Somewhere in the Skies - Chris Garetano: Dark Files and the Montauk Project

Episode Date: September 25, 2017

On episode 24 of SOMEWHERE IN THE SKIES, Ryan speaks with Chris Garetano about his lifelong search for answers to the Montauk Project, said to have been carried out at Camp Hero on Long Island, NY. The government claims that this site is a shuttered military base that once protected Americans, but for decades endless rumors maintain that the United States government engaged in a pattern of covert behavior that saw it experiment on its own citizens in such programs as the Tuskegee Experiments and MK Ultra. Could Montauk’s Camp Hero–with its rumors of mind control experiments, acid tests, child abductions, possible alien contact, and time travel have any truth behind it?  Chris is a filmmaker who released a documentary in 2015 titled, THE MONTAUK CHRONICLES, which covered these very rumors and accusations by those who claimed to have been there. Some admitted having participated in the experiments while some even claimed to have been those experimented on. The film was then expanded on in a recent History Channel special called THE DARK FILES. With a thorough investigation by Steve Volk, Barry Eisler, and Chris himself, they unravel the mystery one witness at a time and find stunning evidence that the Montauk Project may be shockingly all too real. Chris gives us the inside scoop on both the documentary and the television special and reveals some of the incredible evidence they uncovered in their dark and mysterious investigation. Guest Bio: Christopher Paul Garetano is the owner and president of White Phosphorus Pictures LLC. In 2005 He released his first documentary titled, Horror Business; an experimental study regarding the struggles of independent horror movie making. In 2006 he set out to make Montauk Chronicles, focusing on the alleged secret experiments that are said to have been conducted between 1971 and 1983. The final version of Montauk Chronicles was completed in the winter of 2014 and it premiered at the Philip K. Dick Film Festival, in New York City (in January of 2015) where it won the “Best Documentary Prize.” Christopher is an executive producer, director of re-creations and the co-host of the new History Channel show, The Dark Files. In addition to several motion picture projects, he is currently developing a new science fiction thriller with another Network, for 2018. To learn more and to order THE MONTAUK CHRONICLES, visit www.mtkchronicles.com Intro and Outro Music provided by Chris Garetano from the ORIGINAL MONTAUK CHRONICLES SOUNDTRACK, composed by Krystal Cordero Audio Clips provided by Chris Garetano and The History Channel Patreon Campaign: www.patreon.com/somewhereskies Website: www.somewhereintheskies.com Email: [e-mail] Twitter: @SomewhereSkies Order Ryan's Book by CLICKING HERE SOMEWHERE IN THE SKIES is brought to you by HelloFresh. To receive 50% off your first order, visit www.HelloFresh.ca and use the promo code, SOMEWHERE50 Produced by THIRD KIND PRODUCTIONS, in association with ANTICA PRODUCTIONS. To learn more, visit www.anticaproductions.com   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

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And now, on to this week's show. This is Somewhere in the Skies with Ryan Sprague. The reason Americans are so interested in conspiracy theories, it's that conspiracies happen. I started hearing all these stories about the Montauk Project. They were conducting mind control experiments here. somebody is hiding something there we did electrical resistivity imaging after all these years we found evidence

Montauk is a remote U.S. town located on the very eastern tip of Long Island, New York. High on a hill above the rocky waters of the Atlantic Ocean looms a giant rusted radar tower it's a ghost relic of the past that local fishermen use as a marker to help guide their ships safely to shore The old military tower is also a landmark for what once was Camp Hero Air Force Base. The U.S. government claims that Camp Hero once protected Americans, but for decades, endless rumors maintain that within the camp's concrete fortresses

lie the remains of a deep government conspiracy. After World War II, it is known that the United States government engaged in a pattern of covert behavior in such programs as the Tuskegee Experiments and MK Ultra. Could Montauk's camp hero, with its rumors of mind control experiments, acid tests, child abduction, time travel, and even extraterrestrial contact be another top secret example? And how deep did those experiments truly go? This is what we'll be discussing with today's guest, Chris Garatano. Chris is the owner and president of white phosphorus pictures. In 2006, he set out to make the Montauk Chronicles, focusing on the alleged secret experiments that are said to,

have been conducted between 1971 and 1983. The final version of Montau Chronicles was completed in the winter of 2014, and it premiered at the Philip K. Dick Festival in New York City in 2015, where it won Best Documentary. From there, Chris became an executive producer, director of recreations, and co-hosts of the New History Channel show The Dark Files. Picking up where Montau Chronicles left off, The Dark Files is the most thorough investigation of the Montauk project to date. It chronicles former CIA operative Barry Eisler,

award-winning journalist Steve Volk, and Chris's exploration into the mythologies, conspiracies, and accusations that surround Camp Hero. So, without further ado, here's my conversation with Chris Garitano. Chris, thank you so much for joining me today on Somewhere in the Skies. Oh, thank you for having me. Much appreciated.

Of course. So your project, The Dark Files, recently aired on the History Channel, So I wanted to catch up with you today and see how it's going, man, how the reception has been, what the project was all about, how you got started on this entire Montauk project mystery. It's fascinating. It's disturbing. It's extremely mysterious in everything in between. So can you sort of, I guess, to start us off, can you give us a little background on how your interest in the Montauk project all started when you were a kid? Sure. Well, I grew up... I was born in Huntington Village, Long Island, which is on the north shore of Long Island. I grew up in Northport. And on the north shore of Long Island in that area, are very small towns. It's small town, America, harbor towns. And so there's woods and beaches. But in the summertime, mainly we would go camp out and drive out to Montauk, which is the furthest eastern tip of Long Island, New York. And it's kind of remote. It's set aside from everything. In the summertime, it's... thriving because there's these great camping grounds and beaches and, you know, there's surfing and restaurants and all sorts of fun stuff to do in the summer. But in the winter, it's desolate. And I remember

