James Bond Johnson In Roswell

Key player in UFO incident visits Roswell

Judy Rosella Edwards
Record Staff Writer

In 1947, James Bond Johnson was a newspaper writer for the Fort Worth Star Telegraph when he was sent on a routine assignment he says has become `the longest running story.'

Johnson was in Roswell Saturday for the very first time to visit the UFO Museum and Research Center that houses copies of the photo he says he took by accident. His assignment was to write about an event but, because he happened to have a camera with him, he took a photo. That photo keeps Johnson as one of the key players in the UFO phenomena and connected to the museum.

In July of 1947, something unidentified landed northwest of Roswell. At the Roswell Army Field, Col. William Blanchard dictated to his public relations officer a press release about an alien UFO crash landing within 100 miles of the Trinity atomic bomb test site.

---

Daily Record
Bill Moffitt

James Bond Johnson points out the letter in the photograph he shot of General Roger Ramey in 1947. Contents of the letter are said to indicate that there was more than a weather balloon crash at Roswell.

That PR officer, Lt. Walter G. Haut, a Chicago native, wrote and distributed the original press release that eventually went out over the AP wires from Roswell. The remains from the crash were transported to the Roswell air base and then flown via a B29 to Fort Worth.

Upon arrival there, James Bond Johnson was sent to write an article about the material the military found. During the course of interviewing General Roger Ramey, Johnson captured the general on film while he was holding a military communique. Few additional details have been released by the government since then.

Over the years through digitizing Johnson's photo, a few words in the communique have been translated indicating there was something at the site other than the alleged weather balloon.

For him, the curiosity had taken a back burner for several decades. After all, the photo had only taken one fiftieth of a second of his life. He went on to become a child psychologist and a minister. He is now relocated in Long Beach, Calif.

Johnson's curiosity was rekindled by a Leonard Nimoy show about UFOs. When Dennis G. Balthaser, a local UFO researcher, contacted Johnson and encouraged him to come visit the museum, since he had never been
to Roswell, he and his wife came out for their very first visit to the area.

He says he is pleased with what he sees displayed and documented at the museum. Johnson was depicted in the movie, "Roswell," but the movie studio added another 15 fictional photographers to the scenes involving Johnson. "They said it just didn't look right that I was the only photographer," he said.

Eventually the original photographs were sold to the University of Texas- Arlington. Copies are owned by the UFO Museum and Research Center, which former PR Officer, Lt. Walter Haut, opened in 1991. Johnson posed with his photograph and met with visitors to the museum. "The museum reflects the curiosity of people, when you look at the number of visitors who have been here," Johnson said.

References

1. http://www.roswell-record.com/archives/042901/news02b.jpg

---

Debris Photographer James Bond Johnson