Ep.11 The Mystery Airships of the 1800s

Welcome to Brief Encounters, where history’s strangest moments collide with the unexplained. The automobile is still a novelty. The Wright brothers haven’t yet flown. Electricity lights up only a few cities. Yet, across the skies of America, something impossible is happening: cigar-shaped airships, glowing lights, and metallic crafts flying silently through the night. Witnessed by thousands and described in hundreds of newspaper reports from California to Illinois to Texas, these sightings baffle the public. The military remains silent. And in at least one case, someone claims to have seen the pilot—and he wasn’t from around here.


Brief Encounters is a tightly produced, narrative podcast that dives headfirst into the world of UFO sightings, the paranormal, cryptids, myths, and unexplained legends. From ancient sky wars to modern close encounters, each episode takes listeners on a journey through some of the most mysterious and compelling cases in human history. Whether it's a well-documented military sighting or an eerie village legend whispered across generations, Brief Encounters delivers each story with atmosphere, depth, and cinematic storytelling. Episodes are short and binge-worthy perfect for curious minds on the go. In just 5 to 10 minutes, listeners are pulled into carefully researched accounts that blend historical context, eyewitness testimony, and chilling details. The series moves between eras and continents, uncovering not only the famous cases you've heard of, but also the forgotten incidents that deserve a closer look. Each story is treated with respect, skepticism, and wonder, offering both seasoned enthusiasts and casual listeners something fresh to consider. Whether it’s a 15th-century sky battle over Europe, a cryptid sighting in a remote forest, or a modern-day abduction report from rural America, Brief Encounters is your guide through the shadows of our world and the stories that refuse to be explained.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:10):
The Mystery Airships of the eighteen hundreds. The year is
eighteen ninety six. The automobile is still a novelty, The
Wright Brothers haven't flown. Electricity is lighting up only a
few cities, and yet across the skies of America, something
impossible is happening. Cigar shaped airships, glowing lights, metallic crafts

(00:36):
flying silently through the night, witnessed by thousands, described in
hundreds of newspaper reports from California to Illinois to Texas.
The public is baffled, the military is silent, and in
at least one case, someone claims to have seen the
pilot and he wasn't from around here. This is briefing,

(01:00):
and you're listening to episode eleven, The Mystery Airships of
the eighteen hundreds. It started with a single report on
November seventeenth, eighteen ninety six, in Sacramento, California. Hundreds of
residents looked up and saw a brilliant light in the
night sky. But this wasn't a star or comet. Witnesses

(01:23):
described a large, elongated object like a huge cigar, with
a bright light on the front, moving slowly and silently overhead.
The local paper ran the story, then others followed. By
early December, San Francisco, Oakland, and Stockton had sightings too.

(01:44):
Each described the same thing, a metallic airship, often with wings, propellers,
and sometimes even windows. And this was five to seven
years before the Wright brothers ever left the ground. The
sightings didn't stop with California. In April of eighteen ninety seven,
the wave hit the Midwest hard. Over the course of

(02:08):
just a few weeks, newspapers in Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Illinois,
and Indiana were flooded with reports. People claimed to see
massive airships hovering at night, often drifting slowly, sometimes darting
away at impossible speed. Some reports described beams of light

(02:29):
shining down on fields. Others claimed the ships made no
sound at all, while some emitted a whirring or humming noise.
And then came the stories of encounters. Here's where it
starts to feel like a sci fi novel written in
real time. Multiple people claimed to have spoken to the

(02:49):
pilots of these airships. One Illinois man said the pilot
was a mysterious inventor testing a secret flying machine. Another
aimed the occupants were not human, with strange speech and
glowing eyes. In Kansas, a group of farmers reported that
an airship landed in their field. The occupants emerged, politely,

(03:14):
asked for water, and then took off again. And perhaps
the strangest of all, in the tiny town of Aurora, Texas,
a story was printed in the local paper that would
go on to become legend. An airship reportedly crashed into
a windmill on a local farm. The debris was scattered, metallic, lightweight,

(03:37):
unlike anything locals had seen. But what shocked people most
was what was found inside. The pilot said the article
was not an inhabitant of this world. The town buried
the small humanoid body in the local cemetery. A headstone
was erected bearing a crude drawing of the object, and

(03:58):
to this day, the exact location of the grave is
debated and hotly protected. The US government, by the way,
has never officially commented on the Aurora incident. So what
were these things? Let's break down the theories. Early experimental aircraft, possibly,
but there's no record of any craft in eighteen ninety

(04:21):
six or eighteen ninety seven capable of what was seen.
Mass hysteria maybe, but the reports span multiple states, from
independent witnesses with consistent descriptions. Hoaxes by newspapers that happened too,
but the frequency, detail, and variety of stories go far

(04:44):
beyond one off fabrications. Then there's the fringe theory that
these were early visitations extraterrestrial reconnaissance using airships shaped to
mimic the steampunk imagination of the time. Why would they
do that, Some say, to blend in to match expectations,
like a psychological disguise tailored to the human mind. Now

(05:08):
that is next level. Here's the mind bender. Modern UFO
law usually starts in nineteen forty seven with Roswell and
Kenneth Arnold, but the mystery airship wave happened fifty years earlier,
long before Hollywood Flying Saucers or Area fifty one. And
yet the sightings contain nearly all the hallmarks of modern encounters,

(05:33):
strange lights, metallic craft, intelligent movement, even contact. It's like
someone pressed the preview button on a phenomenon we wouldn't
fully recognize for another century, or maybe we just stopped
listening for a while. Whether it was an inventor's dream,
a media invention, or something from far beyond the stars.

(05:56):
The mystery airships of the eighteen hundreds left a deep mind,
not just on the newspapers, but on the collective memory
of America. They were assigned a signal, a shimmering mirage
of a future or a past we still don't fully understand.
Thanks for joining me for brief encounters. Next time, we'll

(06:18):
head even further back to ancient Egypt, where strange beings
with falk and heads, disks in the sky, and carved
flying objects may suggest that contact happened long long ago.
Until then, keep looking up, stay grounded, and remember just
because the skies were quieter back then doesn't mean they

(06:41):
were empty.