Newspaper clippings of Roscoe H. Hillenkoetter in local and national media in the early 1960s regarding UFOs, Air Force secrecy, and his urging Congress for an investigation on UFOs

I decided to try to see what everyone else is seeing when they attempt to source the popular Hillenkoetter quote from 1960 on UFOs, so I simply looked up “hillenkoetter ufo quote” on google and duckduckgo. To my surprise, one of the top results on both search engines is basically a “debunk,” in quotes because it isn’t actually one. People simply can’t find the quote, probably because they didn’t look very hard, and decide it’s “almost certainly” fake. So this post is going to provide some national and local newspaper clippings on Hillenkoetter and UFOs in the early 60s, including this quote and some additional context.

The quote in full was covered in the New York Times on Feb. 28, 1960. Here is an easy to read clipping: https://imgur.com/a/ljgfJyx

And here is the page in full: https://imgur.com/a/BkWJPr0

Here is the article behind a paywall on the Times website where you’ll get the best quality version: https://www.nytimes.com/1960/02/28/archives/air-forge-order-on-saucers-cited-pamphlet-by-the-inspector-general.html

Here is probably a better article, more detailed, written a few days later: Medford Mail Tribune- 03 Mar 1960, R. H. Hillenkoetter on UFOs https://imgur.com/a/5yReih5

For more information, here is an interview Hillenkoetter did about 6 months later with a Washington corespondent 20 Oct 1960 on UFOs in which he basically rewords what he said in his letter to Congress: https://imgur.com/a/XYZlNwj

The Ithaca Journal- 01 Mar 1960, R. H. Hillenkoetter, additional information on UFOs and Air Force secrecy: https://imgur.com/a/TjvxcsH

Bangor Daily News- 20 Jun 1961, R. H. Hillenkoetter again urges Congressional investigation on UFOs: https://imgur.com/a/D4XjBJI

Roscoe H. Hillenkoetter was the third Director of Central Intelligence (DCI), and first Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (May 1947 – October 1950). After retiring from the CIA in 1950, Hillenkoetter warned J. Edgar Hoover of Agency’s “corruption”: https://www.muckrock.com/news/archives/2018/aug/29/Hillenkoetter-hoover/

After his CIA post, he resumed active duty and was eventually promoted to Vice Admiral in 1956. His final post was Inspector General of the Navy, finally retiring on May, 01 1957, after which he served on the Board of Governors for the civilian National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena from 1957 until 1962.