1974: Carl Higdon’s Humanoid/UFO encounter

THINK ABOUTIT ABDUCTION REPORT

In October 1974, hunter Carl Higdon experienced a Close Encounter of the Third Kind while elk hunting in Wyoming’s Medicine Bow National Forest. The incident involved an interaction with a humanoid entity named “Ausso,” who reportedly transported Higdon in a transparent cubicle to a distant location.

This case is distinguished by unique physical evidence, specifically a mangled 7mm copper bullet jacket that appeared to strike an invisible barrier, and the anomalous placement of Higdon’s vehicle in a remote area inaccessible by standard driving. Extensive scientific follow-up by Dr. Leo Sprinkle utilized hypnotic regression to uncover details of the encounter, concluding that Higdon was reporting the events sincerely despite the high strangeness of the claims.

Date: October 25, 1974

Sighting Time:

Day/Night: Day

Location: Medicine Bow National Forest, Wyoming

Urban or Rural: Rural

Hynek Classification: CE-III (Close Encounter III) Close observation with animate beings associated with the object.

Entity Type: humanoid

Entity Description: in black suit & black shoes; bow-legged; ‘slanted head and no chin’, thin hair ‘stood straight up on his head’

Duration: 2 1/2 hours

No. of Object(s): Single

Size of Object(s): about two meters

Distance to Object(s): inside

Shape of Object(s): cubic 

Color of Object(s):

Special Features/Characteristics:

Number of Witnesses: Single

Source: APRO Bulletin, Vol. 23 No. 5 (Mar 1975);  Rick Kenyon, Robert Nantkes, Dr. Leo Sprinkle & Frank Bourke

Summary: Carl Higdon, while hunting elk, raised his rifle and fired, but the bullet only went about 50 feet and dropped. He heard a noise and looked over to see a “sort of man” standing there. The man called himself “Ausso” and asked Mr. Higdon if he’d like to go with him and Higdon replied that he guessed so. The man pointed an appendage and at this juncture, Mr. Higdon said he found himself in a transparent cubicle along with Ausso.

Full Report

Artist’s conception of “Man” in the Higdon case.

Photograph (by Rick Kenyon) of the bullet described by Carl Higdon as the bullet which was fired at a bull elk, but which traveled 50-60 feet, went “splat,” and fell to the ground.

The Tuesday, October 29, 1974 issue of the Rawlins (Wyoming) Daily Times carried Mr. Carl Higdon’s account of his strange experience while elk-hunting on the north boundary of the Medicine Bow National Forest on the 25th of October.

On Saturday, November 2, Dr. R. Leo Sprinkle, APRO’s Consultant in Psychology, Mr. Rick Kenyon, an art teacher in the Public Schools of Rawlins and Mr. Robert Nantkes, Vocational Rehabilitation Counselor at Riverton, Wyoming, spent four hours with Mr. and Mrs. Higdon, their children and several relatives, talking about Higdon’s experience and their reactions to it. The pendulum technique and other hypnotic procedures were utilized to obtain more information from Mr. Higdon about his experience. Dr. Sprinkle was not satisfied with the results and decided to pursue the matter further at a future date. On November 17 another session was held and more information was obtained.

Mr. Hidgon’s experience is certainly strange, and might even be described as bizarre. At about 4 p.m. Higdon was hunting south of Rawlins when his “experience” began to unfold. “I walked over this hill and saw 5 elks,” Higdon said. “1 raised my rifle and fired, but the bullet only went about 50 feet and dropped.” He went over, got the bullet, and tucked it into a fold in his canteen pouch. ‘I heard a noise like a twig snapping, and looked over to my right and there in the shadow of the trees was this sort of man standing there.”

The “man” was 6’2″ tall and approximately 180 pounds. He was dressed in a black suit and black shoes and wore a belt with a star in the middle and a yellow emblem below it. Higdon also said he was quite bow-legged, had a slanted head, and no chin. His hair was thin and stood straight upon his head (see accompanying drawing).

