Somewhere in the Skies - Ben Mezrich: The 37th Parallel

Episode Date: August 20, 2017

On episode 19 of SOMEWHERE IN THE SKIES, Ryan pulls a fascinating interview out of the vault over at INTO THE FRAY RADIO. This interview finds Ryan speaking with NY Times Best-selling author, Ben Mezrich, about his book, The 37th Parallel: The Secret Truth Behind America’s UFO Highway, which chronicles the life and investigations of UFO researcher, Chuck Zukowski. Ben brings us on a deeply personal and fascinating journey into one man’s search for answers to the mysterious cattle mutilation phenomenon, UFOs, and even a possible conspiracy by Bigelow Aerospace. This all culminates into a path of uncertainty and mystery across America known as the 37th Parallel. Guest Bio: Ben Mezrich graduated magna cum laude from Harvard. He has published fifteen books, including the New York Times bestsellers The Accidental Billionaires, which was adapted into the Academy Award–winning film, ‘The Social Network’, and ‘Bringing Down the House’, which has sold more than 1.5 million copies in twelve languages and was the basis for the hit movie 21, and most recently the national bestseller ‘Once Upon a Time in Russia’. He lives in Boston.  Guest and Topic Suggestions, email [e-mail] Website: www.somewhereintheskies.com Twitter: @SomewhereSkies Order Ryan's Book by CLICKING HERE Listen to Into the Fray Radio by CLICKING HERE Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/somewhere-in-the-skies. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ordinary people are seeing extraordinary things in our skies. But how has it changed those involved? From author Ryan Sprague, Somewhere in the Skies, a human approach to an alien phenomenon, is a personal journey that also weaves together a story of stories, furiously pumping new blood into the heart of these mysteries, one experience at a time. Now available on Amazon in paperback and ebook.

For more information, visit Somewhere in the skies.com. This is Somewhere in the Skies with Ryan. Welcome to Summer in the Skies. I'm your host, Ryan Sprague. Today's episode is an oldie, for some, but for many, it's going to be brand new. I am in the middle of Nova Scotia right now. I just gave a presentation, so I'm not quite sure how good the internet's going to be for the next few days, but I did want to get this interview out and this episode out to you guys on time. I will then be going to Syracuse in the middle of upstate New York for camp where I will have no internet. So there was no possibility of getting this out to you guys on time.

So what I'm doing is pre-recording this. This is an old interview that I conducted on a different show, but it, again, will be brand new to a lot of you. This interview originally aired on Into the Frey Radio. Into the Frey is a brilliant podcast hosted by Shannon LaGro. Early on, Shannon connected with me and said she wanted to learn more about UFOs. And in turn, I wanted to learn more about Bigfoot and Loch Ness Monster, ghosts, all that weird shit that we all have an interest in, you know.

We joined forces, and for over 50 episodes of Into the Fray, the Master of Dark Arts himself, Mr. Sam Sheeran and I, we would sporadically come on and discuss many different topics with Shannon. It was some of the funnest times I've ever had talking about these things. Shannon, she also gave us an outlet to really dive deeper into our specialties for Sam. It was a lot more of the paranormal, the ghost, the darker side of all this. For me, it was clearly UFOs. Shannon started a shoot-off, which was called Into the Frey Auxiliary.

And I was fortunate enough to get to interview the person you're about to hear, and that is Ben Mesrick. And he talks all about his book, The 37th Parallow, The Secret Truth Behind America's UFO Highway. So a little about bad Ben Mesrick, he graduated Magna Cum Laude from Harvard, so he is us. smart dude. He has published 18 books, including the New York Times bestsellers, the accidental billionaires, which was adapted into the Academy Award-winning film, The Social Network, and he also wrote Bringing Down the House, which has sold more than 1.5 million copies in 12 languages and was the basis for the hit movie 21. Most recently, he wrote the national bestseller Once Upon a Time in Russia. Today we'll be talking about

the 37th parallel. Like I mentioned, this is a series of, interview originally aired on Into the Frey Auxiliary, but Shannon was so nice to allow me to share it with all of you today on somewhere in the skies. It is by far one of my favorite interviews to date about some of the most compelling UFO

connections ever brought forward. Through the lens of UFO researcher Chuck Sikowsky. Some of you may be familiar with this guy. He's a cattle mutilation researcher, a UFO researcher, and just one of the nicest guys I've ever met. So, let's get to the interview. Please

Check out Into the Frey Radio at Into The Frayradio.com. It's available on all podcatchers, including this interview. But I'm going to share it with all of you today here on the show who may not have heard of Into the Prey. Definitely check it out. And I hope you enjoy my talk with Ben Mezric, all about the 37th parallel. I'm here today with Ben Mezric, author of The 37th Parallel, The Secret Truth Behind America's UFO Highway. Thanks for joining us today, Ben. Oh, thank you for having me.

I got to ask. your extensive list of books and the topics you've covered. I'm sure many others have asked you this as well. What sort of veered you towards UFOs this time? And in particular, the story of Chuck Sukowski. Yeah, you know, I never set out to write about UFOs. I don't have any personal experience with it and I didn't know much about the phenomenon. I basically heard about Chuck from a Hollywood producer, a guy named Bo Flynn, who had done the movie San Andreas, who was a UFO enthusiast, I guess you'd call him. And he said, have you heard of this guy, Chuck is a reserve sheriff's deputy in Colorado who'd been fired from the sheriff's department after investigating a cattle mutilation? And, you know, that was intriguing enough for me to meet with him. And I was just blown away by the story. And, you know, I thought I'd be writing about one guy's obsession with this crazy world. But as I sort of dug into the story, I found that there's a lot in this world that hasn't been covered well. A lot of stories that nobody's really dug into. and I was just kind of amazed by it all.

