très épaisse »
Le témoin me précise que dans la vision ci-dessous, elle est vraiment impressionnée par la couleur cuivrée des objets, comme s’ils « étaient surchauffés »
« Ma surprise a été de deux ordres : 1/-Cet objet filant dans le ciel, devant moi, très haut, avec aucun empennage de queue visible, 2/- Absolument aucun bruit.
Ci-dessous : « Je voyais une boule lumineuse, qui éjectait des petites billes lumineuses elles aussi, qui gerbaient en étincelles. La deuxième gerbait en étincelles plus petites que pour le premier objet ».
« Là, je me souviens très bien que j’étais en train de cuire des pâtes, lorsque mon regard s’est porté vers cet endroit du ciel ».
Voir page suivante deux documents rassemblés, concernant le même témoignage.
La présente relation est accompagnée de deux enregistrements audio. Ils seront bientôt ajoutés à cette relation.
Ces enregistrements ont été effectués au cours de la deuxième semaine du mois d’avril 2008, à l’aide d’un petit enregistreur numérique de bonne sensibilité. Cet enregistrement a été réalisé lors du travail final de mise au point du présent document, sa relecture, en présence des deux époux, et leur acceptation de cette présentation. Je pense que les documents audio intéresseront aussi bien que la présente relation. Pour ce qui concerne les documents audio, je compte approfondir l’enquête, qui fera si nécessaire l’objet d’un complément écrit.
Cette scène a particulièrement frappé le témoin.
Bien comprendre : les lumières ainsi alignées avancent vers l’immeuble alors que se dirige vers elles une masse nuageuse épaisse, qui absorbera les lumières….
Date 2 octobre 2005
Voir Ci-dessous :
Et puis il y a eu aussi ce spectacle incroyable, juste au retour de mes vacances.
C’était le mercredi 5 septembre 2007. De chez moi, j’ai vu un hélicoptère, ( il en passe souvent à cet endroit assez rapproché de chez nous, il s’agit à mon avis d’un couloir aérien régulier pour ces aéronefs ). Mais là, c’était donc vers 23 H, ce qui m’a intriguée, c’est que, au bruit, je me suis bien rendue compte qu’il faisait une grande trajectoire autour des immeubles. J’ai l’ai vu alors qu’il allait quitter mon champ de vision : j’ai bien vu l’hélicoptère bien éclairé, il avait son puissant projecteur devant, qui éclairait une masse sombre qui était devant lui, et qui se dirigeait dans le même sens, à la même vitesse…Cette masse sombre était très rapprochée de l’hélicoptère….
A la mémoire de Sir Arthur Charles Clarke est décédé au Sri Lanka, à 1 h 30 du matin (heure locale), ce 19 mars 2008.
INTERVIEW WITH ARTHUR C. CLARKE.
BY TOD MESIROW
Sri
Lanka. An island south of India, some 17 million residents, site of a 15-year
guerrilla war with separatist Tamil Tigers in the north, exotic film location
i.e. “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” formerly known as Ceylon, formerly a Dutch
colony and an English colony, and home of the writer/inventor Arthur C. Clarke,
the focus of my trip halfway round the world.
My stay was short; 48 hours in total, only twice as long as it took me to get there. I had a day to recover from the trip and wander about, a day to interview Clarke, and then that evening it eased off again, back towards home.
Of all the people I’ve interviewed over the years, none have achieved quite the lasting impact in the way Clarke has. His conception of geosynchronous satellites to allow for instant world wide communication has had an enormous effect on modern history.
After a good night’s sleep, I woke up to a sunny morning, white fluffy clouds floating across the sky. Out my window I can see the ocean, the beach, a large government building, and the city of Colombo, the capital, stretching away to the south.
Nowhere does a nice international hotel feel more like a safe haven than in the third world, at least to someone not accustomed to third world travel. After refusing several offers of a guide, a young boy tags along, gently tossing in a fact or an idea of the next wonder to view. The city is moist; the air is moist, we’re near the equator. Everything seems to have that crumbliness as a result of all the dampness. There are trees and grass, but more than that there are half-completed, or half-destroyed, buildings next to new ones, next to tin shacks where Pepsis and Cokes are sold. People walking, on bikes, stuffed busses, three-wheeled motorized things; the normal urban jumble, all somehow decayed or decaying.
