Digging continues....

Digging on Aslito airfield has commenced.

Captain Cooper overseeing a dig sight - Photo Robert Rustin

We're not digging up the whole field mind you, and of course we have a limited area with which we can work.  But finally, after 8 weeks, the permits have come in.  Kudos to Captain Paul Cooper who has kept after it, and those who helped them get the permits - and special thanks to the HPO and the archaeologists involved - Marilyn and Mike - who are on hand to make sure that every proper protocol is kept.

Aslito airfield - Photo Google Earth

So again, we have two avenues that we are pursuing at the moment.  One is interviews with people who claim they personally saw, or have information regarding someone who saw Amelia Earhart or Fred Noonan on Saipan.  To date we have 17 eyewitness reports, and most of them are new - have never been recorded or published before.  The process we took in our interviews was fairly simple; please tell us your memories (or your mother or father's memories as best as you can recall) about what Saipan was like before the war, and then what it was like during the war.

Aslito in June of 1944. Not far from one of our sights looking North West

The War began for Saipan on June 10th, 1944, because that's when US forces came to the island.  It was a fierce battle for Saipan, and for all the US veterans who survived it, any one of them can tell you how difficult that battle was.  It was the same for the Chomorro, the native people who were living on Saipan.  They had become part of Japan in the earlier part of the century, and there was a robust economy built on sugar cane. The Japanese ran the government offices, but by all accounts, there was little strife, and virtually no problem with their administration until the war with the United States began.

David M Sablan, Mike Harris, Paul Cooper not far from where
David's family hid in caves during the invasion

Then, as the reports go, the Japanese rules became stricter - and according to one historian, once soldiers who were battle hardened in Manchuria (fighting in China) arrived in Saipan, the Japanese soldiers became brutal, and treated the islanders as slaves.  However, there were many families that spoke Japanese fluently, and these people kept their jobs and kept their lives as long as they conformed to the newer, stricter laws.

Aslito from the South side of the field 1944

Once the U.S. forces arrived, then both the Japanese and the islanders searched for safety in the many hundreds of caves that dot the island.  And depending on whether the US thought there were Japanese soldiers or civilians inside these caves, that dictated whether or not they would survive.

We've heard these stories over and over - and the details are all verifiable with historical records.

The camp in Chalan Kanoa with Chomorro natives

And then we ask if they or any of their family had ever heard anything about a female pilot being incarcerated or on the island.  As mentioned in a previous post, the Saipanese are extremely careful about saying what they saw or did not see - about they heard or did not hear.  In all the interviews, we did not find one person who volunteered information that wasn't asked.  They were extremely careful to say "I did not see this personally, but my mother said that she did."  Or "I was sitting there with my brother, so he can confirm these details, but I saw a white woman sitting in the back of a truck with her hands tied.  And she was tall and thin and wore khaki clothes.  And the truck was parked for 30 minutes, so it was not something I could forget at 12 years old, because I had never seen a white person before, let alone a woman with her hands tied behind her back and a black bandana across her forehead. It's not something you could ever forget."

Chalan Kanoa village in 1944 - US Territory ever since

So far we have 15 of these accounts on camera and are scheduled to film two more very soon. Each has its own detail and carries its own weight.  We will let the audience make up their mind whether all these individuals have somehow been coerced into telling their story.

Bilimon Amaron from Mike Harris' footage in 1983

We've also located some of the original footage shot by Mike Harris back in 1983.  So when someone says "My mother said this" we will be able to show that woman actually saying what they remember her saying.  And in the case of Bilimon Amaron, who saw Earhart on a Japanese ship while in custody, and the Electra sitting on the back of the ship in 1937, we have his caucasian business partner for 40 years, who says emphatically "I knew Bilimon extremely well.  And if he said that he saw something, I can swear that he would never make something like that up.  He was an honorable man, and I worked with him for 40 years as a business partner."  I mention that his business partner was caucasian, merely as a touchstone to earlier posts, where we talk about the inability of so called researchers to understand that an islander might actually be accurate when recounting the story of seeing Earhart on a ship, where all the soldiers spoke of her as "Ameera."  It's not about the ethnicity or memory of the witness; it's about the ability of the interviewer to actually hear the answer to their question.

Captain Cooper in action - photo Robert Rustin

Breakfast nook with Jerry Kramer & Jerry Facey -
thanks for your support! (with Mike and Paul)

Finally, we had a tip that there might be some parts of an airplane buried in an industrial parking lot not far from the airport.  And like all tips that we can follow up on, we did.  In this case, we were far from the field, far from any logical place a piece of an Electra (an unusually high aluminum alloy) might be.  But we followed the tip and dug in that particular place.  So far - nothing.  But that was yesterday, and today we are digging near the airfield itself, near an area where eyewitnesses claim to have seen the Electra burned.

Some Japanese ruins from the original airfield - Google Earth

Stay tuned....

A recap and further adventures...

We are still in the hunt.

Captain Cooper at the old Japanese jail - photo Robert Rustin

Captain Cooper reports from Saipan that our permits are in order to being digging at Alsito airfield.  There may be one or two more hoops to jump through, but basically he's on the runway, his engines running.  Here is Captain Cooper in today's Saipan Tribune:

Amelia Earhart experts push for CNMI Cultural Center

Facility to host exhibit on female pilot

By Clarissa V. David
Reporter

A team of researchers doing investigative work in the Northern Marianas on the mystery surrounding famed American aviatrix Amelia Earhart's disappearance is reviving efforts to have a CNMI Cultural Center built on Saipan.

