If you’d rather listen to this story, check out this episode of the podcast.
Although it was late 1955, the anonymous package read “Happy Easter,” when it arrived at the U.S. Office of Naval Research. Once opened, it revealed a copy of Morris K. Jessup’s book “The Case for the UFO: Unidentified Flying Objects.” This curious edition, however, was filled with handwritten notes in different shades of ink, appearing to capture a debate between three individuals. The trio, it seemed, agreed upon two things: (1) The author of the book was close to discovering their technology. And (2) something must be done. This is the “true” story of the Montauk Project.
A year after the ONR received the unusual publication, they summoned the author to explain the annotated book. Immediately upon examination, Jessup noticed something familiar. The handwriting of the scribbled notes resembled that on a series of letters he had received from Carl Allen. In those correspondences, Allen told tale of secret government research that used the unpublished theories of Albert Einstein. Allen claimed that in 1943, an experiment to make the USS Eldridge invisible to radar instead vanished the Navy ship from existence for several minutes before it reappeared in the Philadelphia shipyard. And when it returned, the vessel was the stuff of nightmares. Some of the sailors were fused with the ship, their flesh and bone bodies intertwined with the steel. Those more fortune, simply went mad.
Long Island, NY, 1971. Electrical engineer Preston Nichols did not believe in paranormal activity. So, he was thrilled to receive a grant to disprove the existence of mental telepathy. To his surprise, however, Nichols soon determined that psychic phenomena not only existed, but it behaved much like the radio frequencies with which he was more familiar. In 1974, a few years into his research, Nichols noticed something peculiar about the psychics he had been studying. Every day, at the same hour, their abilities would be rendered ineffective. Their thoughts were quote “jammed.”
Suspecting that the psychic interference was caused by an electronic signal, Nichols scanned the airwaves. Soon, he learned that whenever the telepaths were rendered powerless, a 410-420 megahertz frequency appeared. But from where? Desperate to find the source, Nichols placed a modified TV antenna atop the roof of his car, attached it to a VHF receiver, and went driving. The powerful signal made quick of Nichols’ task, leading him straight to the eastern tip of Long Island. The frequency was coming directly from a football field-sized radar reflector sitting precariously atop a building on the Montauk Air Force base.
Long before the Montauk Air Force based was established, the eastern tip of Long Island held strategic significance. Nearly two hundred years before Nichols went snooping, the Montauk Lighthouse was authorized to keep watch for British ships during the American Revolution. And because its location midway between two major American cities made vulnerable to invasion, the military installation continued to grow throughout the first and second World Wars. To protect it from German spies in the 1940s, the base was fashioned to look like a typical New England fishing village. But what was it hiding in 1974?
When Nichols found the source of the telepathic Kryptonite, he thought it must have been generated accidentally. Although the base was still active in 1974, Nichols couldn’t imagine a use for an antiquated radar system. Unfortunately, the tight-lipped security stationed there were of no help. They would only say that the array was used as part of an FAA project. And while Nichols found this justification to be unbelievable, it was not as remarkable as the truth Nichols would later discover. But he would need to wait a decade before he would remember it.
1984. Nichols had been researching metaphysical phenomena for thirteen years, when he learned the Montauk Airforce Base had been shuttered. Finally, Nichols could examine the mysterious installation without fear. Or so he thought. When Nichols arrived, he found the main gate was open, and the windows and doors of the buildings throughout were likewise left ajar. Furniture, equipment and documents were everywhere. It was as if the military based had been deserted, and in haste.
As Nichols searched through the debris-strewn Airforce Base, he found the remains of odd high voltage equipment. But his most curious discovery was a man living among it. When the stranger’s eyes fell upon Nichols, however, he was more frightened than Nichols. “It’s you,” he said, sounding terrified. The man explained that he had not only been living at the deserted base, but he had been working there when it was abandoned a year earlier. Then, the stranger told Nichols, an experiment had forced the military to flee. The secret project had opened a portal to hell and freed one of its monsters. And the man who led this endeavor, the stranger concluded, was Nichols.
Nichols doubted the unusual man’s story. After all, Nichols had never worked at the Montauk Airforce Base. And monsters from hell were the stuff of B movies. Nevertheless, Nionce chols continued to research the mysteries of the Montauk Air Force Base. As he spoke to long-term residents of the community, their bizarre accounts only raised more questions. Several townsfolk told Nichols it once snowed in August. The Chief of Police revealed that crimes were perpetrated in specific two hour blocks. And many recalled animals overrunning Montauk en masse. As the puzzles mounted, a man appeared at Nichol’s lab bringing with him potential solutions and the threat of murder.
