5 weird ways Wright-Patt has been connected to aliens and UFOs

Raymond Szymanski’s “quest for the truth” about unidentified flying objects and Wright-Patterson Air Force Base has resulted in a new book and speaking engagements here in the Dayton area.

His book — “50 Shades of Greys: Evidence of Extraterrestrial Visitation to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base and Beyond” — delves into the murky world of UFO sightings, Project Blue Book and connections to the military base.

» RELATED: Wright-Patterson was ground zero for UFO investigations

Here are five things we know about UFOs and their connection to WPAFB:

Wright-Patt was part of Project Blue Book: Project Blue Book was a United States Air Force initiative to investigate UFO sightings that ended in December 1969. Records from the project's findings have been declassified and are available for review within the military records at the National Archives.

The black vault: Project Blue Book records are stored on micrfiche at the National Archives, but California-based UFO researcher John Greenewald has compiled more than 100,000 records from Project Blue Book to provide easier access to the records. 

The USAF stance on aliens: In January 1985, the Air Force issued an official denial that Wright-Patterson housed alien space technology and the bodies of beings from another planet. Szymanski said he is convinced that evidence from the controversial crash in Roswell, N.M. in 1947 was brought to the base, but in his 39 years working there he says he never saw any evidence of alien beings.

» MORE: CIA: Most UFO sightings in the 50s and 60s were spy planes

Is it a bird, is it a plane: According to a report declassified in August 2013 titled "The Central Intelligence Agency and Overhead Reconnaissance: The U-2 and Oxcart programs, 1954-1974," high-flying spy jets U-2 and SR-71 were mistaken for UFOs more than half the time in the late 1950s and 1960s.

» MORE: Little green men from UFOs? WWII POW mural at Wright-Patt a mystery

A World War II mural mystery: German prisoners of war who were housed at Wright-Patterson painted three murals while being incarcerated at the base that include depictions of little green goblin-like creatures. One of those murals still sits in building 280, which was the POW dining hall. Theories on what the depictions represent include that the prisoners were referring to aliens.

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