Encounters with the Unknown—Alternate Perceptions Magazine, November 2023
Close Encounters, telepathy, and teleportation
by: Brent Raynes
On Wednesday afternoon, 14 July 1976, the famous "alien abductee" Betty Hill accompanied me down to Lexington, Massachusetts, as I wanted to interview a Michael Pollack, 21, a self-identified "UFO researcher," and his girlfriend Louise, also 21. Both claimed to have had their own personal involvement with UFO phenomena and so I was interested in hearing their stories.
Michael really came to ponder the UFO matter when he met a contactee named Joseph Cottrell (more about him later) who lived up in Groveton, New Hampshire. "After I met him, I started remembering things that happened to me when I was a kid. Encounters that I had had with extraterrestrial craft that I just blocked out of my head because I would tell my mom and she would say, 'Oh, cute little kid' and I'd forget all about it because there wasn't anybody to talk to about anything. I had an encounter in Atlanta, Georgia. I'm not sure exactly what happened. I was out working on my car, and it was in the morning and the next thing I knew I woke up on the ground and the sun was setting. So, I lost a day. I was about 17 at that time. That was the first time lapse I ever had."
He remembers seeing these odd "pretty lights" as a child, though initially he didn't equate them with UFOs. "After I saw those pretty lights, I was sitting there planning on what I was going to do when, flying saucers I called them then, were going to land in the schoolyard across the street because I knew they were going to do it, and I was thinking of how I was going to deal with them. So, I was unconsciously, in a sense, watching things my whole life and when I met Joe Cottrell all these things came back to my remembrance that I had forgotten all about. Then I started researching it and then I started having more encounters. Louise here had no UFO experience. She didn't believe UFOs were real when I met her. I started talking to her and come to find out that she was able to understand about anything I was to share with her, and about three months later she was teleported aboard a space craft and shown things and teleported back down."
Louise's experience happened one afternoon around the middle of March 1976, around Bedford, Massachusetts. She was riding in a car driven by a friend, who declined to be interviewed I was told. Louise claimed that she began to have some difficulty breathing, experienced a tightness in her chest, and next just vanished inexplicably from the automobile. Suddenly, she found herself sitting on the floor inside a circular compartment. The walls were metallic looking. "I remember the ceiling seemed like it was just light," she told us. "I remember trying to understand what kind of light was coming from the ceiling. I couldn't really understand it." She was trying to figure out what was going on. "I remember wondering what I was doing there." She began to "see these big pictures of things," like upcoming elections (something about one that would be fixed), and "big earthquakes happening." She wondered if she was possibly dreaming this stuff.
Next Louise found herself in Cambridge, beside a pond near Route 2 and Harvard Square, about 35 miles from Bedford. It was still broad daylight. "The time I was aboard the craft, didn't seem more than 15 minutes, but I have no actual way of telling."
"I was walking home (from) Harvard Square and as I was walking through this big field in Harvard yard, all of a sudden, I just got this funny feeling that just came all over me and I thought to myself, 'What is this?' All of a sudden, I started getting asked questions in my head. ...It started asking questions like how much faith I could put in the space people." How would she trust "life or death" situations "in their hands"? As she continued walking, she began to get strong visual images where it was hard for her to tell what was real and what wasn't. "All the people running out of the Harvard yard and running into all the buildings and all the lights were out." There was a strong wind. "The buildings started to age, and they started coming apart." It was a scary vision.
Next, we will touch upon this contactee named Joseph Cottrell, the man who Michael said awakened him to the UFO phenomenon. Cottrell's story was indeed a pretty remarkable one. Michael seemed to know this man's story quite well. "He had his hands in all kinds of technical fields," he said, explaining how meeting him opened him up in a major way to the UFO subject. He told me how he was a metallurgist and a federal boiler inspector but upon retirement had moved from Los Angelos, California to a cabin in the woods of Groveton, New Hampshire, presumably to enjoy a more peaceful and relaxed lifestyle. However, Michael said it didn't turn out too well at all for Mr. Cottrell and his family. He described how the man spent about 18 months traveling around the country lecturing. Neighbors it seemed though didn't take too kindly to his strange stories and ideas and shot out the windows of his cabin. It was reported that he spent all of his savings and much of his pension income due to his trips across country. Michael said his son, who had witnessed his UFO encounter, ended up in a mental institution and his wife of 23 years left him.
