UFO Encounters

History

Michael Norris launched UFO Encounters as a monthly magazine in September 1992, published through Aztec Publishing at PO Box 1142, Norcross, Georgia 30091. Subscriptions were $17.95 per year for 12 issues; cover price started at $2.50 and rose to $3.50 by Volume 2. The magazine carried the tagline "Worldwide Coverage of the UFO Phenomenon" and aimed at a general readership rather than the specialist research community.

The first issue set the pattern: field investigation reports written in accessible prose, interviews with witnesses, and coverage of the major cases and researchers of the period. That September 1992 debut carried a Raeford, North Carolina landing investigation (Diane Messing and her mother witnessing a craft land near their mobile home, with subsequent video footage), a George Fawcett retrospective timed to his MUFON 1992 symposium dedication, a New Hampshire triangular craft report spanning six cities, and coverage of the Budd Hopkins "Linda" case presented at the Albuquerque MUFON symposium.

By Volume 2 (1994 to 1995), the magazine had broadened its scope to include speculative pieces alongside case reports: articles on the Roswell alien photographs, the holographic universe theory applied to contact experiences, and the question of extraterrestrial life on Mars. Contributing writers included Nicholas Redfern in his early career, before his prolific book output. The final issues in the archive date to 1995, coinciding with the first season of The X-Files raising public interest to levels that drew larger publishers into the market.