Story by

Fritz Busch

Art Strauch was the first to see a strange object that seemed to be about 2,000 feet above the ground, to the northwest, about a quarter mile away. After watching the silver gray object that changed to a bright white to dull orange color several times, Strauch stopped his car on the road and looked at the object with and without 7×35 binoculars.

He took photographs of it with ah Kodak Instamatic camera, using Kodak Ektachrome X film, color slides EX 126-20. The camera lens was set for infinity. The shutter speed was .60 seconds, no flash.

“The rounded top of the dome was a metallic silver gray that reflected the rays of the setting sun, turning the object into a large, orange ball,” Strauch said in a story in the Tucson, Az.-based, November-December 1965 Aerial Phenomena Research Organization (APRO) Bulletin.

“Surrounding the dome were four small port holes that emitted a bright yellow light. A light blue glow was seen just below the windows. An outer ring was rotating counterclockwise, causing it to throw off an aurora or halo of light that changed from orange to white, with a tinge of blue and green.”

Strauch said he had no idea what the object was, but that it was different than anything he had ever seen in the sky. “I’m positive it was a machine driven by some inner power with tremendous speed. …We heard a high-pitched, whining sound as it passed overhead,” Strauch said. “The outline was unmistakable through my binoculars as that of a flying saucer…then it disappeared into space at tremendous speed.”

Strauch wrote a letter and included a slide and two enlarged photographs of what he saw, dated Nov. 25, 1965, to the U.S. Air Force 934th Troop Carrier Group at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport.

Strauch received a slide and two enlargement prints and a letter dated Jan. 14, 1966, from Eric T. de Jonckheere, Colonel, USAF Deputy for Technology and Subsystems. The Air Force 65-59 Photo Analysis Report by Intelligence Research Specialist William R. Kinney stated “The lack of definitive signature to the light spot and dense background completely devoid of objects of any kind, precludes an interpretive type analysis. Further, the determination of which is the top/bottom of the object could not be made from the information, prints and negative furnished. Constant density of background surrounding the alleged UFO (Unidentified Flying Object) is questionable. Some contrast is normally evident even on a shot of a darkened sky. An analysis of the original negative might prove beneficial.”

A World War II Veteran, Strauch served in five major military campaigns including the D-Day landing at Normandy Beach. He saw action in France, Germany, England, Belgium, Holland and Africa before he was discharged as a First Sergeant.

Appointed a Sibley County Deputy Sheriff in 1960, Strauch was in pursuit of an escaped prisoner in 1961 when he was severely injured and paralyzed from the waist down. Surgery and therapy helped him, but he was disabled and began writing after taking journalism and creative writing classes at Mankato State College. Most of his writing efforts were hunting and fishing articles for the Outdoorsman magazine.

On an online UFO blogging website, a man who identified himself as “Bear” commented on Nov. 25, 2010. “My brother and I saw what I’m sure was the same object as in the St. George photo, near Klossner.”

“It was the same night, and our farm was right along the line of about 35 different witnesses who called in reports to the Brown and Nicollet County Sheriff Departments,” Bear wrote. “I was just a nine-year-old kid at the time, but that night is seared into my memory. Even at that age, although at the time, I didn’t know why I knew that there was no craft of any kind made on earth that could fly like it was flying, going from high speed to hovering almost instantaneously, making turns so fast, it looked like a billiard ball bouncing off the rails. Now I know any human pilot in such a craft would be reduced to a bloody pulp against the inside of the craft from the kind of G-forces involved. What it was I still have no idea, after 47 years of trying to find answers.”

Another UFO incident was reported by Marshall County Minnesota Deputy Sheriff Val Johnson in 1979. Johnson reported a beam of light just above the road while he patrolled near Stephen, Minn., at about 2 a.m. on Aug. 27, 1979.

Johnson said the beam of light sped towards him, engulfing his squad car and breaking vehicle glass. Johnson said he his wristwatch and vehicle clock stopped for 14 minutes during the encounter, the squad car windshield shattered, a headlight and red emergency light were damaged and a radio antenna was bent.

Deputies responded to Johnson’s call for help and found the squad car sideways on the road, Johnson was bruised and had eye irritations compared to “welder’s burns.”

A number of people who study UFO incidents called Johnson’s encounter one of the most significant of the 1970s. Johnson appeared as a guest on ABC’s “Good Morning America” television program on Sept. 11, 1979.