I was a very little kid and we did talk about this on the show on the Dark Files, is that I was walking down the beach with my uncle and my dad and we were collecting shells. And I walked a little bit further ahead of them. And I started to see what to me, I only saw them in cartoons at the time. I think I, and that was the only familiar image, reference image that I had, but they were World War II archaic World War II mines. They were cylinders with these spikes sticking out of them. I suspect they were inactive, but they were there. And I never forgot that. And so I walked a little closer to them and there was a military guard that came out, told us all we had to go the other way. We weren't allowed to go any further. So I found myself questioning exactly what was there because I just thought we were, Montauk was the beach and the camping grounds. And, you know, it was a place to be. hang out in the summertime. The foliage is so thick in the summer is that when you're driving around, you really have to have eyes for it to see that giant sage radar tower in the distance. It's kind of harder to see in the summer. That's why I never really noticed it until much later. And so it was later that I caught Preston Nichols' book. I think I was in either high school

or I was in film school. And a friend who was actually from upstate New York passed it over to me. And I read it. And, you know, I'm a science fiction junkie, my whole. life. So I was familiar with everything in cinema and literature, including forbidden planet, including all the old Outer Limits episodes in search of and all that stuff. So I read the book and I just felt perhaps there was something there, but maybe the publisher, whoever, as they tend to do sometimes, encouraged embellishments and that perhaps they were cherry picking from some of the most popular science fiction episodes. You know, I even saw little glimpses of Twilight Zone episodes in there. And later found out that Preston Nichols himself has a voracious appetite for

science fiction and horror and stuff like that. So I just didn't really think much of it. And I always had an obsession with the paranormal and mysteries of the unknown since I was a very little kid. So it was a little bit later that I finished my first documentary. That was done, found a distributor. And my next one was supposed to be something called Monster Chronicles, which it was this kind of Cryptozoological anthology, which I'm now making in separate movies, starting with Bigfoot. My friend who at the time, his name is John David Brody, had this extreme obsession in the conspiratorial type stories, which at the time weren't very, they weren't in vogue. This was in 0.4 or 05, and they were in vogue in smaller circles, but not to the magnitude that

they are now. So he said to me, well, look, you're from Long Island. why don't you do something on the Montauk project? And I wasn't interested in adapting Nichols' book. But what I was interested in was I realized at that moment that these elderly men, Preston Nichols and Alfred Beelich were telling this story for years by that point. It hasn't really changed much. And these guys didn't get rich off of it.

So I wanted it as a character study, I wanted to visit them in their homes, not make them feel inhibited. I didn't want to bring a big crew, mainly just myself or another person to lend a helping hand, and just start by talking to them. That's all I wanted to do is just turn the camera on and start talking and have a natural conversation about this extraordinary thing that they may or may not have experienced. Then we'll start there. That's where it started in 06.

There are rogue groups within the government, naval intelligence being one but not the only one, and I want to make it very clear. I am not blaming naval intelligence as a whole. I'm not condemning naval intelligence as a whole. There are some very good people in there. But they have a rogue group, which are these Montau kid types,

who are going to the dark side and go on into the black arts. If you don't think that's real, you better do your homework. It is very real. So basically, you know, we kind of springboard with Preston Nichols, the guy who wrote the, you know, arguably the definitive book on Montauk. Can you tell us maybe a little about, Chris, what Camp Hero actually is, you know, backtracking a little bit, in terms of what this base was used for, and then kind of what Preston Nichols claims that he was a part of there. Well, the area in Canada.

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Watch Rhonda Rousey versus Gina Carano, live only on Netflix. Saturday, May 16th at 9 p.m. Eastern Center time, 6 p.m. Pacific time. Camp Hero has a vast history that goes way back. So the Revolutionary War, before that, and it's also the

same location that just after the Spanish-American War, Theodore Roosevelt and the Rough Riders were kind of quarantined out there. So there's always like activity out there. Later, it becomes a place called Fort Hero and World War II. It's turned into the Camp Hero Air Force Station. And so as we know in history, this is the place where before satellite technology was established, the Sage radar tower, semi-automatic ground environment radar tower, that big iconic radar tower was built and designed and used for a variety of purposes, detecting enemy ships. They claim that there are submarine bases underneath, and I would, of course, believe it because it's just this giant stronghold. It's on a cliff facing the Atlantic Ocean, the very furthest eastern

tip of Long Island. But where the weird stuff starts coming in is at the end of World War II, Nuremberg trials, you know, there were a lot of people who were spared. as spoils of war in regard to the United States, absorbing these Nazi scientists into our military, into our scientific and military development. They were developing rockets and all sorts of crazy things for the Nazis. So instead of hanging them, we brought them over,

and this was called Operation Paperclip or Project Paperclip. A never-before-seen report discloses a dark chapter in our nation's history. The U.S. government hunted Nazis after the war, but in some cases protected them on American soil. The Justice Department had resisted releasing this report for four years, but the New York Times got a hold of it. It includes how some former Nazis were knowingly admitted into the U.S. after the war,

the extent of which was never fully understood in the past. For example, one Nazi rocket scientist was later honored by NASA. And it was those paper-clips scientists that Preston Nichols and Alps, Alfred Beelick claim began the Montauk project. It all started at a place called Brookhaven National Labs, which is a little further west of Camp Hero Air Force Station. And according to Nichols, he was eventually recruited by the Brookhaven National Labs because of his expertise in electronics and other reasons, more esoteric reasons like the fact that he has psychic abilities, the fact that he has you know, this connection with certain energies, so he claims. And so he was recruited by the labs first,

