Date:         Tue, 1 Jul 2003 09:45:29 EDT
From:         Bob Lee
Subject:      Heel & Sole Question

Busy weekend I am sure. Nice work keeping everything together.

I was looking at some of the 2000 archives and ran across an interesting discussion that seemed to be casting some doubt on the source of the sole and heel parts discovered on Niku. Did Tighar ever reach a reasonable conclusion on these artifacts? I did try a search of the archives, but didn't appear to find anything conclusive.

Bob
***********************************************************************
From Ric

If things are together it's none of my doing.

As for the shoe sole fragments and heels we found in 1991, my current opinion (which is shared by most, but not necessarily all, of my colleagues) is that they are not related to the Earhart disappearance.  My reasons for thinking that are:

- Photos seem to show that the heels of AE's blucher oxford shoes (two pair with her on the World Flight) featured an unusual two-tone color pattern (light colored on the inside half and dark colored on the outside half.  Neither of the heels we found on Niku look like that. (see Research Bulletin #31 "Shoe Fetish - Artifact Analysis, Part 2" on the TIGHAR website)

- There seems to be a size discrepancy between the reassembled sole and Earhart's shoes as measurable from photos - but because we can't be precise about the size of the reassembled sole we can't be sure that this criticism is valid.

- The shoe parts we found were in the wrong place.  They were on the other side of the island (Aukeraime) from where we now believe Gallagher found the bones and shoe parts in 1940 (at the Seven Site).

So what was a woman's blucher oxford shoe with a 1930s vintage American Cat's Paw replacement heel doing on Niku?  Dunno.  We have to remember that the identification of the sole fragments as being from a woman's shoe was based only on the tightness of the stitching holes that are still visible.  If the rubber sole shrunk over the years (as it may very well have) it could give the impression of a smaller shoe with tighter stitching.  If it's not really a woman's shoe it could date from the USS Bushnell survey in 1939.

Anyway, I don't think it's part of our puzzle.  The area was the focus of intense search activity in 1997 and nothing more was found.  The Seven Site has proved to be a far more fruitful field to till.

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 1 Jul 2003 10:42:49 EDT
From:         Bob Lee
Subject:      Re: Roosevelt's Request

Ric wrote:

> We have a strange situation that needs research.

I've sent off an email to my Mom who had some interest in the whole event as I've said before -- she met Amelia at Purdue shortly before here fateful trip. I'll let you know.

Bob
*****************************************************************
From Alan

With all due respect to Betty I would be more inclined to believe that DURING the search someone may have thought AE could be in danger if information pinpointing her location was made PUBLIC. I cannot imagine that folks would have been told not to relay any information they had to the proper authorities. If that actually happened it would have been widely known and certainly printed in the papers.

Pirate activity has always existed on the high seas just as it does today. AE and FN would have been sitting ducks for such people. It would not surprise me that caution might have been urged although I have never seen or heard of any such warning or even a comment along those lines.

Absent any newspaper evidence in that regard I would have trouble putting any credence to this issue. More likely it was a misconstrued statement.

Alan
*********************************************************************
From Ric

I would be in complete agreement were it not for the fact that two people with no connection to each other tell such similar stories.  There were dozens of wire service newspaper article printed during the search covering every conceivable angle of the story but I've never seen one that could even be misconstrued as President Roosevelt asking the public not to come forward with information.  I don't recall one that even mentioned FDR at all.  Afterward there was, however, something of a political stink about how much money the Navy had spent sending all those ships and planes to search for Amelia.  I wonder if FDR may have said something in the context of that wrangle in trying to put an end to the affair.

****************************************************************************
From Bill Shea

It might have been that "Treasury Secretary Henry Morgenthau, Jr. ......was concerned that release of the official report would smear Amelia Earhart's reputation." (from Riley's article in Naval History)

*************************************************************************
From Ric

It's true that Morgenthau refused to release Warner Thompson's report to Paul Mantz but, as far as I know, the press and the public didn't know about any of that.

**************************************************************************
From Dede

There has to be a newspaper archive of what was printed at that time. Most of the larger newspapers like the New York Times have dated material available at central libraries. Usually when the President or his spokesperson makes any type of statement, it is repeated throughout the media. It may have not been a threat, but rather just a statement made on the basis of information that may or may not have turned out to be valid.
Hope this helps,
Dede
**********************************************************************
From Ric

Betty was in St. Pete.  Mabel was in Amarillo.  Whatever they saw obviously got national coverage and should be findable in any major newspaper archive.

***********************************************************************
From Marty Joy

Could Betty and Mabel have read the same newspaper article and misconstrued what President Roosevelt said?

***********************************************************************
From Ric

That's our working hypothesis.
***********************************************************************
From Herman De Wulf

Couldn't it be that FDR was fed up with confusing reports and a flood of hoaxes triggering off more hoaxes and had decided they confused the search and wanted to put an end to them?  At least, that's what I understand when reading between the lines.
LTM
***********************************************************************
From Ric

I've never seen anything to indicate that FDR was that engaged in the search. The highest government official who appears in any of the message traffic during the search is Secretary of the Treasury Morgenthau.  The White House is not even copied in. The more I think about it the more I suspect that if FDR got involved at all it was in the context of political damage-control when Republicans tried to make an issue of the cost of the search.
***********************************************************************
From Paige Miller

First, I have no knowledge one way or the other about such a request by FDR ... but it sure sounds to me like a pre-WWII urban myth. The reason I say so is that we allegedly have freedom of speech in this country, and it would be an unprecedented thing for a president of the United States to tell the population that they can't speak about a certain subject, especially a subject that was in the news. It is even more bizarre, in my opinion, for the President of the United States to threaten consequences if people kept talking about something that was in the news. What possible benefit to the USA would there be by having its people stop talking about AE, especially since there were virtually no facts known about what happened to her?

Now whether my guess above is true or not, I certainly can believe that Mabel and Betty thought it was true. 
--
Paige Miller #2565
LTM
*************************************************************************
From Ric

Good point Paige.  Americans have always responded to blatant assaults on their Constitutional rights with howls of outrage.  If FDR had tried to pull something like this we'd know about it.  It's my impression that urban legends are largely a by-product of mass communication and are more common now than they were then.  It's hard for me to imagine how the same myth would reach both of Betty and Mabel in 1937.  Radio brought people news and entertainment, but "talk radio" is a more recent phenomenon.  If there's a culprit I suspect it's a wire service story that got picked up by many local papers and could be easily misconstrued.

This is like chasing a ghost.  Something seems to have been scaring people and we have a hunch that there may have been something out there that was making trouble, but we're quite sure that it couldn't have been what they thought it was.  This is a tough one.

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 1 Jul 2003 10:46:22 EDT
From:         Eric
Subject:      Re: Roosevelt's Request

If this request was, in fact, made, it would seem to indicate that there was some sort of international race on to see who could find AE and FN first.  (In the last chapter of his book, Fred Goerner, theorizes just such a scenario.) If this was the case, the U.S. Government certainly would not want some civilian short wave listener to give away AE's location and have it appear in the press.  While I don't subscribe to Goerner's "Amelia was a spy" theory, it is possible that part of his reconstruction might be close to the truth.  (I would like to think, however, that instead of Mili Atoll in the southeastern Marshalls, that AE and FN landed on and were recovered from Gardner Island.)

LTM,
Eric, NAS NORTH, San Diego, CA.
**********************************************************************
From Ric

As Paige Miller has pointed out, the real problem is that no American president could get away with such a public notice without declaring martial law.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 1 Jul 2003 10:56:00 EDT
From:         Dennis McGee
Subject:      FDR's request

On the face of it the two incidents sound out of place.  For the president to specifically issue a "stop work" order, with implied penalties for violating that order, on the AE/FN search seems to me to be a case of ". . . he protesteth too much."  I would think it would certainly raise a lot of questions in the news media and actually encourage some to be even more active in the search.   Calling of the search is one thing, but suggesting punishment for those who continue is a whole different ball game.     I can easily see the president announcing an official end of the AE search.  Hedging his position with phrases such as " . . . thorough search . . . Naval vessels and aircraft . . .  thousands of men . . . professional opinions . . . countless man-hours . . . scoured the sea . . . . etc." FDR could've painted a vivid portrait of a lengthy, comprehensive, and difficult search that came up empty.  Therefore, in an effort to put this behind us and move on (something we'd say in the 90s and 00s) and to let the families grieve in private . . .

    But where the implied penalties for continuing the search came from is anyone's guess.

LTM, who continues the search
Dennis O. McGee #0149EC
***********************************************************************
From Ric

The heck of it is, the Earhart search was not important enough to merit presidential attention.  It was a big news story for a week or so but before the search even officially ended it was gone from page one.  So far, I can't find any mention of FDR in anything related to the Earhart search.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 1 Jul 2003 10:57:23 EDT
From:         Tom King
Subject:      Re: Heel & Sole Question

For what it's worth, I'm one of the colleagues who disagrees with Ric's dismissal of the shoe parts.  Although I think we got overly enthusiastic about the shoe at first, the fact remains that it very much appears to be a 1930s woman's shoe in a place where it shouldn't be.  We still don't know how many shoes Earhart had with her, or what size they were.  As for it being in the wrong place, I think it's silly to suppose that Earhart just hightailed it down to the Seven Site and died; there could be a number of intermediate campsites, and that's what the Aukaraime South site might be.  Or might not, of course.  I'd say the jury's still out.  But I do agree with Ric that the Seven Site is a far more fruitful place to focus our attention.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 1 Jul 2003 16:34:25 EDT
From:         Lynn Stancil
Subject:      No Subject

I would be more inclined to believe that if such a warning was issued that rather than piracy, it would have been the Japanese that Roosevelt feared as they were near an area that was occupied by the Japs during that time.
********************************************************************
From Ric

In July of 1937 the U.S. had no reason to assume that Americans who inadvertently ended up in Japanese controlled areas would be in danger.  The U.S., in fact, officially asked the Japanese to help in the search.

*********************************************************************
From Bob Lee
I am not a FDR scholar by any measure, but I think he was rather a 'spy freak' in that he used a lot of friends and associates to gather information outside of the 'official government channels'. If this is true, this could be a reaction by someone who could claim some 'official' status to try and reduce the number of reports that were coming in from civilians. Why the lack of any broad coverage is a total mystery to me.

Also, while the search may not have been important enough to warrant FDR's involvement -- I bet his wife would have had much more interest in the whole affair and she wielded a fair degree of influence.

Bob
************************************************************************
From Ric

Before we speculate about why FDR may have wanted to squash reports by people who thought they heard Amelia we need to figure out what, if anything, caused these two women to think that he did.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2003 08:44:25 EDT
From:         Daryll
Subject:      Re: Roosevelt's Request

Ric wrote;

>It sounds absurd on the face of it. As far as I know, FDR was not
>directly involved at all.

He was certainly involved in the area trying to secure islands for Pan Am to land their Clippers at during this time period. The prize was Canton and Enderbury, which required a Presidential order. The "Canton Island Affair" between the USCG Avocet & British HMS Wellington occurred in June '37' during the eclipse expedition.

Miller, working with the CG which was under Morgenthau and the Treasury dept. had already secured Howland, Baker and Jarvis using the Guano Act. Hawaiians were living on those islands to maintain a residential status to block the British moves to claim title. The British were busy laying claim to the Phoenix Group and had been to Canton in Jan '37' to plant the flag. The British were trying to do what they could on the part of British Imperial  Airways. "Landing Rights" was what prevented Pan Am & Imperial Airways from going where ever they pleased. The British wanted "landing rights" in Hawaii which was against Pan Am's wishes.

What does this have to do with Earhart?? Nothing if you insist on looking at Earhart's flight as an independent stunt flight by a middle aged woman looking for one last chance at glory.

To maintain that point of view; you have to ignore her backing from Lockheed and other famous aviation technical companies of the time, the US in preparing Howland island which was essential to her Pacific crossing. Her navigator who was once head of Pan Am navigation and who had surveyed routes for Pan Am before. The total lack of support from anything British including any radio communications with Darwin, Nauru and the Gilberts.

Daryll
*************************************************************************
From Ric

>her backing from Lockheed and other famous aviation technical companies
>of the time

Do you have documents from Lockheed or other companies showing that their support of Earhart was anything more than routine celebrity product endorsement? TIGHAR gets free metal detectors from White's Electronics and free shipping from FedEx but to the best of my knowledge the CIA has not ordered them to do that.

>the US in preparing Howland island which was essential to her Pacific
>crossing

You have it backward.  Commercial use of Howland was essential to U.S. claims of sovereignty under the American Guano Act of 1858.  The Dept. of Interior expedited the construction of the runway so that Earhart could use it not so much as a favor to AE but as a favor to themselves.

>Her navigator who was once head of Pan Am navigation and who
>had surveyed routes for Pan Am before.

Who would you have picked?

>The total lack of support from anything British including any radio
>communications with Darwin, Nauru and the Gilberts.

Darwin tried to communicate but it was Earhart who had a blown fuse.  Nauru provided information prior to departure, monitored her frequency and heard at least one transmission.  Earhart never asked Nauru to do anything.  She also never requested any communication with anyone in the Gilberts.

If you have documents to the contrary I'd love to see them.

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2003 09:27:32 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Heel & Sole Question

Tom King wrote:

> For what it's worth, I'm one of the colleagues who disagrees with Ric's
> dismissal of the shoe parts.

Tom, I am one who also does not completely dismiss the shoe parts and for the same reasons you have given. However, I think you made a more important point in reminding us that whatever happened on Niku, if anything, did not happen in one isolated spot. Niku is a small place and although it might not have been an easy playground to explore during the time our heroes may have been there they could have been all over the atoll. I certainly agree there would have been a few and possibly obvious sites they might have concentrated on but we should not limit our analysis too much.

Alan
***********************************************************************
From Ric

Allow me to talk myself into agreeing with you guys.  Let's remember what was found on Aukeraime.

- a fragmented rubber shoe sole
- a Cat's Paw replacement heel
- another heel that is not a replacement heel
- a small brass grommet that may be a shoelace eyelet

We found two heels so it seems most likely that there were two shoes.  Were they a pair?  It's possible that someone would replace one heel and not the other but people usually replace both heels at the same time.  Why two heels but only one sole?  Rubber survives.  Leather doesn't.  It seems most likely that the sole we don't have was leather.

So it appears that we found the remains of a rubber-soled shoe with a replaced heel and the original heel from a leather-soled shoe.  That doesn't sound like a pair to me.  How do two people each lose one shoe in the same place?

Oddly, we have a similar situation where Gallagher found the bones (which we think is the Seven site).  He found "part of the sole" of a "woman's stoutish walking shoe or sandal" and also part of a man's shoe (we don't know what part).  The part of a sole he found almost had to be rubber, as did the part of a man's shoe.  You describe what we found on Aukeraime the same way. Remnants of two shoes, but not a pair.  No other shoe parts found there by Gallagher or by us.  Same question.  How do two people each lose one shoe in the same place?

Same seemingly illogical phenomenon in two different places on the same island.  The most obvious explanation is that there is only one person and that person is wearing a mismatched pair of shoes.  Why would somebody do that? Because one foot was swollen from injury.  A person with a swollen foot who started with a pair of thier own shoes and a larger pair belonging to a companion could wear one of each until they wore out, discard them, and wear the other two right up to the time the person died.  That scenario, of course, only works if the person in question has smaller feet than the companion who, for some reason does not need those shoes.  All of this sure fits the picture of Earhart surviving for a time as a castaway after Noonan's death.

Things that still bother me:

- Those two-tone heels in the photos.
- If the above-described hypothesis is correct, there should have been a Cat's Paw heel with the shoe parts Gallagher found.  Apparently there wasn't.

It will be interesting to see if our future excavations at the Seven Site turn up a Cat's Paw heel just like the one we found over on Aukeraime.

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2003 09:35:20 EDT
From:         Ron bright
Subject:      Re: Heel & Sole Question

Wasn't Paxton accompanied by a woman, never identified, in the early 50"s? She is the one that used the latrine. There were on Gardner for some time, and who knows what type of shoe she could or would wear. Maybe someone can fill us in on Paxton's visit.

LTM,
Ron B
*************************************************************************
From Ric

You mean Laxton.  Lands Commissioner Paul B. Laxton who visited the island early in 1949.  His 1951 article "Nikumaroro" in the Journal of the Polynesian Society makes passing reference to a story he was told about an American woman who had visited the island some time earlier and had a surprising experience with the sink in the government Rest House (which drained right onto the floor). We've never been able to figure out who the woman was, but as I explained in my recent posting, the shoe situation at the Aukeraime site is more complicated than just finding  a source for a woman's shoe with an American replacement heel.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2003 09:41:47 EDT
From:         Ron Berry
Subject:      Re: Roosevelt's Request

Have you guys ever heard of "Yellow Journalism"? If your going to search the news papers, I would like to suggest looking in the Hearst papers they were always inventing something to sell papers.

*************************************************************************
From Ric

It's true that Hearst was the Fox Network of the Spanish-American War but there were no supermarket tabloids in 1937.  There were magazines that carried sensational articles of highly dubious credibility (Police Gazette come to mind) but 15 year old girls and housewives didn't usually read them.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2003 09:46:24 EDT
From:         Ron Bright
Subject:      FDR "request"

As I understand it, the source of Betty's recollection that FDR wanted to cease and desist the search comes from the newspaper. The St Petersburg newspaper is available on microfishe and can be obtained thru interlibrary loan. I have checked the newspaper throughout July 37 about all of the stories contained in St Pete's paper as it was well covered there. (AE once landed there in the Spring of 37, I believe).

Seems to me this can be easily resolved with a review of the newspaper from July-Oct 37. I presume the source or something inferring FDR's interest came from the local paper. I shall review the July-Aug clippings I made for something about an FDR interest, if any.

FDR was interested to some extent after the disappearance as he finally agreed to see Vidal for a few minutes in late July 37.

LTM,
Ron Bright
*************************************************************************
From Ric

Checking the St. Pete papers is a good tactic.  Betty's family subscribed to the now-defunct Evening Independent and sometimes bought the Sunday issue of the St. Petersburg Times.

How do we know about Vidal's visit with the president and how much do we know about what they talked about?
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2003 10:01:57 EDT
From:         Ted Campbell
Subject:      FDR "request"

Concerning the "don't say anything more about AE" issue I would think a concentrated review of military orders would be a fruitful place to start.

I would guess that during the height of the search there were many military personal offering guesses and clues that just tended to fog the search.  It wouldn't be unusual for the military to try to put a lid on all the speculation and this was picked up by the press and it went on from there.

Ted Campbell
**********************************************************************
From Ric

We do know that the rumor mill was rife with stories.  Some time ago on this forum Rollin Reineck told of a letter or memo by a Col. Richards, as I recall, who claimed that Earhart had been heard to say far more than the Itasca reported, and in the spring of 1938 there was an article in the New York Times in which Earhart's voice was described as "broken and choked" prompting speculation that there were chlorine fumes in the cockpit from the battery.  And so on...

As far as I know, there is no way to do a "concentrated review of military orders".  I don't think routine orders are archived and if they are there would be thousands every day.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2003 10:03:29 EDT
From:         Bob Lee
Subject:      Re: Roosevelt's Request

One explanation maybe that both parties having some interest in radio might have been subscribers to a newsletter that may have printed a piece of boilerplate about the Radio Act of 1912 (and others) that reminded amateur radio operators about the law regarding making false reports. Some of the twisted legal jargon could have given some the impression that reporting incidents was, in fact, illegal.

A long stretch and pure speculation -- but it does help explain why something like this would not be widely reported. It may have simply served to "fill up" a newsletter and it could have easily carried an importation policy makers byline.

Now, does anyone know if in 1937 there were newsletter type publication that amateur radio listeners nationwide might receive?

Bob
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2003 10:05:46 EDT
From:         Paige Miller
Subject:      FDR's Request

Ric, I would like to amend my last sentence. The corrected version is
below.

First, I have no knowledge one way or the other about such a request by FDR ... but it sure sounds to me like a pre-WWII urban myth. The reason I say so is that we allegedly have freedom of speech in this country, and it would be an unprecedented thing for a president of the United States to tell the population that they can't speak about a certain subject, especially a subject that was in the news. It is even more bizarre, in my opinion, for the President of the United States to threaten consequences if people kept talking about something that was in the news. What possible benefit to the USA would there be by having its people stop talking about AE, especially since there were virtually no facts known about what happened to her?

Now whether my guess above is true or not, I certainly can believe that Mabel and Betty thought FDR said it.

--
Paige Miller #2565
LTM
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2003 10:10:18 EDT
From:         Paige Miller
Subject:      FDR's Request

Ric says

>It's my impression that urban legends are
>largely a by-product of mass communication and are more common now than they
>were then.  It's hard for me to imagine how the same myth would reach both of
>Betty and Mabel in 1937.

Please read the following article which details the creation of a similar urban myth in 1944. A single mis-statement by one newspaper reporter gets spread in other media and people believe it.

"The Mad Gasser of Mattoon; How The Press Created an Imaginary Chemical Weapons Attack", Ladendorf, B. and Bartholomew, R., Skeptical Inquirer, July/August 2002, Vol. 26, Number 4, pp 50-54, 58.

(FYI -- Mattoon is a small city in Eastern Illinois)
Paige Miller, #2565
LTM
***********************************************************************
From Ric

Is the article available on line?

I don't mean to suggest that urban myths don't pre-date the internet - just that they proliferate faster these days.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2003 10:35:42 EDT
From:         Herman De Wulf
Subject:      AE commemoration

Look what I find in my e-mail today. The New York Times commemorates the disappearance of Amelia Earhart on 2 July 1937 and makes available copies of its front page on 3 July. When you click on the page you get an enlargement. Perhaps this is worth mentioning to the forum as some might be interested of having their copy.

LTM
Herman
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2003 10:42:05 EDT
From:         John
Subject:      Re: Heel & Sole Question

The shoe scenario, for what it's worth, makes sense to a point. However, I would sooner believe that AE, with an injured foot, would have simply used one of her shoes and one of FN's until she too died. I can't see her having recovered from her foot injury and then going back to get the other pair of mismatched shoes when the first wore out. I realize that the climate at Niku is rough on clothing and footwear, but would the shoes have worn out that fast? I think, in this scenario, she probably injured her foot while staying at the Aukeraime site with FN, and used one of his shoes on the injured foot after he no longer needed it. She later made her way to the seven site where she later died. I think this hypothesis fits with what's been found. I can't see her, or anyone else, surviving long enough to wear out two pair of shoes without leaving more behind to show they were there. Granted, there is a lot of area there that hasn't been searched yet. Again, all of this is conjecture since the proof that AE and FN were there hasn't been found as yet. Hopefully that will occur soon.

LTM, who wishes this expedition all the best

John
**************************************************************************
From Ric

For what it's worth, my estimate for how long a pair of "street" shoes would last on Niku, constantly wet from going out on the reef and into the lagoon for fish, on the abrasive coral and coral rubble, in the relentless heat and damp, is maybe a month.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2003 10:54:08 EDT
From:         Ric Gillespie
Subject:      Expedition update

Happy Earhart Disappearance Day everybody!

Today we are waiting for word from the FAA whether the runway at Pago Pago has been approved for resumption of service by Hawaiian Air and, if so, whether the airline will make its scheduled Thursday flight from Honolulu.  At this point, the earliest we can hope to get all our people to MOLLIE waiting at Pago Pago is Monday July 7.  If Hawaiian does not resume service it will be at least July 11 before the trip can depart for Nikumaroro.

We're determined to make this trip happen and we're dealing with the curveballs as they're pitched.  Stay tuned.

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2003 11:04:04 EDT
From:         Dennis McGee
Subject:      Shoe parts

Ric said:  "A person with a swollen foot who started with a pair of their own shoes and a larger pair belonging to a companion could wear one of each until they wore out, discard them, and wear the other two right up to the time the person died."

Ain't gonna work, chief.

Assume the injured foot is the left foot.  Survivor uses larger left show and smaller (their own) right shoe.  No problem.  Left shoe wears out. The big right shoe would work only if it is sufficiently larger than the survivor's foot allowing it to be worn  the wrong side.  For example, you may put my size 13 right shoe on your injured size 10 right foot, but the size 13 left shoe on your size 10 injured right foot would be mighty uncomfortable.

Your hypothesis works only if the injured foot heals enough to wear the opposite footed shoe.

If you have any documentation to the contrary, I'd like to see it.  :-)

LTM, Who's a sure-footed bugger
Dennis O. McGee #0149EC

************************************************************************
From Ric

Point taken...but a person would be highly motivated to make it work even if you had to cut away part of the shoes.  Going barefoot on the coral rubble is not an option.
**************************************************************************
From Tom King


Thanks, Ric; it's nice to be on the same wavelength.

Remember too that there were the hygrometer and the top of the tummy medicine bottle at Aukaraime South.  I don't know what to do with these, and I understand the rationale for not ascribing the hygrometer to Earhart, but there are just still a lot of loose ends about that site to tie up.  Recall too Kent Spading's insistence that there are topographic features there that match Maude's recollection of what he and Bevington saw there in '37.  And for that matter, there's the odd coincidence of the Aukaraime South site with Bevington's "bivouac."


>Things that still bother me:
>
>- Those two-tone heels in the photos.


Yes, and of course, the size problem.  But we don't know whether AE carried other shoes, perhaps larger ones to accommodate thicker socks while flying at altitude, and perhaps without two-toned heels.  There's an interesting photo at the AE Birthplace in Atchison, KS that shows her climbing out of the Electra with her foot in a position that should make it possible to get another measurement of shoe size.  I hope to get a digital image of it shortly.

>- If the above-described hypothesis is correct, there should have been a
>Cat's Paw heel with the shoe parts Gallagher found. Apparently there wasn't.

Well, that's assuming that Gallagher and/or Steenson would have reported it as such.  That seems likely in Gallagher's case, since his descriptions are pretty detailed, but Steenson's is pretty thin, and if the heel were found during the intensive search that followed the breakdown of Gallagher's wireless, Gallagher wouldn't have had too much opportunity to report it.  It's also assuming that the crabs didn't chew up the heel to the point at which its manufacturing marks couldn't be detected.  I know, if they did, why didn't they do the same to the Aukaraime heel?  Because the latter was left untenanted, while the former had something to eat in it?  I don't know, but I don't think the negative evidence of no reported Cats Paw heel at the Seven Site means much.

>It will be interesting to see if our future excavations at the Seven Site
>turn up a Cat's Paw heel just like the one we found over on Aukeraime.

Oh yes.....

**************************************************************************
From Ric

The hygrometer and the bottle cap were about 50 meters from the shoe parts (closer to the lagoon) and you'll that there was also some heavy metal hardware and remnants of 55 gallon drums in that area.  The Bushnell survey map shows that observations from the towers were made to a point on the lagoon shore right near there.  Seems easier to ascribe that stuff to the Bushnell Boys.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2003 11:08:24 EDT
From:         Dan Postellon
Subject:      Re: Heel & Sole Question

Ric wrote:

>So it appears that we found the remains of a rubber-soled shoe with a
>replaced heel and the original heel from a leather-soled shoe.  That doesn't
>sound like a pair to me.  How do two people each lose one shoe in the same
>place?

Two people go swimming, leave their shoes on the beach.  Crabs get one shoe each?
Dan Postellon  TIGHAR#2263
************************************************************************
From Ric

But these shoes were 50 meters inland through dense vegetation from the lagoon beach and about a quarter mile from the ocean beach.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2003 11:31:21 EDT
From:         Randy Jacobson
Subject:      Vidal's vist with FDR

Vidal's visit with FDR was on behalf of GP Putnam, primarily to get the  British to search the Gilbert and Ellice Islands for AE.  In particular, GPP believed a report that there was an unidentified island off the Gilberts, and eventually he got someone (geez, Tom King and I wrote a paper on this, but I can't remember his name!) to take a yacht out and search the area.

***********************************************************************
From Ric

Oh, okay.  You're talking about Capt. Handley and the search for the fabled island of Katagateman.  The manuscript you and Tom prepared on that fascinating story was never completed but only needs some citations completed.  It does not, however, make any mention of a meeting between Vidal and FDR.

I'll send you and Tom copies of the manuscript if you no longer have it. It's a great story and I'd love to make it available.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2003 11:40:11 EDT
From:         Christian D.
Subject:      Re: Cliffhanger

Re comms with Xmas island: I just got (yesterday July 1st) my first email from the island in a little while -no comment as to whether there was an outage, and how long...

Concerning clearing Customs on entering Kiribati, if push comes to shove, Kanton is a port of entry, and if the Xmas official couldn't make it to Apia, the expedition could go to Kanton to enter; of course that would cost some transit days, but it is not that far.

Christian D

*****************************************************************
From Ric

The lines to Kiritimati (Christmas) are back up and we have re-established communications.  Yes, we could go to Kanton to clear customs and it would take at least a two-day chunk out of the seven days we hope to have at Niku, but Kiribati requires that a government representative of their choosing accompany any visit to Nikumaroro and they have designated a Wildlife Conservation Officer from Kiritimati to accompany this expedition.  He will be deputized to perform customs and immigration duties so we don't have to go to Kanton, but he does have to go on the trip.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2003 11:43:18 EDT
From:         Phil Tanner
Subject:      Re: Expedition update

Radio Australia or Radio New Zealand International reported yesterday (Monday 1st July) that an inspection team was awaited but the earliest it could get to Pago Pago was Thursday.

ltm, Phil Tanner 2276
*****************************************************************
From Ric

Thanks Phil.  That would explain the word I just got that Hawaiian has now cancelled Thursday's flight but has not said anything either way about Monday.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2003 11:45:14 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Heel & Sole Question

> How do two people each lose one shoe in the same place?

Playing kickball?

Ric, I think most of us have difficulty with the time difference. By that I mean we tend to think 2003 rather than 1937.

Today you would be hard pressed to find anyone who could, without looking, describe their own shoe soles and heels. they just come with the shoes and then we buy new shoes that also come with soles and heels. In 1937 my grandfather had a last with different sizes and repaired the families shoes. We all knew what soles and heels were on the shoes. I think when Gallagher made his comments about the shoe parts we can almost take his descriptions to the bank. Today we could go through a pile of shoes and they would not be all that meaningful as we pay little or no attention to such things. In 1937 little differences would stand out like a sore thumb. When Gallagher looked at the shoe parts it would have been obvious to him what they were.

I'll buy what he said.

Alan
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2003 11:48:10 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: FDR "request"

> I don't think routine orders are archived and if they are there would
> be thousands every day.

They are in the Air Force and are stored in St. Louis. I have reason to search through them for the early 50s and 60s and have spoken to the person in charge in the St. Louis facility.

I don't know about the army or how far back anything has been kept. In any case I think that might be a fruitless search.

Alan
********************************************************************
From Ric

Must be quite an archive.

But I agree.  Whatever Betty and Mabel saw (if anything) was in the press in some form.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2003 11:51:00 EDT
From:         Dennis McGee
Subject:      More shoes . . .

Ric said: " How do two people each lose one shoe in the same place?"

Dan Postellon said: "Two people go swimming, leave their shoes on the beach.  Crabs get one shoe each?"

But crabs don't wear shoes, right?

And while we're talking about shoes, today is Imelda Marcos's birthday; she's 74.

LTM, Who's a tad giddy today
Dennis O. McGee #0149EC
*****************************************************************
From Ric

Crabs steal socks - we know that much.

Happy Birthday Imelda!  (talk about synchronicity....)
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2003 14:07:16 EDT
From:         Ted Campbell
Subject:      Re: Heel & Sole Question

The two tone heel; have you been able to determine if Cat Paw made a two tone heel replacement or is it possible that the "white" section was an add on e.g. height adjustment correction for some physical abnormality or some stylish embellishment installed by the repair shop?  Could be the "white" part disintegrated like leather.

Ted Campbell
*****************************************************************
From Ric

We discussed this at some length on the forum a year or two ago (how time flies). Cat's Paw never made a two-tone heel but some people on the forum remembered shoe heels from back in the '30s that had a special harder, longer-wearing rubber on the outside corner where most heels wear down first (check your own). Cat's Paw used "traction plugs" - circular plugs of white rubber set into the heel.  I think they still do that.  Other companies apparently used a two-piece heel but we've never been able to identify a particular example.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2003 14:13:54 EDT
From:         Ted Campbell
Subject:      Re: Shoe parts

Dennis brings up an interesting point re right and left shoe sizes.  Can you (Ric) determine the side of the shoe sole you found and can you see any wear on the cats paw heel that may indicated which side?

Ted Campbell
***************************************************
From Ric

The Cat's Paw heel is for a right shoe.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2003 14:17:50 EDT
From:         Alfred Hendrickson
Subject:      Heel & Sole

 How do two people each lose one shoe in the same place?

I am certain that I'm missing something here. Ric, there are millions of
ways two people can lose one shoe in the same place, and this is BEFORE we
consider that perhaps one or both of the found shoes was/were lost elsewhere
and brought to where they were found.

(I've been reading through Forum archives, and I'm wondering if Janet
Whitney is still out there and could help us out a bit. <LOL>, followed by
look of sheer terror. :-P . . . .)

LTM, who was barefoot and pregnant most of the time,

Alfred Hendrickson #2583
***************************************************
From Ric

We don't need a million ways.  Just a couple will do.  Enlighten me as to how
two people each lose one shoe in the same place on an island where you
really, really need your shoes.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2003 14:28:00 EDT
From:         
Subject:      Re: Vidal's vist with FDR

From Ron Bright,

Ric,

I will check the Vidal request and visit with FDR for a "few minutes". Also I note in the Itasca deck log, written by Hines, on 15 July, he writes that the senior Commisioner at Tarawa (Courterys?) "stated no information [was found] on Earhart in spite British organized Gilbert Island search".

I was unaware any "organized" search took place in and around the Gilberts by the British. Nothing was found, presumably.

Are there any "official" reports by the British they anyone is aware of?

LTM,
Ron Bright
************************************************************
From Ric

We have the British file.  No search of the Gilberts by the British was requested or conducted.  The U.S. State Dept. requested and received permission for Lexington's planes to search British waters and for Itasca and Swan to search any uninhabited islands and establish contact with inhabitants of other islands.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2003 14:29:12 EDT
From:         Tom King
Subject:      Re: Shoe parts

Ric wrote:

>Point taken...but a person would be highly motivated to make it work even if
>you had to cut away part of the shoes. Going barefoot on the coral rubble is
>not an option.>

Two personal observations:

1. Last time on Niku, before leaving Samoa I realized I'd forgotten to bring reef-walking shoes.  The only tennies I could find in Pago Pago were ladies' (with red flowers).  They were far too narrow for me, so I simply cut out their sides to give my toes room.  Worked fine, but were goners by the end of the expedition.

2. Mah Confed'rate pro-gen-itors fought a hull WAR wearin' rags on thur feet, and I'll bet they went through a buncha mismatched shoes, too.

TK
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2003 14:33:55 EDT
From:         Mark
Subject:      FDR

Should we expect Oliver Stone on the forum soon ?

       Mark 1214C

*********************************************************
From Ric

Bah!  Stone is an amateur.  At least our mysteries are real.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 3 Jul 2003 11:26:52 EDT
From:         Mike Muenich
Subject:      Heel and Sole

The current heel and shoe issue has gotten me interested enough to again post to the forum.  Do I understand that you have recovered two heels, both rubber?  I know one heel was submitted to Cats Paw for analysis and found that it was generally the correct time frame.  Has the other been examined; comparatively with the Cats Paw?  I seem to recall that there are forensic experts who can deduce substantial information from wear patterns. Shouldn't you be able to tell upon comparative exam if they are the same size?  Same wear pattern?  worn equally?  Are they both lefts or rights or left and right?  the web site I have attached was a police symposium with several days of "shoe" and footprint analysis.  this was one of about 81 "hits" for the inquiry shoe, expert, and "wear pattern", several of which were reports about various of these above questions.

**************************************************************************
From Ric

>Do I understand that you have recovered two heels, both
>rubber?  I know one heel was submitted to Cats Paw for analysis and found
>that it was generally the correct time frame.  Has the other been examined;
>comparatively with the Cats Paw?

That is correct.  Cat's Paw is owned by the Biltrite Corporation and when the shoe parts were first found back in 1991 (good lord, 12 years ago) we sent them the artifacts and they gave us their opinions.  They weren't forensic experts.  They were simply people who had been with the company a long time and knew the business well.

We talked about wear patterns but both heels seemed to exhibit very similar and very normal patterns - and both are very worn.  The Cat's Paw is a right heel and the other one appears to be a left.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 3 Jul 2003 11:48:58 EDT
From:         Alfred Hendrickson
Subject:      We each lost a shoe

No fair, Ric, you're changing the rules here!

The original question was:

>How do two people each lose one shoe in the same place?

Now, it's:

> how two people each lose one shoe in the same place on an island
> where you really, really need your shoes.

(Seriously, I was under the impression that shoes were sort of impractical or undesirable on Niku, as evidenced by the fact that none of the native islanders wore them. Or did they not wear them because they could not get them?) I still think there is a basic premise that I'm missing. When I learn what it is, I'm gonna feel dumb!

Here's a list, which I can add to if you'd like. Pick any two. Thanks for relieving me of the burden of providing a million. That would have taken me a while.

1) They did not each lose one shoe. They each abandoned BOTH shoes. The others are there and have not been found yet.

2) They were laying around in despair, and they heard a plane. They dashed off to signal the plane, and, in their haste, each lost a shoe.

3) Someone suggested playing kick ball. I submit playing hackey sack. Or four square. Or backgammon.

4) They were hungry, and began to eat their shoes, alternating each person's shoes. (It's been done on polar expeditions. Heck, even Charlie Chaplin did it.)

5) They set the shoes down and went to sleep. In the night, the coconut crabs made off with one of each. (Why one of each? Fairness, perhaps.)

6) They buried them to keep them safe from the coconut crabs, and on returning, only found one each.

7) The shoes were wearing out, and were abandoned as they became useless. A single good shoe would be kept as a water dipper or a future meal?

Some of these are ridiculous, I know, but it seems to me there many possibilities.

LTM, who wants me to go back to the beginning of this thread, re-read, and dispel the notion that I've missed something.

Alfred Hendrickson #2583
*************************************************************************
From Ric

Hey, I don't make the rules.  The island does.  Pacific islanders generally do not wear shoes but they also stay away from places where the ground is covered with coral rubble.  Coral rubble is broken chunks of coral.  It's like walking on rough, hot stones and it goes goes clink-clink when you walk on it. Large areas of many atolls are covered in coral rubble.  They're the areas that are not conducive to agriculture and there is no particular reason to go there, so people don't.  When they do they wear shoes.

All of your suggested scenarios require that the same unusual event happen to two different indiviuals at the same time.  That can happen.  You and I can both bend over to pick up a dime and split the seat out of our pants on the same day, but I submit that any hypothesis that requires such unrelated synchronicity is weaker than one that doesn't.

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 3 Jul 2003 11:49:38 EDT
From:         Tom King
Subject:      Re: Vidal's vist with FDR

>No search of the Gilberts by the British was
>requested or conducted.

Foua Tofiga, who was a student on Tarawa in July of '37, told us that he and his colleagues were called out to search the reefs for Earhart - or something; he said the object of the search was never entirely clear.  My impression was that there'd been a search of sorts, but not one involving ships in the water (except Capt. Handley's boat) or planes in the air (which the Brits didn't have).
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 3 Jul 2003 12:10:32 EDT
From:         Eric
Subject:      Re: FDR and Constitutional Rights

Ric wrote:

> Americans have always responded to blatant assaults on
> their Constitutional rights with howls of outrage.

I once read an account by a man who was present when FDR spoke from the rear platform of a train.  A polio victim, FDR was bought out in his wheelchair, man-handled into a standing position and then strapped to the lectern from which he spoke.  While this was going on, Secret Service agents moved through the crowd and opened the movie cameras of private citizens to ensure there was no action footage of FDR having to be thus assisted.  Had they wanted to complain, who could those citizens have gone to?  The news media?  Hardly! (They'd been operating under similar rules for years.)  The FBI or the police?  Ha!  So, yes, I believe that it was possible for FDR or his staff to have used the power of the Federal Government to suppress any information on AE distress calls that might have been picked up by a few private short wave listeners.  

Eric, NAS NORTH ISLAND, San Diego, Ca 
**********************************************************************
From Ric

Yes, but the question here is not whether the government suppressed information in violation of the Constitution.  Such acts were and are sadly common.  The question is whether the government put out a public notice that it was going to do something in violation of the Constitution.  When that happens somebody usually hollers.

Suppose the Secret Service had put a notice in the newspaper the day before the incident you describe above saying:

"During the President's appearance tomorrow it will be forbidden for anyone to take motion pictures of him until he is ready to begin his speech."

Many people would probably comply but others would raise questions.

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 3 Jul 2003 12:13:52 EDT
From:         Ron Berry
Subject:      Re: Roosevelt's Request

In 1937 the super market and its tabloid had not been invented yet. Although his business was on the decline Hearst still owned seventeen daily news papers and five magazines.  They loved to get unsuspecting people to make a claim so that they could enlarge on it.
*****************************************************
From Ric

Regardless of whether it was an accurate wire service story that was misconstrued or a distorted product of the Hearst empire, it should be findable.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 3 Jul 2003 12:31:23 EDT
From:         Karen Hoy
Subject:      FDR's Request

Could FDR's request have been a slick political move?  By expressing concern for FN and AE's "safety," he may have been creating subtle propaganda--i.e "they're alive, but the Republicans won't authorize enough money for a proper search."  Or leading the public to believe that they "could have been captured." Was the whole Japanese Capture Hypothesis just a paranoid embellishment of what someone thought Roosevelt had said?

LTM (who is about to join TIGHAR)
Karen
**********************************************************
From Ric

So far we have no hard evidence that Roosevelt ever made such a request. The whole Japanese Capture Hypothesis was a classic case of life imitating art.  The 1943 Hollywood film Flight For Freedom popularized the idea and "supporting evidence" quickly began to emerge.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 3 Jul 2003 12:41:10 EDT
From:         Ron Bright
Subject:      FDR interest in AE's fate

Presidential  aide M. H. MacIntyre sent a memo to FDR dated 20 July 37 reporting that Gene Vidal had been in touch with GP and that Vidal "has some very interesting sidelights and some speculations, which are probably true, as to WHAT REALLY HAPPENED." [ my emphasis ]  What could that be?

FDR noted on the memo "I would like to see him for 5 or 10 minutes".

These kind of statements of "what really happened" continue to fuel the Earhart mystery. The implication is  that the government "knew"  the real story, but wanted it kept secret.

Although FDR consented to see Vidal on or about 26 July 37, ten minutes doesn't seem to reflect a whole lot of interest in the results of the search or her fate!

I have never seen the results of this meeting IF it took place at the White House. I think Dustymiss is checking out some of this material this summer. Vidal's report might tell us researchers what did happen after 0843, 2 July 37 somewhere over the Pacific. The other source would be MacIntyre as he thought they were "probably true".

LTM,
Ron Bright

[Source: White House memo, reproduced on illustration #13 of Brinks book "Lost Star".  Brinks cites the source as the FDR Library, Hyde Park, N.Y.]
***********************************************************************
From Ric

But if "the government" knew what "really happened" the information - in the form of "sidelights and some speculations" - came from Gene Vidal who seems to have gotten it from George Putnam and yet "the government" (the Treasury Department) refused to release Thompson's report to Mantz who was acting on behalf of Putnam.  It doesn't make sense.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 3 Jul 2003 12:52:25 EDT
From:         Christian D.
Subject:      Re: Heel & Sole Question

> How do two people each lose one shoe in the same place?

Who says that 2 people lost one shoe in the same place?

I'm still surprised that everybody tries to read so much into whatever is found on Niku: the island was not mothballed for 2 generations, in the wait for the Tighars to finally arrive!

For a quarter of a century people lived there full time, and with lots of kids!  So what if shoe parts are now found at the same place? Personally I'd rather always assume that nothing found now is where it was left initially -unless we can find a good reason to think otherwise, and with accurate dating.

Christian D

*********************************************************************
From Ric

That's an argument that I'm sure archaeologists frequently face and I'll let a real live archaeologist answer it.  Dr. King?
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 3 Jul 2003 14:24:03 EDT
From:         Paige Miller
Subject:      Urban Myth

Ric wrote:

>Is the article available on line? (Referring to "The Mad Gasser of Mattoon;
>How The Press Created an Imaginary Chemical Weapons Attack", Ladendorf, B. and
>Bartholomew, R., Skeptical Inquirer, July/August 2002, Vol. 26, Number 4, pp
>50-54, 58.)

No, it does not appear to be online. The same subject matter is also covered, along with a whole lot more, in a recently published book: "Hoaxes, Myths, and Manias: Why We Need Critical Thinking" by Robert Bartholomew and Benjamin Radford, Prometheus Books, 2003 (available at amazon.com and bn.com). Seems to me that this particular topic might be of interest in explaining why sooooo many residents of Saipan have similar but mismatched stories about seeing an American woman pilot. The FDR story seems to match a typical urban myth in many respects.

>I don't mean to suggest that urban myths don't pre-date the internet - just
>that they proliferate faster these days.

Agreed. No doubt the speed of spread has increased today. But let us also not forget Orson Welles had a large number of people convinced that Martians had landed. I'm not saying the FDR rumor, if it is true, was a deliberate hoax, but it certainly could have been a poorly written or mis-read news announcement.

By the way, many years ago in this forum, you reported TWO women had heard similar messages, Mabel and one other woman who's name I can't recall. Both messages contained statements that were something like: "My navigator is badly hurt and needs medical attention". Is it possible to contact this other woman about the FDR rumor?

Another point is: you have catalogued a large number of reports of post-loss messages, did some of them (other than Mabel and Betty) take months and years to be reported? If so, this would again argue against FDR's request not to talk about AE.

Paige Miller #2565
LTM
*************************************************************************
From Ric

There are no fewer than four "haunted women" who told of hearing distress calls from Amelia Earhart and their stories will be dealt with at length in the Post-Loss Radio Study.  In brief:

Nina Paxton of Ashland, KY is the only one who came forward during the search.  She first appears in a local newspaper article on July 9, 1937 and carried on a lifelong campaign to get someone (Walter Winchell, the U.S. Navy, Fred Goerner, the general public) to believe her.  She never said anything about a government request to refrain from telling her story.

Mabel Duncklee of Corinth, VT came forward in 1990 and told of hearing AE's distress calls in 1937 when she was Mabel Larrimore of Amarillo, TX.  She said she didn't try harder to get someone to believe her then because "Our President had asked that no one give out any information if they heard anything because it might endanger her (AE's) life."

Thelma Lovelace of Carelton Place, Ontario, Canada came forward in 1991 to say that she had heard Amelia's call for help when she was living in St. Stephen, New Brunswick, Canada.  That same day she went to the Customs and Immigration officers at the International Bridge that spans the St. Croix River to Calais, Maine. "The officers almost laughed in my face."  She later spoke to several other people but no one believed her.  No mention of any U.S. government request.

Betty Klenck, of course, came forward more recently and, like Mabel, remembers a government request.

All four women tell remarkably similar stories and each one said that Noonan was injured.

Betty is now the only one of the four who is still living.

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 3 Jul 2003 14:25:05 EDT
From:         Alfred Hendrickson
Subject:      NYT commemoration

I'd like to see the New York Times Commemoration you refer to. Was that an e-mail you received from the New York Times? Care to forward it to me? I can't find it, or anything like it, on the NYT website.

Thanks and LTM,

Alfred Hendrickson #2583
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 3 Jul 2003 14:29:34 EDT
From:         Bob Lee
Subject:      Radio Relay League

A few days ago I posted musings on whether the directive that Betty remembers about reporting AE/FN incidents might have come from a newsletter for amateur radio buffs. The American Radio Relay League was founded in 1914 and produced a newsletter, apparently starting in 1915. There is an index of all issues (1915-present) on their website (www.arrl.org), but is only accessible by being a member of ARRL. If anyone is a member, perhaps they could take a look.

Bob
*******************************************************************
From Ric

Hold the phone!   The infamous Walter McMenamy and several other HAMs who reported hearing post-loss signals from Earhart were members of the Radio Relay League.  I had no idea it still exists.  We need to get access to those newsletters.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 3 Jul 2003 14:31:28 EDT
From:         Art Carty
Subject:      Shoes and Occams Razor

I think that this has gotten way too complicated.  A really simple scenario goes like this:

1. Noonan dead, Earhart has injured foot.
2. Earhart puts Noonan shoe on injured foot.
3. Earhart, not being a survival expert and not knowing how quickly shoes will wear out, leaves campsite and winds up at 7 site, leaving mismatched shoes.
4. Earhart dies, sooner (which is why she doesn't go back to get other shoes), or later (she doesn't need other shoes, can't find them, etc).

LTM

Art Carty
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 4 Jul 2003 10:19:13 EDT
From:         Alfred Hendrickson
Subject:      Noonan's Injury

>All four women tell remarkably similar stories and each one said that
>Noonan was injured.

I'm sure this has been discussed before, but Noonan-with-head-injury is a common denominator to virtually all post-loss messages and sightings. It does not seem to matter what hypothesis you subscribe to, ours (the correct one), or captured by Japanese; Noonan hurt his head no matter where he was. I'm going to re-read Long's tome; I know he believed that AE smacked her head on an instrument while ditching, but I'll bet he also had Noonan swimming around with a head injury for a while.

(This is sort of eerie, actually.)

