THE PHANTOM AIRSHIPS: America’s First UFO Wave

Between 1896 and 1897, thousands of Americans reported seeing mysterious flying machines in the skies – decades before powered flight was supposed to exist.

The Sacramento Sightings Begin

On the stormy night of November 17, 1896, hundreds of residents in Sacramento, California witnessed something that should not have existed. Through the dark, rain-filled clouds, a bright light moved slowly across the sky about 1,000 feet above the city’s rooftops. Among the observers was George Scott, an assistant to the Secretary of State of California, who persuaded friends to join him on the observation deck above the capitol dome. From there, they thought they could see three lights, not one, with a dark, oblong shape above them.

The most detailed account came from R.L. Lowery, a former streetcar employee who claimed he heard voices calling from above. “Throw her up higher; she’ll hit the steeple,” someone shouted from the craft. When Lowery looked up, he saw two men seated on what appeared to be a bicycle-like frame, pedaling to power the strange machine. Above them hung a cigar-shaped body with wheels on the sides, similar to paddle wheels on old steamboats. Lowery added with obvious humor that the captain seemed to be referring to a local brewery tower rather than any actual church steeple, as there were no churches nearby.

Deputy Sheriff Walter Mallory was among the many credible witnesses who observed the mysterious object. The sighting made headlines in local newspapers the next day, with stories titled “Strange Tale of Sacramento Men” and “What Was It?”

The Return to Sacramento

Five days after the initial sighting, on November 22, the airship returned to Sacramento. This time, thousands of people watched as it took nearly 30 minutes to cross the city, moving against the prevailing wind. Jacob Zemansky, equipped with a small telescope, reported that the lamp was “an electric arc light of intense power.” He also observed that the light didn’t move in a straight line but seemed to bob up and down in the wind. Edward Carragher, using field glasses, reported seeing a dark body above the light.

During this sighting, witnesses reported hearing talking or singing as the light passed overhead. Some claimed to hear conversations from the craft, with one voice saying, “We ought to get to San Francisco by tomorrow afternoon,” and another responding to a shout from the ground with, “San Francisco – we should be there by midnight.”

San Francisco and Beyond

The same evening the airship appeared over Sacramento, it was also spotted in San Francisco, about 90 miles away. The craft was observed by hundreds of witnesses, including Mayor Adolph Sutro’s domestic staff. As the airship flew over the famous Cliff House and Seal Rocks, its powerful searchlight reportedly stretched more than 500 feet, frightening the seals and causing them to dive into the ocean for safety.

On November 29, over 100 residents of Tulare witnessed what they described as a spectacular display. The craft came down quite a distance, then rose up and took a straight course toward Hanford. Red, white, and blue lights were seen in succession, though no part of the actual ship was visible. Many people watched until it disappeared from sight.

Throughout November and December 1896, similar sightings were reported across dozens of California cities, including Anderson, Auburn, Red Bluff, Redding, Woodland, Chico, Marysville, San Jose, Hayward, Stockton, Visalia, Fresno, Bakersfield, Santa Barbara, and Los Angeles.

The Shaw Encounter

Colonel H.G. Shaw of Stockton provided one of the most unusual accounts. On November 19, 1896, Shaw claimed he encountered a landed spacecraft near Lodi while driving his buggy through the countryside. The metallic vessel was about 150 feet long and 25 feet in diameter, with pointed ends and a featureless surface except for a rudder.

Three tall, slender beings, approximately seven feet in height, approached Shaw while making strange warbling sounds. The beings were described as hairless and appeared to be examining Shaw’s buggy with great interest. They then attempted to physically force him to accompany them back to their airship, but gave up when they realized they lacked the physical strength to overpower him. The aliens returned to their craft, which lifted off and sped out of sight. Shaw believed the beings were Martians who had come to kidnap an earthling for unknown purposes.

The Nebraska Emergence

After disappearing from California skies in December 1896, the airship phenomenon went quiet for two months. Then, on February 2, 1897, the Omaha Bee reported sightings over Hastings, Nebraska. Several residents reported seeing an airship hovering about 800 feet above the ground west of the city. The craft had first been noticed the previous fall, when it was seen floating about 500 feet above ground for approximately 30 minutes before beginning to circle and travel north for about two miles.

On Sunday evening, January 25, 1897, the large, glaring light was seen to circle around for a few minutes before descending about 200 feet. It then circled as it traveled at remarkable speed for about two miles before slowing up and circling for fully 15 minutes. Finally, it began to lower and disappear as mysteriously as it had appeared.