When Duncan Cameron arrived at Nichols’ doorstep, he seemed too eager to help. Immediately suspicious, Nichols did what he had done with anything else out of the norm. He sought to connect Cameron to Montauk. So, Nichols drove Cameron to the Air Force Base, and to his surprise, Cameron not only recognized it, but he knew many of its minute details. But before Nichols could learn how Cameron had gained such familiarity, something even stranger occurred. When the pair entered the transmitter room, Cameron fell into a trance. His eyes vacant, he began spewing information uncontrollably. The most shocking of his revelations: He had been programmed to befriend Nichols, destroy his lab, and kill him.
Cameron was as shocked as Nichols to learn of his deadly programming. Now free of it, however, Cameron committed himself to helping Nichols unravel the mysteries of Montauk. As luck would have it, the pair soon realized that Cameron was “an extremely operational psychic.” And as Cameron began recalling more memories that had been hidden from him, so too did Nichols begin to remember long-dormant experiences. While there was still much to be learned about what he began calling “The Montauk Project,” Nichols was now certain he had been involved. But it wasn’t until six years later, that Nichols would learn just how.
By 1990, Nichols had spent six years attempting to uncover the truth about Montauk. He had stumbled upon a high level secret project, and feared it may cost him his life. So, he went public. Nichols gave an unannounced lecture at the United States Psychotronics Association. Next, he shared military documents he discovered at the abandoned base with an unnamed US Senator. Perhaps safer, Nichols still didn’t know his own seeming role in the project. That is, until he constructed a Delta T antenna on the roof of his laboratory, as one does. As he soldered the wires together, connections in his subconsious were also made. Suddently, Nichols remembered everything.
Nichols began working for the Montauk Project in the early 1970s. The extra-governmental organization had formed to continue the controversial scientific goals of predecessors from decades earlier. The team was to create metaphysical tools that could assist the US military. To assist their paranormal goals, the project made use of the Montauk Chair. First constructed in the 1950s, the chair leveraged the abilities of the psychic sitting upon it, amplifying their powers. In the 1970s, while Nichols worked on the project, that role fell to Cameron. And while the technology that powered the unusual furniture wasn’t fully understood, it was believed much of it was provided by the Sirians, the race of aliens who come from the star system known as Sirius.
Over a decade later, the project had not only make significant progress, but their research also yielded metaphysical phenomena beyond their dreams. And nightmares. While mind control finally seemed attainable, they also learned the Montauk Chair could manifest objects from Cameron’s thoughts. And further experimenting with this form of conjuring, led the team to discover time travel. With the proper attuning, the chair allowed Cameron to open portals to other eras. And while these discoveries were exciting, when Nichols and Cameron learned the project’s true goal, they feared the worst. The researchers were attempting to open a time door to the USS Eldridge in 1943.
By 1983, Nichols and Cameron concerns peaked. The project, they determined, must be stopped. To do so, they would leverage the combined powers of the Montauk Chair and Cameron’s psychic abilities. But they weren’t quite sure when they would enact this contingency. That is, until August 12. On that day, Nichols and Cameron continued their experiments as ordered, when suddenly strange phenomena began. (Well, stranger than usual.) The otherworldly equipment began to whir and click until it appeared to synch with something beyond the scientists perception. When, as often would, a time portal opened. On the other side, the USS Eldridge. It was time to destroy the project.
As the others gathered at the Montauk Airforce Base stared into the temporal doorway in amazement, Nichols crept to Cameron (in the Montauk Chair) and whispered, “The time is now.” Immediately, Cameron imagined a hideous monster, and nearly instantaneously, the Montauk Chair conjured the beast before him. The horrifying creature began feasting on anyone in its sights, destroying anything in that stood between it and its prey. The surviving supervisors ordered Nichols to shut down the generators powering the equipment. But that failed to stop the beast. The experiment continued unabated as if powered by another force. So, Nichols destroyed the equipment itself. And finally, the monster faded into the ether.
Following the events of August 12, 1983, the Montauk Air Force Station was abandoned. The most important, and incriminating, equipment was removed. And those who survived the deadly incident had their memories wiped. Today, it’s possible to visit Camp Hero, the home of the bast, which opened to the public as a state park in 2002. You may not want to linger too, however. Because according to some, the experiments continue in secret today.