LTM, who liked ghost stories,
.
Alfred Hendrickson #2583
************************************************************************
From Ric

Actually, although some kind of injury to Noonan is mentioned or implied in 4 of the 184 post-loss events we know of, none of them specifically mentions a head injury.  Betty comes closest with an obviously irrational Noonan and Betty's own impression that he had a head injury. I don't think there is any mention of a Noonan injury in any of the post-loss messages that were made public in 1937.   Paxton's was the first public allegation of a Noonan injury, but not a head injury, in her 1943 letter to Walter Winchell.  In later years she spoke of Noonan's knee injuries .

Larremore and Lovelace both mention some kind of unspecified injury to Noonan but they didn't come forward until the 1990s.

Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 4 Jul 2003 10:23:31 EDT
From:         Gene Dangelo
Subject:      Re: Radio Relay League

I am an ARRL member too! I'll see what I can find!

Dr. Gene Dangelo, N3XKS, #2211

********************************************
From Mike Everette

Hold on, Ric.  Don't get excited, don't get alarmed; we got the whole thing by the arm....

Been there, done that, got the shirt... already checked this.  NOTHING.

The American Radio Relay League (ARRL) is still very much around.  It is headquartered in Newington, CT. ( I'm an ARRL member.)

The ARRL is the US national ham radio organization.

The "newsletter" is the ARRL's  official magazine, QST.

I have access to complete files of QST in hard copy, starting from 1924, in the NC State University Library.  In 2000-2001  I spent many hours going through the volumes for 1935, 1936, 1937 and 1938, page by page, looking for any mention of AE.  There is NOTHING to be found.

I even e-mailed (more than once) the League's "historical staff." (Actually, whoever happens to get such requests foisted upon them).  They referred me back to QST.  However, one of the "researchers" who communicated with me was Zack Lau, who happens to be the grandson of Harry Lau, the Hawaiian ham operator and US Army Signal Corps rep on Howland at or near the time of AE's disappearance (!!).  But even Zack had no new insight.

Why is there nothing to be found?  Well, this is my view....

The League, at that time (1930s), was very concerned with keeping its focus "Purely Amateur," and anything that smacked of involvement with the commercial side of radio -- including alleged ham involvement with AE -- just wasn't in keeping with that focus.

I have also combed several other radio magazines of the era, that had a broader editorial outlook.  These include "Radio News" and "Radio-Craft." Didn't find anything there either, unfortunately.

73

Mike E.
*************************************************************
From Ric

I shoulda known (and probably once did know) that you had this covered.

"Never mind."
- Gilda Radnor as Emily Litella on Saturday Night Live.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 4 Jul 2003 10:40:05 EDT
From:         Tom King
Subject:      Re: Heel & Sole Question

Oh yeah, Ric, give me all the hard ones.

Christian, you say:

>For a quarter of a century people lived there full time, and with lots
>of kids! So what if shoe parts are now found at the same place?
>
>Personally I'd rather always assume that nothing found now is where it
>was left initially -unless we can find a good reason to think otherwise,
>and with accurate dating."

You're certainly right that we can't assume that anything is where it started out being on the island, or anywhere else.  However, stuff that people leave around does tend to be patterned in its distribution -- if it weren't, archeologists wouldn't have much to do.  If you look around your own office or backyard or bedroom, you'll probably note patterns.  Just the same in an archeological site, which is basically what Niku is.  So we expect, and find, patterning, and the patterning is that domestic stuff like shoes is concentrated in the village -- except that shoes aren't.  We haven't found shoes in the village, or anyplace else except at Aukaraime South.  So we naturally ask ourselves why that is.  And that, of course, is the question we're debating.

It's always possible that kids brought them in from someplace else, or that crabs dragged them in, or that birds dropped them from trees; but usually when you find stuff that somebody or something brought in from elsewhere, you eventually also find the elsewhere from which the stuff was brought, and we haven't found any shoe lode on Niku.

***********************************************************************
From Ric

Well, to be strictly accurate (always our wont) there were the many rubber sandals we found washed up on the shoreline in 1989 which we hypothesized were flotsam from The Wreck of the Flip-Flop Maru (sung to the tune of the Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald).

And there's a humongous boot sole - gotta be at least a size 13 - found near the remains of Gallagher's house the same year.

But no, shoes are real scarce on Niku.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 4 Jul 2003 10:43:42 EDT
From:         Tom King
Subject:      Re: We each lost a shoe

Alfred wrote:

>Seriously, I was under the impression that shoes were sort of
>impractical or undesirable on Niku, as evidenced by the fact that
>none of the native islanders wore them.

THEY don't particularly need to wear them, both because they're smart enough to stay away from the nasty areas, as Ric says, and because they've grown up not wearing them and have developed REALLY tough soles (of the feet).  A wonderful old man I used to know in Chuuk referred to himself as having "feet like ko," by which he meant cow.  It was true.
*******************************************************
From Ric

And when they do wear shoes they run into another problem.  Because they have mostly gone barefoot all their lives they need shoes with width EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 4 Jul 2003 10:45:45 EDT
From:         Tom King
Subject:      Re: Shoes and Occams Razor

I wouldn't be surprised if, in the end, we find that on Niku life imitated Art.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 4 Jul 2003 10:49:32 EDT
From:         Denise
Subject:      Two Shoes!

Ric says: "Enlighten me as to how two people each lose one shoe in the same
place on an island where you really, really need your shoes."

How about this? She's got an infected foot which begins to seriously swell. She is carrying Fred's boots (which she wears to wade over the reef) at the time, so takes the shoe off her injured foot, puts on Fred's boot instead, then either leaves the two unused shoes wear she can find them later or tosses the two she isn't wearing off into the scavola?

Works for me!

Denise
*************************************************************
From Ric

That's a variation on the same theme we've been talking about.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 4 Jul 2003 10:53:06 EDT
From:         Kerry Tiller
Subject:      Re: Radio Relay League

Ric, the American Radio Relay League publishes QST (monthly), and are headquartered in Newington Connecticut. Their HQ amateur station (W1AW) is the only amateur station authorized by the FCC to broadcast one way comms on the ham bands (bulletins, propagation reports, practice code transmissions for novices to gain proficiency, etc.). I have not been a member for some years (since I let my last license expire), but I would be surprised if the active TIGHAR members who are hams are not ARRL members. But even as a non-ARRL member, I'm sure if you approached the ARRL as one non-profit organization to another, they would be happy to open their archives to you. It has never been a secret organization.

Kerry Tiller (ex WN2IVM and WB7SIQ)
******************************************************************
From Jon Watson

I recently (like last month or so) sent an email to the head of the LA chapter of the Radio Relay League.  I didn't receive a reply, and subsequently sent a second email with the same result.  I will try to pursue this through other avenues.  The Radio Relay League is a huge organization, with numerous chapters in California alone.

ltm
jon
*******************************************************
From Ric

Thanks guys, but Mike Everette has already been down this yellow brick road and there's no wizard at the end of it.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 4 Jul 2003 10:59:50 EDT
From:         Ross Devitt
Subject:      Re: Shoe parts

Ric wrote:

> Point taken...but a person would be highly motivated to make it work even if
> you had to cut away part of the shoes.  Going barefoot on the coral rubble is
> not an option.

Just curious,  why would going barefoot on the coral rubble be "not an option"?

I'm just about to spend another weekend barefoot on coral rubble.  I find it far preferable to destroying shoes in salt water, having my feet chafed raw by damp shoes and putting up with bits of shell and rubble in my shoes.

I've been experimenting with this castaway stuff since I got my yacht back in the water last year.  Lots of things we speculated about on the forum are absolute rubbish when actually tested.

I did the underpants experiment, the barefoot experiments and a few others in tropical conditions.  I have also been experimenting with living for a week (well, ten days) at a time washing only in salt water, and washing my clothes in salt water, living on a litre  and a half of water a day and around 300 grammes of food a day.

It's not as tough as we all think.  Due to commitments I'm not able to push these experiments further than ten days at a time for now.

I found a very easy way to get into fallen coconuts in a couple of minutes, to access around 200ml of water per nut.  If I could beat the crabs and rats to say 20 fallen coconuts a day, and develop a taste for Bigass Latro, I'm sure I could gold out for quite a while on Niku.

Another point we discussed.  The drinking only coconut juice for four days in a row (all I had with me) did not give me the runs or a tummy ache.  Eating too much flesh from the coconuts on another trip did.

The coral rubble seems to make it easy to sprain an ankle if one is foolish enough to run on the stuff, as it goes down several feet on most of the islands here.  For the most part though it is fairly rounded by the action of the waves that placed it there originally.

On the other hand, most of the sand we have is made of tiny fragments of broken shell washed in from the reefs.  THAT is hard on the feet.  Cuts the undersides of big toes to ribbons.

Obviously, the fact that I live in the tropics and spend a lot of time walking on coarse sand beaches means my feet are a bit tougher than some, but it doesn't take a lot of time for the soles to harden up.

I looked at the close ups of the coral on Niku and compared it with our coral beaches. Seems very similar to me.

Th' WOMBAT
****************************************************************
From Ric

You may be right.  We're horrified at the prospects of being cast away on an island like Niku but if we were we might make out better than we imagine.  The will to survive is a powerful force and the human animal is can adapt to all sorts of conditions.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 4 Jul 2003 11:04:58 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: FDR interest in AE's fate

So that means the "memo" was Vidal to GP to MacIntyre to FDR to FDR Library to  Brinks to Ron to forum. I could never get that admitted into evidence. Even if it was a photocopy and it could be authenticated there is no way to know what Vidal or GP actually said. I'd have to pass on this.

Alan
***********************************************
From Ric

I understood Ron to say that the memo was from MacIntyre to FDR with a handwritten response on it from the President.  Sounds to me like pretty good evidence that FDR agreed to see Vidal for "5 or 10 minutes".  It is NOT evidence that such a meeting took place.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 4 Jul 2003 11:06:26 EDT
From:         Paige Miller
Subject:      FDR's Request

Eric writes:

>I once read an account by a man who was present when FDR spoke from the rear
>platform of a train.  A polio victim, FDR was bought out in his wheelchair,
>man-handled into a standing position and then strapped to the lectern from
>which he spoke.  While this was going on, Secret Service agents moved through the
>crowd and opened the movie cameras of private citizens to ensure there was no
>action footage of FDR having to be thus assisted.

Seems to me there is a huge difference between the Secret Service effectively restricting a very obvious activity in a crowd in a contained area, and the "government" monitoring conversations anywhere in the country. I submit that the latter was not possible in 1937.

>So,
>yes, I believe that it was possible for FDR or his staff to have used the power
>of the Federal Government to suppress any information on AE distress calls
>that might have been picked up by a few private short wave listeners.

Which raises the question, why would the government care to suppress such information, especially since it was at the same time spending huge amounts of money on a search?

Paige Miller #2565
LTM
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 4 Jul 2003 11:13:32 EDT
From:         Paige Miller
Subject:      What really happened

Ron Bright writes:

>Presidential aide M. H. MacIntrye sent a memo to FDR dated 20 July 37
>reporting that Gene Vidal had been in touch with GP and that Vidal "has some
>very
>interesting sidelights and some speculations, which are probably true, as to
>WHAT REALLY HAPPENED." [ my emphais ]  What could that be?

I don't understand the phrase "some speculations, which are probably true". Seems to me an oxymoron ... a speculation is a guess or conclusion unsupported by facts, how could Vidal, GP or MacIntyre know they are probably true?

Where did GP get this information from? Why didn't GP just tell the world as soon as he found out: "I KNOW WHERE AMELIA IS, PLEASE GO SAVE HER"?

Or is the implication that MacIntyre knew from other sources (not Vidal or GP) what really happened, and yet somehow failed to inform Itasca and Colorado where to look, leaving FDR open to criticism that huge amounts of money were spent on this search and nothing was found?

>These kind of statements of "what really happened" continue to fuel the
>Earhart mystery. The implication is  that the government "knew"  the real
>story, but wanted it kept secret.

Where did this evidence come from, such that the government "knew" the real story? Not Itasca, not Colorado. And why did the government want it secret?

Please tell us, inquiring minds want to know.

Paige Miller #2565
LTM (who was always making speculations)
**********************************************************************
From Ric

This does not seem mysterious to me.  I think MacIntyre is saying, "Vidal, after talking to GP, thinks he knows what went wrong and it sounds reasonable to me."  That's all.  I don't know where anybody gets the idea that somebody is claiming to know where Earhart is.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 4 Jul 2003 11:24:08 EDT
From:         Eric
Subject:      Noonan's Head injury

Ric wrote:

>All four women tell remarkably similar stories and each one said that
>Noonan was injured.

Many of the witnesses that Fred Goerner interviewed on Saipan remembered that FN had a head injury.  Coincidence?

LTM

Eric,  NAS NORTH ISLAND San Diego, CA
********************************************************************
From Ric

Some of the people Goerner interviewed on Saipan described a man with a head injury.  Correct me if I'm wrong, but it is my recollection that none of them identified the man as Frederick J. Noonan.  There may have been a man with a head injury who was seen by several people, or there may have been a story about a man with a head injury that was heard by several people and in either case it would not be unusual to hear several stories about a man with a head injury.  But it's a long way from your statement that, "Many of the witnesses that Fred Goerner interviewed on Saipan remembered that FN had a head injury."

As we've also seen, there are no multiple accounts of a Noonan head injury in the post-loss radio signals.  There is no coincidence to worry about.

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 4 Jul 2003 11:34:12 EDT
From:         Ron Berry
Subject:      Amelia's injuries

If most of us agree that Fred had an injury that was reported by Amelia, then we have to assume that if she had been injured that she would have reported this at the same time. She made no suggestion that she had been hurt, so she would not need Fred's shoe to tramp around in and lose. Also I have a question or two about the crabs:

When the crabs steal something where do they take, do they have a nest or do they head for the water with their prize?  Second question what kind of crabs are these?

*********************************************************************
From Ric

Mabel Larremore, "She also had some injuries but not as serious as Mr.Noonan."

Thelma Lovelace, "We are in need of medical care and must have help."

Betty's notebook gives the impression that Earhart was in pain, "Oh, oh, ouch"

We don't know for sure where the crabs go with stuff they steal but we've never found anything in an excavated crab hole.  There are at least five species of crabs on Niku.  The biggest and most aggressive is Birgus latro - the Coconut or Robber crab.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 4 Jul 2003 13:52:03 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: FDR interest in AE's fate

Ric wrote:

> I understood Ron to say that the memo was from MacIntyre to FDR with a
> handwritten response on it from the President.  Sounds to me like pretty good
> evidence that FDR agreed to see Vidal for "5 or 10 minutes".  It is NOT evidence
> that such a meeting took place.

I agree but the point is that it is NOT evidence of anything else. Certainly not what Vidal or GP may or may not have said and is therefore, in my opinion, of no value at all.

Alan
***************************************************************
From Ric

I think it's evidence that FDR offered to give Vidal  5 or 10 minutes, but it doesn't mean that FDR had 5 or 10 minutes worth of interest in Amelia Earhart.  Vidal was a political figure and there could have been all kinds of reasons that FDR thought it best not to refuse to see him.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 4 Jul 2003 13:55:41 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Noonan's Injury

Did Noonan have a head injury in the old movie?

Alan

**********************************************
From Ric

No.  In the movie the Fred Noonan character (who was not named Fred Noonan) was not even on the fatal flight.  The AE character "Toni Carter" (Rosalynn Russell) takes the airplane up by herself and intentionally dives it into the ocean.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 4 Jul 2003 13:57:33 EDT
From:         Tom King
Subject:      Re: Amelia's injuries

Ric says --

>we've
>never found anything in an excavated crab hole.

Well, maybe we have.  In excavating the hole at the Seven Site, where we thought the skull might have been buried, Gary Quigg and Kar Burns found fish and bird bones falling out of the excavation sidewall at about 50 cm, which seems to be the typical depth of a Birgus latro burrow.  It wasn't possible to observe a borrow in the coral rubble, but it's hard to see how the stuff would have gotten there except down a crab hole.  Interestingly, the fish bones were not of the same species as those in the burn features we excavated, perhaps suggesting (a) that they came from a different feature (There's an unexcavated one upslope of the hole) or (b) that crabs bring fish home for dinner.
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 5 Jul 2003 11:53:55 EDT
From:         Marty Moleski
Subject:      Re: Amelia's injuries

> ... crabs bring fish home for dinner.

Are crabs fussy eaters?

Wouldn't they eat bones and all?

I remember that they skin rats before eating them.  But do they distinguish--can they distinguish?--between flesh and bone?

                Marty
***********************************************************************
From Ric

Can they distinguish between flesh and bone?  You betcha.  Offer a big crab your machete blade and he won't clamp down on it.  Offer him your finger and say good-bye to your finger. Most of the scavenging seems to be done by the juvenile crabs - mostly because there are so many more of them.  These baseball-sized guys don't have the strength to crack big bones.  The adult coconut crabs are very strong and they can go off with bigger bones but they seem more interested in cleaning all the flesh and gristle off than actually gnawing the bone itself.
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 5 Jul 2003 11:57:18 EDT
From:         Marjorie
Subject:      Re: Roosevelt's Request

Is there any way Betty could have heard Mabel Larremore's story earlier? Has it been mentioned in the forum or on the Tighar website before this? I have no intention of questioning Betty's sincerity -- I find her notebook and story to be entirely possible. But to quote Ric himself:

"So far we have no hard evidence that Roosevelt ever made such a request. The whole Japanese Capture Hypothesis was a classic case of life imitating art.  The 1943 Hollywood film Flight For Freedom popularized the idea and "supporting evidence" quickly began to emerge."

I find that I occasionally think I remember something happening only to discover later that my vivid memory was of something I dreamed or saw on television or read.

It seems to me if Mabel's story about the FDR request has been published previously in something Betty reads, we must give as much weight to a "false recovered memory" explanation as we give to the "two separate sources" evidence for the FDR story.

LTM,

Marjorie
**********************************************************************
From Ric

Betty's first mention of her memory of a Roosevelt request was just last week, so what you suggest is at least theoretically possible.
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 5 Jul 2003 12:00:39 EDT
From:         Ross Devitt
Subject:      Re: Shoe parts

Ric wrote:

> You may be right.  We're horrified at the prospects of being cast away on an
> island like Niku but if we were we might make out better than we imagine. The
> will to survive is a powerful force and the human animal is can adapt to all
> sorts of conditions.

Obviously I might not be right either, but I did promise that when I was well enough I'd do some castaway type experiments on the islands here as long as they didn't endanger my health.

Which is sort of where the WOMBAT nickname came from.  The wooden box experiment that we never did!

Th' WOMBAT
***************************************************************
From Ric

As I recall we were going to lock you in a wooden box and see how long you lasted - or something like that. :-)
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 5 Jul 2003 12:16:24 EDT
From:         Daryll
Subject:      Earliest record of Noonan's injuries

I posted this before, but don't forget the telegram that GPP received from the psychic.

>?A100 67 DL=CD NEWYORK NY JUL 5 1937 458P
>
>OPERATIONS MANAGER=OAKLAND AIRPORT OAKLAND CALIF:
>
>PLEASE GET THIS INFORMATION TO GEORGE PUTNAM EMINENT PSYCHIC SAYS BOTH
>ARE SAFE ON REEF LESS THAN 200 MILES NORTH WEST OF HOWLAND ISLAND PLANE
>PRETTY WELL CRACKED UP BUT BOTH ARE SAFE MISS EARHART IN BETTER SHAPE
>THAN NOONAN ITASCA WILL FIND THEM IN MORNING THEIR TIME HASTE IS
>NECESSARY BUT THEY WILL BE RESCUED PLEASE TAKE THIS FOR WHAT IT IS WORTH
>FROM WELL WISHER
>
>UNSIGNED. 225PM

This telegram that GPP had saved in his files was published and made public, according to the author Dean Jennings in his story in POPULAR AVIATION issue of Dec. 1939.

Would an unnamed psychic have any more OR less credibility than Betty's note book or other radio listeners of the period who referenced Noonan's injuries? Your call. This telegram does establish a record with a time and date that "MISS EARHART IN BETTER SHAPE THAN NOONAN" whatever the injuries may have been.

When I first posted this on the forum you established that the telegram was sent 2 hrs after COMFRANDIV got notification of the "281 message".

Their location in the telegram reflects the same doubt that the interpretation of the "281 message" generated within the Navy at Waliupe.

Comments about Miss Earhart, Noonan and the airplane on a reef, square with Amaran's (?sp?) account many years later where he said he treated a man with head injuries who was accompanied by a woman, on a Japanese ship, that had an airplane with a broken wing in a sling off the stern, at Jaluit.

Not having seen the original log entry for the "281 message" generated speculation that the entire "281 message" content had NOT been revealed.

I suppose you can simply pass off what the unnamed psychic said about AE, FN & the plane. BUT the psychic seemed also to have a pretty good idea of where the ITASCA really was AND how long it would take for it to get to the area of where he speculated the reef to be, 200 miles NW of Howland (281 miles NW of Howland re the "281 message"). What time does the ITASCA log say they arrived in the area 281 miles NW of Howland?

Daryll
***********************************************************************
From Ric

Itasca reached 281 north at about 9 p.m. local time on the 5th. The psychic's batting average was pretty crummy:

There is no reef within 200 miles NW of Howland.
Itasca did not find them "in the morning their time."
They were not rescued.

The mention of injuries - Noonan worse than Earhart - does seem to be the earliest description of such a situation.
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 5 Jul 2003 12:26:16 EDT
From:         Eric
Subject:      The Race to Find AE

Paige Miller wrote:

>Which raises the question, why would the government care to suppress
>such information, especially since it was at the same time spending huge
>amounts of money on a search?

My own theory is that immediately after the loss of AE, the U.S. Government did not have sufficient assets in place to effectively follow up on any hot leads as to where she might be.   If  private short wave listeners were, in fact, receiving information that might help pin-point her location, the Government would not want it made public before they could act upon it themselves.   By the time the Navy was able to start SAR operations, AE and FN might already have been picked up by some other foreign power.  That made it a diplomatic matter.  If that foreign power refused to acknowledge that they had AE and FN (but we knew that they did, because of our own intelligence efforts) what could we do?  Push the issue and run the risk of starting a war?  Perhaps FDR or his advisors decided that 1937 was not the time to pick a fight with Japan, even if it meant giving up AE.  ("No blood for Amelia.")

LTM,

Eric, NAS NORTH ISLAND, San Diego, CA.
*************************************************************************
From Ric

If the U.S. had any concerns about a "foreign power" rescuing Earhart and Noonan why did they ask the Japanese to help search for her?  In 1937 the United States and Japan were at peace.  On occasions when U.S. citizens had become lost or strayed into Japanese areas, even sensitive Japanese areas, they had been treated courteously and promptly returned.
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 5 Jul 2003 12:43:04 EDT
From:         Woody
Subject:      Island Survival in General

I've often toyed with the idea that TIGHAR ought to put a couple of people on the island to stay a while, test the survival facet first hand.  I know many of you have spent a week or more there, so it's not like you are totally in the dark about some of these issues, but I wonder if a couple of months might yield some insights.

I'm not volunteering by the way... but thinking over the logistics, it would not be desirable to buy such knowledge with somebody's life.  If a couple of people went to live on Nikumaroro and one of them died, the other could report back that it's difficult to live all right...  You'd want to have an emergency exit, say you had a serious injury or an appendicitis or something, you'd want a reliable radio link so you could call for help and get rescued in a day or something, score it as a death without anybody having to die.

If they drowned or something it would be just part of life, it wouldn't be necessary to have an ambulance standing by for ten minute response time or anything like that.

Gary Paulsen has written some novels on wilderness survival, exploring the philosophy of it.  "Hatchet" is about a kid who goes down in northern Canada somewhere and survives for a summer before being rescued.  "Brian's Return" I think it is explores the scenario where the government takes him back there and has him explain how he survived.  Here we get into an interesting question: there's a difference between going thru a survival exercise for the camera, with a radio link to the rescue squad, and going thru it because you're lost and have to survive or die. In that exercise, Brian took the government man to the site and showed him how he started a fire, how he built a lean-to, how he used the smoke to drive away the mosquitoes... within a few hours, they had a pretty comfortable camp, because Brian already paid to learn all those techniques.  When he was learning them, it was not only painful it was dangerous.

I think of when the Marines or the Seals or whoever conduct a training exercise, with a bunch of recruits who are from various walks of life, and a bunch wash out and a few graduate.  The washouts are like those who would die in an emergency wilderness survival situation, and in a group of 40 there are going to be anywhere from 3 to 37 of them, depending on how tough the course is designed to be.  I think Fred would have been more likely to survive than "Amelia Bdelia".  I think she was kind of a city girl, used to hotels and cabs waiting to take her there and so forth (I'm not all that familiar with this point) but wilderness survival, if that's what she was faced with, may have been new to her and she may have made a lot of mistakes, some unrecoverable.  I think she'd have been one of those 3 to 27 that washed out.

It might be valuable to test the question, could somebody survive for two days?  You could put a dozen pairs of people on the island at different times and see what percentage have to punch 911.

Just some thoughts.

Wood
(trying to avoid the phrase "would have" but it just ain't possible)

*********************************************************************
From Ric

Thanks for trying.  Your next challenge is to do something about your sexism.

Survival under severe environmental and emotional stress is a highly individual issue and there is no way to recreate the circumstances faced by Earhart or Noonan.  We don't know how either of them would react; we don't know whether or to what extent they were injured; the island was different then than it is now; we don't know how often it rained in the days and weeks following the disappearance; etc., etc.

We keep this project as safe as possible.  I don't like having people stay overnight on the island and I discourage it unless there's a good operational reason to do it.

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 5 Jul 2003 13:52:46 EDT
From:         Ron Bright
Subject:      Re: Radio Relay League

A couple of months ago I contacted a principal member of the ARRL at St Petersburg, Fl to see if any of their oldtimers had heard signals from AE in 1937.
whether there were any news reports between themselves, etc.,

So far I have had no reply.

Ron Bright
************************************************
From Ric

I think it's pretty clear that ARRL is dry hole.
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 5 Jul 2003 13:58:43 EDT
From:         Ron Bright
Subject:      Re: What really happened

I would guess that when Vidal talked with GP right after the loss, Vidal told GP that AE's intentions were to fly back to the Gilberts. GP relays that to McIntyre.

Years later  Vidal told an interviewer of that alleged intention. He probably inferred that was what "really happened". [Vidals undated interview transcript, Univ. of Wyoming]

We have no idea if indeed that AE made that statement prior to the flight, or if she meant it or if that was in fact a contingency plan.

LTM,

Ron Bright
Bremerton, WA
**************************************************************
From Ric

You may be right.  We do know that what followed shortly thereafter was an official State Dept. request for British assistance in checking out a specific uninhabited island in the Gilberts.  Arrangements were made (it's a fascinating story that we'll have on the website soon) but it turned out that the island existed only in legend.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 7 Jul 2003 11:31:26 EDT
From:         Ron Bright
Subject:      Re: FDR interest in AE's fate

I disagree that that memo had "no value". Baloney. What triggered the memo was  that Vidal thought may have happened. Take it at face value. No doubt that Vidal was a "public figure", but nevertheless, the basis of the 5 min proposed meeting centered around what happened to AE.

We also know that Vidal thought he knew what happened from later documents, such as returning to the Gilberts.

It seems to me that we could find the notes of that meeting someplace in the FDR library, if it took place. But if it had contained substantive information about the fate of AE, I would guess it would have surfaced by now.

Ron B.
************************************************************************

From Ric

Exactly.  GP was sure that AE was on an island and he thought he knew what island it was - a small island near Tarawa.  That fit with Vidal's own recollection of AE's comment about turning back to the Gilberts.  There seems to be every reason to believe that Vidal met with FDR, made his case, and the president asked the State Dept. to cooperate in asking the British to search the island.  The British tried but the island wasn't there.
**********************************************************************

From Daryll

Ric wrote:

>You may be right. We do know that what followed shortly thereafter was an
>official State Dept. request for British assistance in checking out a
>specific uninhabited island in the Gilberts. Arrangements were made
>(it's a fascinating story that we'll have on the website soon) but it
>turned out that the island existed only in legend.


The same article that I quoted the psychic telegram from talks of that search also. The author, Dean Jennings, says "All material used to illustrate this article from George Palmer Putnam"

It was late in July ...."That morning Mr. Putnam received the following telegram from Hamilton, Ontario:

AMELIA EARHART ALIVE ON CORAL SHOAL ON ONE OF THE GILBERT ISLANDS LATITUDE 2 ABOVE THE EQUATOR 174 LONGITUDE. THIS MESSAGE RECEIVED BY MR. L _____ NEW YORK MEDIUM

[my note, The telegram came from Hamilton Ontario but made a reference to a "MEDIUM" in New York. It could be the same psychic that sent GPP the telegram on the 5th since the telegram in that header had DL=CD and this telegram had MR. L _____ as the medium. The DL=CD might be similar to a secretary's notation at the bottom of a letter]

George noted the Lat. & Long. in the telegram intending to check it on the map later.

"An hour or so later, when the morning mail was delivered, there came a brief but pleasant note from Captain T____ M_____ of Cape Breton Island Nova Scotia..."

It read :   "...I am the retired captain of a copra boat that used to trade in the South Seas. I just happened to remember an uncharted island that we frequently visited for turtle eggs. The Gilbertese natives know where it is, too. The island is at ____"

Supposedly GPP jumped up and had David, his son, get the telegram that he had read earlier and  compared the Lat. & Long. from the medium and Capt. M____. They were the same but the Captain was more detailed. "174 degrees 10 minutes east longitude, 2 degrees 36 minutes north latitude" . "....roughly about 85 miles from Tarawa island".

GPP headed for New York. "Two days later, in New York, George Putnam knew in his heart that he must have that island searched". 

GPP worked with Summner Wells, Under-Secretary of State, who in turn worked with the British who then worked with their consul in the Gilberts to get the island searched. The vessel set out from Makin Island. The vessel cruised around the coordinates for 2 days, even taking soundings. "But there was no land within 20 miles,...". The search cost GPP $1000.

"...island existed only in legend." (Ric G)

Do you mean like the "Golden Fleece" kind of legend?

"Captain M_____ and former members of his crew, all reliable seamen, swore they had been to the island half a dozen times. Even the log of the copra ship confirmed their tale....".

"The episode had only one weird sequel---baffled admission from the Ontario medium that he was never again able to contact Amelia Earhart on the island where he had last heard her voice."

This medium seemed to move between Ontario and New York. His words were "...he was never again able to contact Amelia Earhart on the island where he had last heard her voice." If this so called medium wanted to disguise the true source of his visions, it could easily fit into receiving post loss radio messages which only lasted for about a week after her disappearance. It was an unidentified psychic that sent GPP the telegram on the 5th that closely paralleled the "281 message" in content and time-line.

I believe I recall a letter from GPP in which his focus shifted to the Marshalls in late July. It is a matter of record, that within a couple of months of July, GPP went on vacation to the Galapagos islands and was essentially incommunicado for several months. In the same time period of GPP's vacation, FDR talked his friend Astor, a New York resident, into taking his yacht, the Nourmahal (larger than the KOSHU), to the Marshalls where the Japanese, our so called friends, denied him permission to visit Jaluit.

Daryll
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 7 Jul 2003 11:33:15 EDT
From:         Art Rypinski
Subject:      Roosevelt Public Papers

I've been traveling for a few days, and have been catching up reading about a week's worth of forum postings.  It strikes me that this discussion about President Roosevelt has gotten waa-aa-ay ahead of the available information. If we want to learn what President Roosevelt said to the public, the best quick source would the following publication:

"Public Papers and Addresses of Franklin D. Roosevelt"  (13 volumes, covering 1928-1945). (New York:  Random House, 1938-1950).

This is part of the National Archives' series "Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States," and covers the public statements, press releases, and public correspondence of every modern President. Presidential papers since 1992 (i.e., President Bush the elder's last year) are available on-line.  See:

http://www.gpo.gov/nara/pubpaps/aboutpaps.html

Most of the series has been published by the Government Printing Office, but for some unknown (to me) reason, Roosevelt's papers were published commercially.  Most good University libraries are likely to have a copy of this series (along with other Presidents) in their reference collection.

LTM,
Arthur Rypinski  #2548

***********************************************************************
From Ric

Thanks Art.  Maybe someone who remembers how to use a real library would like to take this on.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 7 Jul 2003 11:34:37 EDT
From:         Dave Bush
Subject:      Bones and crabs

Isn't it possible that the bones you found at 50 cm could have been buried by a castaway who was concerned by the fact that just piling the bones on the open ground attracted the crabs and thus burying the bones helped keep the crabs out of the area?

LTM,
Dave Bush

********************************************************************
From Ric

Tom?
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 7 Jul 2003 11:35:36 EDT
From:         Ron Berry
Subject:      Re: Earliest record of Noonan's injuries

It's not a fair comparison Betty's Note Book and something that a unknown physic had predicted. If this prediction had been right then we would all know his name, but sense his guess was wrong in every respect he never came forward. Betty's Note Book is a synapse of what she thought was an important event. Even though some of it can't be explained, that is what makes it a very interesting piece of evidence. She wrote down things that she did not understand, that  is what lends shades of truth to her scribblings.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 7 Jul 2003 11:36:41 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Shoe parts

> As I recall we were going to lock you in a wooden box and see how long you
> lasted - or something like that. :-)

But we like Ross. Should I suggest some other candidates for the wooden box or should we pass on that?

Alan
*********************************************************************
From Ric

We'll pass on that.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 7 Jul 2003 11:40:06 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Earliest record of Noonan's injuries

> The mention of injuries - Noonan worse than Earhart - does seem to be the
> earliest description of such a situation.

That also could be the original source of subsequent mentions. As to putting any credibility to this I know of no documented evidence any psychic has ever demonstrated their "talent" successfully in all of history.

Alan
******************************************************************
From Ric

I don't think anyone is suggesting that we put any credence in psychics but if the allegations of the psychic were publicized it cold, as you say, be the original source of subsequent mentions.  However, I don't think they were made public.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 7 Jul 2003 11:41:12 EDT
From:         Paige Miller
Subject:      Contradicted by history

Eric writes:

>My own theory is that immediately after the loss of AE, the U.S. Government
>did not have sufficient assets in place to effectively follow up on any hot
>leads as to where she might be.   If  private short wave listeners were, in fact,
>receiving information that might help pin-point her location, the Government
>would not want it made public before they could act upon it themselves.

Yes, the US had very few assets in the area. From what I've read, the US had one asset in the area on July 2, 1937, and that's one more than any other government had.

Your hypothesis is contradicted by history. If the US Government gets a solid piece of information on AE's whereabouts, then Itasca is there to search. When it appears a specific piece of information is obtained from a non-government source, the 281 message, Itasca immediately steams to that location, effectively following up on this seemingly specific piece of information. If a private radio operator gets a solid piece of information and makes it public, there is no other ship near Howland but Itasca, so no other government can get there faster than the US. If a private radio operator were to hear a solid piece of information about AE's whereabouts, I see no benefit to anyone by making that radio operator keep quiet, nor could the US Government legally make such a request to keep quiet.

>By
>the time the Navy was able to start SAR operations, AE and FN might already
>have been picked up by some other foreign power.

In order to make this argument, you need documentation and evidence. What government and what ship?

Again, your statement is contradicted by history. Itasca started search and rescue the same day AE disappeared.  No other government could have started faster, since Itasca started search and rescue before the rest of the world knew about AE's disappearance.

Paige Miller, #2565
LTM
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 7 Jul 2003 11:45:40 EDT
From:         Ed
Subject:      Re: Noonan's Head injury

I firmly believe that there is still more to learn from Betty's experience. Has Betty given any thought to undergoing Hypnosis to perhaps amplify on weak memories or renew those that were unrecalled but relate to the notes? The team that put together the matrix of signals analysis could put together some questions. This wouldn't be a test of Betty's integrity (I believe she heard her!) but rather seize upon a real time opportunity to interview Betty (a true witness) through multiple sessions using her journal. If Betty is willing and TIGHAR can get an accredited/professional hypnotist? Any thoughts?

LTM

Ed of PSL #2415
************************************************************************
From Ric

This has been suggested and discussed before. Hypnosis is not a "truth serum" or a method for recovering lost memories.  Information obtained from a person under hypnosis is no more reliable than what they tell you in a normal state.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 7 Jul 2003 11:49:12 EDT
From:         Mike Holt
Subject:      Re: FDR's Request

Paige Miller wrote:

>Seems to me there is a huge difference between the Secret Service
>effectively restricting a very obvious activity in a crowd in a
>contained area, and the "government" monitoring conversations anywhere
>in the country. I submit that the latter was not possible in 1937.

I'm not so sure.  I think it was quite possible in 1937 that most citizens would have been awed by any government statement with FDR's named attached even by implication.  Based on my talks with my father (born in 1910)  and his buddies, that time before WW2 was one of mindless acceptance of Federal edicts. After all, they told me once, FDR had ended the Depression; to think he could do anything 'wrong" is totally unacceptable.   (I've not tried it, and I can't any more because of my father's memory loss, but I bet they'd deny the truth of the story about the Secret Service and the cameras.)

>Which raises the question, why would the government care to suppress
>such information, especially since it was at the same time spending
>huge amounts of money on a search?

That's the only real question, here.   I can't arrive at any reason they'd bother to say anything at all.

Mike Holt
************************************************************************
From Ric

FDR was popular, yes, but there was also no shortage of people who despised him.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 7 Jul 2003 11:50:14 EDT
From:         Bob Lee
Subject:      Re: Radio Relay League

Based upon previous research postings by Mike Everette, I certainly have to agree with Ric. I don't however see any harm in a member going back and taking a second look at the last half of the year 1937. No telling what another pair of eyes may see.

Bob

************************************************************
From Ric

Be my guest.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 7 Jul 2003 11:53:10 EDT
From:         Bob Lee
Subject:      Re: Island Survival in General

Take away all the problems of physically getting someone to the island and leaving them there for a couple of months -- with some emergency backup plan -- and remember this crucial fact. We don't know what condition (physical or mental) that either AE or FN were in. We can assume they were tired, scared and maybe a bit frustrated. I would have to assume that the island is NOT a very good place to recover from injuries. Add to that that they just might have spent what energy they could muster in an attempt to get off some radio messages before the loss of the aircraft, thereby further reducing their strength and chance of long-term survival.

Could a couple of people survive on Niku? From what I've read on the forum -- two healthy people that knew their time on the island was limited to a couple of months, probably could survive; but I am not sure what that proves.

Bob
************************************************************************
From Dan Postellon

> Thanks for trying.  Your next challenge is to do something about your sexism.

Several starvation survival studies have been done, as well as historical reviews of situations like the Donner party.  Women have a clear survival advantage over men, possibly due to smaller size and a greater percentage of body fat.

Daniel Postellon  TIGHAR#2263
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 7 Jul 2003 14:49:57 EDT
From:         Dennis McGee
Subject:      Kind of off-topic .

Mike Holt said:  "After all, they [Mike's father and his friends] told me once, FDR had ended the Depression;  . . ."


Not really, Mike.  Unless, of course, you want to blame WWII of FDR, which many people do.

The sad truth is that the Depression did not begin to end until FDR began the military build-up in the late-30s.  When the war started (for us, in 1941) our politicians were smart enough to turn on the printing presses and go onto a war footing from day-one, unlike the Japanese and Germans who delayed cranking up their economies for total military production until 1943, or so, by which time it was too late.  World War Two forced us to spend our way out of the Depression and when it ended the economy slumped again until the manufacturers could retool for civilian consumption rather than military hardware.

LTM, who wears combat boots, too
Dennis O. McGee #0149EC

*******************************************************************
From Ric

Not to get into an off-topic debate but -

While it is true that most historians see WWII as the economic engine that finally ended the Great Depression, it is also true that by the mid '30s the programs of the New Deal had had (or at least were widely credited with having) a significant mitigating effect on the Depression.  Roosevelt's re-election in 1936 is proof enough of the widely held perception that his policies had brought improvement.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 8 Jul 2003 10:12:41 EDT
From:         Mike Holt
Subject:      Re: Noonan's Head injury

Is it possible the head injury idea is a holdover from all the aviation movies?   In most of them, as I recall dimly, the usual injury resulting from a crash landing is a head injury.   The public may have come to expect that kind of thing.

Mike Holt
***********************************************************
From Ric

The odd thing is how consistently it is Noonan, not Amelia, who is seriously injured.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 8 Jul 2003 10:32:43 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: FDR interest in AE's fate

Ric wrote:

> Exactly.  GP was sure that AE was on an island and he thought he knew what
> island it was - a small island near Tarawa.  That fit with Vidal's own
> recollection of AE's comment about turning back to the Gilberts.  There
> seems to be every reason to believe that Vidal met with FDR, made his case, and
> the president asked the State Dept. to cooperate in asking the British to
> search the island.  The British tried but the island wasn't there.

Sorry, guys but I don't see any substance here. I don't know what GP thought or what Vidal thought at the time. I don't know why or if FDR met with anyone or what they talked about. I don't believe in psychics and all I'm hearing is Monday morning quarterbacking. Speculation won't cut it. It didn't in 1937 and it won't now. The bottom line of all that discussion is zero. No documentation, no island, and no Amelia.

I can speculate as well that GP would have jumped at any suggestion made with his wife lost in the Pacific. We would have done the same. We would have had the Gilbert's searched the Phoenix Island's searched, looked at Mili Atoll, checked out Tokyo Rose and grasped at every straw thrown. What GP actually believed at the time I suggest no one knows. I have never seen any substance to what Vidal claimed at any given time. If in fact AE ever mentioned the Gilbert's to Vidal or any one else there is no documentation of that nor is there any significance that I can see. The issue is what AE decided to do at 8:43 am on July 2nd 1937 given the immediate circumstances not some supposed casual remark made long before.

Alan
*********************************************************************
From Ric

Refreshing your memory...the subject line of this thread is "FDR interest in AE's fate" and the point here was to determine to what degree President Roosevelt was interested and/or involved in finding Earhart.  There is documentation establishing that he at least agreed to see Vidal and there are documented government actions subsequent to the proposed visit which strongly suggest that the meeting took place and the president extended a degree of cooperation in setting up what turned out to be a wild goose chase.

I think the incident is valuable in that it does appear to define the degree to which Roosevelt was interested - which is to say, mildly.  I think this information further reduces the possibility that there was ever a publicly-issued presidential request that said anything about Amelia Earhart - but as Art Rypinski has pointed out - that can be researched definitively.  More importantly, I think this incident argues against high-level government knowledge of Earhart's fate.

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 8 Jul 2003 10:40:48 EDT
From:         Mike Holt
Subject:      Government edicts

Dennis McGee wrote:

>Mike Holt said:  "After all, they [Mike's father and his friends]
>told me once, FDR had ended the Depression;  . . ."
>
>    Not really, Mike.  Unless, of course, you want to blame WWII of
>FDR, which many people do.

That's not at all what I was getting at.   My father's little group credited FDR with winning the war, by the way.

Ric wrote:

>... '30s the
>programs of the New Deal had had (or at least were widely credited
>with having) a significant mitigating effect on the Depression.
>Roosevelt's re-election in 1936 is proof enough of the widely held
>perception that his policies had brought improvement.

And it's the public perception that's important.   I don't find it at all hard to believe that someone in the government might have said something like  "This flight by AE has value for American aviation, both commercial and military.   Therefore, finding her is of potential commercial and military value" -- or something faintly similar.   By the screwball twists that still alter the public understanding of Federal messages, this might have been understood that finding AE is a top secret activity.

No, it doesn't make a lot of sense, but the mindset in 1937 does not seem to have been the same as it is now.  There was a lot more feeling that whatever America does is important and needs to be kept  away from the other countries.

At the end of it all, as someone said,  there's an innocent statement that we may not see as sending the message the two women  reported receiving.

Mike Holt
*****************************************************************
From Ric

Man oh man, if we're going to get into how the mindset of the nation has changed since 1937 we have our work cut out for us.  I think, honestly, that all we can say is that everyone processes the news through his or her own filter -  and that is as true today as it was in 1937 or 1837.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 8 Jul 2003 10:47:30 EDT
From:         Tom King
Subject:      Re: Bones and crabs

Dave Bush asks:

>Isn't it possible that the bones you found at 50 cm could have been buried
>by a castaway who was concerned by the fact that just piling the bones on
>the open ground attracted the crabs and thus burying the bones helped keep
>the crabs out of the area?

Yeah, but digging 50 cm in coral rubble is hard, especially without a shovel (unless you're a crab).  And I did some experimentation and found that burying lamb bones only 1/4 inch deep deterred the crabs. And of course, we found lots of fish and bird bones in the fire features at between 0 and 10 cm.  So it's possible, but I'd say the crabby idea is a lot more likely.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 8 Jul 2003 10:51:04 EDT
From:         Ross Devitt
Subject:      Re: Shoe parts

Alan said:

> But we like Ross. Should I suggest some other candidates for the wooden box
> or should we pass on that?

> *********************************************************************
> >From Ric
>
> We'll pass on that.

Ross has been uncharacteristically quiet on this......

***********************************************************
From Ric

One might say he has kept the lid on it.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 8 Jul 2003 10:59:35 EDT
From:         Ross Devitt
Subject:      Hypnotising Betty...

From Ross Devitt

Ric wrote:

> This has been suggested and discussed before. Hypnosis is not a "truth serum"
> or a method for recovering lost memories.  Information obtained from a person
> under hypnosis is no more reliable than what they tell you in a normal state.

Is it not true though, that hypnosis can help a person remember the "peripheral" memories relating to the experience?

Betty's interest in the forum has been wonderful to experience.  Some people are naturals for hypnosis and some aren't.

If Betty is the sort of lady who is not averse to new experiences, and if she herself is curious about remembering more, it just might be fascinating.

For me, I turned 49 a few months ago, and I'm still as fascinated by the reminiscences of older people as I was when I was young.

Th' WOMBAT
*******************************************************************
From Ric

>Is it not true though, that hypnosis can help a person remember the
>"peripheral" memories relating to the experience?

Yes, it is not true that hypnosis can help a person remember the "peripheral" memories relating to the experience.  Or, more accurately, if it can help there is no way to know it can help because the "peripheral" memories you may get under hypnosis are indistinguishable from wishful thinking or imaginative embellishments.

The reminiscences of older people are indeed fascinating.  Some are even true, but it takes hard documentation to sort them out.

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 8 Jul 2003 11:28:04 EDT
From:         Tom Riggs
Subject:      Re: FDR interest in AE's fate

My wife has a book titled,  "Eleanor Roosevelt" Volume 2 1933-1938, authored by Blance Wiesen Cook, published in 1999 by Viking, Penguin Putnam Inc. 375 Hudson St. Ny, Ny 10014. The book contains a very detailed biographical account of ER's life.

Pages 458-460 discuss the disappearance of AE/FN.  The only mention Eleanor Roosevelt (ER) makes about FDR and his interest in AE's fate was on July 7, 1937 when she wrote a letter to a friend stating, "FDR was not very hopeful that they will find Amelia.  It just makes me sick".

The author further states that ER learned of the disappearance on a trip home from Delaware.  ER wrote a letter to her daughter and said she, "heard about Amelia over the radio and felt even lower.  I do like her and I'll miss seeing her if she's gone but perhaps she'd rather go that way.  Life might not have held such a happy future for her".  The author comments these are mysterious words for ER to write about AE, and questions what would prompt her to say such a thing.  The author wonders if ER was referring to Earhart's marital situation, or another reality we know as yet nothing about?  As a footnote, the author includes the following (which is re-hash we've already heard before):

"A most curious exchange between ER and Henry Morgenthau, whose Treasury Department presided over FDR's Secret Service and Intelligence unit heightens the puzzle.  When ER asked him to release the Itasca file to Earhart's friends, aviators Paul Mantz, Jacqueline Cochran, and others, Morgenthau's office sent ER an unsigned memo stating the secretary (Morgenthau), "cannot give out any more information than was given to the papers at the time of the search for Amelia Earhart.  It seems they have confidential information which would completely ruin the reputation of Amelia and which he will tell you personally some time when you wish to hear it.  He suggests writing Paul Mantz and telling him that the President is satisfied from his information, and you are too, that everything possible was done."  ER followed that suggestion."

Relative to Vidal, another section in the book discusses Amelia's involvement in FDR's politics and a situation that occurred when Vidal was temporarily removed from his post as director of Air commerce.

"Eleanor Roosevelt's reference to tensions between Gene Vidal, director of air commerce, and other Department of Commerce officials, including its secretary, Daniel Roper, is one example of her (AE's) endless ability to involve herself in every aspect of FDR's administration.  In September, Vidal (Gore Vidal's father) was removed.  Amelia Earhart (his champion and lover) was furious and threatened to abandon her promise to ER to campaign.  She wrote ER, who appealed to FDR, and Vidal was temporarily restored.  After that, Earhart made twenty-eight speeches for FDR throughout the country."

Don't know where the author got info AE and Vidal were "lovers"?  This is the first I've ever read about any hanky-panky between AE and anyone other than George Putnam and the young fellow she met in college.  It would seem nearly impossible given the fact GP was constantly with AE, other than when she was flying, and seemingly dominated her every move in public and private life.  Plus, they "seemed" genuinely devoted to each other.


TR  #2427
*********************************************************************
From Ric

Thanks Tom.  That's very interesting information.

>"Life might not have held such a happy future for her".

Fascinating.

>Department presided over FDR's Secret Service and Intelligence unit heightens the
>puzzle.