and then the Montauk project came about because according to Nichols and Beelich, Congress had a big problem with eventually, because we did kind of celebrate these Nazi scientists, you know, libraries named after them, I think, in one point. But, so Congress had an issue with these guys. They got kicked out of Brookhaven National Labs. And according to Nichols, the skits kind of muddy. But he said that they established the Montauk project in a facility deep beneath the ground at Camp Hero. I'm not sure what was embellished and what wasn't. And I've had over a decade now on this subject matter. So, you know, it begins with this very thin book, which was that first book that Nichols published,

with a very small bit of information to go on. I've since, I feel, between the Dark Files, between speaking to these gentlemen for Montauk Chronicles, and in my own personal research, furthering, you know, every day looking for things and talking to people that I didn't interview for those projects, I feel like I found significant evidence that corroborates at least some of his story. The more believable stuff, though, and I'm not saying I don't believe in time travel or I don't believe in extraterrestrial intelligence. I'm just not sure all of it happened at Camp Hero. That's sort of, in short, the origins of the Montau project. See, that's what I find most fascinating, Chris, is that, you know, beyond the more esoteric elements to this entire mystery of Montauk, there are these small truths that seem to be hidden. And you have to wonder, is this something that Nichols or be like that they're trying to do, you know, plant these little truths throughout possible untruths or, you know, miss or disinformation's and see who can really cherry pick what actually happen, the core of the story.

And I would have to say that you sort of did that for the past decade. And I have followed your process of Montau Chronicles almost from the start. I don't remember exactly the moment that I found your work, but I was one of those first people who were following you on the journey. And I knew that this was an interesting topic. I was living in New York City at the time. So I definitely had that connection there. And then in 2015, the documentary came out, the Montauk Chronicles. Legend has it that beneath this very tower, a dark force had its eyes set on the children.

We were told that what was going on there was for the benefit of humanity. What would you say to the people who say, well, all these children were kidnapped and murdered and you were a part of it, what would you tell them if they said, well, you know, they're trying to say, well, you were part of this. You approved of this. What would you tell? I did approve of it. There was nothing I could do about it. They wanted a large number of programmed boys to be used for mind control operations.

Let's put it this right. If you're sitting there with 20 guns pointed out of you, what are you going to do? Whatever the hell they want. And it was awesome. You did these reenactments all on your own. You created, you know, interspersed with the interviews with Nichols and everyone else. And it came together so well, man. I would love to hear just a taste of what it took for this past decade and what the process was like in creating Montau Chronicles before we even get into Dark Files.

Sure. Oh, thank you. I really appreciate that. Yeah, I love talking about the process of movie making. I guess it first starts with just a love for cinema. And just a quick background on me. Like, I grew up as a kid who was just, you know, I was a quiet kid. I loved reading.

I love special effects makeup. I really got into it at a young age, so I started making masks, and I was reading all the, you know, magazines like Fangoria and Sinafantastique, and I got into special effects and really learned about the old wizards of cinema, going way back to Milliers and Fritz Lang and stuff like that. So to this day, those are my heroes. And I made movies as a kid. I would steal my dad's video camera. My parents owned a video store, so I was just saturated in movies all the time. But I just wasn't like always stuck in front of a TV either. was outside a lot. So I guess I had the best of both worlds because I was always outside and,

you know, experiencing real life. So all of that is, is a love that has been consistent and a dream of mine since I was a little kid. And now I'm faced with, okay, you know, you're at a film school. I had a job in the industry and you realize this cold, hard reality of movie making is not going to be easy. You're going to have to make major sacrifices. So I made my first documentary with just me, a video camera, microphone, and a tripod. And I found a distributor for it, got it out there, played at festivals. It was about a different subject matter. And I started shooting more. And so when it came down to Montauk, I was like, man, I would really love to start shooting some cinema. I made two movies, the one that you saw, and the first one that I actually

kind of toured around in 2011 and 2012 that I wasn't happy with. I literally threw out a feature film, started all over again. I got my hands on since the first time, since film school, because they're very expensive lenses. And then there was this great new technology that was developed, this Seimos sensor inside a camera called the Canon 5D Mark 3, which I still use to this day modified. It's a wonderful camera. And so finally I felt like a filmmaker again.

So I wanted to start my movie all over again. There are devices now that we can use and things like, you know, instead of laying down 50 feet of Dolly Track, you have sliders, or now you have something called a Ronan, which is like a modern-day steady-cam unit. So if you know what you're doing, You have all the devices. You have the devices for post-production.

So I realized it could be done with a lot of focus and application and love. And all of those recreations that you saw in Montauk Chronicles, they were shot in two very small rooms in a suburban basement. And it was just done with, you know, you use a 17-millimeter lens. You can augment and change the perspective of a room, make it look bigger or longer. And I knew that from experimenting with lenses for so long. So it's like, I just, I just really paid attention.

I just did my best to try and make it look the best. And every frame I was just very meticulous, you know, paying attention. And obviously I have my influences, everybody from, you know, Stephen Spielberg to Werner Herzog. So it's like I, I just love movies. And so, like, I really needed to do this and I really needed to make something solid. And I also cared. Here's the other thing. Outside of loving cinema, I really feel that if there were boys that were kids that were

kidnapped off the streets of New York City in the 1970s. And if they were absorbed into this program, if they were murdered, they're not going to have a voice because traditional journalism won't touch that unless we find some evidence, which is why I'd like to be the guy who focuses on that, as opposed to focusing mainly, primarily on the time travel stuff and on the alien stuff, I want to focus on the boys program because if these children were murdered in this thing, I'd like to be the one person who brings a lot of attention to it to maybe give them a voice because they're forgotten if this is the case, if it did really happen. That is a wonderful point, Chris. I have a play that's going to be premiering in New York. A little shameless plug here. It's a modern day take on the Jack the Ripper murders. I was commissioned, yeah, I was commissioned to write this play for Halloween about five years ago now.

