Somewhere in the Skies - Steve Berg: High Strange Encounters

Episode Date: May 5, 2024

This episode is in Loving Memory of Ryan's mother, Susan Sprague, who passed away on May 3rd. She was one of our biggest fans and supporters and we will miss her dearly. Read full obituary, written by Ryan, and where donations can be made to Sue's favorite charities: https://rebrand.ly/6fq0xke On episode 354 of SOMEWHERE IN THE SKIES, Steve Berg returns to give his fascinating solo presentation from Anomacon 2023, titled, The Weird Stuff: The Role of Absurdity and Surrealism in High Strange Encounters. In this presentation, Berg explains that when it comes to encounters with UFO occupants and cryptids, the cases most commonly used as examples for the strongest evidence are the ones that fit into the framework most easily with our sense of reality, often leaving out the really weird cases. But what if the weirdness was part of the point? Using encounter cases throughout history and focusing on the absurd qualities and “dreaminess” of these experiences, maybe we can discover that the more odd and surreal an encounter is, the bigger the imprint it makes. Find all of Steve Berg's work at the Linktree: https://linktr.ee/steveberg This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try and get on your way to being your best self. Visit: www.betterhelp.com/skies Patreon: www.patreon.com/somewhereskies PayPal: [e-mail] Website: www.somewhereintheskies.com Store: http://tee.pub/lic/ULZAy7IY12U YouTube Channel: CLICK HERE Order Ryan’s new book: https://a.co/d/4KNQnM4 Order Ryan’s older book: https://amzn.to/3PmydYC Twitter: @SomewhereSkies Read Ryan’s Articles by CLICKING HERE Opening Theme Song, "Ephemeral Reign" by Per Kiilstofte Copyright © 2024. Ryan Sprague. All rights reserved. Part of the eOne Podcast Network and produced by Lionsgate 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

You're great at protecting your data, but lots of places could still expose you to identity theft. I thought it was safe. If that happens, LifeLock gives you a U.S.-based restoration agent who will stick by your side from start to finish. Phone calls, filing documentation, preparing insurance claims, your agent handles it all. In fact, we're so confident restoration is guaranteed. Pour your money back. Isn't it nice to have someone like that on your side? Save up to 40% your first year at LifeLock.com slash Spotify.

Terms apply. This is somewhere in the skies with Ryan Sprague. First off, I just want to thank Ryan Sprague. Thank you so much for letting me do this. It's a little bit intimidating. But I'm going to do my best, so here we go, folks. Okay, the weird stuff, the role of absurdity and surrealism in high, strange encounters. So the universe is not made of Adams.

It's made of stories. I love this quote. I heard it years ago, and for me, it really resonated. and obviously there's no scientific, you know, validity to it, perhaps. But for me, it's kind of my personal truth, if you will. Okay, so I love this Kamu quote because it's really absurd in itself. And it's like, it's a puzzle. And every time I see this quote, it means something different to me.

I'm not sure if it will have that effect for you. But anyway, folks, UFOs, the paranormal, the unexplained, we love them, right? That's why we're here. And, you know, they're really having a moment from media hungry fans of ghost and bigfoot content to congressional hearings teasing UFO disclosure. These topics that we know and love have been yanked out of the realm of marginalia and are now becoming a hit TV series and are trending topics on social media for better or for worse. So, and while the growth and popularity of UFOs and the paranormal is probably a positive thing, I feel that sometimes the most important aspects are, being left out of the mainstream study of these topics. And that is that UFOs, the paranormal, supernatural, cryptozoology is weird. It's really weird. It's absurd. It's surreal. And

oftentimes, as long as known as was hurt or too terribly traumatized, it's even kind of funny. And perhaps these feelings are key elements of the impact that whatever this intelligence is, or maybe not, it may not even be in intelligence, is trying to make. And while I feel I very do much believe that science has a major role to play in this stuff, I feel that philosophers, theologians, artists, and even humorous have a major role to play as well, and garnering a greater understanding of whatever this phenomenon is. Slide change, jerusalem. All right. So, Twin Peaks, man. For me, it's still. the greatest media representation of the absurd, the weird aspects of UFOs and the supernatural.

