Cleveland Heights, OhioJuly 1954

On the evening of July 7, 1954, a 25-year-old insurance salesman was driving west on Mayfield Road in Cleveland Heights, Ohio, when he spotted an unusual object near his right side of his windshield. The man, who was approaching Lee Road at around 9:50 p.m., described the object as shaped like a smoke ring viewed from the side, or a football that had been flattened top and bottom. It was smokey white in color.

Initially, the man slowed his car to about 5 miles per hour while watching the object hover and wobble gently, like a falling feather. When buildings and trees blocked his view, he turned right onto Lee Road, pulled over to the curb, stopped his car, and stepped out to watch more clearly. From the curb, he had a clean view of the object hovering just above the tree line, roughly four to five miles away. It was dusk, the sky was clear with almost no clouds, and darkness was falling.

Over the next approximately fifteen minutes, the object began to move in a circular pattern, the witness said, like a buzzard circling its prey. As it moved, it banked from side to side. Then suddenly, it sped off toward the south, changing from smokey white to a bright reddish hue as it moved across the horizon and disappeared behind buildings and trees in about five seconds. The witness said the object's sudden acceleration suggested a speed far faster than any conventional aircraft he knew of.

The witness reported the sighting to Cleveland newspapers. He noted in his statement that he had seen similar bright objects at drive-in movies in the past, but those had never lingered more than about thirty seconds and had moved either straight up or straight down before changing direction horizontally. This sighting was far more prolonged and detailed. The Air Force evaluated this case as unidentified. The complete case file is reproduced below as held by the National Archives, 11 pages.