And so I sort of went down that rabbit hole. Yeah, we'll definitely touch on that aspect of the way the mainstream perceives these topics. What did your publisher think, Ben, when you brought this idea of writing the book about UFOs? I mean, how much say do they really have in your, I guess, quote unquote, creative process? You know, they have a lot of say in terms of whether they'll actually publish something or not. Right. I didn't really talk to them until I'd already written up a proposal. I sold the movie and the book pretty much at the same time.

So it was the kind of situation where, you know, once I had the whole story, they were pretty blown away by it. You know, it isn't what you necessarily might think. It's more about Chuck's journey into this world, about this whole idea of the 37th parallel and about, you know, Roswell and all of these kind of unexplained. things that kind of touch a chord. And I think we're in a moment in history when people are becoming much more open to this idea than they used to be. So overall, you know, the publisher was very much behind it. Oh, that's great to hear. It gives us a, I saw the writers out there hope that these topics will get their due diligence, as it were. Did you, did you have any interest in UFOs prior

to this? I certainly early in my career. I worked with the X-Files television show. I have a book for them a long time ago. So I, you know, I knew a little bit about the world, but no, I wouldn't say, I really just thought it was a bunch of crazy people out in cornfield seeing things. I really didn't know anything about, you know, the data. I didn't know about the connection with nuclear bases, for instance. I didn't really know the story behind Roswell. I didn't know anything about cattle mutilation. I'd heard nothing about that. Living on the East Coast, you've never even heard of it here. So it was all kind of new to me. I came in it as an outsider, and my goal in this book was to introduce it to people who don't necessarily know about it. So a lot of this book is,

you know, to people who probably, you know, people like you, people who follow, you probably know this stuff way better than I did going into this. But my goal was to sort of open it up to a bigger mainstream audience. Yeah. And it was really cool. Absolutely. I mean, the book is, it's very digestible. I sort of went into it trying to, let's take the men in black, memory eraser, for instance. Trying to start fresh, you know, like if I had never heard of this, if I had these preconceived notions of what UFOs are or aren't or the people who experience them.

And you did such a wonderful job of making it, not mainstream, but making it digestible for those who are just getting introduced to the topic. I mean, there's so much information out there about UFO's bad information, I have to say that it's easy to get sort of swallowed into it all and not know where to go, where to turn. And I think something like this, by following one man's journey, was the way to go. And I knew Chuck personally before I had even heard about you writing this book, and I was so excited to hear that it was about his investigations, because I've talked to him many times about what he was doing, what he was out there doing.

And it was sort of a dream for many of us UFO researchers, us armchair researchers, who sit at our desks sifting through headlines and this and Mufon reports. Chuck's out there, boots on the ground investigating. Could you tell us a little about your first impressions of Chuck and how you begin to sort of craft this narrative around him? Sure. I mean, when I first met Chuck, you know, I flew out to Colorado when he met me at the Denver airport and he strapped a bulletproof vest on me and gave me a gun.

They were going out at UFO hunting, and at first I thought he was a little crazy. I got to know him pretty well. You know, he's actually pretty logical guy. He has a science background, which is a microchip engineer when he wasn't being a sheriff. And he's a really great guy. He's very talkative. He's a believer. You know, he calls himself a reformed skeptic.

I don't know if he was ever really that skeptical. He's certainly willing to believe, certainly more than I was at the time. I like the fact that his wife is not a believer. You know, she's skeptical of all of it, and he's not just trying to convince the world that UFOs are real, but he's trying to convince his wife as well. And he's a real outdoors kind of intense individual who's not fearful of anything. And he's very good at talking to the sort of ranchers, the people who don't really like talking to outsiders and people who are off, you know, whose cattle have been mutilated and things like that. He approaches everything the way sort of a cop would approach it, and he's looking for evidence, and he's very detailed over. oriented and very smart. My impression him was very good. He's obsessed, but he's not crazy. So it's

kind of that line between going too far with something and, you know, just trying to find the truth. And so I was very impressed by him. Yeah, that's a really good point. That line is so distinct when it comes to obsession and, you know, interest and curiosity, especially when you trip on pretty interesting things like Chuck has, which we'll definitely get into. You did mention earlier about Roswell, sort of the inception of the modern UFO era, that and the foo fighters phenomenon. This case, Roswell, it refuses to die, Ben, both for us in the UFO community and I'm sure for those outside of it. It's the one you always hear about and the one that never goes away. What are your personal beliefs about what happened in 1947 and Roswell, Mexico?

