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From the High Desert book cover

From the High Desert

A Cultural History of Art Bell

Thumbnail for September 2, 1994: UFOs - John Lear

September 2, 1994: UFOs - John Lear

Sep 2, 1994
3h 28m
0:00 / 0:00
John Lear, airline captain and son of Learjet inventor Bill Lear, returns to Art Bell for a rare and wide-ranging conversation tracing the history of UFO encounters from the 1947 Roswell crash through four decades of government secrecy. Holding 18 world speed records and over 17,000 flight hours, Lear brings an aviator's credibility to claims most would dismiss outright.

Lear walks through a detailed timeline of recovered craft and alien bodies, from the 1948 Aztec recovery to the 1964 Holloman landing where extraterrestrials allegedly met with military officials. He describes the 1979 Dulce incident, a reported massacre of 44 scientists and 66 Delta Force soldiers during a confrontation with aliens at an underground base. Lear recounts witnessing a test flight of a recovered extraterrestrial craft near Groom Lake in 1989, arranged by government scientist Bob Lazar, and reveals that Jackie Gleason was shown alien bodies at Homestead Air Force Base by President Nixon.

Once an advocate for disclosure, Lear now argues the public should not know the full truth, suggesting the religious implications alone would cause societal breakdown.

Key Moments

  1. Roswell 1947 - 200 living witnesses and MJ-12: Lear claims that as of 1985 there were over 200 still-living witnesses who touched, loaded, or saw the Roswell craft and bodies, and that Truman formed MJ-12 on September 24, 1947.

  2. Jackie Gleason saw alien bodies at Homestead AFB: Lear recounts that Nixon took Jackie Gleason from a 1972 Florida golf game to Homestead Air Force Base to view alien bodies in cryogenic storage - a story documented in Gleason's second wife's unpublished manuscript.

  3. First human mutilation - Sergeant Lovett at Holloman 1956: Lear cites the Grudge 13 report on Tech Sergeant Jonathan P. Lovett, dragged into a saucer at the Holloman range in 1956 by a snake-like arm, his mutilated body recovered 10 miles downrange days later.

  4. Bob Lazar, S4, and watching the disc fly at Groom Lake: Lear describes Bob Lazar's recruitment via Edward Teller, his S4 back-engineering work on extraterrestrial propulsion, and the March 21, 1989 night Lazar took Lear to watch a saucer test flight from outside Groom Lake through a Celestron 8 telescope.

  5. Lear was fired for believing in flying saucers: Lear, then senior L-1011 captain at American Trans Air, was called to Indianapolis on July 7th, asked if he believed in flying saucers, and fired on the spot with three months severance for signing a no-sue agreement.