Capt. Paul H. Cooper, one of two guest speakers at the Rotary Club of Saipan meeting yesterday, said the center could accommodate not just the world-class Amelia Earhart exhibition the team is putting together but also the CNMI museum.

Cooper said he found the 2005 plan for the proposed $20-million center during discussions with Chuck Jordan, who served as director of the Office of Planning and Statistics for the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands.

“This program is something that Saipan needs,” said Cooper, a pilot for Southwest Airlines, adding that their team already created a committee to do due diligence to ensure that the project prospers.

According to Cooper, there are grants from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and other funding sources that could subsidize the construction of the center.

“There's plenty [of] available grants to do this project. We just need the people of Saipan to get behind this. We're gathering our resources to bring this forward. I'm excited to be able to share this with you today because the center is what's best for Saipan,” he told Rotarians.

Cooper's team is doing research on Earhart, the first female pilot to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean, who disappeared in 1937 aboard a Lockheed Electra Model 10 during an attempt to circumnavigate the globe.

“Our reason is to solve this aviation mystery that's been plaguing the world for the last 70 years,” said Cooper.

The team is composed of Cooper, film director, producer, screenwriter, and freelance journalist Richard Martini, and aircraft recovery lead investigator Michael Harris.

Harris, who also appeared before the Rotary Club of Saipan in January, said at the time that his visit is to make a documentary on the Naval Construction Battalions, popularly known as Seabees “because we didn't want the word to get out about the Amelia Earhart research that we're doing,” said Cooper.

“A lot of people out there don't want us to succeed,” he said.

Cooper said eyewitness accounts from a dozen U.S. Marines, plus over 200 from various Pacific territories attest that Earhart's plane was shot down and was taken to several islands before it was finally brought to Saipan.

“Her airplane was found here in 1944 by the U.S. Marines when they invaded Saipan. It was flown after they found the airplane then it was destroyed,” he said.

According to Cooper, some 20 eyewitnesses they interviewed on Saipan corroborate that Earhart indeed spent time on island during the Japanese occupation of the Northern Marianas.

Another group, The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery, is convinced that Earhart went down in Nikumaroro island, about 400 miles southeast of Earhart's intended destination, Howland Island.

“They don't have one piece of evidence. They don't have an eyewitness. Now, have I found a piece of the airplane? Not yet. But I'm close, I believe. The way the dominoes have fallen since I've been here, if my footsteps weren't guided by God, it would not have been possible for me to discover what I've discovered since I've been here. The whole team has just been totally blessed with this experience,” said Cooper.

Meanwhile, Mike Harris Sr. reports from Florida that he's been successful at locating some of the footage that he shot back in 1983 of islanders speaking on camera about seeing or hearing stories about Amelia Earhart being on Saipan.  This footage has been mistakenly identified as coming from "T.C. "Buddy" Brennan" when it was Mike who was directing the documentary and had hired the cameraman.  For whatever reason, Mr. Brennan released a video and a book about the expedition, but neglected to tell Mike that he was using his footage in either.  We've come that much closer to rectifying that oversight.  Mike will soon have a print of his footage in hand, so we can access it and blend it with what we've shot on Saipan.

Mike Harris shooting on Saipan

We've also had progress on two fronts; we have been able to locate some of the footage shot during the Oliver Knaggs expedition on Mili and Jaluit back in the 1980's.  After an exhaustive search, we are in the process of discussing what exists in VHS or 16mm form.  We will report back to you what condition this footage is in - but for those Earhart researchers who've been able to see Oliver Knagg's book, this footage will do a lot of clearing up the Mili portion of the story.  (Islanders reported the Electra coming down in Mili in 1937, these are eyewitness interviews with people who claim to have witnessed that event.)

Also we are pursuing an interview with someone who was instrumental in the Earhart saga.  We were able to interview her brother on Saipan, and god willing, we will do an interview with this woman who had a key role in the sighting of Amelia Earhart on Saipan.  The point of this being that we are asking people to just tell us what they saw - and when compared with other stories, eyewitness accounts, a fuller picture comes into view.  This person can also gives us an accurate portrait of what it was like on Saipan during the war years - and that information is priceless in terms of living history. 

Robert Rustin and David Dougherty - thanks for your help

Saipan, as we've come to learn, played a key role in world history.  Once the airfield was taken by the US forces, the air war was essentially won.  It was this key moment when bombers could refuel on their path to Tokyo.  And within months, the airfield had been expanded, and then a larger one was built three miles away on Tinian, where bombers could fly around the clock.  And of course, it was on Tinian where warfare changed forever, with the introduction of Fat Man and Little Boy into the lexicon of warfare.  It was this airfield that changed the way war has been fought since, and perhaps forever.

Aptly named Forbidden Island - another mystery of Saipan

By the way, one tidbit we've learned while on Saipan.  Japan was developing an atomic bomb at the same time the US was developing its own.  The story, as we've been told it from two sources is this; the Germans had a submarine not far from Saipan where Japan and Germany were doing a joint effort in the race to develop an atomic bomb - the bomb to end all bombs.  And when the first bomb destroyed Hiroshima, as the story goes, when word made it to this submarine, the three Japanese scientists went into their quarters and committed harakiri.  This story is not part of any history program we've come across, and if true, would change the argument about the necessity of dropping an atomic. If these fellows had been successful, the world would certainly have been a different place - and I probably wouldn't be writing this sentence...

Stay tuned... 

Amelia's Ring, a prison tale and a ghost story...