Twin Peaks. It has this dreamy feeling of the Black Lodge, the offbeat use of comedy in the visually surreal images that make me feel like I'm actually having a high strange experience. I remember when I watched it when I was 12 years old, my mother, the pilot, I truly felt like I was being initiated into the world of the weird. I also believe that there is an inherent anti-structure, self-negating component to these supernatural experiences people have. And absurdity is often the vehicle for how it's conveyed. It can distort a reality in a whimsical fashion.

It can even greatly impact the experiencer's worldview. And maybe because absurdity stands out. It makes an impact. It helps you remember. And it can be used to make a moment having an unrealness about it. I'm pretty sure I just made up the word unrealness, but let's get it into the lexicon because it makes sense, right? It's something out of the urinary absurdity. And that is a detail that I personally focus on when I'm reading, researching UFOs and the paranormal.

Perhaps it's the phenomenon's way of shouting at the experiencer, hey, you, this is not normal. Pay attention. So, surrealism. Surrealism, in my opinion, is the artsy cousin of absurdity. Surrealism is a 20th century avant-garde movement in art and literature which sought to release the creative potential of the unconscious mind. For example, by the irrational juxtaposition of images. It's a style, in my silly opinion, that surrealism in art is a vehicle to transport visions from the other world, the astral plane, whatever you want to call it, to the screen, to the canvas, or on vinyl. And I like to think, for example, the extremely wide array of UFO occupants,

their behaviors, their deceptive qualities, are a perfect example of surreal images, perhaps borrowed from our unconscious mind. In comedy, surrealism is often used as non-sequiters, offbeat details, or references. In film, it's used as a tool of dream logic, such as a David Lynch movie, really any David Lynch movie. In a Lynch film, a common motif is that on the exterior of a location or even within a person, things maybe seem normal, mundane, like a slice of cherry pie, the local diner. But underneath or inside, there is a whole world of abstract weirdness transpiring.

And it's that world underneath and inside that I'd like to bend your ear about today. The Black Lodge, where the supernational entities of Twin Peaks reside is a wonderful, to me, media representation of the other world, the astral plane. And maybe an artistic metaphor for where UFOs, cryptids, ghost. synchronicities, you name it, all come from. So, John Keel lovingly referred to it as the Super Spectrum. And Jacques Valé, in his groundbreaking book, Passport to McGonia, referred to it as, you guessed it, Magonia. Many see UFO simply as one sees a Norman Rockwell painting.

You know, everything's kind of on the surface. There's not a lot of hidden depth, in my opinion, to that kind of work. And I'm not saying that's good or bad, but sometimes I do feel like it's forgotten that a good number of experiencers describe their experiences in the art language of a Salvador dolly painting. Some of these cases I'll be using as an example will maybe seem kind of goofy to people who really are hardcore firmly planted in the nuts and bolts camp, which, look, it's fair. I can't prove the validity of any of these cases. That's not my point today. However, I do think it's important to remember that sometimes these big organizations

that have been collecting data on Bigfoot, UFOs, and reports, they often leave out the weird stuff. And the reason is likely because they won't be taken seriously by the scientific community. Who cares? But to leave out the weird, honestly, I think is bad science. It does not further us down the road of understanding the origin or the meaning of the subject. Sure, the weirdest probably doesn't give you a better grasp on propulsion and all that stuff. I'll never understand. Or even really care about, to be honest.

but the weirdness and the sheer variety of encounter experiences tend to do away with the simple narrative structures of a galactic federation or the simplicity of a nuts and bolts explanation. So, blah, blah, blah, Steve, with all that being said, I'm going to give you some examples. I'm encounter cases that are so deeply burned into my psyche. And they've had a real impact in like being a lover of stories and a lover of philosophy. These different encounters I'm going to talk about really. are absurd. They're surreal and I think they're sort of funny aside from any kind of trauma in anyone experienced, obviously. So there's two kind of modes of emotional experience that I'd like

