Government / Military

John P. Spaulding

no date recorded

Lieutenant Colonel, U.S. Air Force; Chief, Civil Branch, Community Relations Division, Office of Information. Signed the Air Force's reply of 25 January 1966 to Raymond Fowler on the Exeter, N.H., sightings, printed at folio 6039 of the 1966 House Armed Services hearing. That letter attributes the early sightings that night to Operation Big Blast "Coco" and records the subsequent observation by Officers Bertrand and Hunt as "regarded as unidentified". The agenda of the USAF Scientific Advisory Board Ad Hoc Committee on Unidentified Flying Objects, printed at folio 5996 of the same hearing, lists Lieutenant Colonel Spaulding of SAFOI presenting "the Air Force problem" at its meeting of 3 February 1966.

In the UAP recordRuled into the unidentified-phenomena thread on 2 September 2026 from this entity's own name and role text, which contain: "unidentified flying object". An editorial classification of what thread this entity belongs to; it rests on no page and does not claim to. Neighbours were not used - see apply-subjects-2026-09-02.mjs for why.

2 of 2 connections resolve to a document you can open.

2 notes on how this record was made

Documents1 behind a connection

Documents behind a connection

Unidentified Flying Objects 1966-04-05

2 connections

ColourIncidentsHearings & panels

→ Exeter Incident

signed the Air Force letter recording the officers' sighting as unidentified and the earlier ones as Big Blast

Unidentified Flying Objects
printed p. 6039 · PDF p. 51 checked against the page

Caveat The same letter is in tension with itself and this connection does not resolve it: two sentences earlier it states that the Big Blast timing "eliminated these aircraft as a possible evaluation of this incident". Whether that contradicts the attribution, or divides the night into two events, turns on what "this incident" means, and the letter does not say. See the folio 6039 passage note.
→ SAB Ad Hoc Committee to Review Project Blue Book

presented "the Air Force problem" to it, 3 February 1966

same document as the row above
printed p. 5996 · PDF p. 8 checked against the page

Caveat THE AGENDA PRINTS A SURNAME, NOT A FULL NAME. Folio 5996 reads "Lieutenant Colonel Spaulding, SAFOI" and nothing more. That this is the John P. Spaulding who signed the letter at folio 6039 is the operator's ruling of 25 August 2026 - same rank, same office, nine days apart in one hearing record - and no page held here states it. Guardrail 7: a shared surname is not a shared identity.

Notes on this record

The name

THE IDENTITY IS AN OPERATOR RULING, NOT A DOCUMENT'S STATEMENT. Folio 6039 gives the full name "JOHN P. SPAULDING" with rank and office. Folio 5996 gives only "Lieutenant Colonel Spaulding, SAFOI". Same rank, same office - SAFOI is the Secretary of the Air Force Office of Information - and nine days apart in one hearing record. The operator ruled them the same man on 25 August 2026. Guardrail 7 exists because a shared surname is not a shared identity, and no page held here says these two are one person; the grounds are recorded so a reader can weigh them.

The date

NO DATE ESTABLISHED. He appears in this record only through two documents, the earlier dated 25 January 1966. This project does not hold a birth date, a date of commission, or a date of appointment to the Office of Information, and the convention on this map for a person known only from documents is to leave the date null rather than adopt the date of the first paper that names them.