Person
Leonard Stringfield
Also known as Leonard H. Stringfield, Len Stringfield, Stringfield
- UFO researcher and author (CRIFO, MUFON); WWII Army Air Forces intelligence officer (self-reported)
Leonard H. Stringfield (1920–1994) was an American UFO researcher from Cincinnati and the first to gather accounts of crashed UFOs and recovered bodies systematically. By his own account he served as an Army Air Forces intelligence officer in the Pacific during the Second World War, ran the early civilian group CRIFO in the 1950s, and screened sighting reports for the Air Force's Air Defense Command; none of this is confirmed by official records in this archive. From his 1978 MUFON paper Retrievals of the Third Kind to his seventh Status Report in 1994 he published dozens of retrieval accounts, many of them set at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base.
He is filed as a researcher, outside the archive's credibility criteria, because his accounts come almost entirely from informants identified only by initials, often relayed second-hand. He said so himself: he had never seen a retrieved craft or body and held no affidavits, and his cases could be considered hearsay. He matters because his accounts underpin much of today's crash-retrieval narrative and are cited in testimony submitted to Congress; this file lets readers trace those claims to their source.
Sources: Leonard Stringfield, Retrievals of the Third Kind (1978) and Status Reports (Internet Archive scans) · Michael Shellenberger, written testimony to Congress · Wikipedia
Facts and claims
- claimed In his 1978 MUFON paper “Retrievals of the Third Kind” he wrote that, “According to my sources, these immobilized craft and deceased occupants, described as humanoid, have been placed in custody at certain military installations where they were studied under the highest security measures.” He followed it with seven self-published Status Reports, the last in 1994. — Leonard Stringfield Source: archive.org
- claimed In the same paper he set out the limits of his evidence: “I personally have not seen a retrieved UFO, parts of one, or its occupants. Also, for the record, I do not possess a single affidavit to prove that any one of my informants has seen a retrieved craft or its occupants.” His informants' names were withheld at their request, and he acknowledged that the cases “can be construed as hearsay.” — Leonard Stringfield Source: archive.org
- unverified He says that in the mid-1950s he was “asked by the Air Defense Command to screen and report UFO activity by code name, FOX TROT KILO 3-0 BLUE”, working with the Ground Observer Corps. — Leonard Stringfield Source: archive.org
- documented Michael Shellenberger's written testimony to Congress cites Stringfield's 1978 paper and Status Reports throughout its timeline of alleged crash retrievals from 1948 to the 1960s, including anonymous accounts of bodies and materials at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. Source: Michael Shellenberger written testimony + appendices
Connected files
Books
- Situation Red, the UFO Siege! (authored)
- UFO Crash/Retrievals: Status Reports I–VII (authored)
Claims
- The U.S. has recovered the bodies of non-human beings from crashed craft (asserts)
- The U.S. holds recovered craft of non-human origin and runs a secret program to reverse-engineer them (comments on claim)
Concepts
- Crash retrieval & reverse engineering (collected cases of) — From 1978 he published dozens of retrieval accounts; he said himself his cases could be considered hearsay
Places
- Wright-Patterson Air Force Base (claims about) — Many of his retrieval accounts are set at Wright-Patterson; he said his cases could be considered hearsay