Local UFO researcher Jefferson Kincaid is sponsoring another Portland July 4th UFO Celebration. Come join Jefferson and Oregon MUFON and learn about the important place that Portland and Oregon occupy in UFO history.

Many people know about Kenneth Arnold's sighting of flying saucers over Washington state on June 24, 1947, but most don't know that Arnold landed first in Yakima, WA, and then in Pendleton, OR, where reporters took his sensational story world-wide.

UFOs continued to be sighted for weeks afterward and Portland was a hub of UFO activity.

  • There were numerous sightings by people all over Portland for weeks: police officers, homemakers, pilots, businessmen, and many others.
  • U.S. Army Air Force jets searched for UFOs over Portland and Oregon/Washington.
  • Oregonian reporters conducted extensive interviews with United Airlines commercial pilot Capt. E. J. Smith and crew about UFOs they had seen over Oregon on a flight from Boise, ID, to Portland, OR.

Learn all about this and more at the 2010 Portland July 4th UFO Celebration. If you know of anyone who was alive on July 4, 1947, and knew about these events, please invite them to come, too.

We will have speakers and other entertainment.

  • When: July 4, 2010, 12 to 3 PM. 
  • Where: KJ Bar & Grill, 2002 SE Division St., Portland, OR. 
    On June 24, 1947, while flying near Mt. Rainier, pilot Kenneth Arnold sighted nine unknown aerial objects between Mt. Rainier and Mt. Adams. His description of their motion looking like saucers skipping over water resulted in a reporter coining the term "flying saucers." Reports from across the nation of "flying saucers" continued into early July. On July 4, 1947, a rash of UFO sightings occurred in Portland including sightings by police officers and airline pilots. The now famous UFO crash at Roswell, New Mexico, is thought to have occurred around July 7, 1947. At least one other UFO crash is believed to have also occurred in New Mexico in July. Press attention to the rash of UFO sightings continued until around the beginning of August, at which time the subject just seemed to disappear from the front pages. Did the UFO activity really die out so rapidly, or did the press just stop reporting about it? Come learn more this July 4th.

See Oregonian June/July 1947 articles for more information.