George Van Tassel was used to sleeping light.

He ran an airfield way out in the Mojave Desert, and it wasn't unusual for pilots to show up at all hours landing their plane.

Something could be broken, maybe somebody needs fuel. You get the idea.

And that's how it went on the evening of August 24, 1953.

George was not particularly surprised to be woken up at around two in the morning.

Picture a figure backlit in the doorway.

George saying grogly,

What do you want?

The man introduced himself.

He said his name was Solganda, and he wanted George to come with him so that he could see

what he had flown in on.

George got out of bed and followed Solganda outside, and there in the airfield was Solganda's craft,

this weird bell-shaped ship hovering up above the ground.

George couldn't believe it.

He went to stand underneath it to see it up close.

Then he said, an anti-gravity beam took me up

through a hole in the bottom of the craft.

What happened to George on that ship

would change the course of his life.

And it would also change the course of this little patch

of Mojave Desert.

Because as George says,

...