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The UFO Flap in Prescott, Arizona
By Richard W. Kimball
The Daily Courier
[Prescott, Arizona]
An old American Indian rock carving near Mishongnovi, Arizona accurately describes the existence of "flying saucers" and space travel, according to a Hopi Indian leader.
In the summer of 1970, the late Chief Dan Katchongva, in the company of his counselor Ralph Tawangyawma and interpreter Caroline Tawangyawma, went to the city of Prescott to learn more about the rash of UFOs recently seen in that area.
The residents of that central Arizona community said they saw hundreds of flying saucers in the night sky over the city for more than two weeks prior to the Hopi leader's arrival.
Katchongva, who died in 1972, said he believed the sightings were intimately connected to Hopi prophecy. The traditional Hopi chieftain has long been interested in UFOs because he believed they were a part of Hopi religious beliefs.
UFO researcher and former Prescott resident Paul Solem said the existence of the saucers justified an old Hopi prophecy that a "Day of Purification" was soon to arrive. It would be a day when all wicked people and wrong-doers would be punished or destroyed.
Contact with flying saucers would signal the first step of an massive migration northward by Indians from Central and South America, Solem said.
Chief Katchongva told reporters of the Prescott Evening Courier that the petroglyph on the Hopi Reservation shows a definite connection between the Indians and visitors from space.
"We believe other planets are inhabited and that our prayers are heard there," he said.
"The arrow on which the dome-shaped object rests, stands for travel through space," Katchongva said in explaining the rock carving.
"The Hopi maiden on the dome-shape (drawing) represents purity. Those Hopi who survive Purification Day will travel to other planets. We, the faithful Hopi, have seen the ships and know they are true," he said.
"We have watched nearly all of our brethren lose faith in the original Hopi teachings and go off on their own course. Near Oraibi the 'Plan of Life' was clearly shown and we know that those who have forsaken the original teachings will pay with their lives when the True White Brother comes," he went on.
According to Katchongva, the Hopi prophesies say the Hopi people will be divided three times. The first division occurred in 1906 when Chief You-kew-ma and his followers were forced out of the ancient Indian town of Oraibi to begin a new community in Hotevilla, he said.
(Read about that in "Hotevilla" by Thomas Mails)
Titus Quomayumtewa saw a 'flying saucer' and the Kachina that piloted it. Paul Sewaemanewa saw the saucer years before when he had made his prayer rites," Katchongva said.
"These two men are of the faithful. We know we are to be divided once more and few will be left just before our True White Brother arrives with the matching pieces of stone tablet. Many Hopi men wear their bang haircut that represents a window from which they continue to look for the True White Brother," he went on. Joe Kraus, who was the managing editor of the Prescott newspaper at that time, said he witnessed the appearance of the flying saucers one Friday evening.
"If one is to believe Hopi prophecy, the reasons the saucers are sighted here most often and contacters seem to be attracted here is that this is a chosen land. Prescott is within the Hopi circle of sacred ground where the beings from another world are supposed to bring about prophecy," he said.
Not all Prescott residents believed the saucers were benign. One resident wrote a letter to the paper that said the UFOs were the "evil spirits of Satan's realm."
"Some of the saucer people may even say they are God or Christ, but they are not. The Bible states that this will appear in the religions in the end days. Most saucers being reported have some kind of cosmic atoms (lights) appearing in different colors. I believe these to be Satan and his realm (fallen angels) of light. Many strange things are to take place before Jesus comes," the woman said.
"The last day Chief Dan Katchongva of the Hopi Nation was here, the ship came in real low -- about 800 feet,"
Richard W. Kimball
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If one compares the requirements of being a "chosen people" one has to go no further than the Hopi and the Israelites...living austere lives and customs.
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