go. Well, I mean, I definitely, you know, I went into it not knowing anything about Roswell. My impressions of Roswell were the kitschy, you know, dress up as an alien and go to the ball and go eat in a flying saucer restaurant and that kind of thing. But the real facts of Roswell, I think, are very compelling. You know, you have, you know, an Air Force base, which is one of our first nuclear bases that housed the planes that went to Japan, to bomb Japan. And they track something going through a storm in the middle of the night. Whatever that was crashes on a field leaving 300 yards of

metallic debris that's supposedly covered in hieroglyphics. The Air Force sends over personnel who then put out a press release saying we have in our possession a flying saucer and they rescind their own press release and then they fake a photograph with a weather balloon

and then they move all the debris to Area 51. It's an amazing story, one that hasn't fully ever been clarified. There are still documents this day talking about the unidentified debris. The Air Force has this debris. And so it's a real mystery, you know, and there's never been sort of a resolution to it. The idea that it's a weather balloon is a joke. There's no way it's a weather balloon. The one theory that, you know, the other theory about a flying saucer sent by the Russians,

which is an intriguing theory doesn't explain why it's got to be kept a secret, why the files can't come out, why the debris can't come forward. There's no reason why the debris wouldn't still be in existence. There's no reason to get rid of it. So it's obviously still there, even if it was a weather balloon. You would think they would just bring it out. And so I feel it's a very compelling thing, and it's hard to sort of turn away from. I think it's to me, it's the one event that I think really speaks to the idea that something came here from somewhere else.

And then you tie it into the foo fighter phenomenon. You know, the foo fighter phenomenon in the 1940s during World War II, American and UK and Japanese pilots as well, were seeing these fireballs that were flying alongside the planes. When you turn towards them, they would turn away or they'd disappear and then they'd come back. it was covered in the New York Times, cover of the New York Times, an article saying, what are these food fighters? Are they some weird German weapon? And then we captured the German scientists after World War II, and we asked them what these were, and they said they didn't know what they were either.

And Roswell comes right on the heels of that. So it really speaks to the idea that something was going on in the 40s. Now, I don't know since then, obviously, there's been tons and tons of sightings. There's been many more fireballs seen. There's been thousands of sort of witness accounts. But I feel like those, you know, the foo fighter to Roswell is to me the most definitive case where you really have a fair amount of evidence. You have something that the government certainly has and for some reason covered up.

And it's, to me, is the most compelling evidence that we've been visited. That's a great point. Yeah. I mean, the 40s were ripe with this. You had almost a UFO hysteria. I mean, even the Kenneth Arnold incident, which you bring up briefly as well. I mean, this was all happening at the same time, and you have to wonder. Right.

It all ties together, and it's all documented, and we're talking about the Air Force, talking about a first nuclear base. We're talking about a lot of sort of things that come together that make you wonder if this was this moment, you know, and what it could be we don't really know, but for some reason the Air Force decided to cover it up. And this was also a moment in time when the Air Force was very good at first. covering things up. This is what the government did. This was the time period of the Manhattan project, which was the largest cover-up in history. 100,000 people were involved in making the atomic bomb, of which only 15 knew what they were actually doing. And, you know, whole towns were built in secret. Secret cities, you know, were put together. There was the Office of Censorship,

which actually eliminated the words nuclear and atomic from the English language. It would take it out of newspapers and magazines. They even took it out. out of Buck Rogers comic books. So there was a real sort of censorship in place at the time. There was an ability to cover things up in place in the late 40s and early 50s, the likes of which we don't have today. So something could be kept secret then that would be harder to keep secret today. So I don't know.

I mean, it really does speak to the idea that something happened. And for whatever reason got caught up in this veil of secrecy and has remained there. Yeah, it's sort of a snowball effect from there. Once you start the lie from the beginning, like, how do you unravel that? They're not going to come forward and admit they've been lying for 50, what, almost 60 years now. Right, right. So it just stays, you know, this hidden thing. Yeah, dug your own hole, Air Force, for sure.

So, Ben, let's get a little back to the core of the book. The cattle mutilation phenomenon was something I always veered away from in my own personal UFO research because, A, like you mentioned, I'm from the East Coast. I live in New York City. And it seemed so infrequent here on the East Coast to ever hear about cattle mutilations. You know, maybe back in the 80s, I believe it was like nightline or dateline

that did like one small special on it. But in your research with Chuck and just in general, this phenomenon is much more prevalent than I thought. Could you tell us a little bit about what the cattle mutilation phenomenon is and why you decided to focus on that in terms of Chuck's own investigations?

Sure. Well, you know, since basically the 60s, but even earlier, more than 10,000 cows and horses have been found lying on their left side, usually missing organs. The cuts are all circular and they look surgical, and the animals are completely drained of blood. You know, there's no blood at the scene. There's no blood in the bodies. There's no witnesses, no footprints, no fingerprints. No one's ever been arrested and no one's ever been caught doing it. in the 70s, it got so bad that three state governors got together and petitioned the Attorney General of the United States demanding an investigation.

And the FBI investigated, used over 100 agents, and came to no conclusions. They found nothing. No one's ever been arrested. So it's this very wide-reaching phenomenon in multiple states spanning 60 years that no one can figure out. And, you know, whether it's related to some weird biotesting or some cults, you know, was one theory or a biker gang was another theory. It's so vast. And the idea of these animals drained of blood, it's just very creepy. You know, Chuck believes it's connected to UFOs. There's often sightings in the same area.

The ranchers who see this happening always speak about things in the sky and then they think that there's a UFO component. It's a weird one and no one can figure it out. And, you know, it's something that hasn't really been covered very well. Every now and then you'll see an article here or there, but you won't see any major mainstream, you know, journalists looking into it. And it's just one of those things. And I was captivated by it just because it's so wide-reaching. And you talk to these ranchers and they're traumatized. You know, their animals are mutilated in a very horrible fashion.