The “man”, Higdon said, asked if he was hungry, he replied that he was and the man tossed him some (4) pills and he took one. The pills were in a container much like a “Dristan” package (apparently the cellophane type as he said it was transparent). He put the container in his pocket. Higdon also commented that he didn’t understand why he took them because ordinarily, he doesn’t even like to take an aspirin. The “man” had told him that the pills were “four-day” pills, apparently to slake his hunger. Higdon said the man called himself “Ausso” and asked Mr. Higdon if he’d like to go with him and Higdon replied that he guessed so. The man pointed an appendage that came out of his sleeve and at this juncture. Mr. Higdon said he found himself in a transparent cubicle along with Ausso. He was sitting in a chair with “bands” around his arms (apparently holding him in the chair which resembled a high-backed “bucket seat”) and a helmet-like apparatus on his head — somewhat like a football helmet except that it had two wires on top and two on the sides leading to the back. On a sort of console opposite his chair Higdon said he saw three levers of different sizes which had letters on them and which “Ausso” manipulated.

Mr. Higdon was very unclear on the size of the cubicle. He said there was a mirror on the upper right in which he could see the reflection of the five elk which seemed to be behind him in a “cage” or corral. They were still, not moving, just as they had been when he first spotted them before he encountered “Ausso”. He thought the cubicle was about 7×7 and couldn’t account for the elk being there also.

When Ausso pointed his appendage at the largest lever is moved down and the cubicle felt like it was moving. After they took off, Higdon said he saw a basketball-shaped object under the cubicle which he took to be the earth. There was another being in the cubicle who left, “just disappeared” when they landed. Ausso said that they had traveled 163,000 light miles.

Outside the cubicle, Higdon said, was a huge tower, perhaps 90 feet high with a brilliant, rotating light and he heard a sound like that made by an electric razor. The light bothered his eyes considerably and he put his hands over them.

Standing outside the tower were five human-appearing people — a gray-haired man of 40 or 50 years old, a brown-haired girl about 10 or 11, a blonde girl of 13 or 14, and a young man of 17 or 18 with brown hair and a blonde 17 or 18-year-old girl. They were dressed in ordinary clothing and appeared to be talking among themselves.

Ausso pointed his “hand” and they (Ausso and Higdon) moved into the tower and up an elevator to a room where he stood on a small platform and a “shield” moved out from the wall. Ausso was on the other side of it. The “shield” was “glassy” appearing, stayed in front of Higdon for what he estimated to be 3 or 4 minutes, then moved back in the wall.

Ausso then told Higdon he was not what they needed and they would take him back. The two moved out of the room to the elevator and then down to the main door. It seemed that all Ausso needed to do was to point his “hand” and they moved effortlessly.

Next, Higdon found himself back in the cubicle with Ausso, who was holding his gun. He said the gun was primitive and wanted to keep it but wasn’t allowed to and he gave it back to Higdon. Then he pointed at the longest lever and Higdon found himself standing on a slope. His foot struck a loose rock and he fell, hurting his neck and head and shoulder.

At this point, Higdon didn’t know who or where he was and got up and walked past his pick-up truck which was sitting in a wooded area on a road with deep ruts. He walked along the track about a mile past the truck, then came back to the truck and heard a woman’s voice. As he regained a little of his senses, he used the citizen’s band radio to call for help. He told the woman he didn’t know who he was or where. Authorities were notified and Higdon was eventually found about 11:30 that night. He was dazed and confused and had difficulty recognizing his wife. The search party had a considerable problem getting Higdon’s 2-wheel drive vehicle out (it had to be towed as it could not navigate the rough road).

Higdon was brought to the Carbon County Memorial Hospital in Rawlins at 2:30 a.m. on the 26th. Besides the sore head, neck, and shoulder, his eyes were extremely bloodshot and tore constantly. He had no appetite on Saturday and his wife Margery had to force him to eat. On Sunday morning, however, he was ravenous and complained about the meager size of the hospital breakfast.

This, essentially, is Carl Higdon’s account of his time from 4:15 p.m. on October 25th, 1974 when he first spotted the five elk until he called in on the CB radio.

Some foundation for his story is found in the testimony of the search party who said Higdon’s pickup truck could not have driven into or out of the area where it was found. Also, unidentified lights were seen near the area where Higdon was found before the searchers started driving out of the area so the lights of the vehicles could not have accounted for the unidentified lights.