We walk by one shop and there’s a man on an overhang painting his building an ocean blue; next to his building there’s a large pile of picked over trash, right on the ground. We walk past an elephant; he’s being tended by three or four men in sarongs and bare feet. Half the feet I’ve seen here are bare. My guide, who calls himself Sri Lanka Man, tells me this elephant has killed two people and is crazy, that he belongs to a monk who has nine other elephants. The elephant’s caretakers say something to SLM, who asks me if I have any sweets, or candy. I say no; we go to a stand not far away and buy six hard candies. Unwrapping them all, SLM puts his hand out to the elephant, who is standing halfway below us, next to a pond, so that we’re looking him in the eye, and he cant’ get to us quickly with his two, long, pointy tusks. The elephant’s trunk finds the candies and sucks them up, curling back to his mouth and depositing the transitory treasure on his outstretched tongue.
We continue on to the Buddhist Temple on the lake. It’s small and wooden, and has tusks inside, on either side of a statue of Buddha in a large wooden box. I wonder what the relationship between Buddhism and elephants and their tusks is all about.
Next is the Buddhist temple where the elephant monk lives. He’s in front with another elephant, this one all covered with red cloth, with mirrors and embroidery all over it. We walk inside the temple and look at large brightly coloured statues of Buddha and other figures of the religion. I take my shoes off, unlacing the, and step gingerly around in my socks. Going in and out of temples is easier if you’re not wearing basketball shoes. There is a room filled with monks, all dressed in traditional orange sarongs with balked heads, busy eating their midday meal. Outside are the younger monks, sitting quietly in a line, eating as well. SLM shows me carvings of stone that lead into the temple. All very old, he says, carved by hand. Hundred fifty years ago people very strong. Which I guess he’s saying is in contrast to the many thin people who seem to predominate the areas we’ve visited so far.
Off to another few statues; one a sitting gold Buddha in a park where donkeys wander around; the other a large standing stone Buddha. While we’re looking at the tall standing Buddha the tour guide I first turned down pulls up in his three wheeler, and an Asian couple gets out of the back. He sees me and smiles. I gesture to SLM and say he walked along after me, and we ended up going around. Are you friends I ask. Yes he say. It’s fine. He had found his tourists for the day, so he was happy. Across the street was some large modern building; SLM couldn’t explain to me what it was; a cow-drawn cart went by, amidst the rest of the automobile traffic. A handmade, wooden car, pulled by a cow. More contrast.
We drove to Kelaniya, a 2,500 year old Buddhist temple with female monks. SLM was concerned that I understand the monks were women. The temple was large, and old. there was a Bo tree next to it, and people were walking clockwise seven times around the tree, and then approaching the statue of Buddha underneath the tree with an offering. There was a row of candles, and people would add oi, it looked like, and say a prayer.
Inside the temple the walls were covered with pictures describing Buddha’s history. A woman sat on the floor, her seven or eight-month old child lying on it’s back on a blanket. She was smiling and talking to the child. The child was calm as it looked around the dark room. In another room there was a large golden Buddha, with a sky and mountain diorama behind him.
People put their hands together, palms touching, fingers pointed upwards, and prayed, some standing, some kneeling. In another room there was another Buddha, reclining on his side, perhaps 30 or 40 feet long, behind a wall of sheer drapery.