Digging continues on Saipan.

Captain Paul Cooper has been diligently pursing all leads, sometimes with a magnatometer, sometimes with a GPR, and sometimes with intuition. (Helped by a shovel and some good luck).

Talking to Connie about the ring - photo by Robert Rustin

Connie Kaufer, a relative of the woman who Amelia gave a ring to, has been helping in the effort.  She met with Robert Hunter, curator of the CNMI museum on Saipan (an excellent museum if you're even in the area), and Connie described the ring so that he could generate some sketches.

Meanwhile, Paul has been on site with the help and assistance of the photographer Robert Rustin, looking in the ruins of the family home to see if it can be located.  It was lost during a typhoon, went under the floorboards... and perhaps is still there.

Looking for the ring - photo by Robert Rustin

One of the friends of this blog, Woody Peard, contacted us about the ring.  He supplied us with a photograph that was sent to him by Ann Pellegreno.  Ann is the aviatrix who recreated Amelia's flight in 1967, flying in an Electra.  While she was in Lae, New Guinea, she met the famed photographer James Francis, who has done a number of books about the history of the island.

At some point she was given this photograph - I'm not sure if it was taken by Francis, but if memory serves me correctly (and I think the story of the photograph can be found in "Last Flight" - Amelia's book about her last flight) she met with a local mission on the island, and a number of people came to meet the famed Aviatrix after she had dinner with them.  I've been looking at photos of Amelia and her last flight for 30 years, and I have seen another foto of this same meeting - not sure if it was the same photographer, or if it was with someone else's camera - and I have to dig through the files to find out where it currently is being held.

Lae with AE and Fred - photo courtesy Ann Pellegreno & Woody Peard

But the story is that the woman on the far left of the photograph is holding a ring in her hand, and it's been reported that that was the ring that was given to Amelia before she left on her last flight.

Holding what looks like a ring - Photo courtesy Ann Pellegreno & Woody Peard

And may, perhaps, be the same ring that Amelia gave to Mathilde Arriola (interviewed by Fred Goerner and Father Arnold in 1960 for "Searching for AE") when Amelia was incarcerated on Saipan.  Forensic technology can help us get a better view of the bauble in the woman's hand, as well as help us see if there are any written accounts of this woman giving her that same ring.  But we're on a path and we are pursuing it.

Sam being interviewed by Alexie of the Marianas Variety & Saipan Tribune
photo Robert Rustin

We also got a request from Sam McPhetres, local historian and co founder of the Northern Marianas College.  Sam has been instrumental in our research, helping us with searching the archives for eye witness accounts, and many other leads.

Scott Russell from the NMI Humanities Council - photo Robert Rustin

Sam had one request; could we help him drain the large water tank located in the middle of the jail in Garapan?  This cistern contains water that hasn't been disturbed since 1944, when the jail was taken by US forces.  Sam suspected there was a detention room under that cistern, a "hot box" for prisoners who were given extreme punishment.  With all the permits involved with getting our first shovel into the ground, we thought it was unlikely we'd be able to fulfill that request.  However, Captain Cooper insisted that he could and would do so, and here's some photos of that historic event.

Draining the cistern at the jail - photo Robert Rustin

 Finally, we had a wonderful interview with Tan Escolastica, who has been a historian of sorts, one of the frequently interviewed people on Saipan for her memory of people and events.  We spoke to her first when we arrived on the island, and then a few weeks later when she helped us find an old hidden cemetery, and finally, another interview where she wanted to recount a profound vision she had the night before.  She was in her home and saw a figure appear in the hallway.  She described the figure as tall, thin, wearing khaki and when she turned towards Tan Escolastica, she clearly saw that it was Amelia.

Tan Escolastica telling her story. Photo Chris Neltner

Science will tell us that because of the stirring up of events, the search for her plane, that this "vision" of Amelia's ghost was just an imaginary event.  That may very well be the case.  However, as we've outlined in previous posts, we've left no stone unturned in our search. And that includes interviews with "dowsers" who were able to pinpoint ley lines on Saipan that Paul Cooper also found independently, and in my case, it involved a psychic who I happened to meet while working on the feature film "Salt."  I was having lunch with an old friend, and this old friend had brought her friend Pattie Canova to our brunch.  At some point, Pattie offered to do a "reading."

Pattie Canova - www.pattiecanova.com

I told her that was very kind, I didn't need to do a reading, as I've done my own research into the world of ESP, and I was very comfortable with the results I'd gotten - no need to do one.  She insisted, and I said "Ok."  She had me flip over some playing cards and said "You're doing a project about a female pilot.  Is it Amelia Earhart?"  I look at my friend in chagrin, assuming she must have said something.  I didn't know that Pattie is renowned in NYC, and does this kind of thing for a living.  I've become friends with her and believe beyond a shadow of doubt, she knew nothing about the famed flier.

Amelia and her Electra

So I set aside my skepticism for an hour - and instead of trying to get her to prove she was accurate, I dove into an interview with someone, or something that knew more about Amelia Earhart than anyone I've spoken to, past or present.  And I know a lot about her - from family secrets, to other secrets that have never been published, but were part of my research for the film "Amelia."

So - when we say that it could have been Amelia's ghost visiting Escolastica - we mean literally that whatever energy that is out there in the Universe that contains the engrams of memories that belong to the Aviatrix, it may very well have made a visit to this gentle older Chomorro, who is very religious, who has never claimed to have seen Amelia on Saipan, despite knowing many folks who have, and who isn't making this claim to satisfy any modicum of fame, fortune.. or to appear on this blog.