Right. And to them, it's a very big deal, obviously, because they live and die by these animals. it's part of, you know, their livelihood. So it's really kind of a stunning thing. And nobody really knows what's going on with it. Yeah, I mean, that is such a good point. Like, this isn't just, you know, we sort of the carnivores in the world see cows as, you know, nothing but livestock is, you know, a way of consumption.

But this is the livelihood of these people. And not only that, they have such a connection with the animals as well that, of course, course it's going to be traumatizing. And when you're losing hundreds of thousands of dollars of your, you know, quote unquote product, I can only imagine it's, this could put people out of business. And the fact that it's a complete mystery, of course that needs to be investigated. And someone like Chuck, who is a deputy sheriff, is the one to sort of do that when no one else will look into it or try to find answers. In tracking the investigations that Chuck did, did you, um, What did you find most challenging when you were following him on these sort of journeys, Ben?

What challenged you the most in what Chuck was doing? Well, yeah, it's interesting. I mean, there's a couple things going on. First of all, when you try to look into this from an outside perspective, one of the problems is people who are too willing to believe. You know, there's a mistake of not believing enough, but there's a mistake of believing too much. So it's all about the credibility factor.

I mean, which of these events, which of these things that Chuck looks at, can you look at and say, okay, this is a real mystery, or which do you look at and say, okay, they're just looking for something, you know, because you're searching for patterns all the time. That's what the human brain does. And if you're not careful, you're going to see things in the middle of the night

that aren't really there. And Chuck does that too, and it's interesting, you know, certain things he eventually figures out, okay, this was just fireworks, you know, or this was just that. And then I think that that's an important part of it. But difficulty, you know, ranchers don't like to talk to people on the outside.

They're embarrassed by what they saw, They're afraid of being looked at as crazy, so it's hard to sort of get into some of these investigations. And then there's the idea that none of this is taken seriously. No real major scientist can look into a cattle mutilation, for instance, without being ridiculed. People lose their jobs, just like Chuck did. It's tricky for people to really get into this. And so, you know, you have to look at it and know that most of the people who are looking at it people who are already willing to risk their careers or are coming from sort of a different

place. So it's tricky, you know, coming at it and trying to figure out what's credible and what's not credible. But, but yeah, I mean, it's fascinating. It's very untouched. You know, the whole thing is just a wide open thing right now. So I found it fascinating, yeah. Yeah, absolutely.

I mean, you could even mirror that to the UFO phenomenon. We strive so much to be taken seriously by the scientific community. but in a way you can't blame them for not not. I mean, we have the scientific method. You need repeatability. And when these quote unquote UFOs are blinking in and out, there's no way to track that, to analyze that. So it's frustrating when, you know, the UFO researchers want them to look into this,

but they're being honest. They really can't. There are some groups, however, who do, and we will definitely get into that. One of the most interesting things about the book, Ben, is we get to the point of view of different people throughout the book, which I think you do very well, mostly Chuck, but also his sister Tammy. And one of the most interesting was that of a billionaire with an interest in UFOs. Could you tell us a little about Robert Bigelow and what attracted you to including him in your narrative? Yeah, so Robert Bigelow is a really interesting individual. I know he's a name that people in the UFO community know well.

Well, Bigelow is a reclusive billionaire. He made his money in real estate, you know, founded budget suites of America and grew his fortune from there. He's always had a lifelong interest in UFOs. You know, he's a believer. In his younger days, he set out to use his money to attempt to put together scientists to prove or disprove the existence of UFOs. He built something called the National Institute of Discovery Science, which was housed in Las Vegas, which he put together some real chemists and biologists and ex-FBI. agents and their goal was to really track down and understand what was going in the world of

UFOology. Then it gets a little murkier. He starts to have a connection with Mufon, which is the nationwide kind of grassroots UFO investigation movement. He funded their star teams for a while until he stopped. And then he kind of made a career change and he launched a Bigelow Aerospace, which is a major aerospace company. They make pieces for the International Space Station. They had a piece on the last, space-ex launch, not the one that blew up, but the one before that. They make the trans hab, which is the inflatable rooms that attach to the space station. But still, he conducts UFO investigations. It turns out that the FAA, you know, the American organization that

controls all of our civilian pilots, in their manual, if a pilot sees something, they don't report it to the FAA, they don't report to the U.S. government, they report it to Bigelow. Bigelow sends out his own team to investigate. And all of the that information is kept private. Fico has all these private files on UFO studies. You know, there are conspiracy theories who believe that, you know, he's found something that he's reverse engineering stuff. That's what Chuck believes.

But it's very mysterious. You know, it's a private billionaire who is essentially at the forefront of UFO investigations. He's taken over for the government in terms of investigating. And he's, you know, the center of the whole sort of, you know, he's well-funded. he knows what he's doing he has scientists on staff he runs labs that will analyze stuff um and nobody knows what he's doing with all of this information but he has it under his own control so he's a fascinating guy it's it's an incredible company um and what they're up to nobody really knows right you know and you even touch briefly on his his purchasing of the skinwalker ranch in utah very mysterious place

you know we've talked about it briefly on our show but so much just weird stuff going on there everything from UFOs to cryptids to just everything you could possibly think of. So very interesting that he would purchase this place. I know it was sold at one point and only a few days ago it came forward that he purchased it again. So you got to wonder what is this guy doing? What's he trying to either contain or investigate? And you mentioned even in the book, you know, Chuck saw the front of Bigelow's building where you have a half gray alien face on it.

