Project Mogul’s “Alamogordo II” phase…

Given the close links between Project Helios (US Navy stratospheric balloon platform for scientific experiments) and Project Mogul (US Army long-duration high-altitude sound monitoring experiments), I wanted a list of all the Project Mogul people in Alamogordo in June-July 1947, but didn’t have one.

So here’s my first attempt at drawing one up. It’s not complete, but it’s a decent enough starting point.

Crary’s Log

Albert Paddock Crary (1911-1987) was a pioneering geophysicist and glaciologist, and also the Field Operations Director of Project Mogul. His Mogul field log was later used (somewhat dubiously, if you ask me) to try to explain away the Roswell Incident as simply a lost Mogul balloon (when it plainly wasn’t).

Usefully for us, Crary’s log lists who arrived at Alamogordo on 28th June 1947, the starting day of “Alamogordo II” (i.e. the second phase of the expedition, which finished on 8th July 1947):

Balloon expedition personnel arrived Saturday evening – Peoples, Trakowski, Mears, Ireland, Olsen, Moulton, Alden from AMS and Moore, Schneider, Hackman, Smith, Hazzard, 2 others and a Lt Smith from Navy NYU.

Interestingly, even though B. D. (“Bruce”) Gildenburg – who wrote the scathing (if somewhat scattershot) 2003 takedown “A Requiem to Roswell” in Skeptic magazine – worked on Project Mogul (and later ran Holloman AFB’s balloon recovery section for many years), I believe he was not actually at Alamogordo in June-July 1947.

Staff in Alamogordo

Though his report’s overall findings didn’t make a lot of sense to me, James McAndrew’s Synopsis of Balloon Research Findings did actually try to summarize Project Mogul’s technical reports fairly well.

For example, it notes that “three of Crary’s staff […] resided permanently in Alamogordo”:

• Don Reynolds
• Sol Olivia
• Bill Edmonson (“Edmondson”? “Edmondston”?)

But there was also Vivian and Eileen, that Crary was working very closely with. Was “Vivian” Vivian Bushnell? Was “Eileen” Eileen Ulrich Farnochi?

AMS People

• Dr James W. (“Jim”) Peoples, the “Primary Scientist”
• Capt. Albert C. Trakowski (“Chief” of the project from January 1947 to May 1949)
• A. H. Mears
• Charles (“Charlie”) Ireland
• (Joseph?) Olsen
• Moulton
• John Alden

NYU People

McAndrew’s Appendix 16 includes a copy of the NYU team’s “Special Report #1”, which gives more details of the NYU project personnel’s names (as mentioned by Crary) and roles:

• Charles B. Moore – Research Engineer
• Charles S. Schneider – Asst. Proj. Director
• Murry Hackman – in charge of the Electronic Weather Equipment
• James Smith – Weather Observer and Draftsman
  • Is this “J. Richard Smith”, the full-time Meteorologist hired in May 1947? [Appendix 15]
• Richard Hassard – Chief of Flight Detail
• “2 others”
  • Possibly Henry Kammenzind, Ralph Morrell, William Kneer [Appendix 16]
  • Possibly William O. Davis, Fred Barker [Appendix 15]