So.  Take it for what you will.  A dear elderly lady, who has been instrumental in helping the historians of the island, gave us a call and wanted to tell us about her encounter with Amelia's ghost.  We will include a transcript of it when we get around to completing our book, film and exhibit; Earhart on Saipan.

Thanks for tuning in....

Saipan Redux

Still pulling all of our sources together, as well as resources...

Mike Harris & Capt Cooper on site 1

Here's a shot of the airfield and one of our sites close to where US Marines said they saw the Electra burned.  We've done some test digs as well as examine the best method to find aluminum in a field full of ferrous material.  Note the bunker behind Mike, it's one of the original ones that have been there since prior to the War and mark the old airfield.

Test hole dug with help of HPO

Typical pieces found in the grass

There's bedrock in some places, about six feet down.  However, between the surface and the bedrock we've found a number of pieces of metal.

Escolastica's son

Escolastica's son helped us track down an old cemetery. (apologies for not having your name in front of me! Thanks for coming to our talk as well) This cemetery has been moved for the most part, and most of the bodies were re-interred at the new cemetery.  However, Robert Wallack, one of our eyewitnesses, who found Earhart's briefcase in a safe in Saipan (confirmed by a number of Marines we've spoken to), told us about a cemetery that had a wrought iron fence around it.

Took us awhile, but we were able to locate it.  There are still some tombs that haven't been moved, perhaps the family members didn't get a chance to do so.  But their resting area is in a beautiful patch of bamboo.  This is the cemetery where Robert Wallack was told by a local woman that "An american woman flyer and another American man were buried."  Wallack told me about it in his interview, and he also pointed out that "It was different than the one that a local native had told Tom Devine about."  He found it odd that two islanders would point to two different cemeteries.

This could be because two other flyers were executed just prior to the War's start - they were captured in early 44 and held in the Garapan prison.  It could be because a person heard the story from someone else and got the wrong cemetery.  It could be that the bodies of Earhart and Noonan were recovered as reported in "The Stars and Stripes" in 1944. We know of at least three different cemeteries where she and Fred Noonan might have been buried.  But here's the one I told Robert Wallack I would find for him:

Old Garapan cemetery

Some of the crosses were bare, but others had names on them:

Old cemetery

Rich went off to Tokyo to scour the military archives.  Along with an interpreter, he was shown records from every Japanese prison from 1937 to 1945.  Both he and the librarian were surprised to learn that the records from Saipan had never arrived.  The librarian thought that might be perhaps they were never returned by the US after the war.  Of course, we've learned from our search of the US National archives that those records never made it to Washington either.  So despite a wealth of detailed prison information - somehow the records on Saipan seem to have disappeared into thin air.  Or have they?

In the heart of Tokyo, the Japanese Imperial Palace looms large.

The Japanese Imperial Palace looms in the background

Meanwhile, there are flights that leave from Tokyo to Saipan every day filled with tourists from Korea, Japan, China and Vladivostok in Russia.  After all, it's US soil - and who wouldn't want a little vacation time on US soil? Great shopping, great beaches, wonderful friendly natives, and a wealth of secrets.

Delta flights to Saipan from Tokyo

Meanwhile, one more sunset from the beach in front of the Hyatt hotel in Garapan.  Calling to us to continue our search, as the secrets of Saipan have yet to be revealed.  Stay tuned....

The shores of Garapan

Our response to "unintentional manipulation" during questioning

Earhart researcher, filmmaker Richard Martini: No manipulation

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Published on Monday, March 04, 2013 00:00

Written by By Alexie Villegas Zotomayor - avz@mvariety.com - Variety News Staff

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Aircraft Recovery Associates refutes the arguments advanced by The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery researchers in their research paper on the reliability of witnesses.

In their research paper titled, “Amelia Earhart, Saipan, and the Reliability of Eyewitnesses,” TIGHAR researchers Dr. Thomas F. King, Thomas A. Roberts, and Joseph A. Cerniglia cited studies as they offered caution in connection with “uncritical reliance on eyewitness accounts – particularly when these accounts have been gathered by untrained personnel and have been frequently retold.”

EARHART RESEARCHERS CAPTAIN PAUL COOPER, MIKE HARRIS, AND RICHARD MARTINI ANSWER QUESTIONS FROM THE AUDIENCE DURING A PUBLIC PRESENTATION AT AMERICAN MEMORIAL PARK LAST MONTH. PHOTO BY ALEXIE VILLEGAS ZOTOMAYOR

TIGHAR is exploring the Nikumaroro Hypothesis, that Amelia Earhart and her navigator Fred Noonan may have crash landed on Gardner Island, now Nikumaroro, in the Phoenix Islands in the Republic of Kiribati.

In response, Aircraft Recovery Associates lead investigator Richard Martini, on behalf of the group said that the comment borders on “unintentional racism,” implying that the islanders aren’t capable of accurately recalling their own memories.

“Are these researchers saying that these islanders we’ve interviewed are lying? Or that they are being manipulated? Are they stating that the U.S. Marines are lying? Or that they are being manipulated?” asked Martini.

Martini, a journalist and an award-winning documentary filmmaker, has been conducting his own research for the past 25 years.

Martini e-mailed this reporter their response and posted a copy on their website earhartonsaipan.com.

“There’s no such thing as ‘unintentional manipulation’ — a clever catch-phrase to make it seem that ‘oh, they must be making this up because the camera is convincing them to lie about what they heard or saw.’”

