Newspapers all over the country picked up the story and printed it under headlines describing flying pies, flying piepans, and flying saucers. Alert to the possibility that the objects might have been a new type of aircraft of Russian origin, investigators from Military Intelligence interviewed Arnold and officials from Air Technical Intelligence requested a report. No one doubted Arnold’s word. He was an experienced pilot, a respected citizen, and a careful observer. Nevertheless his description showed some inconsistencies that made it difficult to decide what the nine disks really were. If they had actually been forty-five or fifty feet long, they must have been much closer than he thought; objects that size would not have been visible at a distance of twenty to twenty-five miles. However, if the estimated distance was correct, then in order to be visible the objects must have been much larger, at least 210 feet long. One of the estimates must be wrong--but which one? Until that question was settled, the computed speed was meaningless, since to estimate the velocity of a moving object an observer must know either its true distance or its true size. Even after a careful study, Air Force investigators could not identify the disks; they might have been clouds, a mirage, or some kind of aircraft, but no definite answer was possible from the evidence available. Predictably, after so much publicity, a rash of similar sightings broke out all over the country and continued for the rest of the summer. During the hot months of the “silly season,” newspapers are traditionally hospitable to tales of barnyard freaks, sea serpents, and man-bitten dogs. Such stories were now shoved aside as people in every state began to report unorthodox objects sailing through the sky--flying disks, flying dimes, flying ice-cream cones, flying shoe heels, and flying hubcaps. Seeing saucers became a national pastime, but Arnold, who had reported the strange objects in all good faith, resented the implied ridicule. Deluged with telephone calls and mail, he resolved to keep silent in the future even if he should happen to see a ten-story building flying through the air. In spite of the publicity, the flying-saucer scare would probably have died with the first frost of autumn but for the efforts of a talented writer, editor, and publisher of science fiction, Raymond A. Palmer. Among the many letters Arnold received was one from Palmer, then editor of _Amazing Stories_. Tired of being laughed at, Arnold found the tone of “sincere interest” so appealing that he answered the letter[II-2]. After a second letter a week later, he changed his mind about keeping silent and agreed to sell his story for publication.