The New England UFO Newsletter (Whole number 22, April-July 1981) noted how on the night of Cottrell's encounter UFOs were also reported in other cities like Gorham, Colebrook, Stafford, Littleton, Miles Pond, Peachem, and Sutton, Vermont, according to Kim Nilsen, a writer for the Coos County Democrat (November 1974?).
The UFO Newsletter cited in the paragraph above carried a word-for-word talk that Mr. Cottrell gave to their Study Group. Though Michael seemed quite well informed, it's always best when one can get any account first-person.
Here it is:
It was 9:30 p.m., mid-September 1973. I was sitting in my kitchen studying for a private pilot examination. Wayne, my nineteen-year-old son and my wife Alice were in the living room watching TV. I felt as though I wanted a breath of fresh air. As I approached the rear door, a see-through one, I saw what appeared to be a huge ball of fireflies - a sort of "mayday" of fireflies - approximately 1500 feet from me.
I then walked down the few stairs to ground level and continued walking in the driveway. I planned on going to investigate this phenomenon. As I walked a few more yards, the huge ball looked as though it burst into seven units of much smaller 6-to-9-foot diameter (balls) and (these) converged in my direction very rapidly and noiselessly. The colors were a green, similar to a firefly's light and changed to a whitish (sic) and to warm reds continually. They came to within 100 feet from me at a height of 50 feet above ground, arranged in a 4-3 set of positions (believed to mean two groups of lights, one containing three balls, the other four balls, ed.)
I could not believe it was happening! I realized (how? ed.) that there were alien beings inside the glowing balls. As I thought to myself or was saying out loud "Why me?, Why me?, Why me?", a telepathic thought in my brain said, "Why not you?" in an amusing, friendly thought.
We continued looking each other over. I viewed their craft, wondering at its composition and energy source, hearing no noise. I marveled, wondered, was amazed and scared, all at the same time. I never did see their persons. We continued looking each other over, they, undoubtedly receiving incredibly more than I (my two eyes to their fourteen). This went on for ten-fifteen minutes. I then thought of taking a picture. I ran to the front door (thirty-forty feet) and yelled to Wayne and Alice, "Come on, come on, look!" as I was loading my camera. When I finished, my son, Wayne, grabbed his 22 rifle and I grabbed a shotgun that was propped in the corner. My wife continued with TV, strangely showing no interest in coming or even in looking out the window. Wayne and I bolted out the door and there they were, waiting. But they had moved the four units 150-200 feet away and 35 feet above the ground. The three units had moved northerly 40-50 feet away. As I maintained my awe, Wayne and I were talking as I was worried for our safety. Suddenly they asked, "Are you going to shoot us?" I was standing with a camera and gun and, strangely, never did use either. I felt ridiculous, and said, "No, that is how we humans are - silly!" They then started a beam of energy at my feet. They asked if they could examine me. I said will there be any pain, as I didn't like the idea, and they were already starting with my feet and toes and continuing rapidly, it seemed, to examine. I noticed (the light) spent more time and activity in areas of old injuries. On and on, to my brain, I could feel the beam as it was adjusted to varied intensities, widths, "speeds" and so on. It was apparent to me that they were gathering a Xerox copy of me and everything about me, down to the cell structure, a "spectrograph analysis" (sic) on the highest order.
Continuing to probe and copy all areas of my brain, they seemed to be acting with greed and glee, so to speak. I was not overly apprehensive, but the beam began to increase its energy to the point of becoming very uncomfortable.
At this point I said, "Hey, you said it wouldn't hurt!" Immediately, I felt the beam energy lessen at least 40 percent. Continuing on all the while "talking," I was thrilled and amazed that it was possible to telepathically communicate. I was "imprinted" with a new world of alien beings! They were friendly! Of that I was happy.
"Imprinting," I define as when you meet someone human for the first time, not only are we conscious of conversation, hearing the words, but also we humans take in lots more than we realize. Thoughts were going on (in my encounter) that will not be on Earth (for) 2000 years unless we humans are able to accept their friendship.
Through the contact I had with them, I have also been hit with a desire to be in continual communication with them and become friends with more of them. Since September 1973, I have been actively investigating and researching them. One-hour total contact has whetted my appetite to know more.
When the examination and "talking" were completed they came nearer and it was evident to me that they were going to want us to go with them. Incredible! They actually want us to go with them. Leave to what? Be back when? Thoughts in my head as they were very close.
I started to get apprehensive and downright scared. I then held my hand out (as a signal for them to stop) as (it seemed) they would be right where we were in only a few seconds. The "signal" worked. They immediately returned to the previous position for a few more minutes and...out went their glow. They were gone....
