Office Memorandum: Unidentified Flying Objects

This memorandum, dated May 27, 1953, and authored by H. Marshall Chadwell, the Assistant Director of Scientific Intelligence, serves as an official directive regarding the administrative handling of Unidentified Flying Object (UFO) reports. The document formally assigns the responsibility for maintaining current knowledge of UFO sightings to the Physics and Electronics Division of the Office of Scientific Intelligence (OSI). At the time of the memorandum, relevant files were located within the Air Branch of the Applied Science Division and the Operations Staff. The document identifies Mr. Jackson Hacket of the IPS as the current custodian of these files. The directive instructs that the Physics and Electronics Division should take custody of these files to fulfill its new responsibility. Furthermore, it specifies that future material on this subject forwarded from O/CI should be routed directly to the Physics and Electronics Division. The memorandum includes a distribution list indicating that copies were sent to various internal departments, including the Addressee, Reqts/DI, IPS/SI, ASD/SI, and the AD/SI, with copies also designated for the subject file, daily reading file, and chrono.