to kind of have everyone keep in mind as I go through some of these examples. One is dream logic, all right? So dream logic, which is defined as the nonsensical logic one possesses while dreaming that makes perfect sense until he or she wakes up. To me, a lot of the cases that I'm going to be talking about, or cases in general that are thought of as weird, strange, operate in a kind of dream logic. Two, two is Jenny Randall's Oz Factor. And this is a wonderful term she coined where it refers to an experience being isolated or transported by the real world of everyday life into an environmental framework, which is

quite similar to the real world, but changed enough to be noticeable and disturbing. And some of the even like detailed elements of that are when they step into this almost bubble of non-reality, the sound, everything sound different. The atmosphere feels weird. There's just a feeling of being transported into another reality when people have these highest range experiences often. Okay. And then some of the, these are some of the attributes to that I'm, I feel all these cases kind of represent that I'm going to be talking about. One is a performative quality. A lot of times these encounters feel like almost like little staged plays to me.

Pop culture mimicry. It does seem that when you kind of go back and study a certain decade of Ufology or, you know, cryptozoology, maybe not so much cryptozoology. But it seems like whatever the phenomenon is, it's kind of mimicking our pop culture. There is such a wide array of manifestations. I mean, if these are aliens from another planet, we must. have like 1,500 different aliens from different planets coming here. Paralysis. Paranormal residue. Oftentimes when people have these experiences, later they go home thinking like, well, that was crazy. But then poltergeist activity starts

happening and they'll have psychic premonitions. Just weird stuff tends to follow them home. Sometimes. Changes in perception prior to the encounters. A lot of times right before encounter happens, people do kind of experience that Oz factor. Time being played out in a nonlinear fashion, oftentimes the linear world that we live in is just thrown into a tizzy during these experiences. Stage displays for witnesses. That kind of goes with the performative quality at the top. Time distortions.

Time gets all whizzy-wig. Reality transformations. Nonsensical qualities. Unusual sounds and odor, like sulfur, burning rubber, and even like whirring noises that are often heard before people have a UFO encounter. and then encounters not appearing what they, encounters not being what they appear to be. I will go into that further, obviously.

So with my first case, I am going to be talking about Jerry Townsend's 10 cans. So in 1965, Jerry Townsend was driving right outside of Long Prairie, Minnesota, when his car stopped, which we've heard that before. And so as he was coasting around a bend in the road, He came to a stop and he sees a giant rocket ship. And it's, I mean, it's 30 to 40 feet tall. And so he like stares at it for a little bit. And then he sees a bright, colorless light appear at the bottom of the rocket ship.

And three beer can looking alien entities, whatever you want to call them, are staring back at him. He kind of thinks to himself for a minute, like, hey, I'm going to go over there and push one of those, grab one of those tin cans. so, you know, I can have some proof of this thing. He even thought about pushing over the rocket. So he gets out of his car, and he's steering one down. He's kind of having a standoff with these beer can aliens, and then one of them kind of rushes at him, like in a kind of aggressive fashion. He smartly gets back in his car to safety.

And then the tin cans kind of like look at him. They go back under the light. The light becomes bright. The rocket takes off, and it goes up into the air, and then it comes to a complete standstill, a rocket, right to a standstill. Then it vanishes. So right away he goes and reports us to the police. The police come out and investigate the situation.

They find three little oil slicks, and they do find out later that multiple people saw lights right around the same time in the same area. I think a group of hunters saw them and some other people. But this case is obviously very odd. I love it. It's got all the hallmarks of absurdity. beautiful. A plus. Hey everyone.

Ryan Sprague here, host of Somewhere in the Skies. If you've ever thought about supporting us, we have great two easy options for you right now. If you listen to the show on Apple Podcasts, you can click the subscribe button at the top of your Apple feed. Or you can join our Patreon at patreon.com slash somewhere skies. Both of these options give you the same benefits.

early access to the main show, bonus episodes and content, and priority to ask our guests, your listener questions. So to help support Summer in the Skies, click that subscribe button on Apple or visit patreon.com slash somewhere skies. Thank you so much for your support and keep looking up. The next case I want to talk about is, look, I'm originally from Nebraska, so I have to put a Nebraska case in there. I call this one the wind weirdie. And so in Falls City, Nebraska in 1956, a man that had the alias, Mr. Hanks, he didn't want to give out of his name for obvious reasons. He was driving home from work right into Falls City, Nebraska, and I've been to Fall City. It is a tiny little town.