Like, why? You know, what is that about? I mean, he's not making it hidden that he's interested in this topic that he has been for a very long time. It's just a question of what is his interest? What is he doing with this information? And, yeah, Skinwalker Ranch is really fascinating. You know, he owns it. He closed it down and put a bunch of scientists within it who have been studying it for a long time

and are uncovering really interesting things. But, yeah, nobody really knows what he's up to, what he's trying to do. and where he's going with all of it. In terms of what Bigelow might be doing, you mentioned that he has scientists on staff, ones that analyze things brought to them. One of the most fascinating stories in the book is when Chuck and Bigelow's world sort of collide.

Chuck did a dig out at Roswell. He found something. And could you tell us a little bit more about this episode, Ben, about what he found and what ended up happening to the fragment that he discovered? Sure. So Chuck did a archaeological dig. at Roswell. It was part of a sci-fi channel shoot, but the sci-fi channel was kind of doing a

fake dig. You know, they would have to dig down so deep that they were digging in dinosaur era rather than in the 1940s. And Chuck managed to convince the archaeologist to charge to let him dig at the proper place. He had the coordinates that he'd gotten from the mortuary, the one who had provided the coffins supposedly the Air Force back in 1947. And when Chuck did his dig with his sister, he found a little piece of metallic material that matched the description from the debris at the time. And then Chuck essentially put out a press release and said, is there anybody out there who wants to help me, you know, analyze this piece of material? And he was contacted by Bigelow's people. A Bigelow scientist contacted him and said, we'll take a look at it. So we sent

this piece of material over to Bigelow's labs. And they ran a, you know, a study on it. And they came back to Chuck saying, you know, it doesn't match anything in our known database of materials. That's not to say it's an alien thing, but we don't know what it is and it needs more research, and then they cut off all contact. And that was the moment that sort of sent Chuck over the edge a little bit. He became, you know, a little bit obsessed and wanting to know why they wouldn't respond to him, what they were doing with his stuff, where it all went from there. But yeah, it was sort of just, how bigelow people work. They'll look into something and then kind of

just vanish. Yeah. And it's just kind of a wild sort of scenario of what is going on. Very wild. I mean, in terms of that, Ben, did you personally experience anything, you know, strange or odd when you were following Chuck on his journey? Any

X-Files to bring forward? No, not personally. You know, I've never seen a UFO. I've never had an experience that like Chuck has fairly often. for me it's just not something that I've ever kind of run into I write a lot of very controversial crazy books my last book was about Russian oligarchs

so I'm not you know if somebody was following me I would have to look through a list of the people who might be following me right you know the UFOs would only be one on a list so it's it's not something I really noticed I really don't have any idea but I do know that Chuck certainly feels like he's been followed that people interested in what he's been doing and he's fairly nervous about things.

But yeah, it's pretty wild. Yeah, there's definitely a lot going on in terms of cover-ups in terms of government interest in this and all of that. It's pretty clear that there have been multiple cover-ups in time. But I myself haven't really run into anything crazy. Right. That was actually going to be my next question. What do you make of the whole paranoia aspect of maybe the UFO community,

you know, in terms of the book? you know, Chuck becomes a little paranoid. His sister has a very interesting experience, which will leave for the readers. But yeah, what do you make of the whole idea of paranoia in terms of mixing it in with this whole UFO thing? Are UFO researchers being monitored by the government? Is this just, you know, wishful thinking on their part?

What do you make of that whole thing? I mean, it's a great question. You know, there's no question that there have been cover-ups, and there's no question that Roswell was the event of a major cover-up. Yeah. But yeah, I think that, listen, there are people who are just overly paranoid and there are people who have raised interest. Certainly, if you try and walk into Area 51, you're going to get arrested and you're going to get looked into. And I do think that certainly in the 50s, with the world being what it was, people were followed and people were, there were tabs on people.

You know, I don't think that there's any nefarious organization that says, okay, this guy's getting too close to the UFO truth. I think that the whole idea of UFOs is so easily mocked, that there's no need for anyone to do anything nefarious because you can just make fun of people. I mean, no one's going to take you seriously. Even if you found, you said, I have an alien in my basement. No one's going to take you seriously. And the government knows this full well. I do think things are kept hidden, not necessarily for bad reasons.

You know, conspiracies aren't always bad. Sometimes people keep secrets for very good ones. reasons. And there might be a very good reason to keep this stuff secret. I think it's interesting, you know, the Hillary Clinton thing where she recently was on Jimmy Kimmel and she said one of her goals in office would be to get these files opened up. And, you know, she was also asked in an earlier conference if she believed that we've been visited and she said she wouldn't be surprised. And this is a woman who has been closer than any of us have been to that information. You know, her husband was the president, tried to get these files as well. She was Secretary of State. I mean, these are

These people know way more than we know. And if she's willing to believe, I think anyone should be willing to believe. But it's interesting. I do think there are cover-ups. I don't think there's this nefarious, murderous government out to get people because they're talking about UFOs. I don't think that's necessary, but it does feed into people's paranoia. Look, we're all being watched all the time.

I think, you know, the Snowden stuff, the NSA stuff, it's very clear that they've been gathering information on everybody for decades. That's just what the government does. That's what the NSA is there for. For good reasons, for the most part, they want to do it to try and keep people safe. Whether UFO knowledge comes up on that list or not, I couldn't tell you. I think Area 51 knowledge certainly does. If you're looking into military bases, I'm sure someone is looking at you, you know, and things like that.

