Dayton, OhioJuly 1957

On July 19, 1957, in Dayton, Ohio, an observer saw an object overhead through binoculars and reported it to Civil Defense. The Air Force was contacted and asked the witness to fill out a formal questionnaire about the sighting.

The file contains two Project Blue Book record cards for separate sightings on July 19 and another date, along with standard questionnaire forms and related investigative documents. However, the OCR quality of the handwritten responses on the witness forms makes it difficult to read the specific details of what was actually observed, including duration, size, color, and behavior of the object. The questionnaire pages are largely illegible, and no clear narrative of the sighting emerges from the technical information forms.

The record cards indicate the sighting occurred at 1555 local time (3:55 p.m.), was observed by a civilian, lasted for an unknown duration, involved an unknown number of objects, and the course is listed as unknown. The official Air Force evaluation on at least one card is marked "unidentified."

The file also includes multiple unrelated civil UFO sighting reports from other locations and dates in July 1957, newspaper clippings, and an editorial letter from Flying Saucer Review that discusses a confirmed hoaxed UFO photograph. These materials do not pertain to the Dayton case itself.

The complete case file, as held by the National Archives, is reproduced below across 24 pages of microfilm.