And, like my encounter with a perpetrator, he wanted his name left out of it. He wanted people to know the truth and not to believe in a fantasy. As a man of science, he did not want a myth to continue due to his folly. But he did not want to run the risk of ruining his career and reputation and relations with friends and family.

Dr. Etscorn told me that, so convinced was he that his graduate student had solved the Socorro story and identified a hoaxer, he gave her an A on her thesis paper!

Left entirely unanswered by hoax skeptics (including Kevin Randle) is why Dr. Stirling Colgate, Dr. Frank Etscorn, Dave Collis (Energetics Lab) and several other senior administrators and alumni would wish to implicate their own students? Why would these men of science, who are by nature truth-detectors and fact-checkers, lie or misinterpret? Why would they wish to tarnish the reputation of the school? Why would they want to run the risk of harming their former students involved in the hoax? Because their commitment to truth is greater than any of those things.

A HOAXER FOUND, A LESSON LEARNED

This author has found and spoken to an involved perpetrator of the Socorro UFO hoax, a student at New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology in 1964. Using resources and clues obtained over years, the identification was not easy. There were many missed opportunities, embarrassing moments, and awkward calls.

There is also major disappointment over what was not shared and what cannot be shared. I cannot tell you with 100% assurance exactly how the hoax was performed (I was not told, but I will make a good attempt later in this piece). And I am unable, due to the requested anonymity, to tell you the names of involved people. But what I did learn is perhaps equally as important, just as enlightening.

The individual did not reach out to me – I contacted him by phone. Retired and in his 70s, he is a man of accomplishment. Though he never denied being a perpetrator, he also does not want his name associated with the event. How many of us would want to recount our youthful follies to our children? Who amongst us would wish our names on the net, revisiting embarrassing moments during our late teens or early twenties? Where are those of us who will come forward to publicly explain our tricks and lies from college?

The man is rightly concerned that having his name used would mean continued calls at all hours from strangers, emails from those he does not know, demanding answers. Perhaps knocks at the door from unwelcome inquisitors. Reporters? Why do they need to, for our sake, disrupt the winter of his life, and those of others involved? Why should those involved cause harm to their legacies? Why should they be shamed in front of their families? For what reason should they break a promise made to close college friends that none of them will ever say anything to anyone ever about any involvement in the hoax?

As he pointed out, there is a ‘damned if you do or don’t’ dynamic to admitting publicly to the hoax. When one asks, how was it propelled and navigated? How many were involved? What were their roles? – no answer that a perpetrator may provide will ever be sufficient. They will be victimized as liars. They will be told that they must reunite on camera and reenact the prank. They will be forced to play the ‘20 questions’ game – a game that they do not need or want to play for us. They would be demanded to show physical proof. They think instead, “Why do I need to show proof of anything to anyone?”

So that even if they were to come forward as people want, and say how the hoax was done – there will no doubt be critics. There will be those who would say “technically it could not have been done that way” or “it doesn’t fit Lonnie’s testimony”. That is, no amount of explanation would ever be enough.

The worst scenario would be to be believed. That would mean scorn. The perpetrator would be asked how he could ruin Lonnie’s life? How could you live with yourself knowing what you had done?

In talking to him, it was clear: all of this meant more to me than to him. He does not obsess about it like many of us do. I got the distinct impression that he puts it out of his mind, compartmentalizing it as a means of coping with what he had done. Many of us feel that the hoaxers have an obligation to identify themselves and tell all. They of course have no such obligation whatsoever. No more than you have an obligation to tell your daughter about that wild weekend with Jennie back in ’84. Nor do you tell Aunt Helen about the terrific weed that frat brother Joe had at that party in ’87.

In fact, he thinks about the event so much less than many of us do, that I got the sense that, although he knows of the continued interest in the case all these years on, he was not aware of Dr. Colgate’s statements on the hoax. That is how I got him to say anything of substance about the event. When I told him Colgate said it was a balloon, he agreed, “Yes, it was.” When I said Colgate knew it to be students that were involved, he said, “Well, yes, of course, but that is all I am about to say any further on any of this.” I was not to get from him details on who or how many were involved, what balloon was sent up, how it was powered and controlled, how they hid from Lonnie, etc. He was clearly not going to offer up the identities of the others, nor the details of what they did. All he really wanted to say was how only grief would come to him were he to do so.

HOW THE GREATEST UFO HOAX IN HISTORY WAS LIKELY DONE