Prospect Hts, IL being encounter — May 1952

Ann Sohn reported watching an unusual object over a vacant lot beside her Prospect Heights, Illinois, home on a May night, most probably in 1952. Looking through her window, she said that she saw humanlike figures through illuminated square openings around the object. They appeared to operate lever-like controls while the craft hovered nearby for several minutes. Sohn wrote to J. Allen Hynek in May 1974. Ted Bloecher corresponded with her, and Robert Runser investigated for the Center for UFO Studies during summer 1975. Her initial dating was spring 1955, but recollections of construction on the neighboring lot led her to revise the probable year to 1952. The report describes the object departing abruptly and silently toward the north. The account was published in MUFON UFO Journal number 157 in March 1981. Its date reconstruction and the long interval before investigation should accompany the observed details. The plate illustrates the window observation; it does not imply a landing, conversation, or occupants leaving the object.