About The times. (Gainesville, Ga.) 1972-current | View Entire Issue (Aug. 1, 2020)
Shannon Casas Editor in Chief | 770-718-3417 | life@gainesvilletimes.com She (Times gainesvilletimes.com Weekend Edition - August 1-2, 2020 UFOs in Hall County? KELSEY PODO I The Times Old articles from The Times’ archives reveal patterns of alleged UFO sightings in Northeast Georgia. North Georgia locals recount alleged sightings over years BY KELSEY PODO kpodo@gainesvilletimes.com Hall County UFO data from the National UFO Reporting Center: (People can document sightings that happened either recently or in the past) Gainesville: 1968-2019,28 sightings Flowery Branch: 2006-2015,11 sightings Oakwood: 2007-2020,10 sightings Braselton: 2019, one sighting Gillsville: 2011, one sighting Lula: 2007-2015, four sightings Buford: 2002-2020,25 sightings ‘I was raised Christian and believe in the Bible. It gives me the belief that it is possible that God created other life. I wouldn’t live in fear until proven wrong.’Anthony Harrison, North Hall resident JOHNNY VARDEMAN vardeman! 956@att.net Tomato time takes troubles off your mind You know the COVID-19 pandemic isn’t getting any better when the 25th anni versary Jack McKibbon BLT luncheon is canceled. That luncheon, which has featured tomato-bacon-lettuce sandwiches with homemade ice cream for dessert, is a cel ebration of the peak of homegrown tomato season in North Georgia. When it was held for more than two decades on Murphy Bou levard in Gainesville, it also was an oppor tunity for classic car and truck enthusiasts to gather, kick the tires and stare at what’s under the hoods of vintage vehicles. The event is named after McKibbon because he has been the daddy of it, start ing it a quarter-century ago, along with such friends and colleagues as Howard Page, Howard Whelchel, Joe Wyant, Brent Danneman, Lee Martin, George Selke and the late Cecil Cochran, who churned the peach ice cream. The luncheon almost faded into history until Peach State Bank rescued it a couple of years ago. It won’t be held in the bank’s parking lot at the corner of West Academy and Washington streets downtown this year because of the impossibility of social dis tancing the hordes seeking to satisfy their ’mater sammich (interpreted “tomato sand wich”) cravings. While the luncheon offers bacon and let tuce to fix your sandwich, purists will be happy with just white bread, mayonnaise and a hunk of homegrown tomato. Most also insist on Duke’s Mayonnaise. Bill Smith, an award-winning chef at Crook’s Corner in Chapel Hill, N.C., was fea tured in Our State magazine, a publication that extols the pleasures of The Old North State. A video shows him talking about and fixing a tomato sandwich. He goes with white bread and one thick slice of a home grown tomato, but daringly suggests McCor mick’s Mayonesa Mayonaisse, instead of Duke’s or Heilman’s as many connoisseurs prefer. One of its ingredients is lime juice. Smith sprinkles a little salt on his tomato, but others believe a dash of pepper is better. Some depart from white bread and go with wheat, but the main ingredient, of course, is the saucer-sized slice of tomato. Bob Hamrick, former Gainesville mayor, used to say a good ’mater sammich is sloppy; you know you’ve got one when you have to lean over the kitchen sink to eat it, the juice running down to your elbows. North Georgia gardens are brimming today with those ripe red Big Boys, Better Boys or whatever. People line up to harvest them at local farmers’ markets. There are even festivals to celebrate this famous fruit (it isn’t officially a veggie). They’ve been held everywhere from Glen Ella Springs in Habersham County to Cali fornia to Tennessee. In Spain, they shoot rockets filled with tomatoes, then wallow around in the juice on the streets. Another such quirky event is a Tomato War in Ver mont. There they drink Bloody Marys, then throw tomatoes at each other. New Jersey holds a tomato contest with cash prizes going to growers of the largest tomatoes. Some specimens have weighed more than 6 pounds. It is unclear who “invented” the tomato sandwich, though one of the Earls of Sand wich is said to have invented the sandwich itself, ordering a hunk of meat between two slices of bread that he could hold in one hand while gambling with the other. One would guess ’mater sammiches came quickly after that. Surely Native Americans discovered how tasty tomatoes are between bread slices, though mayonnaise probably wasn’t readily available on the trading post’s shelves as it apparently