Alien Base: The Evidence for Extraterrestrial Colonization of Earth – A Pantomime of Unrealities – ZRET AND THE NORCANS
‘Oh help me, help me!’ It was June 1920, and 16-year-old Albert Coe was on a canoeing vacation in Ontario with his companion Rod. Alone at the time, Coe heard the muffled cry while clambering to the top of an outcropping of rocks in remote and rough terrain on the Mattawa River. Looking around, Coe could see no one, so he let out a yell. Slightly to his right and ahead came an answer. ‘Oh help me, I’m down here.’ ‘I still couldn’t see anyone,’ said Coe, ‘and had walked about 25 feet in the direction of the voice when I came to a five-foot-wide cleft in the base rock that ran diagonally toward the river.
Wedged down this narrowing crevice was a young man with his blond head some two and a half feet from the surface. He only had one arm free, so I reached over and grabbed his wrist, but could not budge him. We always carried a coil of rope and a hunting knife, so I cut down a sapling about 10 or 15 feet long to use as a lever, and working my rope under the pit of his pinned arm, circled it around his back and chest, bringing a loop to ground level, at the same time telling him I would try to pry him out. If I failed, I told him not to worry, for my pal was somewhere on the other side of the river, and between the two of us we would free him.’
Slipping the pole through the loop and using the opposite edge as a fulcrum point, Coe gave a heave and felt the stranger move. Raising the lever end higher he propped it on a tree branch, jumped the crevice and pulled the man out. His legs were so numb that he was unable to stand, and the left hip, knee and shin were badly lacerated. The first thing he asked for was water, so Coe clambered back down the rocks to the river and fetched some in his felt hat. Slitting two of his bandannas, Coe also bathed and dressed the wounds. Then some oddities became apparent:
As I was helping him my curiosity was rising as to the identity of my ‘patient’. I told him of our trip and that I was searching for a way to open water, at the same time noticing he was wearing an odd silver-gray, tight jumper-type garment that had a sheen of silk to it. It had a leathery feeling without a belt or visible fasteners attached, but just under the chest was a small instrument panel. Several of the knobs and dials were broken, from being jammed against the rock in his fall. Being so many miles from any form of civilization, I pointedly asked where he was from, if he was on a canoe trip, also when and what had happened to cause his misfortune.
He said that he was not canoeing, but had a plane parked in a clearing, three or four hundred yards downstream, and had started out early the previous morning to do some fishing. In attempting to jump over the crevice, the loose earth and moss had given way underfoot and he had just about given up all thought of ever getting out alive when he heard some of the stones, loosened in my ascent, bouncing down the rock . . . he decided to cry out and said that my answering yell was like a miracle.
‘Well, planes were very primitive in those days,’ Coe went on, ‘and if you can imagine the side of the mountain, coming down, and all those rocks and branches, how the heck did he manage to land a plane? So I didn’t say anything to him — I was thinking the guy was nuts. I thought maybe he’d banged his head and was having hallucinations.’
The stranger requested Coe’s name and address, expressing his eternal gratitude for having been saved. He asked Coe to look for his small tackle-box and fishing-rod which he had dropped when he fell down the crevice. Coe was unable to find the tackle-box, but he did locate the fishing-rod. ‘The mystery of this strange person deepened within me,’ said Coe, ‘the peculiar outfit, a plane landing in this rocky forest and now a fishing-rod, the likes of which I had never seen.’
The butt was about three-quarters of an inch in diameter and had the same leathery touch as his suit, but bright blue and formed in a slight rounded protuberance just above it. It had a tiny slot in either side and continuance in a slender aluminum shaft. It had no guides or reel, for the fine line came directly out from the inside at its tip, as a fine filament, to which was attached aconventional dry fly. I asked where he had purchased such a rod and the question was partially parried with a reply that his father was a research engineer and it was one of his own design.
By now, the circulation was beginning to return to the stranger’s numbed limbs. Although occasionally grimacing from pain, the man’s overall composure, without apparent reaction to the stress or shock from such a torturous ordeal, was astonishing. An offer to help the man back to his plane was at first declined.
Coe and his companion, Rod, had come up against a lot of logs and other flotsam in the river and were anxious to find passage through or around it. The stranger said that, observed from his aircraft, five to six tough miles lay ahead, though he thought the teenagers could perhaps pull their canoe through some of the shallow, swampy water. ‘He did not want to impose upon me any further and said I had better think of starting back, for he had already been quite a burden,’ explained Coe.
From the condition of his leg I doubted that he could even walk, but made no comment as I helped him up. He took two steps, swayed and grabbed a tree to keep from going down. I threw one arm around his waist, lifted his left arm over my shoulder and insisted again that he accept my aid . . . He finally gave in, but on condition of a promise; asking for my solemn word that I would not divulge to anyone, not even my partner, anything that had taken place today, or what I may see.
He then told me that his father had developed a new type plane that was still in an experimental stage and highly secret, but he often helped in the lab when home from school. As sort of a test, his father had permitted him to use the plane for this fishing trip. In the future he would fully explain the reason for his request that I keep my promise. Agreeing to this request, Coe supported and half-carried the man downstream to his aircraft.