Nah.  The Treasury Department also presided over the Coast Guard.  Commander Warner Thompson's report "Radio Transcripts- Earhart Flight" trashes AE. That's what they didn't want to release.

>one example of her (AE's) endless ability to involve herself in every
>aspect of FDR's administration.

I think that's rather an exaggeration.  I'm not aware of any "involvement" AE had in the administration.  She was friends with Eleanor and she used that connection to her own benefit.

>Don't know where the author got info AE and Vidal were "lovers"?

I don't know of any proof, but there's nothing new about the allegation. Earhart was rumored to be romantically involved with Paul Mantz, Gene Vidal, Harry Manning, etc., etc.  That goes with the territory when you're a celebrity. How true were the stories?  Inquiring minds want to know - but the evidence seems to all be circumstantial.  Your impression that GP was with her constantly is incorrect.  She was on the road doing speaking engagements more than she was with him.  She told him up front, in writing, on their wedding day that she had no intention of being sexually faithful to him.  She had memorabilia that she wanted destroyed in the event of her death.

As far as I'm concerned, AE's personal life was her business, but I don't hold her up as role model for my daughters.

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 8 Jul 2003 11:29:06 EDT
From:         Rayfield
Subject:      Re: Radio Relay League

I have the June, July, August, September, November, and December issues of QST (missing October).  I've found no reference to Earhart in them at all.

   John Rayfield, Jr. - KR0Y
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 8 Jul 2003 11:33:16 EDT
From:         David R. Jeane
Subject:      Re: Bones and crabs

Not in keeping with "energy saving", it is easier to pitch them into the bush or back into the ocean rather than dig a 50cm deep hole into coral rubble I imagine. Especially without a shovel.

David R. Jeane
****************************************************************
From Ric

As Tom King has pointed out, a thin layer of dirt is sufficient to hide them from the crabs.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 8 Jul 2003 11:55:57 EDT
From:         Alfred Hendrickson
Subject:      Noonan's injury

>The odd thing is how consistently it is Noonan, not Amelia, who is
>seriously injured.

This is more or less what I was keying in on with my post of 7/4. I do not immediately see that this commonality among the stories will reveal anything helpful to us, but I find it interesting all the same.

LTM,

Alfred Hendrickson #2583
*******************************************************************
From Ric

It's the old "What are the odds?" question.  There are 13 alleged post-loss messages which purport to offer at least some information about the situation Earhart is in.  Of those, 3 report that "All's well" or "We are OK". None allege that only AE is injured. There are 4 (Betty Klenck, Mabel Larremore, Thelma Lovelace, and Nina Paxton) who report that Noonan is injured. Two of the 4 (Betty and Mabel) report that AE also has injuries but not as serious as Noonan's. None allege that both are injured but AE more seriously than Noonan.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 8 Jul 2003 12:01:08 EDT
From:         Bob Lee
Subject:      Re: Government edicts

Ric wrote:

>through his or her own filter ....

Yes, that is exactly right. However -- in a case where we are relying to any degree on press reports, one must remember that until Viet Nam and more importantly the Watergate mess, the press was loathe to report on many privately known aspects of our leadership. Examples from a non-historian:

FDR's Health
Ike's ham handed handling of the USSR
Kennedy's array of personal faults
Nixon's whole personality

All this means is that we do filter information, but if we don't get the information in the first place -- what's to filter?

I believe Betty. I don't think, however, that we're gonna find anything that specifically mentions Earhart. I suspect that this memory comes from seeing something regarding false reporting of radio messages and it was "filtered" into Betty's realm and her involvement with the Earhart situation.

Bob
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 9 Jul 2003 10:56:19 EDT
From:         Ric Gillespie
Subject:      Marie Long

My friend Dave Jourdan of Nauticos passes along the sad news that Elgen Long's wife, Marie, died on June 20th.

>She died peacefully at home, at the age of 77 1/2.  Elgen asked me to
>spread the word ... please pass this on to whoever you think should know.
>
>Elgen and Marie were married for 57 years, and those of us who knew her
>could tell that she was a remarkable woman who played no small part in
>Elgen's success and recognition.  She lived a long and productive life,
>and will be missed by many.
>
>A memorial service will be held at the Hiller Aviation Museum in San
>Carlos (near the San Francisco Airport) on July 12th at 11 am, followed
>by an informal celebration of her life.
>
>Elgen said that, in lieu of flowers (which he has plenty of!), a
>donation to Parkinson's Disease research would be appreciated.  I would
>add that I know Marie benefited greatly by the support of her local
>Hospice organization.  Also, Elgen and family deserve much credit for
>helping Marie spend her final days at home where she was happiest.
>
>With condolences and best wishes to the Long family,
>
>Dave

Neither Dave Jourdan nor Elgen Long is a subscriber to this forum and, as far as I know, Elgen does not have an email address. so my suggestion would be that messages of condolence should be directed to the Hiller Museum at museum@hiller.org with a request that they pass it along to Elgen.

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 9 Jul 2003 11:10:10 EDT
From:         Bob Lee
Subject:      Re: Noonan's injury

It is interesting. I know that Fred had a navigation station of sorts in the rear of the plane. I also know (from the forum) that he spent considerable time in the right hand seat of the cockpit. Would moving from the front seat to the rear be something that could be easily done? Would the cramped quarters of the rear station offer less safety than the front seat? IF Fred were at the nav station during the landing, that 'could' account for this injuries being the more serious of the two.

Bob

******************************************************************
From Ric

Passage between the aft cabin and the cockpit was awkward but perfectly doable. This is speculation of course but, I would think that Fred would definitely want to be in the right seat for all takeoffs and landings.  That's where he had a real seat and a seat belt and could help with co-pilot tasks.

The presence of a control yoke in a pile of gear beside the airplane in a photo taken in Darwin, Australia leads me to suspect that the yoke on the co-pilot's side had been removed to give Fred more room to work up front.  In the event of an abrupt stop, the absence of the yoke could increase the chances of injury both from striking his head on the instrument panel (no shoulder harness) and from his knees hitting the shelf that extends back from the base of the panel (unique to the Lockheed 10).  Interestingly, Nina Paxton claimed that Earhart said that Noonan had injured his knees in the landing.

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 9 Jul 2003 11:21:31 EDT
From:         Daryll
Subject:      Chronology & Foreign affairs

#1.

Alan wrote:

>The mention of injuries - Noonan worse than Earhart - does seem to be
>the earliest description of such a situation.
>That also could be the original source of subsequent mentions. As to
>putting any credibility to this I know of no documented evidence any
>psychic has ever demonstrated their "talent" successfully in all of
>history.

Ric wrote:

>I don't think anyone is suggesting that we put any credence in psychics
>but if the allegations of the psychic were publicized it could, as you
>say, be the original source of subsequent mentions. However, I don't
>think they were made public.

The point was that the telegram had a date and time on it. According to the author of the article, GPP had NOT made that telegram public before the date the article was published in Popular Aviation which was Dec. 1939. Supporting evidence of Noonan's injuries surfacing between July 5, 1937 and Dec. 1939 couldn't have been influenced by the telegram.

#2

Eric writes:

>My own theory is that immediately after the loss of AE, the U.S.
>Government did not have sufficient assets in place to effectively follow up
>on any hot leads as to where she might be.........

Paige Miller writes:

>Your hypothesis is contradicted by history. If the US Government gets a
>solid piece of information on AE's whereabouts, then Itasca is there to
>search.


You both seem to ignore the politics of the time and of the area. The Marshall Islands was the ONLY place that Naval assets couldn't go to check out with their own eyes. I don't care if the Japanese said they would look for her with their own ships, the fact remains that of the entire search area, the Marshalls was the only area left out of the search for political reasons.

Soon after the loss, Congress sent a congressman to confront Sec. of the Navy Swanson to ask him point blank if Earhart was on a spy mission. He said no, he went on to say that he thought she went down in the Marshalls and saw something she shouldn't have. He said any talk on that possibility was a "Powder Keg".

GPP understood that the Marshalls were on the limit of possibilities just as well as the Gilberts were, which the Swan and Itasca had visited.

The Marshalls was a sensitive issue back then, which is why I think that there wasn't a lot of reference to searching them. It was even out of bounds to speculate about it openly in a magazine article in 1939 in which GPP had contributed to the contents.

Dean Jennings, author of the article, wrote about a Mr. Ka, "...a Los Angeles crystal gazer..." that GPP, "Accompanied by his son, David, and a stenographer" had went to for a "demonstration".

From the article;

".....over a huge crystal ball.

    After a moment of silence, he began reciting letters rapidly in a hollow, muffled tone. He rattled them off for seven minutes and, when typed, they proved to be rambling sentences in Latin. Subsequently, when the message was translated, it contained an astonishing amount of little-known information about Amelia Earhart's flight and gave the location of the lost plane.

    A search of the remote area described was out of the question......"

The location was given by the medium to GPP but it wasn't revealed in the article in '39'. Why not?  Ask yourself what meaning that last sentence above had?

This is an example of how they (GPP & Jennings) danced around a
reference to the Marshalls. Off-hand I only recall GPP using the term Marshalls in a letter to FDR's secretary thanking the President for the Navy's efforts.

All this tends to follow the concerns expressed on this forum in the past couple of days about the "air" or sense of disclosure of where AE could be by radio listeners would somehow  jeopardize her life in some way.

If people who were listening and hearing AE sending SOSs, then that means she was alive somewhere. The only area that the Navy hadn't searched was the Marshalls. The fear could have been that the Japanese hadn't found her either and reports of hearing SOSs would cause the Japanese to look more closely in their uninhabited areas if only to find and stop the transmissions.

On a larger political scale, the Marshalls, under public pressure could have prompted a Naval confrontation between the US & Japan, which was the "Powder Keg" that Sec. of the Navy Swanson mentioned to the congressman.

"  A search of the remote area described was out of the question......"

Daryll
************************************************************************
From Ric

It's always fun to watch your mind at work.

>Soon after the loss, Congress sent a congressman to confront Sec. of the
>Navy Swanson to ask him point blank if Earhart was on a spy mission. He
>said no, he went on to say that he thought she went down in the
>Marshalls and saw something she shouldn't have. He said any talk on that
>possibility was a "Powder Keg".

You wouldn't happen to have a source for that would you?  When is "soon after the loss"?  Who was the congressman?  On what did Swanson base his opinion?
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 9 Jul 2003 11:25:13 EDT
From:         Tom King
Subject:      Re: FDR interest in AE's fate

One aside about AE and GP: When she reviewed the draft of "Amelia Earhart's Shoes" at my request, AE's niece Amy Kleppner objected to some sort of scornful comments I'd included about GP; she said that from the family's perspective AE and GP had been very much a team, that the latter's devotion to the former was shown by his urgent attempts to continue the search for her, and that after her disappearance GP continued to be close to and supportive of the family. She portrays him, at least, as a dedicated spouse and supporter.
************************************************************
From Ric

I've never seen anything to suggest marital problems between AE and GP. Their relationship may have been unconventional but it seems to have been genuinely close.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 9 Jul 2003 11:43:45 EDT
From:         Bob Lee
Subject:      TIGHAR Tracker

I picture Ric standing over a large map of the pacific moving the various TIGHAR assets around like a battlefield planner. How close am I? Any news?

Bob

***************************************************************
From Ric

That's exactly right.  Just like the scenes of Fighter Command in "Battle of Britain".  I sit up here brooding on the balcony, surrounded by banks of phones, while down below uniformed young women push markers around on a giant map.

The action has been pretty intense.  The runway at Pago Pago looks like it will be out of action for some time (maybe a week, maybe months) so we've moved our port of embarkation to Apia, Western Samoa.  MOLLIE is repositioning (as indicated by the little boat on the map) and we're presently re-booking the air travel with Air New Zealand. It now looks like the team will depart Apia on or about July 17 and be back there on or about August 1.  That should give them 7 days at Niku.

We'll be over budget and there are still loose ends to tie up (like getting our Kiribati rep to Apia on schedule) but the operation is moving forward.

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 9 Jul 2003 11:44:51 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Hypnotising Betty...

> Yes, it is not true that hypnosis can help a person remember the
> "peripheral"
> memories relating to the experience.

The legal community hassled over this concept for quite some time. Many people's lives were ruined by the so-called lost memories. Subsequent studies have shown they have no credibility or validity. Like cross examining children the questions themselves easily plant inaccurate and down right false responses.

Alan
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 9 Jul 2003 12:05:40 EDT
From:         Ross Devitt
Subject:      Re: FDR interest in AE's fate

>  I do like her and I'll miss seeing
> her if she's gone but perhaps she'd rather go that way.  Life might not have
> held such a happy future for her".

Amelia had stated somewhere that she thought she had "one more long distance flight in her" or words to that effect.  Someone on the forum will have the full quote.

I wonder if that was tied in with Eleanor's words.  There may have been some illness few knew about.  If aviation was a huge part of Amelia's life, just knowing she was planning to give up long distance flying might have had something to do with it.

Amelia did call the flight "around the world, just for fun" after all. 
Maybe Eleanor knew something....

Th' WOMBAT
*********************************************************************
From Ric

I think that if Eleanor "knew" anything it was that the day of the celebrity stunt flyer was coming to a close.  Amelia had made her name in a day when all you had to do to become famous in aviation was to boldly go where no one man (or woman) had gone before.  All you needed were some basic skills, a good airplane (that was the hard part), the patience to sit in a noisy little room for a long time, and the guts to try it.

By 1937, just nine short years after AE had been feted in a ticker-tape parade for riding as a passenger across the Atlantic, Pan American was flying scheduled passenger service across the Pacific.  Even the World Flight had to be justified by calling the airplane a "flying laboratory" (which it was not).  The game was played out and AE knew it.  I expect that Eleanor did too.  What would life have been like for a 40 year old has-been flier?
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 9 Jul 2003 12:07:26 EDT
From:         Dan Postellon
Subject:      Re: Bones and crabs

Do crabs eat a different group of fish than people do?  Maybe only those that wash up on the shore?   Dan

**********************************************
From Ric

I've never known a crab who was picky about what he ate.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 9 Jul 2003 12:09:57 EDT
From:         Ted Campbell
Subject:      Re: Bones and crabs

Not so fast!  Remember it is and has been the American custom to bury someone six feet deep.  If you can't get six feet deep (because of rocks, coral, etc.) you do the best that you can.  Maybe 50 cm is all he/she could do because of the tools, energy, etc.

Ted Campbell

*********************************************************
From Ric

I think you're a bit confused.  We're talking about some fish and birds bones that were found 50 cm down, not a human burial.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 9 Jul 2003 12:14:54 EDT
From:         Ted Campbell
Subject:      Re: Hypnotising Betty...

I think Betty's notebook, and her most recent recollections, stand on their own - it's either real or not real in the sense it is something a 15 year old thought she heard back in 1937.  We, in 2003, can't judge if she got all the words right or even if she got the phrases correct, or maybe it is all made up. All we can do is see if what she wrote so many years ago correlates with what we have learned over the years since and hopefully in the years to come.

The exploration of Gardner Island, the post loss messages matrix (Ric, we are anxiously awaiting this to be published on the web), the bones chronology, antidotal recollections, etc., are all part of that analysis.  Until all this work is done we can't really honestly judge Betty's notebook accuracy.  Nor can we dismiss it out of hand.

Many a historical event has only been recorded by a single individual - how many cameraman recorded Orville and Wilber's first flight?  How do we rationalize a Boeing 777 flying overhead?

The best we can do, us of the "get me the information now" generation, is to wait until the scientific disciplines publish their findings and/or hypotheses.  We then have the opportunity to weigh in with our criticisms, suggestions or alternate theories.

Let's give the system the time to work before we start to tear down the little information we have on the subject.

Ted Campbell
*********************************************************************
From Ric

The Post-Loss Radio Study will go first to TIGHAR members as a hard-copy magazine-size issue of TIGHAR Tracks.  It's only fair that those whose support made it possible get to see it first.  Later we'll put it up on the website. Still working on it.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 9 Jul 2003 12:17:04 EDT
From:         Denise
Subject:      Barefoot Natives

Ric says: "Because they have mostly gone barefoot all their lives they need shoes with width EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE."

It's not life-long barefootedness that gives Polynesians and Melanesians the need for "shoes with width EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE". Several years back, after communicating on this issue with Kenton Spading, I did a month-long study in shopping malls in four different towns in Far North Queensland looking at Aboriginal and Islander people and noting their various forms of footwear.  The conclusions drawn from this direct observation were that:

1) neither Papua-New Guineans nor Aborigines, despite the frequency of their being raised shoe-less, wear different shoes from anyone else.

2) Melanesians and Polynesians (of whom we in FNQ have many) wear surf-shoes with open sides or flipflops, and when they don't, like all those schoolkids in Adidas, they LIMP.

Since these sampled Islanders included many from the Torres Strait - Australian-Melanesians - raised in Australia and thus shod practically from birth - and they were as unable to wear regular shoes as any Melanesian raised shoe-less anywhere else in the Pacific, I think we can knock this belief right on the head: you don't get wide feet from going shoe-less.

I am more than willing to concede it's the barefootedness that gives their soles the toughness, but that amazing width requiring that EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE comes from their ancestors.

LTM (who wore narrow shoes)

Denise
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 9 Jul 2003 12:21:23 EDT
From:         Rick Metzger
Subject:      Re: FDR interest in AE's fate

The smell of conspiracy is in the air.

The only way FDR knew where AE/FN had landed was if someone told him.

Who? And is it documented?

K.I.S.S.

They flew to some point within 50 miles (radio) of Howland then turned onto 137/337(radio) to intersect the island. Which way did they turn?

All evidence points to the south. What Island lies on 137/337 to the south? Gardner. Why didn't AE/FN hear any radio signals? Not because their antenna cable was lying at Lae, because they were receiving through their loop antenna (Hooven). That was set for 500kc (Hooven) while they were transmitting on a higher frequency.

Not until after they were lost did they acknowledge a call to them by transmitting three dashes.

Could they have used the loop antenna to transmit a voice signal?

Rick Metzger

***************************************************************
From Ric

No.  The loop was a receiving antenna only.  The transmitting antenna was the Vee that ran from a mast on top of the fuselage to each vertical fin.

I'm aware of no evidence that FDR knew any more than anyone else about what became of Earhart and Noonan.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 9 Jul 2003 12:37:27 EDT
From:         Jim Preston
Subject:      Re: TIGHAR Tracker

RE: the runway at Pago Pago, I flew DC-10's into there in the early 80's for CAL. The runway had cracks then and we used to complain but to deaf ears. It was always as you said , we have no money.
****************************************************************
From Ric

You were right and they were right.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 9 Jul 2003 12:39:20 EDT
From:         Bob Lee
Subject:      Re: FDR interest in AE's fate

"Life might not have held such a happy future for her".
>
> Amelia had stated somewhere that she thought she had "one more long
> distance flight in her" or words to that effect.

I think that the quote had more to do with her stunt flying days than really giving up flying -- period. I seem to remember that she had sent GP a note somewhere along the way that said, in effect, that she was looking forward to a time where they could just fly off together for the sheer pleasure of it.

Bob
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 10 Jul 2003 15:03:54 EDT
From:         Carol Dow
Subject:      Re: Comments on CW

>To intersect the island, which way did they turn? All evidence points
>to the south. What Island lies on 137/337 to the south?

I would like to jump into this one. Yes, they must have turned south, i.e.,  singe line of position landfall with Noonan shooting out of the distortion free  left window rear cabin. One of the glaring flaws in the radio transmissions  also begins to surface. Itasca did not CW an "A" or an "N" commonly accepted range signal (dah-dit or dit-dah) on the 500 KCS freq. and Earhart had nothing to home on except occasional conversation. I believe that might have been the killer on the radios....no continuous wave signal, and the part that really hurts is it would have been so easy for those guys in the radio shack to send a CW "A" or "N" at the crucial time. Frustration to say the least and a massive job of bungling and incompetence on the part of the Itasca radio crew. For quite some time I was really suspicious about the reason why Earhart switched frequencies to 6210 and broke a valid connection on 3105. It seems to me the Itasca radio operators spent the better part of a crucial time of day trying to get Earhart to switch back to 3105. I know 6210 was the daytime freq. and 3105 would have eventually faded so she had every reason to make the switch. A lot of conspiracy-spy theories started after she broke the connection, but I discounted that in my beliefs because it was standard procedure to switch freqs. at that time of day. Bad luck all the way around. Howland Island was a mystery island to Earhart. It was a jinx. She tried to reach it from both directions (including Hawaii), and both attempts failed. That blasted place. Sometimes I wonder if someone was practicing Voodoo and put a hex on Howland. Any witch doctors around? Joke. Hope I have the facts straight. Any comments? The handwriting on the wall at Garapan Prison I believe is indicative of the fact Earhart may have been into the supernatural with the I-Ching and the planets Mars and Jupiter indicated in the writing (Lily Gelb's translation from Tom Devine's latest book). Interesting stuff.

Carol Dow

**************************************************************************
From Ric

No, your facts are not straight.  Itasca sent "A"s on 7500 which is exactly what had been prearranged per Earhart's request.  Earhart heard the signal.

There was no "estblished connection" on 3105.

Tom Devine's latest book is interesting only as an illustration that there is apparently no limit to how silly the Conspiracy Crowd can get.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 10 Jul 2003 15:06:27 EDT
From:         Carol Dow
Subject:      Re: Comments on CW - slightly off topic - Voodoo

I used to be prayer counselor for the 700 Club when I lived in Dallas, and I ran into witches and Voodoo. The island of Haiti is famous for the occult. I often wondered if that might not be the reason why those people live in such misery. In the United States, Salem, Mass. is famous for the occult, and it all came about when they started importing black women from Haiti as slaves way back when. They brought their own brand of Voodoo to Salem and began teaching it to little children, and that's how it all started. Don't laugh, it happened Jackie Cochran, a clairvoyant held a seance for Earhart after she disappeared. Not exactly what you would expect to hear from the First Baptist Church. The Rev. Dr. W.A. Criswell would shake his head in sorrow. The handwriting on the wall at Garapan Prison makes me wonder who Earhart was praying to at the time. I know it tarnishes the Earhart reputation, but it is something to think about, assuming she wrote the symbols on the wall. Who else but Earhart could have written something that sophisticated? It took over 65 years for someone to come up with a translation. Sorry about that, but facts is facts.
Carol Dow
**********************************************************************
From Ric

Carol, you're beautiful.  Never change.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 10 Jul 2003 15:08:28 EDT
From:         Eric
Subject:      SAR Ops

Paige Miller wrote:

> Itasca started search
> and rescue the same day AE disappeared. No other government could have
> started faster, since Itasca started search and rescue
> before the rest of the world knew about AE's disappearance.

While Itasca was able to start immediate SAR operations, they had only the vaguest idea where to look.  (Their search area never did include the Phoenix Group/Gardner Island.) And even conducting SAR operations in itself does not necessarily mean that someone else might not have found AE and FN first. Consider the case of Doug Hegdahl (a co-worker of mine here at North Island). During the Vietnam war and while onboard a ship operating on Yankee Station, Doug was blown overboard during a gunfire operation. Once he was discovered as missing, his ship looked for him for 4 days.  They eventually decided that he had been lost at sea and held a memorial service for him. In fact, Doug had been picked up by native fishermen, who eventually turned him over to the North Vietnamese. (I believe he was the only Navy enlisted man to end up in the Hanoi Hilton.) The V.C. were very casual about reporting their prisoners.  In fact, it was only when they started to release them that the status of some prisoners changed from MIA to POW.  (There is evidence to suggest that some MIA's had actually died while being held as POWs, and the V.C. never acknowledged their fate.)  We know Doug's story because he survived to tell his tale.  (Because of Doug's story, I'm not ruling out the possibility that AE and FN MIGHT have been picked up by native fishermen, island traders or some non-military unit, and still ended up in Japanese hands.)

LTM

Eric, NAS NORTH ISLAND, San Diego, Ca.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 10 Jul 2003 15:12:29 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Barefoot Natives

> but that amazing width requiring that EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE
> comes from their ancestors.

From ancestors who went barefoot?

Alan
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 10 Jul 2003 15:17:08 EDT
From:         Ted Whitmore
Subject:      Castaway survival

In 1945 the Navy @ Pearl Harbor conducted a school in 'Sea and Jungle Survival.'  It was a very interesting course and all the Coasties headed for Loran station duty via Sand Island CG Station (across the harbor from Honolulu) were sent to the course.

Interestingly, An  island situation such as Niku with bearing coconut trees was a relatively easy place to exist; bearing coconut trees can supply everything necessary to survive indefinitely except companionship - if you have some know how to use them you can make make shelter, provide drinking water, vegetable food, fiber for making twine, fish hooks, fish line, a coffee type drink (including cream for it), etc.

I'll grant that AE (and probably FN) were probably not well versed in survival but I'm sure considerable information on the subject was readily available in the 1930's.  The Polynesians have used these arts for centuries.

Ted Whitmore

**************************************************************************
From Ric

I don't doubt that information was available but I haven't seen anything to suggest that Earhart included any kind of survival training in her World Flight preparations.  What she knew about castaway survival probably came from whatever she could remember from reading Robinson Crusoe as a kid.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 10 Jul 2003 15:19:54 EDT
From:         Chris in Petaluma
Subject:      Re: Noonan's Head injury

Couldn't FN have been furious after landing on Niku and possibly yelling at AE possibly blaming her for getting them in that situation?  This all being misconstrued that FN had a head injury and was delirious as apposed to just being pissed off. (and perhaps having another injury?)  Would FN follow AE's suggestions as to how to find Howland no matter if he thought they were wrong?

Chris
******************************************************************
From Ric

I can't tell you that anything was impossible, but I would think that AE would follow her navigator's advice.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 10 Jul 2003 15:21:13 EDT
From:         Tom Strang
Subject:      AE Legend?

What has make Amelia Earhart a legend?   Ignorance compounded by opinionated speculation!  It appears some of us on the forum are continuing that tradition lately.

Resectfully,

Tom Strang  # 2459
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 10 Jul 2003 15:39:23 EDT
From:         Daryll
Subject:      What's my sources??

Ric wrote:

>It's always fun to watch your mind at work. 
>
Soon after the loss, Congress sent a congressman to confront Sec. of
the Navy Swanson to ask him point blank if Earhart was on a spy mission.
He said no, he went on to say that he thought she went down in the
Marshalls and saw something she shouldn't have. He said any talk on that
possibility was a "Powder Keg".
>
>You wouldn't happen to have a source for that would you? When is "soon
>after the loss"? Who was the congressman? On what did Swanson base his
>opinion?

Let me return the compliment about my mind.

>You wouldn't happen to have a source for that would you?

First of all, Ron Reuther and his connections have to be given credit for finding the source back in Sept 2001. As a result I did get a copy of the book from the library in Feb 2002 and I did read it. I can't find my own personal notes but I don't think Ron Reuther would object to me using his posted notes on the subject. This is research after all for a common goal....right? 

The source was : "The Wild Blue Yonder, Sons of the Prophet Carry On" by Emile Gauvreau published in 1944. I always try to take note of copyright dates and the current political climate of the times.

Background on the author Emile Gauvreau : Gauvreau was an author of at least 3 books, including this one and one on General Billy Mitchell. Gauvreau says "The Wild Blue Yonder" was reviewed by Hap Arnold and some other notables in aviation and Gauvreau certainly had substantial contacts in the field. Gauvreau was Director in Chief of a Congressional Investigation of our aircraft status launched by the Committee on Patents of the House of Representatives. This included investigation of patents, patent contracts, patent pooling, cross licensing and every phase relating to patent agreements, especially concerning the aircraft industry. In this role he worked with General Billy Mitchell [died in 1936] [and others].

>When is "soon after the loss?"

It has to be during the tenure of Claude A. Swanson as Secretary of the Navy. To be more specific, count back 6 months from the 1938 article in Smiths's Weekly of Sydney, Australia about the Navy spying on the Mandates during the Earhart search which was referenced. That article I believe was in Mar. or May '38' (?). The time period in question then would have been circa Sept. to Nov. '37' for Swanson's comments.

 
>Who was the congressman?

Congressman Sirovich [Chairman of the Committee on Patents at the time]. You can see how Gauvreau, Director in Chief of a Congressional Investigation, would have known of the conversation between Swanson and Sirovich.

>On what did Swanson base his opinion?

He was the Secretary of the Navy. What inputs would you think he would have had?

I think Ron Reuther's notes accurately reflect the books printed content in the following, (3) is a footnote in the book:
 
Claude A. Swanson, Secretary  of the Navy, who told Congressman Sirovich [Chairman of the Committee on Patents at the time] it was incredible under the circumstances to believe the Earhart plane could have disappeared without a trace unless every matchstick of it had been deliberately destroyed. (3). "This is a powder keg" he said, "and any public discussion of it will furnish the torch for the explosion.  I firmly believe that Miss Earhart, in trying to reach Howland Island, a speck on the map, lost her directions perhaps by a sudden shift in the wind and was brought down over territory she was not supposed to see.  We are aware that something is going on there.  I am not the only one in this department who feels that she saw activities which she could not have described later and remained alive.  That is the only explanation I can reach  for the blotting out of their plane and every solitary piece of her equipment.  Otherwise something would have remained. The attention  which Japanese newspapers paid to the smallest details of this sad flight from the time it began shows the peculiar interest with  which Japan followed every mile of her progress.  To speculate about this publicly  probably  would sever our diplomatic relations with Japan and lead to something worse." 

(3.)  Congressman Sirovich had visited Secretary Swanson to inquire about a report in Congress that Miss Earhart had been sent by the Navy on a secret mission which involved flying over Japanese mandated territory to see if it was being fortified.  This report was emphatically denied. 

Daryll

*************************************************************************
From Ric

So your source is a 1944 book by Gaverau.  Your speculation about the Smith's Weekly article seems reasonable but all you really know about the date of the alleged conversation is that it must have occurred after July 1937 and before the book was published in 1944. Gaverau quotes the alleged conversation verbatim and at length but does not claim to have been present himself.  There is no primary source cited.  Did Sirovich remember the whole conversation word for word and relate it accurately to Gaverau, or was a recording and transcipt made of the conversation, or is Gaverau paraphrasing the essence of what he understood Sirovich said he remembered of what Swanson told him?

And what if all this really is a fairly accurate account of something that Swanson said? Swanson doesn't actually claim to know anything.  What it sounds like is a repeat of the rumors that flew after "Flight For Freedom" was released in 1943.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 10 Jul 2003 15:42:57 EDT
From:         Angus Murray
Subject:      Re: Comments on CW - slightly off topic - Voodoo

Carol Dow wrote:

>Sorry about that, but facts is facts.

Facts ARE facts (I blame the teachers) but nothing you are talking about bears any relation to anything factual. AE did not end up in Garapan prison. Would you accept a bet of.. say $1000 - or even $10 if you can't afford to lose that much??

Regards Angus.

******************************************************
From Ric

Forum Rule #3

We don't hold Carol responsible for what she writes.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 10 Jul 2003 15:44:14 EDT
From:         Tom King
Subject:      Re: Castaway survival

Earhart, in her book "For the Fun of It," talks about being a tomboy as a kid, exploring the marshes and fields around Atcheson, so she at least had some sense of how to get along in the outdoors.  As an example of her farm exploits she recounts an amusing effort to trap a chicken in a box.  Too bad the birds on Niku tend to be too big to fit in a sextant box.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 10 Jul 2003 15:53:19 EDT
From:         Bob Lee
Subject:      Re: SAR Ops

>AE and FN MIGHT have been picked up by native fishermen, island traders or
>some non-military unit, and still ended up in Japanese hands.

I had similar thought recently and posted a couple of messages about traffic in the area of Niku and native travelers. Ric informed me (sorry if I misquote you Ric) that the British banned inter island travel and that the distances between islands is really too great to allow 'casual' travel. Military vessels have been largely ruled out.

Bob
**************************************************************
From Ric

You do not misquote me.  For Earhart and Noonan to have been picked up by anyone you have to put them down someplace where there was someone.  Note that throughout the entire Earhart search by Itasca, Colorado (and her planes), Swan, Lexington (and her planes), Lamson and Drayton; none of the ships or planes ever reported seeing any other vessel, large or small.  It's very lonely part of the world.

Referring to the 1937 search as "SAR Ops" is a bit like referring to a medieval tournament as an "Operational Training Exercise".
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 10 Jul 2003 16:02:34 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Noonan's Head injury

> Couldn't FN have been furious after landing on Niku and possibly yelling at
> AE possibly blaming her for getting them in that situation?

Not commenting on that item specifically but I'm sure FN AND AE had been in a lot of terse situations before. Amelia certainly had in aircraft incidents, at least the Hawaii wreck. Is there anything documented to indicate either of these two would get hysterical or panic in the face of adversity?

Another pilot in Vietnam once told me if I was about to auger in not to panic. I would die all tensed up.

Alan
************************************************************************
From Ric

What few accounts we have of Earhart's personal reaction to mishaps suggests that she remained calm and was, if anything, defensive and controlling.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 11 Jul 2003 12:04:54 EDT
From:         Mike Holt
Subject:      Re: Castaway survival

Tom King wrote:

>Earhart, in her book "For the Fun of It," talks about being a tomboy ...
>Too bad the birds on Niku tend to be too big to fit in a sextant box.

(Forgive me, Oh Great Bird of the Galaxy!)

Can we check the sextant box for chicken DNA?

Mike Holt
***********************************************************
From Ric

With pleasure  ... if we could find the box.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 11 Jul 2003 12:06:16 EDT
From:         Bob Lee
Subject:      Re: AE Legend?

> What has make Amelia Earhart a legend?   Ignorance compounded by
> opinionated speculation!  It appears some of us on the forum are continuing that
> tradition lately.
>
> Respectfully,
>
> Tom Strang  # 2459

I resemble that remark.

Bob
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 11 Jul 2003 12:11:13 EDT
From:         David Katz
Subject:      Re: Comments on CW - slightly off topic - Voodoo

Ric wrote:

> Forum Rule #3
>
> We don't hold Carol responsible for what she writes.

Seems odd...  Everyone else on the forum is responsible for what they write. How does one get a free pass?  Or is there special exemption for writings so far-fetched that they are posted merely for their entertainment value?

David Katz
******************************************************************
From Ric

You guessed it, but it's not always easy to tell which ones fall under the exemption.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 11 Jul 2003 12:13:02 EDT
From:         Alfred Hendrickson
Subject:      Two questions

I'd like to hear from the forum on these two items:

1) If we went WAAAYY out on a limb, and pretended (for just a moment) that the Electra 10E ditched that morning 66 years ago, with near-empty fuel tanks, how long do you think it would float? I surmise that the aircraft would quickly take on a nose-down posture, but what are your thoughts on how long it would float? Long's book talked about the fuel dump valves being a means for water to fill the tank. What do you think of that?

2) On items found on Niku all those years ago, I can form a picture in my mind of each one of them; sextant box, bottle, bones, etc., EXCEPT the corks on chains. Back then, bottles had corks. Even today, a cork is a great bottle stopper. But why corks on chains? Why not just one cork? It seems to me that if we knew something about what product or products were produced and/or distributed with corks on chains, we might be able to learn more about where it came from.

Help me out here; I'm losing sleep!

(Note to Carol only: Feel free to sit this one out if you wish.)

LTM, who needed eight hours of sack time every night,
Alfred Hendrickson #2583
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 11 Jul 2003 12:15:23 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: What's my sources??

Daryll, that was not a bad job but none of that represents a documented source. None of that would come into evidence to support the truth of your allegations. I recognize you are not a lawyer and not familiar with hearsay and credible proof but by now after being flamed on occasion and watching others go down to a similar fate you should have a better idea of what constitutes acceptable support. Someone's book will never cut it. If you will look back over what you offered and what Ric responded I think you will get the idea. The author of the book could have taken literary license with much of what he wrote. Keep in mind he had a point to make. From what you offered we don't know:

1. If any of the "quotes" were actually made.
2. If they were made accurately.
3. If the person making them had any documented proof of what he was saying.

The author took a number of "alleged" sources and wove them into the point he wanted to make. That won't get us any where.

Now the significance of what you wrote is NOT the truth of the matter but simply a starting point for someone to try and confirm any of what was alleged.

As you can easily see from rereading your own post that the allegations were based mostly if not entirely on speculation. What wind shift for example? And they may have drifted over territory they weren't supposed to see? First of all I don't know of any such territory in 1937. Secondly as a flight sim pilot at the least you must recognize that with our heroes heading almost due east and the wind varying from ENE to ESE their "drift" would be virtually nil if not canceled out all together. In any case it would have taken a massive hurricane or an unheard of jet stream running south to north at low altitude to get them into the Marshall's.

Alan
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 11 Jul 2003 12:17:05 EDT
From:         Gary
Subject:      Re: Comments on CW - slightly off topic - Voodoo

> Forum Rule #3
>
> We don't hold Carol responsible for what she writes.

This sounds like something Yogi Berra would say!

Gary
******************************************************
From Ric

Thank you.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 11 Jul 2003 12:19:01 EDT
From:         Bob Lee
Subject:      Oceania Map(s)

I stumbled upon a pretty darn nice map of Oceania at the CIA's website. The map is public domain.

http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/docs/refmaps.html

I took the PDF version of the  map and enlarged a section 400% that includes the Phoenix group, the Marshalls, etc... . I have also played with overlaying a GPS grid on the enlarged section of the map. If there's any interest in those, I'll be happy to email them out or put them on a public website.

My SpamFilter is ready, so here's my email for anyone interested: bob@sunstarip.com

Bob Lee
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 11 Jul 2003 12:20:14 EDT
From:         Amanda Dunham
Subject:      Re: Comments on CW - slightly off topic - Voodoo

Carol Dow wrote:

>I know it tarnishes the Earhart reputation, but it is something to think
>about, assuming she wrote the symbols on the wall. Who else but Earhart could
>have written something that sophisticated? It took over 65 years for
>someone to come up with a translation. Sorry about that, but facts
>is facts.

So Earhart was a witch, now?  Why'd she need a navigator in the first place, then?  I guess the back up broom malfunctioned?  Ric, maybe you should tell the current Niku team to look for pentacles formed in coral rubble.  Or a very broken down Quidditch pitch.  (Hey look, I just got close enough to the topic to mention flying!)

Carol, puhleez, pretty please tell me you are not one of those who are trying to get the Harry Potter books banned...

LTM, and your little dog, too--
Amanda Dunham
#2418CE
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 11 Jul 2003 12:23:40 EDT
From:         Paige Miller
Subject:      FDR's Request

Daryll writes

>If people who were listening and hearing AE sending SOSs, then that
>means she was alive somewhere.

Seems like we are in agreement on this point.

>The only area that the Navy hadn't
>searched was the Marshalls.

At the time these post-loss messages were being received, the US Navy had not searched any island (unless you consider Howland and Baker being searched...). Colorado didn't arrive in the Phoenix Islands until after the post-loss messages stopped. The only way that your sentence above makes any sense is if the people kept hearing messages and kept coming forth with them AFTER the Phoenix Islands and the Gilberts were searched. And if my map deceiveth me not, both Tuvalu and the Tokelaus are closer to Howland than the Marshall Islands are. There was a lot of islands unsearched when people were hearing these messages, and not a single island had been searched by this time.

So it would seem to me that people hearing those messages in the first few days after AE disappeared *COULD* have had valuable information that might have led the US Navy to AE. There's quite a large chance that AE was NOT in Japanese controlled territory. Asking people not to come forth with such information (if indeed such a request did happen) does not make sense ... unless the US already knew AE was in the Marshall Islands. Is that your claim?

By the way, which makes more sense? You are FDR or some other high ranking US Government official. You have the choice of the following two statements:

1) If you know anything about AEs whereabouts, do not talk about it or you will be punished (Betty and Mabel's claim)

2) If you know anything about AEs whereabouts, please bring it to the attention of the nearest US Government official CONFIDENTIALLY so we may have a chance to rescue her

>The fear could have been that the Japanese
>hadn't found her either and reports of hearing SOSs would cause the
>Japanese to look more closely in their uninhabited areas if only to find
>and stop the transmissions.

My fear is that AE is on land somewhere and through absolute paranoia that you are describing above that there is a slight chance that she is in Japanese territory, useful information could have been suppressed. Unless of course you are claiming the US already knew she was in the Marshalls. I personally do not see the United States Government acting out of such paranoia while at the same time spending large amounts of money to find AE. Those two actions are inconsistent.

You maintain that there was some sort of ill-will between Japan and the United States in 1937, which would lead them to capture Americans found in the Marshalls and not return them to the United States or even admit that Americans were being held captive. Since I'm not a history expert, I ask for historical references now that Japan was doing this in 1937 (not in 1939). Thanks.

Paige Miller #2565

LTM
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 11 Jul 2003 12:34:57 EDT
From:         Ross Devitt
Subject:      Re: Castaway survival

Ric wrote:

> What she knew about castaway survival probably came from
> whatever she could remember from reading Robinson Crusoe as a kid.

And that might not be quite as funny as it sounds....

Th' WOMBAT
**********************************************************
From Ric

I was not being facetious.  Robinson Crusoe is a cultural template.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 11 Jul 2003 12:37:36 EDT
From:         Ross devitt
Subject:      Re: What's my sources??

>   That is the only explanation
> I can reach  for the blotting out of their plane and every solitary
> piece of her equipment.  Otherwise something would have remained.

Two years earlier on the 8th November 1935, another Lockheed disappeared in the early hours of the morning .  Sir Charles Kingsford Smith and Tommy Pethybridge in the lady Southern Cross would have disappeared without a trace just as Amelia and Fred did if it hadn't been for the fact that in May 1937 its starboard undercarriage leg was picked up by Burmese fishermen on the rocky shore of Aye Island off the south coast of Burma about 140 miles south-east of Rangoon.

The RAF searched the whole area between Singapore and Rangoon without finding anything, and the entire area is densely populated compared with the Marshalls, the Gilberts or the Phoenix, in fact anywhere Amelia may have been.

If it had not been for the tyre floating and carrying the undercarriage leg ashore, it would still be a complete mystery, and even then it took 18 months and an accidental discovery.

It was thought they may have hit Aye itself and at least one well equipped expedition has practically torn the island apart (well, explored it) and found nothing.  It is now surmised that, based on an earlier sighting, the crash may have been quite a long way away and the current carried the u/c parts ashore.

Whatever the case, it shows that it is more than possible for "the blotting out of their plane and every solitary piece of her equipment." to be quite feasible, especially as the place was hardly populated at all.


Th' WOMBAT
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 11 Jul 2003 12:39:06 EDT
From:         Lawrence
Subject:      Re: Castaway survival

What AE and FN could or could not do in a survival situation is unknown. Some people seem to take to adversity and prosper while others wither and die. Remember "Gilligan's Island"? The professor could make a nuclear reactor from two coconuts, but he couldn't fix a two foot hole in a boat.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 11 Jul 2003 12:44:16 EDT
From:         Doug Kiniry
Subject:      Write up on ITASCA with photos

I figure many people have seen this but maybe a few would be interested that have not.

http://www.uscg.mil/hq/g-cp/history/Itasca_1930.html


Doug Kiniry
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 11 Jul 2003 14:34:11 EDT
From:         Tom King
Subject:      Corks and chains

For Alfred -- Re. your second question: my guess would be small barrels/casks of some kind, or maybe water bags.  Seems to me I used to have a canvas water bag with a screw top on a chain, and I should think a cork could just as reasonably be attached in the same way.

*********************************************************************
From Ric

It seems to me that there should have been such a thing as a standard cask for carrying emergency drinking water aboard ship.  A maritime museum might have an example of such a thing and if it featured a cork with a brass chain that would be interesting.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 11 Jul 2003 15:51:50 EDT
From:         Daryll
Subject:      No one EVER expects the Scottish inquisition !!!

Ric wrote:

>So your source is a 1944 book by Gaverau.  Your speculation about the
>Smith's Weekly article seems reasonable but all you really know about
>the date of the alleged conversation is that it must have occurred after
>July 1937 and before the book was published in 1944. Gaverau quotes the
>alleged conversation verbatim and at length but does not claim to have
>been present himself. There is no primary source cited. Did Sirovich
>remember the whole conversation word for word and relate it accurately
>to Gaverau, or was a recording and transcipt made of the conversation,
>or is Gaverau paraphrasing the essence of what he understood Sirovich
>said he remembered of what Swanson told him? And what if all this really
>is a fairly accurate account of something that Swanson said? Swanson
>doesn't actually claim to know anything. What it sounds like is
>a repeat of the rumors that flew after "Flight For Freedom" was released
>in 1943.

No one EVER expects the Scottish  inquisition !!!

>but all you really know about the date of the alleged
>conversation is that it must have 
>occurred after July 1937 and before the book was published in 1944

We can narrow done the conversation to between July 2,1937 & July 7, 1939 when Swanson died. That would seem to trump your >"Flight For Freedom" was released in 1943.

To further confirm that time period, the text of the conversation would tend to confirm that period by its content alone. 

>This is a powder keg ... and any public discussion of it will
>furnish the torch for the explosion...We are aware that
>something is going on there...To speculate about this
>publicly probably  would sever our diplomatic relations with Japan
>and lead to something worse

All of these quotes are examples of a pre-War political status. You consider the movie "Flight for Freedom" in '43' as the genesis of all the "conspiracy theories", which is not exactly true.

>Soon after Pearl Harbor the Navy was officially to approve a
>motion picture script which represented the execution of Amelia
>Earhart by the Japanese on a fortified mandated island. Although
>naval authorities were willing to have the film prepared and offered
>their co-operation other matters interfered with its production.
>Gaverau quotes the alleged conversation verbatim and at length but
>does not claim to have been present himself. There is no primary source
>cited. Did Sirovich remember the whole conversation word for word and
>relate it accurately to Gaverau, or was a recording and transcipt made
>of the conversation, or is Gaverau paraphrasing the essence of what
>he understood Sirovich said he remembered of what Swanson told him?

YOUR HOLY EMINENCE !! ALL I CAN SAY IS THAT I SAW THE HOLY MOTHER HOVERING ABOVE ME   !!!!!!

We do know that Morgenthau had a stenographer present during a meeting to record the minutes that he presided over. 

>Congressman Sirovich [Chairman of the Committee on Patents at the
>time]...Gauvreau was Director in Chief of a Congressional Investigation
>of our aircraft status launched by the Committee on Patents of the House
>of Representatives...

These were the same ingredients for a committee meeting that quite possibly could have had a stenographer present to record the minutes. Did Gauvreau know that a transcript existed for him to quote Sirovich accurately after his return from a meeting with Swanson?? I don't know. Would that be a primary enough source for you, similar to the Morgenthau conversation that was recorded?? The burden of proof is not on me because I accept the political mood that was portrayed in the text. The text is in conflict with your perspective. 

>Swanson doesn't actually claim to know anything.

Does anyone claim they actually KNOW something????

"...there is no reality, only perception..." [Dr.PM]


Daryll

***************************************************************************
From Ric

All you can really say about any of this is that if the conversation is accurately related (a big if), it indicates that rumors about Japanese culpability in the Earhart disappearance predate Flight for Freedom.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 11 Jul 2003 15:53:56 EDT
From:         Lynn
Subject:      Re: Two questions

I haven't seen the corks on the chains.  However in the 1930's it was very fashionable to carry little decorative ashtrays that came with corks attached to a chain. Not sure what they used the corks for though.

Lynn

************************************************************
From Ric

Nobody (at least nobody living) has seen the corks and chains.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 11 Jul 2003 16:54:11 EDT
From:         Lynn
Subject:      Corks & chains

Can you elaborate?   How many chains and how many corks attached to each chain?

*******************************************************
From Ric

As I said, the sum total of information we have is contained in the the statement:

"Those corks on brass chains would appear to have belonged to a small cask."

From that I would deduce that there was more than one cork and more than one brass chain.  It seems most logical that there were two or more units, each consisting of a cork with a brass chain attached.  The "small cask" is mentioned in the singular, either because a typical cask featured more than one cork/chain unit or Steenson was just being imprecise.
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 12 Jul 2003 11:33:07 EDT
From:         Alfred Hendrickson
Subject:      Corks and chains

I have it that the words were:

"Those corks on brass chains would appear to have belonged to a small cask."

If the phrase had been "This cork on a brass chain . . " it would make more sense to me.

I wonder if the casks had 2 openings, each plugged with a cork. One opening near each end of the cask, to let water out, and to let air in while drawing off water. A chain joined the corks to keep them together. (Sort of like what Mom tried to do with our mittens when we headed for school in the wintertime.) AE & FN liberated this thing from somewhere, perhaps from washed-up Norwich City debris, and used it in the benedictine bottle.

Alternately, the corks were not from a cask at all; they were from a fishing net. I'd think that would have been obvious, though, and would have looked like cask stoppers.

I'd also consider rod-and-line fishing gear, but my experience with rod-and-reel ocean fishing is we used weights, heavy ones, and not floats. What else does one use cork for?

LTM, who frequently told me to "put a cork in it"

Alfred Hendrickson #2583
*****************************************************************
From Kerry Tiller

I really don't think we are going to get anywhere trying to analyze the cork and chain thing unless we we have the actual artifact in hand (like the "knob" that turned out not to be one), or at least a good picture of it. At one time, not too far removed from the mid 1930s, cork stoppers with attached brass chains (to keep one from losing the cork) were common for a lot of uses. Here's just one example for you that could fit our scenario: for over a hundred years up until WWI, the U.S. military used canteens in varying forms that all had cork stoppers with brass chains attached. Hundreds of thousands of these were produced. In the 1930s, Bannerman's was a military surplus outlet where, through their mail order catalogue, you could get everything from uniforms to guns to actual practical stuff like haversacks and canteens that were issued to the military as far back as the Civil War. Picture yourself provisioning an adventure of some sort circa 1935. The depression is in full swing and you are looking for some corners to cut. You have a need for water canteens. You can order thirty year old G.I. issue ones in serviceable condition from Bannerman's for 50 cents a piece. They have corks and brass chains. Just like the one your father still uses when he goes fishing.

