The story I am about to tell you encompasses UFO sightings, cattle mutilation, light orbs, poltergeist-like activity and Indian folklore. (But I tell you now that I shall not go into the precise detail of that.)
It is the story of the Lore of the Land.
The Lore of the Land comes not from any government but from the Indian people to whom the land really and truly belongs.
The story takes place in an area of north-east Utah in the United States and focuses on a cattle ranch which has become colloquially known as the Skinwalker Ranch.
The name ‘Skinwalker’ derives from Indian folklore. Skinwalker refers to the human transformation into a fearsome animal with witch-like supernatural powers.
In the context of lycanthropy, the official term referring to this kind of delusional belief, while Europeans have the Werewolf, native American Indians have the Skinwalker.
This story has probably happened over many centuries but I will essentially relate only to what is known to have happened since 1994.
It is worth knowing that Utah was the 45th State to join the USA in 1896, almost 50 years after it was ceded to America by Mexico.
There are many folk who think that Utah is three disproportionate States within one if we separate the Deseret (land of milk and honey of the Mormons) around Salt Lake to the west from the territory of the Navajo to the south and centre, leaving the residual northern basin to be the land of the Ute tribe.
That being said, the Skinwalker Ranch is not within the 45 million acres which comprise the Uintah Indian reservation situated to the south of it.
The Skinwalker Ranch comprises 450 acres and three homesteads, first established around 1905, owned by the Myers family from 1935 until 1994 when it was sold to the Shermans who themselves sold it on after two years to a scientific enterprise called National Institute of Discovery Science (NIDS for short) for less than half the price they had paid for it.
The ranch itself is a few miles off the main highway 40 which runs south east from Salt Lake City to Colorado State. The small townships of Roosevelt, Ballard and Fort Duchesne are the nearest places of any populus within proximity to the ranch and Bottle Hollow Reservoir serves as a marking point.
The ranch is hardly remote but it has been fenced off for a number of years by its owners to keep prying-eyes and trespassers out and the Hickens Road which leads to the ranch has been declared no longer a public road since July 2016.
Understandably so perhaps if secret research and experiments are being done there and the American Government are ‘chipping-in a financial hand’.
It is hard to understand, given what we are led to believe, that the Myers family experienced nothing out of the ordinary during their decades of tenure or that the Shermans did not undertake enquiries about the home before acquiring it, let alone the limits (or off-limits) of the former Indian reservation. Perhaps they did.
The people who feature most prominently in this story are Junior Hicks, Frank Salisbury, Terry Sherman, Robert Bigelow and George Knapp.
Junior Hicks was a school science teacher to mostly native Indians around the area and had gathered evidence from many observers, some of whom were ex-students, of something deemed of scientific value from unexplained phenomena.
Hicks would share this data with a fellow Utah Statesman, Frank Salisbury, who was eminently qualified to interpret such data and write in 1974 the first book on the subject called ‘The Utah UFO Display’.
The arrival of the Sherman family seemed to arouse a paranormal stimulae which did not manifest itself to the Myers. It is, however, hard to believe that this was just a coincidence or indeed that it was unique to them or the ranch itself.
George Knapp was an ambitious journalist who had sprung the 1989 news story of Robert Lazar and Area 51. He was a friend of business tycoon Robert Bigelow in Las Vegas circles who had a passionate, self-serving interest in unexplained phenomena.
So when the story first broke, both Bigelow and Knapp realized it was an opportunity not to be missed.
Bigelow set up NIDS, acquired the ranch from the Shermans but kept Terry Sherman on for a while as a cattle hand and facilitated the ranch as a 24-7 science research laboratory.
To be effective, the research had to be done in secret. Everyone working there, including George Knapp, were tied in to a Non-Disclosure Agreement for the duration of Bigelow’s ownership.
Only when the NIDS research ended in 2004 was Knapp permitted to publish a book from his eight years of research called ‘Hunt for the Skinwalker’.
The scientific research at the ranch did not stop. Bigelow disbanded NIDS and formed a new Company, BAASS – Bigelow Aerospace Advanced Space Studies with the specific purpose of getting the bulk of a budget available from a Government Agency AATIP – Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program.
In 2016, Bigelow sold the ranch for 4.5 million US $ to a mysterious realtor Company called AdamantIMV and big plans seemed on the horizon.
Much has been made of the legal proviso supposedly written into the 1994 contract reserving oil rights when the Myers family sold to Sherman. It makes no sense that this would relate to an obscure burial ground of a Myers family member within the ranch acreage or indeed to disrespect burial ground of native Indians.
We should keep in mind that this is a geographical, geological, magnetic basin of some significance for salt, water, oil and other minerals which goes beyond the folklore of the native Indian.
That in itself might suggest some kind of rational explanation for the paranormal activity which exists in the area, not just at the ranch, why extra-terrestrials may have some practical interest there and a justification for the covertness of the Bigelow operation.
Aspirations that the ranch might be turned into some kind of fantasy-theme park related to UFOlogy and the paranormal and provide a portal into another dimension seem somewhat less credible than the speculative currency of commercial exploration and exploitation of the land.
The reason for the 2016 acquisition may have everything to do with minerals and nothing whatsoever to do with unexplained phenomena. The outcome of Bigelow’s 20 years scientific research has never been disclosed.
The Shermans lived at the Skinwalker Ranch for 30 months. Their dream home experience turned into a nightmare. They experienced things during those 30 months which seem ridiculous to the rational mind but it would be wrong to doubt their testimony about what actually happened.
There is no doubt that there is a fanatical, almost obsessive, interest in the subject matter of unexplained phenomena occurring at the Skinwalker Ranch and the surrounding area which has certainly been fuelled by the ‘Hunt for Skinwalker’ book and later documentary in 2018.
While Frank Salisbury and Junior Hicks have tried to rationalize, public passion and enthusiasm have driven a bandwagon with the aid of the internet to create a sensational, theatrical drama of the real events.
This story is not about the UFOs, poltergeists, Orbs and other strange phenomena but about recognizing that there is an alternative intelligence at play which humanity (and perhaps animal life as well) may not be ready to understand.
It is a story about a story and I do not think it necessary, therefore, to go into the precise details of the experiences. The reader can source that information elsewhere.
It is quite possible that the ranch is built on unholy ground and on the path of the Skinwalker. Nothing proves otherwise. Some things are just meant to be.
I think the concept of the Skinwalker is so often misunderstood. The lore of the land is to protect the land and not bring harm to humans. Transforming into a Skinwalker is culturally explained as the way to reach the afterlife. It may be more than a matter of belief.
By that we can conclude that things are happening (such as the hybrid breeding of cattle) which is forbidden and the land is occupied by those who should not be there.
Whether having the last laugh in a tricksters wager is right, the native Indian of Utah has declared the Lore of the Land as something the pioneering white settler should adhere to, respect and follow.
Mr. Paul 