On February 5, the airship was sighted again near Invale, a tiny farm town 40 miles south of Hastings. People returning from a prayer meeting witnessed the craft, which seemed to be conical-shaped and perhaps 30 to 40 feet in length. It had a bright headlight and six smaller lights – three on each side – and appeared to have two sets of wings on each side with a large fan-shaped rudder. The witnesses claimed to hear rumbling engine noises and the voices of the airship’s occupants speaking to each other.

The Kansas Sightings

In Kansas, the airship made its presence known with several dramatic encounters. On the night of March 27-28, 1897, Topeka-area residents noted a mysterious object in the skies that was described as a “blood red light” moving slowly across the heavens. Several hundred witnesses observed the phenomenon, and some people were reportedly so frightened that they hid in their storm cellars, fearing that a great calamity was approaching. Among the witnesses was Governor John W. Leedy himself.

One local farmer reported that something from above had lowered a grapnel hook that snagged him and dragged him before setting him down unharmed. The Ellis County Republican quoted a clairvoyant as saying the airship mystery stemmed from “not one but a whole fleet of ships managed by strange and wonderful beings, bright intelligences from a far-off planet.”

The Hamilton Cattle Incident

The most famous Kansas encounter occurred at the ranch of Alexander Hamilton near Leroy. At about 10:30 p.m. on April 12, 1897, Hamilton was alerted by his agitated cattle and emerged from his house to investigate. He saw an airship slowly descending over his cow lot, about 220 yards from his house.

Calling for help from his tenant and son, Hamilton grabbed axes and ran toward the strange craft as it lowered to within 30 feet of the ground. The airship consisted of a great cigar-shaped portion, possibly 300 feet long, with a carriage underneath made of panels of glass or other transparent material alternating with narrow strips of some other substance. The craft was brilliantly lit from within, making everything clearly visible.

Inside, Hamilton could see six of the strangest beings he had ever encountered – two men, a woman, and three children. They were talking among themselves, but Hamilton could not understand a single word. When the occupants caught sight of the witnesses, they activated some unknown power, and a great turbine wheel about 30 feet in diameter began to buzz like a separator cylinder.

The vessel rose like a bird, and when it reached about 300 feet above them, it paused and hovered directly over a three-year-old heifer that was bawling and jumping in the fence. Upon investigation, Hamilton found a cable about half an inch thick fastened in a slip knot around the heifer’s neck, with one end passing up to the vessel and tangled in the wire fence.

Unable to remove the cable, Hamilton cut the wire fence loose and watched in amazement as the ship, cow and all, rose slowly and sailed off toward the northwest. The following evening, Hamilton learned that his cow’s hide, legs, and head had been discovered about 13 miles north and four miles west of his cattle lot, apparently dropped by the mysterious travelers.

Hamilton’s story was supported by several distinguished local residents who signed affidavits confirming his character and the truth of his account. However, decades later, it was revealed that Hamilton had fabricated the entire story as an entry in a local “Liars’ Club” competition.

Illinois Encounters

As the airship wave moved into Illinois in April 1897, the encounters became even more detailed and bizarre. The first Illinois sightings occurred in Evanston and several other communities near Chicago on April 3. Local newspapers quickly spread rumors that the airship was filled with “English spies,” though this claim had no basis in fact.

The craft remained over Evanston for 45 minutes, observed by more than 500 people. Witnesses described it as “composed of two cigar-shaped bodies attached by girders,” while others claimed it had wings and sails. Professor G.W. Hough of the Dearborn Observatory dismissed the sighting without even looking, insisting it was merely the star Alpha Orionis.

Walter McCann, a news vendor in Chicago, provided what may have been the first photograph of the mystery airship. On April 12, while picking up newspapers at the Northwestern Railway depot, McCann spotted the ship approaching from the south. He rushed into his store to retrieve a camera his son had won in a contest and managed to snap two photographs as the craft passed overhead. The Chicago Times-Herald’s staff artists subjected the photos to acid tests and declared them authentic, though the original images have since been lost.

The Springfield Landing

One of the most detailed landing reports came from near Springfield, Illinois, where two farmhands reported an extraordinary encounter. The airship landed in a field where they were working, and three occupants emerged – two men and one woman. The crew members told the startled workers that they would make a report to the government about their journey “when Cuba is declared free,” referring to the ongoing struggle for Cuban independence that would soon involve the United States in war with Spain.