My point is simply this: even as late as 1937, cork stoppers and brass chains were still common place for a variety of liquid containment uses. For this piece of evidence to help us, we need more detail than we have.

LTM (who was a real corker in her time)
Kerry Tiller
***************************************************************

From Arthur Rypinski

I had always just sort of assumed, without ever thinking very hard about it, that ship's lifeboats were normally equipped with what passed for survival equipment in those days, and that the survival equipment included a water cask.  "Corks and chains" thought I, probably were the remnants of water casks from the Norwich City's lifeboats, stored in the supply cache, and then later looted by someone.

But my notion of a water cask in a lifeboat is not drawn from any specific recollection, but is drawn from the subliminal accumulation of miscellaneous knowledge that comes from reading a lot of books.  Still, there ought to be somebody out there who does have specific knowledge.

LTM,
arthur rypinski #2548
*********************************************************************
From Ric

Earhart had a couple of canteens with her on the first World Flight attempt and photos show them to be of a fairly conventional cowboy type - more likely to have a metal screw-on cap secured with a chain.

I think we need to give credence to Dr. Steenson's assessment.  He not only had the artifacts in front of him but he lived in the context of the region and the times.  If he looked at them and said that they "appear to have belonged to a small cask" then I think that it is very likely that they came from a small cask of a type that Steenson had seen before.  Steenson had been serving in the islands of the Pacific since at least 1928.  He was an old hand.  That's probably why Sir Harry wanted him to look at the stuff Gallagher had found in the first place.

So what kind of "small cask" would Steenson be familiar with?  Probably something that was fairly common in the British maritime Pacific environment.  I think that makes our corks and chains most likely associated with Norwich City and, by extension, links our castaway with the shipwreck or, more probably, the supply cache left behind by the rescuers.

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 12 Jul 2003 11:36:56 EDT
From:         Dave Bush
Subject:      Voodoo postings

> You guessed it, but it's not always easy to tell which ones fall under the
> exemption.

I resemble that remark or at least approximate it from time to time and place to place. After all, I have an image to keep up and I am a legend in my own mind.

LTM,

Dave Bush
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 12 Jul 2003 11:38:08 EDT
From:         Tom Strange
Subject:      Re: AE Legend?

For Bob Lee,

With all due respects my post was not directed to any one individual, just a note of caution - I'm uncomfortable with the heightened level of speculation on the forum lately - As I can see from the forum copy of my post I should reframe from posting after a red eye read of the forum.

Respectfully,
Tom Strang  # 2559
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 12 Jul 2003 11:39:46 EDT
From:         Ron Berry
Subject:      Voodoo postings

Did I miss something ?????? what was written on the walls of Garapan ? I read Fred's book.

LTM  Who always read all of the writing on all of the walls.

**************************************************
From Ric

What you missed wasn't worth catching.  Tom Devine has written a new book with new allegations.
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 12 Jul 2003 11:40:25 EDT
From:         Dave Bush
Subject:      Re: FDR's Request

>The only area that the Navy hadn't
>searched was the Marshalls.

Who searched Gardner? No one. A couple of airplanes flew over it, that's all, nothing else, finis! How about the rest of the Phoenix group? Only one island was "searched" in that the airplanes landed and asked if anyone had seen AE and they asked: "WHO?".

LTM,
Dave Bush
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 12 Jul 2003 11:44:03 EDT
From:         Paige Miller
Subject:      Disappearing without a trace

Wombat writes:

>Two years earlier on the 8th November 1935, another Lockheed disappeared
>in the early hours of the morning .  Sir Charles Kingsford Smith and
>Tommy Pethybridge in the lady Southern Cross would have disappeared
>without a trace just as Amelia and Fred did ...
>
<...snip...>

Thank you for this information, Wombat. Most useful at this point in the discussion over AE's fate.

Paige Miller, #2656
LTM (who often disappeared without a trace)
******************************************************************
From Ric

When an airplane goes down at sea sometimes stuff turns up and sometimes it doesn't.  (How's that for a profound observation?)
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 12 Jul 2003 12:33:10 EDT
From:         OK
Subject:      Re: Disappearing without a trace

As a Civil Air Patrol pilot for many years it is not uncommon for debris [inflated tires,etc] that can float to sometimes be the only record of an aircraft wreck.  There have been many episodes of this over the years and are the only way that the final fate of the missing.

Having spent many years over the SW Florida coast  in searches the land can be seen for a very long distance even from low altitudes [500ft.] which leads me to believe that early in the morning  they, if at all close, should have been able to see their objective quite well.  And I realize I wasn't there, but being close to the equator should have had the advantage of being in the right place before the thunderstorms arrived.
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 12 Jul 2003 13:30:18 EDT
From:         Daryll
Subject:      For Alan, Paige and Ross

#1

Alan wrote:

>What wind shift for example? And they may have drifted over
>territory they weren't supposed to see? First of all I don't know of any
>such territory in 1937. Secondly as a flight sim pilot at the least you
>must recognize that with our heroes heading almost due east and the wind
>varying from ENE to ESE their "drift" would be virtually nil if not
>canceled out all together. In any case it would have taken a massive
>hurricane or an unheard of jet stream running south to north at low
>altitude to get them into the Marshalls.

I sent you a VHS tape of the simulation. I put you in the airplane and put the airplane over Howland Island. I fly 337 deg for 20 miles and put the airplane in a circling holding pattern. I reset the clocks to match the Itasca's radio log. I take the airplane out of the holding pattern and head NW on a 337 deg heading to simulate AE&FN looking in the other direction on the LOP. Very near 0843, their last logged radio transmission, I turn the airplane to 281 deg (re the archived post loss message). We fly through some bad weather and end up over Mili Atoll where the airplane runs out of gas. I feather the props and drop the gear and make a wheels down landing on the lagoon side of largest island in Mili Atoll.

If you don't want to look out of the window or get out of the airplane because you bought a ticket to Niku then that's your prerogative. I'm going get out and look for some coconut crabs.

Daryll
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 14 Jul 2003 12:14:26 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: For Alan, Paige and Ross

Daryll, where did they land and refuel so they could fly your mission to Mili?

At best they had 139 to 150 gallons of fuel which would just barely get them as far as Niku in any direction from Howland and AE even said they were low on fuel. They were. It is a physical impossibility to fly all the way to any of the Marshall Islands.

The Daily Express averaged an even higher rate of fuel consumption than AE's plane and with the same fuel usage AE's Electra couldn't have made land in any direction.

Alan
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 14 Jul 2003 12:18:27 EDT
From:         Mike Everette
Subject:      Re: Disappearing without a trace

At the risk of being a little off topic, I offer this tidbit to amplify what Ric wrote:

>When an airplane goes down at sea sometimes stuff turns up and sometimes it
>doesn't.  (How's that for a profound observation?)

During WW2, an AAF P-47 Thunderbolt out of Wilmington, NC on a training flight was lost without trace on February 25, 1944.  In March 2000, a large chunk of P-47 wreckage washed up on Ocean Isle Beach, south of Southport, NC.  The wreckage could not be positively ID'ed as being from this particular aircraft, but it was an excellent candidate.

73

Mike E.
***********************************************************
From Ric

How about this?  In 1937 a Lockheed 10 attempting to reach Howland island was lost without a trace.  In 1991 a piece of wreckage was found washed up on Nikumaroro.  The wreckage could not be positively ID'ed as being from this particular aircraft, but it was an excellent candidate.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 14 Jul 2003 12:25:38 EDT
From:         Mike Juliano
Subject:      Re: Noonan's Head injury

If the Lockheed bulkhead (between the cockpit and the cabin) is as hard to get through as a Beech 18's I'd think that head injuries would be common even without a crash or hard landing. Did the Electra have seat belts? I don't remember seeing them in any of the photos.
LTM
Mike J.#2591
********************************************************************
From Ric

I don't understand why the cockpit bulkhead would be an issue, but it was made of sheet aluminum.  The Lockheed parts manual for the Lockheed 10 lists "safety belt supports" as part of the cockpit floor.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 14 Jul 2003 12:27:11 EDT
From:         Paige Miller
Subject:      Swanson's statement

Ric says:

>When an airplane goes down at sea sometimes stuff turns up and sometimes it
>doesn't. (How's that for a profound observation?)

I guess profundity (if that's the right word) is in the eye of the beholder. However, Daryll wants us to believe, using poorly documented or undocumented references, that the following quote was indeed from the Secretary of the Navy:

>Claude A. Swanson, Secretary of the Navy, who told Congressman
>Sirovich [Chairman of the Committee on Patents at the time] it was
>incredible under the circumstances to believe the Earhart plane could
>have disappeared without a trace unless every matchstick of it had been
>deliberately destroyed.

Given Ric's profound observation, the truth of which cannot be debated, it seems that the Secretary of the Navy had to be an absolute nincompoop to make such a statement about a small plane disappearing in a very remote part of the Pacific. Unless of course, the Secretary didn't make such a statement, then I take back the "absolute nincompoop" allegation.

I also am confused as to why the Chair of the Committee on Patents was involved at all, and why this seems to be the only alleged surviving documentation of the Secretary of the Navy making such a claim.

Add on Alan's observations of a day or two ago, and this story is starting to have enough non-sequiturs that the "Urban Myth" flag beginning to wave in my brain.

Paige Miller, #2565
LTM
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 14 Jul 2003 12:28:32 EDT
From:         Paige Miller
Subject:      FDR's Request

Daryll  --

The issue is not whether you can go via flight simulator from near Howland to Milli Atoll under certain assumptions.

The issue is that several days ago, you posted a quote, attributed to the Secretary of Defense, and Alan had specific questions about that quote. You did not answer any of Alan's questions at all (or should I say, you did not answer any of Alan's questions atoll) with your reference to flight simulator results. You have avoided the issue.

And I would like to read your answers to those specific questions, as I'm sure Alan would. If we had a clearer understanding of the Secretary's statement, its possible we would give more credence to the quote itself, and to the hypothesis that underlies it.

So allow me to re-iterate Alan's questions: "What wind shift for example? And they may have drifted over territory they weren't supposed to see? First of all I don't know of any such territory in 1937. Secondly as a flight sim pilot at the least you must recognize that with our heroes heading almost due east and the wind varying from ENE to ESE their "drift" would be virtually nil if not canceled out all together. In any case it would have taken a massive hurricane or an unheard of jet stream running south to north at low altitude to get them into the Marshalls."

Paige Miller #2565
LTM
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 14 Jul 2003 12:31:46 EDT
From:         Lawrence
Subject:      Re: For Alan, Paige and Ross

I'm under the impression that you cannot feather the props on an Electra 10E of 1937 vintage.

******************************************
From Ric

Your impression is correct.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 14 Jul 2003 12:33:48 EDT
From:         Bob Sherman
Subject:      MARIE LONG

Marie Katherine Kurilich Long     December 8, 1925 ~ June 20, 2003

Yesterday, Sat. 7/12, Chuck Jackson and I attended a celebration of life for Marie at the Hiller Aviation Museum, San Carlos California.  We were astounded to learn of Marie's incredibly busy life as Elgin's partner since May 12, 1946.

A long time friend of Marie's read a thumb nail description of her life; several dozen pages over 20 minutes!.  One incident will give you an idea. In 1971 when Elgin flew his record solo polar flight around the world, 25,000+ miles, Marie logged 44,000 miles, arranging the myriad details, and either waving good by or hello to Elgin at every stop.

Marie managed a family and looked after their construction business while Elgin took his regular trips for Flying Tigers Air Freight, AND became involved in more projects than you can ever imagine.   With their children and Elgin's various assignments with Tigers .. and an occasional whim, Marie managed households in 34 locations around the world.  Each time it was, well, if we have to move, Lets Go!

During their 58 years together Marie found time to sponsor and record Rock Groups, organize and nurture numerous projects for churches, charities, neighborhoods, and other organizations, including the Western Air Museum at Oakland airport. She attended numerous awards and ceremonies for Elgin in various parts of the world, and he attended almost as many for her.  She and Elgin spent many years researching and writing the book they co-authored, Amelia Earhart. Numerous friends testified that they never heard of anyone who was so willing and able to tackle anything.  An outline of her many accomplishments can be found in 'Who's Who of American Women.'

'RC'  Sherman
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 14 Jul 2003 12:58:53 EDT
From:         Ross Devitt
Subject:      Re: Corks and chains and sextant boxes

Re-reading the various reports submitted by persons involved with the wreck of the N.C. and the rescue of survivors, I rediscovered the following.

"POSITION OF NORWICH CITY

High on reef of N. W. corner of Gardner Island. Four foot out of water at low tide. Gutted by fire from engine room forward. Star. side buckled in, large rents port side, amidships, bottom must be torn out from fore peak to No. 4 hold and (water in No. 5) the only apparent good portion of vessel is the stern; propeller and rudder. Bridges collapsed. Funnel leaning forward and foremast aft.

                                (Sgd)
                                J.H. Swindell, Master
                                G.A. Gibson, Chief Officer.
                                A.J. McCulloch, Chief Engineer.

(Rent on port side not observed by me, A.J. McC.)"

This description makes it fairly clear that the sextant box probably didn't come from the Norwich City, unless it was taken into a lifeboat, in which case, the sextant would almost certainly have come aboard also.

According to the description, the part of the ship where the sextant would have been was destroyed by fire.

With the attention paid to describing the stencilled numbers on the sextant box and other details, I feel sure some mention of it being burned to a crisp might also have been made.

Just another pointer to the box being from the Electra, rather than the Ship.

On the other hand, the following suggests they may have had time to place the sextant (in its box) aboard.

"Lifeboats were provisioned and got ready for launching while the officers and myself sounded around the vessel to ascertain her exact position.

Although, if this was the case, about the only way the sextant box from the N.C. could end up in the hands of a castaway is if it was lost from a lifeboat and opened, tipping the sextant into the sea, then washing ashore.

The description of the sextant box suggests nothing that would indicate long term immersion followed by time spend as driftwood on the shore. In fact the mention of the joints and stencil etc suggest it was in fair condition.

As for casks and chains.  The water in the lifeboats was apparently stored in metal containers: "We used twelve tins of water to two of milk;"

and regarding collected water: "so as much as possible was obtained and stored in a couple of tanks taken from the lifeboats."

An interesting thing I found was: "Our water supply I daresay would have lasted about three weeks at the present rate, longer if necessary." because this conflicts with another statement from the time of the rescue: "Send us as much water as you can as we have none. We have meat --"

This over a period of four days.  Somehow the survivors managed to use enough water for about 3 weeks in about 3 days.

Some idea of what might have been in the survivor's cache can be gleaned from the report of another rescue some years later, but the same general period: "Whoever designed these lifeboats has done a grand job. Neither Bob nor I had any sailing experience, but it was almost child's play. The warm clothing was a Godsend. We had nearly 50 half-pint tins of water and plenty of condensed milk and barley sugar and we rationed ourselves to one tin of water a day."

Compare that with the statement "About noon on Saturday the first ration was issued, which consisted of one biscuit covered with corned beef and half a tin of milk and water. A similar issue was given to each man about sunset."

This might suggest that the half pint tins of water and tins of condensed milk were standard lifeboat rations.  It also suggests that particular lifeboat held a little over 3 gallons of water.

As a matter of interest, my yacht's emergency rations include tins of condensed milk.  I had never really considered the possibility that it may have been condensed milk aboard the N.C. lifeboat, but it certainly makes more sense than tinned ordinary milk.  These also happen to be around half a pint each.

I can't find any mention of casks in any contemporary literature regarding lifeboats.  By contemporary, I mean the period 1910 to 1950.

From an Everest expedition diary of 1926 though comes the following: "The cork came out of the thermos flask, the eagerly anticipated hot drink was emptied,"

I think we already established somewhere that some containers looking a lot like thermos flasks were in one photograph of the Electra being loaded or unloaded prior to the trip.

By the 1930's the Thermos Flask (a German invention) appears to have been in common use aboard passenger flights (according to a number of contemporary accounts) to provide hot tea or coffee.  I can't remember whether I read about Earhart and Noonan drinking hot beverages during the trip.

I think I recall some of my own thermos flasks having the corks attached by chains to the neck of the flask.  There must be others on the forum who had a thermos in the days before plastic stoppers!  In addition, the drinking cup screwed on over the cork end.

Sorry for the rather long, rambling post, but it may throw some additional light on a few things..

Th' WOMBAT
*********************************************************************
From Ric

Good work Wombat.  Remember, though, that the NC cache was made up not of supplies from the wrecked ship or its lifeboats but from supplies brought ashore from the rescue ships.  Still, it does appear that tins rather than casks were the standard containers for carrying drinking water in 1929.

The thermos angle needs more research.  Recall that the Seven Site produced an artifact that could easily be the handle from a small drinking cup.  If we could pin down the make and model of the thermos flasks visible in Earhart photos, and if they turned out to feature corks with brass chains and a cup with a handle like ours - that would be very interesting .
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 14 Jul 2003 13:01:50 EDT
From:         Denise
Subject:      The Pacific in 1937

Paige says that Daryll "maintains that there was some sort of ill-will between Japan and the United States in 1937!"  Look, correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't Japan invade Manchuria only a week or so after Earhart's disappearance? And doesn't USA go "ho hum!", merely asking the League of Nations to slap them on the wrist and tell them to stop being so naughty - or a close facsimile of this! - not even agreeing to put an embargo on their shipments to Japan of petrol and scrap iron. That doesn't sound much like ill-will to me!  It feels more like yawning indifference.

My reading of this time frame is U.S. ill-will in the Pacific was being channelled towards the British, what with the "Incident at Canton Island" which almost turned into a shooting war and Pam Am and BOAC (or was it still British Empire Airlines then) squabbling for landing rights for their Clippers. This is the current political bun-fight that A.E. foolishly flew into.

Paige, you asked for historical references as to what was happening at the time A.E. vanished! Well, having spent several months researching this very subject, I can answer that with ease:

In Europe during July '37 and the months immediately following, things looked good. Sure, there was a civil war in Spain but that was its own business. Germany was a bit of a worry but generally things were quiet there too what with the whole country in a glow of post-successful-Olympics euphoria. And, sure, Hitler had recently invaded the Rhineland, but - ho hum! - the rest of the world didn't mind because the Rhineland was originally part of Germany and everyone thought it had been unfairly annexed by the very unjust and vengeful Treaty of Versailles and thus this invasion seemed like more like an act of social justice ... so it wasn't until a few months later when Hitler started sabre-rattling again because he decided he also wanted to own the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia - which had Treaties with France and Russia - that for the first time it looked like war was a distinct possibility, only Chamberlain wanted "Peace in Our Time" and refused to recognise the threat and they all went off to Munich for tea and cakes and to talk about it ... but after that things, as interesting as they are, move out of our timeframe.

In Asia things weren't bad either. Japan was the biggest worry, what with their squabbling with the Chinese, but that wasn't seen as such a bad thing: Chiang Kai-shek's wanted to shut China's Open Door Policy - cutting China off from the outside world AGAIN - and Japan, along with much of the rest of the world, needed Manchuria's heavy metals for its heavy industries. And, sure, Japan invaded Manchuria only days after A.E. vanished, but that Invasion wasn't a big deal internationally either because no one else wanted China to cut off the rest of the world so Japan was only doing what everyone else wanted done.  The reports of Japanese atrocities were a bit of a worry but, ho hum!, why rock the boat complaining!

As for the rest ... Britain and USA were squabbling over landing rights in the Pacific and doing savage little jump-claims on each other's islands, but neither Roosevelt nor Chamberlain wanted to go to war over it - Chamberlain because he wanted "Peace in Our Time" and Roosevelt because he was seeing bigger threats elsewhere - so they didn't get into a war and managed to somehow maintain a tricky and spikey sort of friendship despite everything which kinda is how things still stand today.

You know, looking at July '37, everything seems so calm it's hard to believe things were so close to the edge of whirlpool that sucked the world down into such a horrific and bloody war.

LTM
Denise
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 14 Jul 2003 13:03:44 EDT
From:         Denise
Subject:      FDR's request

You're asking for a reason why Betty and co. were asked to hush!  If you look at the timeframe, it would have been about the same time Roosevelt was asking the League of Nations to censure Japan over Manchuria.  I think it's perfectly possible he didn't want the possibility of the Earhart whereabouts - and the possibility of Japan finding her and holding her to ransom - to enter into the mix.

It's a thought!

Denise
*****************************************************
From Ric

Allow me to remind you that it has not been established that Roosevelt asked anyone to hush.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 14 Jul 2003 13:05:33 EDT
From:         Rich Young
Subject:      Japanese-American relations in the 1930's

All was not peaches and cream between the United States, (and the rest of the world, for that matter), and Japan in the 1930's. !8 Sept, 1931 - Japan basically annexes the Manchurian region of China by force in the :Manchurian Incident"  The U.S. protests, and fails to recognize the new puppet state of "Manchuko".

1933 - Japan invades Jehol, claiming it to be part of "Manchuko" - China cedes Tientsin.  Again, the U.S. protests.

1936 - Japan denounces ongoing naval limitations talks involving itself, Great Britain, the United States - eventually pulls out of existing agreements.

7 July, 1937 "Marco Polo Bridge Incident" - at almost the same time as Amelia Earhart should have completed her flight around the world, the First Japanese Division stationed in north China attacked the city of Wanping, thus launching Japan's war with China.

12 Dec, 1937 - the U.S. gunboat Panay is sunk and a Brittish gunboat is badly damaged by Japanese dive bombers while anchored in the Yangtze River in the process of protecting and evacuating Western national citizens and embassy staffs.  Japan later apologizes, pays cash indemnity.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 14 Jul 2003 13:07:16 EDT
From:         Eric
Subject:      Day of Infamy, 1937

Paige Miller wrote:

>You maintain that there was some sort of ill-will between Japan and the
>United States in 1937, which would lead them to capture Americans found in
>the Marshalls and not return them to the United Sates or even admit that
>Americans were being held captive.  Since I'm not a history expert, I ask
>for historical references now that Japan was doing this in 1937 (not in
>1939.)

During the 1930's a reactionary military autocracy, centered in the Japanese army and supported by fanatic nationalist associations, gained predominant influence in the government, thanks to a campaign of political terrorism and assassination.  By the 1937, the Japanese Government was rapidly losing control to this faction, which set about establishing a new order in Eastern Asia under the political and economic domination of Japan.  In 1937, the Japanese launched an all-out invasion of China. The U.S. Navy took its first major casualties on December 12, 1937 (only 5 months after AE disappeared). The shallow-draft gunboat USS PANAY was on patrol duty in the Yangtze River, China, to protect American lives and property.  On the morning of December 12th, a heavily armed party of Japanese soldiers boarded the PANAY and demanded that her CO tell them whether he had seen any Chinese troop movements on his way up the river.  That officer refused to answer, saying that the U.S. was neutral.  Shortly after noon, a flight of Japanese dive bombers bombed and strafed the PANAY, sinking her with the loss of two crewmen and one civilian passenger, plus many wounded.  (A newsreel cameraman who was on board at the time captured the whole event on film.) The PANAY had been flying the American flag and had a painted U.S. flag on her deck as an extra precaution. This incident has sometimes been referred to as a "rehearsal of Pearl Harbor," since December 12th was also a Sunday. So clearly, as early as 1937, the Japanese military was not above using its muscle to "send a message" to those who opposed it.


Eric, NAS NORTH ISLAND, San Diego, Ca.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 15 Jul 2003 14:51:25 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Japanese-American relations in the 1930's

As you can see, different people view the same events in a different light. From my perspective of over 71 years I see Denise's view more of an accurate representation of the events of 1937. Certainly there were serious goings on but as much as some would not like to believe those things were sort of routine and continue around the world today. I think Denise's contention that all were pretty much at peace in 1937 is correct.

Clearly some incidents taken alone were highly provocative but those things go on all the time. We nudge each other's subs and play Cowboys and Indians in fighters but that is sort of like elementary playground stuff.

I can't see any part of the Marshall Island/Japanese theory holding water. Great and exciting for books and movies but pure hogwash.

As to Daryll, as much as I nick at Daryll he is genuinely trying to sort out the theories he has been exposed to. He tries to do good research but as he is finding out the support for all that stuff is hard to come by and is mostly stuff dreams are made of. Various authors sound like they've done their homework and thus make "convincing" cases like the guys did with Irene Bolam. Thorough examination causes all that to fall to pieces but it sure looks good in their books. They give you hearsay and support it with foot noted hearsay. Those footnotes are foolers. They give a documented look to total nonsense.

Not just Daryll but all of us have fallen prey to such "documentation." Daryll spent a lot of time and worked hard on his Howland to Mili Atoll flight Simulation scenario and did a great job. Unfortunately sometimes assumptions that appear reasonable throw our theories a curve.

But nothing is ever lost or wasted in such cases. All of this becomes a learning experience and when one dead end is reached it just means one less rabbit trail to worry about.

I expect Daryll to keep hammering away until things are resolved one way or another to everyone's satisfaction.

Daryll and anyone else, if you are not satisfied by one of our so-called profound answers keep at it until you are. We'll all learn something. (like my spell check made me capitalize Indians but not Cowboys so I had to choose to even up things myself)

Alan
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 15 Jul 2003 14:57:19 EDT
From:         Jerry Hamilton
Subject:      Tin Hats

A local story from around these left coast parts may help in the TIGHAR search. A few weeks ago some mystery crop circles appeared in a California wheat field. Since then it has attracted quite a few new-age, alien-seeking, divining-rod-equipped, and just-gawking visitors. Some have come wearing hats made of aluminum foil. The metallic hats, apparently, conduct energy to their brains. So Ric, got any aluminum foil around the house? Maybe we could get the members of the current expedition to stand in a hand holding circle wearing aluminum hats while on Niku. The collective brain energy ought to turn up something.

blue skies, jerry

***************************************************************
From Ric

True Story:
The first TIGHAR expedition to Niku (1989) did indeed have some aluminum hats.  They looked pretty much like ordinary ballcaps but they were supposed to be radar reflective so that folks on shore at night would show up on the ship's radar.  We did a lot of dumb things on that first trip.

Now we just use pyramid-shaped umbrellas to augment brain power.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 15 Jul 2003 15:01:11 EDT
From:         Joe
Subject:      Re: Disappearing without a trace

Ric, when is your next trip to the island??
Joe

**********************************************************
From Ric

Mine?  Next summer, if we can raise the money.  But TIGHAR's Niku Vp expedition, led by Van Hunn and staffed by Walt Holm, John Clauss and Howard Alldred is ready to depart as soon as we can get the gang assembled in Apia, Western Samoa.  Check the website for the latest update.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 15 Jul 2003 15:05:24 EDT
From:         Ron Reuther
Subject:      Pan Am and the US Navy pre Pearl Harbor

Naval History Magazine, Sep/Oct 1999 has a good article by Dr. Justin Libby, a professor of history at Indiana University/Purdue University Indianapolis. The article, entitled Pan Am Gets a Pacific Partner, makes some very good points and backs up many of the author's statements by footnotes which are available upon request, but which I have not seen.

It is a good discussion of the overall relationship of the US Navy, Pan Am, and Japan in the Pacific in the mid-1930s.  It covers involvements that could very easily have applied to Earhart's flight.  Some of them are highlighted any especially interesting subjects are in bold.

Highlites are:

"In the mid-1930s, while in the midst of forging air routes across the Pacific, Pan American Airways discovered a willing partner in the U..S. Navy.  The sharing of information and resources promised commercial success to Pan Am and its fleet of "Clippers" - and provided vital mapping and navigational facilities to the Navy."

"As naval strategists searched for ways to overcome these limitations and increase their knowledge of Japanese activities, some planners recognized that an indirect method - one that could circumvent congressional suspicions - would have to be tried."

"The Navy and Pan Am found that they had common interests and together produced an important and fruitful partnership in the years prior to the attack on Pearl Harbor."

"Captain S.C. Hooper of the Navy's Department of Communications defended the Navy's position in a statement to the Chief of Naval Operations. " From the Navy's point of view," he wrote, "it is highly desirable to have adequate direction-finding service for airplanes established in the Pacific, and to train Navy Personnel in the operating of such direction finders for both peace and wartime."

"Tokyo would have opened itself to U.S. counter-protests- since Japan was using Nanyo Kohasta Kaisha (the South Seas Development Corporation) as a front for its Imperial Navy in a manner similar to the way the United States was using Pan Am.  There the issue rested in 1935, with both nations using commercial ventures to cloak military preparedness."

"The successes of this partnership between Pan Am and the Navy, however, cannot be credited to Juan Trippe alone, but also to his chief surveyor - Tasmanian -born Harold Gatty...but in reality he was Trippe's front man, looking for Pacific landing zones even if they were located near the Japanese mandated islands."

"Before Trippe and the Navy planners could digest all of these ideas, Gatty sent his bombshell: direct air service was possible from Honolulu to Tokyo via Marcus Island northwest of Wake...Aircraft flying to Marcus also could overfly Japanese defense installations in the mandated islands - in particular, the Marshall and Mariana groups - although the planes would have to deviate from a direct course.  Nonetheless, Gatty's idea was feasible, and the overflights would appear far more innocent than naval surveys."

'Gatty was not deterred [by rejection of the preceding idea by US and Japanese offices].

He recommended service to Batavia (Jakarta) in the Netherlands East Indies (Indonesia), with connections to Singapore and Hong Kong.  As the route structure at last became a reality, Trippe next had other problems to face - one of which involved various incidents of sabotage against Pan Am personnel and equipment from 1935 to 1938."

"There was one aspect of this cooperative venture that failed to achieve total success - the area of intelligence gathering."

"The Navy had for years also recognized the vulnerability of naval routes throughout the mid-Pacific, creating the need for a more southerly sea passage beyond Japan's capabilities to attack. Pan Am assisted the Navy in that issue as well by inaugurating service to New Zealand, Australia, and Singapore in 1940-41 - thus completing the mapping and navigational facilities throughout the entire Pacific area."

"Following the Japanese attack of 7 December 1941, all Pan Am installations were transferred to the Navy, marking the end of an important phase in civilian-military cooperation.  The joint venture proved successful.  Pan Am and the Navy, in pursuit of their own interests, had benefited from a nearly ten-year association and enhanced U.S. defense interests in the Pacific."

Ron Reuther
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 15 Jul 2003 15:07:18 EDT
From:         Ross Devitt
Subject:      Re: Corks and chains and sextant boxes

Ric wrote:

> Still, it does appear that tins rather than casks were
> the standard containers for carrying drinking water in 1929.

I'd be more inclined to say "might be" than "were".  My post was based on reading that was only prompted when TIGHAR put un the Norwich City records on the web site.  I'm still searching and talking to old mariners (we don't have a lot of them left up my way).

> The thermos angle needs more research.  Recall that the Seven Site produced
> an artifact that could easily be the handle from a small drinking cup.  If we
> could pin down the make and model of the thermos flasks visible in Earhart
> photos, and if they turned out to feature corks with brass chains and a cup 
> with a handle like ours - that would be very interesting .

My memories of these early flasks is that the genuine Thermos brand did not usually have handles on the cups, they were basically a large cap that screwed down over the top.

I also recall that some had one large cap that could be used as a cup/small bowl (you are looking at around 5" or so) and a smaller one inside that also screwed down.

By the time I was using the things there were also similar vacuum flasks such as the "Aladdin" brand, but I wonder what were available back then.

I'll have to find the photo again, but I remember when the "fire extinguisher" thing was going on that I suggested there may be vacuum flasks in the photo.

Th' WOMBAT
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 15 Jul 2003 15:10:12 EDT
From:         Daryll
Subject:      RE your posted questions

Paige Miller wrote:

>Daryll, you did not answer any of Alan's questions at all (or should I say,
>you did not answer any of Alan's questions atoll) with your reference to
>flight simulator results. You have avoided the issue.
>
>And I would like to read your answers to those specific questions, as
>I'm sure Alan would. If we had a clearer understanding of the
>Secretary's statement, its possible we would give more credence to the
>quote itself, and to the hypothesis that underlies it.

I get the digest to the forum. I don't read posted material until a day after it is posted.

If Ric doesn't want to post my responses to your  individual questions then
there can't be any meaningful dialogue.

Daryll
********************************************
From Ric

I'll post your responses but I'm not hopeful that there will be meaningful dialogue.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 16 Jul 2003 12:25:36 EDT
From:         Alfred Hendrickson
Subject:      It don't get more on-topic than this . . .

The Fedex lady just brought me a box from TIGHAR Central containing, among other things, my new TIGHAR cap. This fashionable piece of headgear is smart-looking, well-tailored, tastefully adorned with the logo, goes well with most all of the items in my wardrobe, and fits my balding pate very nicely. It sure beats any hat made of aluminum foil.

If you don't have one, I'd urge you, in the strongest terms, to delay no longer. Get yours now.

LTM, who never went anywhere without an appropriate cranial covering,
Alfred Hendrickson #2583
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 16 Jul 2003 12:28:23 EDT
From:         Alfred Hendrickson
Subject:      Corks, chains, etc.

Thanks, Wombat.

I'm not sure where this is all leading, or if it is any help at all, but here are some more of my thoughts:

When I think of small tins of water, I think single-use, survival pack stuff, with screw-on lids.

When I think of a cask, I'm not sure exactly what it looks like, but for some reason, I think of a wood keg of sorts, plugged with a cork. I don't know how to place these in time, but I'd guess they'd have been older, pre-1900 perhaps.

When I think of a flask, I think of a glass container, or a thermos, and either a screw-on lid or a cork would be appropriate. I believe glass or glass-lined containers are called flasks even today. I have an antique thermos bottle that has an inner cork, and an outer, aluminum, screw-on lid that can be used as a cup. It does not sport a brass chain.

Initially, I liked the idea that the cork and the bottle did not begin life together; one or both were scavenged and they were put together out of necessity. But I did see, on ebay, several vintage old (liquor?) bottles for sale, each with a cork and a chain. The chain behaves as a keeper for the cork.

What exactly is Benedictine, anyway? My dictionary is of no help. Is Benedictine a medicine? Or a beverage?

The wire handle is interesting, too, from the thermos bottle angle.

If I could take the clips, the handle, the cork, chain & bottle, and put them together, perhaps I'd have a still.

Hmmmm.

LTM, who knows that if I have nothing concrete to go on, I'll speculate. 
Alfred Hendrickson #2583
*************************************************************
From Ric

Go down to the liquor store and ask for a bottle of Benedictine.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 16 Jul 2003 12:30:15 EDT
From:         Alan
Subject:      Re: your posted questions

Ric wrote:

> I'll post your responses but I'm not hopeful that there will be meaningful
> dialogue.

No, Ric. It is not necessary to post answers to my questions. They were not meant to elicit answers. I can do that myself. There WAS NO gigantic wind shift. The jet stream has never been found below 10,000' running north and south. AE did not land anywhere, refuel and fly to Mili Atoll.

Paige, Daryll knew what my questions meant and that I was not expecting answers to them. He knew I was simply making a point and I am well aware he disagrees with me but that's fine. It'll all sort out in the end.

I also appreciated you pressing him on the subject. We all need to be more careful of the ideas we suggest and properly label them as supported (giving the support) and not supported but merely speculation. Even speculation ought to have SOME rationale.

I have been a little discouraged about our efforts and potential success lately but now I have renewed hope. Only today I have learned about the aluminum hats and brain energizing pyramids. On to Niku.

Alan
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 16 Jul 2003 12:32:55 EDT
From:         Karen Hoy
Subject:      Noonan's Car Accident

This is a little off topic, and probably a Dead Thread, but does anyone know the type of car Fred was driving on April 4, 1937? The Terraplane roadster had an all steel chassis and a weight of 3900 Ibs ("Automobile Quarterly 1971"), so if this was the car involved in the accident, it may not have been seriously damaged.  However, I haven't been able to find any mention of the make and model of the car he was driving. If anyone has an idea, please enlighten this old car buff!!

LTM
Karen Hoy
*****************************************************************
From Ric

He had a Terraplane after the accident but I don't know if it was the car that was in the accident and was repaired or whether he bought it to replace the car that was in the accident.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 16 Jul 2003 12:41:44 EDT
From:         Daryll
Subject:      Daryll responds

Ric wrote:

>I'll post your responses but I'm not hopeful that there will be
>meaningful dialogue.

Let's try this again. My Forum digest that I got Saturday morning ended after #1. Consequently, I don't know if Paige understands my viewpoint. Continuity is necessary for any forum postings if you want to label this as pseudo research.
------------------------------

#2
Paige Miller wrote:

>Daryll writes:
>
If people who were listening and hearing AE sending SOSs, then that
means she was alive somewhere.

My whole point was that there was one small portion of the search area that the Navy did not have free access to. Not because it was too far or that they didn't have the means to get there. They were politically restricted from going there.[DB]

>unless the US already knew AE was in the Marshall Islands. Is that
>your claim?

No, its not my claim that the US KNEW for sure where they were. Some of our respected researchers do believe that there was a spy over flight or that by prearrangement AE&FN were to head for the Marshalls as an excuse to search there.

For me I don't see the evidence to show that even though those aspects have credibility to fit the times. If the government did arrange a spy overflight or had a prearrangement to head there, then that is an extreme form of abandonment of AE&FN by the people who arranged it.

The reception of the "281 message" had so much credibility to the Navy that I think it was the genesis of all the hoax theories to follow, after nothing was found 281 miles NW of Howland . There was just too much reliance put on the interpretation of fragmentary phrases. I think the message was genuine.

I think that message and others provided the impetus for FDR to talk Astor into taking the Nourmahal to the Marshalls in an attempt to solve the post loss message riddle. The Japanese had implied to Astor that he would be given permission. When he formally applied for permisson to visit Jaluit from Samoa, he was denied.

>You maintain that there was some sort of ill-will between Japan and
>the United States in 1937, which would lead them to capture Americans
>found in the Marshalls and not return them to the United States or even
>admit that Americans were being held captive. Since I'm not a history
>expert, I ask for historical references now that Japan was doing this in
>1937 (not in 1939).

Japan was America's best foreign customer in 1937. They spent $250,000,000 on American products. In 1938 they spent $150,000,000. That might not seem like a lot by today's standards when Lotto jackpots approach those sums. To get an idea of the impact on the American economy back then, look up on the internet for the conversion to "today's US dollars". I can assure you that it is in the billions of dollars.

There was some "ill-will" toward America because China was regarded as an ally of American. Chennault was already there in June of '37'. I think you understand how the Japanese regarded the Chinese and that manifested itself on July 7th 1937. Japan's focus was "Asia for Asians". That sounds noble but the Japanese still wanted to be the top Asians in the area.

The "ill-will" that Japan exhibited and acted on was toward Pan Am and their expansion in the Pacific. It has been mentioned before about their sabotage attempts against the Clippers. Pan Am also owned C.N.A.C. the Chinese airlines. Trippe and his wife personally inspected those assets in '35' when they became the first passengers to travel around the world on scheduled airlines.

As hard as everyone tried to make AE's flight look like her own, the Japanese didn't buy into it and regarded it as a Pan Am survey flight. We are now in the area of "Reality vs Perception". You can argue that that wasn't the reality but it doesn't make any difference if that was the Japanese perception. The Japanese saw them leave on the same day that Musick left San Fran to survey the route to NZ. She had Noonan, Pan Am's ex chief navigator, as part of the crew. Because of circumstances it was the same composition on the 2nd attempt.

Gatty (working for Pan Am) recommended Batavia as a point to service Singapore and Hong Kong. Look at AE's route on your maps and see how that fits into the vast Pacific. If you combine the then current Pan Am route with AE's and Musick's you have three prongs cutting through the the Pacific. It would tick-off not only the Japanese but the British and their own efforts to establish an air route as well.

History has shown that Pan Am never established a central route through the Pacific to Batavia. Ask yourself if the Japanese could have been successful in shutting down Pan Am's expansion along that central route by keeping AE&FN's rescue a secret?

Daryll
*****************************************************************
From Ric

>As hard as everyone tried to make AE's flight look like her own, the
>Japanese didn't buy into it and regarded it as a Pan Am survey flight.

I somehow missed your citation of the Japanese document that supports that outrageous statement.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 17 Jul 2003 11:26:46 EDT
From:         Ron Berry
Subject:      Re: Corks and chains and sextant boxes

Where can the picture of the aircraft being loaded, the one that shows the vacuum bottles, and the fire extinguishers.

*******************************************************
From Ric

It's probably available online in the Purdue collection.

We should probably put it up on the website.  Things are sort of busy around here.  We'll try to get to it soon.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 17 Jul 2003 11:28:59 EDT
From:         Skeet Gifford
Subject:      Re: Noonan's Car Accident

I don't know what Fred drove before his auto accident, but in April 1998, TIGHAR conducted a "contest" to identify the convertible shown in a photo  taken at the beginning of the Second World Flight.

For Karen the Car Buff, the (drum roll, please) winning entry follows:

The car is a 1937 Terraplane Series 72 Super convertible.

The wheel base 117 inches. Engine 212 cu in, 101 hp at 4,000 rpm. Tires 6.00x16, optional 7.00x15. Overall drive ratio is 4.11 (3.54 would have been perfect). The convertible weighed 2,825 pounds. By comparison, the 1937 Ford V8 convertible weighed about 2900 pounds and had 85 hp.  Other data include:

*       Engine number 250,XXX, Chassis number 72-XXX.

*       The carburetor was two-barrel. The engine bore is 3 inches, the stroke 5 inches.. Standard compression ratio 6.25, but an optional aluminum 7.0:1 head increased horsepower to 107. What do you want to bet that...

*       It had hydraulic brakes and a high (for the time) cruising speed. The 1937 Terraplane briefly held the 1,000 mile speed record, averaging 86.54 mph, but a Hudson raised the bar to 88.99 mph. Incredibly, while setting several records, the Terraplane averaged 21.08 miles per gallon!  Unquestionably, the car did not have the stock drive ratio.

*       The Super Terraplane Convertible Coupe sold for $770.

*       83,436 Terraplanes were produced in 1937, a drop of 10.5% from 1936 production. This was the last year under the Terraplane name. In 1938, it was known as the Hudson Terraplane.


LTM (Love Those Motorcars)

******************************************************************
From Ric

Given that it was a 1937 model it seems more likely that it replaced the car that was in the accident.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 17 Jul 2003 11:31:38 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Daryll responds

Daryll wrote:

> As hard as everyone tried to make AE's flight look like her own, the
> Japanese didn't buy into it and regarded it as a Pan Am survey flight.

Ric wrote:

> I somehow missed your citation of the Japanese document that supports that
> outrageous statement.

I somehow missed ANY support for the entire posting. I see it all as opinion and I don't even know whose. Without documentation all that it is meaningless.


Alan
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 17 Jul 2003 11:32:51 EDT
From:         Ross Devitt
Subject:      Re: Corks, chains, etc.

> Go down to the liquor store and ask for a bottle of Benedictine.

Actually, if you like an interesting, very traditional liqueur, Ric's suggestion is a good one.  It's a little like Drambuie, but not really like Drambuie ????

And again, not exactly your average seaman's drink.

Th' WOMBAT
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 17 Jul 2003 12:02:10 EDT
From:         Daryll
Subject:      Paige & Alan's questions

To correct my previous posting, Trippe and his wife made their trip in 1936 not in '35'. In either case it was prior to AE&FN's flight.

Ric wrote:

As hard as everyone tried to make AE's flight look like her own, the
Japanese didn't buy into it and regarded it as a Pan Am survey flight.
>
>I somehow missed your citation of the Japanese document that supports
>that outrageous statement.

In the same paragraph that I talk about "Reality vs Perception" you ask me to document my perception regarding the Japanese perception??

Your characterization of "outrageous" is your perception of the facts isn't it?

That's why I referred to Earhart research (mine and everyone else's) as pseudo (pretend) research. It is perception based on fact that was found in reality.

The crash & sankers rely heavily on the half hour of fuel statement, supposedly heard, which forms their perception. I don't see AE & FN as suicidal for them to expect to arrive at Howland with only an hour left of fuel.

Kelly J. recommended that long range flight should NOT be attempted without the cambridge fuel analyzer working properly. AE & FN spent a couple of days making sure it was. WHY? Because they were not suicidal. It was necessary for proper cruise control. We know that Pan Am had a course in cruise control circa May '37' that was a required subject to pass. Part of that course was how to maintain a "Howgozit" chart. The chart (maintained by the navigator) was a tool for the captain to make decisions as to proceed on course or turn back which was a reflection of fuel consumption vs winds that they encountered. We know of Pan Am flights that had to turn back because of those calculations. The half hour of fuel statement came (could have come if you will) from Noonan's howgozit chart.

AE is quoted as saying "I haven't the courage to tell people my plans in advance. A pilot shouldn't worry and if I listened to every prediction I'd probably never leave the ground." This is one reason why we don't know what their alternatives were if they didn't find Howland. A second reason is that whatever they did was decided upon moment by moment by Noonan's calculations of how the wind was affecting their fuel consumption.

In Noonan's letter (April '37') to Weems he said. "The greatest difficulty is, of course, the determination of drift angle." He went on to describe how the drift angle was measured. He further states, "However, it would not be so desirable in a region where sudden wind shifts could be expected. Then reliance would necessarily have to be placed on D.F. bearings despite their lack of extreme accuracy."

It seems to me that this was the case the morning that they approached Howland. They were in the I.T.C.Z. (?) without any DF or communications.

Alan totally discounts the Marshalls from a fuel standpoint. I flew the 281 scenario again (130 kts, wind 081 @ 17 kts) last night on the simulator with "Real Time". "Real Time" is a program that I downloaded off the internet from a sim site. It is supposed to maintain the correct time as time zones are crossed and when the simulation is speeded up.

20 miles NW of Howland I set the clock at 08:00 am. I turned to 281 at "Point AE" at 08:35. I speeded the simulation up to 8X. I watched the clock very closely as I approached 180 (date line). I saw the clock briefly drop 2 hours and then stabilize at one hour behind the time that it was maintaining on the other side of the 180 meridian. I sighted Mili Atoll over the port engine about 18 miles away at 11:21 am. Since I noted the one hour loss on the clock, I mentally added one hour to make it 12:21 pm. I was on the ground at 11:39 am (12:39 pm). When I closed out the simulation the log book showed 5.2 hours TT which seems it should have made it 01:39 pm. I don't know why there seems to be some sort of time discrepancies. The point I was trying to make is that the Mili scenario, under those wind conditions, had an outside (longest) time of 01:39 pm. The Itasca believed they could stay in the air until 12:00 noon. Oscar B.'s calculations from the Lockheed reports shows that duration is more than possible. The Daily Mail Express flight seems to confirm those capabilities. I don't know what else I can say when someone says they absolutely didn't have the fuel to reach the Marshalls.

I guess we're back to a person's perceptions.

Daryll
*********************************************************************
From Ric

In other words, your statement of fact that:

>As hard as everyone tried to make AE's flight look like her own, the
>Japanese didn't buy into it and regarded it as a Pan Am survey flight.

is purely your "perception".

We all have perceptions and we all have facts.  You don't seem to be able to tell which is which.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 18 Jul 2003 14:27:26 EDT
From:         Randy Jacobson
Subject:      Re: Paige & Alan's questions

Daryll said:

>In Noonan's letter (April '37') to Weems he said. "The greatest
>difficulty is, of course, the determination of drift angle." He went on
>to describe how the drift angle was measured. He further states,
>"However, it would not be so desirable in a region where sudden wind
>shifts could be expected. Then reliance would necessarily have to be
>placed on D.F. bearings despite their lack of extreme accuracy."
>
>It seems to me that this was the case the morning that they approached
>Howland. They were in the I.T.C.Z. (?) without any DF or communications."

In point of fact, the InterTropical Convergent Zone was about 200 miles north of the latitude of Howland, thus, AE and FN did not encounter sudden wind direction shifts.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 18 Jul 2003 14:29:37 EDT
From:         Wesley Smith
Subject:      Re: Noonan's Car Accident

Just curious ...... does anyone know what became of Mr. Noonan's car?  Or has the forum already covered this?  If it's still around, I for one would enjoy seeing it.

S. Wesley Smith

************************************************
From Ric

I don't know for sure but I would think that Mary Bea kept it and it eventually went the way of all flesh ... er... steel.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 18 Jul 2003 14:30:50 EDT
From:         Dan Postellon
Subject:      Re: Noonan's Car Accident

Now I'm interested.  How many cars of this vintage had aluminum engine parts?

Dan Postellon  TIGHAR#2263

**************************************************
From Ric

Uh oh...not an old car thread.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 18 Jul 2003 14:31:52 EDT
From:         Tom Strange
Subject:      Re: Paige & Alan's questions

Interesting read - " perception of Japanese perception" - "It is perception based on fact that was found in reality" - If I may be so bold to ask, whose reality?

The 1937 international political climate in the Pacific region had some impact on the Earhart search which is of little doubt - But unless we have factual evidence to state specifically what that impact was, speculation based on perception does nothing but mislead research into the last known flight of Amelia Earhart, Fred Noonan, and NR16020.

Respectfully,
Tom Strang
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 18 Jul 2003 14:34:42 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Paige & Alan's questions

One last try.

Daryll, you have either not noticed or don't care that almost everyone disagrees with your theory and almost everyone flames you for not supporting anything you say.

