Folk singers seem to be a relatively healthy bunch, Phil Oches aside.

I have heard that dentists have the highest rate of suicide but can not ascertain the validity of the claim.

Perhaps you have heard of the rash of suicides and murders among world class micro biologists recently.

Or consider the suicides of the unofficial George Bush biographer or the woman who claimed sexual abuse by George Bush who took her life 6 weeks after making the claim.

No occupation is immune from certain inherent dangers or of course natural deaths, but researchers should be aware that if they can't be fired, its still easy to be killed by co-varient forces.



The normal cause of deaths in US usually begin with heart disease, followed by physician mistakes and then cancer.


Now some people claim that ufo research is hazardous to your health.

No not just the young Congressman from New Mexico who died shortly after insisting upon a GAO investigation of UFOs, but many grass roots researchers.

Danny Casolaro, an investigative reporter looking into the theft of Project Promise software, a program capable of tracking down anyone anywhere in the world, died in 1991, a reported suicide. Casolaro was also investigating several UFO "NO-Nos" Pine Gap, Area 51 and governmental bioengineering.


Not long ago, Mae Bussell, a gutsy, no-holds-barred, investigative radio host died of a fast-acting cancer just like Ann Livingston and Karla Turner. Bussell was acutely interested in UFOlogy.


Deck Slayton, the astronaut, was purportedly ready to talk about his UFO experiences, but cancer also intervened.


Brian Lynch, young psychic and contactee, died in 1985, purportedly of a drug overdose. According to Lynch's sister, Geraldine, Brian was approached approximately a year before his death by an intelligence operative working for an Austin, Texas, PSI-tech company. Geraldine said they told Brian they were experimenting on psychic warfare techniques. After his death, a note in his personal effects was found with the words "Five million from Pentagon for Project Scanate."



In the '80s Eastern Airlines pilot Capt. Don Elkin committed suicide. He had been investigating the UFO coverup for over 10 years and, at the time, was deep into the study of the Ra material with ('aria Rucker. There are reports of negative psychological interferences having developed during this latter investigation.


Certainly nothing is stranger, and breeds speculation more quickly, than the 30-some-odd deaths associated with SDI (Star Wars) research at Marconi Ltd. in England between approximately 1985-1988. Here in capsulated form is a list of a few of the more bizarre deaths:

Roger Hill, a designer at Marconi Defense Systems, allegedly commits suicide with a shotgun, March 1985.

Jonathan Walsh, a digital communications expert employed by GEC, Marconi's parent firm, falls from his hotel room, November 1985, after expressing fear for his life.

Ashad Sharif, another Marconi scientist, reportedly tied a rope around his neck, and then to a tree, in October 1986, got behind the wheel of his car and stepped on the gas with predictable results.

In March of 1988, Trevor Knight, also associated with Marconi, died of carbon monoxide poisoning in his car.

Peter Ferry, marketing director of the firm, was found shocked to death with electrical leads in his mouth (August 1988).

Also during the same month of the same year, Alistair Beckham was found shocked to death with electric leads attached to his body and his mouth stuffed with a handkerchief. He was an engineer with the allied firm of Plessey Defense Systems.

And, finally, but by no means the sole remaining death in this unique cluster, Andrew Hall was found dead in September of 1988 of carbon monoxide poisoning.

What, you may be asking, does SDI research have to do with the deaths of UFO investigators? Theoretically, quite a lot. If, as many investigators have hypothesized, Star Wars research was initiated with the dual purpose of protecting "us" against Soviet aggression and/or the presence of UFO craft in our atmosphere, then several possibilities arise. Most compelling is the idea that the soviet KGB, realizing that the Western powers were on the verge of perfecting a high-powered beam-weapon that could be used from outer space or atmospheric space against them, marshaled a last-gasp, all-out espionage offensive to slow or destroy the project. If this scenario is true, and the weapon was indeed successfully developed, we have an explanation for the collapse of the Soviet Union ("Surrender or you might be incinerated").

Other explanations have been offered. For example, scientists working on the project discovered the true nature of the research they were involved with and the overwhelming stress led them to suicide. Or they discovered that their real collaborators were "greys," or Western politicians working with/for grey aliens. One thing seems obvious. Something went terribly wrong at Marconi. Scientists usually don't commit the kinds of bizarre, "unscientific" suicides we find here.

One other possibility is that a contingent of unfriendly ETs got wind of what GEC and Marconi and its affiliates were up to and, to protect themselves, created enough psychic trauma within the minds of many of the scientists to drive them to suicide. But if this is so, why have the deaths stopped? Has the project been shelved? Highly unlikely. The best bet is that the project was completed, roughly about 1988, and whatever it is, beam-weapon or otherwise, it is now operational.

Certainly neither the public at large, and not even UFOlogists generally, seem thoroughly aware of the real risks UFO investigators run. In fact those UFOlogists who are aware of the suspicious deaths of some of their colleagues in the 50s and 60s, seem to believe that whatever forces and agencies that were then responsible have softened their tactics in the `80s and `90s. The evidence, as we have indicated, does not seem to support such a conclusion. There is no doubt, however, that the `50s and `60s produced some strange goings-on.

Jessup and McDonald

Undoubtedly the most intriguing (and perhaps appalling) deaths in UFOlogy were those of Dorothy Kilgallen, M.K. Jessup and Dr. James McDonald - the former an alleged accident, the latter two purported suicides. The details of these deaths, despite official pronouncements to the contrary, are disturbing to say the least. Each of the three individuals seemed to have much to live for, all were successful, and everyone of them was deeply immersed in the relatively new UFO-phenomena problem.


