Clarence Kelly Johnson
Aviation pioneer and Lockheed U-2 and SR-71 aircraft designer, witnessed a UFO with his wife Althea in 1953 from their ranch in Agoura, California.
Legendary aeronautical and systems engineer of some of the most iconic airplanes of the 20th century, Clarence "Kelly" Johnson worked at Lockheed for 50 years. Johnson played an important role in the design of multiple Electra models, the P-38 Lightning, the Constellation family of airplanes, the U-2, the SR-71 Blackbird and many other aircraft. The U-2 was the world's first dedicated "spy plane", designed by Johnson under the secret Project Skunk Works program for the US Air Force.
On December 16, 1953, Kelly and his wife Althea spotted an unidentified flying object from their ranch near Agoura, California. Familiar with atmospheric phenomena such as lenticular clouds, Johnson at first sought a terrestrial explanation for the object he watched in the distance. In a letter describing what he witnessed, he recounted, "when it did not move or disintegrate, I asked my wife to get me our eight-power binoculars, so I would not have to take my eyes off the object, which by now I had recognized as a so-called 'saucer.' "
When he returned to the Lockheed offices the following day, Johnson was surprised to learn that a group of Lockheed employees observed the same object while flying in a Lockheed Constellation from a different location off the Southern California coast. Johnson reluctantly wrote to the US Air Force and informed them of the sighting, as he thought it was significant and important information for the military to know. The US Air Force investigated the sighting as part of Project Blue Book and dismissed the sighting as a lenticular cloud.