Often, a lot of these things are Black Ops military projects. You know, one of the things that Bigelow uncovered in the 80s, the majority of the 90s, the majority of the 9th, I guess. The majority of sightings at the time were these giant black triangles. They were called big black deltas. Bigelow scientists came to the conclusion that those were actually this secret military air force project to build hyperkinetic blimps, these giant football seal-sized blimps that could fly at immense speeds. So this was a secret Air Force project. I'm sure that if you were trying to get to the bottom of that project, they were keeping tabs on you. because, you know, they don't want that secret to get out.

And I think that's true for a lot of these things. You know, you're seeing the testing of some sort of stealth aircraft, and the government's going to keep tabs on that. So, yeah, I don't think it's unrealistic to believe that you might be being followed if you're looking deeply into Air Force projects. But if you're, you know, saying, hey, I believe there's an alien there, I think the government would be less likely to give you problems. Because, you know, they know you're not going to be believed.

They know no one's going to buy it. So they don't have to worry about you. And there's a great scene in the story where Chuck was followed at Area 51. These two military personnel followed him up there. And when he confronted them, they basically said, you're just a UFO nut. And so to them, that's not really a threat. And so that's intriguing. Yeah, but I don't discount the idea that they're following people and looking into it.

I just think it's not this nefarious, you know, scary thing. I think you just have to expect that people listen to you. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it seems like some of these radical believers are sort of their own worst enemies. But like you just said, they can also be used as a great defense in Chuck's case, where he was considered the pinnacle UFO nut and got him off Scott Free going to Air 51 for sure. And he embraces that whole idea of being a nut because he knows it keeps him safe.

Yeah. And it keeps the idea out there that if you saw something, well, tell it to Chuck, you know. And that's really what he wants. He wants to be the guy you call up because you know he's kind of crazy about this stuff. And then that makes it easier for him to get his information. Yeah. And I mean, he's been to the ringer so much. You mentioned earlier he was fired from his job.

Like, what do you have left to lose at that point? You know, your own wife doesn't believe you. Your job lets you go. You're so entrenched in this. Like, what do you have to lose by being the UFO nut? Exactly. Yeah. It's interesting.

Chuck's such a nice guy, and he is level-headed. I mean, let's not get that wrong. While he is a believer, he's extremely objective. He doesn't believe that everything is connected to aliens, for sure. But, yeah, you do such a good job of crafting the, uh, the quote-unquote character of Chuck. So definitely want to give you kudos on that. Ben, why do you think the mainstream has such an issue with taking this topic of UFO seriously? Why is there that X-Files music behind every news coverage of it, that smirk the side-out glance?

Is it part of that whole ridicule factor from above? Just make fun of it and the truth will never get out there. You know, your book is a mainstream book. You're a New York Times best-selling author. I mean, that's going to open the doors for this topic. Obviously, the serious researchers out there have to commend you on that. But why do you think it's not taken seriously? I'm sure you yourself have experienced some ridicule in your book tour and with your interviews.

Why? Why is this the case? Yeah, I mean, I think it's interesting. You know, so I think originally it probably was more on purpose, you know. Back in the 40s and the 50s, when sightings happened, the Air Force would send, you know, Air Force personnel to these UFO symposiums to these sites. They would give interviews and say, yeah, I don't know what that is. You know, they would make it as much sort of, they knew it was mocked. knew that they could sort of use that to cover up whatever it is they were doing. But I think initially it was on purpose. It became such an impossible to believe scenario. And then Hollywood

had a lot to do with it. In current years, things like the X-Files and things like that. Everyone knows about it. Everyone talks about it, but it's just considered kind of a joke. It's kind of you know, crazies and wildness and people see stuff. And I think it's just sort of a defense mechanism for people. You don't know what the heck it is you're seeing, so it's easy just to say, okay, little green men, that sort of thing. And so scientists themselves can't really look at it seriously

without getting laughed at it in Ma. So it sort of just builds on itself. I think things are changing. You know, 30 years ago, people didn't believe the idea in life on other planets. That seemed just, you know, farcical. There's no way there can be life anywhere but here. But now we pretty much everyone believes

that somewhere out there, there's probably life. You know, we're finding light Earth-like planets all the time and people used to believe it's way too far away. You know, the distances are too vast. And now we don't believe that anymore either.

We know that some of these stars are not that far away and we could probably reach some of them with current technology. So those ideas are definitely changing and I think the idea of visitation will slowly become more and more believable. But, you know, there's just always going to be

this jokey factor to it. You know, you watch ancient aliens, which is really fun to watch. But the majority of people watching that show are, you know, either stoned or make fun of it, which is totally fine. And that doesn't make it any worse to show, but it's not something taken seriously. You know, you don't have symposiums at Harvard around it. Or if you do, they're not well attended. But I think that that stuff will change when the government releases files that will change people's minds about that. I do think we're reaching a point where some of this evidence will come forward and will change all of this.