So he was, I know the exact road he was probably driving in because there's one way and one way out. And he is, you know, getting back into town, gets back into town a little bit close to his neighborhood, and he sees something flying in the sky that looks like a job. giant bird. And he's like, oh, it must be a hawk or something. And then it starts getting kind of closer. And it looks like it's wobbling and kind of having problems flying. And so he's like, well, that is very odd. And he sees the thing, it gets closer and he's starting to notice some details of it, that this is a creature or entity that's got really wrinkled, brown, tan, leathery skin, piercing ice water blue eyes. And it has a computer. type device on its chest and it's turning dials and knobs and it's got these wings, obviously,

that's how it's flying. But they're not organic wings, like kind of you would think of as a mothman or a lot of other flying humanoid cases. These are, there's a shoulder harness strap, like it's wearing an apparatus, which you can almost think of, is that the UFO? You know, like the actual wings and the computer thing. But he described it as demonic looking. and it seemed to be having some kind of mechanical problems.

So when it got closer to him, he got out of his car and he was immediately paralyzed, just, you know, utter fear coursing through his blood. And it gets close, it's wobbling. And then after a while, it kind of, by turning some knob, course correct itself and flies off. Now, the thing was he, this really had a major impact on poor Mr. Hanks. He was acquitted in saying that for the rest of his life, he actually took on other jobs so we didn't have to sleep as much because he would always have nightmares. It disrupted his family life like you hear about a lot of times. So this isn't really

one of the funny cases. But he really has some psychological problems after this. And he, the thing that, like, such a bad psychological problem than he needed to work more. He needed to get another job because he just had to keep his mind off this thing. Poor guy. Awful situation. Uh-oh. Okay. And so the next case I'm going to be kind of going over is the Cusack UFO Devils. So in August 29, 1967, a 13-year-old boy and his nine-year-old sister were, you know, walking around the beautiful countryside in France. And they noticed this ball in, like, in a clearing.

And, you know, then they kind of, you know, walk a little closer to see what was going on. And they see four little entities covered in like a black skin tight suit. And then they had like little pointy beards, pointy nose, and they looked like little devils, they said. One was holding a mirror-like object. There was a very strong smell of sulfur in the air. Josh Cutchin, anybody, the Rimstone Deceit, read more about that if you want to know more about sulfur. So they stared at this, you know, totally confused.

And after a while, the being started floating up in the air and one by one would go head first. into this like spherical orb thing, except for the last one was looking around the ground and he picked up his mirror. Also, they were rooting around the soil when they first caught him. I forgot to mention that. But the last one was like looking for his little mirror object, grabbed it and then he hopped in it too. So the two kids, I believe their father was the mayor. And so he like, you know, immediately got some place out there.

They went and investigated. They did find some yellow trace evidence of yellowed grass. and there was still a very strong smell of sulfur. And also, what's up with the soil samples? How much dirt do we really need? Gosh, here's just a kind of a different illustration of the beings going head first into the ore, which I think is so adorable and so funny. Okay.

So this next one, some of you have probably heard this one. Maybe not. But I love this case. I was actually trying to find this location this summer. My wife is kind of from the area, so I had my father-in-law drive me around the area by the old police barracks. So I kind of got a sense of where it could be. It was like one of three properties, and it was still just so wonderful. I love the magical place and seeing where things might have happened.

It's exciting for me. Anyway, on October 25, 1973, Uniontown, Pennsylvania, 15 witnesses saw a red object. one boy and his friend grabbed the gun to go get a closer look of where the object appeared to have landed in like a fairing in a clearing he noticed that it was actually headed towards his father's house so he has a gun in some tracer bullets and real bullets and they go over and they see this red disc hovering by a barn just right off the ground so they're staring at this object and they smell a putrid smell in the air there's a whirring noise and then all of a sudden they hear what sounds like that Sounds like very loud babies crying. Terrifying. And they are like, what in the hell is going on here? And they noticed that on the fence line, like here's the barn, here's the UFO. And there's a fence coming up, they notice two very tall, big foot-like creatures with glowing green eyes.

