Often considered the first modern UFO witness.
While flying near Mount Rainier in Washington state on June 24 1947, Kenneth Arnold saw nine extremely fast moving disks skipping across the sky. An AP wire reporter described them as flying saucers” — a name which stuck. Due to the publicity surrounding his report, and because he was a professional pilot who seemed reasonably sane, Arnold became known worldwide as a respectable UFO figure.
At the urging of , Arnold was briefly involved with the . He suspected that it was all a huge con by Fred Crisman or that it was some sort of intelligence operation.
Letter and drawing by Arnold regarding his sighting:
