Episode 499: The Abduction of Betty and Barney Hill

I'm Dan Taberski. In 2011, something strange began to happen at a high school in upstate New York. A mystery illness, bizarre symptoms and spreading fast. What's the answer, and what do you do if they tell you it's all in your head?

Hysterical, a new podcast from Wondery and Pineapple Street Studios, binge all episodes of Hysterical early and ad-free on Wondery Plus. Hey weirdos, I'm Ash, I'm Alayna.

And this is morbid.

She just burped, Alayna just did a big old burp. We should put it in, we should keep it in. That would be horrifying for people to hear first as soon as they turn on their thing.

I would love it if I turned on my radio and I heard a burp, my radio, my radio. We are all kinds of fucking goofy today, we're feeling wily today.

What's your case? My case has to do with the UFO. Oh, perfect, that's fantastic. I was like, we're feeling goofy.

What's your case? Yeah, that's the right energy to take into this. I think I'm going to talk about the Betty and Barney Hill.

Abduction story What? Betty and Barney Hill? I would like to start this off by saying they are such a precious couple and I love them both. I love them both so much and you will also love them by the end of this.

They just seem delightful in every way, I already love them right now. And you know, you take what you will from this. But I think it happened. I think UFos are real. In fact, I wanted to shout out a new show that was actually not new, but it's new to me that I've been watching on Showtime.

I was telling you about it the other day. Oh yeah, it's J..J. Abrams U.FO show and it is so good. It's either three or four parts.

I watched the first two and it is like, chilling, it's. It's an interesting subject, everyone I know, sometimes it gets the old the old look over people like UFos.

I'm not really interested and it's like, I don't know, maybe you should be. You sure about that, you sure about that. That's kind of like, what this show goes over.

Yeah, how it's been like, like, oh, like, so tall when you really look into it. But and when you look into, we'll cover some more of these because they're very fascinating, I love them.

When you get like a mass sighting, like where it's like 200 people see one. Or like the one in the Berkshires in Massachusetts, where like, over 200 people saw it. Something's awry there. Like, you know, we can't, we can't discount it. I love it.

So let's get into this because it's quite a tale, get into it, yeah. So we're going to start with talking about who Betty and Barney Hill are, so you can get an idea of them, how they came together. All that fun stuff.

Oh, they're the cutest couple in the nation, they're real cute so. Eunice Elizabeth Betty Barrett was born June 28th, 1919, in Newton, New Hampshire. A Kansa, Yeah.

And grew up on a farm in Kingston, New Hampshire, which is a small town near the Massachusetts border, Massachusetts. What? What, you know? Farming was definitely a difficult and somewhat unprofitable life at the time, but the Barretts were a super close knit, very cute, very supportive family.

Seemed like everything was, you know, pretty top notch on there. But, you know, she was a very curious, very creative, very highly intelligent child. And she spent a lot of her early life just dreaming about escaping the farm life and going on to other opportunities, according to her college friend Marianne Franklin, who we will mention later, too. Betty's first attempt at becoming independent and breaking out on her own was when she tried to join a traveling circus as an acrobat in training. That's incredible.

But her parents wouldn't let her go lame, they wouldn't let her join the circus. Why not so? After graduating from high school in 1937, she enrolled at the University of New Hampshire UNH.

I've been there many times. She met and befriended her, her college friend that we just mentioned Marianne Franklin there. Marianne Franklin was the only Black student on that campus. Oh my God.

Can you imagine being in that position? No, I cannot on any level, in any galaxy. And what time period was this? This was in 1937. Oh God.

So it was through Marianne Franklin that Betty learned. This is like, really, the first. She learned about the extent of the inequality and marginalization experienced by Black Americans around the country, but particularly in the South. And this is when Betty began really taking part in advocating for liberal causes. Hell yeah.

Later, Franklin said she was very active, she may have had a problem as a result of that. Because so many people at the time were not accepting of racial, racial equality. So she stepped out because she met Marianne, Franklin, became her friend and was like, Fuck this, I'm going to stand up for you. Hell yeah, I love that.

Fuck yeah, Betty, Betty forever, Betty forever. Now. In the summer, following her sophomore year, she contracted a difficult and very long lasting abdominal infection. And it actually stopped her from going back to UNH for her junior year.

She was like, really sick. So instead, while she was kind of healing up, and you know, while she was feeling better but not able to return to school, she took a job. Waiting tables at Rudy's Farm Kitchen in Hampton, New Hampshire. Rudy's Hampton is like a seaside town, not far away from where she grew up. I know Hampton.

