I tried to get into Crane, IN files, but was told that they would be transferred to National Archives shortly (that was back in 1995 or so). NARA has received the files, and is working on declassifying them. When last I checked, late last year, they were still not available to researchers. My information indicates that what was at Crane were the copies of all radiotelegrams throughout all the Navy, and not ONI files per se. Strangely, ONI files on AE are at NARA, and are quite innocuous. Other ONI files on (barely) related subjects are similarly innocuous, as Op18G at that time was largely a hollow structure, and well undermanned.

Does that mean that we are still waiting declassification of these ONI files sometime in 2000 ? That's consistant with Weinberger's reply to Goerner. How does your source know that the classified files contain only Navy radiotelegrams ? So I guess we just have to wait. It's hard to believe that a guy like Carrol F. Harris would conjure up pure baloney for the Earhart research with such tantalizing recollections but maybe he became influenced by Goerner's thoery. I'm going to pursue for a bit. My guess is Harris saw proposed intelligence opportunities prior to the flight but never implemented. ONI was busy then with what was going on with the Japanese buildup in the mandated islands, so not too far fetched.

LTM,
Ron Bright

Our search for the bones found on Nikumaroro in 1940 has hit a series of dead ends -- literally dead, in that most of the people involved in the discovery are now precisely that. The documentary record stops in 1941 -- at which time the bones were being held by Dr. D.W. Hoodless of the Central Medical School pending further direction from the High Commissioner.

We've heard a couple of times, though, about a John Eric Pery-Johnston, who was the Pathology Laboratory Technician at the time, and who might still be alive, probably in New Zealand. Today I got a letter from Sir Ian Thomson, who was Aide-de-Camp to High Commissioner Sir Harry Luke, and who has particularly urged us to pursue Pery-Johnston as the person most likely to know what happened to the bones. Sir Ian gives us a lot more particulars, to wit:

Name: John Eric Pery-Johnston
Born 1912
Diploma in Pathology and Bacteriology in the New Zealand State Health Department
Married
Technician in the Pathology Laboratory in Fiji in 1940-41

A couple of efforts to find Pery-Johnston in New Zealand in the past have failed, but we've never had this much information before. Volunteers????

LTM
Tom King

A call to arms....... We do have at least one member in NZ, the chap who found the file in Tarawa. He is back in NZ writing the book he was doing research for. Peter MacQuarrie. I will dig up his email address for you, Tom.

P

For Reynaud:

I don't think walls are a likely explanation for the "Seven." In prehistoric times there were walled structures in this part of Oceania, in fact as close as Hull Island, but they're quite visible as such on the surface -- not like buried Roman ruins that can be seen only from the air by the patterns they cause in vegetation growth. The same goes for walled structures built by guano miners in the 19th century -- some of which we recorded on McKean Island. On the other hand, the linearity of the "Seven" is very peculiar, and if the "ceramic" artifact turns out to be part of a prehistoric shell ornament, it could indicate that some kind of prehistoric structure caused the strange vegetation growth. It's certainly worth keeping in mind as a possibility.

LTM (who's pretty prehistoric)
Tom King

When I called Crane to discuss AE stuff, I was aware that they archived all radio message traffic from 1937. I did not inquire about other materials, as I was lead to believe from the Master Sergeant there that all they had was radio message traffic from that era. He may have been wrong about that. There may be some early ONI- related material about radio traffic interceptions from the Japanese, but I doubt seriously that ONI HQ material would be transferred there. One can look at available ONI material to discern whether there is other material (references, etc.) that may be classified, but my perusal of ONI papers indicates that all HQ stuff has been declassified and archived at NARA already. Now, I may be wrong (it has happened it the past, but only according to my wife...).

> From Ron Bright
>
> Does that mean that we are still waiting declassification of these ONI files
> sometime in 2000 ? That's consistant with Weinbergers reply to Goerner. How
> does your source know that the classified files contain only Navy
> radiotelegrams ? So I guess we just have to wait. .....

I hope you don't mind if I jump in here. I'm new to your forum. I'm enrolled in a continuing education class in Manchester, New Hampshire USA and am doing a research paper on AE. I was born a few years after Amelia died, and knew very little about her story before I began my research. I joined this forum to learn more.

I saw your post about the search for John Eric Pery-Johnston. It is an unusual name certainly, so I did a quick internet search. I don't know if the following will be useful to you, but if someone is willing to contact the person below, the name is odd enough that you may discover more information.

On an Australia web page listing the winners of a bicycle "Duathlon" I saw (abstract):

LOOK Winter Series Duathlon; Race 4
Category Results: Race 4 - September 19 1999
Venue Percival Park, Eagle Farm Brisbane
Ladies 25 to 29 Inclusive
15th 13 Karen Pery-Johnston 1:18:24. 0:15:48 14 0:45:10. 14 0:17:25.
Enquiries: Ray Event Management
Ph: 07 3268 6665 Fax: 07 3268 7002
email: david@rayevent.com.au

I further look in the Australia white pages and found the following:

Data Entered:
pery-johnston
Queensland
Capital City
Residential
Results:
Pery-Johnston K
21 Dunella St Sherwood 4075 (07) 3278 4308

Australia is after all only a few hours away from New Zealand. If someone in your group is willing to contact Karen Pery-Johnston, she may be a relative of the person you are seeking.

Janice Brown

I happened to run across the recent posts about the removal of the cabin window prior to AE/FN's departure from Miami, and I can't recall if anyone may have thought of this, but it dawned on me that when the RTW attempt was being made westbound, an optical window would probably have been necessary in the northern side (starboard) to take sun shots, since the sun would be predominantly on that (north) side of the airplane. With the direction reversed (eastbound), it was no longer necessary to have the window since the sunshots would probably be taken from the port side (still north), and so it was skinned over. The aluminum was probably lighter than glass, and stronger to boot, which would have been added incentives.

PS have you heard from Ric? How's the class going?

ltm
jon

We also speculated that it might be a good idea for the sun not to be streaming into that cabin in the tropics.... but the point of AL being much lighter than glass is an excellent one.

I heard from Ric last on Sunday night; he should call me this evening, out of the woods. The course went well, and he was pretty confident of the field school having met everyone. I'll let everyone know tomorrow.

Pat

The latest revelation about the 'ceramic' bit is certainly good news. At least we can now say, with some certainty, that the mystery bit here is man-made. What fragment of which object however will probably remain a mystery.

I'm not quite sure what the measurements of those projected circles were, as I have left my notes in England. However I'm sure that there could be a point along the circumfrence of the larger circle, that would be rotated 360 to describe a diameter of an inch thereabouts (This larger circle was projected from the small bit of curvature at the top of the object as seen from the photo6b.jpg).

The hard part is actually trying to guess where this would happen along the length of the supposed object, and if this length was indeed long enough to accommodate the bulb that is in TIGHAR's possession.

With this, you could possibly say that this is part of a light fixture, IF the projected dimensions and curvature correlate with a suspected object, namely the light bulb.

LTM
Charles Lim (who probably isn't making sense AND doesn't know what he's on about because he's having too much fun)