On the way back to the city, we stopped at a cricket match I had seen on the way down. I love the remnants of colonialism that former colonies choose to retain. Sri Lanka was playing Pakistan in a test today; this was not that match, but several hotel employees had told me about the match proudly. We moved on, and I watched Sri Lanka pass by. The little three-wheeler had no doors, only a canvas roof. We passed a woman beating her clothes on the ground next to the local water tap; there were suds making the ground white. she looked pretty strong to me. We went past a metal shop, and a shirtless man was inside hammering away. Several small bicycle shops were busy with activity. All along the road people were walking, squatting in doorways, sitting on walls watching the world go by. In other parts of town, walls were high, and rimmed with barbed wire. The nice parts of town all had compounds; the poor parts had dogs running everywhere and trash piles in between open homes. A bus stopped to let people out. A man holding his daughter followed by his wife returned my smile. Further up the road a young boy in a sarong and no shirt was dumping a big bowl of water over his head. He smiled and laughed when he saw me watching, and threw some water in my direction, knowing it would never reach me.
Another stop was the National Museum. Admittance was $1.00 US. Inside were old stone carvings, drums, weapons, and jewellery. My favourite was the throne of the last King of Kandy, the ancient capital when Sri Lanka was Ceylon, that the British took with them to England when they conquered Ceylon in 1815. It was returned in 1936. More than 100 years later. The throne is covered in gold, with gems, and details of Ceylonese history. Quite regal. While we were inside the museum, the rains came. They lasted about 15 minutes, and then were gone. Earlier in the day, there was a huge circular rainbow of sorts surrounding the sun. Sri Lanka Man said Vishnu did it every so often. Whoever did it, I thought it looked pretty damn cool.
I arrived for my interview around 8AM. The house was built for the Bishop of Sri Lanka, Dr. Clarke tells me, but he died before he could occupy it. The elevator is a key feature, as Clarke has post-polio syndrome and doesn’t walk much. It’s old colonial style, large rooms with high ceilings, fans, ceramic tile floors in some rooms, wood floors in others. There’s a perfectly-kept traveler’s palm outside, that fans out one leaf at a time. It’s very hard to get it to grow that way according to my local contact.
I’m lead upstairs and find Clarke in his office, a large room with 3 walls of book cases, the fourth filled with a tv and other electronics. He sits behind his desk, and greets me with a big smile.
During the nearly 24 hours it had taken me to fly to Sri Lanka I read the official biography of Clarke; now a day later I was sitting in his house talking to him; the man who thought of satellites, who wrote “Childhood’s End,” who wrote “2001 A Space Odyssey.” Most people I don’t find as interesting.
“Listen to this,” he said, all giddy like a mischievous child. He turned his computer off, and it said “I can feel my mind going Dave,” in the voice of HAL, the murderous computer of 2001. He turned it back on; it said “I am now fully operational,” again in HAL’s voice. I’m sure he’s been doing that for years, for the countless visitors he’s welcomed, and he still thinks it’s a riot. Nice to know enthusiasm persists in some cases.
Back at the hotel, I put on my bathing suit and head down to the huge swimming pool, populated mostly by Europeans, in Sri Lanka on business. the sun sets behind palm trees over the ocean, as I lean back against the edge of the pool, talking to a Brit who’s in Sri Lanka to buy coconuts. They use parts of the coconut as padding in the mattresses of beds. He really enjoys his time in the warm sun of Sri Lanka. I feel like a world citizen, flitting here and there across our small, lovely planet, in search of stories, scenery, and sightings.
How did you come to conceive of the idea of placing satellites in geosynchronous orbit for communications?
ARTHUR C. CLARKE - Well, at the time I was walking-- at the time I was working in microwave radar, the first D.C.A. ground controlled equipment. So, you know, I was dealing with that technology. At the same time, now that the war was obviously coming to an end, we were trying to revive the British interplanetary society, which had been formed in 1933 with this crazy idea of going to the moon. So, I said, well, oh-- in what way can rockets be used to make some money to pay for spaceships, you see. [LAUGHS] So, I put the two ideas together, these rockets to launch satellites and use the satellites to act as relay stations for television and wrote it up in summer of '45 and it was published exactly 50 years ago, which I can't really believe.
What kind of impact did your paper have?
A.C.C. - I think it was influential in the long run. At the time it didn't have much of an impact. Ah, it-- the war was still on. Well, actually it was when the time it was published the atom bomb had been dropped and the meteor rocket had arrived. So, people took these ideas more seriously. It was not regarded with derision as it would have been if it had been published ten years earlier. And then of course, famous people saw it and I have reason to believe it sort of triggered the American interest in the idea of satellites.