After their cryptic announcement, the occupants waved goodbye to the farmhands and climbed back into their craft, which lifted off and disappeared into the sky. The workers noted that all three occupants appeared to be ordinary humans who spoke perfect English.

The Mt. Vernon Repair Incident

Near Mt. Vernon, Illinois, the city’s mayor was scanning the sky with his telescope when the airship came into view. In addition to observing the craft itself, the mayor claimed to see one of its occupants hovering in the sky around the vessel. The flying figure appeared to be a man with some sort of device strapped to his back that allowed him to maneuver freely through the air, apparently making repairs to the ship’s exterior.

This sighting was followed by several more landing reports in Nilwood, Downs Township, and Green Ridge, where the occupants were seen checking machinery on their craft before quickly departing when approached by curious witnesses. The pattern suggested the airship was experiencing mechanical difficulties that required frequent maintenance stops.

The Missouri Encounter

On April 10, 1897, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch published one of the most unusual encounter stories. W.H. Hopkins reported finding a grounded airship about 20 feet in length and 8 feet in diameter near Springfield, Missouri. The vehicle was propelled by three large propellers and appeared to be made of an unknown metallic material.

When Hopkins approached the craft, two crew members emerged – a beautiful woman and a bearded man, both completely nude. Hopkins attempted to communicate with them, trying various gestures and words to determine their origins. After several minutes of confusion, the crew members finally understood what he was asking. Both pointed toward the sky and uttered something that sounded distinctly like the word “Mars.”

The encounter lasted only a few minutes before the nude occupants returned to their craft and departed, leaving Hopkins to wonder if he had just met visitors from another world.

The Vincennes Spectacle

On Friday night, April 16, 1897, the mysterious airship passed over Vincennes, Indiana twice, providing one of the most well-documented sightings of the entire wave. The first appearance occurred around nine o’clock, when the craft traveled along the extreme eastern portion of the horizon. A sphere of golden light was clearly visible, and those near the ship claimed they could see the dark lines of its car, though no passengers were observed during this pass.

From his home on Burnett’s Heights, Sam Judah reported seeing the ship clearly with its fluttering wings, its movements resembling a side-wheeler steamboat sailing through the air with incredible velocity. Colonel Ewing, checking his thermometer at his doorway, initially thought the light was a falling star but soon realized it was moving too slowly for a meteor. He watched the airship for approximately four minutes.

Anton Simon noticed what appeared to be a ball of fire moving from northwest to southeast, which he later recognized as the mysterious airship. Victor Schonfeld, described as an expert observer who had made airships and balloons a lifelong study and had even made several balloon ascensions himself, testified that this was definitely a genuine airship.

An hour and a half later, the airship returned, passing over the northern portion of the city and traveling in a northwesterly direction. During this second pass, it seemed to fly directly over the fairgrounds (present-day Gregg Park) and traveled more slowly than during its first swift passage. Some witnesses claimed they could hear voices from the airship, and one gentleman watching from Burnett’s Heights reported seeing a man moving about inside the ship, apparently adjusting machinery.

The Table Rock Mystery

The Table Rock Argus published one of the most disturbing airship accounts on April 16, 1897. A group of “anonymous but reliable” witnesses reported seeing an airship sailing overhead with many passengers visible through what appeared to be windows or transparent panels.

Among the passengers, the witnesses claimed to see a woman tied to a chair, another woman attending to her, and a man with a pistol who appeared to be guarding the bound prisoner. The implications of this sighting were deeply troubling – was someone being held against their will aboard the mysterious craft? Before the witnesses could decide whether to contact authorities, the airship had already disappeared into the distance, leaving them with only their disturbing observations and no way to help the apparent captive.

The Aurora Crash Investigation

The Aurora, Texas incident of April 17, 1897, became one of the most investigated airship stories. According to S.E. Haydon’s report in the Dallas Morning News, the airship crashed into Judge J.S. Proctor’s windmill in the early morning hours, destroying both the craft and the mill. When townspeople rushed to investigate, they found metallic wreckage scattered across the judge’s property.

The debris was described as resembling a mixture of aluminum and silver, with strange hieroglyphic markings that no one could decipher. Among the wreckage, residents found the body of the pilot, who was clearly “not an inhabitant of this world.” After careful consideration, the townspeople decided the pilot must have come from Mars and gave him a Christian burial in the local cemetery.

