The Official Photos of the Roswell Incident4.10pm 8 July 1947

PhotographersFort-Worth Star-Telegram James Bond Johnson

Fort-Worth AAF Public Information Officer Major Charles A. Cashon

All photographs in this file depict the remains of a Rawin weather balloon. The public should be aware that the materials shown in these photographs are not the original Roswell wreckage. The original metallic foil should be a dark-grey shape-memory titanium-based alloy akin to NiTi (or NiTiCo). Since witnesses reported the shape-memory effect as occurring at room temperature, the highly crinkly-nature and bright-silver colour of the foil shown in these photographs is certainly a substitute wreckage.

This view is supported by the affidavit of Major Jesse A. Marcel, the principal investigator who examined the original Roswell wreckage on the local rancher’s property.

The Official Photographs ofJames Bond Johnson1

1 Photograph from http://mysite.verizon.net/res0gau0//id2.html.

The photographs shown in the next few pages were taken by Mr James Bond Johnson, a reporter for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.

Photographs marked with a UTA number are from the Fort Worth Star-Telegram Photograph Collection, Special Collections at the University of Texas Arlington Library. All other photos taken by Mr Johnson are said to be owned by UTA, but since the original plates are missing, they are now in the public domain.

The licensing rights to reproduce these photographs for commercial use can be obtained from:

Cathy SpitzenbergerLibrary Assistant for PhotographsSpecial CollectionsUniversity of TexasBox 19497Arlington, Texas 76019-0497Tel: 817 272 3393Fax: 817 272 3360

NOTE: Wikipedia claims 10000207.tif is in the public domain. This is incorrect.

Plate missing from UTA (Presumed to be in the public domain)Person depicted is Brigadier-General Roger Ramey.

Plate held by UTA. AR406-6 #2026 10000684.tif

Plate missing from UTA (Presumed to be in the public domain)Persons depicted are Brigadier-General Roger Ramey (left) and Colonel Thomas J. Dubose (right)

Photographic plate held by UTA. AR406-6 #2026 10000207.tif

The Official Photographs ofMajor Charles A. Cashon

Please note that photographs taken by US Government workers are in the public domain and may be used for commercial or non-commercial purposes.

With this in mind, Major Charles A. Cashon, the Public Information Officer (PIO) of Fort Worth Army Air Field in July 1947, was ordered by General Roger Ramey to take several early photographs of Jesse Marcel holding the substitute wreckage. The photographs of Cashon were taken on the same day as James Bond Johnson (i.e., July 8, 1947) but was not present when Mr Johnson arrived in General Ramey’s office.

Special Collections of UTA will assume ownership to the licensing rights for these photographs because they came from Fort-Worth Star-Telegram. However the Special Collections are unaware these additional photographs were slipped into Mr Johnson's photographic collection by the USAF.

Photographic plate held by UTA. AR406-6 #2026 10000208.tif2

Person depicted is Major Jesse A. Marcel

2 Taken by Major Cashon before Mr Johnson arrived. Marcel was kept in 24-hour seclusion away from the interview to avoid answering questions from Mr Johnson.

Photographic plate held by UTA. AR406-6 #2026 10000258.tif

Plate missing (Available in the public domain).First published in the 1967 edition of the Look Magazine.

Person depicted is Warrant Officer Irving Newton3

3 Karl Pflock names Major Charles A. Cashon as the photographer for this image.

Photograph of a non-secret weather balloon(the official USAF explanation in July 1947)

To convince the public of the non-secret weather balloon explanation for the Roswell incident as announced by General Roger Ramey of the Fort Worth Army Air Field, the USAF demonstrated this weather balloon to Mr James Bond Johnson, the photographer of this picture.

Photographic plate held by UTA. AR406-6 #2027-3 10004162.tif

Photograph of a secret Mogul balloon(the official USAF explanation as of 1994)

The picture shown on the next page reveals the reflector component of a typical Mogul balloon. The balloon is spherical in shape, and there may be one or more balloons incorporated into a typical Mogul design. Usually the bigger the reflector and/or the more reflectors attached, the more balloons are required to lift the payload.

The man holding the reflector is Dr Charles B. Moore (1920-2010) who formerly worked on Project Mogul. This official picture shows his best recollection of what a Mogul balloon should look like, including the materials used to make one (i.e., no shape memory alloys).

Dr Moore may have had his own interpretation of how to describe a Mogul balloon, but it is clear from glancing at this picture that no Mogul reflector or its balloon(s) can be described as a “disc”. Unless there is a more secret Mogul experiment involving an unclassified reflector component shaped like a “disc”, we must assume a standard Mogul balloon has no direct connection to a “disc”. The use of the word “disc” must refer to something else.

Furthermore, Dr Moore has never stated he used exotic materials such as a titanium-based shape-memory alloy to construct the reflector or balloon(s). The metal used in the reflector component was aluminium.

Does this mean the USAF is trying to say the standard Project Mogul experiment is a cover for yet another secret project (perhaps the object was really an experimental aircraft or missile of some type) conducted near Roswell they don’t want to talk about?

This picture is believed to have been taken by staff at New York University (NYU) during the time he was interviewed by the USAF for the Roswell Report of 1994-95.

Professor Charles B. Moore holding up the reflector component of a typical Mogul balloon.