Let me go through your posting and see if I can show you what we all are complaining about.

> To correct my previous posting, Trippe and his wife made their trip in
> 1936 not in '35'. In either case it was prior to AE&FN's flight.

That doesn't correct anything. What is your source for that? It appears you aren't sure which it is. Let me also add that your opinion or someone else's opinion is not a source. Neither is Goerner's book or anyone else's.

> In the same paragraph that I talk about "Reality vs Perception" you ask
> me to document my perception regarding the Japanese perception??

Your perception is not fact nor is it of any use in this investigation without some rationale for it.

> That's why I referred to Earhart research (mine and everyone else's) as
> pseudo (pretend) research. It is perception based on fact that was found
> in reality.

What is the value of pretend research? You say it is perception based on fact but you don't say what that fact is.

> The crash & sankers rely heavily on the half hour of fuel statement,
> supposedly heard, which forms their perception. I don't see AE &FN as
> suicidal for them to expect to arrive at Howland with only an hour left
> of fuel.
 
If the crash and sankers are relying on the alleged half hour fuel comment they are foolish in that we know it wasn't so. At 8:43 everyone knew it wasn't so. I think everyone believes they were low on fuel, however.

> We know that Pan Am had a course in cruise control circa May '37' that was
> a required subject to pass. Part of that course was how to maintain a
> "Howgozit" chart. The chart (maintained by the navigator) was a tool for
> the captain to make> decisions as to proceed on course or turn back which
> was a reflection of fuel consumption vs winds that they encountered. We know
> of Pan Am flights that had to turn back because of those calculations.
> The half hour of fuel statement came (could have come if you will) from
> Noonan's howgozit chart.

Well, I don't know any of that. What is your source for the cruise control course in 1937? What is your source that it was a required subject to pass? What is your source that Noonan had a howgozit chart? Common sense tells you he couldn't possibly have figured he only had 30 minutes of fuel.

> AE is quoted as saying "I haven't the courage to tell people my plans in
> advance. A pilot shouldn't worry and if I listened to every prediction
> I'd probably never leave the ground."

What is your source for this quote?

> This is one reason why we don't know what their alternatives were if they
> didn't find Howland. A second reason is that whatever they did was decided
> upon moment by moment by Noonan's calculations of how the wind was affecting
> their fuel
> consumption.

That's pure conjecture, Daryll. We don't know anything of the sort.

> In Noonan's letter (April '37') to Weems he said. "The greatest
> difficulty is, of course, the determination of drift angle." He went on
> to describe how the drift angle was measured. He further states,
> "However, it would not be so desirable in a region where sudden wind
> shifts could be expected. Then reliance would necessarily have to be
> placed on D.F. bearings despite their lack of extreme accuracy."
>
> It seems to me that this was the case the morning that they approached
> Howland. They were in the I.T.C.Z. (?) without any DF or communications.

There is nothing anywhere suggesting there were any sudden wind shifts.

> Alan totally discounts the Marshalls from a fuel standpoint.

I discount the Marshall's for a number of reasons not just lack of fuel. The weather was worse toward the NW according to the Itasca's report. It was nearly twice as far away as any other land. If all you Japanese/Marshall theorists are correct about the relations of the two countries and what you think the Japanese were doing at that time it would have been the stupidist thing to do. The direction that made the most if not the only sense was SE where they might hit Howland or Baker or the nearby Phoenix Islands.

> I flew the 281 scenario again (130 kts, wind 081 @ 17 kts) last night on
> the simulator with "Real Time". "Real Time" is a program that I downloaded
> off the Internet from a sim site. It is supposed to maintain the correct
> time as time zones are crossed and when the simulation is speeded up.
>
> 20 miles NW of Howland I set the clock at 08:00 am. I turned to 281 at
> "Point AE" at 08:35.

Daryll, you made up your own criteria. What leads you to believe they were flying at 130K or that the wind was 081/17k? What leads you to believe the plane was 20miles NW of Howland at 8:00am. There is "NO point AE." What leads you to believe they turned to 281 at 8:35 or any other time?

> The point I was trying to make is that the Mili scenario, under those wind
> conditions, had an outside (longest) time of 01:39 pm.

We don't know what wind conditions existed between Howland and Mili Atoll. But the distance is 756 n.m. At 130k it would take 5.82 hours. All fuel estimates give them about 139 to 150 gallons at 8:43. At that time they were still strength 5 in the Howland area according to all estimates. At 8:43 they indicated they were still searching for Howland running north and south NOT heading for the Marshalls. At 38 gph and a 150 gallon reserve they could fly for only 3.95 hours. That's 513 n.m. and dry tanks 263 n.m. short of Mili. If you will fly a search for Howland starting at 7:42 turning SE at that time to 157 and flying for a short distance of say 50 miles then reversing course for 100 miles then heading SE again which is the most likely pattern you will find you have pretty well used up all your time. It goes fast. I suggest this because FN would hit his LOP first to the North. He would not fly way past Howland to hit his LOP to the South. At his expired time he believed he was over Howland. The wind at that time was from the ESE according to the Itasca deck reports so if anything he would have drifted north. So I would think he would turn SE first.

All that is my speculation of course but I've given my rationale for my position. Ric believes they were south of Howland and he may be correct but the point
is that Noonan thought he was over Howland and would have searched accordingly.

> The Itasca believed they could stay in the air until 12:00 noon. Oscar
> B.'s calculations from the Lockheed reports shows that duration is more than
> possible.

Daryll, Oscar is correct. Duration is possible. Duration doesn't extend range. It only lets you loiter longer.

>The Daily Mail Express flight seems to confirm those capabilities.

Daryll, the Daily Express averaged 48gph. At that fuel consumption the Electra couldn't have reached ANY land.

Daryll, this time I DO want answers to the questions I asked. I don't doubt any of the items I asked for support on but I want to know where you got all that.

Alan
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 18 Jul 2003 14:37:34 EDT
From:         Daryll
Subject:      Alan & Ric

#1

Alan wrote:

>I somehow missed ANY support for the entire posting. I see it
>all as opinion and I don't even know whose. Without documentating all
>that it is meaningless.

Well Alan....I'm not surprised since you have admitted to me, Paige and the Forum that you didn't expect any answers to your questions. I can only assume your questions were only intended to bait me.

#2

Ric wrote:

In other words, your statement of fact that:

>As hard as everyone tried to make AE's flight look like her own, the
>Japanese didn't buy into it and regarded it as a Pan Am survey flight.
>is purely your "perception".
>
>We all have perceptions and we all have facts. You don't seem to be able
>to tell which is which.

Remember the government bureaucrat who was head of the Patent Office in the 1800's. He wrote a letter recommending that the Patent Office should be closed because everything had been invented. I think we can agree that he was rather short sighted.

>your statement of fact that...

...did I say that it was fact?? I thought I made it clear that it was my perception and it was in the same paragraph where I talked about "Reality vs Perception".

To save everyone the time of looking up the word "research" in the dictionary I will post the first definition--  1. diligent and systematic inquiry or investigation into a subject in order to discover or revise facts, theories, applications, etc....

This is what the AES does concerning the Amelia Earhart story. My perceptions have a basis in fact developed from our collective research. If we could simply go to the library and withdraw the facts and documentation then there would be no need to do the research because it would have already been done. Where do "new" things come from?

>We all have perceptions and we all have facts. You don't seem to be
>able to tell which is which.

Look about you in today's world. Politics, facts and perceptions are driving current events. According to you, I guess I'm not alone.

Daryll
*****************************************************************
From Ric

Man oh man, isn't THAT the truth?
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 19 Jul 2003 08:47:54 EDT
From:         Ron Bright
Subject:      Prof I.Hata Report/Mystery solved

One of the most outspoken critics of the Japananse capture theory some 25 years ago was Prof Ikuhiko Hata, Dept of Law, Nihon University Graduate School, Tokyo. His orginal remarks were made to a reporter in a Washington Post Article summarizing the Earhart research efforts circa 1973. At the time, Prof Hata was attending Harvard, and speaks English. He was interviewed for the article, but provided no written material.

The article gave his conclusions, but never cited any sources, documents, or witnesses. Thus in an effort to find out the extent of his investigation and validity, I contacted him through a colleague just recently in Tokyo. Unfortunately he remains rather tightlipped regarding his inquires but does offer his opinion.

My colleague wrote: Prof Hata almost seemed suspicious. repeating that he had written the article[ I don't know what he is referring too] and done the research over 20 years ago, so what is the issue? Why would anyone be looking into the  mystery when he apparently solved it?  He concludes that AE was lost at sea and not returned to Japan so why the continued research? (Telephone interview)

Well anyway I am back to the same basic problems. I want to get  his article(s,) his research sources, interviews, etc.,so that we can access his investigation. I now have his fax and telephone number so I shall give it a try. It appears he will cooperate and will be helpful.

Ron Bright
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 19 Jul 2003 09:46:47 EDT
From:         Dave in Fremont
Subject:      Daryll's perceptions

Just when you think Daryll is going to drop a bombshell and actually have a fact or valid source, he starts up again with the metaphysics...

He never fails to disappoint.

LTM,
Dave (#2585)
*************************************************************************
From Ric

There is much to be learned from Daryll and we should thank him for sharing his  thoughts with us.  As he himself points out, "Look about you in today's world. Politics, facts and perceptions are driving current events. According to you, I guess I'm not alone."

Indeed, he is not.   As you point out, when Daryll is confronted with demands for hard facts to back up his certainty he takes refuge in metaphysics - facts and perceptions blur together to achieve the desired truth.  Arguing about sources is pointless because the problem is not about the availability or nonavailability of information.  The problem is that all information is considered to be subservient to the pre-ordained conclusion. When employed by Daryll and his friends in the Amelia Earhart Society (AES) this approach to the search for truth is harmless.  When employed by those who wield real power the consequences can be catastrophic.

Politics and current events are off-topic on this forum, but we've always said that the most important goal of the Earhart Project is the development and demonstration of sound methodology in the pursuit of historical truth.  In the end, what really happened to Amelia Earhart is not important.  What we learn while searching for the answer to that riddle is.  What each of us does with the lessons we learn here is, of course, a matter of personal choice and not subject to debate - at least, not on this forum.

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 19 Jul 2003 10:03:13 EDT
From:         Alfred Hendrickson
Subject:      Thermos bottles

Ross Devitt wrote:

>My memories of these early flasks is that the genuine Thermos brand did
>not usually have handles on the cups, they were basically a large cap that
>screwed down over the top.

I have the same recollection you do, Wombat; the outer lid/cup did not usually have a handle. In fact, I never remember seeing one with a handle at all. I wonder, though, if drinking a hot liquid from a thin-gage aluminum cup would be uncomfortable, or downright dangerous, especially if one were simultaneously piloting an Electra 10E. I'd think a 10E pilot would insist on, nay demand, a cup that had a handle. For safety. Imagine my surprise when I looked at ebay item number 3233363870 - an old Thermos brand bottle with a cup, with a handle. (I have asked the item seller if there is a date anywhere on it.)

I think we have the smoking gun right here, only we're calling it Artifact 2-6-S-46.

There's more: In those days, Thermos products were manufactured in Norwich, CT !! (Short pause for effect, music up gradual, fade to black)

LTM, who used to refer to Norwich, CT as Norwich City
Alfred Hendrickson #2583
*****************************************************************
From Ric

At my request Alfred is trying to acquire the item on ebay.  The handle on the cup looks a bit large to be just like -46 but it IS a handle on a thermos cup.  It would be very interesting to see how its construction and method of attachment compare to -46.
**************************************************************************

From Alfred Hendrickson:

Ron Berry asks:

>Where can the picture of the aircraft being loaded, the
>one that shows the vacuumed bottles, and the fire extinguishers.

Ric wrote: 

>It's probably available online in the Purdue collection. We
>should probably put it up on the website.  Things are sort of busy around
>here.  We'll try to get to it soon.

It is on the TIGHAR website at:
http://www.tighar.org/Projects/Earhart/Bulletins/bulletin11_28_99.html

Look at ebay item number 3234113831 - It looks EXACTLY like that cylinder in the foreground of the pic of FN & AE loading the plane. The one we were thinking was a fire extinguisher. (Perhaps this has been figured out already).


From studying that photo, I'd guess AE & FN each had 2 thermoses; one for liquids, and one for solids like stew or something (a wide mouth type). Heck, on a 20-some hour flight (no stewardesses) they had to eat.

LTM, who thinks the item in the photo is a fourth thermos bottle, not a fire extinguisher
Alfred Hendrickson #2583
***********************************************************************
From Ric

Thanks Alfred.  I've clearly lost track of what's on the website and what isn't.

I'm not sure I agree that the ebay item looks exactly like the thing in the photo but I do think that it's entirely possible that the photo shows four thermos-type containers.  Any of them could have handles on the cups that don't happen to be facing the camera.
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 19 Jul 2003 10:06:59 EDT
From:         Jim Dix
Subject:      Re: Noonan's Car Accident

Aluminum Hi Compression heads as (possibly) on Fred's terraplane were quite common from 1900's on. Aluminum was very common in crankcases before they were cast along with the cylinders. (not too different from modern aircraft practice.) My 1913 Model T has an aluminum transmission cover. Aluminum pistons started very early. 

My contribution to the dreaded "old car thread". Back to lurking!

LTM (Love to Motor)
Jim Dix 2132
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 19 Jul 2003 10:08:05 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Alan & Ric

Daryll wrote:

> Well Alan....I'm not surprised since you have admitted to me, Paige and
> the Forum that you didn't expect any answers to your questions. I can
> only assume your questions were only intended to bait me.


No, Daryll I wasn't trying to bait you. I respect your efforts. I only have trouble with your lack of support. As I pointed out I was only making a point but I would never try to bait you or anyone else. I'm pretty straight forward. No tricks.

You clearly put a lot of work into the video you sent me and I appreciated it. We may differ on some points but eventually we'll get it all cleared up.

Alan
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 19 Jul 2003 10:11:00 EDT
From:         Deirdre
Subject:      Re: Prof I.Hata Report/Mystery solved

AE may very well be lost at sea....or something may turn up. Why ignore leads?  For years, there were denials of a Japanese submarine being hit right before Pearl Harbor. Recently, the families were given closure when they found the sub after all these years. Why did the Japanese deny for so long and make these families wait so long? Bureaucracy, maybe? How many years did it take to investigate leads on what happened to all those Japanese sailors? It seems to be the natural thing to do.

************************************************************************
From Ric

If there is a lead that suggests that Earhart was lost at sea or captured by the Japanese I'm not aware of it.
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 19 Jul 2003 11:39:29 EDT
From:         Marty Moleski
Subject:      Re: Daryll's perceptions

Ric wrote:

> Indeed, he is not.   As you point out, when Daryll is confronted
> with demands for hard facts to back up his certainty he takes refuge
> in metaphysics - facts and perceptions blur together to achieve
> the desired truth.

I do NOT want to defend Daryll in any way at all.

I would like to put in a good word for "metaphysics" because a correct orientation toward fact-finding is itself a metaphysical position.  There's good metaphysics and bad metaphysics.  In and of itself, the word is neutral, not a curse word.

As an example of a good metaphysical position, I'd offer the proposition that 

"Arguments about historical events should be backed up with evidence derived, as much as possible, from contemporaneous sources."

This proposition cannot be defended by any empirical technique.  It is not derived from scientific observation, but from philosophical considerations.

LTM.

Marty #2359
*************************************************************************
From Ric

Okay, I'll bite (knowing full well that getting into a philosophical debate with you is like getting into a hotdog-eating contest with a crocodile).

I would submit that the only historical arguments that can be conclusively settled are those that can be investigated archeologically.  For example: We can debate all day long about what the Founding Fathers intended by the wording they chose to use in the Second Amendment but we cannot settle that argument unless somebody comes up with contemporaneous documents (letter, diaries, etc.) which specifically disclose that intent.

Similarly:

I haven't done it but I would think that it is possible to do a broad statistical study that would show that attempts to discover the location of lost objects (for example, foundations of ancient buildings) are much more likely to be successful if aided by contemporaneous documents rather than folklore.  That was certainly true of our discovery of the Seven Site.  We tried to find it in 1991 from the recollections of Coast Guard veterans but failed.  Forensic imaging analysis of a 1941 photo enabled us to go back in 1996 and find it.

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 19 Jul 2003 11:41:27 EDT
From:         Daryll
Subject:      Yogi meets Alan

Alan wrote:

>One last try.
>
>What is your source for that?
>
>Well, I don't know any of that. What is your source for the cruise
>control course in 1937?
>
>What is your source that it was a required subject to pass?
>
>What is your source that Noonan had a howgozit chart?
>
>What is your source for this quote?
>
>That's pure conjecture, Daryll. We don't know anything of the sort.
>
>Daryll, this time I DO want answers to the questions I asked. I don't
>doubt any of the items I asked for support on but I want to know where
>you got all that.

******************************************************

Alan....you really know how to "sweet talk" a person. Your trade as a lawyer is very evident in the way you try to create doubt, the last tactic a lawyer uses in a losing case.

You don't know any of "that" because you don't do any of your own research. The things that I say comes in part from the efforts of other researchers who have put forth the effort to do the research, not just by reading someone else's web site.

Since I know your motives behind your disingenuous questions, I have decided not to put forth the effort to answer those questions.

I have to admit Alan that your quote:

>Duration doesn't extend range. It only lets you loiter longer.

Makes it real hard for me to hit the send button while I'm laughing so So so hard  !!!

Let me introduce you to my friend Yogi Berra,....Yogi meet Alan you both have a lot to talk about.

Daryll
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 19 Jul 2003 12:12:46 EDT
From:         Rick Metzger
Subject:      Re: Noonan's Car Accident

There were approx. 45 different auto manufacturers in 1937. Each one had a different engine configuration. There were at least 4 (some had 16) aluminum (alloy) parts on most every engine (pistons). However there were some that used cast iron pistons. Some small parts were cast in aluminum Aluminum was not used in automobiles very much until after WWII.

What does this have to do with AE, FN and the Electra??????????

Rick
***************************************************
From Ric

Nothing at all....but once the dreaded old car thread is out of the box it's almost impossible to kill.
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 19 Jul 2003 18:56:25 EDT
From:         Marty Moleski
Subject:      Re: Daryll's perceptions

Ric wrote:

> Okay, I'll bite (knowing full well that getting into a philosophical debate
> with you is like getting into a hotdog-eating contest with a crocodile).

:o)  I'm gonna bite my tongue, not that bait.  :-P

> I would submit that the only historical arguments that can be conclusively
> settled are those that can be investigated archeologically.

I don't disagree with your view or your examples.

All I'm saying is that the proposition that "the only historical arguments that can be conclusively settled are those that can be investigated archeologically" is a philosophical statement of the metaphysical variety.  It is not itself a finding from archeology, physics, chemistry, materials sciences, radio-carbon dating, or the like.

LTM & the boys.
Marty #2359
***************************************************************
From Ric

Okay, I see what you mean - I think.   So any "rule" that we derive for ourselves - whether based on experimentation, observation or gut hunch - is, by definition, a metaphysical exercise.
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 19 Jul 2003 19:08:51 EDT
From:         Daryll
Subject:      Bea / B.

Ric wrote:

>I don't know for sure but I would think that Mary Bea kept it and it
>eventually went the way of all flesh ... er... steel.

Putnam: What did Fred Noonan call his wife?

Voice : Fred wants you tell B. that it wasn't his fault....He is living. (Evasive answer.)

Daryll
************************************************************
From Ric

Daryll is referring to the transcript of a seance in which a medium supposedly gave Putnam information from AE and Fred.

What's your point Daryll?  That the medium knew that Fred called his wife "Bea"? I know that, but I'm not psychic.  I've seen a letter Fred wrote to her which starts, "Bee Dear,".  I can think of lots of ways a medium might know that.  Maybe everybody called her Bea.  Maybe Bea was present for the seance.
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 19 Jul 2003 19:09:24 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Yogi meets Alan

Daryll, I'll let your response speak for itself. As I said that was my last try.

Alan

=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 21 Jul 2003 10:01:42 EDT
From:         Herman De Wulf
Subject:      Re: Introduction on ADSL

What is this? (referring to a a message ostensibly from TIGHAR1 subject "Introduction on ADSL")

********************************************************
From Ric

That did not come from here.  Apparently, someone on the forum who receives the forum as a daily digest has the Klez virus which attempts to spread itself by masquerading as someone from your own address list.

Anyone who received such a message should just delete it and certainly should not open any attachment.  You will NEVER receive a valid message with an attachment via the Earhart forum.  The forum software does not support attachments.

You will also never receive the Klez virus from TIGHAR.  We're Macintosh based.

Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 21 Jul 2003 10:03:15 EDT
From:         Marty Moleski
Subject:      Re: Daryll's perceptions

Ric wrote

> Okay, I see what you mean - I think.   So any "rule" that we derive for
> ourselves - whether based on experimentation, observation or gut hunch -
> is, by definiton, a metaphysical exercise.

Yes, I think that's essentially what I'm saying.

There are empirical laws derived from physics and chemistry and other natural sciences that are not metaphysical: f = ma, v = ir, e = mc^2, etc.

The kinds of principles that say "scientists should share their data with each other," "scientists should tell the truth," "historians should rely on primary sources" are not derived from physics, chemistry, biology or other natural sciences. These are metaphysical ideas.

What's wrong with Darryl wasn't that he was "going all metaphysical" but that his metaphysical principles are hogwash.  He's appealing to analogies instead of to evidence.

LTM.

Marty #2359
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 21 Jul 2003 10:04:06 EDT
From:         Dave in Fremont
Subject:      Re: Daryll's perceptions

And aren't we all glad I entered metaphysics into the forum... This time around, anyway <wink>

LTM,
Dave (#2585)
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 21 Jul 2003 10:18:10 EDT
From:         Angus Murray
Subject:      Re: Bea / B.

Ric wrote:

> Daryll is referring to the transcript of a seance in which a medium
> supposedly gave Putnam information from AE and Fred.

I'd be interested to see that transcript Ric. Can you post it?

Regards Angus.

***************************************************************
From Ric

It comes from an article, graciously made available by Ron Reuther, that was published in the December 1939 issue of Popular Aviation entitled "Is Amelia Earhart Still Alive?" by David Jennings.  The article chronicles the paranormal aspect of the Earhart search, which was far more involved and extensive than I ever had any idea.  In the days, weeks and months following the disappearance, Putnam was inundated with calls, letters and telegrams from psychics, mediums and just ordinary people who had had visions and dreams about Amelia's fate.  The article provides valuable new insight into the context in which the reports of post-loss radio receptions by amateurs were considered.

We're going to make the entire article available as a document on the TIGHAR website as a downloadable PDF with a thank you to Ron Reuther for bringing it to our attention.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 21 Jul 2003 10:19:09 EDT
From:         Jon Watson
Subject:      Re: Noonan's Car Accident

Ric wrote:
>
> Nothing at all....but once the dreaded old car thread is out of the box it's
> almost impossible to kill.

Don't let Skeet hear you say that....

And as long as we're talking about Fred's Terraplane, because of its performance the Terraplane was one of the cars of choice for bootleggers as well...oops, now somebody will try to tie that back to imply that Fred was a boozer because of his car...

ltm
jon
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 21 Jul 2003 10:20:36 EDT
From:         Kerry Tiller
Subject:      Re: Yogi meets Alan

O.K. Daryll, even your obfuscation is getting weak. Do you have documentation for your theory or not? I have to assume not, since you have been called to task to produce it on more than one occasion on this forum and we haven't seen it yet. Your credibility is shot. (IMHO)

Kerry Tiller
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 21 Jul 2003 10:22:18 EDT
From:         Alfred Hendrickson
Subject:      Artifact 2-6-S-46 and the ebay thermos

We're barking up the wrong tree here. The ebay thermos handle (item 3233363870) is connected to the cup by the wire handle extending and going all around the cup. It does not appear to be welded or brazed. It simply holds onto the cup by looping all around the cup, just under the rim. Look closely at the picture that shows the thermos inside the lunchbox; it is pretty clear there. Also, I saw another thermos auction (look at 3233656286) that had a cup exactly like this, but its handle was sort of slid down from the rim unevenly. It made the method of attachment even more visible.

- Alfred
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 21 Jul 2003 11:54:58 EDT
From:         Daryll
Subject:      Evidence

Ric wrote:

>As you point out, when Daryll is confronted with demands for hard
>facts to back up his certainty he takes refuge in metaphysics.

That's not really so. I'll answer questions. I won't answer questions that include a statement as to why my response will BE wrong before I even have had a chance to answer the question.

>Arguing about sources is pointless because the problem is not about
>the availability or nonavailability of information. The problem is that
>all information is considered to be subservient to the pre-ordained
>conclusion.

Were you referring to me or yourself? I ask because in another response you wrote:

>If there is a lead that suggests that Earhart was lost at sea or
>captured by the Japanese I'm not aware of it.

Even though TIGHAR hasn't found the smoking gun, you are convinced that the ONLY place the flight could have terminated is on NIKU. That seems to me that you have arrived at a "pre-ordained conclusion."

>In the end, what really happened to Amelia Earhart is not
>important.

Perhaps this is our basic philosophical difference. To me and my friends in the AES it is important.

>I would submit that the only historical arguments that can be
>conclusively settled are those that can be investigated
>archeologically.

I don't mean to be argumentative, but isn't the evidence produced at an archaeological site then subject to interpretation which is a form of perception?

>Daryll is referring to the transcript of a seance in which a medium
>supposedly gave Putnam information from AE and Fred.
>What's your point Daryll? That the medium knew that Fred called his wife
>"Bea"? I know that, but I'm not psychic. I've seen a letter Fred wrote
>to her which starts, "Bee Dear,". I can think of lots of ways a medium
>might know that. Maybe everybody called her Bea. Maybe Bea was present
>for the seance.

The above was only one of GPP's questions to the medium meant as an attempt to determine credibility. You wrote the name "Bea" and another form of the spelling "Bee", the transcript had the letter "B.". Does this indicate that this was a "transcript" where the spoken Bea / Bee / "B" was understood to be the letter?

You have this piece of evidence before you to evaluate. How do you classify it? Is it contemporaneous documentation?

Can you pull any useful information from it? Do you know the nickname that AE used for GPP that only "(....one or two intimate friends knew it...)" circa '37' to  39'.

This forum discussed Betty's notebook. One aspect was the suitcase in the closet. GPP asks the medium; Putnam: Where is her will?

You will notice that the transcript has responses in (...) that follow some questions and answers.

These responses seem to come from GPP himself sometime after the transcript was written. To date them more accurately, between July '37' and Jan. 1940.

My point of interest in the seance transcript is in the last question and answer.

Putnam: Ask Amelia if she knows anything about the trip I am contemplating.

Voice: Yes. That is very good. By all means go. (I was planning a cruise. I did go later.)

GPP's response within the (...) has future tense and past tense within the same comment. That would imply to me that this cruise that he went on took place between July'37' and Dec '39' / Jan '40'. What cruise was he referring to? Why did he connect the cruise question to Amelia? Do you know?

Daryll
***********************************************************************
From Ric

No and neither do you.  Let me correct a misconception you seem to have.

>Even though TIGHAR hasn't found the smoking gun, you are convinced that
>the ONLY place the flight could have terminated is on NIKU.

I have never said that and I don't think that.  What I have said - repeatedly - is that I am willing to accept any solution to the Earhart mystery that is based on facts.  So far, the facts seem (to me anyway) to point very strongly toward Niku and I haven't seen any that point somewhere else.  We use the same criteria for evaluating information that purports to support the Niku hypothesis as we do for information that appears to support other theories.

>>In the end, what really happened to Amelia Earhart is not
>>important.
>
>Perhaps this is our basic philosophical difference. To me and my friends
>in the AES it is important.

Why is it important?  I realize and accept that determining the fate of missing persons is important to the family, but we're not conducting this investigation on behalf of the Earhart family.  Are you?  We're an aviation historical foundation, but I can't think of a way that Earhart's failed flight influenced aviation history or would have if it had been completed successfully.  We're doing this because the Earhart disappearance has become a very popular mystery and we see it as a vehicle for developing and demonstrating sound techniques in historical investigation.  It's a fascinating intellectual exercise that involves some very difficult field work in some interesting and rather exotic places.  I'd like to think that those who support our work do so because they see it as a valuable learning experience that is also a whole lot of fun.
That's what's important.

>archaeological site then subject to interpretation which is a form of
>perception?

Of course.  A creationist can look at a fossil and, with a straight face, tell you that God created it to test our faith.  This is an example of the retreat into metaphysical hogwash that we were talking about.  All physical evidence must be interpreted and all interpretation is based on perception, but that doesn't mean that the truth is anything you choose to make it.  If you expect others to take your interpretation/perception seriously you had better be able to present information that causes them to draw the same conclusions you do.

>You wrote the name "Bea" and another
>form of the spelling "Bee", the transcript had the letter "B.". Does
>this indicate that this was a "transcript" where the spoken Bea / Bee /
>"B" was understood to be the letter?
>
>You have this piece of evidence before you to evaluate. How do you classify it?
>Is it contemporaneous documentation?

The transcript produced in the magazine article purports to be taken directly from notes that Putnam took during the seance.  The original transcript is not reproduced. So, no.  The information in the magazine article can not be considered to be contemporaneous documentation of the event in question - i.e. the seance.

>This forum discussed Betty's notebook. One aspect was the suitcase in
>the closet. GPP asks the medium; Putnam: Where is her will?

Yes, that's pretty interesting.  We have no way of knowing whether GP really had trouble finding the will or if this was a trap for the medium.  The medium answered, "In the safe-deposit box.  With the watch." To which Putnam added the parenthetical comment, "(Wrong.)"

>GPP's response within the (...) has future tense and past tense within
>the same comment. That would imply to me that this cruise that he went
>on took place between July'37' and Dec '39' / Jan '40'.

The article says that Putnam was first asked to listen to this particular medium in September 1937 and it seems that the seance took place shortly thereafter.  As you say, the transcript he gives the writer of the article contains a question and an answer about a trip.  The question is put in the present tense, "Ask Amelia if she knows anything about the trip I am contemplating." The answer is also in the present tense. "Yes. That is very good. By all means go." It is Putnam's parenthetical comment that is in the past tense, "(I was planning a cruise. I did go later.)"

Clearly, the parenthetical comment was written sometime between whenever Putnam completed the cruise (which had to be after September 1937) and whenever the deadline was for the December 1939 issue of Popular Aviation (normally about three months before publication).  It must, therefore, be the case that the parenthetical comments were added to the transcript at a later time, perhaps for the writers benefit, or that the entire "transcript" is actually a reconstruction from memory (despite the author's claim that they were recorded "during that ghostly interview").

Putnam provided the medium with the information that he was planning a trip. All the medium did was approve of it.  There is no indication that the cruise has anything to do with the search.

LTM
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 21 Jul 2003 12:20:56 EDT
From:         Marty Moleski
Subject:      Did AE Hear Something on 500 or 3105?

A friend of mine has been doing a close reading of the materials on the web site.

He has called my attention to two entries on this page:

http://www.tighar.org/Projects/Earhart/Bulletins/06_05_02Bulletin/pos2page2.html

At 0743-6, the entry reads:

"KHAQQ from ITASCA. Received your message, received at signal strength five. Received A-s (on 500 and 3105). Go ahead. Unanswered."

At 0747-8 (the next entry) it says:

"KHAQQ from ITASCA. Received your message, received at signal strength five. Received A-s (on 3105)."

The question for the radio gang is whether this shows AE acknowledging receipt of the A's transmitted on 500 and 3105.

I have been consistently overlooking these entries.  My impression, which I've stated many times over the last year or so, was that the only acknowledged transmission was of the A's on 7500 at 0800-3.

I may have been wrong--and if so, I apologize for the oversight. :o(
LTM.

Marty #2359
***********************************************************
From Ric

The actual notations in the log (see the PDFs on the website) are:

For the 07:43-46 entry -
KHAQQ DE NRUI  R MSG R QSA 5 R A-S (500 ES 3105) GA / UNANSWD

For the 07:47-48 entry -
KHAQQ DE NRUI  R MSG R QSA 5 R A-S (3105)

My interpretation has been that these are code transmissions to Earhart on the indicated frequencies which conclude a string of "A"s sent by Itasca.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 21 Jul 2003 12:22:00 EDT
From:         Ross Devitt
Subject:      Re: Thermos bottles

> From studying that photo, I'd guess AE & FN each had 2 thermoses; one for
> liquids, and one for solids like stew or something (a wide mouth type).
> Heck, on a 20-some hour flight (no stewardesses) they had to eat.

We had Thermos flasks in the 1960's with wide mouths as well.  Used to fill them with either a thick soup or a stew when going away in winter.

I'm 49yo, so I was a child when we used "genuine" Thermos flasks.  There must be some forum members a little older than me with better recollection for the details?

Something to consider though.  The outside of a Thermos flask was light tin.  The container inside was silvered glass.  I believe the early ones were a single glass with the vacuum formed between the tin case and the glass flask but I know later ones were a two layer flask with a vacuum between the layers as well.

One of the reasons I remember Thermoses is that I copped a hammering for somehow managing to break the inner flask with a spoon once.

Th' WOMBAT
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 21 Jul 2003 12:33:10 EDT
From:         Rich Young
Subject:      Duration

Alan wrote:

>Duration is possible. Duration doesn't extend range. It only lets you
>loiter longer.

Duration is potential range, Alan.  The only way it COULDN'T be range is if you backtrack or circle.  (At least in this universe.)  Perhaps before you jump on Daryll (or his other brother Daryll), you should see if YOUR emperor is wearing any clothes.

LTM, (who's always tastefully and appropriately dressed)
Rich Young
********************************************************
From Ric

I'll take a stab at this (and probably regret it). The only way to get the extreme time aloft that Daryll was talking about is to back way off on the power and when you do that you slow way down.  If all you're interested in doing is staying aloft (loitering) that's fine, but if you actually want to go someplace you're better off at the most economical cruise setting.  You'll run out of gas sooner but you'll do it farther away from where you started.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 21 Jul 2003 13:04:54 EDT
From:         Carol Dow
Subject:      Virus

I don't understand a few things about the Klez virus. Would you clue us in?

1. How did that "thing" get a hold of the mailing list if Mac users are immune?

2. I didn't download so I'm safe. Is correct? Ah so?

3. MACs have been attacked by viruses, but 90% (maybe more) of the users out there have IBM compatible Microsoft software. So all the cuckoos design viruses to attack IBM compatible PCs. But that doesn't mean that the hate crowd is immune to Macs. If someone had the urge they could design around the MAC systems even if it is difficult. AND that has happened. There have been MAC viruses.

So, back to No. 1 question. How did that !~@#$%^&*()_!@#$%^&*() thing get the mailing list? Hhhmmmmm. There are viruses out there that don't require downloads. They are self executing. Isn't that a nice thought?

Respectfully submitted and would like to hear your thoughts on the subject.
Carol Dow
***********************************************************************
From Ric

The virus never came through here.  If you become infected with the Klez virus it goes into your address book and picks an address you have there and pretends to be that person.  It then sends a message to everyone else in your address book with an attachment that includes the virus.

In this case, the TIGHAR1 email address was in somebody's address book and got selected by the virus.  The virus then sent a message to the other addresses which apparently included the Earhartforum address.  Only messages received from the TIGHAR1 address are distributed by Listserve as forum postings. That's what I do as moderator. I take the incoming messages and send them back out to Listserve.  In this case, Listserve received a message it thought was from me and sent it out as a forum posting.

As far as I know, as long as you don't open the attachment you're safe.

***********************************************************
From Jim Preston

Way to go Ric. You must have noticed from my address that I am also a Mac Person. Having worked for Apple for a number of years.
Jim Preston

*************************************************
From Ric

As Carol says, we don't get tagged by most of this stuff because there aren't enough of us to make an attractive target. All you PC folks ....don't go out and buy a Mac.  Too expensive.  Not nearly challenging enough to use.  You'd hate it.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 21 Jul 2003 14:18:50 EDT
From:         Bob Lee
Subject:      Re: Virus

For what it's worth, most of the 'email' viruses take advantage of the Microsoft Address Book Format. You may get some satisfaction in using an alternative email client other than Outlook/Outlook Express. Many of the viruses currently in the wild that take advantage of email propagation are Visual Basic files. Take a look at Pegasus Mail (www.pmail.com); it's a great 'free' email client for PC's and in the knowledge base on the website is a good way to protect your email without spending a dime. It's an award-winning package that's worth a look.

Bob
************************************************************
From Angus

Carol wrote:

> I don't understand a few things about the Klez virus. Would you clue us in?

The Klez virus is truly HORRIBLE! You don't have to download to get infected you merely have to download your e-mail and the virus is self executing. You are probably already infected and your machine in incipient meltdown mode. The Klez virus is really a worm. Worms generally come through your email client, but you see people can also get infected if they accept a Trojan File which has the worm as the payload.

It seems to me that the best thing you can do is to immediately junk all files containing the words "Garapan", "Japanese", "Gilberts" or "captured". The Klez worm likes nothing better to get its teeth into files which use those words, cruising the registry until it finds them. When it does it unleashes a vicious payload and the damage that the modified files containing those words can do is breathtaking. Don't just take my word for it. Ric will confirm it (he wrote it).

Regards Angus.
*******************************************
From Ric

Carol, put down the pills.  Stand away from the bottle.  Take a deep breath. Angus is only kidding.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 21 Jul 2003 16:42:52 EDT
From:         Dan Postellon
Subject:      Re: Evidence

>Voice: Yes. That is very good. By all means go. (I was planning a
>cruise. I did go later.)

Now you know that the medium was a fraud.  This is a typical answer that could apply to any trip.
Dan  TIGHAR#2263

********************************************
From Ric

Had the medium said, "Yes, that cruise is a good idea.  By all means go." It would have been interesting, but Putnam is the one who later said it was a cruise he had been talking about.  In his original question he only mentioned a "trip".
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 21 Jul 2003 16:53:20 EDT
From:         Marty Moleski
Subject:      Re: Did AE Hear Something on 500 or 3105?

Ric wrote:

> The actual notations in the log (see the PDFs on the website) are:
>
> For the 07:43-46 entry -
> KHAQQ DE NRUI  R MSG R QSA 5 R A-S (500 ES 3105) GA / UNANSWD
>
> For the 07:47-48 entry -
> KHAQQ DE NRUI  R MSG R QSA 5 R A-S (3105)
>
> My interpretation has been that these are code transmissions to Earhart on
> the indicated frequencies which conclude a string of "A"s sent by Itasca.

I do NOT know anything other than what you've told me about how to read these transcripts, so I'm just askin', not sayin'.

Let me line up the fragments and the translation:

For the 07:43-46 entry -

KHAQQ DE NRUI : Itasca called AE
R MSG : Received your message.
R QSA 5 : Received it at signal strength 5.
R A-S (500 ES 3105) : We are transmitting A's on 500 & 3105 kcs. (??????)
GA : Please talk to us.
/ UNANSWD : We didn't hear anything back.

This seems to be an inconsistent translation of the "R" abbreviation. It doesn't seem reasonable that Itasca would say "received A's on 500 and 3105.  But the message was "unanswered," so it doesn't seem to be AE saying "I heard the A's."  YUCK!

Is it possible for R to stand for "listen for A's on 500 or 3100"?

For the 07:47-48 entry -
KHAQQ DE NRUI : Itasca called AE.
R MSG : Received your message.
R QSA 5 : Received it at signal strength five.
R A-S (3105) : We are transmitting A's on 3105 kcs.  (????????)

Is this just a re-transmission of the 7:43-46 entry?  Trying again because the first was "unanswered"?

I favor the interpretation that the whole message as recorded is what Itasca said to KHAQQ, because that is how the transcript begins.  But then the "R" just doesn't make a whole lot of sense (to me).

LTM.

Marty #2359
*****************************************************************
From Ric

And all I know about telegrapher's shorthand is what it says on two different reference sheets we have via Randy Jacobson ( I think).  Both agree that R means "received".  I agree with you.  The use of that second R doesn't seem to make any sense.

Maybe our radio gurus can provide some insight.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 21 Jul 2003 16:55:05 EDT
From:         Kerry Tiller
Subject:      Re: Virus

Here's another way to protect yourself: Don't use your address book. Mine is empty. Most of the time I need an e-mail address, I have at least the last message from that person sitting in my in-box, or in a folder with that person's name on it, or I have the last message I sent to that person in my sent items queue. Worst case scenario, keep your e-mail address lists in a folder on your hard drive; not as a part of your e-mail program (I know, you have to manually type them once that way). I am a MAC man, but I do use Outlook (I know, I'm weak. I tried to use Eudora for years, but it just didn't cut it. I use I.E. for my browser, too.)

Kerry Tiller
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 21 Jul 2003 17:01:58 EDT
From:         Ted Campbell
Subject:      Re: Virus

Now that was cruel!

***********************************************
From Ric

What? Me or Angus?  Or both?  We canna help it.  A Campbell should know that.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 21 Jul 2003 20:02:55 EDT
From:         Suzanne
Subject:      Re: Introduction on ADSL / Virus

Ric wrote:

>You will NEVER receive a valid message with an attachment via the Earhart
>forum.  The forum software does not support attachments.

My received post from the forum did indeed come with a text file attachment that had several underlines in its file name.

From my email software log:

2905 16:0.18 Preparing new messages to display: 5
2905 16:0.18 TIGHAR1, Introduction on ADSL
2905 16:0.18 Decoding "C:\Download\Eudora\____________warn.txt"

The attachment, ____________warn.txt, stated that malicious code had been removed from the letter by some named virus software that had three initials.

Suzanne
***************************************************************
From Ric

I was mistaken.  There are circumstances where an attachment can appear with a forum posting. It happens if the posting is too long.  The daily digest, for example, is a single email containing all of that day's postings.  It often comes with only the first few messages in the body of the email and the rest as an attachment.  The Klez virus posting was apparently so big that it was treated the same way.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 21 Jul 2003 20:03:59 EDT
From:         Jim Preston
Subject:      Re: Virus

Kerry. why not use Netscape. I have been using it since v1.0, 1983 and have no problems with macs. There was a known MS glitch that messed up netscape when both were on the computer. Just another subtle MS thorn in the Mac's side.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 21 Jul 2003 20:09:27 EDT
From:         Herman De Wulf
Subject:      Re: Virus

I have run my Symantec Norton anti-virus twice. There is no sign of any virus in my computer. None has been isolated or quarantined. I don't understand how his Klez thing or whatever got into the forum. I never use an address book. I return mails using their own address or I write the address each time I send an e-mail without using an address book. I think this is the safest way to operate.

LTM
**************************************************************
From Ric

No virus got into the forum.  A message containing a virus attachment got posted to the forum because somebody's virus-infected computer sent out a message to Listserve using my email address.  It could happen again but there is nothing I can do to stop it. The problem didn't originate here.

Just don't open any suspicious attachments and you'll be fine.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 21 Jul 2003 20:12:06 EDT
From:         Ross Devitt
Subject:      Re: Virus

I'm still trying to open it out of curiosity.  Not being a Mac person or a Windows person allows me to play with these things without fear of propagating them....

Th' WOMBAT

****************************************************
From Ric

Crikey Wombat, if somebody gave you a ticking box and told you it was a bomb, you'd open it just to see if you could.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 21 Jul 2003 20:13:20 EDT
From:         Rick Boardman
Subject:      Re: Did AE Hear Something on 500 or 3105?

I'm no radio guru!  I did ten years in a military radio environment, though. The ancient military issue logs we were supposed to fill in, had a handy-dandy list of abbreviations in the back cover.  None of us cold war warriors had a clue where half of them originally came from, but we used them anyway.

I recall using "R  A -I-" , or "R AS -I-" as shorthand for "Roger, Wait out". What we usually meant by that was "I heard and understood your last transmission; Wait for my next transmission."

Does that make any sense?  Gurus?

Rick Boardman
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 21 Jul 2003 20:15:52 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Duration

Ric wrote:

> I'll take a stab at this (and probably regret it).

No, Ric, you're not going to regret it. Oscar Boswell may jump in here but I imagine what he will add is that indeed it is possible to back off on the mixture considerably but what occurs is high temp and high risk to the engines without (in this case) practical gain. Essentially the bottom line is that the engine produces X amount of horsepower for X amount of fuel. Horsepower is the force that moves a given weight a given distance. Add to this equation the fact that reduced power reduces airspeed and increases drag because it forces the aircraft into a higher angle of attack.

Therefore to achieve the most distance for the fuel we need the angle of attack at optimum. On the contrary if we want to achieve the greatest duration we can simply hang the plane on its props and "hang around."

Rich, the emperor's clothes are intact. Do a little research on recips or check out at the airport with some of the recip pilots. You will find there is a great difference in how you manage fuel between recips, jets and turboprops but the aerodynamics remain the same.

Alan
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 21 Jul 2003 20:17:13 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Virus

> As far as I know, as long as you don't open the attachment you're safe.

Correct. Generally speaking virus' only functions in executable files not emails. That means it needs to have the extention of .exe, .com, .bat, etc. There is an exception (at least one) and that is the Microsoft Word virus. A Word document CAN contain a virus but it can only mess up Word files. It is easy to take care of and can't do any other damage (so far) except mess up your Word documents and program.

All these nonsense emails you occasionally get saying "Don't open an email whose title is......" are hoaxes. Opening an email does nothing.

Alan
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 21 Jul 2003 20:18:13 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Virus

> The Klez virus is truly HORRIBLE! You don't have to download to get
> infected

ANGUS!!!! Carol is not fair game. <G> Carol, DO NOT use RAID on your computer.

Alan
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 22 Jul 2003 10:51:37 EDT
From:         unknown
Subject:      Re: Duration

From that old pilot in florida,
        no question:  better yet run one only for absolute maximum duration' but i will bet she did not have that information.
      therefore:
       Run them hot and lean.   makes no difference when your life is at stake; just do it!

***********************************************************************
From Ric

Yup.  Refusal to do that is what got Bob Stack slapped by John Wayne in "The High and the Mighty".  But running hot and lean is very different from the loafing that will get you the extreme time aloft.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 22 Jul 2003 10:53:38 EDT
From:         Dave in fremont
Subject:      Re: Virus

You are too self-effacing about the Mac... both are great machines. The best thing Steve Jobs ever did was donate Macs to schools... The worst thing Steve Jobs ever did was keep all that IP proprietary... Ask anyone who's ever tried to use "not on the 'approved list'" SDRAM in their Mac.. <wink>

LTM

Dave (#2585)
*****************************************************************
From Ric

What say we try to get back on topic?
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 22 Jul 2003 10:56:08 EDT
From:         Randy Jacobson
Subject:      Re: Did AE Hear Something on 500 or 3105?

From the Coast Guard Manual of Communications Procedures, circa 1933:

R
It is used (a) by itself after a call to mean "last message or transmission has been received"; (b) after a call, and followed by identification data, to mean "message or transmission indicated has been received"; (c) R shall not be made until the correct group count has been established; (d) in radio, after a call and following a numeral from the "readability" table (1 to 5) to mean "the readability of your signals is as indicated".

*******************************************************************
From Ric

Okay, so how do you interpret the use of R in the context under discussion?
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 22 Jul 2003 10:57:36 EDT
From:         Carol Dow
Subject:      Re: Virus

Alan wrote:

> Carol, DO NOT use RAID on your
>computer. 

How about Lysol? It kills germs more better. Yuk, yuk.

******************************************************
From Ric

Thus endeth the Virus thread.
========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 22 Jul 2003 10:59:13 EDT
From:         Pete
Subject:      Re: Did AE Hear Something on 500 or 3105?

I remember the "DE", log shorthand for "This Is", as in "K2P DE L3E, INT TRK 5603", I also remember so many times my "quick log" was written on the scope face in grease pencil, then added to the actual log when I got the chance.

I wonder how fast orders were passed down on the 1MC aboard ITASCA?

Pete
Former Operations Specialist, USN
Now #2419

**************************************************************
From Ric

What's a 1MC?
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 22 Jul 2003 11:04:02 EDT
From:         Chris is Petaluma
Subject:      Re: Evidence

Is Daryll actually Niki?  Seems he's playing the same childish game of obfuscation.  Forumites like him must being getting awfully bored.  As am I.

Chris
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 22 Jul 2003 11:05:22 EDT
From:         Ross Devitt
Subject:      Re: Virus

Ric wrote:

> As far as I know, as long as you don't open the attachment you're safe.

Not True!  Windows users who have certain settings enabled in Outlook or Outlook express can open some attachments simply by highlighting the file as it comes in.

I guess the prime example is having HTML enabled for email.  The html code loads as the highlight bar passes over the email, the HTML code is downloaded, javascript is run and an activeX control runs creating whatever havoc is required.

We've proved it can happen time and time again.

Th' WOMBAT  (I spend a large part of my working life removing viruses from computers protected by the latest "almost" up to date anti-virus software)
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 22 Jul 2003 11:07:08 EDT
From:         Dennis McGee
Subject:      Rs

Rick Boardman said:  "I recall using "R  A -I-" , or "R AS -I-" as shorthand for "Roger, Wait out".  What we usually meant by that was "I heard and understood your last transmission; Wait for my next transmission."


That is pretty much the way I remember it also from my 10 years in the Morse code-intercept environment back in the 60s.  The notation "R AS1" equated to "I understand your last transmission.  Wait one minute for my next transmission."