When UFO researchers investigated the story in 1973, they found a rough-hewn gravestone that aviation reporter Bill Case of the Dallas Times-Herald believed marked the alien’s grave. The stone bore scratches that Case interpreted as representing an airship. A metal detector gave strange readings in the area, which investigators claimed indicated the pilot had been buried in some sort of metal uniform.

However, when investigators returned a few months later, both the headstone and any metallic material beneath it had mysteriously vanished. In 2008, the television show UFO Hunters was allowed to remove the capstone from the well where the airship debris had allegedly been dumped. They found no UFO wreckage but did discover high concentrations of aluminum in the water.

The Rice Lake Doctor Incident

Minneapolis newspapers carried an extraordinary account of a physician from Rice Lake, Wisconsin, who claimed to have been abducted by the airship crew on the night of April 13, 1897. According to the story, the doctor was taken at gunpoint to care for the airship’s captain, who was suffering from influenza.

The account described how the doctor was forced aboard the craft against his will and found himself treating a sick man while flying through the night sky. After a struggle, the doctor reportedly escaped by leaping from the airship into the lake 40 feet below. However, the Rice Lake Chronotype provided a more mundane explanation, reporting that the doctor had simply fallen through the ice while trying to cross the lake on foot, with no airship involvement whatsoever.

The Kalamazoo Explosion

Near Kalamazoo, Michigan, on April 12, 1897, residents of Pavilion reported witnessing the apparent destruction of the mystery airship. A couple tending to a sick horse in the early hours of April 13 described seeing the familiar bright front light and smaller side lights, along with visible propellers. The craft was moving at rapid speed when they heard a tremendous explosion or thunder-like sound, and the airship vanished from sight.

The next morning, a nearby farmer discovered a large metal coil on his property. Another resident found what appeared to be a propeller-like piece on his farm. Most remarkably, a man who had been shingling a barn the previous day returned the next morning with two other workers to find the roof covered with small pieces of metal debris.

The discovery of apparent airship wreckage created a sensation, with many believing they had finally found physical proof of the mysterious craft’s existence. However, no analysis was ever conducted on the metal pieces, and they eventually disappeared, leaving only the witness accounts as evidence of what may have been the airship’s destruction.

The Waterloo Hoax

On April 16, 1897, the city of Waterloo, Iowa became the center of national attention when news broke that the mystery airship had been found. A 40-foot craft was discovered tucked away on circus grounds behind a cheese factory, complete with its builder, “Professor Jourgensen,” and his detailed logbook documenting flights over multiple states.

Thousands of people flocked to see the airship, and the discovery was reported in newspapers from coast to coast. The revelation seemed to solve the great airship mystery once and for all. However, upon closer examination, the hoax quickly unraveled. The materials used to construct the craft were extremely heavy and clearly unsuitable for flight.

Under questioning, the elaborate deception fell apart. Several local businessmen had designed and built the fake airship using $60 worth of materials, created a fictional logbook, and paid a man named Feathers from another town to pose as the mysterious Professor Jourgensen. The hoax briefly made Waterloo famous but ultimately demonstrated the public’s desperate desire for answers about the airship phenomenon.

The Phenomenon Fades

By May 1897, airship sightings had largely ceased across the United States. The mysterious craft that had captivated the nation for months simply vanished from the skies as suddenly as they had appeared. No inventor ever came forward to claim credit, no working airship was ever publicly demonstrated, and no conclusive physical evidence was ever recovered.

The airship wave of 1896-1897 remains one of America’s most puzzling mass phenomena. Whether the result of mass hysteria, elaborate hoaxes, secret experiments, or something more extraordinary, the reports from thousands of witnesses across the continent created the first nationwide UFO flap in American history, setting the stage for similar mysteries that would follow in the decades to come.

Sources: KQED, Slightly Odd Fitchburg-01, Slightly Odd Fitchburg-02, Troy Taylor, Wikipedia-01, Wikipedia-02, Davenport Public Library, Travel KS, Kansas Semi-Weekly Capital, Omaha Nebraska Bee, The Valley Advance, Tales of History and Imagination, Kim Burrafato

NOTE: Some of this content may have been created with assistance from AI tools, but it has been reviewed, edited, narrated, produced, and approved by Darren Marlar, creator and host of Weird Darkness — who, despite popular conspiracy theories, is not an AI voice.