And so I really got into the whole serial killer scene, as it were, a very dark, disturbing kind of subculture here in America. And, you know, you do start to become very fascinated with the killer, with what made them do this, what was the motive, what is their background. But what many people forget are the, you know, the handfuls of victims that occurred because of these people. They are never the focus. They're forgotten. And, you know, I think what you're doing in giving a voice to the Montauk Boys, which I would love to elaborate on in just a moment here, is giving them a voice in remembering that if any of this happened, if the Montauk Boys were a real thing happening during the Montauk project, that's horrible. It's absolutely horrible that this would be going on in New York and in America in general. So if you could, would you mind sort of giving us a, I guess, a close.

Cliff Nose version of what the Montauk boys actually are. Okay, sure. And I think your play sounds amazing, by the way. So, okay, so this is what is said to have happened. So these Nazi scientists that I mentioned earlier, the paperclip scientists, they were involved in some really, you know, sadistic, horrible things like something called, look up something called Middleworks. It was where V2 rockets were developed during Nazi Germany. But there were a lot of victims of the concentration.

camps that were brought down there and basically used as something much worse than even modern slavery and not modern slavery, but, you know, antebellum slavery in the U.S. or even, you know, horrible prison situations of third world countries like this was just evil. They would bring these people down there. And these are some of the scientists that we absorbed to, you know, we celebrated and made them rich that these guys would oversee horrible ballots of torture and death and murder of, people who were prisoners at the concentration camps that had to dig with their hands until they were basically dead, beaten, abused. So these guys were used to this kind of thing, if this is true. And so between 1971 and 1983, the proprietors of the Montauk Project, the alleged Montauk project, needed human subjects.

And so what would be better than to find prisoners or people in an orphanage? or people in a mental institution. And these are the places that we found out in a like programs like the Holmesburg Prison Experiments. This is tantamount. So it's very believable that it was happening in another place like Camp Hero and that they were also looking for human subjects. Human subjects would be easy pickings if you looked on the streets of New York City between

1971 and 1983. There were an astronomical amount of runaways. males, prostitutes living on the streets, kids that ran away from home, drug addicts, kids that wouldn't be missed. And so this is what they say they were looking for. These were the disposables, the kids that they were absorbing into this program. So between 1971 and 1983, there would be these dark characters that would go out and recruit these runaway children. They would be kidnapped. They would be brought down into this dank, you know, non-cosmetical.

appealing facility. And that's how I wanted to make it in the movie. It was like, you know, this isn't like this sterile, beautiful hospital. They don't care. You know, this is, this is a, it was described by the alleged victims that it was just, you know, stone walls. In some cases, were leaking water. It was really nasty and dirty. So that's the way I wanted to make it. And so they were brought down to this horrible place. And if you want me to continue, I will. Oh, yes, please. Okay. Unfortunately, yes, I would like you to continue. Sure. And again, I could have easily have made it as bad as I imagine it would have been, but I don't think I would have

had many audience members. And I could think of two movies that maybe would have gone a little further than I did in Montau Chronicles. I tried to make more, to suggest it, you know, visually, as opposed to actually showing what happened. But these kids were kidnapped and the technique, which was used in other places that we could prove where mind control projects occurred. The technique would be that they would bring the child down there, the teenager down there, beat him to the point of where his personality was absolutely fractured. Anything that he was,

anything that, you know, anything that, any security that he had within his psychological mainframe was completely shattered by the beatings, by rapes, by drugs being injected into his body, massive amounts of experimental hallucinogens. And I was told that, everything from, you know, the people who were doing this were wearing masks, to killing animals in front of them, to beating other children in front of them, anything that they could do to create this fear trauma system, to break their personalities, to shatter them completely. The beatings were the most horrible.

And the fact that they were doing it without the approval of the kids. You know, it was literally kidnapping. One thing they loved to do was drown you, hold you, hold you. underwater to the point where you were about to give up. They wanted to split the mind. They wanted to shatter the mind. Then they would program each individual piece for something else.

But what was the intention on the beatings and the drownings? That must have... That was to shatter the mind. You have heard it. So they can manipulate it? Yes, they can manipulate it. Once that was achieved, if the kid was still alive, this would be the point now where they would start to rebrand.

they would start to rebuild the child's mind and implant this programming. So the programming would be triggered by a symbol or a word or a series of words eventually where they could train this kid to be a Manchurian-type assassin to go commit an assassin or a public atrocity or whatever they were looking. There's another aspect to this too that Alfred Biel claims that basically once they were shattered, they'd be rebuilt into these psychic soldiers for, psychic warfare within the military. And in short, that's what they were doing. They were kidnapping these kids and using them in all kinds, myriad of experiments down at Camp Euro. And a lot of them

were just really dark and brutal. The two movies I was referring to earlier would be a French film by Pascal Laguerre called Martyrs. And the other one would be Sallow by Pasolini. These are, I think, if in cinema, anything represents what happened down there perfectly, it would be these two movies and I don't think you know most people don't want to go there for the second movie so yeah let's only hope that it's as fictitious as possible but uh in terms of that chris now we then move on to another project like we mentioned earlier that was recently aired on the history channel and that was the dark files which also dives heavily into the montauk project how did the opportunity for dark files come about where did this begin and where did montauk chronic

end, I guess. Sure. Well, I made two movies over a course of 10 years, so I was contacted by a few production companies, including NBC Universal, while I was making the two movies. So it wasn't anything new that I started getting contacted by people that were interested in collaborating on something. But the first thing that I felt was solid enough was when I was contacted by the production company.