The bullet which was greatly mangled (see photo) was only the copper jacket, the lead slug was missing. This jacket was examined by Dr. Walter Walker, APRO’s Consultant in Metallurgy who could only say that it had struck something extremely hard with great force. Higdon points out that the 7 mm bullet is so powerful it can completely transit a standard telephone pole.

Other interesting details which Higdon recalled during hypnotic sessions: Before Higdon was returned to the ground, Ausso pointed at the pocket where Higdon had put the pills and they floated out and up and remained suspended in the air. Ausso had only 6 teeth — three above and three below. He said that on his planet there were no fish, that he could not tolerate the sun’s rays as they burned him and that he was exploring and searching for food. He said they took animals back with them for breeding purposes. Last but not least, when the cubicle first took off, Ausso pointed at Higdon’s truck and it “just disappeared.”

In conclusion, we quote Dr. Sprinkle from his first (and preliminary) report: “Although the sighting of a single UFO witness often is difficult to evaluate, the indirect evidence supports the tentative conclusion that Carl Higdon is reporting sincerely the events which he experienced. Hopefully, further statements from other persons can be obtained to support the basic statement.”

After the snow melts, an attempt will be made to locate the lead slug from the bullet, and hopefully it will be able to add something to a very puzzling story.

Scientific Investigation: Dr. Leo Sprinkle’s Findings

The scientific rigor applied to the Higdon case was spearheaded by Dr. R. Leo Sprinkle, a psychologist from the University of Wyoming and a noted consultant for APRO. Dr. Sprinkle conducted several hours of intensive interviews and utilized the pendulum technique and other hypnotic procedures on November 2 and 17, 1974, to probe the depths of Higdon’s subconscious memory. These sessions were instrumental in uncovering “bizarre” details that Higdon could not initially recall, such as the specific appearance of the entity “Ausso,” the internal layout of the transparent cubicle, and the startling claim that he had traveled approximately 163,000 light miles during the encounter.

Dr. Sprinkle’s preliminary findings suggested that despite the high strangeness of the account, Carl Higdon was “reporting sincerely the events which he experienced”. The investigation noted that the hypnotic regression helped bridge the gap between Higdon’s conscious confusion and the physical anomalies found at the site, such as his mangled bullet and the inexplicable placement of his pickup truck. While Sprinkle remained cautious, he concluded that the indirect evidence supported the credibility of Higdon’s testimony, marking the case as a significant example of how psychological evaluation can be paired with physical forensic data in Close Encounter III investigations.

Researcher’s Notes: Forensic & Anomalous Data

• Ballistic Anomaly: The most significant physical evidence is the mangled 7mm copper bullet jacket. Forensic analysis by APRO’s metallurgist, Dr. Walter Walker, confirmed the jacket had struck an object of extreme hardness with immense force, yet the lead slug was entirely missing. Higdon reported the bullet appeared to hit an invisible “jello-like” barrier only 50 feet from the rifle.

• Vehicle Displacement: Higdon’s 2-wheel drive pickup truck was discovered in a remote, muddy area characterized by deep ruts. Search parties noted that the vehicle could not have been driven into or out of that specific location by conventional means, suggesting it was placed there by an external force.

• Physiological Effects: Immediately following the encounter, Higdon exhibited severe physical symptoms, including extremely bloodshot eyes that teared constantly, a sore neck and shoulder, and a complete loss of appetite for the first 24 hours. By the second morning, he experienced a state of extreme “ravenous” hunger.

• Technological Observations: During hypnotic regression with Dr. Leo Sprinkle, Higdon described a “transparent cubicle” approximately 7×7 feet in size. The craft utilized a helmet-like apparatus with wires and a control console featuring three labeled levers. He also reported seeing a huge tower, approximately 90 feet high, with a brilliant rotating light that caused significant eye strain.

• Entity Interaction: The entity, “Ausso,” demonstrated advanced “pointing” maneuvers to move objects and individuals effortlessly. Higdon noted that the entity could not tolerate the sun’s rays and claimed to be searching for food, specifically stating that his home planet lacked fish.