I think it's just unlikely that we're going to stay like this for much longer because people do believe in the sciences they just won't talk about it. You know, I talk to a lot of aeronautic engineers who are believers, people at NASA who are believers, pilots who are believers, Air Force personnel who are believers, politicians who are believers. There's a lot of people who believe who just can't really talk about. it in public because they risk losing their jobs. You know, so I think that will change. It's not so bad that it's kind of mocked because it allows sort of people to talk about it, you know, without having to risk things. Yeah. But eventually I think that will change and I think people will, you know, the word will eventually get out. That's a great point. Are there any cases, Ben, that you feel within

euphology should be like at the front and center as this consciousness sort of converges into belief. What cases would you say someone should look at if they're just getting into this of possible visitation? Well, I mean, Roswell obviously is something that, you know, but it's been written about millions and millions of times. It's not a new thing. I think the Randlesham Forest thing in England is a definitely very intriguing, interesting story that hasn't really, you know, been covered very well. Dulcy Mountain is, there's a lot written back and forth about it. Most likely, I think it's just a military base of some sort,

which we won't ever get information about. But that's something people look into. You know, it's the kind of thing where, you know, whenever there's a sighting, there should be some sort of official investigation to a conclusion. And that's what's really missing. You know, you'll see,

there'll be some sort of weird thing in the sky that a hundred people will report, it'll be covered by the news, and then it just goes away. Yeah. You know, nobody looks at it. Nobody comes to it. A week later, you don't hear what it was,

and that's kind of what's missing, is this real investigation afterwards. Look, if there was a shooting and a hundred people witnessed it, there would be a trial and someone would go to jail. That would be enough. A hundred witnesses is more than enough

to convict someone of murder. So 100 witnesses should certainly be enough to inspire an investigation into a sighting. And so I think those things need to be covered well. So, yeah, I mean, you know, who knows. But I don't have any real answers for anybody, but I do think there's just enough evidence out there to at least push it in that direction.

Yeah, so that's, yeah. Absolutely. And I mean, well, I said earlier, Ben, I'm a screenwriter and playwright here in New York, but by trade, but I've sort of always been interested in UFOs. You've taken this approach in your writing where it's very interesting. I remember hearing you speak about the film version already being in development for the book, and you cater your writing of the book to this future endeavor.

Has your process of writing changed it all by using this new approach of kind of looking ahead before you've even created? It's very intriguing, and I would assume that's where the business in the market is going in terms of being a professional writer. Right. You know, so I've always wanted to write both books and movies. I've never wanted a book just to be a book. So whenever I sit down to write a project, I won't write it if I don't think there can be a movie involved. Ever since, I did the movies 21 and the social network. And ever since those projects, I've been in a position where I can sell the movie before I write the book. So I've actually, all the last eight books that I've done, I've sold his movies before I sold the book. I put together a 14 to 20 page proposal. and that's the selling tool. And so the movie is already set up, 37th Parallels set up at New Line with the producers that did San Andreas and the upcoming Baywatch. And that allows a screenwriter be brought in early. You can be developing the movie while you write the book.

I just think there's this synergy between books and movies now. Most good movies are either based on a book or a comic book. You don't have, you know, there's no real separation anymore. So I feel like that's for me always been, I don't think my, writing has changed. I've always, for better or worse, been a very visual writer. And I've always wanted to write, even nonfiction. I write nonfiction, but I write it like a movie or like a thriller. And I certainly get critiqued for it. There are definitely critics who don't like the way I write nonfiction. But, you know, I just feel like it's a really good way to tell a story. And a movie

brings you a much bigger audience, obviously. It allows you to sort of tell the story in a different way. and it gives other people a chance to weigh in as well. And I just think it's a really great sort of way to tell a story. And I think if it can't be a good movie, then it can't be a good book. There's no reason why you could write a great book that shouldn't also be a movie. I mean, there's just plenty of projects, you know, that can be both. So that's what I do, yeah. Absolutely.

And I mean, like you said, you've now brought this topic into a mainstream publishing house in a mainstream movie studio, like, that's what it needs, and you've done that. How is the feedback been with the 37th parallel so far? Yeah, so it's, you know, the book kind of came out of the gate very fast and explosive. It's doing very well. A lot of people seem to take to it. I think, you know, it's opened itself to a big audience.

You know, it's not to say that everyone who picks it up as a believer or comes out a believer, but a lot more people, you know, have come to me saying, you know, I got to tell you, I never really tell anybody, but I saw something or my mom saw something. I get that so often now. And so it's really intriguing to me that this phenomenon touches way more people than people realize. It's been very a positive thing. I've been very happy to be embraced by the UFO community. That was something I didn't necessarily expect because coming from the outside.

Often I write about topics that I'm an outsider of, and often you get attacked by people in the community who don't like an outsider coming in. this has been different. This has been embraced. I think people have been very happy that I'm trying to bring this to a mainstream audience, even though it can seem very basic to people who really know what they're talking about. I've read most of these stories before. They understand what I'm trying to do. But it's been really amazing. There's been a lot of emails and a lot of comments on, and, you know, I'm on Twitter, so I get to see a lot of it, which has been great. Yeah, I think it's been an awesome. launch. So it's a topic that really touches a lot more people than I realize. And, you know, you expect it to be just crazy people who live in the Midwest, and that's not what it is. It's really people from all walks of life who are really intrigued by the idea of UFOs. And so it's been very positive. That's great to hear. Yeah. I mean, there's so much material out there on this topic that is just God all. My advice to people in the industry are thinking of writing books about it are thinking of getting involved is the whole key, I think, to this phenomenon is to take it

as seriously as you can. What I mean by that is, you know, sometimes you're interviewing someone about something they saw and they can sound very credible and they have really, you know, an interesting experience that obviously was real to them. But then they go off on tangents about Bigfoot and ghosts and all these other things. And that's going to be a lot harder for the mainstream to accept. Yes. You know, you have to focus. on the thing that is most easily rational, you know, is the most rational. I think the UFO thing is something you can communicate well, because everyone's kind of intrigued by the idea, and the idea isn't that far-fetched, you know?