So one of the boys, I don't know if I would do this, takes one of the Tracy rifle, fires two. on the second one, one of the creatures tries to reach out and grab the bullet, the tracer bullet as is flying towards them. And all of a sudden, the UFO completely vanishes. Later, you know, and so the two creatures were still by the fence line. And eventually they kind of turned around and started walking back into the tree line forest area where they came from. The police came later and investigated the scene. And the first officer who came said, where the UFO had supposedly landed, there was a giant red glow that he said I could read a newspaper from the glow on the ground.

Then later, the wonderful Stan Gordon, the infamous Stan Gordon, he has kind of been the guy who's reported all the stuff in Pennsylvania in terms of like high strangers, bigfoot UFOs. Him and his team came out like at two in the morning to investigate the case. The glow was gone by then, but there was this putrid, awful, you know, rotten egg. smell that hung in the area, making some of his investigative team actually, like, sick and vomiting. Then the boy who had shot at the Sasquatch, his name is not available, he started going into convulsions, started acting animalistic, was like growling. They said it sound like something that would not come from a human, but he was growling and he was going absolutely ballistic. So later on, you know, they kind of calm him down, get him kind of, you know,

back to normal. He, all of a sudden, after this thing happened, he wore glasses this whole life. He didn't need glasses anymore. He, for the years and years afterwards, he had psychic visions, premonitions. He claimed that, like, he would, like, say to a bird, like, come land on my shoulder, the bird would land on his shoulder. So there was all this after effects. that are really interesting to think about too. And you hear about this sometimes with these high stringent encounters. And I just love the idea. And this is not the only case in this kind of 1972, 73 flap in Pennsylvania,

where UFOs and Bigfoot were seen at the same time. It was kind of a thing. Actually, that was happening then. So this case is the Emelson case in Poland. So what's, first off, what's the deal with farmers seeing? having somebody wonderful encounters. I'm so jealous. Maybe it should become a farmer.

Anyways, in May 10th, 1978, Jan Wolski was riding his, he had a horse-drawn carriage, and he was riding along, pretty day in the countryside in Poland, and these two beings that looked like the being on this slide appeared next to him.

Then they kind of scurried off in front of him and went to like a little break in the bushes. So Jan decided to kind of, he's like, wow, that's not normal. probably, I'm going to go follow and see where these little creatures went. And so he goes and he sees this like kind of rectangular craft with these like four like screw nobules on all four corners

and a little elevator that he sees the three, the two entities go up into. So he gets closer to it and he actually steps onto the elevator and goes inside too. And one weird detail that I, that really sticks out to me is that this is obviously looks like a very technical. highly technological craft, but the door was like made of some kind of like fabric carpet. Like it was like cheaply like tacked on the door. So anyways, he goes inside and then they're, they tell them to undress and they take these two kind of saucer like devices and kind of, you know, scan him, do some tests on him. And, you know, then he's told to put his clothes back on.

He's offered some icicles, which he assumed was some sort of food. I probably would have taken one. You never know. It could be delicious. And then, you know, at the same time, a young boy named Adam Popolet claimed to have seen UFOs while he was experiencing this thing. Later on, when they came to, you know,

investigate, I think a couple days later or a day later, there really wasn't any evidence of the craft, but there was a lot of little weird footprints. Just a truly bizarre encounter. I love it. Oh, this is a monument. It's kind of a famous

case in Poland, they really celebrated. So they developed a little monument to it. It's beautiful. That little box. And some of the another thing, you know, some of the after effects of these things, and I don't know if this has anything to do with it, but I think it's worth mentioning that the Wolski family, Jan's family,

had a lot of different problems. People were falling ill. One of his sons, Edward, actually died in mysterious circumstances when his body was found in a nearby forest. And today, the Wolski farm is completely abandoned. So not kind of a tragic ending to that one. All right.