It was also not uncommon for the sender to string out a series of Rs -- "R R R R" -- if he was impatient.  It was the Morse code equivalent of "Yeah, yeah, yeah"

LTM, who's a tad impatient herself these days
Dennis O. McGee #0149EC
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 22 Jul 2003 11:19:24 EDT
From:         Rich Young
Subject:      cruise vs. loiter

Ok - I se what you are saying, Ric.  Nearing Howland, the Electra must have been pretty "light", in a gross weight sense, and most economical cruise (ground track) depends heavily on wind direction and strength.  What kind of numbers are we looking at for weights for the last part of the flight, and max endurance and max distance airspeeds, (given the wind strength and direction reported by ITASCA, assuming a track SSW along the reported LOP)?

LTM, (who always uses HER cruise control)
Rich

*****************************************************************
From Ric

I'll pass this to anyone who has more time to answer it right now.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 22 Jul 2003 14:24:10 EDT
From:         Rich Young
Subject:      lean mixture

"...indeed it is possible to back off on the mixture considerably but what occurs is high temp and high risk to the engines"

Pardon my ignorance, but isn't that exactly the technique (low RPM, very lean mixture) that Lindberg used on his solo trans-atlantic crossing?   And also taught to the P-38 pilots in the Pacific while a technical rep for Continental Aircraft?  As I recall, the line mechanics had objections similar to yours, but the expected engine damage didn't materialize, and the Lightning's range was greatly extended, making the shootdown of Yamamoto, among other long-distance missions, possible.

LTM, (who never runs out of gas)
Rich Young

*************************************************************************
From Ric

All very true but it has nothing to do with the discussion about Earhart. Kelly Johnson had already gone to great lengths to establish the most economical cruise settings for NR16020 and had given AE some simple guidelines to follow to achieve decent fuel economy.  To achieve greater economy required a degree of attention and precision that was beyond Earhart's competence.  In short, although the airplane may have been capable of delivering the best-case scenario numbers that Oscar Boswell calculated, that kind of performance was not available to Amelia Earhart.  She did know how to pull back the power and slow down and thus cut the gallons per hour to a relatively low figure, but that wouldn't help her go farther.  It would only keep her aloft longer.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 22 Jul 2003 14:28:02 EDT
From:         Chris Kennedy
Subject:      Re: Did AE Hear Something on 500 or 3105?

If he is willing to help, perhaps Randy Jacobson could start by first going through the transmissions as recorded in the Itasca log, without any TIGHAR interpretations.  Also, what does the reference in the 1933 manual to "1 to 5" and to "readability" mean?  I remember Bob Brandenburg commenting once that he had questions concerning what "strength 5" (mentioned in the Itasca log) meant---Randy, can you help here?

--Chris Kennedy
***********************************************************************
From Ric

Chris, there are no "TIGHAR interpretations".  The translation of the radio shorthand used in the Itasca log which appear on the TIGHAR website are precisely those provided by Randy Jacobson using original Coast Guard references.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 22 Jul 2003 14:29:30 EDT
From:         Dave in Fremont
Subject:      Re: Did AE Hear Something on 500 or 3105?

The 1MC is the general announcing circuit on US Naval and Coast Guard vessels... The ol' "Now Hear This..." circuit.

LTM,

Dave (#2585)
****************************************************************
From Ric

I guess the first question would be - did Itasca have one?
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 22 Jul 2003 14:35:35 EDT
From:         Daryll
Subject:      for Marty, Kerry & Ric

#1
Marty wrote:

>What's wrong with Darryl wasn't that he was "going all
>metaphysical" but that his metaphysical principles are hogwash. He's
>appealing to analogies instead of to evidence.

Marty maybe you can explain that for me in a little more detail. Is it your suggestion that my theories are not based on facts or evidence?

#2
Ric wrote:

>It comes from an article, graciously made available by Ron
>Reuther,....with a thank you to Ron Reuther for bringing it to our
>attention

As an added note, Ron Reuther is a member of the AES.

#3
Kerry Tiller wrote:

>O.K. Daryll, even your obfuscation is getting weak. Do you have
>documentation for your theory or not? I have to assume not, since you
>have been called to task to produce it on more than one occasion on this
>forum and we haven't seen it yet. Your credibility is shot. (IMHO)

Kerry,...remember what they say about the word "assume".

Ric doesn't have any intention of opening up HIS forum for someone to present arguments and evidence that are contrary to his objectives. What you ask is beyond the scope of this forum. The AES has recently bound it's newsletters into one volume. More than 700 pages accumulated over a 10 year period. The costs alone for making these available to our membership was $85. This is not a sales pitch because there is no intention of releasing research material outside of the AES.

#4
Ric wrote:

>What I have said - repeatedly
>- is that I am willing to accept any solution to the Earhart mystery
>that is based on facts. So far, the facts seem (to me anyway) to point
>very strongly toward Niku and I haven't seen any that point somewhere
>else. We use the same criteria for evaluating information that purports
>to support the Niku hypothesis as we do for information that appears to
>support other theories.

You seem to totally reject any eye-witness statements, as evidence, that comes from the Marshallese people. Some of our researchers have gone there in an attempt to get as close as they could to those sources of information. The people, still living and who knew the eye-witnesses were familiar with the story of the "Earhart woman". They knew the eye-witnesses who originally told the story. They could only vouch for the character and reputation of their deceased fellow country men. It seems that it is some of the outsiders that want to characterize them as having motivations other than the truth. These Marshallese could only tell what they knew after the Americans liberated them from the Japanese. The one person who could have helped a great deal on the Earhart story was the missionary Carl Heine. He acted as a translator for the Japanese governor at Jaluit. He and his wife were beheaded by the Japanese during the war. This same parallel about the ability of communicating the truth exists today in Iraq.

>Why is it important? I realize and accept that determining the
>fate of missing persons is important to the family, but we're not
>conducting this investigation on behalf of the Earhart family. Are
>you?

No,....but you must realize that a great many people found a sympathetic connection to Amelia and her fate. Little girls grew up and became what they are today because of Amelia.

>No and neither do you. [referring to GPP's cruise,].....Putnam
>provided the medium with the information that he was planning a trip.
>All the medium did was approve of it. There is no indication that the
>cruise has anything to do with the search.

This is why its called research. Bear in mind that what we refer to a cruise today (all you can eat) is not what was called a cruise in 1937. One of our researchers has personal correspondence from GPP that he was in the Galapagos islands after this seance session that we have been referring to. Because the Galapagos is so isolated you would expect to take a boat there. We can't pin down the dates exactly. What is interesting is that Astor took his BIG yacht the Nourmahal into the Pacific in an attempt to get to Jaluit. FDR had spent time on the Nourmahal after the assassination attempt in Miami. Astor's mission was over by May '38'. We have the note that he wrote to FDR about his cruise. The note was hand carried by Kermit Roosevelt from Hawaii back to the White House. Even though Astor mentions some intelligence information that was gathered, there seems to be something that was being withheld until a face-to-face could be arranged with FDR on his return.

The Galapagos islands were not an unfamiliar place to the Putnams or the crew of the Nourmahal.

Daryll

#5
Ric wrote:

I'll take a stab at this (and probably regret it). The only way to get the extreme time aloft that Daryll was talking about

"extreme time"????

My 281 simulation indicated an endurance of 25 hours and some odd minutes. The last radio message at 08:43 was 20:13 minutes into the flight. The Itasca expected a 24 hour endurance which would have been up around 12:30 pm, Oscar B.'s long range flight profile extended to 28 hours of endurance.

Daryll
***************************************************************
From Ric

I can't find anything in the above worth dignifying with a reply.  If anyone else can, be my guest.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 22 Jul 2003 14:37:44 EDT
From:         Randy Jacobson
Subject:      Re: Did AE Hear Something on 500 or 3105?

Ric asked:

>Okay, so how do you interpret the use of R in the context under
>discussion?

AT 1913Z, the literal log states: KHAQQ DE NRUI R MSG R QSA 5 A-S (500 ES 3105) GA / UNANSWD

TRANSLATION: Itasca to Earhart: we received your message, your signal strength is 5, sending "a"s on both 500 and 3105 khz, go ahead but no answer

At 1917Z, the literal log states: KHAQQ DE NRUI R MSG R QSA5 R A-S (3105)

TRANSLATION: Itasca to Earhart: we received your message, strength 5, Roger, sending "a"s on 3105 khz with key

This is how I translated things when I was working on translating the logs continuously.  I suspect the R after QSA5 is a typo.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 22 Jul 2003 14:39:22 EDT
From:         Patrick Gaston
Subject:      Klez & Co.

"All these nonsense emails you occasionally get saying "Don't open an email whose title is......" are hoaxes. Opening an email does nothing."

That is perhaps the worst piece of advice ever posted on this Forum and, if followed, will lead to a lot of infected computers.

As someone noted, most email worms like Klez are written to take advantage of flaws in the Outlook Express program -- of which there are legion - that allow certain types of  attachments to self-execute.   Most of these bugs were supposed to have been fixed in Outlook Express 6, but that didn't stop the "TIGHAR virus" attachment from trying to execute THE MOMENT I OPENED THE MESSAGE (fortunately my AV software picked off the little bugger).

Even scarier is the fact that you don't even need to open the message to trigger some viruses -- all you have to do is "view" it in the Outlook Express preview pane.  For maximum security on Outlook Express:

1.  TURN OFF the preview pane

2.  Right-click and immediately DELETE (without opening) any message, even if it seems to come from someone you know, that contains a strange subject line.  Example:  A message from Ric Gillespie headed "Marshalls or Bust".  Then, using the same procedure, delete it from the "Deleted Items" folder.

3.  Deleting your entire Windows Address Book, as some have suggested, is a good way to prevent the virus from propagating itself immediately but your computer still may be infected, which means you still may be sending a copy of the virus every time you hit the "reply" button.  Different viruses work differently.  I once read an article saying that if you used a certain type of email address as the first entry in your WAB, it would stop the self-propagation process.  However, I never tried it.

4.    Most importantly, if you are an Outlook Express user (and even if you're not), invest $29.95 in an antivirus program like Norton or McAfee that updates itself continuosly via the internet.  Best software investment you will ever make.

Alan's advice may work for those who don't use OE, although I still wouldn't bank on it.  Virus-writers are wily (albeit sick) individuals who pride themselves on staying one step ahead of AV technology.  Anybody who has ever spent three hours manually deleting a virus from their system -- or worse yet, lost their entire hard drive -- knows whereof I speak.

So why do we continue using Outlook Express?  Hey, what else would we do for aggravation?  Besides reading the Forum, I mean.

Pat Gaston
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 22 Jul 2003 14:52:44 EDT
From:         Kerry Tiller
Subject:      Re: Did AE Hear Something on 500 or 3105?

Ric wrote:

> What's a 1MC?

It's a naval ship's PA system; a way of passing words of general interest to the crew as a whole. What it has to do with the discussion at hand will have to be answered by Pete.

Also, for Pete:

The "D E" for "this is" comes from morse code short hand. "T" in morse is one dah, "H", "I", and "S" are four, two and three dits respectively. "This is" would come like this: <_ .... .. ...   .. ...> Long ago, the morse operators gave it a sound short hand of <_.. .> which corresponds to "D" <_..> and "E" <.> it was also more convenient to simply write "DE" in the log. As for "INT TRK"; that is post 1955/CIC scope dope short hand for "interrogative track", meaning you doubt a radar track's validity.

For the rest of the forum:

As others have said, "R" in a radio log means "Received". Importantly (and more specifically) it means "I understand your last transmission". It is the "R" (or "Roger" in voice comm)'s only meaning. Not only did you hear the other station, but you also understood the message. For flow of communication and to reduce unnecessary transmissions, the "R" is usually followed by one of three pro-words: "Over" (if you want the other station to continue), "wait" (I'll be back with an answer) or "Out" (end of transmission). "over" in morse is <_._>, the same as the letter "K". "Wait" is <._...> equal to the letter "A" <._> and the letter "S" <...> run together, or sent as a single character. It is written in the log "AS" with an over score (meaning the letters are run together). "Out" is the same thing with "AR" <._._.>. As late as the 1990s we were still using these old morse short hands in the voice logs.

I don't know if this has been helpful or confusing. I'll shut up now.

PS for Pete; If you were in my CIC and I caught you writing radio rough log info on a radar repeater with a grease pencil, you would get the green log book up side of your head.

LTM (who always thought of her son as a man of letters)
Kerry Tiller; ex- OS1 USN, WN2IVM & WB7SIQ
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 22 Jul 2003 15:09:11 EDT
From:         Rebecca
Subject:      Re: for Marty, Kerry & Ric...why conduct the investigation?

Ric wrote:

>Why is it important? I realize and accept that determining the
>fate of missing persons is important to the family, but we're not
>conducting this investigation on behalf of the Earhart family. Are
>you?


Daryll wrote:

>No,....but you must realize that a great many people found a sympathetic
>connection to Amelia and her fate. Little girls grew up and became what
>they are today because of Amelia.

I heartily second your statement, Daryll.  I grew up knowing that the women in my family DID things, with AE as the prime example because everyone had heard of her.  My experience was that there were ten people to tell me why a woman couldn't or shouldn't get a Ph.D. for every one who was supportive, so it was a tremendous advantage for me to know that those naysayers didn't know what they were talking about.  My grandmother Orpha played dolls with Amelia (yes, AE did play dolls with my un-tomboy grandmother, and I remember my grandmother telling me with a smile that Amelia played kind of rough), and homemaker Orpha's four daughters earned Master's degrees in the 1930s and 1940s.  Orpha's cousin Beatrice earned her law degree in the same class with Sandra Day O'Connor. Orpha's daughter Kitty was Composer of the Year in Oregon a few years ago. It actually came as a shock for me to realize as a young teenager that AE wasn't my inspiration alone, but she was actually an inspiration for girls and women all over the world.

AE displayed a freedom of movement in a society in which women's choices and opportunities were severely restricted.  When my Aunt Ruth applied for a teaching position (I think in the 1960s), she had to sign an agreement that she would quit her job if she married.  The first women to run in the Boston Marathon were shoved by men who didn't think women should be allowed to run. These things weren't very long ago.  And yet we have the shining example of AE going about her business in the 1920s and 1930s, gaining public acceptance for flying, and looking for the next flying record to set.  She doesn't have to be perfect.  She's just a favorite example of a woman who did things.

        Rebecca
********************************************************************
From Ric

Heros (and villains) have the impact they do not because of who they were, or what they did, but because of who we think they were and what we think they did - what Daryll would call our perceptions.  During her life and over the decades since her death Amelia Earhart has enjoyed, with few exceptions, an uncritical and often adoring popular image.  If the legend does not stand up to objective scrutiny it is only of importance to those of us who must deal with her in objective terms.  For those who find inspiration in the legend it is the legend that is important.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 22 Jul 2003 15:10:27 EDT
From:         Dennis McGee
Subject:      Questions

Daryll said: "This is not a sales pitch because there is no intention of releasing research material outside of the AES."

Why is that, Daryll?  TIGHAR has a whole slew of research material it has released to anyone with a PC.  To my knowledge, and I've been a member since about 1989 (I think), nothing is kept back; what you see is what we have.

Daryll said:  "What is interesting is that Astor took his BIG yacht the Nourmahal into the Pacific in an attempt to get to Jaluit. FDR had spent time on the Nourmahal after the assassination attempt in Miami. Astor's mission was over by May '38'."

I am curious exactly what these three sentences have in common, and why they are presented in this fashion.  Is there some connection between Astor, Jaluit, FDR, the assassination attempt, and Astor's "mission?"  I'm at a loss to understand your logic here.

LTM, who enjoys the downtime
Dennis O. McGee #0149EC
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 22 Jul 2003 15:27:00 EDT
From:         David Katz
Subject:      Re: Klez & Co.

Pat Gaston wrote:

>Hey, what else would we do for aggravation?  Besides reading the Forum, I
>mean.

That's easy:  become a Red Sox fan!

David Katz

**************************************************************
From Ric

Aggravation?  You want aggravation?  Check out the expedition updates on the TIGHAR website at
http://www.tighar.org/Projects/Earhart/nikuvp/dailies.html
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 22 Jul 2003 15:57:20 EDT
From:         Marty Moleski
Subject:      Re: for Marty, Kerry & Ric

Daryll wrote:

># 1
> > .....What's wrong with Darryl wasn't that he was "going all
> >metaphysical" but that his metaphysical principles are hogwash. He's
> >appealing to analogies instead of to evidence.
>
> Marty maybe you can explain that for me in a little more detail. Is it
> your suggestion that my theories are not based on facts or evidence?

Yes.  When people ask you for evidence, you say, "But other people, including TIGHAR, make similar arguments."  These are the analogies to which I was referring.  I haven't seen any "contemporaneous sources" to back up your hypotheses.  People who say that the dead "eyewitnesses" were good folks doesn't seem to me to be "evidence."

LTM.
Marty #2359
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 22 Jul 2003 16:00:16 EDT
From:         Alfred Hendrickson
Subject:      Artifacts

(The Terraplane-bootleg-moonshine-Noonan connection was great! I almost jumped into that one!)

Here's more speculation and puzzling on thermos bottles and the "cup handle" artifact:

I have looked at photos and descriptions of somewhere between 50 and 100 vintage thermos bottles. I have done all of this looking on ebay, since I can't find pictures of these things anywhere else.

Thermos (brand) seems to be, and to have been, the dominant manufacturer, going back to the early 1900's. I saw a brand called Icy Hot, but this is a subsidiary of Thermos. Thermos is actually The American Thermos Bottle Company, Norwich, CT. They had offices and/or manufacturing facilities in other cities, too. Cincinnati, I think, and one other.

Two other brands were Aladdin and Keapsit; I'm guessing, based on what I see, that they were not as common.

I have found two examples of thermoses (generic use of the word here) with cups that had handles (see my earlier post); both of these were handles attached with a means not apparently involving welding or brazing. The artifact appears to have been welded or brazed. Also, the artifact looks very small to be a good handle. Perhaps the artifact IS a cup handle that just wasn't the ideal size or the best design. I kind of doubt it, though. I think it's something else.

I keep looking at it and thinking it might be a hook for hanging something, or an eye for tying something onto. Perhaps, originally, it was straight, and it got bent over later in life.

Hmmm.

Sorry, all, but you're gonna have to put up with me and my ramblings.

LTM; she could talk the leg off a chair,
Alfred Hendrickson #2583
****************************************************************
From Ric

Don't apologize Alfred.  You're actually doing research.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 22 Jul 2003 16:40:31 EDT
From:         Marty Moleski
Subject:      Re: Did AE Hear Something on 500 or 3105?

Randy Jacobson wrote:

> Ric asked:
> >Okay, so how do you interpret the use of R in the context under
> >discussion?
>
> AT 1913Z, the literal log states: KHAQQ DE NRUI R MSG R QSA 5 A-S (500 ES
> 3105) GA / UNANSWD
>
>    TRANSLATION: ITASCA TO EARHART: WE RECEIVED YOUR MESSAGE, YOUR SIGNAL
> STRENGTH IS 5, SENDING "A"S ON BOTH 500 AND 3105 KHZ, GO AHEAD BUT NO ANSWER
>
> At 1917Z, the literal log states: KHAQQ DE NRUI R MSG R QSA5 R A-S (3105)
>
>    TRANSLATION: ITASCA TO EARHART: WE RECEIVED YOUR MESSAGE, STRENGTH 5,
> ROGER, SENDING "A"S ON 3105 KHZ WITH KEY
>
> This is how I translated things when I was working on translating the logs
> continuously.  I suspect the R after QSA5 is a typo.

Your translation as presented in this post makes the most sense to me.

The website page doesn't have your translation.  Instead, it translates the "R" literally: "Received A-s (on 500 and 3105)" and "Received A-s (on 3105)."  These are both coded in black, meaning that the editor of the page takes them to be "administrative notes" rather than the content of what was transmitted.  I can't see a difference in the .pdf file of Position Two Page Two between what was presumably transmitted (R MSG R QSA 5) and the next fragment (R A-S). "A-S" does seem to be Galten's way of saying "we're transmitting a string of A's."  Bellart used A A A A or AAAAAAAAAA or the like.  Once Galten takes over, it's all A-S.

I'm not confident that the two messages in question were sent by phone, either.  They sure look a lot like what would be sent using CW.  The editor of the page for the website interprets them as "voice".  Bellarts noted when he used the "fone" once, but Galten doesn't, at least in what I see of Position Two Pages Two & Three.

LTM.

Marty #2359
************************************************************************
From Ric

The website has the 07:43 message as morse and the 07:47 message as voice. Both  should be morse.  We'll fix it.

Randy says:

>AT 1913Z, the literal log states: KHAQQ DE NRUI R MSG R QSA 5 A-S (500 ES
>3105) GA / UNANSWD

No it doesn't.  The literal log has an R after QSA 5.  You left it out of your original transcription for your database - probably because it didn't make any sense to you.

Your original interpretation of the R in the 07:47 entry was ROGER.  I don't remember changing it to RECEIVED but I must have.  ROGER makes more sense.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 23 Jul 2003 13:23:15 EDT
From:         Mike J.
Subject:      Re: DidAEHearSomethingon500or3105?

I'm a little bit confused here. The notation by the signal man in the log was in Morse"shorthand". If Earhart didn't have a Morse key on the aircraft why wasn't the message copied as voice? If she did send in Morse Code this is the way the message should have read:

KHAQQ DE NURI : Itasca called AE
R MSG : received message from AE
R QSA 5 : Received AE at signal strength 5 (loud and clear)
R A-S :Received from AE "we are busy"
Under the table of operating signals A-S(.-...) "we are busy and will call back in so-many minutes."
Morse shorthand shows AS with the hyphen right over AS not A-S.
(500 kcs is the hailing frequency and 3105kcs is the working frequency)
GA could be the operators initials, I can't find it in the table of operating
signals.
"UNANSWD" is obvious.
The 4 minutes and few seconds would be an appropriate time to hail again.

LTM ( who always uses her Shrader's Electronic Communications)
********************************************************************
From Ric

You are more than a bit confused.  This is a code transmission TO Earhart, not a reception FROM Earhart.  KHAQQ DE NRUI means "KHAQQ this is NRUI (Itasca).
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 23 Jul 2003 14:06:56 EDT
From:         Alfred Hendrickson
Subject:      Daryll and the AES

Intro: Dennis says that Daryll says the AES is not releasing research material.

Who, or what, is the AES? The Amelia Earhart Society perhaps? I'm curious. Who are they? What is their story? What is their mission? Are they researching something? How many members do they have? What do they have that we want, anyway? I can't find them on the web. Does anyone have a URL for them? I'd genuinely like to know more about them.; on forum or off.

LTM, who reads all things Amelia, and never hid anything,
Alfred Hendrickson #2583

****************************************************************
From Ric

The AES is indeed the Amelia Earhart Society.  As far I know, it is neither incorporated as a business nor recognized as a nonprofit organization.  It's just a group of people who call themselves the Amelia Earhart Society.  I know something of its evolution.

Back in 1988 when we were first becoming interested in the Earhart disappearance there was an informal group who called themselves the Amelia Earhart Research Consortium.  Most, but not all, of the participants were adherents of the various Japanese capture theories and their discussion seemed to us to consist mostly of wrangling over interpretations of various eyewitness accounts.  The group eventually fell apart.

Meanwhile, in the spring of 1989 we began the process of assembling a team for our first expedition to Nikumaroro.  Over a long weekend in Dayton, Ohio we held a seminar on the project and interviewed a number of prospective volunteer participants.  Among them was a contractor from the Denver area by the name of Bill Prymak.  When Bill was not selected for the team he became rather upset and formed his own research group mostly from members of the defunct Amelia Earhart Research Consortium.  He called his new group the Amelia Earhart Society.  Over the ensuing years the group has survived with a membership of - it has been my impression - around a dozen members.  They are sort of the "old guard" of the Japanese Capture crowd.  Bill Prymak, bless his heart, has maintained his membership in TIGHAR and a few of the members of the AES monitor and occasionally post on this forum.  They're generous with their opinions but rarely share documents or hard information.  A notable exception is Ron Reuther who has favored us with copies of obscure articles that are of great interest.

If there are errors in my description of the AES I'm confident that they'll be corrected.

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 23 Jul 2003 14:10:42 EDT
From:         Kerry Tiller
Subject:      Re: for Marty, Kerry & Ric

Daryll writes:

> Ric doesn't have any intention of opening up HIS forum for someone to
> present arguments and evidence that are contrary to his objectives. What
> you ask is beyond the scope of this forum. The AES has recently bound
> it's newsletters into one volume. More than 700 pages accumulated over a
> 10 year period. The costs alone for making these available to our
> membership was $85. This is not a sales pitch because there is no
> intention of releasing research material outside of the AES.

(LOL) Of course you don't want anyone outside of the AES to read your "research". It won't stand up to the scrutiny of someone who is not a true believer. I suspect in your soul of souls you know this to be true. You suffer the same problem Fred Goerner wrestled with. When confronted with the lack of real evidence for a theory you have spent years trying to prove, it is too late to admit even to yourself that you have been wrong. Part of FG's problem, as I opined a few years ago on this forum, was that he was a journalist, not an historian. Eye witness accounts are the stuff of which journalism is made. To an historian, they represent merely a direction for further research.

As far as Ric not allowing you to present evidence here, I can't think of anything more absurd. If he is spending all this time and money looking for our hero and heroine in the wrong place, I'm certain he would want to know. One of the reasons I plunked down fifty bucks of my then meager NCO pay to join TIGHAR (and why I still plunk down fifty five bucks on an even meagerer, if that's a word, retirement pay) is that the organization is completely open about its research and evidence. You will find no obfuscation here. If you are not willing to share your evidence outside of AES, what the heck are you doing on this forum?

LTM

Kerry Tiller
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 23 Jul 2003 14:19:05 EDT
From:         Bob Lee
Subject:      Re: Artifacts

Great work Alfred. I also took some time and did some searching on the Internet (I use www.metacrawler.com) and looked for antique bottles and thermoses to see what I could see. They are actually some pretty good sites out there -- although with none of your effort, I came to a similar conclusion on the artifact.

Although I wasn't able to find one, I remember owning a 'camping cup' that was tin and had a very poorly designed handle of reasonably large diameter 'wire'. The handle was too small and very uncomfortable to use. I checked out Civil War equipment sites and other odd places with no success -- so perhaps I am mistaken.

I enjoy your posts sir.

Bob
*************************************************************
From Ric

>diameter 'wire'. The handle was too small and very uncomfortable to use.

Sounds familiar.

I have some recollection that Tom King saw a handle similar to our artifact on a cup in a display in an airport (of all places).
*******************************************************
From Alfred Hendrickson:

Does anyone know if there is any mention of lanterns or lamps in the Niku colonization documents? It seems to me that, during Gallagher's bone search, he may have needed portable lights for searching or for finding his way back to the village after sunset. Kerosene lanterns? Oil "hurricane" lamps? Anything like this? As I study the "cup handle", I sometimes think I may be looking at a piece of a lantern. The artifact may be a loop for a bail, perhaps? Or a keeper of some sort?

I also think of vintage pots and pans, which had wire bails which may have needed loops like this artifact to keep them on the pot. The artifact may also be a handle for a pot lid.

Both of these types of items were constructed of wire and sheet metal, joined by welding. Both are handy on camping trips, and Gallagher was camping, after a fashion.

LTM; who was a happy camper herself,

Alfred Hendrickson #2583
************************************************************
From Ric

Oil or hurricane lanterns were, I believe, pretty standard methods of lighting in the colony.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 23 Jul 2003 14:27:51 EDT
From:         Marty Moleski
Subject:      How to Decode Log Book?

Thanks for your patience with all of the radio log questions.

I just deleted your last answer before going back to look at the page in question.

I think I see now how you decide when Galten is using voice or CW.  Correct me if I'm wrong.

When Galten uses "KHAQQ DE NRUI," that means he's using CW.

When he types KHAQQ FM ITASCA, that means he's using voice.

Another possible improvement in the translation:

At 0804, NRUI2 says:

  GIVING TO DPE TT NO SIGS ON 3105 ES IMPOSSIBLE TO WRK ITA / R

On the web page, "ITA / R" seems to be treated as the object of the verb, "work".  It's possible that Galten is making a note that he rogered the guys on the island.

Position Two Page Two is the rough, unsmoothed log.  Do you have a copy of the smoothed log?  Does it cast any light on these questions?

Sorry to bother you with all this stuff when you're using all of your superpowers to get Niku VP on the open sea.  ;o)

LTM.

Marty #2359
***************************************************************
From Ric

I finally resorted to telekinesis.  I know it's cheating but something had to be done.  They're now on their way.  Postion as of 14:30 EDT on July 23 was 12* 59' S/ 171* 11' W

Good thought to check the smoothed logs.  The entries are identical to the rough originals.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 23 Jul 2003 14:29:35 EDT
From:         Randy Jacobson
Subject:      Re: Did AE Hear Something on 500 or 3105?

Well I'll be!  I did omit the "R"!  After transcribing over 3300 telegrams and about 1500 radio log entries, I'm surprised that not more mistakes were made.

I agree that the 0747 local time message is voice; the 0743 message is most likely CW.  I still don't understand the last "R", but sure enough, it's there, both on Bellart's original and the smoothed copy of that radio log.

I'll change the database accordingly.

For the forum readers: I wouldn't read too much into any one message, as they were written hurriedly and not intended for close examination by forensic analysis years later.  By reading the whole log, one gets a better feel for what and how information was being written down, and what important anomalies begin to really stand out.  Examples are the erased "drifting" and "circling" inserted; the breakdown of communications protocols with Earhart; the sense of panic in the radio room, etc.

There are other anomalies in the record that make things hard to interpret: typos, codes that are unfathomable, etc.  "fone" is used often with Howland Island, and I believe that means voice communications, but have never been able to confirm it.  A number of "Z" codes are still unknown, but that doesn't mean there's useful information to be gleaned from the overall picture of what was going on (which to me, if more meaningful than trying to understand perfectly each line on the radio log).
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 23 Jul 2003 14:32:09 EDT
From:         Ross Devitt
Subject:      Re: cruise vs. loiter

Ric wrote:

> I'll pass this to anyone who has more time to answer it right now.

I seem to recall a long series of posts covering this topic around 2 years or so ago.  Around the time we were engrossed in the fuel consumption and engine settings investigations/speculations/analysis.

There should be heaps of stuff on it in the forum archives describing the difference between flying for maximum time aloft (which often doesn't cover much distance for the fuel used) and maximum range) which uses up your fuel in a shorter time, but gets you a lot further sooner)..

Th' WOMBAT
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 23 Jul 2003 14:43:40 EDT
From:         Ross Devitt
Subject:      Re: lean mixture

Ric wrote:

> To achieve greater economy required a degree
> of attention and precision that was beyond Earhart's competence.

Can you prove that attention and precision was in fact beyond Earhart's competence?

I have a lot less time that she had, and certainly a lot less time on twins, but I'm pretty sure that even with my limited experience I could lean out a Baron or Aztec to eke out a little more time/distance without blowing up the engines..

Heck, if she could bake cookies surely she could lean an engine...

Th' WOMBAT
*******************************************************************
From Ric

Of course I can't prove it.  How would you go about proving a statement like that without having AE here to fly a test?  But I'll tell you why it's my opinion.

Getting the kind of performance we're talking about involves much more than simply leaning the mixture.  It involves an almost constant juggling of manifold pressure, prop rpm, and mixture and altitude as the airplane burns off fuel and becomes lighter.  We don't know what instructions/recommendations Kelly Johnson may have given Earhart for Lae/Howland leg but we do have his suggestions for the Oakland/Honolulu flight.  Those instructions are by no means intended to yield maximum performance.  They're a very simplified recipe for getting adequate fuel economy.  Climb to this altitude, set the power, props and mixture just so, wait three hours, change to these settings, and so forth.  This is Sesame Street long-distance flying.  I have to assume that Johnson knew his customer.

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 23 Jul 2003 14:47:44 EDT
From:         Ross Devitt
Subject:      Re: Did AE Hear Something on 500 or 3105?

>   ROGER makes more sense.

ROGER = Message received and understood.  (?)

Th' WOMBAT
***********************************************
From Ric

Hmmm.....you're right.  Basically means the same a "received", don't it?:
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 23 Jul 2003 14:49:15 EDT
From:         Ross Devitt
Subject:      Re: Artifacts

Alfred Hendrickson writes:

> Thermos (brand) seems to be, and to have been, the dominant manufacturer,
> going back to the early 1900's. I saw a brand called Icy Hot, but this is a
> subsidiary of Thermos. Thermos is actually The American Thermos Bottle
> Company, Norwich, CT. They had offices and/or manufacturing facilities in
> other cities, too. Cincinnati, I think, and one other.

I had recalled the vacuum flask as a German invention in my original post, but it appears it was invented in England and then created in Germany.  This from the Thermos company's own historical info:

"Invented in 1892 by Sir James Dewar, a scientist at Oxford University, the "vacuum flask" was first manufactured for commercial use in 1904, when two German glass blowers formed Thermos GmbH. They held a contest to name the "vacuum flask" and a resident of Munich submitted "Thermos", which came from the Greek word "Therme" meaning "heat"

> Two other brands were Aladdin and Keapsit; I'm guessing, based on what I
> see, that they were not as common.

Aladdin still available here until recently (not sure if it still is). 

> I have found two examples of thermoses (generic use of the word here) with
> cups that had handles (see my earlier post); both of these were handles
> attached with a means not apparently involving welding or brazing. The
> artifact appears to have been welded or brazed. Also, the artifact looks
> very small to be a good handle. Perhaps the artifact IS a cup handle that
> just wasn't the ideal size or the best design. I kind of doubt it, though. I
> think it's something else.
>
> I keep looking at it and thinking it might be a hook for hanging something,
> or an eye for tying something onto. Perhaps, originally, it was straight,
> and it got bent over later in life.
>
> Hmmm.
>
> Sorry, all, but you're gonna have to put up with me and my ramblings,
>
> LTM; she could talk the leg off a chair,
>
> Alfred Hendrickson #2583
> ****************************************************************
> >From Ric
>
> Don't apologize Alfred.  You're actually doing research.

And I still haven't found anything to prove my recollection of vacuum flasks with chains anchoring the corks to the lids.  Perhaps it was something the family did (we had some inventors among the F1 drivers and gold miners).

Th' WOMBAT
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 23 Jul 2003 14:53:33 EDT
From:         Dan Postellon
Subject:      Re: Virus

> I'm still trying to open it out of curiosity.  Not being a Mac person or
> a Windows person allows me to play with these things without fear of
> propagating them....
>
> Th' WOMBAT
>
> ****************************************************
> >From Ric
>
> Crikey Wombat, if somebody gave you a ticking box and told you it was a bomb,
> you'd open it just to see if you could.

You mean you wouldn't??!   Dan Postellon

*******************************************
From Ric

Well, maybe just a bit, but I'd first assemble a good team to help me and do fund-raising to make sure we had the right equipment and we'd put photos of the explosion up on a website.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 23 Jul 2003 14:55:14 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Questions

Dennis McGee wrote:

> Daryll said: "This is not a sales pitch because there is no
> intention of releasing research material outside of the AES."
>
>   Why is that, Daryll?  TIGHAR has a whole slew of research material
> it has released to anyone with a PC.

Dennis, TIGHAR posts research information because it HAS some. I assume AES doesn't release research information because it doesn't have any relevant to the search.

Alan
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 23 Jul 2003 14:56:35 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: for Marty, Kerry & Ric

Ric wrote:

> I can't find anything in the above worth dignifying with a reply.  If anyone
> else can, be my guest.

I gave up, Ric. Daryll is wandering around through the ether of AES and apparently there is nothing you or I or anyone else can do to help him understand what a scientific investigation is or what evidence or rational support means. He offers none because we are not able to communicate to him where he is going astray. I would have thought by now, with all our comments, there would have at least been a hint that we weren't seeing ANY evidence or support for anything he has written. Alas, such is not the case. Daryll only repeats his unsupported theories and conclusions without anything to back them up.

Alan
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 23 Jul 2003 15:03:27 EDT
From:         Eric
Subject:      Truth vs legend

Ric wrote:

> For those who find inspiration in the legend it is the
> legend that is important.

Or, to paraphrase John Ford in THE MAN WHO SHOT LIBERTY VALANCE: "When given a choice between the truth and the legend, print the legend."

Eric, NAS NORTH ISLAND, San Diego, CA.
****************************************************
From Ric

Anybody know what to do for a severely bitten tongue?
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 23 Jul 2003 15:21:41 EDT
From:         Bob Lee
Subject:      Kiribati Rep Question

Unbelievable situation. Sorry to pester you on what must be a hectic day, but what is the reason for the Kiribati representative? Does anyone going to Niku need a local rep -- or is it because of the nature of the expedition (bone recovery, etc...) that this is necessary.

Bob

**************************************************************
From Ric

The Republic of Kiribati always requires that a government rep accompany visits to any of the uninhabited islands of the Phoenix Group.  There are two basic reasons:

- The island environment is fragile and they want to be sure that nobody does anything harmful (fires, deforestation, extensive fishing, etc.)

- The government rarely gets a chance to visit these remote corners of their country.

We have always found the government reps to be valuable additions to the expedition.  They understand the wildlife, the vegetation and the culture of the settlement that was once on the island far better than we do.  In the past we've always had guys from the Customs Division in Tarawa and they're now our old  friends.  This is the first time a Wildlife Officer has been tasked and we were looking forward to working with him.  Unfortunately, a series of transportation and paperwork problems prevented him from getting from his home island of Kirtimati (Christmas Island) to Pago Pago in time to meet up with the rest of the team and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Kiribati has very graciously allowed the TIGHAR expedition to depart without him.  We take it as a high compliment that the government has extended this unprecedented degree of trust to TIGHAR.  The expedition will now proceed directly to Kanton Island where they'll clear Customs and Immigration and then proceed on to Nikumaroro.  The current ETA for Kanton is Saturday and Niku on Sunday night.
LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 23 Jul 2003 15:28:56 EDT
From:         Daryll
Subject:      For Marty and Dennis

#1
Marty wrote;

>...Yes. When people ask you for evidence, you say, "But other people,
>including TIGHAR, make similar arguments." These are the analogies to
>which I was referring...

Can you help me out? I have been looking for that quote that you attribute to me. I was looking for it so I could tell in what context that it was made. Since you have the quote you must know where I can find it so I can refresh my memory.

>People who say that the dead "eye-witnesses" were good folks doesn't
>seem to me to be "evidence." 

If the people (fellow Marshallese) who knew the eye-witnesses personally and had heard the same Earhart story from them (during their lifetime) and when they were asked if they believed the story and they replied that they did because the eye-witnesses that they knew were honest and trust worthy people in the community, seems to imply something of value. It might not fit into the strict definition of "Evidence" that the legal experts on this forum have argued before. History doesn't always have a camera, or a device that can record testimony to be reviewed years after the fact. 

#2

Dennis McGee wrote:

>Daryll said: "This is not a sales pitch because there is no intention of
>releasing research material outside of the AES." 
>
>Why is that, Daryll? TIGHAR has a whole slew of
>research material it has released to anyone with a PC. To my knowledge,
>and I've been a member since about 1989 (I think), nothing is kept back;
>what you see is what we have.

TIGHAR and the AES exist for different purposes.  TIGHAR has a moderator that filters information that is then disseminated among the members. The TIGHAR website expresses certain views of the available evidence that has been collected.

The AES has a moderator but nothing is filtered. The moderator receives inquires from prospective new members and posts the their curriculum vitae for the membership to review. Any member can post anything that they desire, no matter how far off topic or even using profanity if they desire. You put it in and it goes out to everyone. We don't have dues or sell T-shirts.

This kind of freedom is why our members, about 50, have a say in who is a member of the AES and who is not. We are a research group. Research depends on the free flow of information among us.  Research has value because there are expenditures to obtain the information. Any member has access and can review our archives for sources of evidence.

When you demand a source for evidence I have to consider the rights of our membership before I give it.  We have a member who spends quite a bit of time in the Pan Am archives, which has an expense in itself. Pan Am considered it's ocean flying technics a kind of trade secret. I'm sure we all have had experiences in the areas where we have worked where information is not to be distributed to the general public. You don't tell the profitability of your company because you would then invite competition. Pan Am had to open up its ocean flying technics to other air carriers because of WWII.  If I talk about Noonan's technics and his likely use of howgozit charts I could inadvertently breech a members research rights. I could talk about published documentation of a source but sometimes it might not be as contemporaneous as the forum seems to require.    

>I am curious exactly what these three sentences have in common,
>and why they are presented in this fashion. Is there some connection
>between Astor, Jaluit, FDR, the assassination attempt, and Astor's
>"mission?" I'm at a loss to understand your logic here. 

FDR's assassination attempt predates our time period of concern. It was meant to show FDR and Astor's familiarity. Astor was head of the "Club" or often referred to as the "Room". They were gentleman spies who pursued it as a hobby. The US Navy couldn't get into Jaluit (Marshalls) in an official search capacity. It's possible that a civilian vessel could. The person with the boat had to be trusted to keep his mouth shut on the true purpose of the mission. GPP was driven to find Amelia, he might have insisted on going along. The newspapers followed GPP because of the Earhart story, if they saw him on a boat in the Pacific, a smart reporter could put 2 & 2 together. The Galapagos could have been a safe place to join the cruise. Jaluit was the objective. Carl Heine was a Australian missionary who acted as an interpreter for the Japanese governor in Jaluit. If Astor had gotten to Jaluit, Carl Heine logically could have acted as the interpreter for Astor and the Japanese governor.

In such a situation a causal reference to Amelia Earhart by Carl Heine (see his story that appeared in the Pacific Monthly about the letter addressed to Amelia Earhart that he found in the Jaluit post office circa May '38') would have given Astor all he needed to transmit a code word to the Navy, who were  monitoring his radio traffic. That is what FDR was looking for. For the first time they would have had the evidence they needed to move into the Marshalls to resume Earhart's trail. If GPP was along he would have been a source to identify Amelia or any personal items she might have had.

Now before you even ask about sources review what I said above about the AES above.

Daryll
****************************************************************
From Ric

Marty is on retreat for a week and won't be able to respond to your question until he gets back.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 23 Jul 2003 15:32:08 EDT
From:         Tom King
Subject:      Re: Artifacts

Ric says:

>I have some recollection that Tom King saw a handle similar to our artifact
>on a cup in a display in an airport (of all places).

Yes, though I wasn't in a position to make a comparison.  It was at San Francisco International, in an exhibit on stuff associated with traveling. I'm also sure I remember something vaguely similar that my family had when I was a kid in the 1950s.

And yes, lots of kerosene lamps in the village -- we've noted two or three, and pieces of more.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 23 Jul 2003 16:59:18 EDT
From:         Dave in Fremont
Subject:      Re: For Marty and Dennis

After that, I now know the first name of the guy who owns the comic book shop on The Simpsons.

LTM,

Dave
*********************************************************************
From Dennis McGee

Daryll said (in response to why the AES doesn't share its "research"):  "The AES has a moderator but nothing is filtered. . . . .Any member can post anything that they desire, no matter how far off topic or even using profanity if they desire. You put it in and it goes out to everyone. . . . . When you demand a source for evidence I have to consider the rights of our membership before I give it." 

An unmoderated, anything-goes forum?  The computers guys have an expression for that activity, GIGO -- garbage in, garbage out.  As for protecting your members' rights . . . what rights?  If your members post their stuff on the internet how can they expect any privacy protection?

It's in the public domain once it appears, isn't it? Sorry, Daryll, I just don't buy it.  

LTM, who is short on naivete today
Dennis O. McGee #0149EC
*****************************************************************
From Ric

I'm sort of fascinated by Daryll's assertion that TIGHAR and AES exist for different purposes.  TIGHAR is trying to solve the Earhart mystery.  What are you guys doing?
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 23 Jul 2003 17:02:04 EDT
From:         Alfred Hendrickson
Subject:      The wire handle artifact

Tom King says: "And yes, lots of kerosene lamps in the village -- we've noted two or three, and pieces of more."

I'm in favor of comparing the artifact to the lanterns to see if there is a match (no pun intended). I hate to trouble you with it though, Ric. Tell you what; send me my plane ticket, and I'll personally go and check this out. No sacrifice too great for the cause, you know.

LTM, who said, "If you want it done right, you gotta do it yourself"

Alfred Hendrickson #2583
*********************************************************************
From Ric

Mother was talking about fund-raising.

I can tell you that the lantern pieces we've seen in the village bear no resemblance to the artifact.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 24 Jul 2003 12:02:17 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: lean mixture

Th' WOMBAT wrote:

> I have a lot less time that she had, and certainly a lot less time on
> twins, but I'm pretty sure that even with my limited experience I could
> lean out a Baron or Aztec to eke out a little more time/distance without
> blowing up the engines.

Ross, I agree you could do that and so could AE but given the nature of her flying career as we know it and the complicated procedure she would have had to have gone through and at the same time those two trying to figure out where they were, what to do next and how to get there I seriously doubt that process was ever attempted. In addition I doubt AE had the expertise to figure out how much if any fuel she could save and I doubt Noonan could figure out his precise location and how long it would take to get any place particular to make some small fuel savings of value.

Certainly I think she took action to reduce fuel flow initially but what she did after that is anyone's guess.

Alan
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 24 Jul 2003 13:09:39 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: For Marty and Dennis

Ric wrote:

> Marty is on retreat for a week and won't be able to respond to your question
> until he gets back.

That's true but Alan is NOT on retreat. I'll summarize what Daryll wrote for those who don't want to wade through it.

1. AES has total freedom of expression IF they decide to let you express anything at all.

2. Those select people they permit to express themselves can post anything they want apparently on any topic. I would hate to have to sift through all that for something of substance.

3. AES HAS found nothing of substance leading to the solving of the mystery and all that stuff they haven't found is secret.

Just hassling you a little Daryll. I'm sure some of the members work hard on the subject but clearly nothing has been found of significance.

Alan
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 24 Jul 2003 13:14:58 EDT
From:         Ross Devitt
Subject:      Re: Did AE Hear Something on 500 or 3105?

> Hmmm.....you're right.  Basically means the same a "received", don't it?:

I was in the Air Force and in the Dept of Navy and involved in communications and search & rescue for quite a number of years, but I'm not sure that I'm "right".

I posted this as a question...

Th' WOMBAT
***********************************************************
From Ric

Neither Received nor Roger makes any sense.  I have to go with Randy on this one.  I think the R is most likely a typo in the original log that also got picked up in the smoothed version.  I see no support for the interpretation that it means that Earhart's reported receiving "A"s.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 24 Jul 2003 13:20:59 EDT
From:         Ron Berry
Subject:      Re: Artifacts

I remember corks with chains to attach them to what ever you needed them for. When I first started out in the grocery business that was a standard item in the dry goods dept. They sold well in those days. I don't know what the correct name for that type of chain is, but I can describe it for you. It was the type of chain that was made of tiny stainless steel balls held together with a stainless wire that went from one ball to another. Thus making each ball and wire individual, so when they were all hooked together they made a chain.
***************************************************************
From Ric

I think I know the kind of chain you're talking about but the ones found on Gardner were brass.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 24 Jul 2003 13:33:31 EDT
From:         Danny Brown
Subject:      Re: Truth vs legend

The exact quote at the end of the movie by the newspaper editor to Jimmy Stewart is, "This is the west, sir. When the legend becomes fact, print the legend." That pretty well sums up the media through the present day.

LTM (a legend who loved both John Wayne and Jimmy Stewart)
Danny Brown
**************************************************************
From Ric

This has nothing to do with anything, but the line always struck me as strange.  A legend, of course, cannot become fact merely through repetition.  I can only speculate that what he meant was:

"If the legend becomes more accepted than the fact, just tell the people what they want to hear."

By implication, he is also saying, "This is the west, sir.  We're not much interested in the truth." Not very complimentary but alarmingly insightful.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 24 Jul 2003 13:35:21 EDT
From:         Lutrell
Subject:      Z codes?

What is a "Z" code??

Thank You

John Luttrell
Atlanta

***************************************************************
From Ric

Randy can explain it better than I can.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 24 Jul 2003 14:52:43 EDT
From:         Mike Everette
Subject:      Re: Z codes?

Z Codes are a set of three- letter groups, used in radiotelegraphy as abbreviations or as a means of shortening "standard" messages.  Each "Z-signal" has a different standard meaning.  One example is "ZKJ" which means "you have permission to leave the network."  If the signal were sent as "ZKJ?" or, "INT ZKJ" it would be the question, "Do I have permission to leave the network?"

(Note:  The punctuation mark ? and the procedural signal or "prosign" INT mean the same thing."

Several agencies used Z-signals or Z-codes:  US Army, US Navy, Bureau of Air Commerce, Weather Service etc etc.  Trouble is, that in each service's usage, the Z-signals MAY NOT ALWAYS MEAN THE SAME THING from one service to the other.

Z-signals are not necessarily agreed-upon internationally.

Another form of this method of abbreviation is the Q-Code or Q-Signal. These are also three-letter groups, such as "QTH" (The location or position of my station is")  or QRA ("The name of my station is").  Again, if used with a question mark or INT, they become questions.

The Q-signals are, largely, established by international agreement. Sometimes, though, special Q-signals may be adopted by individual agencies.

These sorts of codes save much transmission time, using Morse telegraphy (or "CW").  They also enable radio operators who speak different languages, to communicate with one another.