Whatever the source (rumored to be the Earl of Mountbatten), this kind of leak in the atmosphere of the mid- 50s was an unacceptable leak. It is well to recall that the secret CIA-orchestrated Robertson Panel had met in 1953 and issued the Robertson Report. Briefly summarized, this document-and the attitudes reflected there - represented a new hard-line attitude to covering up all significant UFO phenomena. The year 1953 and the meeting of the Robertson Panel truly initiated the UFO coverup as we know it today, with a few extra dollops having been added.


Dr. James McDonald, senior physicast, Institute of Atmospheric Physics and also professor in the Department of Meteorology at the University of Arizona, died in 1971 purportedly of a gunshot wound to the head. There is no one who had worked harder in the 60s than McDonald to convince Congress to hold serious, substantial subcommittee meetings to explore the UFO reality of which he was thoroughly convinced. He was definitely a thorn in the side of those who maintained the official coverup and, needless to say, his passing to them would be a blessing.

McDonald, allegedly depressed, shot himself in the head. But, alas, he didn't die. He was wheelchair-ridden but somehow, several months after his first attempt, he allegedly got in an automobile, drove to a pawnshop, purchased another pistol from his wheelchair, drove to the desert and did himself in. How convenient, one might say, for his adversaries. And McDonald, there can be no doubt, had made enemies. The question is: How much did these enemies aid and abet the demise of this most worthy and influential campaigner?

Astronomer MIL Jessup

When astronomer and archaeologist M. K. Jessup allegedly committed suicide in Dade County Park, FL., in 1959 certain alarm bells should have gone off. There is no doubt the well-known author of such influential works as The Case for the UFO and The Expanding Case for the UFO had been depressed. Things had not been going well for him, and he had, it must be admitted, indicated his gloom to close friends, Ivan Sanderson, the biologist, and Long John Nebel, the well-known New York City radio host. Sanderson reported him disturbed by "a series of strange events" which put him "into a completely insane world of unreality."

Was the reality Jessup was faced with at the time "completely insane" or were there, perhaps, forces driving Jessup to the edge, forces with a plan? Anna Genzlinger thoroughly investigated his death. Her conclusion: "He was under some sort of control." Remember, these were the days of secret governmental mind-control experiments which have only recently been uncovered.

And what of particular interest was Jessup investigating at the time? Something that was top secret and would remain so for some time: the Philadelphia Experiment.

Frank Edwards

Frank Edwards, the noted news commentator, died of an alleged heart attack on June 24, 1967, on the 20th anniversary of the Kenneth Arnold sighting. Was that coincidence?

Probably not. Several other prominent UFOlogists died the same day, Arthur Bryant, the contactee, Richard Church, chairman of CIGIUFO and the space writer, Willie Ley. The circumstances surrounding the death of Edwards, who like James McDonald was pushing for meaningful Congressional subcommittee meetings, raise huge questions. It so happens that a "World UFO Conference" was being held in New York City at the Commodore hotel on that very day in June, chaired by UFO publisher and author Gray Barker. Barker stated publicly that he had received two letters and a telephone call threatening that Frank Edwards, who was not in attendance, would not be alive by the conference's end.

It definitely looks like someone was sending a message. As an unhappy sequel to this account, Rep. Rouse, who had been supporting Edwards in his campaign for Congressional attention to the UFO issue, died of a similar heart attack shortly afterwards.

The annals of UFOlogy are frighteningly filled with the deaths of UFOlogists from unusual cancers, heart attacks, questionable suicides and all manner of strange happenings. Did former Secretary of Defense James Forrestal really commit suicide as purported by jumping out a hotel window at about the time saucers may have been crashing down in the southwestern desert? Was UFO writer Damon Runyon, Jr.'s suicidal plunge off a Washington D.C. bridge in 1988 really an act of will? What really happened to Dr. B. Noel Opan who, in 1959, after an alleged visit by MIBs, disappeared, as did Edgar Jarrold, the Australian UFOlogist, in 1960.

How do we explain the rash of heart attacks that took so many: Frank Edwards, Rep. Rouse, author H. T. Wilkins, Henry E Kock, publicity director of the Universal Research Society of America, author Frank Scully and contactee George Adamski? How do we correlate accurately the large number of purported suicides, including: Rev. Della Larson, contactee, author Gloria Lee (Byrd), Marie Ford, UFO enthusiast who discovered Larson's body, researcher Doug Hancock, and, more recently, researcher Feron Hicks? What do we do with the inordinately large number of cancer deaths which pepper the UFO field and burn doubtful holes in our credulity: Canadian researcher Wilbert B. Smith, Brazilian researcher Dr. Olavo Fontes, Jim and Coral Lorenzen (photos are earlier in this article), and the deaths of biologist Ivan Sanderson and CUFOS founder James A. Hynek.

I knew Allen Hynek when he developed a very rare and fast brain tumor.
The same kind of rare brain tumor that killed Bob Marley. I assure you there was no similarity of life styles or enviormental factors.
There was of course the similarity of falling out with the policies of the powers that be.

As Susan said "Remember the days when not everything was a conspiracy theory?"
Perhaps she is right, just like many gangland slayings may actually be coincidental.


Then again, murder by suicide and disease agents seem relatively plausible to me.