Max B.Miller and Flying Saucers International
From Flying Saucer News, Summer 1953:
FLYING SAUCERS INTERNATIONAL. (Los Angeles, U.S.A.)
President: M.B.Miller.
A very active Group. Has issued numerous releases etc., and we have just
received their first issue of 'SAUCERS' - a photolith publication of four
pages, nicely produced and featuring a photo by 'Prof.G.Adamski'... This Group
is organising the
WORLD'S FIRST FLYING SAUCER CONVENTION
to be held at the Hollywood Hotel, California, August 16th.17th and 18th.
We wish this enterprising venture every success - and await its conclusions
and decisions with intense interest. The F.S.C. has been invited - and we
only wish it were possible for a Rep. to attend.
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From a Boston newspaper, August 24th, 1953:
Flying Saucers 'Converge'
By Kimmis Hendrick
Chief of the Pacific News Bureau of The Christian Science
Monitor
Hollywood
Some persons enjoy thinking there really are such things as flying saucers. But they let the matter drop there. Others organize. And organization, as everybody knows, leads almost inevitably to conventions.
At least that's what Flying Saucers International of Los Angeles has found. Its First Flying Saucer Convention - the world's first, actually, it points out - was as inevitable as the conquest of space. Famous old Hollywood Hotel, where it convened, probably has not seen so enthusiastic a crowd throng its lobby in many a day.
Max B.Miller, FSI president, said that some 500 people came for the second open meeting, and the report was that for want of even standing room, around 2,000 had to be turned away.
Not an Eyewitness
Young Mr.Miller - in an organization predominantly adult, he is just 17 - also said that he did not become connected with the organization because he had seen a saucer. He became an adherent out of sheer interest in the fascinating possibilities of the subject.
His colleagues, on the contrary, seem to have had any number of first-hand contacts with the "space-piercing" vehicles.
At an afternoon session of the three-day meeting, one speaker was heard to describe with disarming casualness the "known" activity on earth of current visitors from Mars and Venus. their landing places apparently are Florida and Maine.
Mr.Miller pointed out that the range of view and interest represented by conference participants covered all the fields from natural-science fiction to occult studies and the ordinary layman's interest in gathering data on curious aerial objects. There was a great deal said about famous predictions, tying in the pyramids of Egypt, Nostradamus, the claims of astrology, and so on.
'Evidence' Exhibited
On the other hand, a modest but interesting exhibit of photographs and newspaper clippings indicated the organization's sincere interest in what most people would call "evidence."
While careful spokesmen for government and research have offered explanations for various phenomena which seem to remove them from flying-saucer status, Flying Saucers International emphasizes the value of keeping an open mind. That, indeed, was what the convention here sought to encourage.
Two issues of the organization's neat little publication, Saucers, had appeared in time for the convention. Issue No.2 carries a front-page photo in black and white - light tracings against a dark background. Reads the caption: "Saucer photo? It is, believe it or not. The photo was taken by August C.Roberts on Skywatch Tower in Jersey City...."
Unusual 'Experience'
Among other items appears a two-page story by Truman Bethurum, a convention participant, under the title "I Was Inside a Flying Saucer." The author relates an exceptional "experience" in the Nevada desert which ultimated in his opportunity to "see" the inside of a flying saucer, meet its "captain" - "a gorgeous woman... having a Latin appearance" - and converse with her in English.
Another item extends membership privileges in Flying Saucers International to anyone interested - except those "with any subversive ideas toward the United States." Regular members have no duties, but representative members are obligated to report all flying-saucer information they come across and to investigate any clue sent to them by headquarters.
Organizations Listed
So far, Mr.Miller says, membership totals 200, and comes from every part of the country.
A convention bulletin lists five other flying-saucer organizations - two in the United States, one in Australia, one in New Zealand, one in England. It also recommends such books as "The Flying Saucers Are Real" by Donald E.Kehoe, "Is Another World Watching?" by Gerald Heard, "The Coming of the Saucers" by Kenneth Arnold and Ray Palmer, "Behind the Flying Saucers" by Frank Scully, and "Flying Saucers," by Donald H.Menzel.
In connection with the convention there was a striking exhibit of commercial paintings for natural-science-fiction publications and the movies by a young Los Angeles artist, Mel Hunter.
Exhibited, too, were letters from such personages as the Vice-President of the United States, the Secretary of Defense, the Mayor of Los Angeles, and at least two distinguished commentators, acknowledging invitations to attend the convention and regretfully saying that prior engagements prevented them from accepting.
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Letter published in an American newspaper:
DEAR SIR -
We of Flying Saucers International observed your column about space visitors
with great interest.
There is little doubt that interest in the flying saucer subject has increased
beyond utmost expectations. Thousands of people attend lectures on this subject
in the Southland every week. I believe there are about 50 lecturers on flying
saucers here.
The mention of the planet Clarion in your column is nothing new to us. Truman
Bethurum, a well-respected citizen of Redondo Beach, claims to have made 11
contacts with space visitors from Clarion.
He lectured before us at our first convention last August, and we were the
first to publish his story in our publication, 'Saucers,' which I sent you.
I would like to discuss this subject further with you if you have the time.
MAX B.MILLER,
Editor, 'Saucers,'
1420 S.Ridgeley drive.
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