IAPA Newsletter

History

The Illinois-International Aerial Phenomena Agency published its newsletter from 2007 Spruce Drive, Glenview, Illinois, beginning in 1963. Dale N. Rettig served as Chairman-Editor. The organisation operated with ambition that outstripped its modest suburban origins: seven research committees (Sightings, Electromagnetic Effects, Landing Cases, Occupant Reports, Photographic Evidence, Radar Cases, and Historical Research), annual membership of $1.50, and single issues priced at thirty-five cents.

Timothy Green Beckley served as Assistant Editor and Director of the Interplanetary News Service, a newswire-style service that distributed sighting reports to subscribing UFO organisations. Beckley was then a teenager operating out of New Jersey, already building the network of contacts that would make him one of the most prolific publishers in the field over the following decades. His "Saucerian Short Shots" column carried brief news items about UFO reports from around the world.

The newsletter's editorial stance emphasised objectivity. Rettig positioned IAPA between the contactee groups (which he considered credulous) and the debunkers (which he considered closed-minded). The seven-committee structure was designed to bring systematic investigation to each category of report, though whether a suburban Illinois club with $1.50 memberships could sustain seven active research committees is another question. The ambition was real; the resources were thin.

Volume 1, Number 2 appeared in June 1963. The newsletter ran to roughly twenty pages per issue, mixing original sighting reports, reprinted material from other organisations, book reviews, and administrative announcements. Production quality was typical of the era: typewritten, mimeographed, stapled.