extraordinary%20encounters

Though some abduction proponents have
argued that abducting aliens are benignly intentioned,
Hopkins holds that they are indifferent
to human beings and are coldly unemotional.
Their purpose in coming here is to
study humans as if they were lab animals, and
they are particularly interested in our genetic
makeup.
See Also: Abductions by UFOs; Close encounters of
the third kind; Hybrid beings
Further Reading
Bloecher, Ted, Aphrodite Clamar, and Budd Hopkins,
1985. Final Report on the Psychological Test -
ing of UFO “Abductees.” Mount Rainier, MD:
Fund for UFO Research.
Hopkins, Budd, 1981. Missing Time: A Documented
Study of UFO Abductions. New York: Richard
Marek Publishers.
———, 1987. Intruders: The Incredible Visitations at
Copley Woods. New York: Random House.
———, 1996. Witnessed: The True Story of the
Brooklyn Bridge UFO Abductions. New York:
Pocket Books.
Unusual Personal Experiences: An Analysis of the Data
from Three National Surveys, 1992. Las Vegas,
NV: Bigelow Holding Corporation.
Hopkins’s Martians
In a letter published in the April 19, 1897,
issue of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, a traveling
salesman named W. H. Hopkins reported that
while strolling through hills east of Springfield,
Missouri, three days earlier, he encountered
two beautiful, unclad Martians.
The alleged incident occurred as newspapers
throughout America were chronicling
often sensationalistic accounts of unidentified
aerial objects generally referred to as “airships,”
though today they would be called
UFOs. Most people who took the reports seriously
believed that the ships were the secret
creations of American inventors who soon
would reveal all, but there was also some speculation
that Martians might be touring Earth.
Dubious tales of encounters with extraterrestrials
appeared in some newspapers.
Hopkins claimed that he had seen an airship
landed in a clearing. The most “beautiful
being I ever beheld,” a naked young woman
with hair falling to her waist, stood next to the
Hweig 125
craft. She was picking flowers, speaking all the
while in a musical voice in a language Hopkins
did not recognize. She was also vigorously
fanning herself even though the day was
hardly warm. In the shade cast by the ship, a
naked man with shoulder-length hair and a
beard, fully as long as the woman’s hair, lay on
the ground, also working a fan.
Until Hopkins stepped forward, the couple
did not know they were being observed. The
man leaped to his feet, and the woman threw
herself into his arms. As Hopkins tried to assure
them of his good intentions, they glared
back at him, clearly unable to understand
what he was saying. In time, however, the tension
dissipated, and a kind of conversation,
mostly involving gestures, ensued. When he
inquired about their place of origin, they
“pointed upwards, pronouncing a word
which, to my imagination, sounded like
Mars.” They studied him “with great curiosity.
. . . They felt of my clothing, looked at my
gray hair with surprise and examined my
watch with the greatest wonder.”
After he was given a tour of the interior,
the ship flew away with the occupants waving
farewell to Hopkins, “she a vision of loveliness
and he of manly vigor.”
See Also: Allingham’s Martian; Aurora Martian;
Brown’s Martians; Dentons’s Martians and Venusians;
Khauga; Martian bees; Michigan giant;
Mince-Pie Martians; Monka; Muller’s Martians;
Oleson’s giants; Shaw’s Martians; Smead’s Martians;
Thompson’s Venusians; Wilcox’s Martians
Further Reading
Bullard, Thomas E., ed., 1982. The Airship File: A
Collection of Texts Concerning Phantom Airships
and Other UFOs, Gathered from Newspapers and
Periodicals Mostly during the Hundred Years Prior
to Kenneth Arnold’s Sighting. Bloomington, IN:
self-published.
Clark, Jerome, 1981. “The Coming of the Venusians.”
Fate 34, 1 (January 1981): 49–55.
Hweig
Hweig is an extraterrestrial who channels
through an Oregon woman named Ida M.
Kannenberg. She believes that she first encountered
aliens in the California desert in