was “invented” in the 1700s. There have been songs written about homegrown tomatoes (John Denver), even books about them. “Tomatoville” is a web site all about tomatoes. There are even monuments to tomatoes, kind of like the one to the Big Red Apple in Cornelia. One tomato monument sits in front of the municipal building in Warren, Ark. Another stands in Pittstown, Pa., which pro claims itself “Tomato Capital of the World.” There’s even one in Russia. Somebody should erect a ’mater sammich monument in North Georgia. Not to take away from anybody else’s tomatoes, there just seems to be something especially flavor ful about the ones grown around here. The pandemic is depressing. Politics is painful. Street violence is disheartening. But tomatoes are plentiful and ripe for the picking and the eating. Nothing like a juicy homegrown slice of tomato inside a couple of pieces of bread to make things all better. Johnny Vardeman is retired editor of The Times. He can be reached at 2183 Pine Tree Circle NE, Gainesville, GA 30501; phone, 770-532- 2326; email, vardeman1956@att.net or johnny. peggy1956@gmail.com. His column publishes weekly. Anthony Harrison, of North Hall, says he will never forget the day he saw a UFO. He remembers staring up at the sky in his front yard at age 8 and spotting some thing he couldn’t explain. Harrison said he yelled for his mother, who came out of the house to gaze in awe with him. “It was in the early 70s,” he said. “Me and my mother were in the front yard. It was a gray overcast day with low-lying clouds, and in the sky, there was a triangu lar rotation of round colored lights, alter nating back and forth.” Harrison said the peculiar sight was near North Browning Bridge Road around Don Carter State Park. He recounts watch ing it with his mother for around 10 min utes before it disappeared. “I’ve got a very vivid memory of it,” he said. “Thinking back on it now, there was no sound whatsoever. It was bright and coming through the clouds and very large. ” Having sifted through his mind for explanations, Harrison said he came to one conclusion — UFO. “I was raised Christian and believe in the Bible,” he said. “It gives me the belief that it is possible that God created other life. I wouldn’t live in fear until proven wrong.” Harrison isn’t the only person in Hall County to have spotted an odd object in the sky. Ronald Peewee Simmons, who used to live in South Hall, said he remembers see ing one from his front yard around 1977. He was 14 years old at the time, and said the occurrence took place after dark. “I was in my front yard with some of my family,” Simmons said. “I looked up and saw a row of lights. All were different colors, then they would change colors. This went on for about an hour then it went out.” He said the object never made a sound. A pattern of reports Despite an absence of extraterrestrial data in Northeast Georgia, The Times’ archives, contains a trove of UFO-related articles and letters to the editor spanning over decades. An article published on June 24, 1988 in The Times headlined, “UFOs Attack Northeast Georgia,” outlines reports from the area where people have spotted the unexplained. The story, written by James Kendley, begins with accounts from July 26,1948. Around 10 p.m. that day, several Hall resi dents noticed a light traveling north. Carl E. Hopwood, his niece and J.M Lun sford told The Times (formerly The Daily Times) of a “skyrocket with varicolored fire from beneath it... about 2 feet in diam eter ... had a 6-foot fiery tail and was trav eling at an altitude of about 5,000 feet at a speed of 650 miles per hour...” The article states that Emeline Shirley of Alto reported seeing a “reincarnated saucer” on the same day around the size of a grapefruit, which shed “weird blue light.” From June to August in 1964, The Times reported that 30 people from Northeast Georgia over the course of around 15 days described at least 11 UFO group sightings. The first collection of descriptions involved a “top-shaped (object), glowing orange, moving then hovering. Display ing various colored lights, mainly a green light pointed downward. A smell described from brake fluid to embalming fluid.” Other sightings published in The Times include those from Oct. 21,1952; July 5, 1953; June 20,1996; Oct. 5-7,1966; March 22,1967; Nov. 23,1968; Sep. 12,1973 and Sept. 12,1980. Both Lisa MacKinney, Hall County Library director, and Glen Kyle, executive director of the Northeast Georgia History Center, said their respective databases don’t include any