FLASH! BREAKING NEWS! KECKSBURG, PA, July 27, 2019 -- The Kecksburg UFO Festival, which commemorates the reported landing of an unidentified flying object in a farmer's field near here on December 9, 1965, is underway in this little farming community east of Pittsburgh.
Now in its 14th year, the festival brings together true UFO believers, those still alive who witnessed the event, and local residents who simply like the attention accorded this little town that really doesn't have much else going for it -- except a great volunteer fire department and some really nice people.
Too bad I'm not there, because as loyal followers of Not Fake News by now know, as a young reporter working for the Greensburg, PA Tribune-Review I covered that "landing," what my night editor promised would be the "story of the century."
At last year's festival, I was a speaker and shared my experience covering that fateful event with the faithful in attendance.
This year, however, they passed me by. Nevertheless, my expertise was in demand by the media. Stephen Huba, a reporter for the TRIB, interviewed me and I got to tell my story again anyway. You can check out his article here. Actually, I had so much to say that Huba broke out my comments into two pieces. Here's the other one, in which he also mentions Not Fake News and links to one of my blogs about the incident and last year's festival.
When I set out to be a reporter way back in 1962 after about a year of j-school, I expected to do great things -- cover politics, maybe Congress or the White House, or perhaps be a foreign correspondent. For eight years, my career moved pretty rapidly, as I landed a job with United Press International and covered state politics in Pennsylvania and New Jersey. But then, I went to the "dark side" and started working for a Congressman in Washington.
During my time as a reporter and UPI bureau chief, I covered the mob in New Jersey, a march with Dr. Martin Luther King a week before his murder, managed the state's coverage of the assassination of Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, covered the 1968 Democratic National Convention, and a lot more.
But which story has followed me all these years? The Kecksburg UFO. That's landed me more than a dozen interviews and appearances on Unsolved Mysteries and The History Channel.
I still think it's kind of cool when they ask me what I think really happened that evening in 1965. Like I'm some kind of expert, ya know?
'Cause then I get to reply, "I don't know, but it's a hell of a story."