And working there is. When she met Bob Stewart, who was the cook at Rudy's, she was immediately drawn to Bob. This is not Bernie, by the way. I was like, I don't care about Bob.

She was immediately drawn to Bob, She said. Like he had a very warm personality, He was very charming. He's just not Bernie now. What she said about Bob was Bob Stewart seemed like the best thing on the horizon, so I grabbed him.

Oh, that's cute, no? So they dated for a little bit and got married in June 1941. And, according to Betty, Bob had an ex-wife at the time, and it was then that his ex-wife heard about him getting remarried.

It was not pleased about it. So Betty said she picked up the three kids and dumped them at Bob's mother's house. Oh, and at this time, Bob's mother was not able to care for three young children that were her grandchildren. That's a lot.

So Bob and Betty took sole custody of the children, and three years after this, Betty officially adopted them. Oh, wow, and became a full time mother, full time homemaker. And Bob ended up getting a much better paying job at the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard because the shipyard at the time was super, super active.

OK, because World War II was coming to a close. Oh geez, lots of stuff going on, literally everything going on in the story already.

Yeah, and at this point you look like, OK, this seems positive, you know? Like they took the kids, Betty stepped up and was like, You know, you're mine now.

I'm going to take care of you. But then, you know, once he gets the job at the shipyard. All of a sudden, she found out that Bob had been cheating on her with multiple women. Oh, fuck Bob, see, I knew he was no Barry.

Yeah, and she said, At first I thought he was a pretty good guy and it took me years to find out. Different. Oh, that's really sad, yeah.

So, after 14 years of marriage and raising his three children, they ended up divorcing in 1955.

Are you kidding me? She raised his kids and he was cheating on her all the while. Yeah, what a douche.

Luckily, she did get some money from the divorce settlement. And so she bought her own house in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, and found a job at a local department store. She was like, I'm going to start over. So, not long after she moved into the house, she suddenly was approached by a representative from the Gulf Oil Company. And they wanted to buy the house on behalf of the company. What?

She's like, I literally just bought this well, and then she was like, I just bought it. This is like my first independent foray into the world. Like, I'm feeling a little like, weird or territorial about this, yeah.

But she was like, You know what, I'm going to be a boss bitch and I'm going to negotiate the shit out of this. And she ended up getting more than twice what the company had initially offered and happily sold them the house. Betty is a boss ass bitch. So not long after, though, she was like, Well, it was nice.

She was like, I'm a little worried I'm going to miss that house because it was like my first independent thing, you know? Like, all of a sudden she was like, Wait, I kind of feel like I kind of gave that up a little too quick. So she went back to the Gulf representative just out of curiosity. She was like, I'm just going to shoot my shot.

And she said, What do you plan to do with that? You know, I never really asked you, what are the plans here? And they said, Oh, we're just going to tear it down. Oh why? Like, OK, how would I offer you one dollar? And I take the house and have it relocated to another lot and you can keep the lot?

Are you serious? And they agreed for a dollar. So she made twice the money they offered her on that house and then got to keep it. She bought the house back for one dollar, got to keep the entire thing and just gave them the property.

What a story, yeah, already. And she moved the house to a nearby lot, and she lived there for the rest of her life. Incredible.

I love that. I'm so glad that she didn't have to give it up. I know it really worked out. Your first house is so special.

Yeah, like that, you get on your own, you know? After what she went through, it's like, Hell, yeah, Betty. So in the summer of 1956, the house is being relocated from one lot to another, and during that time, Betty had to stay at a boarding house that was owned by a couple who recently moved to New Hampshire from Philadelphia.

Now, while at this boarding house, she met Barney Hill. Let's go now. At the time, Barney was in the area on vacation with his wife Ruby and their young children. Oh, and stayed at the like just for a time at the boarding house while they were passing through.

Initially, the Hills and Betty, they all got along very well. She liked all of them, they were all friends, they they kept in touch. They decided that, you know, everything was cool.

OK, and later, Barney and his wife ended up separating in 1957. And they were not to, like this was all long distance, and so it's not like they were like meeting up or anything like that.

Like, they were genuinely friends, it just happened and they ended up separating right immediately, he was like.

He ended up talking to Betty and was like, she's such a good friend and always had a thing for you, Betty. And soon, their friendship developed into romance. And, you know, there was no funny business beforehand. It doesn't sound like it was just friendship that developed into something else that's beautiful.