Citing the article published by Variety last Friday, Martini said, “The article claims that “even word choice by a questioner can influence memory,’ which of course is possible, unless you’re someone who’s been doing this for some time, and knows how to ask a person to recollect whatever it is they want to recollect.

King et al. stated in their paper, “Most of the eyewitness and other accounts by American military personnel are subject to similar forms of unintentional manipulation, memory construction, and faulty interpretation. Although there may be kernels of truth in some or many of the stories, there are ways of accounting for them that do not involve the presence of Earhart and/or Noonan in the Marianas.”

For Martini, “manipulation” is a pejorative and that there are no two ways around it. “Either a person is manipulated or they are not,” he said.

Martini said, “It may be ‘unintentionally racist’ because it’s been the history of Saipan, the history of the Chomorro people, that if an American can’t understand them, or take the time to ask them questions about their lives, about their personal experience during the war, they couldn’t possibly be telling the truth about what they heard or saw from their parents. The Chomorro were first told by the Spanish what to say or believe, then told by the Germans what they should or shouldn’t learn, and then by the Japanese on what they could or couldn’t say. And then when the CIA was based in Saipan until 1962, another group of people would tell them how to speak or what they could or could not say. Our exprience on Saipan is that everyone has secrets to tell, but in general, has chosen not to tell them.”

Martini also described as “paternalistic” and “chauvinistic” the TIGHAR researchers “expertise masquerading as science.”

He said it has little or nothing to do with science or the pursuit of the truth.

He said this is typical “of people who have a vested interest in their own version of the truth.”

“For example, one man we interviewed, 82 years old, said he was 12 years old when he saw a female fitting Earhart’s description sitting with her arms bound behind her in the back of a army truck parked prior to the War in Chalan Kanoa. He said, ‘I clearly remember it, as the truck was parked for 30 minutes, and I had never seen a white person before.’ We asked him questions about other details about the war, about his family hiding in caves. These and other details we were able to corroborate. Why would he slip one lie into an hour of truth?”

Martini said that the Chamorro people interviewed couldn’t be “cajoled or “manipulated in any fashion to say something they didn’t actually witness.”

He also said that a Chamorro will say that he or she didn’t see it personally and say that somebody else did.

“A Chomorro will say ‘I did not see this personally, and I repeat that it was my mother or father who saw it, so I can’t say that it happened, but this is what they said. He didn’t say it was Amelia Earhart. He said it was a ‘tall, thin woman wearing a khaki shirt with light colored hair with her arms bound behind her back and a black bandana across her face.’ If he was being manipulated — or trying to obfuscate — why not just say ‘I saw Amelia Earhart?” He did not know who she was, but he did see her as a prisoner prior to the war.”

Martini said they take the time to corroborate information.

Citing as an example what a U.S. Marine relayed to him, Martini said the veteran told him, “I remember it as if it was yesterday. I was the wire operator in Col. Clarence Wallace’s tent. I decoded the message that came in on June 19, 1944 that said ‘We have found Amelia Earhart’s airplane on Aslito airfield.’ I took the message to my commanding officer and he signed it. And I thought it was odd that he made no comment about it. And then he ordered me to the hangar to guard the plane for 24 hours.’”

Martini said they corroborated this story in interviews with other soldiers who saw this man guarding the plane.

“What part of his story was made up? What part was ‘manipulated?” he said.

Martini said, “To call a U.S. Marine a liar is, in our humble opinion, beyond the pale. Oh sorry — he was ‘unintentionally manipulated’ into repeating what he saw. Well, we have news for these researchers; the camera, in this case, doesn’t lie. This Marine spoke the truth and we have five other corroborating witnesses. And we’d like to see them tell a Marine to his face that he was ‘unintentionally manipulated.’”

“To imply that as a filmmaker, or a journalist, we have somehow manipulated people into saying what they think they saw, as opposed to what they saw, or what their parents told them they saw, is to imply we’ve been unintentionally (or intentionally) manipulating eyewitnesses,” said Martini.

The veteran filmmaker also said, “As a team, we’ve been at this for enough time to understand the difference between conjecture and reporting.”

The Aircraft Recovery Associates said, their premise is simple: let the people speak for themselves about what they saw or heard.

“We suspect those who choose to ignore the overwhelming accounts do so because of an inherent disregard of native islanders, or US Marines, or both,” said Martini.

Martini said the TIGHAR group has been developing and testing their hypothesis that Earhart wound up on Nikumaroro for 30 years.

“Isn’t it time to step back for a moment and consider that there might be some logic to what all of these eyewitnesses have said? After all, if the premise was true that people can spontaneously make up memories based on wishful thinking, where are all the witnesses who saw her on some other island? If it’s true that the U.S. Marines might have been deluded by the fog of war, why didn’t they say she was on Iwo Jima, Okinawa or Guam?” said Martini.

For Martini, one cannot ignore the fact that over a dozen soldiers claim they found her plane, saw her plane, or watched it burn at As Lito airfield.

“This was only 7 years after it disappeared — it’s not like they’d had a chance to come up with some other scenario,” he said.

Aside from these soldiers, he said, there were over 200 eyewitness accounts.

In the span of three weeks, they managed to get 15 new eyewitnesses.

“Logic tells us that these accounts bear further scrutiny — not that they may be incorrect, or manipulated, which is faulty reasoning — any cop can tell you that when eyewitnesses agree upon something, then it’s worth pursuing. That is, unless they’re being ‘unintentionally manipulated’ of course,” said Martini.

