Some people think the study of UFOs is limited to the United States and that none of the other countries in the world actively contribute anything or anyone of significance. However, Canada makes several contributions and in the past, one of Canada's major contributions was through one of the pioneer Ufologists, Wilbert Brockhouse Smith.

He actively began looking at UFOs back in the late 1940's and that was a time when you quickly got branded as a crackpot or crank if you said you believed in Flying Saucers and they were coming here from other planets.

At the time of his death, Wilbert Smith was superintendent of Radio Regulations Engineering with the Department of Transport [DOT], responsible for the engineering aspects of all matters concerning the use of radio in Canada, including equipment standards, radio relay systems (micro-wave), broadcast facilities and interference studies. Not the type of position you would find being filled by a crackpot or crank.

Mr. Smith had an important position and it was because of this and also because of his relentless nature that he began to unearth some interesting pieces of information about the UFO Phenomenon. He attended a conference in Washington in 1950 and while he was there, he spoke with the Canadian Embassy and was informed of four significant pieces by them.

One, the matter of UFOs was the most highly classified subject in the US, rating even higher than the H-bomb.

Two, UFOs exist.

Three, their modus operandi is unknown but a small group headed by Dr. Vannevar Bush is making a concentrated effort. (Incidentally, Dr. Bush has been associated with MJ-12.) and

Four, the entire matter is considered by US authorities to be of tremendous significance.

Now we hear these items and everyone goes "Ho-hum, yeah, so tell me something I don't know." But these little tidbits are not so boring because they happen to be official positions and we'll come back to these shortly.

But, continuing with Mr. Smith for a moment, it should be noted that he headed up some projects in Canada based on his studying Geomagnetism and those studies also led him to delve further into how it tied into UFOs. Matter of fact, in 1953, Mr. Smith set up a UFO listening base in Shirleys Bay, near Ottawa, Ontario. At 3:01 in the afternoon of August 8, 1954 the instrumentation at the Shirleys Bay installation registered an unusual disturbance… as a matter of fact, Wilbert Smith said that "the gravimeter went wild". The total event was thoroughly documented by Mr. Smith but less than a year later Mr. Smith did an about face and said that Shirleys Bay had never detected any UFOs. It is quite obvious that some pressure had to come from somewhere to get Mr. Smith to take that ignoble position and it would appear that most of it came from the United States.

Now I said I was going to come back to the main four points that Mr. Smith discovered while in Washington, right?

UFOs exist. Okay, slam dunk here, that's a pretty serious statement but it could mean anything, right?

Okay, how about "the entire matter is considered by US authorities to be of tremendous significance"? Gee, really? No kidding, you get hundreds and thousands of reported sightings every single year so there is little doubt that it would be considered to be tremendously significant.

We of course have the tidbit about their modus operandi being unknown but a group headed up by Dr. Vannevar Bush is studying it? Hmmm….. Now why would you consider studying something that didn't officially exist?

Oh, but my favourite point of all of them is that UFOs being the most highly classified subject in the US, rating even higher than the H-bomb. This statement is the most important one of the bunch, because to be blunt, why do you worry about trying to classify something that doesn't exist…..

But that's just my take on it!