Now let's talk about Barney, let's so Barney Hill. I was calling him Barry earlier, I'm sorry.

That's OK, I'm saying, he's no Barry. I mean, he's not. that guy was no Barry either, that's the thing.

So you were right, he was not that so. Barney Hill was born July 29th, 1922. What does that make him July 29th?

Hold on, hold on, my brain is farting, fucking.

OK, my sister's birthday is July 25th and she is a Leo, so I think that's Leo. OK, yeah, I'll take it.

So a Leo and a cancer? I don't know how those two things line up. Yeah, that's fine. He was born in Newport News, Virginia, but little is known about his early life. He ended up dropping out of high school and he worked a bit as a store clerk.

And then he ended up joining the army. He served there for three years as a truck driver in World War Two. He ended up being honorably discharged in 1943 after a grenade incident. Oh, wow. And it was during his time in the military that he met and married his first wife, Ruby, and they had two sons in the decade that followed.

OK, now. After? After his discharge, he found work as a mail carrier with the Post Office in Philadelphia. And this is when he became very active in what was at the time the very burgeoning civil rights movement and other community causes. He served as a committeeman for his son's boy scout troop. Oh, yeah.

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I'm Dan Taberski. In 2011, something strange began to happen at the high school in Leroy, New York. I was like, at my locker and she came up to me and she was like, stuttering, super bad. I'm like, stop around, She's like, I can't.

A mystery illness, bizarre symptoms and spreading fast, like doubling and tripling. And it's all these girls with a diagnosis. The state tried to keep on the down low. Everybody thought I was holding something back.

Well, you were holding something back intentionally. Yeah, yeah, well, yeah, now it's hysteria, it's all in your head, it's not physical. Oh my gosh, you're exaggerating.

Is this the largest mass hysteria since the Witches of Salem, or is it something else entirely? Something's wrong here, something's not right. Leroy was the new dateline, and everyone was trying to solve the murder.

A new limited series from Wondery and Pineapple Street Studios, Hysterical Follow Hysterical on the Wondery app, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge all episodes of Hysterical early and ad free right now by joining Wondery Plus.

Now, at first, Betty and Barney's relationship, like I said, was long distance. They ended up really just talking through letters and phone calls. How romantic I know. But then it changed. In the summer of 1957 because she re-enrolled at UNH and took an internship position with the Leighton Farm School, which was a home for delinquent girls in Philadelphia. Oh, wow.

Now, the internship in Philadelphia made it possible for Betty and Barney to be together in person. Love it. They were romance, romance, romance. And when the internship ended a few months later, they were now facing being long distance again. So Barney made the decision to relocate with Betty.

I love that. So for Barney, he had spent most of his life in and around Philadelphia, so this was a big decision, a big move. He was uprooting his whole life, yeah, and he had children, too that lived in Philadelphia, right?

Yeah, he did so, he was like, I'm going to have to really make this work. And he was also going to be relocating to New Hampshire, which was a place where he would be one of very few Black people in the entire state. Yeah, even today, the population is only 10 percent, people of color, most of whom live in the larger cities, not like the smaller areas, right?

So this was, like, at the time, especially a big source of stress. Yeah, nerve wracking. I cannot claim to know what this feels like. No way. So for Barney, the shift was very stressful, but he did acclimate very quickly to life in Portsmouth.

So he ended up making a lot of friends very easily with the tenants in Betty's building and some of the people in her social circle. So he really just fell right into it. He had a good community, yeah, and as a U..S.

Postal worker, he was able to transfer from his job in Philadelphia to one in Boston. Like, pretty easily, nice, so that wasn't an issue. But the transfer meant that he would be working one of the shittiest shifts because he was transferred in, which happened to be opposite Betty's schedule. So they hardly saw each other at first.

Oh, that sucks, and it's like, they're just getting out of this long distance thing now. When Betty and Barney married in May 1960, their work schedules were so intense that they couldn't even take a honeymoon. At first, they had to go right back to work after getting married. It would end up being 16 months before Barney was able to take time off from his postal route to actually go on a belated honeymoon.

Oh my god, that sucks. So, on September 15th, 1961, he finally got approval to take a few days off from his job. And he decided he was going to surprise Betty with a trip to Niagara Falls in Montreal. Oh my gosh, awesome. And he got the news on a Friday evening.