LTM  (who knows all the secrets)
and
73
********************************************************
From Ric

ZME (thanks Mike)
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 24 Jul 2003 14:57:13 EDT
From:         Bob Lee
Subject:      Re: Truth vs legend

The 'legend' of the west was addressed perfectly by Woody Guthrie:

Lyrics as recorded by Woody Guthrie, RCA Studios, Camden, NJ, Apr 26, 1940, released on "Dust Bowl Ballads," transcribed by Manfred Helfert. ? 1961 Ludlow Music Inc., New York, NY

    Lots of folks back East, they say, is leavin' home every day,
    Beatin' the hot old dusty way to the California line.
    'Cross the desert sands they roll, gettin' out of that old dust bowl,
    They think they're goin' to a sugar bowl, but here's what they find --
    Now, the police at the port of entry say,
    "You're number fourteen thousand for today."

    CHORUS:
    Oh, if you ain't got the do re mi, folks, you ain't got the do re mi,
    Why, you better go back to beautiful Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Georgia,
Tennessee.
    California is a garden of Eden, a paradise to live in or see;
    But believe it or not, you won't find it so hot
    If you ain't got the do re mi.

    You want to buy you a home or a farm, that can't deal nobody harm,
    Or take your vacation by the mountains or sea.
    Don't swap your old cow for a car, you better stay right where you are,
    Better take this little tip from me.
    'Cause I look through the want ads every day
    But the headlines on the papers always say:

    If you ain't got the do re mi, boys, you ain't got the do re mi,
    Why, you better go back to beautiful Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Georgia,
Tennessee.
    California is a garden of Eden, a paradise to live in or see;
    But believe it or not, you won't find it so hot
    If you ain't got the do re mi.

Bob
*************************************************************
From Amanda Dunham

When the man said "This is the west, sir" my interpretation was that he was talking about the "wild west" instead of an actual location. As if to say, legendary places require legendary occupants otherwise Buffalo Bill doesn't have a show.  It was also a way to remind the Jimmy Stewart character that as a politician he was part of the "show" himself.

That was my interpretation growing up on the Barbary Coast and watching the film on Saturday afternoons.

LTM, who's just decided what to add to the Netflix queue
--
Amanda Dunham
#2418CE

*****************************************************
From Ric

It may be worth noting that Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show was never performed in the wild west.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 25 Jul 2003 10:00:16 EDT
From:         Ross Devitt
Subject:      Re: lean mixture

Alan wrote;

> Certainly I think she took action to reduce fuel flow initially but what she
> did after that is anyone's guess.

And if I think about it logically, beetling around at 1000ft as she apparently was, there is no probably real way to cut fuel consumption greatly.

Th' WOMBAT
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 25 Jul 2003 10:02:47 EDT
From:         Alfred Hendrickson
Subject:      Artifacts - chains

For Ron Berry:

It was the type of chain that was made of tiny stainless steel balls held together with a stainless wire that went from one ball to another. Thus making each ball and wire individual, so when they were all hooked together they made a chain.

The type of chain you describe is called "ball chain" (also "bead chain" and "bead-ball chain"). I think the rolled metal connectors for these are called fins". I, and probably you, have seen these on pull chain light fixture sockets and as keepers on rubber sink and bathtub plugs. You specifically mention stainless steel; is there a chance that what you were seeing was plated steel? Ball chains are/were also made of brass.

Another common style of light-weight chain is called jack chain. Each link is a figure 8, twisted 90 degrees at the locus of the two circles that make up the 8.

A third is called sash chain. Each link is a small piece of bow-tie shaped sheet metal, with two oblongish holes. To make the chain, each link was fed through the previous one and folded over so the two holes would coincide. This type of chain was used to connect window sash to window sash counterweights. It would lay fairly flat, roll easily over pulleys, resist twisting, and it had a longer service life than sash cord. Obviously, it could be, and was, used for other things besides hanging sash.

I'm not sure when each type was invented, but FWIW, I speculate that it is likely that the "corks on brass chains" involved one of these types.

Where does this now leave us? I'm not sure exactly.

LTM, who, like me, sweats the details,

Alfred Hendrickson, PE
TIGHAR Associate Member #2583
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 25 Jul 2003 10:04:25 EDT
From:         Jon Watson
Subject:      Re: Artifacts

Ron is referring to "bead chain".  You can get it at any good hardware store, in any length you want - they cut it off a spool.  It comes in silver colored metal and brass colored metal.

Ron, do you remember what they were for?

ltm
jon

**************************************************************
From Ric

See Alfred Hendrickson's excellent little treatise on chains posted today.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 25 Jul 2003 10:19:03 EDT
From:         Jon Watson
Subject:      Re: Truth vs legend

Since we've arrive at this juncture, let me point out that this weekend is "Buffalo Bill Days" here in Golden, Colorado.  It's the local hoo-hah, and I invite anyone who wants to, to drop around.  You're on your own for lodging, food
and everything else...

Buffalo Bill is actually buried on top of Lookout Mountain, just west of Golden, under tons of cement.  That's to keep the folks from Wyoming from stealing his body again...

But then, having a cement monument over the grave didn't keep them from moving Gerry Gallagher's body...see, I knew I could tie it back in.  I do wonder, though, how they got the coffin out without destroying the monument.

ltm,
jon
************************************************************************
From Ric

Point of order - Gerard ("Gerry") Gallagher is alive and well and living in Scotland.  His late lamented cousin Gerald ("Irish") Gallagher is the peripatetic corpse in question.

When we first went ashore on Nikumaroro in 1989 we thought that the cement landing beacon at the head of the blasted channel was Gallagher's tomb.  We later discovered the actual monument in the old government station area near the fallen flag pole.  At that time there was a depression along the southern side of the monument in which a rather large coconut crab had established a burrow going back in under the monument.  We attributed the depression to the crab but in retrospect it was probably the remnants of the excavation made to remove the coffin some 21 years before.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 25 Jul 2003 10:22:43 EDT
From:         Mike Juliano
Subject:      My Morse Stake.

Although some if not all of my theorizations may not align with standard AES or Tighar rhetoric the possibility that something might have been overlooked could exist. i.e.

Instead of aaaaaaaa....being transmitted She could have  transmitted AS with the hyphen OVER the AS instead of in the A-S. This would then mean "Busy... will call you back".

Mike J.  P.S. I can prove the morse and the Q signals and the operating signals.

*********************************************************************
From Ric

In your theorizations you might factor in the fact that Earhart had no way to send code other than by mashing the push-to-talk and there is no indication in the Itasca log that she ever tried to send code while the aircraft was in flight.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 25 Jul 2003 10:26:07 EDT
From:         Ron Berry
Subject:      Re: Artifacts

The war could have been responsible for a change in the type of chain that was used.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 25 Jul 2003 10:51:15 EDT
From:         Warren
Subject:      What are the odds?

I'm curious.

Since this potential Electra part is exciting enough to put together a special trip...

Since you have the inside skinny...

Since you are obviously a betting man...

Give your personal "Vegas odds" on this being an Electra part that is able to be identified as such.

LTM (Who only bets on sure things.)

Warren
**********************************************************************
From Ric

Allow me to correct a couple of misconceptions.

- The object seen last year was not exciting enough to schedule a special trip.  It was one factor in deciding to do a preliminary expedition in preparation for the 2004 Niku V trip.  We have far too many scars from previous battles to go launching special expeditions based on one anecdote.  The survey of the overwash area and the reef surface measurements the team will do are just as important as checking out this lead.

- I am not a betting man.  I never go to casinos.  I think state lotteries are a tax on stupidity. The last time a placed a sports wager was a $2 bet to show on a horse at Delaware Park three years ago.

All I can tell you about the object the team will check out is that we think it's worth a look.  I wouldn't begin to know how to calculate the odds that it is a piece of the Electra.  As promised, as soon as Mollie reaches the island we'll put up a rather lengthy research bulletin on the website that explains everything we know at this point.

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 25 Jul 2003 12:59:56 EDT
From:         Alfred Hendrickson
Subject:      Ric and Gamblers Anonymous

Ric wrote:

>The last time I placed a sports wager was a $2 bet to show on a horse at
>Delaware Park three years ago.

You High Roller you! C'mon! Don't tease us, Ric. Spill it. Did you land in the money?

LTM,

Alfred Hendrickson #2583
**************************************************************************
From Ric

This is like SO off-topic.  Yes, we almost always win on the rare occasions when we go to the track.  It's scary.  That's why we mostly stay away.  Also, we're horse people but we're very ambivalent about Thoroughbred racing.  The money that drives the industry pays for the infrastructure (equine medical research, the availability of health and mortality insurance, etc.) that benefits all horses and horsemen - but racing two-year-olds is child abuse and the "sport of kings" is still steeped in ignorance and barbaric practices.

Now, you see?  You've got me talking about horses.  Let's get back on-topic.

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 25 Jul 2003 13:03:59 EDT
From:         Mike Juliano
Subject:      Re: My Morse Stake.

So you're telling me she mashed out the message in CW with the mic key? The reason I'm asking this is that all shipboard operators are required to make entrys as to whether the transmission was voice or code. Just looking at the message it appears that it was sent in code and transcribed with morse short hand.The Communications Act of 1934 combined and standardized most of the International operating proceedures.The Coast Guard who would be dealing with these international agreements SHOULD have kept the letter of the Law to the highest standards. By the way .It is illegal to erase or black out an entry in a ships radio logs.
LTM
Mike Juliano
****************************************************************************
From Ric

Mike - read my lips.  All of Earhart's inflight transmissions were sent in voice.  All of the Itasca radio log entries accurately reflect that.  The log entry you are referring to is a transmission FROM Itasca TO Earhart.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 25 Jul 2003 13:06:35 EDT
From:         Lawrence
Subject:      Re: Artifacts

I remember old army canteens had a brass or aluminum chain attached to a plastic cap. The chain was like inter locking triangles. I would imagine that older types of canteens may have used a cork cap instead of plastic.

*******************************************************************
From Ric

Yes, U.S. Army canteens from the Spanish American War and earlier had corks attached with chains.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 25 Jul 2003 14:07:32 EDT
From:         Jim Preston
Subject:      Re: lean mixture

Anyone with prop experience should have learned about ground effect. You get the plane down low 50 or less and then reduce power. I know from experience in four engine recip's going to the Azores and losing 2. We did that and as a young pilot, that's how I learned. It works.
Jim Preston

************************************************************************
From Ric

Interesting thought.  What, I wonder, are the chances that Earhart would do something like that?  I think she understood the advantages of flying in ground effect because she seems to have used them immediately after take-off from Lae, according to witness reports.

But getting down that low has the disadvantage that you can't see as far, and when you're desperately searching for land that's a big disadvantage.
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 25 Jul 2003 14:08:14 EDT
From:         Jim Preston
Subject:      Re: Artifacts

Hey, WW II and Korea canteens had the same chain. I had one, as a collector's item, but maybe it was issued when I was enlisted in the AF in 1963.
Jim
=========================================================================


Date:         Fri, 25 Jul 2003 17:02:41 EDT
From:         Jim Preston
Subject:      Re: Ground Effect

I can't tell you how many times during the 60's taking off from Kwajalein during the middle of the day we would go off the runway suck up the gear and stay in ground effect untill we could get enough speed to bring up the flaps, gain airspeed and then start climbing at 100-300 fpm. We always seemed to be heavy as we went to Guam or Okinawa from there

*****************************************************
From Skeet:

The L-10 has a wing span of 55 feet. Pilot folklore opines that ground effect kicks in at one half the span.

Two separate texts state that reduction in drag is negligible at an altitude equal to one span. At one quarter span, the reduction in induced drag is 23.5 percent. At one tenth span (5.5 feet in the L-10), reduction in induced drag is 47.6 percent.

Additional drag of the propeller tips in the water is not factored.
***************************************************************
From Ric

Legend has it that Earhart's props were kicking up spray after takeoff from Lae.  The film of the takeoff stops shortly after rotation and the airplane seems to be climbing but it could have settled back down or AE could have intentionally descended to take advantage of ground effect over the water.  But flying really low over the water is very tricky because you can't tell if you're looking at biggish waves far away or little waves up close.  There are no clues for depth perception.  The same is true over deserts or frozen surfaces.  I scared myself half to death one time making a low pass over a tent that was inexplicably pitched out in the middle of a huge frozen lake only to discover that the tent was a baseball cap.
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 26 Jul 2003 11:51:46 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: lean mixture

> there is no probably real way to cut fuel consumption
> greatly.
>
> Th' WOMBAT

You're probably right, Ross. Of course we tend to think in jet engine terms now which are far more efficient at altitude. Turboprops also but not to the same extent. Props however are less affected and in the range AE flew there was not all that much difference. Altitude changes were more for favorable winds than fuel flow differences.

I would have to go into the charts for the plane to know exactly. Perhaps this weekend I'll have time. It's certainly an interesting point.

I think there has been a general feeling AE kept the Electra at 1,000' but I don't think so. At the lighter weight near Howland climbs were less fuel expensive. The climb would be for Noonan's benefit not that of the engines. Plus we have to keep in mind THAT Electra was pretty heavy at basic weight.

Alan
*********************************************************************
From Ric

We've fought about this before a couple dozen times.  Had I been in the situation I think Earhart found herself in when proceeded down the 157 line I would not have climbed because:

- I desperately want to find land.
- I don't know where I am so I don't know how close I may be to land.
- I may only have one chance to see land.
- If I climb up through the scattered deck I will effectively be blind during the climb to - what? - whatever it takes to get above the tops - 5,000 feet? 7,000 feet?  and while Noonan takes his sun shots and while I descend back down below the bases.  That could easily be a half hour or more.  No way.  I'm staying down here.
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 26 Jul 2003 11:53:24 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: lean mixture

From Alan

> I think she understood the advantages of flying in ground
> effect because she seems to have used them immediately after take-off from
> Lae, according to witness reports.

That's possible but I think more likely she was just trying to gain airspeed for a climb. Remember the same witnesses report the plane settled off the end of the runway. She was at maximum weight and at that point would have been close to stall had she tried to climb.

I think I would have to know how much a 50' flight would affect range vs 1,000' before I would suggest she might have done that. My personal opinion is that even if she knew about ground effect I doubt she could have figured how significant doing that would be. Plus it would sure reduce their lateral visibility.

Alan
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 26 Jul 2003 11:58:22 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Ground Effect

Skeet Gifford wrote:

> The L-10 has a wing span of 55 feet. Pilot folklore opines that ground
> effect kicks in at one half the span.
>
> Two separate texts state that reduction in drag is negligible at an
> altitude equal to one span.

That would seem to eliminate the ground effect idea as a viable technique for increasing range.

Alan
**********************************************************************
From Ric

I'm not saying that she used ground effect to increase range (I frankly doubt that she did) but I don't think your conclusion stated above is supported by Skeet's statement.  It looks to me like using ground effect is a highly viable technique for increasing range provided that you can fly low enough.
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 26 Jul 2003 12:11:20 EDT
From:         Anthony Lealand
Subject:      TIGHAR Artifact 2-2-G-5

Is this thermometer artifact formed into a hook by the whole stem and bulb being bent through a right angle, or is the stem straight with a hook fused on the side?

If it is bent into a right angle then it is most likely an oven thermometer.  My mother had one on her oven with the bulb projecting into the oven.

If it is straight with an add on hook then I have no idea.

Anthony Lealand
*********************************************************************
From Ric

The remnant of the right angle "hook" is not fused on.  The thermometer is entirely consistent with an instrument called a "sling hygrometer" used to take "wet bulb" readings to determine humidity levels.  ( I would be very surprised if there were any oven thermometers on Nikumaroro.)  A sling hygrometer has the thermometer attached to a cord by means of an eyelet on the end of the thermometer.  The thermometer, with a moistend "bulb" on the other end, is whirled around on the end of the cord by the person taking the reading.  It's not uncommon for the eyelet to break under the strain resulting in the loss of the thermometer and just the kind of damage we see to the artifact.

I think the most likely source of this artifact is the 1939 Bushnell survey. The map that resulted from that survey shows that observations were made from a point on the lagoon shore just a few meters from where the artifact was found.
=========================================================================


Date:         Sat, 26 Jul 2003 14:07:51 EDT
From:         Herman De Wulf
Subject:      Re: Ground Effect

I have my doubts about flying in ground effect...

We are all familiar with the phenomenon (those of us who are or have been pilots, I mean). The phenomenon is more marked in low wing aircraft (Pipers) than in high wing aircraft (Cessna's) because their wings are closer to the ground. It becomes noticeable when you come in to land and the airplane will refuse to land when you want to round off, continuing to fly and fly and fly until you begin to wonder if there will be enough runway left to come to a stop. It may be useful when practicing forced landings between the panels, as we all know...

However, there is an other side to the coin. When aircraft take off in overload they may fly as long as they are in ground effect. But I've known too many dive into the ground, killing all aboard, when the pilot began climbing out of ground effect. What Amelia Earhart clearly did (according to the reports available and the pictures we've seen) was staying in ground effect after take off from Lae and stayed in it long enough for airspeed to build up to the point she felt confident the kite would fly when she climbed out of ground effect.

Flying low means burning more fuel because density of the air is higher near the ground than at altitude. If you want to get all the range out of your airplane, you'll want to climb to a comfortable altitude where the air becomes less dense and you'll get more speed out of the horsepower applied. If you know what kind of winds to expect you'll want to climb to where it blows either from a comfortable direction to enhance your range or blows less strongly from where you want to go to... Which can mean that if you have to fly into the wind it might be wise to stay low because the higher you climb, the stronger the headwind will blow. Flying low in this case has nothing to do with ground effect.

Flying in ground effect in an airplane with a wing span of 55 feet means one would have to race over the landscape (or the sea) at something like 12 feet. This, as we all know, is suicidal.

LTM (who used ground effect for pin point simulated emergency landings)
**********************************************************************
From Ric

Airplanes don't inexplicably dive into the ground and flying very low is not suicidal.  It is, however, a specialized skill that most pilots never need to learn and, in fact, are admonished not to try.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 28 Jul 2003 11:25:44 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Ground Effect

> It looks to me like using ground effect is a highly viable
> technique for increasing range provided that you can fly low enough.

True, but as I read Skeet she would have to fly at half the wingspan or about 27 feet above the water. I would have trouble that she did that.

Alan
***********************************************************************
From Ric

I agree.  I don't think she did that either.
*************************************************************************
From Harvey

Herman De Wulf wrote:

> When aircraft take off in overload they may fly as long as they are in
>ground effect. But I've known too many dive into the ground, killing all
>aboard, when the pilot began climbing out of ground effect.

What do you think was the cause of these crashes, Herman? Do you think that the pilot failed to achieve the climb speed needed to cope with the overload ?Or is it possible that the overload condition produced a balance problem associated with CG position? Or...?

  Harvey,# 2387

*******************************************************************
From Herman

Ric wrote:

>Airplanes don't inexplicably dive into the ground and flying very low is
>not suicidal.  It is, however, a specialized skill that most pilots
>never need to learn and, in fact, are admonished not to try.

No, they don't  dive inexplicably into the ground. They do so because they stall when trying to climb out of ground effect. Stalling at 12 feet is fatal. I've know this to happen a number of times. It once happened before my eyes when I was on hold as the next airplane to take off at the local airfield. They guy before me had his weight and balance wrong, if ever he calculated one. He had three passengers on board and too much fuel. When he left the ground the kite became airborne in ground effect but when he pulled the stick to climb the plane stalled and nose-dived into the ground killing all four. I have known this kind of accident happen a number of times at various airfields.

One "dangerous" airplane when taking of in overload was (and is)  the Piper PA-28 Cherokee with the 140 hp engine. It seats four but it is really a three seater only, as you discover when calculating weight and balance. When carrying four you can only take enough fuel to fly a circuit... I know because I've flown a Cherokee 140 for years. Once some I saw a guy take off in one with four on board and he ended up in the airfield enclosure because the airplane refused to climb. The plane was wrecked but fortunately it didn't catch fire all four got out with only bruises.

As for low flying, I remember that when I was a kid during WW II the British used to cross the Channel at zero level in their Typhoons. They stayed at sea level to avoid radar detection. It worked alright and they succeeded in crossing the Channel without being detected, but they lost many a Typhoon which hit the water. Suffice it to read the biographies written by former RAF pilots who flew "rhubarbs" during the war. Flying low over water you don't use instruments, flying is VFR. And it is easy to misjudge altitude over water.

LTM
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 28 Jul 2003 11:26:50 EDT
From:         Jim Preston
Subject:      Re: Ground Effect

Good answer Ric, I was taught to fly low and as I stated it works in big airplanes and having no time in little people killers I couldn't address that. The smallest plane I flew was a T-37 and the biggest was a DC-10. My emergencies were in a C-97 down to 2 engines, unable to dump cargo and we got as low as we could 20 feet over the water. Granted this was during the day, not at night, big difference. But ground effect works. A C-97 could glide and float, a DC-10 could not.
Jim
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 28 Jul 2003 11:29:26 EDT
From:         Jim Preston
Subject:      Re: Ground Effect

Ric wrote:

>was inexplicably pitched out in the middle of a huge frozen lake only to
>discover that the tent was a baseball cap.

Ric, you weren't by any chance sniffing avgas before seeing this were you. I was taught, USAF, to stay on instruments at night but I was also taught to watch the shadows of the props on the water and always look way ahead to determine you relative altitude. Having fun at 10 feet above the water, 250 knots and high noon teaches you things you remember and sometimes will save your life.
Jim
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 28 Jul 2003 11:39:50 EDT
From:         Ross Devitt
Subject:      Re: Ground Effect

Ric wrote:

>  I
> scared myself half to death one time making a low pass over a tent that was
> inexplicably pitched out in the middle of a huge frozen lake only to discover 
> that the tent was a baseball cap.

A frozen lake in Texas??

Th' WOMBAT
***************************************************************************
From Ric

Massachusetts.  From 1973 to 1984 I did risk management and accident investigations for the aviation insurance industry in the northeastern United  States. I was based first in Philadelphia, PA and later in Trenton, NJ and traveled Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York and the New England states in a wide variety of light singles from Skyhawks to Bonanzas. Lots and lots of hours in crummy weather with not enough airplane.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 28 Jul 2003 11:58:15 EDT
From:         Ben the Skeptic
Subject:      Re: Prof I.Hata Report/Mystery solved

Ric says:

>If there is a lead that suggests that Earhart was lost at sea or captured by
>the Japanese I'm not aware of it.

What of the testimony of Thomas Devine and the other military officials outlined in the book Eyewitness: The last days of Amelia Earhart? Is their story completely fabricated and lacking any veracity? Clearly they saw SOMETHING. I dont think they made it up. I dont know what it was they saw, and neither does anyone else. But, they know what they THOUGHT they were looking at.

GP Putnam himself, requested a search of the Marshalls and Saipan, after learning of a newspaper report from Japan, detailing the capture of American "spies."

I realize that is hardly to be considered a "Lead", however I think these stories should be paid more attention than mere flights of fancy. (no pun intended)

Also, I know you are busy on your expedition, but if you would humor me, I wonder why you maintain that IF in fact NR16020 is at the bottom of the Pacific, it would be impossible to recover. I realize it isnt exactly the Titanic in size, but ASSUMING it is there, why shouldnt it be able to be located?

Ben the skeptic (BTS)
PS Pay no attention to my skeptisism. As much as I try to stir things up, I get up every day waiting anxiously for the expedition update. Like I said Before, if she's out there, You'll find her.
**************************************************************************
From Ric

First of all Tom Devine is not a military official.  He's just a former serviceman who thinks he remembers something.  There are dozens and dozens of former servicemen who have recollections about seeing or hearing things about Amelia Earhart.  Trouble is, most of them contradict each other.  A tremendous amount of attention has been paid to these stories by those who want them to be true but, to date, no hard evidence has turned up to support any of them. Chances are that very few, if any, of these folks are fabricating anything.  They fervently believe they saw what they remember seeing - but people remember things wrong.  You do it.  I do it.  Everybody does it.  And sometimes we remember things correctly.  Unfortunately, there's no way to tell inaccurate memories from accurate ones without some kind of hard documentation.  Stories can point you toward real evidence but, by themselves, they are just stories.  That is the central lesson of all historical investigation.

> I wonder why you maintain that IF in fact NR16020 is at the bottom of the
> Pacific, it would be impossible to recover. I realize it isnt exactly the
> Titanic in size, but ASSUMING it is there, why shouldnt it be able to be 
> located?

Short answer, it's too small and it could be too many places.  Attempts to constrain the search area to a few hundred square miles have been based upon bad arithmetic and unwarranted assumptions.  Deep sea searches for the Earhart airplane are, in my opinion, nothing short of idiotic.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 28 Jul 2003 12:00:58 EDT
From:         Carol Dow
Subject:      AE Festival- Atchison

If you can imagine Carol Dow, Elgen Long, Joe Klass and his wife, a two star Admiral USN Ret.) Gene Tissot, and a free lance documentary film maker sitting at a table having lunch you should let your imagination run free. Then you need to throw in comments from Amy Morissey Kleppner and everything goes flying off the table. We did everything but eat lunch. Elgen Long says David Jordan has sold three out of five "units" necessary for Nauticos to proceed on their second search off Howland Island. They expect to be at sea again in March of next year. Amazing if not unbelievable, I would say.

Elgen Long took a little battering from yours truly on his collapsing dump valves, Joe Klass threw letters at him from (if I remember correctly) the Marshall Island Governor authenticating Mili Atoll and hauling the airplane off in a sling, and Amy Kleppner glared me in the eye and declared that Irene Bolam was an outcast as far as the Earhart family was concerned. None of the Putnam's or the Morrissey's wanted anything to do with her. They believe she was a fake off on some kind of a spy adventure with her spy adventure husband. Rollin Renieck (Hi Rollin) missed the pow-wow, but he's also into the Irene Bolam affair with a new book about to be published. He has a very convincing short video. Whatever happened to the LTM letter? It was the wrong mother.

To make things worse I threw the handwriting on the wall, Garapan Prison, Saipan,  at Elgen which he didn't like. Sorry folks but time marches on. Not too much was said about Nickamurro (or however you spell the blasted name). Senator Tom Daschle's wife, Linda Hall, received a women's aviation award (by the way she's a doll along with Kathleen Sebalius, the Governor of the great state of Kansas who is doing a fabulous job). Sebalius for President. Elgen Long is smooth as hell. His book is selling all over the world on its own staying power. So, if you don't have anything else to do, write a book and clip coupons the rest of your life. If it doesn't make any sense that's not really important because the public doesn't know what's going on anyway.

Just fake it, you know? Shoes, gun the engines... it doesn't make any difference. Who cares what the weather was? She crashed someplace. I dunno where. You know? That's all from here late on a Sat. evening. Nice newsy stuff, no less. Time to schnooz and forget about this mess. It's hot here in Kansas City.
Carol Dow
***************************************************************************
From Ric

Thanks for the report.  I can think of anyplace I've ever been happier not to be than at that lunch in Atchison.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 28 Jul 2003 12:02:06 EDT
From:         Dave Bush
Subject:      Re: lean mixture

FWIW - Its my "understanding" that "ground effect" was not "discovered" as a concept until World War II. That is to say that no one identified the phenomenon and its effect until then, altho many had certainly experienced it (ie: floating on landing).

LTM,

Dave Bush
****************************************************************
From Ric

That would surprise me.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 28 Jul 2003 14:16:22 EDT
From:         Jim Preston
Subject:      Re: Ground Effect

If I never learned anything else in the Air Force, it was never fly anything with (1) ONE engine. When it quits you lose 100% of your power. More engines more chance of survival.
Jim

******************************************************************
From Ric

Statistically, not necessarily.  When you lose the engine in a single you have only one option - land, right now.  When you lose an engine in a twin-engined airplane (which is twice as likely to happen than in a single) you have a choice.  You can land right now or keep going.  Which decision is the right one depends on a lot of factors, including how long it has been since you flew this crate on one engine.  I used to get myself in trouble with airplane salesmen all the time for talking pilots out of "upgrading" from their single to a light twin.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 28 Jul 2003 14:24:35 EDT
From:         Ric Gillespie
Subject:      The Secret Revealed

TIGHAR's Niku Vp expedition will arrive at Nikumaroro today.  As promised, we have put up a research bulletin on the TIGHAR website explaining what we know and what we suspect about the object seen last year by a marine biologist. Go to the Archived Research Bulletins index at 
http://www.tighar.org/Projects/Earhart/Bulletins/ArchivedBulletins.html
and click on bulletin #41 - Wheel of Fortune.

The preliminary investigation of the object may begin later this afternoon. You'll find daily updates on the expedition's progress at
http://www.tighar.org/Projects/Earhart/nikuvp/dailies.html

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 28 Jul 2003 15:00:04 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Prof I.Hata Report/Mystery solved

Ben the skeptic wrote:

> What of the testimony of Thomas Devine and the other military officials
> outlined in the book Eyewitness: The last days of Amelia Earhart?
> Is their story completely fabricated and lacking any veracity? Clearly they
> saw SOMETHING. I dont think they made it up. I dont know what it was they
> saw, and neither does anyone else. But, they know what they THOUGHT
> they were looking at. I wonder why you maintain that IF in fact
> NR16020 is at the bottom of the Pacific, it would be impossible to recover.
> I realize it isnt exactly the Titanic in size, but ASSUMING it is there,
> why shouldnt it be able to be located?

Ben, those are good questions and I suppose periodically they need to be brought up so nothing falls through a crack.

The Japanese and Marshall theories are not based on any tangible evidence. Authors selling books wrote about conversations supposedly from people who made various claims. It is not possible to verify any of that.

Ric can tell you that when interviewing "witnesses" the session must be carefully constructed so as not to lead the witness into saying what you want them to say. The session should be audio taped at the very least.

In my profession (legal) leading is generally not permitted in court and is particularly hazardous when interviewing children in abuse cases. Children will
say most anything.

In the case of the Japanese/Marshall authors there was another problem they apparently were not aware of. Asian/Pacific culture is that the people want very much to please and never to offend. they try exceptionally hard to fathom what you want to hear or want them to do and tell you what you want to hear. You take a car into a shop and you want it repaired and returned the same day if possible. The job is going to take a week IF they can find the parts but they know you don't want to hear that so they say it will be ready soon - maybe today.

It is clear from reading the Japanese/Marshall books that the people knew ahead of time what the authors were there for. How much of what they said is true is impossible to guess but those were far from scientific investigations.

You may also know from my postings I cannot find a way to get the Electra to the Marshall's in the first place. There was far from sufficient fuel.

As Ric pointed out there was no consistency in the "witness" stories as to the Japanese theory. Even the GI stories were far from consistent. There is no believable reason to their whole argument.

I won't go into all there flimsy arguments but suffice to say it has been beaten to death here. Look at the archives on the web site.

As to the crashed and sank theorists you ask two different questions. locating and recovering are two different problems. If we knew the PRECISE location of the plane recovery would probably be feasible. We don't. No one does. At 8:43 local I believe the plane had a reasonable range of about 400 miles based on the aircraft performance charts and flight tests. That's an 800 mile diameter circle. That is a half a million square miles. In spite of faulty math and made up data there is no one that has surfaced who can pin the Electra's location down any better than that -- if it went into the sea.

As to pursuing any of these ideas what would you base the pursuit on?

Alan
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 28 Jul 2003 15:17:45 EDT
From:         Ric Gillespie
Subject:      Forum speculation

Now that the details about what we call the "Wheel of Fortune" are known to all who care to visit the TIGHAR website, and before any of us know what the heck the thing really is, it might be interesting to review some of the speculation that followed the very limited information we released back in January.

I don't bring this up to embarrass anybody.  I just think that it's very interesting to see  how different people assembled the same puzzle pieces in different ways.

LTM,
Ric
*****************************************
1/30/03
Angus wrote:

Since it was a marine biologist,  we can't altogether rule out the possibility that he may have seen it in the sea (marine biologists making brief visits don't pussyfoot around too much on land). Since he thought Tighar must have already seen it, and he was only there briefly, it must be something fairly large and reasonably easily seen if you know where to look. Since he was a marine biologist he probably wouldn't know an aileron from a supermarket trolley so it must be readily identifiable as an aircraft part and not just a hunk of metal. If it was something small which could be easily washed away, Ric wouldn't wait till June. If it was a candidate for an Electra part it must look old. So..... its big, its old, its heavy, ( No not Ric), its in the water, its easily identifiable as an aircraft part and it has survived the salt-water for all these years so...it must be either the landing gear or the second engine. As he was only there briefly, its likely our marine biologist would have gone somewhere where there was accessible and interesting marine life and close to where his boat could be controlled by the rest of the party offshore. When you've been aboard for a while its nice to get ashore to stretch your legs - which could mean the blasted channel area. And its unlikely to be where Tighar have looked already. Stuff moves south with time but an engine is large mass, small surface area so my guess is that its an S3H-1  R1340 engine off Ritiati or north of Nutiran.

Regards Angus

************************************************************************
Mike Holt
2/1/03

A "brief visit" by a marine biologist suggests to me that the scientist was going somewhere else, and Niku was on the way to someplace else.   He (identified as "he" in Ric's initial announcement) landed on the island mostly to be able to say to his friends back home that he'd been to the island ... unless there is something of special interest to such as he.    Is there something on Gardner that would attract marine biologists?

I suspect the chap went to some place on the island that TIGHAR may not have gone, but which is familiar in some way to marine biologists. The biologist may not have had a clear idea what parts of the island had been explored by TIGHAR.    He just went somewhere that looked like some places he knew well.     What's his area of research?

We on the Forum don't know yet whether the artifact was on the land or in the water, nor do we know if -- were it in the water -- whether it was detected visually or remotely.   Since it appears that the island has been at very least surveyed completely from the air, my first guess is that the artifact is submerged, or has been covered in brush or sand which for some reason has been cleared away.   Have there been any storms there recently which would have changed the shape of the beach or the extent of the brush?

Given that he new about TIGHAR, it may be assumed that he's at very least an aviation enthusiast.   But that may be in error: it may be equally likely that Niku fits a profile in which he is interested professionally, or that Niku is on the way or near to someplace of particular interest to marine biologists.   What he knows about aviation leads to the possible identity of the artifact.   If he knows, for example, what I know, the artifact is going to have to be identifiable obviously as an airplane part from the right era.  If he's a pilot of some experience and of different airplanes, that broadens  the possibilities.   Is he a pilot, or does he simply pick up a copy of "Air Classics" on his way home?

Given what I recall about the rates of destruction of metals on that island, whatever it is has to be fairly substantial.   I vote, therefore, for either an engine or landing gear, buried in sand underwater.

LTM
Mike H.
**************************************************************
Jonathan
01/30/03

- The artifact was found in a place where TIGHAR expeditions have not spent a lot of time lately; a place where a marine biologist would be likely to go, and where an artifact might possibly turn up suddenly. How about the lagoon?

- Unless the finder happens to be a pilot or aviation buff on the side (which is possible since he or she knows about TIGHAR), the artifact would have to be recognizable to a layman as a piece of an old airplane. I would think random pieces of sheet metal, glass, cables or wiring are out.  As Lawrence said, it would be too large to move easily.  This would also rule against instrument panel fragments and the like.

- The finder did not photograph the object and assumed TIGHAR had already seen it.  Upon checking the TIGHAR web site, and seeing no mention of the object there, he or she would probably have assumed TIGHAR had decided the object was not Earhart-related.  This makes me think there's something ambiguous about the object -- it COULD be part of an old airplane, but maybe not.  If I stumbled across something like, say, a propeller, or part of a radial engine, I would know that TIGHAR hadn't seen it before.  Something so obvious would have been snapped up.  In that case,  I'd photograph the fool out of it and get on the horn as soon as I got back home.

So my vote is for something:

- relatively large;
- easy to identify as, but not conclusively, part of an airplane;
- if it was indeed found in the lagoon, it would be light enough to wash in from the reef.

So my vote is for a tire, or a fuel tank of some kind.  Flame away.

    -Jonathan.
********************************************************************
From Lawrence

So, a mysterious marine biologist is on Niku. He or she stumbles on an artifact which may belong to an Electra 10E. Knowing of TIGHAR and Ameilia Earhart, he or she does not disturb the scene. Hmmmmmmmm. I presume he or she had a camera or video recorder, but no mention of that is in your news release. Instead, he or she contacts TIGHAR and reports his or her findings. If this was a small item, let me say, smaller than a bread box, he or she would have probably taken it to the local authorities, but no, he or she leaves it there, subject to storms, and eventual loss. If the object was too large to handle, then photo documentation would be a natural, he or she being a professional would have considered the ramifications of this tremendous find.
*******************************************************************
Dennis McGee
1/31/03

I am skeptical that this marine biologist saw anything on the island "that might be an identifiable component of a Lockheed Electra."

You say the biologist was familiar with TIGHAR's work, yet he neither photographs the find nor recovers it because he assumed we already knew of it.  If he is aware of TIGHAR's work then he would also be aware of what we know and don't know, and obviously we knew nothing of this artifact or else something would have been on the website about it.  And even if we did know of it, it did not dawn on him at that time to take a quick photo or two just to document its present condition.

By chance, did the biologist mark the site in any way -- a pile of stones or debris, a GPS coordinate, a rough map, a yellow ribbon around the old Kanawa tree -- so it could be quickly relocated?  Anything?  I'll bet not, because he assumed we already knew of it so there was no need to document it, and because it was a "brief visit" (10 minutes? 12 hours? 2 days?) and he didn't have time to waste on something he thought we already knew.

I think the guy is pulling our leg, but we still have to check it out.

LTM, who suffers from pulled-leg syndrome
Dennis O. McGee #0149EC
**********************************************************************
Dave Porter
2/6/03

My guess, based on the information that (1)the item was found by a marine biologist, and (2)the folks you plan to send are all divers, is that the item is underwater, and in an area that hasn't been searched by TIGHAR previously.
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 28 Jul 2003 15:19:20 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Ground Effect

> When you lose an engine in a twin-engined airplane (which is twice as
> likely to happen than in a single) you have a choice.  You can land right
> now or keep going.  Which decision is the right one depends on a lot of
> factors.

As a long time pilot and flight instructor it has been my experience that pilots being offered choices or having to make decisions is not a good thing.

I have no idea how to compute the odds that they will make a wrong decision but accident statistics would indicate it is significantly high.

I always liked a lot of engines but I was painfully aware that just multiplied the number of possible malfunctions.

Alan
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 28 Jul 2003 16:52:42 EDT
From:         Dennis McGee
Subject:      Malfunctions?

Alan said: "I always liked a lot of engines but I was painfully aware that just multiplied the number of possible malfunctions."

Yeah, but when was the last time you heard of a B-52 have eight simultaneous engine malfunctions?  :-)  Not counting fuel starvation, of course, which is not a malfunction but more likely pilot error.  BUFFs have "routinely" (?) lost one or two due to malfunctions, but never eight.  Or when did the last three- or four-engine transport lose all engines to something other than fuel starvation or flying through a pumice cloud?

It's weird isn't it.  Two engines are not necessarily safer than one engine, but three or more seems to add the safety margin people assume exists with two engines.

LTM, stuck at SEL
Dennis O. McGee #0149EC
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 28 Jul 2003 16:53:21 EDT
From:         Mike Haddock
Subject:      Re: The Secret Revealed

Very nice post about the wheel. It is a breath of fresh air and something I'm sure will create a lot of speculation. Hope it turns out to be of value. Good hunting!

LTM,
Mike Haddock #2438
=========================================================================


Date:         Mon, 28 Jul 2003 16:54:50 EDT
From:         Ron Bright
Subject:      Re: Prof I.Hata Report/Mystery solved

Prof Hata launched into an intensive research of AE after he read the Goerner book that suggests AE ended up there. The Kamoi, thought to have picked up AE, was halfway between Saipan and Yokosuka, Japan on 2 July 37, he reported. The other Japanese ship in the area was the Koshu which according to the log was in the Marshalls and at Mili. He reviewed the Koshu log (like AOKI) and found no mention of Amelia. We know the Koshu was a Jaluit, also, near Mili, from numerous other sources.

Hata also argued that the Saipanese accounts about AE may well by "possible fiction"' and he cited language communication by "uneducated people". (Blanco?).  Hata concluded that he wondered why the Japanese residents of Saipan at the time-who were about half the population- do not remember what the Saipanese natives claim to have seen. Many of course, will argue that the Koshu logs were "cooked" and the officers who were interviewed continued to cover up the story. And that the  Japanese population would also lie about the incident. [ Washington Post Article of 2 July 78 by Ruth Dean, Staff writer, not copyrighted] I have finally contacted Hata and expect to directly interview him soon to determine the scope of his inquiries.

LTM,.
Ron B.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 29 Jul 2003 09:41:38 EDT
From:         OK48
Subject:      Re: loitering time

See what happens when you have an Air Force pilot write here who has little to no loitering time under his belt it is common for p-3  on sub patrol [that is Lockheed Orion's] to run on two of 4 when over a search area and also has there not been research done on twins that give the advice to shut one down deliberately as it will definitely lower total fuel consumption?  from s florida

***********************************************************
From Ric

It seems to me that the shutting down of "extra" engines in flight would be advisable only in fairly unusual circumstances.  How often is loiter time a factor in normal operations?

This is getting pretty off topic.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 29 Jul 2003 09:55:39 EDT
From:         Bob Lee
Subject:      Re: The Secret Revealed

Very juicy. After re-reviewing maps and photos I can definitely see what peaked your interest in this potential piece of evidence.

Now, after looking a the maps again, I can't help but wonder *why* our castaways would travel to the '7 site area' to establish camp. I searched through the archives a bit, but didn't see anything that jumped out at me as to why they would have chosen that particular location. Probably obvious when you're on the island.

Can't help but think that staying close to the wreck of the Norwich City -- because of the wreck being somewhat of a focal point -- would have been a better option.

Bob
***************************************************************
From Ric

Any reason we come up with for moving to the Seven Site is speculative but the fact is that the castaway(s) of Gardner Island (whoever he/she/they were) did reside and expire at the southeast end of the atoll.

Look at the map again.  Where is the land between the ocean and the lagoon narrowest? You need access to both for food and to watch for rescuers.  In 1937 the Seven Site was the narrowest part of the island where the environment was habitable - a nice open grove of kanawa and buka on a breezy ridge.  The Norwich City was a burned out, rusted, crab infested hulk of no use to a castaway.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 29 Jul 2003 10:00:13 EDT
From:         Ross Devitt
Subject:      Re: Ground Effect

> If I never learned anything else in the Air Force, it was never fly
> anything with (1) ONE engine. When it quits you lose 100% of your power.
> More engines more chance of survival.
> Jim

When one engine fails in a single, you point the nose down a bit and look for somewhere to land (preferably straight ahead).

When one engine fails in a twin, you sometimes find the airplane trying to turn around, one wing might be trying to drop, the airplane might be trying to fallout of the sky - all sorts of things start happening all at once.

There's a tendency for pilots to add power to the engine that's still running and forget which rudder pedal to press on to keep straight.

Twins may have their advantages, but there's a whole lot more quick thinking involved in an engine failure. (as Jim knows obviously) and only constant habit and training keeps us alive...

Th' WOMBAT
******************************************************
From Ric

Let's get back on topic.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 29 Jul 2003 10:02:34 EDT
From:         Alfred Hendrickson
Subject:      WoF

The possibility that there is a part of AE's 10E sitting there in the lagoon passage is truly awesome. Wouldn't it be neat if it was? Dare I get my hopes up?

LTM,

Alfred Hendrickson #2583
****************************************************
From Ric

If you do you're a better man than I am Gunga Din.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 29 Jul 2003 10:05:45 EDT
From:         Harvey
Subject:      Re: ground effect

Dave Bush wrote:

> FWIW - Its my "understanding" that "ground effect" was not "discovered" as a
> concept until World War II. That is to say that no one identified the
> phenomenon and its effect until then, altho many had certainly experienced
> it (ie: floating on landing).
> 
> From Ric
> That would surprise me.

There is an NACA tech memorandum on this subject dated  Jan-Feb,1934 (publ.1935).It is NACA TM 771 titled "Ground effect on the takeoff and landing of airplanes" by M. Leseuer . It is available at the NACA tech server web site. It correctly identifies reduced (induced) drag as the cause of ground effect. This memo references previous work on the subject dating back to 1927.

LTM
harvey 2287
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 29 Jul 2003 10:23:57 EDT
From:         Angus Murray
Subject:      Re: The Secret Revealed

I don't agree that for it to have been an Electra wheel, it must have been dismantled to remove the tyre. We can be fairly sure that an Electra wheel would have been submerged in seawater for some time before anyone tried to dismantle it. Islanders would be most unlikely to have the spanners (wrenches) sockets or special tools necessary to do that. Additionally, seawater, aluminum and steel make a great formula for electrolytic corrosion and there is a good chance that the four studs or bolts which secured the flange would have been seized solid.

On the other hand there are at least two mechanisms that might remove the tyre without dismantling. When the aitrcraft landed, the tyre could have been totally destroyed and shredded after bursting and being run flat. The rim would likely show signs of run-flat damage in this case.

The tyre could also well have been forced of the rim by side forces after puncturing during a ground loop. It might initially have been retained by the undercarriage leg but if that became detached from the wheel either in the accident or afterwards, the tyre would be able to escape. It could escape even if the beads remained intact and part of the undercarriage "fork" remained attached - once the "fork" was broken. It is also possible that the two "halves" of the wheel centre actually came apart in the accident due to mechanical forces stretching or shearing the retaining bolts to failure but this scenario, in common with the deliberate dismantling scenario, leaves nothing for the wheel centre to retain itself to the reef. If it is an Electra wheel I think it is likely some part of the undercarriage leg or at least one flange is what retains it in position on the reef.

If this turns out to be an Electra compatible wheel, there is realistically no possibility that it came from anywhere but AE's Electra.

Regards Angus.

**********************************************************************
From Ric

I have hunch that the object Greg saw - whether it's part of an Electra wheel or something else - was not merely cemented to the reef by virtue of its long presence in that spot.  That can and does happen, but I have a hard time accepting that the thing just happened to end up sitting upright like that.  I think it is more likely that it was put there intentionally to serve a purpose. In old photos of the village you can see a large structure on the beach down close to the water just onshore from the WoF is alleged to be.  I am quite certain that the structure is the "boat shed" mentioned in P.B. Laxton's 1949 description of the village.  The shed held the island "surf boat" - a whaleboat-type launch used to ferry goods and people over the reef to visiting ship before the channel was blasted in the 1960s.  When in use, it seems logical that there would have been both a bow mooring on shore  and a stern mooring about 20 feet out in the water.  The stern mooring would need to be either very heavy or affixed to the reef surface somehow.  There would be a floated line that could be easily retrieved and tied off to the launch.

Look at the exploded view of the Goodyear Airwheel.  When disassembled, the main component has four bolts protruding from the narrow end.  If that component were hammered down into the reef you could end up with something that looked like what Greg saw.  Pure conjecture, of course, but it's fun to theorize.

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 29 Jul 2003 10:34:46 EDT
From:         Dr. Know
Subject:      CONNECTING THE DOTS

I don't know why I am doing this but I am.

Just bear with me for a little while and I think you will agree I know what I am talking about but I want you in the FORUM to figure it out as we go along.

I will give you hints along the way and those of you with a truly open mind will see what really happened to AE and FN.

This is the only way I can think of to make you see the light and agree with me. BUT REMEMBER the important thing to find the airplane. I know where it is and so will you . Recovering it is another thing for another day.

For the first clue you will receive  will at first reading seem impossible but believe me it will start to make sense if you will just do your homework. There are at least 5 or 6 sub-clues you may think about AFTER you plot the following clue on a big chart (a small chart will not do)

FIRST CLUE:    5 degrees 54 minutes north/178degrees 16minutes west......SPLASH.

Please remember, AE , for a very simple reason made one horrible navigational error.... one that cost her life.

Have fun and let me see how you do!!!!

******************************************************************
From Ric

I don't know why you're doing this either but you have greatly underestimated the intelligence of the folks on this forum and you have set yourself up for an unpleasant lesson.

(Okay boys.  Another gunfighter just rode into town and he's standing out there in the middle of Main Street talking about how he's the fastest gun in the territory.  Who wants him? )
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 29 Jul 2003 10:46:08 EDT
From:         Angus Murray
Subject:      Six Pointed Star.

What is the feature visible in both the 1953 and 2001 photos of the lagoon passage? It looks exactly like a six pointed star with a hole in the middle. It is about halfway down the 2001 photo and very close to the r/h edge of the photo. It is also clearly visible in the 1953 photo, just outward (rightward) of the Ritiati side of the lagoon shore. Looks a bit big for an R1340 engine.

Regards Angus.
***************************************************************
From Ric

It's big coral head and it's not as regularly-shaped as Photoshop makes it look at that resolution.  The water there is about chest deep.  Bill Carter and I metal-detected that whole area in 2001.  In fact, I think that coral head may be the one Bill climbed up on to get away from a big shark that was getting a little too nosy.  I remember laughing at him standing up there and this fin going 'round and 'round the coral head and him shouting, "Just leave, okay? We don't need your help."
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 29 Jul 2003 10:50:58 EDT
From:         Jim Preston
Subject:      Re: Ground Effect

Hey Alan, you must have had mechanics that weren't nearly as good as I had in the Air Force and later with CAL. In the Air Force I was taught to THINK what could happen at any time and to be mentally prepared to correct the situation ASAP. My son was taught the same thing in the Navy. Why anyone wants to land on a postage stamp is beyond me. Case in point, he is on the USS Nimitz in the Gulf now, and last night he e-mailed me about a A6 Prowler that was lost 2 days ago. After the cat shot, witnesses said the back of the plane turned into a fireball and 4 ejection seats came out. They are all safe and we probably won't read anything about it but here is a 2 engine aircraft that probably couldn't fly far on 1 as for the weight so out you go. Right decision they are all alive but it's an OLD Viet Nam era airplane. You know if you lose one with 4 that's only 25%, one with 3 that's 33% one still has time to look around. B-52's don't count too many engines.
JIm
*******************************************************
From Ric

Interesting.  Now that the imbedded media are gone we don't hear about stuff like this.  Makes you wonder what else is going on that we don't hear about. But we're getting way off topic.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 29 Jul 2003 10:56:29 EDT
From:         BTS
Subject:      Re: Prof I.Hata Report/Mystery solved

I must concede that your observations of Asian/Pacific culture have a definite ring of truth. The scenario that they were only telling the authors/researchers what they wanted to hear, is not only feasible, but highly probable.