Yeah. The idea that something came here at some point in our history, it's very possible. But when you start talking about other phenomenon that are less likely or more hard to grasp, you lose your credibility. and a lot of times, you know, I pick up books about UFOs and they're going off on tangents that are going to be very hard for people to accept. And that's where it kind of shades the whole phenomenon

in a lot of ways. And the Roswell story is part of that. The facts of Roswell are really intriguing and incredible and you don't need to add in, you know, alien autopsies and bodies and things like that, whether or not they're real or not. it's when you start throwing in that that you lose people. You know what I'm saying?

Right. Absolutely. Stick to the Air Force, putting out a press release, saying they found a flying saucer. Everyone wants to know what the heck's going on with that. Yeah. You start talking about basements filled with little bodies, you lose people. Yeah. And so that's where I stand on that.

Yeah. No, that's a good point. I mean, it's not to say that all these esoteric topics aren't connected. It's just let's start here and work our way out. Exactly. Let's start where we can start. And people will go with you on that because there's enough there. And, you know, look, if you have proof of alien bodies, go with that. But that's going to be a lot harder for people to accept without seeing an alien body.

Yeah. Then are there any other sort of paranormal topics you either plan on or would like to cover in future books? Has this opened your mind at all to talking about Bigfoot or Loch Ness Monster? I have any plans going forward. in that realm. I'm always open to stories and, you know, I find my stories, people pitch me. People send me things emails. People call me up and said, have you heard about this guy? That's how all my stories come to me. Um, so yeah, I mean, I, if, if something really credible and intriguing was sent to me, I would look into it. It would, it would have to be, you know, something you haven't seen before.

It would have to be a story that, you know, is, is, is, I could really dig into. Um, but I don't have anything at the moment planned out in that realm. Um, you know, I'm always, open to seeing and looking at evidence, looking at important things. But no, I don't have anything right now set in that world. Gotcha. Yeah, I mean, you got your hands full, I would imagine, with a movie coming up. What exactly the 37th parallel has been? I definitely want to leave up to the readers. It's very intriguing, this line throughout the United States that Chuck uncovered, and you subsequently have sort of uncovered. It's very interesting. Do you want to maybe talk about that briefly without giving away too much?

Well, I mean, the idea of the 37th parallel is Chuck's research has sort of taken him down this pathway. He believes that the majority of animal mutilations and UFO sightings occur along the 37th parallel of the United States, which is this latitude line that runs from one end of the country to the other. It also turns out that most of America's underground military bases are on the 37th parallel from Area 51 to the Pentagon, Cheyenne Mountain, Fort Knox. And then it turns out that most American Indian burial sites are along the 37th parallel as well,

which is interesting. They have a very strong UFO component to them, of star travelers and sort of a belief in people coming from the stars. So all of these things seem to come together on the 37th parallel. And so Chuck focuses a lot of his research and a lot of his travels along that line. And so that's kind of where. the book, you know, has its center. But yeah, it's interesting. It really is.

And you have some pretty intriguing photos as well, all credited to Chuck, which is really cool. You get a sense of who this guy actually is. And again, like I highly suggest people grab the book to see these photos, especially the maps of everything that has been found on this parallel. It's just, it's studying when you actually look at it and can see it in front of you. rather than hearing it. So very intriguing.

Ben, where can we find the book and more about what you do? Sure. So you can find me at Ben Mesrick on Twitter or Benmesrick.com is my website. And it's on Facebook as well. The book should be everywhere, you know, every airport and bookstore, Amazon, or wherever you want to find it. It should be out there. So hopefully people will pick it up. Awesome.

And again, guys, the book is the 37th parallel, the secret truth. America's UFO Highway. Ben, I want to thank you for coming on today. It's been very refreshing having someone from the mainstream talk about this topic and give it the credibility it deserves. So again, I have to commend you on that. And we can't wait to see this story continue to unfold because I'm sure Chuck is still out there investigating on these ranches. And we can't wait to see this come to life on the big screen man. So again, thank you so much for joining us. Well, thank you for having me. I appreciate it. All right, that is it for this week's episode, guys.

Again, thank you to Shannon Legrow for letting me use this interview, and thank you to Ben Mesrick as well. Please check out all of Ben's books. You can find them all on Amazon, not hard to find. And that's it. That's all I got for you guys this week. Again, I am doing a lot of traveling this month, so please bear with me as I try to get these episodes out on time.

I do have some awesome interviews coming up scheduled in the roster, so keep an eye out for that. You can find all of my... stuff at somewhere in the skies.com. We're on Twitter at SummerSkies. If you have any guest or topic suggestions, you can always email me at Sprag 51 at hotmail.com. Yes, I know.

Ancient hotmail. It's a little embarrassing, but it's all I have right now, having some issues with this Summer in the Skies email. So, yeah, if you want to reach out to me, you can always contact me through the website as well where you can find all past episodes. That's Somewhereinthes.com.

Please, please. Rate and review the show on iTunes. We are getting very close to getting on the what's hot part of our section on iTunes. So that is very exciting. But I can't do that without your guys help. So please, rate and review the show on iTunes. It helps more than you know. That is it, guys.

I will see you here hopefully next Monday. And remember, keep your feet on the ground, but never stop searching. This has been a third kind production. To learn more, visit thirdkind productions.com.