It was in December, just as I was releasing Montau Chronicles, which was December of 2014, I started to release it as a streaming thing. And then the DVD came out a little bit later in 2015 in the Blu-ray. But they were interested in talking. So we started talking. And it was a blank slate. You know, they saw my film. They wanted to further the investigation, do something for television.

And so we started talking there. And then within four months or so, it changed hands. Because, you know, the way it works is you have the production companies and then you have the networks. Networks hire the production companies to go and make the specials or the television shows. And then so it changed hands, went to another production company and became something else. And I actually shot a pilot with this other production company. But it wasn't even on the same topic. It was something very different.

So I was kind of disappointed in that situation only because we didn't stick to the program. But I was retained all along. So eventually, the original production company, Texas crew productions, a bunch of great guys who I work with now, called back the following January and said, well, we have the project back. We want to do this. And so we started from scratch again. And it was just, I don't know, hundreds of pages of notes, meetings in Texas, you know, I guess communicating back and forth with history about what they were interested in. And then it was around summer that, because in the beginning, you know, they wanted me. to be an on-screen host. Remember, I'm a filmmaker. So I started off just wanted to be behind the

scenes. I wanted to be a producer on the project. So by July, they said, well, I think they want you to host as well. And I said, I guess I'll do it. You know, I guess we'll give it a shot. But I really had a lot to do with what was going on behind the scenes for the most part. The hosting thing came as a secondary thing. But I enjoyed it. And I enjoyed being part of the investigation. We chose my co-host, Barry Isler and Steve Volk, I would say around August, after testing a lot of different people, and I think you were even on the list. You know, like it was just juggling a lot of different people, a lot of people. Maureen Ellsbury was on the list, a whole bunch of different people to try with me.

But I think there was so many people on the list, and ultimately they wanted someone very different than myself. So they chose a journalist from The Washington Post, who's very skeptical, Steve Volk, wrote this great book, Stringology. And Barry Isler, who was ex-CIA, and an author, and he was also a lawyer. So interesting guys, and that's who they ended up settling on. I thought the dichotomy between the three of you was fantastic. I mean, you had you who, you know, you'd been researching this mystery for so long. Then you have someone like Steve Vogue,

love, love, love his book, who brings that skeptical side to it and is a journalist. He is going to grill these people who you eventually interview on The Dark Files. best he can. That is his job. And then to have someone like I slept come on, you know, his experience with the CIA and intelligence agencies, I can only imagine that he would bring an observant eye in terms of if these people are telling the truth in terms of, you know, even in the special you show like their eyes twitching or the way they move in terms of like if they're lying or stressed. It was awesome. It was awesome to see the dichotomy between the three of you. I thought you guys made a great team, and that ultimately made Dark Files different than most shows, where it's from one focus. We're going to prove that this is alien. We are going to prove this is time travelers or the Montauk Boys. So I thought that was really interesting. You guys did a lot in the short amount of time, the limited amount of time that you have for a special like this.

So again, kudos on that. Thank you so much. Thank you. Of course. and I would have loved to have been involved, but I think you could have picked a better team, to be honest. Well, I mean, if we do, you know, we're going to do more episodes. So what's cool about that is now it opens the door for bringing in more people,

more people that, I think, have a lot to say like yourself. And I think Maureen is great. And I think all these people should, I know she's been on stuff before and so of you. But I just feel like in this realm, I think it would be more naturalistic and more true to who you are. Because I know that Brad Bernstein, who's a showrunner and everybody else, That's what they want. You know, that's what they want. They want something as real as possible.

Obviously, we have to design a few things in terms of just getting the schedule down correctly. Right. But otherwise, it's very natural the way we put it together. Well, yeah, I think it's great. And you got my card, my man. And I'm sure a few of the listeners would love to be involved as well. But, you know, back to Dark Files. Okay, so you have the three of you going out to investigate Camp Hero, see what was going on there.

and you came across an extremely compelling video by Brian Minnick. Could you possibly, I know it's hard, this is an audio interview, but possibly describe what we, or even just tease what we were seeing in this video. Of course. Brian is great. He was a wonderful surprise because we were working with Oliver over at Dan's Papers, which is a paper on the east end of Long Island. And I believe he referred Brian to us. And we were working with another guy named Paul Fagan,

who had a lot of great research in regard to Camp Hero, but it was more like a geographical research. Brian, on the other hand, who was visiting the place for many years and documenting since he was a kid, since he was a teenager, they were kind of urban explorers, and him and his buddies would, you know, explore the base and look through. And I knew they knew of the legends behind the base at the time, So that made it exciting for them.

And I guess we kind of live vicariously where we watch his videos through these kids, because that's what it is. It's just him as a kid and his friends, kind of exploring the base and finding evidence that has since been covered and constructed over. So everything from evidence that there are underground levels, not, okay, not, I mean, we found something much more significant later on the show with, the geological researchers, but in regard to Brian, he has actual footage of things that don't exist anymore. Everything from these little channels that show you lower levels, at least right

beneath the surface, to the acid houses, right? Things that have been dubbed the acid houses, the things that were topside, structures that were topside where allegedly psychological experiments took place, you cannot deny that in one of these structures, that is never, no longer there. Okay, they knocked it down and made a picnic area out of it. But Brian had photos and footage that just blew me away because you'll never see these structures again. And he has it. He has the footage of the interior of the asset house where every single room we've established was deliberately painted a very peculiar pattern on each wall. This isn't something that kids did. This isn't something that forward military guys did. This was this I truly believe in my heart as, as a, you know, fairly intelligent guy, I believe that this place was used for these experiments. And Steve Volk took the information over to some of Tim McHillery's people who had worked with psychedelic drugs during experiments. And two of them confirmed that they believe that these patterns were used for the same purposes as well.

