This week I was surprised when I read the above article by one of my colleagues about the 60th anniversary of the Solway Spacemen and I thought it was familiar. It turned out I did a feature on the 50th anniversary 10 years ago when I was last with the News & Star which was published on this day.
During my time at the Scarborough News I did loads of stories, with my long time contact Russ Kellett, who regularly organised sky watches for sightings and claimed to have been abducted. Having said that it was bizarre that it was the anniversary of one of my articles and it just shows that time marches on.
Is the truth still out there?
PHOTO… As it appeared in The Cumberland News…
Mystery still surrounds the iconic photograph which put Cumbria on the map as a UFO hotspot. As its 50th anniversary approaches reporter Ian Duncan investigates the mystery of the Solway Spaceman.
PHOTOGRAPHER… Jim Templeton…
At first glance it is like any family happy snapshot taken at a Cumbrian beauty spot.
Young Elizabeth Templeton smiles for the camera while visiting Burgh Marsh on the Solway Coast on a sunny spring day in the 1960s.
The photograph was taken on May 23, 1964, by her father Jim Templeton, a keen photographer and Carlisle firefighter.
But when the photos were developed, Jim noticed a mysterious figure in the shot – behind his daughter – which looked like someone in an astronaut suit seemingly floating in the air.
Even now the mystery of the so-called Solway Spaceman, which has been published and talked about around the world, remains unsolved.
Initially the photo was published in the Cumberland News and at the time Carlisle police said they were baffled and sent it on to photographic experts at Kodak Laboratories. However they could find no explanation for what Jim had snapped and offered a reward to anyone who could.
Stephen Mera, who has been a UFO investigator for more than 30 years and is the managing editor of Phenomena Magazine, has stood at the spot where the picture was taken.
“It’s a very unusual photograph,” he says. “As time has gone on we’ve got better with computers and analysis but it has never been concluded [whether it is genuine or fake].”
Stephen says the photograph has been inspected by the best professionals and, judging by the depth of field, it would appear that the figure was floating in thin air. He adds: “It just makes it quite profound – it’s one of the country’s best photos.”
A couple of weeks after the Solway Spacemen hit the headlines, Jim received a phone call from a technician who worked on the Blue Streak missile project in Woomera in Australia. Stephen says the technician was shocked at the similarities between the mysterious Cumbrian figure and an incident that he had witnessed while working.
He adds: “The technician had spotted similar looking spacemen figures, wandering around the launchpad, during an aborted countdown of the missile on May 23 – the very same day Jim had photographed the mysterious figure on Burgh Marsh.
“It wasn’t long before the spaceman photograph gained the attention of two sinister Men In Black-type characters, who apprehended Jim at the Carlisle fire station and demanded he showed them the location of where the photograph was taken.
“Jim agreed and they pulled away in their black Jaguar and did not speak to Jim during the journey.
“Once at the location they asked Jim to point out where the photo was taken and had he seen the alien. Jim explained that he did not personally notice the spaceman figure, but was convinced of its reality.
“The dark suited figures asked Jim to remain at the scene as they returned to their car.
“After a short dialogue, the agents suddenly drove off and left Jim to walk several miles back to his workplace, and reflect on his encounter and belief that he may have actually captured a space suited alien visitor.”
Mr Templeton maintained that the spaceman figure was real right up to his death in November 2011. Stephen says that the picture put Cumbria “on the map” and adds: “Everybody wanted to know the location and everybody is just as puzzled as they were on the first day.”
Former News & Star chief photographer Mike Scott was one of the first people outside Jim’s family to see the photo. He was working in the paper’s former premises in English Street, Carlisle, one Thursday when Jim came in.
“We started out a bit sceptical,” recalls Mike. “We thought it was a bit of a hoax. We thought it must have been arranged but Jim was adamant.
“I think he came in on a Thursday. And it went in the next day’s Cumberland News.
“Every national newspaper and TV company jumped on the bandwagon. It appeared everywhere. Jim became famous because of it.
“All these UFO theorists got in touch. It was never, ever shot down in flames by anybody.”
Did people tend to be sceptical or did they think this could be something spooky? Mike says: “If you wanted to believe in it, you believed in it.”
Author Pat Regan, who runs the North West UFO Research forum, says that Cumbria is still a hotspot for UFOs and it is important to keep an open mind when it comes to photographic evidence.
Pat says that he had a similar experience when he was with his daughter Jasmine, who was seven years old at the time, when they spotted a “twister” or small whirlwind.
He took a photograph of the freak weather event but when they enlarged the picture they noticed a green disc which cast a shadow.
“She’s very nervous about it and she has a healthy fear,” he adds. “A lot of things can be explained by weather conditions but there are a lot of things that can’t.”
Watching the skies
CLOUDED VISION? Shirley Kulaszewski ’s photo above Silloth in 2012…
CUMBRIA is no stranger to stranger to UFO and extraterrestrial sightings and it has been claimed that the county is a hotspot for sightings:
Last October strange lights, which changed colour were spotted by Richard Smith in the skies above his home in Keswick;
In June 2012 64-year-old photographer Shirley Kulaszewski from Silloth snapped a mysterious object which resembled a flying saucer in the Solway skies;
In February 2009 a woman from Ambleside reported seeing a “big orange thing” over the Lake District fells. She said that it was not a Chinese lantern and was moving in a triangle shape for about half an hour;
In January 2009 there were reports of orange lights off the coast at Ravenglass, Cumbria – witnesses described seeing orange lights and there were two lights together when one veered off to the north before dipping down to sea level and then up again;
Also in January 2009 a mysterious light followed a man along the Cumbrian coast near Maryport. It was between 10 and 11pm and as he made his way out of Flimby, onto faster roads, the light kept pace with him – he was travelling at about 55mph and the light was going too fast for a fishing boat;
On New Year’s Day 2009 in Workington Lee Stamper, a mechanical engineer, and his friend John Laycock witnessed a strange light in the sky – it was ruled out as a Chinese lantern because it moved against the offshore breeze.
It is unexplained and mysterious
A special event was held in Burgh-By-Sands to mark the anniversary of the Solway Spaceman photograph.
Displays in the village hall at the weekend included a range of printed materials – such as books on UFOs and Space Exploration – as well as two short films inspired by the events of 50 years ago.
Organiser Peter Cottam said it sparked a lot interest fromresidents – just as the original picture did 50 years ago.
He says: “People put a spin on these things but I think when it was first raised it did rouse a lot of curiosity – especially when it was linked with the Woomera rocket project.
“The picture that Jim Templeton took, of his daughter sitting there with the spaceman behind her, these things just keep coming up again and again.”
Peter says that he had heard the photograph described as “Britain’s Roswell” but he was more cautious. He adds: “I don’t know if I’d go that far. I have seen cuttings and once or twice people have linked it with that – it is unexplained and mysterious.”
The two films shown at the exhibition were a re-enactment of the photograph by pupils and staff from William Howard School and one made by Jenny Randles which appeared in a BBC broadcast.
As published in the News & Star on Wednesday, May 21, 2014.
Ian Duncan Media 