It is also difficult to place the Electra in that area, unless the entire flight  was clandestine in nature. I find that unlikely. I do however believe it is possible that the 2 fliers were "rescued" by Japan. More likely from the Phoenix group, than from the sea.

That is the only possible way I can see, aside from espionage, as to how they might have ended up in Japan.

You wrote : As to pursuing any of these ideas what would you base the pursuit on?

If I had the resources at my disposal, I would not go looking for AE in Japan. If I was to look in the water, I would base my pursuit on the findings of Elgen Long, and eliminate some of the search area based on the progress made by Nauticos. (assuming they would be so kind as to share that information with me. NOT!)

But I am in pursuit of the truth. So I would not stop there. If money weren't an issue, I think I'd be arriving on Nikumaroro, very shortly with Mr. Gillespie and his team.

Ben The Skeptic
(BTS)
**************************************************************
From Ric

Mr. Gillespie is not with his team on this trip.  He's sitting comfortably at his computer feeling guilty as hell and worrying about his boys who are not, of course "his boys" and are perfectly capable of carrying out this mission.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 29 Jul 2003 10:57:53 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Prof I.Hata Report/Mystery solved

Ron Bright wrote:

> I have finally contacted Hata and expect to directly interview him soon to
> deterimine the scope of his inquiries.

That should prove interesting Ron. Good post in putting those things in good perspective.

Alan
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 29 Jul 2003 11:02:59 EDT
From:         Dave Bush
Subject:      Bones and Mason

In a research bulletin dated 7/15/03 it is written:

Dr. Hoodless' daughter wrote that her father was an active member of the Masons. It is conceivable that he may have donated the bones to a Masonic Lodge for use in ritual ceremonies. Dr. Karen Burns (a forensic anthropologist) and the 1999 TIGHAR team examined one such set of bones kept by the Lodge in Suva. Since the Masons are a private organization, their records are not open to public inspection. We cannot exclude the possibility that the Gardner skeleton may have gone into the custody of some other Masonic lodge or that they were disposed of in some other fashion by a fellow-member of Hoodless' lodge.

FWIW - I am a Mason and know of no use of bones in Masonic (AF&AM) rituals. Also, we are not cannibals or atheists.

LTM,
Dave Bush

*********************************************************************
From Ric

You got something against cannibals and atheists?  :-) It is a fact that the Masonic Lodge in Suva has bones that are used in rituals.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 29 Jul 2003 11:04:25 EDT
From:         Herman De Wulf
Subject:      Re: Ground Effect

Alan wrote:

>I have no idea how to compute the odds that they will make a wrong decision
>but accident statistics would indicate it is significantly high.
>
>I always liked a lot of engines but I was painfully aware that just
>multiplied the number of possible malfunctions.

You may not be aware of this, but these are almost exactly the historical words Charles Lindbergh spoke when he was asked why he wanted to cross the Atlantic in a single engine.

LTM (who always believed in keeping things simple)
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 29 Jul 2003 11:05:56 EDT
From:         Claude Stokes
Subject:      Re: Ground Effect

I have a glider rating so i dont need any engines at all.  Its great fun,, u should try it
the stoker
ltm
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 29 Jul 2003 11:35:32 EDT
From:         Phil Tanner
Subject:      Re: The Secret Revealed

Agree that whatever it is, it might well have been put in situ for a purpose. I can't picture the villagers just discarding any piece of non-ferrous metal which might have another use, even if the tyre (as we spell it) would have had more value.

Phil Tanner 2276

******************************************************************
From Reed Riddle

> Look at the exploded view of the Goodyear Airwheel.  When disassembled, the
> main component has four bolts protruding from the narrow end.  If that
> component were hammered down into the reef you could end up with something
> that looked like what Greg saw.  Pure conjecture, of course, but it's
> fun to theorize.

That brings up an interesting idea...did the colony use any of the wreckage from the Norwich City for anything?  If they salvaged some components for, say, a big support weight for the boat tie down or other things, and if the Electra came down near the wreck, then it's possible that scattered airplane wreckage was used by the colony for stuff.  That presumes that any airplane parts were unrecognizable as such by the time the colony was started, but we're presuming that anyways.  And, as has been pointed out before, it's difficult for the average person to tell the difference between airplane wreckage and other wreckage.

If there is any instance of the colony recycling debris, then it might be worth taking a closer look at photos of the colony to see if anything jumps out.  It might be impossible to track down any of the equipment now, but perhaps something has been left behind in the colony after all.

                    Reed
*****************************************************************
From Ric

I invite expedition veterans on the forum to check my memory, but I don't recall seeing much of anything in the village that appeared to be salvaged from the shipwreck - and it's not hard to understand why.  Norwich City debris is massive and rusted solid.  It's not good for anything unless you just need something heavy but most of the wreckage is too heavy to move.  Airplane debris, by contrast, is very different.  We have at least one anecdotal account of a control cable being used as a heavy-duty fishing line leader and sheet aluminum being used to fashion a large hook.  The scraps of sheet aluminum we've found in the village support stories told by former residents who say that sheet aluminum was cut into small pieces for use as fishing lures.  Of course, such use would be "consumptive" and a considerable supply of salvaged sheet could be used up over the years.

It's a mistake to think of the colonists as primitive natives who lacked tools and knowledge of Western culture.  Many of the laborers were poor and relatively uneducated, but the colony was also well-supplied with skilled craftsmen who had been trained in British schools in Funafuti and Tarawa.  They were familiar with ships and had seen airplanes.  I would be surprised if they had any difficulty distinguishing the different types of wreckage.

LTM,
Ric
*********************************************************************
Thanks Ric,
Never really considered doubting the fact that the southeastern end of the atoll was where the castaways survived and perished. The food source issue is a good one and prevailing winds would seem to argue for that site also.

What struck me is that I can imagine that the rusting hulk of the Norwich City would be a focal point for any potential rescuers. I would think that a rescuer flying over the island would immediately concentrate on the wide reef and wreck area. This is why I questioned leaving that area. I didn't think that the wreck would be of any use to the castaways other than a really good landmark.

If this is the case, it might help explain why our castaways were not seen by the search flights. Like you said -- pure speculation.

Bob
**********************************************************************
From Ric

Here's some more speculation for you.  If you're hanging out on Nutiran near the shipwreck, the things you need to survive (food from the forest and the lagoon) are a long way from the beach.  The shipwreck does draw attention but perhaps you have already had the experience of hearing search planes overhead and not being able to get to beach and out into the open where you can be seen in time.  That would be a hard lesson.  Find someplace where you NEVER have to be far an open area where you can be seen.
**********************************************************************

From Kent Johnson

Who knows what effect landing on the coral flat may have had on the tire, too?  May have shredded it and over time the remaining bead wire has corroded away.  Leaving only a wheel.
************************************************************
From Ric

if the thing is a wheel at all we should be able to tell something about its history once we get it home.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 29 Jul 2003 11:44:17 EDT
From:         Reed Riddle
Subject:      Re: CONNECTING THE DOTS

> FIRST CLUE:    5 degrees 54 minutes north/178degrees 16minutes
> west......SPLASH.

Hmmm....that position is almost the same distance from Howland as Nikumaroro, but in the opposite direction.  Perhaps Dr. Know thinks that they turned left instead of right...which would imply that they didn't know which way was North for some reason.  At that time of day, just after sunrise, any competent navigator could tell where North was, in general...and even Noonan at his drunkest could have as well.  This isn't Bugs Bunny making a wrong turn at Albuquerque.  :)

It's also in the middle of the ocean, with nothing else close to it or on that track for miles and miles.  There's no way they went that way, presuming they wanted to live.

This should be fun to watch.....

                    Reed
*************************************************************
From Alan

The quandary is whether to just shoot him now and get on with reality or let him play his foolish game and THEN shoot him.

Alan
************************************************************
From Ric

Which brings to mind another classic Warner Bros. line.

Bugs to Elmer:

"Do you want to take me home or shoot him now?"

Daffy:

"No, no!  Shoot me now! Shoot me now!
***************************************************************
From Alan

Another thought. This is a serious and important scientific investigation not a silly puzzle game. Are children allowed on the forum?

If our mystery guest has anything of value to say perhaps he just needs to say it as most of us have more important things to do besides playing games.

Put him with Daryll.

Alan
*******************************************************
From Ric

I knew this wasn't going to be pretty.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 29 Jul 2003 14:23:41 EDT
From:         Tom King
Subject:      Re: Bones and Mason

Let me clarify.  First, the report is in error: Kar Burns didn't examine the bones.  Kris Tague, Barb Norris, and I did.  What happened was this:

Shortly after our arrival in Fiji we had a press conference at the museum.  A reporter came up afterwards and asked if knew that there was a box in the Suva Masonic Lodge with a skull and bones in it.  Needless to say, I was interested.  So we contacted the local lodge, whose representative said sure, there's a skull and crossed bones that we use in certain ceremonies.  He was happy to let us look at it.

So we went with him into the lodge building, and he pulled out a dark wood box.  "Oh boy oh boy oh boy," I thought, that sure looks like kanawa."  But it had a sliding door, which didn't seem a very likely part of any box built by hand on Nikumaroro.  And when pulled up it revealed -- yes indeed, an honest to god human cranium and a couple of long bones (humeri), but it obviously wasn't "our" cranium; it had two intact malars, and Hoodless' notes say that the cranium he examined was missing one.  I looked carefully to make sure that it wasn't a matter of somebody else's malar being patched in, or something, and it wasn't; it was original.

We asked where the bones had come from; our informant didn't know, said they'd been there as long as anyone remembered.

My guess is that the bones were from a prehistoric burial site in a dunefield somewhere that got eroded out of the dunes and was picked up by someone. There's a major prehistoric cemetery on Viti Levu, not far from Suva, that could easily have produced them.

We've recently learned that during the 2002 coup, a mob burned the historic Masonic lodge in Levuka, Fiji's old capital, and made off with a skull kept there.  It would be real interesting to examine it, but needless to say, doing so presents some complications.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 29 Jul 2003 14:24:38 EDT
From:         Tom King
Subject:      Norwich City stuff in the village

Ric invited other observations --

There are lots of machine parts in what we call the Carpenter's Shop site, many of them quite heavy, that may have come from the shipwreck.  There are some heavy ferrous pins stuck in the ground on the Nutiran mudflat, which may have come from the wreck.  A couple of bricks, probably from the engine's firebox, have turned up.  There are chunks and pieces of ferrous metal that could have come from the wreck but didn't definitely -- but then, if the pieces around the wreck weren't around the wreck, you wouldn't know that they definitely came from it, either.  There's a heavy block on the flagstaff, doubtless used to raise and lower the jack, which could have come from the wreck, which probably had many such items.  There was a ferrous adze bit in the village meetinghouse site, which could have been made from Norwich wreckage or could have come in as a manufactured item.  Lots of bits and pieces, and I'd be surprised if they didn't bring stuff in to use, but nothing that's very obvious.  Things like lanterns and plate glass and turnbuckles and such could have come from the wreck, but didn't necessarily.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 29 Jul 2003 14:29:57 EDT
From:         Dennis McGee
Subject:      Gunfighters

Ric said:  (Okay boys.  Another gunfighter just rode into town and
he's standing out there in the middle of Main Street talking about how he's
the fastest gun in the territory.  Who wants him? )

Ric, you are assuming we are in the mood for a fair fight.  Hell, I'd just poke a rifle through the window and drop him right there on Main Street.  I don't care what he/she has to say.

LTM, who not in a sportin' mood today
Dennis O. McGee #0149EC

**************************************************************
From Ric

Now, now....if we did that he would be able to say that we refuse to hear dissenting views.  Heck, we let Daryll ramble on and on and he still accuses of refusing to hear dissenting views.  The good news is that nobody will need to waste a bullet on Dr. Know.  All we need to do is throw him some rope and he'll string himself up.  He's already halfway up the ladder now.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 29 Jul 2003 14:32:32 EDT
From:         Alfred Hendrickson
Subject:      Re: CONNECT THE DOTS

Dr. Know? A doctor in what? This one is easy, Ric. That's no gunfighter, that's a snake oil salesman. Be guided by the Forum rules & regulations. You have declined to post certain of my notes that were more relevant than this. And I'm a paying passenger. I say give Dr. Know the heave-ho. And then tell me why you opened the door to this one.

Dots, schmotz. The wreck photo is more interesting and relevant than this. (Hey, cool, I just opened another wreck photo thread!)

Grumble, grumble, grumble. <g>

LTM, who has the purchasing power, but ain't buying it,

Alfred Hendrickson #2583
*****************************************************
From Ric

>(Hey, cool, I just opened another wreck photo thread!)

Wanna bet?
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 29 Jul 2003 14:33:58 EDT
From:         JDubb
Subject:      Re: The Secret Revealed

Ric, after reading "The Plan For Niku Vp" I have a small question. Does the team plan to do any exploration with metal detectors this trip?

Thank you
Jdubb

(long time lurker)
******************************************************
From Ric

Yes.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 29 Jul 2003 14:56:55 EDT
From:         Istancil
Subject:      Re: Gunfighters

Geesh, you guys are ruthless.  Just make a wager and be done with it.

********************************************************
From Ric

Oh, we're not so bad really.  It's just that it's always fun when somebody like Dr. Know appears.  The Earhart Woods are full of these guys.  They show up with "the answer" and quickly find out that most of what they think they know is either flat wrong or is unsupportable conjecture.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 29 Jul 2003 16:09:05 EDT
From:         Ron Berry
Subject:      Re: The Secret Revealed

The wreck was and still is a focal point of the island, any air search would include a flyover to the wreck.  that is what occurred when the air search did arrive at the island. I am thinking of something that was written in Betty's log. Something about New York City. This could easily have been misunderstood from the words Norwich City.
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 29 Jul 2003 16:09:50 EDT
From:         Mike Haddock
Subject:      Re: Gunfighters

As Ray Liotta said to Joe Pesce in "Goodfellas", "you're a funny guy"!!
LTM
Mike Haddock #2438
=========================================================================


Date:         Tue, 29 Jul 2003 16:17:32 EDT
From:         Russ Matthews
Subject:      Just say "Know..."

Let me suggest another way to "make [us] see the light and agree with [you].

1.  State your case.

2.  Present your sources.

3.  Be prepared to back up your claims.

The hard part is not making us listen with an open mind... we want to be engaged, we want to be convinced, we want to solve this mystery... the hard part is living up to the standards we have imposed.  That's where "Dr. Know" and others like him/her inevitably run into problems.  They don't understand that their claims must earn a place here.  It isn't that we're prejudiced towards any one theory, but rather (as a frustrated TV producer once remarked) that we're "biased towards the facts."

As a showplace for responsible and co-operative historic investigation, the Forum demands rigorous methodology and high standards of evidence - not some silly, pseudonym, puzzle-game.

Marshall Gillespie, it's time to get off the jailhouse porch, disperse the lynch mob gathering in the streets, and tell that greenhorn to show us what's in his saddlebags or mosey on out of town.

LTM,

Russ
******************************************************************
From Ric

Yyyup, but ever since we answered him the feller hasn't said nothin' more. Ain't seen hide nor hair of him. Somebody wanna go look back of the livery stable?  I'll be over in the saloon.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 30 Jul 2003 08:43:50 EDT
From:         Dr. Know
Subject:      THREATS TO DR. KNOW

O YE OF LITTLE FAITH......YOU GUYS WANT TO SHOOT DR. KNOW BEFORE YOU GIVE HIM A CHANCE TO DRAW!!

REMEMBER, IN THAT CLASSIC MOVIE 'SHANE' SHANE SHOT JACK WILSON (JACK PALANCE)  AND WHILE SHANE WAS SHOOTING GOOD OLE JACK  JACK WAS KNOCKED BACK INTO SOME EMPTY WOODEN BARRELS YOU MAY RECALL. COULD THESE BARRELS BE THE ONES YOU ARE LOOKING FOR WITH THE 'CORKS AND CHAINS'??

BAD JOKE, DR. KNOW  KNOWS.

RIC, THANK YOU FOR HAVING THE GUTS TO POST MY FIRST CLUE....JUST GIVE ME A FEW MORE CHANCES TO CONNECT ALL THE DOTS.

I FEEL LIKE JACK CARTER MUST HAVE FELT WHILE HE WAS STANDING ON THAT CORAL HEAD WITH ALL THOSE SHARKS CIRCLING AROUND.  I WAS COUNTING ON ALAN AND MIKE TO SEE THE LIGHT....I STILL HOPE I'M NOT WRONG.

AS BETTIE DAVIS ONCE SAID 'FASTEN YOU SEAT BELTS BOYS, IT'S GOING TO BE A BUMPY RIDE'

MAYBE DR. KNOW HAS BEEN SEEING TOO MANY MOVIES.
********************************************************************
From Ric

Put up or shut up.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 30 Jul 2003 08:44:40 EDT
From:         Dave Bush
Subject:      Re: ground effect

I stand corrected and better educated.

LTM,
Dave Bush
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 30 Jul 2003 08:46:56 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Prof I.Hata Report/Mystery solved

> I would base my pursuit on the findings of
> Elgen Long,

With all due respect to Elgen Long and in particular to his late wife who was also a principal in the research and writing of their book, I would point you to the TIGHAR web site and to Rollin Reineck's excellent review of Elgen's book.

Alan
*********************************************************
From Ric

Rollin Reineck's excellent review of Elgen's book???  On the TIGHAR website???
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 30 Jul 2003 08:48:00 EDT
From:         Dave Bush
Subject:      Re: Bones and Mason

Glad I'm not a mason in Suva, then. Guess its a local tradition.

LTM,
Dave Bush
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 30 Jul 2003 09:00:44 EDT
From:         Angus Murray
Subject:      Re: CONNECTING THE DOTS

> FIRST CLUE:    5 degrees 54 minutes north/178degrees 16minutes
> west......SPLASH.

I think this is Dr Know's theory:

AE flew a true course which was intended by Fred to be magnetic. (Fred was still too hung over to notice and was too tired to take any celestial observations during the night). This put them off course to the north by the magnetic variation, not far from the position above. (Dr Know probably made a few mistakes with the correct average variation and distance to Howland).

AE (silly girl) in looking at the position marked on Fred's plotting chart, mistook (since Fred hadn't bothered to mark them) the 180 degree meridian for the170E degree meridian and  misinterpreted their position near 05 54N 178 16W as being 5 54N 171 44E. When she checked the chart she saw they must be a mere 25 miles from Knox atoll at 5 55N 172 09E hence her reference to Mili and Knox in her call to Nina Paxton.

All sheer fantasy unfortunately.

Regards Angus.

*********************************************************************
From Ric

At least you brought the discussion around to something worth discussing. The Conspiracy Crowd has long waved Nina Paxton like a bloody shirt because she heard Amelia talking about Mili Atoll, Knox Island, and Klee Passage - but Nina never said any such thing.  In 1937 she said only that she had heard Amelia say she was on or near a little island.  In 1943 Nina claimed that she had heard AE "describe" specific geographical features in the Marshall's but she never said that AE actually said those names.  In the post-Flight For Freedom wartime environment Nina seems to have provided her own interpretation of where Earhart had been.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 30 Jul 2003 09:02:30 EDT
From:         Dave in Fremont
Subject:      Re: The Secret Revealed

Speaking from a total lack of knowledge, I'm assuming the Goodyear Airwheel had a pretty sizable inner tube inside the tire. If this is, indeed, what the WOF turns out to be, the castaways may have disassembled the wheel to either use the inner tube for some "domestic" use or to repair a tire blown on landing.

I know... pure speculation... but still interesting to ponder.

LTM, who always knew indecision was the key to flexibility,
Dave (#2585)
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 30 Jul 2003 09:03:31 EDT
From:         Denise
Subject:      Just call us Bolivia!

Note to Tom King:  You talk about Fiji's 2002 coup!  No such thing! The last coup was in 2000. Yes! I know! I know! We're building up quitte a reputation for having them, but no ... we can't claim credit for one in 2002! Guess were just too busy that year to get around to it!

You're right, however about "a mob burning the historic Masonic lodge in Levuka, Fiji's old capital." but that too was in 2000. That was the one that came about after the visit of that weird sect of New Zealand's "Mongrel Mob" Maoris who put the Fijians up to it, claiming something nefarious about the Masons relationships with "The Black Man" and sending them out to find proof.  What that has to do with running off with a skull I have no idea, but, gosh, it certainly is interesting, isn't it!

LTM (who loved that cute little historic Masonic lodge in Levuka)

Denise
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 30 Jul 2003 10:12:35 EDT
From:         Tom King
Subject:      Re: Bones and Mason

For Dave Bush

Actually, the skull and bones thing is not a local Masonic tradition.  When I came back from the '99 trip I spent some time in the Masonic library in San Francisco and looked it up.  Apparently the use of the skull and bones to show initiates something about the transitory nature of human life goes way back in Masonic tradition -- at least according to what I read.

LTM (who has the greatest of respect for Masons, but then, likes trowels and isn't bothered by bones)
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 30 Jul 2003 10:13:12 EDT
From:         Tom King
Subject:      Re: Just call us Bolivia!

Sorry, Denise; you're right of course.  What can I do to recoup?
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 30 Jul 2003 10:15:44 EDT
From:         Ted Campbell
Subject:      Re: The Secret Revealed

>Speaking from a total lack of knowledge, I'm assuming the Goodyear Airwheel
>had a pretty sizable inner tube inside the tire. If this is, indeed, what the
>WOF turns out to be, the castaways may have disassembled the wheel to either
>use the inner tube for some "domestic" use or to repair a tire blown on
>landing.

And an air supply to pump up the repaired tire?  Or the tools necessary to disassemble the tire to get the tube out?

Not likely!
Ted Campbell
***********************************************************************
From Angus

Not a chance! If the aircraft was still on its gear with a punctured tyre, how do you jack up three tons of aircraft to remove the wheel? And what do you use for a puncture repair kit? (There is actually a way to repair a small puncture as effected in 3rd world countries but there's no way that AE or FN would know that). If it was on collapsed gear there would be no point in trying to repair the tube for an attempted take-off and you'd still have the problem of raising the aircraft's weight if you just wanted to use the tube as a life-ring etc. Even if by some herculean effort you managed to do it, where would you take off for?  There is little doubt that they would not have had enough fuel to return to Howland and maybe not even enough to get to Hull which was about 140nm away. You would have to be very desperate to attempt it whilst there was still a chance of rescue and once that chance had passed all the remaining fuel would probably have been used for battery charging.

The chance of the wheel being dismantled by AE & Co is precisely zilch.
Regards Angus.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 30 Jul 2003 10:42:59 EDT
From:         Dr. Know
Subject:      Connecting The Dots

Angus, my boy, you are getting warm.

Remember what I said in the beginning:

"It was a very SIMPLE error in navagation.'  I also said that you needed a large chart that at least shows NAURU and the location of the SWAN on the morning of July 2nd..

As she left Nauru she was to have changed course to 87 degrees true. For whatever reason, she missed this change and continued on course of about 67 degrees true.  Forget about rhumb lines because I don't think Fred used them.

Now go ahead and extend your sun line 157/337 degrees to make sure it goes far enough North to intersect her course of 67 degrees.  Please remember anywhere along this Sun line, a person would see the rising Sun at the same instant you would see it standing on Howland Island.

If she had been on an accurate course of 87 degrees true from Nauru, somewhere on her approach to Howland she would change course to 67 degrees true to enable her to intersect the Sun line North of Howland Island.  This means that if she had been correct in her navagiation, as soon as she saw the Sun come up, she would have seen the rising Sun directly off the nose of her airplane. Remember, the 67 degree course is perpendicular to the 157/337 Sun Line.

Now , I have to ask you guys to think a little bit.  It has been almost ten years since Dr Know did any hard research on the mystery.  Therefore, I am having to pull from memory on some of the course lines using degrees for they may not be absolute, right on the money.

Ok, If you plot this on your charts (hint, hint) locate the position of the Swan. The Swan location may not have any bearing on the cause of her loss, but just think:::If she was trying to DF on a 9 megacycle signal, THIS could be a primary cause.

Fellows, use your heads, and try to put yourself in that airplane at sunrise and just imagine the confusion in that cockpit when all of a sudden they saw the nose of the airplane pointing right at the rising sun and they began to realize that they never made their course direction change to 67 degrees that would enable them to intersect the sun line to give them their LOP; and therefore, making a right turn down the sun line to Howland....IF they had been on the correct course, not the error course.

At this time I am not going to go into when and where Noonan saw the rising sun which enabled him to extend parallel sun lines, etc.

One last thought......Mrs Paxton and Betty were on the same longitude. Think about Sun Spots, Harmonics, and Skip.

THATS ALL FOR RIGHT NOW...AS DR KNOW HAS TO GO TO A PROCTOLOGIST CONFERENCE AND WILL BE GONE FOR A FEW DAYS..  AS ALWAYS, FELLOW TRUTH-SEEKERS.....

LTM
DR. KNOW
************************************************************************
From Ric

Stay away as long as you like.  Your theory is pure speculation piled on pure speculation.  By that method you can put the airplane anywhere.

You do point out one interesting coincidence which has nothing to do with your ramblings.  Nina Paxton was in Ashland, Ky at 82.38 W.  Betty was in St. Petersburg, FL at 82.40 W.  For what it's worth, another shortwave listener - Charles Russell in Dennison, Ohio - was at 81.20 W.  However, all three heard what they heard at completely different times of day.

Incidentally, if you think any of the post-loss messages are authentic you are arguing against your own crashed and sank theory.

Enjoy your proctology conference.  I think we can move on.

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 30 Jul 2003 10:47:32 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Reineck's review

Ric wrote:

> Rollin Reineck's excellent review of Elgen's book???  On the TIGHAR
> website???

Yes, Ric. Rollin tore Elgen's theory to pieces on the forum on 1 November 1999. You have it posted in the archives in the November 1999 group. Your preface read:

"From Ric

Rollin Reineck has published the following review of the Longs' book at http://community-1.webtv.net/DB325840/AmeliaEarhartThe/page2.html and has privately expressed to me his willingness to have it posted on the forum.  Ergo....."

I'm aware you also wrote a review of Elgen's book but I thought Rollin's review, him not being a main part of TIGHAR, might impress our friend more than what you write or the rest of us write.

Alan
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 30 Jul 2003 11:01:22 EDT
From:         Dennis McGee
Subject:      Dr. Know

A proctology conference?  An apt metaphor for Dr. Know's theory, for sure.

LTM, who is locked and loaded
Dennis O. McGee #0149

**************************************************************
From Ric

I had a hunch you'd finger that one.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 30 Jul 2003 13:53:02 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Connecting The Dots

> Enjoy your proctology conference.  I think we can move on.

I saw nothing in his post worth commenting on. I know of no evidence to put the plane at Nauru and I know of no evidence they should have ever been on a 67 degree heading. Once again we have found someone who does not understand celestial and the LOP.  And I would hope we all have been brought up well enough not to connect his profession with what he writes.

Alan
********************************************
From Angus

> As she left Nauru she was to have changed course to 87 degrees true.

What evidence is there she ever went to Nauru? A direct course to Howland from Lae is well over 100nm south of Nauru.

> For whatever reason,

Don't tell me you don't know?

> she missed this
> change and continued on course of
> about 67 degrees true.

How do you know?

> Forget about
> rhumb lines because I don't think Fred
> used them.

What do you mean think? Is that a guess? Perhaps he just changed course continuously to keep to the great circle -or thought of a number and told AE to fly it.

> Now go ahead and extend your sun line
> 157/337 degrees to make sure it goes
> far enough North to intersect her course
> of 67 degrees.  Please remember anywhere along this Sun line, a person
> would see the rising Sun at the same
> instant you would see it standing on
> Howland Island.

Assuming of course the line went through Howland and that they were at the same height as Howland island.

> If she had been on an accurate course
> of 87 degrees true from Nauru, somewhere on her approach to Howland

Where exactly?

> she would change course to 67 degrees
> true to enable her to intersect the Sun
> line North of Howland Island.

Why would she change course to particularly 67 degrees? You don't have to approach a sun line at right angles to it. You merely have to know your speed and course to be able to turn at the correct time. And if you are suggesting they actually wanted to end up north of Howland - where is the evidence for this?

As Ric says, all this is pure speculation without any evidence. I know that you haven't a clue what happened to AE. For a start perhaps you can explain why Fred omitted to discover they were off course from his star shots as the weather at both Nauru and Ocean island was fine - or do you really think he had a hangover?

Any believable theory purporting to explain the disappearance of AE has to:

1) Have solid evidence for each of its components

2) Explain and incorporate all the known evidence - even if it is contradictory

3) Be based on a likely scenario.

Your ideas fail on all three.

Regards Angus.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 30 Jul 2003 13:54:10 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Dr. Know

> From Ric
>
> I had a hunch you'd finger that one.

OK, forget my "upbringing" comment.

Alan
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 30 Jul 2003 13:56:31 EDT
From:         Dave in Fremont
Subject:      Re: The Secret Revealed

Yikes, guys!  With all Dr. Know's nonsense, I just thought I'd have a bit of fun.

Ted, take another look at the Luke Field inventory... They had a toolkit on-board with wrenches, so it's possible they at least had the tools to disassemble the wheel. In addition, the inventory also shows two air bottles for the life jackets and a high pressure pump, although the pump was probably an hydraulic type.

LTM,
Dave (#2585)
*********************************************************************
From Ric

How do you jack up the airplane?
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 30 Jul 2003 14:01:19 EDT
From:         Bob Sherman
Subject:      WIZARD OF ID

" ..Enjoy your proctology conference.  I think we can move on.  LTM,   Ric"

Recall the daily cartoon strip, Wizard of ID ?   In one, the Wizard was in the basement stirring a pot of potions .. his wife came part way down the stairs to tell him she was going to see the eye doctor.

"You should not refer to Dr.'s by their specialities", he said.  "Why not? ", she asked.

"Because we would not have any proctologists", he replied.    RC

**************************************************************
From Alfred Hendrickson:

 HAS TO GO TO A PROCTOLOGIST CONFERENCE

Dr. Know is a proctologist! So THAT is where he comes up with this stuff! How poetic! How fitting! Let's hope that, at his conference, he can "dig up" something better than what he posted. Alternately, let's hope not.

LTM, who was regular,

Alfred Hendrickson #2583
***************************************************************
From Ric

Ok guys.  I think we've poked at that joke enough.  It's also possible the Dr. Know was pulling our leg about his profession.  I don't blame him for wanting an excuse to get out of town after posting that message.
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 30 Jul 2003 14:54:55 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Connecting The Dots

> Your ideas fail on all three.
>
> Regards Angus.

Angus, of course what you posted is correct but none of us need to deal with this nonsense. It's obvious the guy doesn't know what he is talking about and has nothing to add.

To tell the truth I suspect Doctor Know is one our frequent posters and not someone new at all. I could hazard a guess but to what end?

Alan
=========================================================================


Date:         Wed, 30 Jul 2003 14:58:22 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Jacking it up

> From Ric
>
> How do you jack up the airplane?

I don't think that would be much of a problem. Leverage. The problem might be finding something to use like a big tree limb not to mention block and tackle, heavy chains, ropes, etc.

OK, so it wouldn't be a piece of cake.

If Harrison Ford and Anne Hesche could do it so could Fred and Amelia.

Alan
*******************************************************
From Ric

Anyone who has ever been out on that reef is rolling on the floor holding their sides.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 31 Jul 2003 12:02:08 EDT
From:         Cam Warren
Subject:      Jacking it up

Ric wrote:

>How do you jack up the airplane?

You get a few guys under the wing to push up.

Been there, done that, in Australia, in the outback. Plane was a twin-engine Cherokee as I recall.  Pilot got one wheel stuck in a mudhole, was all set to walk home. We weren't - and didn't. 'Nuff said.

Cam Warren
****************************************************************
From Ric

You may have forgotten that this brain-dead thread got started when somebody suggested that Earhart and Noonan were the ones who removed the tire from the wheel (if a tire was removed from a wheel).  I don't care how many guys you can assemble on an uninhabited island.  You're not going to jack up a Lockheed 10 by having them push up on the wing.

***********************************************************************
From Dave in Fremont:

Ric,

If you're talking about being able to remove the wheel, I see the port main gear strut collapsing at the end (or de facto, what would be the end) of the rollout, making the jacking of the Electra unnecessary.

But that raises a question. If the Electra landed successfully and was just sitting on the reef flat intact, wouldn't you expect the WOF to also have the main gear strut still attached?

LTM,

Dave (#2585)
*********************************************************************
From Ric

If the port gear leg collapsed why on earth would you think you should fix the flat tire? Yes, I would expect that the gear leg, yoke, axle, wheel and tire assembly would separate for the aircraft as a unit.

*************************************************************************
From Bill Shea

maybe they didn't have to jack it up if it was upside down, No?

*********************************************************************
From Ric

Fred:
Well Amelia, here's another fine mess you've gotten us into.  The airplane is flat on its back out here on this reef.
AE:
Sorry about that.  I guess we better get busy and fix that flat tire.

***************************************************************
From Alan

Ric wrote:
> Anyone who has ever been out on that reef is rolling on the floor holding
> their sides.

You could have told me there are no big tree limbs laying around a bit more tactfully. <G>

Alan
*****************************************************************
From Greg Parnell

If I were a survivor, I would use any sharp object I could fashion to persevere and cut the tyre off the rim. I could use the rubber to make lots of distinctive black smoke from my signal fire when I heard or saw the expected search aircraft or ship approaching.

Regards,

Greg
***************************************************************
From Ric

An aviation junkyard owner I talked to when researching Goodyear Airwheels told me that those heavy duty tires reinforced with "music wire" were virtually impossible to cut through even with the tools he had in his shop.  He was very sure that the only way that tire could come off the rim was if the wheel was disassembled.

A much easier way to make black smoke would be to soak a pile of brush on the shore with engine oil.
*************************************************************************
From Rich Young

> From Ric
>
> How do you jack up the airplane?

You don't - nor is it necessary to do so - IF you can "think outside the box".  Rather than jack the airplane, block the landing gear leg with something that can stand the weight, (wooden chock, bricks from the Norwich City engine room, even a rock COULD do), and dig out a hole underneath the blown tire.  I know that doing this on coral would be a chore, but with a hammer, (improvised or otherwise) and something to use as a chisel (large screwdriver? Norwich debris?) eventually you could get there.  Remove and repair tire, re-install.  Fill the hole as much as possible, (small stones, clam shells, sand even), re-inflate the tire from either the cylinders intended for the life preservers or, (more likely) a hand pump, (improvised if necessary) and the inflating tire will lift the gear leg off of its support (or you just rock it off).  I'm not saying they went all the way through this drill, but they could have started the process and then been overcome by events.  If the airplane can't go up, then the ground under the flat tire must go down.  Of course, this is totally ignoring the possibility of salvaging some kind of cable and manual winch or block and tackle off of the Norwich City  (lifeboat davit, maybe?) and constructing some type of temporary A-frame in situ to attempt lifting the wing.  You'd be surprised at what you will attempt when the alternative is sufficiently unappealing - do either Amelia or Fred have anecdotal evidence of "shade tree mechanic" improvisational skills in their bios?

LTM, (who calls triple-A when she has a flat),

Rich Young
********************************************************************
From Ric

Guys...Flight of the Phoenix was FICTION.

Supposing just for a moment that AE and FN found themselves on the reef with an intact airplane except for a flat tire.  What would be the point in trying to fix it?  They don't have enough gas left to go anywhere.  Their best hope is to call for help and hope that Itasca shows up.  Then they might be able to fix the flat, get some gas, take off and fly up to Howland.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 31 Jul 2003 12:06:23 EDT
From:         Marty Moleski
Subject:      Re: For Marty and Dennis

Daryll wrote:

> Can you help me out? I have been looking for that quote that you
> attribute to me. I was looking for it so I could tell in what context
> that it was made. Since you have the quote you must know where I can
> find it so I can refresh my memory.

Sorry.  I was operating from short-term memory, all of which has been dumped and reloaded while I was away.  I'll try to watch for the pattern I'm talking about and let you know when I see it.

> If the people (fellow Marshallese) who knew the eye-witnesses personally
> and had heard the same Earhart story from them (during their lifetime)
> and when they were asked if they believed the story and they replied
> that they did because the eye-witnesses that they knew were honest and
> trust worthy people in the community, seems to imply something of value.

Possibly--if the original eyewitnesses are correct, then testimony about the character of the eyewitnesses may be helpful.  This is how I understand the "apostolic character" of the Christian tradition, so I can't dispute the general principle.

> It might not fit into the strict definition of "Evidence" that the legal
> experts on this forum have argued before.

If there was only one eyewitness of sound character who claimed to have seen AE (or AE & FN) and if there were some other strand of evidence to back up the sighting, it might make an impressive argument.  But there seem to be dozens of eyewitnesses in many different locations, all of sterling character--some of them are Jesuits (or were until they died).  Given that context, something more is required than the claim that the late lamented eyewitness was an all-round good guy.

> History doesn't always have a
> camera, or a device that can record testimony to be reviewed years after
> the fact.

True.  But the fewer records there are the less compelling the argument is that we should take some deceased person's word at face value.

LTM.

Marty #2359
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 31 Jul 2003 12:07:55 EDT
From:         Bob Lee
Subject:      Re: The Secret Revealed

Right on Angus. Unless an unknown rescuer was willing to take them to safety in exchange for that wheel -- it would seem an exercise in mouse-milking to remove it.

I suspect that very little was done by AE/FN for the first few days other than trying to raise help via the radio. I think that they were unprepared for the destruction of the aircraft, and equally unprepared to switch from rescue thinking to survival thinking. Obvious speculation.

Bob
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 31 Jul 2003 12:09:02 EDT
From:         Marty Moleski
Subject:      Re: Bones and Mason

Dave Bush wrote:

> FWIW - I am a Mason and know of no use of bones in Masonic (AF&AM) rituals.

I don't know how to check on worldwide Masonic practices in the 1940s.

I've been inducted into two fraternities.  Both used bones in the induction rites.  In both I was sworn to secrecy about the rituals.  I would not expect the Masons, as a general rule, to publish the details of their inner workings for non-members to inspect.

> Also, we are not cannibals or atheists.

I hope that I did not imply either proposition in what I wrote.

LTM.
Marty #2359
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 31 Jul 2003 12:12:20 EDT
From:         Marty Moleski
Subject:      Re: The Secret Revealed

Ron Berry wrote:

> The wreck was and still is a focal point of the island, any air search would
> include a flyover to the wreck.  ...

My own totally amateur guess (TAG) is that AE & FN never expected an aerial search.  They were probably expecting the Itasca to ride to the rescue.

But I won't kill or die for this opinion.  Just flappin' my gums before returning to the 686 messages that accumulated while I was on retreat.

LTM.

Marty #2359
*******************************************************
From Ric

The only way AE and FN could have expected an aerial search is if they were able to receive news reports about their own disappearance and the Navy's efforts to find them- but it is entirely possible that they did.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 31 Jul 2003 12:13:07 EDT
From:         Paige Miller
Subject:      Dr. Know's game

Dagnabit, Dr. Know, you're about to tell everyone MY OWN theory, one that I have researched for years, and I warned you not to. Okay, I'll beat you to it, I will let everyone know my theory. Here it is ... AE had to make a water landing and floated with her airplane until she was near the Pacific coast of Paraguay. There, she was picked up by the Paraguyan navy, according to many witnesses, and interred in a jail in Ascuncion, until space aliens contacted her telepathically. The space aliens then performed a "skin transplant" on her, resulting in ... yes you guessed it, Irene Bolam. She also allegedly scrawled her initials AEP into the jail wall.

Where's my Jack Daniels?

--
Paige Miller #2565
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 31 Jul 2003 12:15:43 EDT
From:         Paige Miller
Subject:      Staying near the Norwich City

Bob says:

>I would
>think that a rescuer flying over the island would immediately
>concentrate on the wide reef and wreck area.

The only airplane that flew over Gardner -- flown by Lambrecht of the Colorado -- did no such thing. He circled the entire island.

--
Paige Miller #2565
LTM
**************************************************************
From Ric

There were, of course, three aircraft from the Colorado flown by Lambrecht, Fox and Short.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 31 Jul 2003 12:26:07 EDT
From:         Ross Devitt
Subject:      Re: Connecting The Dots

Angus wrote:

> What evidence is there she ever went to Nauru? A direct course to Howland
> from Lae is well over 100nm south of Nauru.

There's no hard evidence.  There was speculation because of the mention of the new very bright light on Nauru and the mine workings that would show up very distinctly (like a large city) in the night, that were both mentioned in the telegram to Lae, that she would have been crazy not to have used Nauru as a navigation waypoint, but that was thrashed to death a couple of years ago.

There was also some story that a ship had heard an aeroplane passing overhead I think, but I can't recall for sure.

Th' WOMBAT
****************************************************************
From Ric

The idea that Earhart diverted from the direct course to Howland to pass over Nauru was first advanced by ex-Pan Am navigator Paul Rafford and mentioned in the 1985 book "Amelia Earhart - The Final Story" by Vince Loomis and Jeff Ethel.  Nauru, not knowing Earhart's intended route and trying to be helpful, mentioned the new light along with the weather in a message sent to Earhart in Lae.  Rafford saw this as proof positive that Earhart detoured via Nauru.  The ship you're thinking of is the Myrtlebank which was south of Nauru and near Earhart's direct route to Howland.  It may have been the "ship in sight ahead" that Nauru radio heard Earhart mention.  Later, the First mate of the Myrtlebank claimed to have heard an airplane pass over that night.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 31 Jul 2003 12:28:20 EDT
From:         Suzanne
Subject:      How Forums Work

Ric, you don't have to post this joke, but I thought you might get a chuckle out of it!

(From Ric: I did and I will.)

How many forum users does it take to change a light bulb?

1 to change the light bulb and to post that the light bulb has been changed

14 to share similar experiences of changing light bulbs and how the light bulb could have been changed differently

7 to caution about the dangers of changing light bulbs

27 to point out spelling/grammar errors in posts about changing light bulbs

53 to flame the spell checkers

41 to correct spelling/grammar flames

6 to argue over whether it's "lightbulb" or "light bulb" ... another 6 to condemn those 6 as you-know-what retentive

2 industry professionals to inform the group that the proper term is "lamp"

15 know-it-alls who claim *they* were in the industry, and that "light bulb" is perfectly correct

156 to email the participant's ISPs complaining that they are in violation of their "acceptable use policy"

109 to post that this forum is not about light bulbs and to please take this discussion to a lightbulb forum

203 to demand that cross posting to hardware forum, off-topic forum, and lightbulb forum about changing light bulbs be stopped

111 to defend the posting to this forum saying that we all use light bulbs and therefore the posts *are* relevant to this forum

306 to debate which method of changing light bulbs is superior, where to buy the best light bulbs, what brand of light bulbs work best for this technique and what brands are faulty

27 to post URL's where one can see examples of different light bulbs

14 to post that the URL's were posted incorrectly and then post the corrected URL's

3 to post about links they found from the URL's that are relevant to this group which makes light bulbs relevant to this group

33 to link all posts to date, quote them in their entirety including all headers and signatures, and add "Me too"

12 to post to the group that they will no longer post because they cannot handle the light bulb controversy

19 to quote the "Me too's" to say "Me three"

4 to suggest that posters request the light bulb FAQ

44 to ask what is a "FAQ"

4 to say "didn't we go through this already a short time ago?"

143 to say "do a Google search on light bulbs before posting questions about light bulbs"

1 forum lurker to respond to the original post 6 months from now and start it all over again
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 31 Jul 2003 12:35:32 EDT
From:         John
Subject:      Re: CONNECT THE DOTS

My apologies to all for my initial wreck photo question which lead to the surfacing of Niki and lots of fuel for the forum. I guess it wasn't so bad. The forum was slow at that point anyhow. Say, IF the WOF is from AE's Electra, and can  be proven to be so, does the game end here or do we keep looking for more? I like to have as much evidence as possible before arresting someone, I'd hate to see this end when it is proven that AE and FN did land on Niku. That wouldn't be enough to stop the capture theorists who could still claim they were captured. In fact, if all we have is a wheel off the plane, they could still claim that the plane was recovered, sans wheel, and taken somewhere as well.

LTM, who is waiting to read the final chapter

John
*********************************************************************
From Ric

No matter what we find the Conspiracy Crowd will be able to work it into their scenario.  That's the beautiful thing about the conspiracy mindset - the truth is subservient to the theory.  Sometimes I think it's a form of mental illness.

Anyway - finding a "smoking gun" on Niku, whether it's a wheel or some other pieces of wreckage or an old hag who stumbles out of the bush muttering "Well it's about g--d--- time!", will only establish that we have the right place to continue our investigation into what really happened to Amelia Earhart.

LTM,
Ric
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 31 Jul 2003 12:38:05 EDT
From:         Ted Camppbell
Subject:      Re: The Secret Revealed

Have you ever tried to remove a tire and rim from the landing gear axle to change a tire?

I doubt they carried an axle nut wrench and as noted how do you jack the darn thing up off the ground?

*********************************************************
From Ric

Aside from the practical obstacles there would appear to be no motivation to even attempt such a thing.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 31 Jul 2003 12:44:08 EDT
From:         Carol Cow
Subject:      Comments on Useable Fuel

I'm talking to Elgen Long when I was in Atchison and Long says Earhart had the capacity to literally strip all the fuel out of the belly tanks and the left main and pump into the right main. I always wondered about that because up until now I really wasn't sure all the fuel the Electra was carrying was useable. There's usually a "bottom six" that won't pump from somewhere, but Long is saying the fuel system would literally strip it all out. What happened in the right main is another question because how are you going to feed to both engines from the right main? So, there was a crossover system.  An L-10E had to keep both engines turning because the props wouldn't feather. So both engines were critical. Thusly, the old axiom....don't turn into a dead engine....in Earhart's case it was double trouble. I remember looking at the fuel diagram some time ago (it's buried around here someplace), but there's no way to tell the location of the drain valves on the fuel tanks. You would have to see the actual airplane. You want to comment on the foregoing or over to the forum, etc? I actually enjoyed talking with Elgen Long even if I didn't agree with some of the things he is saying. The problem is to separate the fact from the fiction. Joe Klaas and I took turns attacking Elgen Long. Can you imagine that? I know you can't. Ric says, "oh Lord." Poor old Elgen he just lost his wife, and he's really hurting. He needs a wife for hire? Yuk, yuk, yuk. It ain't me.

All I would do is argue with the guy. Ric, you know someone who can cook?
Carol Dow
*****************************************************************
From Ric

No, I don't want to comment on any of the above except to say that you have graduated from harmlessly stupid to overtly offensive.  Goodbye Carol.
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 31 Jul 2003 12:46:33 EDT
From:         BTS
Subject:      Dr. Know No No No No

For Dr. Know

Even a Skeptic like me has to stop and say, "You can't be serious." I find your postings to be ridiculous in their entirety.

Mr. G. was right when he said you had underestimated the intelligence of the forum members.

Trust me 'Dr.', They're reeaally smart. They know their sh*t. I must admit, I too, can see no reason for you doing this. If you knew where NR16020 was located, and had half a brain, you'd go get it yourself and make millions in touring revenues.

Instead, you infiltrate this forum, leaving messages that are crypticly foolish, insulting the intelligence of some very learned people. If that's how you like to get your kicks, I guess more power to you.

But, I submit, if you had any realistic notion as to the location of this aircraft, you never would have joined this forum to begin with. In fact, I bet you joined this forum while surfing the web, looking for an update, on the biggest mystery of the 20th century.

Am I getting warm Dr.? Or should I check 5 degrees 54 minutes north?

BTS
Ben The Skeptic
=========================================================================


Date:         Thu, 31 Jul 2003 12:48:18 EDT
From:         Alan Caldwell
Subject:      Re: Staying near the Norwich City

> There were, of course, three aircraft from the Colorado flown by Lambrecht,
> Fox and Short.

This would be a good time to reiterate what you've pointed out before probably many times, Ric. From the photo taken during the 1937 fly by of Lambrecht and company it is clear they could not have seen very much from their position. You made that obvious by the helicopter flight around Niku in your video. Lambrecht's flight doesn't prove anything as far as I can see.

Alan
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Date:         Thu, 31 Jul 2003 12:51:26 EDT
From:         Bob Lee
Subject:      Re: Bones and Mason

My Grandfather was involved both as a Freemason and Knights Templar. My Mom recently told me about the meetings held at their house - very secret - not a word was spoken about them -- and this is the first time she had ever told me about them in 47 years! I have to guess that that level of secrecy is gonna be a bit hard to break through.

Why did she tell me about this? I had told her she should read 'The DaVinci Code' and she did....

Bob
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From Ric

For more, subscribe to the forum on this subject at cannibalmasons.com. (Just kidding.)  Let's get back on topic.