Absolutely. I mean, we have evidence and proof that the military were doing these experiments at one time. We have video proof that this has happened. So like you said, just the stark evidence of the acid houses alone says that something different, something strange was going on there, mind-altering drugs, you know, things to do with the mind. I can only imagine. And the fact that we now have this evidence immortalized in terms of Brian's footage, it's amazing. And I can't believe that you guys were able to get that. I hope he has it in a safe place, and I hope that you keep in close contact with him to make sure he doesn't

disappear off the grid. Oh, I think he's interested in talking more about it. I suggested he put a doc together himself or a book and a website, because I think that would just be so helpful to further research. Because, once again, this is such, it started off as such a fringy type subject because of the first book and because of all the stuff that's in it. I mean, we're talking about monsters and all sorts of different things. creatures and people who travel back to biblical characters. You know, it starts off as a difficult

thing to swallow all in one place for most people. So now that we've actually found a little evidence, there may have been experiments there because on public record, they say that number one, there's nothing underneath the ground, but there is. And number two, or number one as well, that nothing happened there outside of normal operations that we know about historically. So that's not the case. I don't believe that for a second. And I can't confirm all the other more extraordinary stuff, but what I think we're close to confirming is that there were experiments there for sure. I couldn't agree more. Now, in terms of the more extraordinary claims, Chris, I'm going to sort of put you on the spot here.

We have many people you interviewed who claim to have been Montauk boys. Some of them very convincing. Some of them having stories that are so out there that it made my brain hurt. hurt. Now, one of these people is extremely contentious. It is the elephant in the room, and that is Stuart Swartlow. And when you see the Dark Files, I suggest everyone go watch it. There is a pretty heated exchange that happens during the special. We won't give that away. But what do you think of this guy, man? I mean, out of all the people, it seems to be the most contentious story out there, and even questioning if this guy was involved. So, again, putting you on the spot, who is

this guy and what do you make of him? What I might, in short, because we could go on all day about this, but I believe he's not to be trusted. I believe that this is a gentleman who ran into Preston Nichols late in the game, saw it as an opportunity perhaps to incorporate this thing into his lineage and use it to profit off of it because I've seen him just do some really nefarious stuff to people, you know, within his own groups and people that I know and people that I care about and even myself. I mean, this is a guy, you have to be very careful.

This is a man who claims that he literally traveled back in time to the crucifixion of probably the most well-known biblical character, Jesus Christ, and went to physically, touched his feet, extracted blood from him, asked him for forgiveness. I mean, where is he coming with this? and then travel back and use the blood to clone him. This is one of the stories he tells. He also tells people a variety of other things, too,

that I think he should be very, very cautious because I'm astonished that there are some really great people that listen to his stories. I mean, I've attended some of his lectures, and I'm just blown away by some of the great people that actually attend these things and listen to this guy's words, and they don't even question it.

They don't even dig to do any, to do any research. You know, this is a man who claims he was blind until he was 40, 35 years old, completely blind. And then he doesn't remember the name of the doctor who cured his blindness. Can't tell us just about anything. It's just a very thin, phlegmese and some, in many cases, extremely offensively outrageous stories that he tells, that I feel, regardless of whatever he's doing, you shouldn't let this distract you from the fact. that there may have been a brutal mind control program that occurred at Camp Hero.

And that's how I feel about him in short. It's hard for me, probably for legal reasons, too, that I can't go on and on about him. But I don't trust him. And I have many good reasons not to. And I don't think anyone else should either. I think you should be very cautious. Great. Well, I mean, I'm glad we could clear the air on that because the minute I saw the guy on the special,

I didn't believe a word he said. But, again, I was not there. But that being said, you also, you give us a good look into Nichols very late in his life. And it's clear that whatever this man has been through, it has clearly affected him in many ways. I mean, you were in his home. It was, it's kind of sad, man. I mean, to look at where he is now. And we see this a lot with people who are involved with things, who blow the whistle on things,

that you see this deterioration within their life. They've risked and sacrificed a lot. They've probably lost friends, colleagues, family members because of the information they're bringing forward. Or it could all be a complete fabrication. Again, who are we to say? But I found it very interesting that, you know, between when you first interviewed Nichols and now, it seems like a lot has changed.

Am I kind of, am I on the right path with that? Very much so. And, you know, when I interviewed Nichols for the first time in 06, that's not the footage that's in my movie, Montau Chronicles. And you've seen the difference between Montau Chronicles and the Dark Files and how he has deteriorated. Yeah. Well, that's just, I think that's just age finally catching up with Preston and he's not doing so well. The weird thing is the first time I interviewed him in 2006, and I can release those eventually. He was, it was weird, he was hallucinating almost.

So he was much more lucid in 2013. when I went back to shoot the interviews again. And there was this weird moment where he knew I shut the camera down. And he knew I removed the lens and I put the cap on the front element of the lens. He had a completely different demeanor and composure. And he just looked at me and said, you know, Christopher, there's just some things I'm not going to be able to tell you on camera. And I looked at him for a second like, wow, wait, is this the guy I was just talking to? I think he's a much deeper and more complex person than anybody.

might allow or most people might allow Preston. I do believe Preston was involved some way at Camp Hero. Not sure what, but he is a much more believable person, I feel, than Stuart Sloe, much more. You know, Swardlow seems to just throw any outrageous, elaborate claim out you, and it always has a price tag, and it has an obscene price tag. He'll charge you five grand for to have an afternoon with him or something, you know. We're very familiar with that. in the UFO field as well. I won't name names, but I think the listeners know exactly who I'm talking about. And again, these are people who will take advantage of people's beliefs and just ring them for every penny they can. Unfortunately, you and I run into that all the time

with these topics, but we're just trying to get the most credible information out there and do your research. You are a shining example of that. One of the most powerful moments in the Dark Files came when you visited the prison. And I would love to hear you. about that in the two individuals you guys spoke to who were actually inmates. This was very disturbing and very sad stuff. Yeah, see, here's where truth is as strange as fiction. So we visited Holmesburg Prison and we met a guy named Alan Harmbloom, who is the author of many books, but one of which is acres of skin that focuses on cosmetic and chemical experiments at Holmesburg. but also mind control experiments.