Were you walking along the street one day and the idea hit you on the head or was it sort of a natural extension of your work?
A.C.C. - Well, I'd been thinking about space travel and all its applications, you know, for decades and, um, we space cadets of the British Interplanetary Society, we used to meet occasionally, even during the war, and lots of brainstorming sessions in what should we do to make space travel possible and I can't be absolutely sure that this wasn't really one of my colleagues' ideas, but I at least was the one who wrote it up and presented it to the public. [LAUGHS]
The impact of geosyncronous satellites has been enormous. Is that something that's gratifying to you?
A.C.C. - Yes, it's been very gratifying to me and particularly of course when people call it the Clarke Orbit, even though the idea of a satellite which is stationing over the earth is an old one, it's perfectly obvious of course, it had been obvious from the time of Newton when he formulated the laws of gravitation, such a satellite was possible. And early in the 1920's, ah, there was a book on the subject written by a gentleman by the name of Nordon, ah, which gave all the principles of space station construction, including the spinning space station rather like the one in 2001.
What was your contribution?
A.C.C. - My contribution was to point out that the solution to the problem of long distance TV was not to build hundreds of towers each [LAUGHS], you know, a few hundred miles apart, ah, or a floating towers across the Atlantic, which had been suggested, ah, but to go to a satellite orbit. And the particular one that was the best was the obviously, obviously the stationary one. Although the other satellites in lower orbits now are coming into the picture for telephony and other purposes, but for direct broadcast into the home for television, then the stationary satellite is the obvious answer.
Did it change the world?
A.C.C. - It has changed the world, I'm certain of that, but I can't claim too much credit, because if I hadn't published that paper in October '45, about ten of my friends would have done so within the year. [LAUGHS]
You were just quicker on the feed.
A.C.C. - That's right.
Why was science-fiction so appealing in the 30's? You were a rabid fan of science-fiction writing in the 30's. What was it about it that made it so much fun?
A.C.C. - Well, it appeals to people with, you know, imagination and science-fiction in various forms have been popular for a long time and of course Jules Vern is a classic and then Wells in England and there've been various other writers who-- there's a lot of science-fiction in the-- in the 19th century, most of which, except for Wells, has been forgotten. I was turned on by the early wonder stories and amazing stories in the 1930's and, ah, then by a book called the Conquest of Space, which was written by the assistant editor of Wonder Stories. That was published in, in 1931 and I'm happy to say the writer, David Lasser, is still around and still active.
Why has science fiction so precognitive?
A.C.C. - Well, we musn't overdo this, because science-fiction stories have covered almost every possibility in-- well, most impossibilities, obviously we're bound to have some pretty good direct hits as well as a lot of misses. But, that doesn't matter. Science-fiction does not attempt to predict. It extrapolates. It just says what if, not what will be, because you can never predict what will happen, particularly in, in politics and economics. You can to some extent predict in the technological sphere, um, flying, space travel, all these things, but even there we missed really badly on some things, like computers. No one imagined the incredible impact of computers, even though robot brains of various kinds had been-- my late friend, Issac Asmiov, for example, but the idea that one day every house would have a computer in every room and that one day we'd probably have computers built into our clothing, nobody ever thought of that.
The idea of an intelligent computer, an artificial intelligence like hal, do you think we'll achieve that?
A.C.C. - Oh, I don't think any question of that. I think that the people that say we will never develop, um, computer intelligence, ah, they merely prove that some biological systems don't have much intelligence.
How was it to create the scene when hal is dying in 2001?
A.C.C. - Well, I think it's Danny Curry and he deserves most of the credit for this and by the way, I'm gonna switch off my computer there and you will hear Hal say, "My mind is going." It happens every time I switch off my computer. [LAUGHS]
Was 2001 an interesting experience? You're planning what would happen if.