- See more at: http://www.mvariety.com/cnmi/cnmi-news/local/54035-earhart-researcher-filmmaker-richard-martini-no-manipulation#sthash.bN7NFXS4.dpuf

Response to Tighar's "unintentional manipulation" in eyewitness reporting

Tighar has finally responded to our research...

By saying it's not really research.  

Please consider this article in today's Mariana's Variety:

Archaeologist, researchers caution reliance on Earhart eyewitness accounts

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Published on Friday, March 01, 2013 00:00

Written by By Alexie Villegas Zotomayor - avz@mvariety.com - Variety News Staff

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MOST of the eyewitness accounts and those of U.S. military personnel are subject to unintentional manipulation, memory reconstruction, and faulty interpretation.

In the wake of the persistent interest to probe the mystery surrounding the disappearance of famous aviatrix Amelia Earhart and her navigator Fred Noonan, Dr. Thomas F. King, Thomas A. Roberts and Joseph A. Cerniglia, in a paper titled “Amelia Earhart, Saipan, and the Reliability of eyewitnesses” examine the hypothesis claiming that Earhart and Noonan were on Saipan based on accounts given by residents and some U.S. military personnel and also how these so-called “eyewitness accounts” could be tainted.

“We want to offer some cautions about uncritical reliance on eyewitness accounts — particularly when these accounts have been gathered by untrained personnel and have been frequently retold,” wrote King, Roberts and Cerniglia.

The three are affiliated with The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery or TIGHAR that has been exploring the Nikumaroro hypothesis — that Amelia Earhart and Noonan managed to land on Nikumaroro, formerly Gardner Island, in the Phoenix Islands in the Republic of Kiribati.

King et al. said that there was a flurry of interest in 2012 in stories about Earhart and Noonan on Saipan in the Northern Marianas 75 years after their disappearance while en route to Howland Island from New Guinea in 1937.

They said two new books were published that featured these stories and more are yet to come.

King, a senior archaeologist with TIGHAR, along with Roberts and Cerniglia also submitted a paper last year to the first Marianas History Conference and their paper delved into the eight stories that point to Earhart and Noonan in the Marianas.

In their new paper discussing the reliability of eyewitness accounts, the authors divided these stories into two groups: (1) Micronesian stories, recollections of Chamorro, Carolinian or Marshallese delivered orally and recorded by non-Micronesians; and (2) U.S. military stories, related by U.S. military personnel about what they experienced or by others to whom they spoke.

They said that a few stories come from non-military American sources. They also noted one story from a Japanese informant reported by Mike Campbell in his book.

“The reports that are most impressive to most readers are those of eyewitnesses: people recounting what they say they actually saw, usually in 1937 on the part of the Micronesian informants and 1944 on the part of U.S. military personnel. If these people are not lying — and how could they all be? — then an unbiased reader may reasonably conclude that what they say is true,” said King et al.

The authors cited contradictions in the accounts however.

King et al. said, “A problem that confronts some of the authors who have published material on the Earhart-on-Saipan hypotheses is that eyewitnesses have sometimes provided contradictory testimony.”

They said this problem is often addressed by rejecting some stories and accepting others.

“Acceptance and rejection are often couched in very unambiguous terms,” King et al. said.

They said that informants whose stories are rejected are taken to be Japanese collaborators, participants in a U.S. government cover-up or simply not to be trusted.

“It may well be that all informants were telling what they believed to be the truth, though perhaps shaded in some cases to meet what they understood to be social expectations. However, this does not necessarily mean that any informant described ‘objective’ reality — that is, reality as it might be perceived by another party. There are good reasons to view all the eyewitness and other informant stories with skepticism, even while accepting the honesty and good will of those who have told them,” they said.

As to the reliability of eyewitness accounts, King et al. shared scientific studies that explored reliability of memory, including memories of eyewitnesses.

They cited, among other studies, research undertaken by Elizabeth Loftus of the Univ. of Washington whose 1979 book “Eyewitness Testimony” as the most widely available.

Referencing Loftus, King et al. said, “A growing body of research shows that new, postevent information becomes incorporated into memory, supplementing and altering a person’s recollection. New information can invade us, like a Trojan horse, precisely because we do not detect its influence.”

For the TIGHAR researchers, the studies including Loftus’ tend to show that memory is a highly malleable phenomenon. “Our memories can be significantly transformed by influences from outside our heads— notably by the suggestions of interviewers.”

“Even word choice by a questioner can influence memory,” they said.

These studies, they said, show that people’s memories can change over time in response to external and internal stimuli, and that people can come quite seriously to believe that they recall things that are different from what they originally saw and stored in memory.

“Altered memories can be as vivid, and as firmly and honestly believed in, as ‘pristine’ memories,” they said.

Senior archaeologist King and his fellow researchers said that there is a possibility of false memory creation with respect to both major populations of Earhart-on-Saipan eyewitnesses, referring to veterans of the U.S. military and Micronesian residents.

Explaining further, they found it striking that most memories related to Earhart and Noonan and the Lockheed Electra surfaced a dozen or more years after the 1944 invasion of Saipan.

“Many were not reported until the 1990s, in response to inquiries by Henry Duda, Thomas Devine and others.”

“It is not difficult to imagine a veteran of the invasion, looking back on a very exciting, frightening, confusing, perhaps heroic, perhaps traumatic period in his life, and finding gaps in his memory, things to wonder about,” they said.

They said that reading an appeal like Duda’s, or a book like Fred Goerner’s, Paul Briand’s, Vincent Loomis’, Buddy Brennan’s or Thomas Devine’s, “he may begin sifting and re-sifting his memories.”