I'm sure some of you out there know about All Color Sam, Sam the Sandown clown. Hello and I am All Color Sam, which is maybe the best quote from NT ever. So in late common Sandown, I Love White, UK, 1973, a young boy and a girl heard this, we're playing outside, you know, having a great time. They heard this ambulance noise, really loud. And then the amyless noise kind of stopped, and they looked in this little stream where there was a bridge right by and they see this, you know, what looked like a man or a clown splashing around the water. And then the entity gets up and starts hopping, doing high knee jumps, like away from them towards this like metallic looking structure. You know, they were very curious, obviously. And so they walked towards the structure, walked towards Sam.

And they said it looked like a cross between a clown, a robot, and an alien. The kids said it behaved shy but friendly. And then all said it grabs a microphone. But it's kind of confusing whether it actually spoke in the microphone or it just kind of held up for effect. Sam ended up taking the kids to the metal hut where he was interacting with them. They asked Sam if he was a ghost and he said, not really but sort of. summing to that effect. I can't remember the exact quote.

They asked him if he was a man and he said no. But then he kind of drew on a piece of paper, hello, my name is all color Sam. So that's why they referred to him as Sam. But Sam claimed that he just got done building the shack and it was made of metal and it had these kind of like weird devices on the wall. The kids weren't sure if it was wallpaper or actual devices, but there were some sort of like technological aspects,

almost like this was a craft. itself. And Sam claimed to live in the interior of the shack. And in one little detail that I find so weird and beautiful and wonderful, Sam does almost like a magic trick where he takes a berry, a blueberry, puts it in his ear, shakes his head around violently, the berry appears in his eye. Then he shakes his head again, and the berry comes out of his mouth. And I believe it was Rod Christopperson that it's almost like he was doing a taste test

to make sure if the berry was good or bad. And I love that. Also, so, you know, yeah, you know, one thing I, the wonderful thinker in this stuff, AP Strange, mentioned to me that during this period in the Isle of White in the UK, there was kind of this pagan revival. And there was a music festival right around then that was kind of, like, celebrating. There was a whole, like, movement in, like, music. It was, like, pre-heavy,

metal, but it was kind of pagan influence, a lot of, you know, Dungeons and Dragons imagery that happened. And, you know, as Sam's holding the microphone, and it's almost like, you know, this resonant energy maybe, you know, like he can explain it much better. You should bug him about it, but I thought it was very interesting. He's kind of, um, he's the one I think he's, he's really made Sam, I think, kind of a known popular guy. To me, these encounters kind of feel more like a performance in a little black box theater of an off, off, off, off Broadway show. And maybe they're even a mask for what these anomalies really are, almost as if they're pieced together by cultural images and taken into some sort of bubble of non-reality.

I find it interesting to almost kind of like look at these displays or, you know, encounters, whatever you want to call them, like a little Steven Spielberg movie, or more like a David Lynch movie, I should say, directing these little scenes from. a remote location. So while we're all or you're all or whoever is waiting around, you know, trying to wait out this political drama of our government telling us exactly what you want to hear about UFOs and a kind of a package ex-files narrative structure, don't forget about the weird parts because the stories are perhaps the point. And maybe they will lead us even to better questions because I don't think we'll ever be able to

really know what this stuff is per se, but being able to ask better questions, I think, is a big step forward. So thank you, everyone, for your time. I really appreciate this. I hope some of it made sense. But I really do appreciate the time. Thank you so much. Ooh, all right. Somewhere in the Skies is produced by Third Kind Productions in association with the Entertainment One Podcast Network. I'm Danica Patrick. With the average car now over 12 years old, most manufacturers warranties have expired. That's why smart drivers choose endurance. If your vehicle is less than 20 years old, no matter the mileage. Endurance could have your car covered and your rate won't go up no matter how many claims you file.

Choose the plan that fits your budget and get one year of elite benefits free. For your free quote, visitendurancewarranty.com. That's endurance warranty.com. Covered varies by plan, view contracts and exclusions at endurancewarranty.com.