And all of the techniques, what happened was the people who were running the experiments set shop up at Holmesburg Prison and under false pretenses would encourage prisoners for $10 or something to have certain solutions put on their skin, which would burn their skin off. And, you know, this is supposed to be a bubble bath solution, but it's burning the guy's skin off. So I don't really believe half the time it was even what they were saying. saying it was, they were saying it was Johnson and Johnson bubble bath, but regardless of any of that, they were experimenting with a total mind control program that Hornblum also exposed. And again, they were looking for human subjects. They can't fully achieve a conclusion with lab rats. They

need people. And the best, easiest, cheapest way to get human subjects to them, if you get into their cold scientific perspective for a minute. They're just thinking logically saying, why don't we go to prisons? Why don't we go to orphanages? Why don't we go to places where nobody cares about anybody? And that's what they were doing. And this is consistent. This is just common practice on their part during that time. And so that's why I find Montauk, at least these aspects, these human experiment aspects, to be very believable. And so at Holmesburg, there were several gentlemen that we talked to when we visited for the Dark files. And they were survivors of these experiments and they were subjected to a variety of things. I believe Yusuf, the one gentleman we talked to, was not only, he described a certain chemical being

put on his back and that it ate the skin off his back and ate the paint off the wall after he removed the bandage and put it on the wall. Oh, God. Yeah, so this wasn't bubble bath. And so he was also in a mind control experiment. We got that footage of him talking about that as well, but I guess we weren't we we didn't put it in the show just because of you know getting it down to a certain amount of hours but um yeah he was also a victim of the actual mind control experiments which they were running i believe out of several rooms in the back of the prison and in a trailer in the back of the prison where they were injecting these guys with massive amounts of drugs just like the montauk experiments probably putting them through some traumas that we didn't really know about

and and so all of this is available and this is this has been confirmed this isn't even speculated. This is a real thing. This really happened. And a lot of people don't know this. They don't realize it because once again, when we look into, you know, these fringe stories, they're always integrated with this, this fantastic or this supernatural aspect to it, which again, I'm not ruling out as a total hoax. I'm just saying that the Montauk story, and I've described this before, it's really strange. It's like you have uphology and you have stories of hauntings and you have cryptids and cryptozoology, but then you have the Montauk Project. Montauk project is really strange. It's like this really sinister, brutal tale with this candy-coating of aliens and monsters and time travel,

but it's got this real sinister, abusive, malicious, evil core to it all. And it's so disturbing. And it's so different than any of these other things. And that's why it's terrifying to me, because I don't know exactly what this is all about, even after 10 years. That is a good way to look at it, man. I mean, yeah, I think a lot of people tend to veer away from the more dark and disturbing aspects. They'd rather be safe with Pleiadians coming here as Space Brothers or a spirit coming back to give you the winning lottery numbers. I don't know. But, yeah, I think, you know, people like you and people who are looking into the Montauk Project takes a lot, a lot of courage.

And I can only imagine it eats away at you at times thinking that our country could do these horrible things. to people, but places like this prison, it is clear that they have been done and that it only strengthens the possibility. I think that it could be done at Montauk. And, you know, at the end of Dark Files, we will not give this away, but you, like you mentioned earlier, you guys did some pretty interesting geological, I guess, what would you even call it, satellite digs, as it were, of the area. And you found some very compelling things. Again, we'll leave the viewer to make their own decisions on that. But I think what's going on there, and the evidence you guys have found

has only strengthened the possibility that there is a core reality that these experiments were going on there. Yeah, and we did work with geophysicists. They were real. They weren't, you know, I saw other, I've been around other situations where, like, I would go up to the,

this is, I can't say, but I was, all right, I was on a project that I was hired, and I'm glad it didn't work out, but there was a moment where I went up to one of the gentlemen and I said, oh, so you're the electronics guy. What is your expertise?

He's like, I don't have one. I'm like, what do you mean you don't have one? He's like, I don't know, I'm an actor. Actor? So in this case, we really did work with geophysicists. They are experts. They can be checked out. And these guys found several things of interest,

one of which they used something called electric resistivity imagery, where, and again, we have. a lot of resistance from the town. We wanted to get closer to the actual structure itself. And for some reason, I mean, even things you didn't see in the show, like the UNS Army Corps of Engineers blocking us from coming in, it was crazy. Didn't even make it to the show. But we have the footage. And so these geophysicists would put these basically electrodes into the ground, and then they would be tied together. And the reading would look perhaps sometimes 60 feet deep, a vertical slice of imagery.

Now, this was just a vertical slice, but what they found underneath the ground, you'll see in the show. You can go check it out on historychannel.com or, I guess, look for a rebroadcast. But something very significant. Remember, the public record says there's absolutely nothing under the ground at Camp Hero. And that is not true. And the geophysical equipment proves that, that there is something manmade and something enormous under the ground. I mean, we only had a vertical slice of imagery. So imagine, if you will,

somebody else went down there or somebody brought GeoVue down there and did 30 vertical points of imagery. We would find something. Right. Right. Evidence does not lie, people. Well, Chris, moving away from Dark Files, you have another project coming up that is completely different, and that is in the realm of cryptozoology. And you said that this, was one of the first projects you ever worked on. And this is about our hairy hominid friend, Bigfoot. I got to hear about this, man. What can we expect next from you in terms of Bigfoot?