They cited a notice published in Leatherneck magazine issued by Henry Duda that stated: “C’mon, Marines. Let’s bring out the truth. During the invasion of Saipan, I, and other Marines, as well as Army and Navy personnel, became aware of considerable material and information that Amelia Earhart, her navigator, Fred Noonan, and their airplane had actually landed on Saipan during her 1937 around-the-world flight, rather than the generally accepted assumption that they had gone down at sea. I wish to contact any additional Marines who may have information, especially those who were on guard duty where her plane was found in a Japanese hangar at Aslito Field.”

For King et al. they didn’t want to criticize Duda’s notice; however, they noted that it was a leading question.

“This sort of questioning pervades the record of eyewitness testimony elicitation on which the Earhart-on-Saipan stories are largely based. To judge from the psychological literature, it would seem almost made to order for the inadvertent creation of false memories,” they said.

They also said that there could be complications with Micronesian people recovering memories of 1937.

They said that there is some evidence that some American servicemen actively sought Earhart as they advanced through the islands.

They said that these servicemen may have asked very leading questions in 1943-1944.

The U.S. servicemen, they said, were encountering Micronesians going through “intense emotional upset.”

They said, “There would surely have been a strong motivation to tell the frightening newcomers what they seemed to want to hear and show them what they seemed to want to use.”

They also did not discount the opportunity for the creation of false memories.

As to the creation of false memories, the researchers also cited an interview made by Fr. Arnold Bendowske with Matilde Fausto Arriola in 1977, which they said was a “textbook case of leading the witness.”

Fr. Bendowske, in interviewing Arriola, said, “I mentioned to the Admiral at that time your name because you saw Amelia Earhart yourself.”

According to the transcript of that interview, Arriola replied, “I did not know her name when I first saw her. She did not mention her name or who she was.

Asked of the year, Arriola was trying to remember and Fr. Bendowske asked her, “Was it 1937 or 1938? Do you recall?”

The Earhart researchers said that Arriola regarded the priest as an authority figure being a Catholic and the priest’s mentioning that the U.S. military wanted her testimony enhanced the seriousness of the investigation.

“Asking leading questions is not the only interviewer practice that may have skewed the testimony of interviewees; the opportunity to profit from the ‘right’ kind of testimony also seems to have existed in some cases,” King, Roberts and Cerniglia noted in their research paper.

The TIGHAR researchers also looked into interrogation across cultural boundaries, implications of group opinion, and intercultural misunderstandings.

For King, Roberts and Cerniglia, “Although there may be kernels of truth in some or many of the stories, there are ways of accounting for them that do not involve the presence of Earhart and/or Noonan in the Marianas.”

They said, “This is not to say that Earhart and Noonan definitely were not captured by the Japanese, imprisoned on Saipan, and/or executed and buried there. Some version of the Earhart-on-Saipan story may be true. The evidence is tainted by the methods (or lack of method) involved in its collection, making it difficult if not impossible to judge its veracity.”

They said the association with Noonan or Earhart should be set aside in considering the stories about an American woman held captive on Saipan; that an effort to identify her and reconstruct her story could result in a valuable contribution to the history of Micronesia during the Japanese period and World War II.  

- See more at: http://www.mvariety.com/cnmi/cnmi-news/local/54002-archaeologist-researchers-caution-reliance-on-earhart-eyewitness-accounts#sthash.JHQxsFSM.dpuf

And now, if you will, consider my (our) response to the writer of this article, so it's clear what Tighar is really implying about Chomorro and US Marine testimony:



Dear Marianas Variety,

Sorry we didn't get back to you earlier.  We went to Japan to continue research on the Earhart saga. Yes, we do plan to create a documentary and a book.  In Rich's case, he's already completed a documentary on the topic called "Earhart's Electra" which is available at Amazon.com, it was the genesis of this search of Saipan.  It was posted at Kickstarter, and Mike Harris happened to catch it, and pointed out that it was he who had shot the footage of the islanders who saw Amelia Earhart on Saipan back in 1983.  This footage has always been incorrectly attributed to T.C. "Buddy" Brennan, who came up to Mike at a lecture and asked if he could accompany him to Saipan. Mike suggested he and Rich team up - he saw Rich had been interviewing US Marines about finding the airplane on Aslito airfield - the same GI's that he'd read about.  Rich interviewed Robert Wallack who found her briefcase, Thomas Devine, Douglas Bryce, Andrew Bryce, Erskine Nabers who was a wire operator on Saipan and decoded the message that they had found her plane on Aslito on June 19th, 1944.  Rich has four other US Marines who either saw the plane or saw it destroyed by US Forces.  On top of that there's the extensive list of islanders that CBS newsman Fred Goerner interviewed in the 1960's, the people Oliver Knaggs interviewed on Mili and Majuro, the islanders Mike Harris interviewed on Jaluit and Saipan in the 1980's - some of the dozens of whom are referenced in many books including Don Wilson's.  Then of course, there's the "Stars and Stripes" which printed the first Earhart allegation in 1944, where two GI's claimed they were asked to dig up her grave. Which brings us to the article ("Archaeologist, researchers caution reliance") about researchers warning that eyewitness reports are "subject to unintentional manipulation."  This comment borders on "unintentional racism" as it implies islanders aren't capable of remembering their own memories.  How can that be?   Are these researchers saying that these islanders we've interviewed are lying? Or that they are being manipulated?  Are they stating that the US Marines are lying? Or that they are being manipulated?   There's no such thing as "unintentional manipulation" - a clever catch phrase to make it seem that "oh, they must be making this up because the camera is convincing them to lie about what they heard or saw."  The article claims that “Even word choice by a questioner can influence memory."  Which of course is possible, unless you're someone who's been doing this for some time, and knows how to ask a person to recollect whatever it is they want to recollect. Either a person is manipulated or they are not.  "Manipulation" as a word is a pejorative, no two ways around it. It may be "Unintentionally racist" because it's been the history of Saipan, the history of the Chomorro people, that if an American can't understand them, or take the time to ask them questions about their lives, about their personal experience during the war, they couldn't possibly be telling the truth about what they heard or saw from their parents. The Chomorro were first told by the Spanish what to say or believe, then told by the Germans what they should or shouldn't learn, and then by the Japanese on what they could or couldn't say.  And then when the CIA was based in Saipan until 1962, another group of people would tell them how to speak or what they could or could not say.  Our exprience on Saipan is that everyone has secrets to tell, but in general, has chosen to not say them. This kind of paternalistic, chauvinistic so called expertise masquerading as science - which has little or nothing to do with science, or the pursuit of the truth, is typical of people who have a vested interest in their own version of the truth.  For example, one man we interviewed, 82 years old, said he was 12 years old when he saw a female fitting Earhart's description sitting with her arms bound behind her in the back of a army truck parked prior to the War in Chalan Kanoa.  He said "I clearly remember it, as the truck was parked for 30 minutes, and I had never seen a white person before." We asked him questions about other details about the war, about his family hiding in caves.  These and other details we were able to corroborate.  Why would he slip one lie into an hour of truth? In all the interviews, we found that the Chomorro people go out of their way to state exactly what they saw or didn't see, and can't be cajoled or manipulated in any fashion to say something they didn't actually witness.  A Chomorro will say "I did not see this personally, and I repeat that it was my mother or father who saw it, so I can't say that it happened, but this is what they said."  He didn't say it was Amelia Earhart. He said it was a "tall, thin woman wearing a khaki shirt with light colored hair with her arms bound behind her back and a black bandana across her face."  If he was being manipulated - or trying to obfuscate - why not just say "I saw Amelia Earhart?"  He did not know who she was, but he did see her as a prisoner prior to the war. We have taken the time to corroborate what their parents or relatives have said with other people who saw or said the same thing.  Or take the US Marine who said "I remember it as if it was yesterday. I was the wire operator in Col. Clarence Wallace's tent.  I decoded the message that came in on June 19, 1944 that said "We have found Amelia Earhart's airplane on Aslito airfield."  I took the message to my commanding officer and he signed it.  And I thought it was odd that he made no comment about it.  And then he ordered me to the hangar to guard the plane for 24 hours."  We were able to corroborate his story because we interviewed other soldiers who saw this man guarding the plane. What part of his story was made up?  What part was "manipulated?" To call a US Marine a liar is, in our humble opinion, beyond the pale.  Oh sorry - he was "unintentionally manipulated" into repeating what he saw. Well, we have news for these researchers; the camera, in this case, doesn't lie. This Marine spoke the truth and we have 5 other corroborating witnesses. And we'd like to see them tell a Marine to his face that he was "unintentionally manipulated."  To imply that as a filmmaker, or a journalist, we have somehow manipulated people into saying what they think they saw, as opposed to what they saw, or what their parents told them they saw, is to imply we've been unintentionally (or intentionally) manipulating eyewitnesses.  We've been at this research for over 30 years. Rich was hired to share his research for the feature film "Amelia,"  has done documentaries for the US State dept among others and knows the protocol of investigative journalism. Mike came to interview people who saw Amelia Earhart here back in 1983.  As a team, we've been at this for enough time to understand the difference between conjecture and reporting.   Our premise is simple; let people speak for themselves about they saw or heard.  We suspect those who choose to ignore the overwhelming accounts do so because of an inherent disregard of native islanders, or US Marines, or both - and in either case, ignore whatever "science" they cite as evidence of their own search, considering the source. The truth is, Tighar has had a bite at this apple for 30 years, developing and testing their theory that Amelia Earhart wound up on Nikumaroro.  Isn't it time to step back for a moment and consider that there might be some logic to what all of these eyewitnesses have said?  After all, if the premise was true that people can spontaneously make up memories based on wishful thinking, where are all the witnesses who saw her on some other island?  If it's true that the US Marines might have been deluded by the fog of war, why didn't they say she was on Iwo Jima, Okinawa or Guam?   The fact remains; over a dozen soldiers claim they found her plane, saw her plane, or watched it burn at Aslito airfield.  This was only 7 years after it has disappeared - it's not like they'd had a chance to come up with some other scenario.  And nearly 200 islanders claim they saw or heard or experienced her presence on Saipan, we've got 15 new eyewitnesses in just three weeks alone.  Logic tells us that these accounts bear further scrutiny - not that they may be incorrect, or manipulated, which is faulty reasoning - any cop can tell you that when eyewitnesses agree upon something, then its worth pursuing.  That is, unless they're being "unintentionally manipulated" of course. Scrapbook of AE pix on Saipan Oh, and we interviewed the fellow who was with the Marines when they found this scrapbook on Saipan this week.  His name is Richard "Rick" Spooner.  We encourage everyone to check into his bonafides.  He's known as "the Marine's Marine."  And he joins a chorus of Marines who want to speak the truth about what they saw on Saipan; after all "the truth will set you free."