information regarding Hall UFO sightings. “We’ve got nothing here about it,” Kyle said. “I haven’t come across anything UFO Northeast Georgia related, which is too bad because I think it would be kind of cool.” Melanie Baez, the founder of the Para normal Society of Northeast Georgia, also expressed that she had no information about local UFO sightings but will keep an eye open. The National UFO Reporting Center keeps a catalogue of thousands of UFO sightings through history, most of which are in the U.S. People can file a report by visiting its website at nuforc.org or by call ing its hotline at 206-722-3000, which is only recommended if the observation occurred within the last week. According to its database, local UFO sightings reported to the center include 28 in Gainesville from 1968-2019; 11 in Flow ery Branch from 2006-2015; 10 in Oakwood from 2007-2020; one in Braselton in 2019; 1 in Gillsville in 2011; four in Lula from 2007- 2015 and 25 in Buford from 2002-2020. What could they be? Lt. Kiley Sargent of the Hall County Sheriff’s Office said over his 30 years in law enforcement, he has come across sev eral UFO reports; however, not of extra terrestrial nature. “When you’re thinking about unidenti fied flying objects, that’s anything that can’t be identified, not necessarily an alien lifeform,” Sargent said. “That could be any type of aircraft that’s unidentified. ” While working in the Criminal Investi gations Division from 2009-2015, Sargent said he touched base with the Federal Aviation Administration or the nearby airport, if a report came in about an unex plainable object in the sky. “We generally start with the local air port,” he said. “Sometimes the military may be having some type of operations that are not very public that may be classified.” Nowadays if people spot peculiar lights flying through the sky at night, Sargent said drones may be the culprit. Maurice Snook of Athens, a retired chem ist known by many in Northeast Georgia as Mr. Science, has been keeping a close eye on the sky for around 70 years. He received his first telescope in the ‘50s as a child, and since then hasn’t stopped studying planets, stars and other celestial objects. Before the COVID-19 outbreak hit the Peach State in March, Snook would travel to schools throughout the region to engage children in chemistry shows and teach them about astronomy with his massive telescopes. Snook knows the night sky just as well as the back of his hand and has seen his fair share of odd sightings. Snook said on every occasion, he has been able to connect his own observations to a logical explanation. Snook said he remembers when he first started spotting Echo satellites. The first one was launched in 1960, which appeared as a large silver balloon. He said Echo sat ellites bounce radio signals off their reflec tive material, allowing communication from one end of the continent to the other. From that point on, he said more sat ellites have taken up residency in space. Recently, he said the pieces of equipment have arrived in larger numbers. “Every couple of months, they’re (com munication companies) sending up hun dreds of satellites in one launch,” he said. “When they’re placed into orbit, they’re together near one another, and eventually will be dispersed.” When people spot different colored lights moving in sync, on most occasions, Snook said they’re looking at recently dis patched satellites. “Satellites are one thing, especially if they are rotating and the sun reflects off solar panels or a bright side of them, they can make a pretty bright star-like object that looks like it was moving,” he said. “And then disappears as it rotates away.” Snook said airplanes can also produce a similar effect, appearing like large approaching objects with colorful lights. And there are natural explanations, too, he said. If someone observes a bright sphere leaving a path of light in its wake, he said they’re most likely viewing a fireball, also known as a brighter-than-usual meteor. Snook said Georgians may even be able to spot one of these brilliant blasts of light on Aug. 11 during the Perseids meteor shower, one of the brightest meteor show ers of the year. Snook says he can’t speak with total certainty about what others saw, but for all those alien hunters out there, it’s likely bad news. “Unless I was there seeing what they were seeing, I’m not going to say, ‘Oh you’re just crazy,’” he said. “I’m sure there is no doubt a logical explanation of a natu ral phenomenon, and you don’t have to invoke alien spaceships.”