It was kind of creepy that was making all this noise, like trying to intimidate us, and then we go up to look for it, and it goes in heights. So once the sun went down, it seemed like the best thing to do was to leave. Who knows what type of impact it would have on the species to kill them. one. It would take me not having a choice. If this thing was coming after me, I'm going to put a bullet in it. Okay, so we have this incredible source material. The best material that was put out in the world about this particular subject, Bigfoot, North American Sasquatch, has been in books, you know, and I've been reading them since I was a kid. So there's some wonderful stuff in literature

and in books. But not so much in TV and movies, but it is a saturated subject for television and movies. I just feel like it's never been translated correctly. And so I am making a motion picture that portrays this correctly, that has a great perspective

and maybe a unique perspective on the whole thing. And I'd like to go back to some of the greatest stories, everything from certain Native American tales to the Fred Beck story at ape canyon, Mount St. Helens, to the Theater Roosevelt-Bowman story, to the Patterson-Gimlin experience, to all of these things.

And I have a bunch of others, too, that are lesser-known, but I think to me, exhilarating stories. And adapt them as these kind of anthology cinematic moments. This would be a two, two-and-a-half-hour movie. That would have ligaments of great narration. I've been talking to Tony Todd, the actor Tony Todd, I want him to narrate this film, and hopefully he's going to. He almost narrated the Dark Files.

It's just got to get everyone on the same boat, and I was really pushing for him. And he's such a great guy, and he's got such a great voice. So I'd like him to narrate Bigfoot. And so this great narration leading you through, we begin with, you know, the creation of the earth, something magnificent like that, and then moving forward into species being created. And this isn't a short period of time, but then throughout history. Now, this country has gone through many changes over the years. It was forged in war and violence and genocide.

So imagine, if you will, this species did exist, that there's something between animal and man. And they're not enormous in number. You know, they don't have this breeding population like deer or bear might have. They're a little more conscious of the fact that they need to keep that population down. And so they see us through the forest and they look out at the Civil War. look out at the Industrial Revolution and they see these things and they want nothing to do with us. So they retreat and become extremely elusive. And that's kind of the perspective of the story. It's like this historical timeline of the best Bigfoot stories told through this partially

documentary type format that's linking it together, if that makes any sense. Absolutely. That's really interesting. You never get like a historical lens of Bigfoot throughout the ages. And yeah, I think that's an interesting angle to take in terms of why. these creatures wouldn't want to interact with us, or why even some alien species would want to come down here after we explode an atomic bomb, you know, I could see it on a grand scale back here on Earth, too. No wonder we've never found a big foot body. There's only probably a couple of them out there. Again, who am I?

I'm no cryptosuologist, but that sounds really interesting. So are we in production for this yet, or is this still in development? Well, I started off as a very independent picture, so I went out to Utah, and I went out to Colorado, and I went out to Northern Michigan, and even places in Florida where people said they saw similar creatures. And I have a lot of footage, but since the Dark Files has been established and aired, I have other people that are willing to perhaps participate, and I don't have to make. Bigfoot is such a large movie. The script is such a big, you know, imaginative vision of the whole thing that I'm going to need a little. little bit of help with this. So I was patiently waiting for the Dark Files to be released to have other opportunities to do this justice, do my script justice and not, because really with Montauk, I did everything

myself. I had a couple of helping hands here and there, but really that's all. And it was difficult, very difficult. It's going to be difficult anyway, but I would much rather have a few hands. And I think now I'm coming into that opportunity. So I kind of patiently put Bigfoot on just on pause while we made the Dark Files. And now that that's released and we're moving into the series, I'm hoping to have better opportunities with Bigfoot, and it looks like I will to create that next year. Awesome. Yeah. Take a moment to breathe, man. And then we want you back to work. Thank you. Well, where can we find Montauk Chronicles and Dark Files, Chris? Well, you can go to Montaukronicles.com, and Montaukronicles is available in all formats. You have DVD and Blu-ray,

which have some great extras on it, making of documentaries, full base exploration, extended interviews. Or if you just want to rent it or purchase the digital copy, there's a link on my website as well to do that. And for the dark files, you go to history channel.com or history.com and search the dark files. And I guess you just type in your cable provider and you'll be able to watch it now if you want to. Or look for a rebroadcast, but I think it would be much easier to find it online. Yeah, it's very easy. Did it myself. watched it three times in a row.

Oh, fantastic. Didn't sleep that night, but that's another story. Well, Chris, you've shed light on a very dark and deeply disturbing mystery, and I can only imagine it's going to become deeper. Every step you take an investigating Camp Hero, the Montauk Project. So while I don't envy that path, I certainly respect it, and I highly respect the work you do. So thank you for joining me on Somewhere in the Skies today.

Thank you so much, Ryan. Thank you. All right. That is it for this week's episode. to check out the Montauk Chronicles at mtkronicles.com and the Dark Files is now available on the history channel at history dot com. If you haven't already, please

consider subscribing, rating, and reviewing someone in the skies on iTunes. Recently, I've learned that the only way the show can move up in the rankings is not by downloads or even ratings and reviews. It's actually the number of subscribers to the podcast. So please consider subscribing today. If you have any guest or topic suggestions

or want to share a story or experience with me, you can reach me through the contact tab on the website, somewhere in the skies.com. We're also on Twitter at SomewhereSkies. We're now on Instagram as well at SomewhereSkies pod. And last but not least, to become a patron on Patreon, visit patreon.com backslash Somewhere Skies. So I thought it would be cool to end the show with a song

from the original Montau Chronicle soundtrack. So I leave you with a song titled Beginning, The Adventure, composed by Crystal Cordero. I will see you here next Monday, and remember, keep your feet on the ground, but never stop searching somewhere in the skies.