A.C.C. - Well, it was, ah, you know, a fascinating experience, because for many reasons. Um, I was moonlighting at Time Life where I was doing a book called Man in Space. Ah, this was in 1964 when the Apollo Program, you know, had been announced. But, ah, no one really believed we would go to the moon and, ah, still sort of had a scepticism. And also, ah, Stanley and I had to out guess what would happen, um, I believe-- this may not be true, maybe Stanley's publicity department-- he's supposed to have gone to Lloyd's, taken an insurance against Martians being discovered before the film was released. [LAUGHS] Well, ah, I don't think-- I don't know how Lloyd’s would
have carried the odds on that one. [LAUGHS] So, anyway, we were writing the film, ah, before we had any close-ups of the moon's surface. So, we had to guess what it might be like and there are all sorts of problems. I-- we-- I think we did pretty well. One or two mistakes. For instance, we show the moon as more rugged then in fact it turned out to be. It turned out to be sort of smooth and sort of sandblasted.
The film had an enormous impact. I mean--
A.C.C. - Eventually, eventually, but when it came out first there was a lot of negative criticism. I can remember one M.G.M. executive saying well, that's the end of Stanley Kubrick. And so [LAUGHS]--
Describe the impact you think it had eventually.
A.C.C. - Well, it turned on a whole generation, I believe in some cases with certain chemical assistance. [LAUGHS] But, um, and it still has its impact. In fact, um, I'm always coming across references to it, sometimes indirect. A lot of t.v. commercials now. I'm sure you're-- there's one on the local t.v. It shows somebody throwing a paintbrush up into the air, some paint commercial, and the paintbrush goes up to the sounds of 2001-- And, oh, I caught an episode of the Simpsons the other day and there's a marvelous parody of a-- apes all around the, the slab [LAUGHS] Very funny.
Even today.
A.C.C. - Very much today.
Who came up with the title?
A.C.C. - That was Stanley's. I think, ah, we had a-- the private working title was, um, Journey Beyond the Stars and, um, my-- [LAUGHS] one of my private titles, which gave the idea of what we were working on one time was How the Solar System was Won. [LAUGHS] That might be a good title one day.
With the exploratory nature of it all.
A.C.C. - Very much so.
In 2001 there's the pan am shuttle that goes off and there's all the corporate things--
A.C.C. - That shows how hard it is to for-- forecast the future. The Pan Am is gone, so is the Bell System you see.
What's your favorite scene?
A.C.C. - My favorite scene from 2000 and, and 1? I'm not sure I have a favorite. Certainly one I think with the greatest impact is when he picks up that bone and [LAUGHS] because that begins human history and you reminded me that I-- we screened this once in the U.N. Building for the Secretary General and the top branch of the U.N. and I suddenly realized, ah, when that scene came on that this is what the United Nations is trying to stop, the warfare, and also that the U.N. building is safe as a slab. [LAUGHS]
I wonder if there was something subconscious.
A.C.C. - Could well be. In fact, much of it-- as you see, I did a lot of brainstorming only a few blocks from the U.N.
The model has now become a cultural icon.
A.C.C. - True, yes.
Tell me about Olaf Stapleton. Does his work effect you in any particular way?
A.C.C. - Very much and I'm happy that Stapleton is now been rediscovered after a period of obscurity. Um, his novel, if you can call it a novel, Last and First Men, which is a history of the next 2000, million years or so, all the races of man on the different planets of the solar system. Although obviously dated in many ways, it was originally in 1930, had a colossal impact on me more than any other work I can imagine and his later book Star Maker, Sirius um, these are the great classics of modern science-fiction and, um, I'm happy to say that Stapleton has now been rediscovered.
How did he affect you?
A.C.C. - Well, just the reading of that book, which-- these enormous timespans, the idea that history was just beginning and not-- history would not be a matter of near few thousands of years, not even mere-- millions, but thousands of millions and on many planets.
It was a total paradigm shift?
A.C.C. - Yes, in a way and at the same time I had discovered Wonder Stories, ah, so, you know, my mind was going, expanding like the universe. [LAUGHS]