SUBJECT: UFOs IN WYTHEVILLE FILE: UFO1264
NEWS CLIPPING SERVICE
DATE OF ARTICLE: February 24, 1989
SOURCE OF ARTICLE: Daily Telegraph
LOCATION: Bluefield, Virginia
BYLINE: Charles Boothe
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THIS FILE WAS PROVIDED BY THE UFO NEWSCLIPPING SERVICE
AND PREPARED BY PARANET ALPHA -- PARANET INFORMATION
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ANOTHER VIEW
UFOS IN WYTHEVILLE: AUTHORS STILL SEEKING ANSWERS
Credit: D. Gordon
About 75 people gathered at Fincastle Motor Inn in Tazewell
on a recent snowy Friday night. What they saw and heard left
many with a new, or renewed, interest is strange things that are
seen in the sky.
Everyone was there to hear and meet Danny Gordon and Paul
Dellinger, who recently co-authored a book on the UFO sightings
in Wythe County.
I read the book a few weeks ago and wrote about it in this
column, but I wanted to hear Gordon and Dellinger tell their
stories first-hand. It was well worth the trip, despite the bad
weather.
Gordon, news director of radio station WYYV in Wytheville,
is a skeptic and initially hesitated to get involved with the
story after two area policemen reported seeing a strange object
in September 1987. Gordon read the story on the air, with tongue
slightly in cheek, and he was quite surprised when his phone
started ringing off the hook. People were calling to tell him of
other sightings in the area.
After many reported sightings from people, who, he was
convinced, had no reason at all to make the stories up, Gordon
decided to go look for himself. That was the beginning of a
series of events that Gordon could not have imagined, or
believed, would ever happen.
Gordon, a newsman with 10 years experience, soon saw a UFO
and eventually saw many more, about 40 in all.
But the sightings came with a price.
He was constantly bombarded with phone calls about UFOs, not
only from people in the Wytheville area, but calls and letters
came from many states as the story gradually broke around the
country.
In fact, the calls, letters and visits by people who had
seen or wanted to see UFOs were almost more than Gordon could
handle. It soon turned into a wide-awake nightmare that left him
exhausted.
His life was threatened, someone broke into his apartment
and stole the negatives of the photos of UFOs he had taken (he
has some color prints he still carries with him at all times),
and he's convinced his phone was, and is, tapped.
Gordon finally decided to enlist the help of Dellinger,
Wytheville bureau chief for the Roanoke Times and World News, to
record what had happened. It's a fascinating story, and anyone
who hears them speak or reads their book, Don't Look Up!, will be
absolutely convinced Gordon and many people in the area saw some
very bizarre aircraft in the sky.
Gordon is still a skeptic, he's also now somewhat of a
cynic. Because everywhere he turned for help -- the news media,
the U.S. Air Force, a private UFO investigation organization --
he got nothing but flack, deception and, sometimes, ridicule.
And that doesn't sit well with Gordon, who is obviously an
honest man, a straight-shooter who likes to cut through the bull.
Maybe the response from that famous king of yellow
journalism, The National Enquirer, best sums up what has happened
in Wytheville.
When the sightings were at their peak during late fall 1987,
they sent a reporter to Wytheville to cover the story. But he
didn't write a word.
The reason: People who witnessed the UFOs were not weirdos,
they didn't have any wild stories to tell. They were down to
earth folks who saw some unusual, and unexplained, flying objects
-- not the sensational type of stuff tabloids use.
Unfortunately, few respectable newspapers or television
stations did much with the story either, just a few articles and
spots about the sightings -- nothing investigative.
But Gordon is sticking to his guns. He's not in it for the
money or the attention. That's not his style. He just wants
some answers.
Charles Boothe is city editor of the Daily Telegraph
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