Historical Timeline
From his first investigations in Oklahoma City to the recovery of his surviving records decades later, the timeline traces selected milestones in Hewes's work, the International UFO Bureau, and the archive that grew alongside them.
Bureau Record
1957
As a teenager in Oklahoma City, Hayden C. Hewes begins organizing what was first known as the Interplanetary Intelligence of Unidentified Flying Objects. The early effort focused on collecting reports, corresponding with witnesses and researchers, and creating a network for investigating UFO sightings.
Related Archive Files
Bureau Record
Late 1950s–Early 1960s
During the Cold War, Hewes writes Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev seeking information about UFO reports and Soviet interest in the subject. Khrushchev responds. Hewes later recalled that the exchange was followed by a visit from two FBI agents. The exact date should remain broad until the surviving archive correspondence is confirmed.
IUFOB Deep Research in Progress
Bureau Record
1959
Hewes writes FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover on behalf of the organization, requesting an article for an upcoming UFO publication. Hoover replies on August 31, declining the request. The surviving correspondence provides an early federal record of Hewes and the organization.
Related Archive Files
Bureau Record
1964
On June 22, the U.S. Air Force responds to Hewes and agrees to receive him at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, where Project Office personnel would arrange access to UFO investigation files dating to 1948. Hewes subsequently visits the base and continues corresponding with figures connected to Air Force UFO investigations.
Related Archive Files
Bureau Record
1964
After the Air Force authorization, Hewes writes J. Edgar Hoover again on July 5 seeking information concerning UFO investigations. Hoover answers on July 13, stating that the FBI did not investigate UFO reports and forwarded such information to the Department of the Air Force.
Bureau Record
May 1965
The organization begins publishing the Interplanetary Intelligence Report, edited by Hayden Hewes and William F. Riefer. The bimonthly publication carried sightings, investigation reports, organizational news, photographs, correspondence, and research from the growing network.
Related Archive Files
Bureau Record
July–August 1965
A major wave of UFO reports sweeps Oklahoma and surrounding states. On August 1, Hewes joins Oklahoma Highway Patrol personnel during the activity and later describes seeing a multicolored object himself, the sighting he would identify as his first and only personal UFO observation. IUFOB also investigated material from the wave and submitted information to Project Blue Book.
Related Archive Files
IUFOB Deep Research in Progress
Bureau Record
1965–1966
Beginning with a reported sighting near Hartshorne, Oklahoma, on July 26, 1965, IUFOB investigates a sustained series of reports from the southeastern Oklahoma community. Hewes and Bureau investigators gathered witness accounts and preserved records from what became one of the organization's significant Oklahoma field investigations.
Related Archive Files
IUFOB Deep Research in Progress
Bureau Record
March 23, 1966
William "Eddie" Laxson reports encountering a large, unusual object blocking Highway 70 near Temple, Oklahoma, while traveling to work at Sheppard Air Force Base. Hewes becomes one of the investigators associated with the case, which was also examined through Project Blue Book.
Related Archive Files
IUFOB Deep Research in Progress
Bureau Record
1970–1971
IUFOB Press publishes The Aliens in March 1970, followed by The Intruders in 1971, drawing on accumulated reports of unusual craft and reported occupants. In February 1971, IUFOB also sponsors a scientific UFO seminar in Oklahoma City, reflecting the Bureau's growing public and research activity.
Related Archive Files
Bureau Record
1973
The organization formally incorporates under the name International UFO Bureau, marking an important transition from Hewes's earlier investigative organization into the IUFOB name and organizational identity that would continue for decades.
Related Archive Files
Bureau Record
1973
Hewes and IUFOB investigators travel to Aurora, Texas, to examine the famous 1897 claim that an airship crashed there and its pilot was buried in the local cemetery. The Bureau interviewed residents, searched the reported crash site, tested recovered metal, and pursued the cemetery evidence. The surviving evidence did not prove an extraterrestrial crash, and IUFOB ultimately left the case unresolved.
Related Archive Files
Bureau Record
September 1973
After learning that Georgia Governor Jimmy Carter had publicly discussed a UFO sighting, Hewes writes him on September 14 and sends an IUFOB sighting form. Carter completes and signs the handwritten report on September 18 and returns it to the Bureau. The correspondence became one of the most historically significant records preserved in the Hewes collection.
Related Archive Files
Bureau Record
1974–1976
On July 13, 1974, Marshall Applewhite and Bonnie Nettles, later known as "The Two," visit IUFOB headquarters in Oklahoma City. Hewes and Deputy Director Dan Garcia conduct an extended recorded interview with the pair. Drawing on that early access, Hewes and author Brad Steiger later publish UFO Missionaries Extraordinary in 1976, documenting the beliefs and early development of the movement years before it became known worldwide as Heaven's Gate.
Related Archive Files
IUFOB Deep Research in Progress
Bureau Record
1977
After Jimmy Carter becomes president, Hewes seeks a meeting with the White House to present research gathered by IUFOB. The requested meeting is declined, while Carter's earlier handwritten IUFOB sighting report continues receiving national attention.
Explore the Carter Records
Bureau Record
September 13, 2017
Hayden C. Hewes dies in Oklahoma City at age 73 after roughly six decades of writing, investigating, publishing, corresponding, and collecting material related to UFO phenomena. The files accumulated during that work survive as the foundation of the Hayden C. Hewes Archive.
Bureau Record
2023–Present
The surviving Hewes files are recovered for preservation, beginning a new phase in the history of the International UFO Bureau. The collection is now being organized, digitized, preserved, and prepared for broader public research.
Explore the ArchiveA Lifetime in the Record
The surviving archive reflects decades of investigation, correspondence, organization, and preservation extending far beyond any single UFO case.
An Investigator Who Asked
One of Hewes's defining habits was his willingness to contact people directly.
When a government agency might have information, he wrote the agency. When a public figure reported a UFO sighting, he requested the details. When another researcher was pursuing a case, Hewes opened correspondence.
Over time, those exchanges created an unusual historical record linking UFO cases with researchers, government offices, military personnel, political figures, scientists, witnesses, and institutions across several decades.
Beyond Individual Cases
The value of the Hayden C. Hewes Archive is not limited to determining what happened in any single UFO case.
The collection shows what investigators asked, how witnesses were approached, which ideas gained attention, how institutions responded, and how the discussion surrounding UFOs changed across generations.
Explore the Surviving Record
The timeline provides the history. The archive preserves the surviving documents behind it. Browse published correspondence, case material, photographs, reports, notes, clippings, and other records from Hewes's decades of work.