So he planned to wait until Monday. He was like, he told her what was going to happen, but he was like, we're going to go Monday. Because that's when the banks open and we can begin our trip, right? But Betty was like, I don't even care what we do.

I just want to be together and like, go. So she was like, I don't even care about the banks, I don't care about getting more money. So they just pooled the cash they had on hand, which was $70 in total. Oh my God.

And Betty was like, That's enough, it's fine with me. And she was like, if we stick to a tight budget, we bring food with us, we just don't eat at a ton of restaurants. We'll be good.

We just want to spend time together. Yeah, that's it, let's just go. So I love them now. Early Sunday morning, September 17th, they packed up some food, their stuff, and they brought their dachshund Delci in the back seat, and they began making their way to Canada.

I love this now. They very strictly adhered to their budget on the first few days. So Betty and Barney decided, you know what? We're going to make our way down to downtown Montreal on Tuesday morning, September 19th. We'll book a motel for the night.

We'll take in a show in the city. I love this, it's so romantic, I know, but they got directions from somebody.

And unfortunately, that person only spoke French, so they misunderstood and it caused them to get lost on their way from Niagara to Montreal. So they were driving east and they realized they had gotten very lost from the downtown area. Where the hell are we? They'd kind of wasted a lot of their day.

So they decided, you know what, let's just find a hotel for the night. We'll try again tomorrow. But then they realized, Oh wait, it's difficult to find a hotel that's going to let a dog in. Oh, true.

So, to make matters worse, there was also a tropical storm making its way up the east coast from the southern states. It was going to make driving conditions difficult. It kind of felt like it was like all converging at once. Yeah, so they were like, you know what?

Why don't we just start the five hour drive back to New Hampshire? Oh, like, you know, we're still together, we're still making the trip together. So, even though they'd heard that storm warning, they said that the skies were very clear and they were by all weather accounts.

By the time that Betty and Barney passed over the border into the mountains of northern New Hampshire, so they were driving south along I-93 in Ashland. When Betty saw what she thought was a shooting star and she pointed it out to Barney. But as they got closer, it occurred to both Betty and Barney that whatever it was in the sky, it had stopped moving and was just hovering in the air. The thing, which was large, and they both said, was cigar shaped seeming at the time. It began to move forward slowly, and then it began going upwards, like ascending again. And this is when Betty was like, Barney, pull over on the side of the road.

We need to get a better look at this. Like, what the fuck is that? So outside of the car, they looked up at this wild thing above them. Yeah, they were super confused, not really understanding what the hell was up there.

And they were also wondering, how is this thing just hovering motionless in the air like that? Yeah, like, gravity doesn't necessarily work like that. And they couldn't hear anything like propellers, like a, like a helicopter. That's creepy. So Betty gave Barney the binoculars they had brought with them on the trip.

And Betty later recalled, And as he looked up, he could see a row of men standing in the windows, looking down at them. I'm looking at the pictures right now that they drew, and I'm like, Uh, what, what? So, one by one, apparently, the figures watching through the window walked away, and then the ship began descending in their direction.

So they had no idea what to do, so they both jumped back in the car and headed south on route three. And the object is following them now. Oh, and they said it was moving in a very erratic pattern above them.

Yeah, and so Barney really didn't want to freak Betty out, so he was trying to act like everything was fine and he was. He said he was trying to be as calm as possible and just drive home.

Yeah, and his only reason was he didn't want to upset Betty. So at one point, Barney entertained the idea of stopping at a cabin or a motor lodge, maybe just to be near other people. Because he was like, we were just freaked out, yeah, but he was like, Honestly, I think we should just keep going.

So they drove for about a half hour and then they rounded a curve near Indian Head, which is a natural rock formation and actually a landmark in Franconia. Notch. And they came to this like large, open area. And as soon as they came into this area, they saw the flying object hovering about 100 feet up in the area, right in front of their car. Oh, and so Barney was startled by this.

And he said he slammed his foot on the brake because he wasn't ready for it. And it was in the middle of the road that they came to a stop. And he said, he grabbed Betty's revolver and binoculars and got out of the car and moved closer to see what the fuck this thing was. Oh, this is terrifying. And he said, he approached and the thing tilted forward slightly. And two red lights began to glow as fins on the side of the object began to part and the object started moving slowly forward.

So he was fucking terrified, and he rushed back into the car and told Betty, We got to get the fuck out of here. Yeah, like, goodbye now. They raced down the highway.

The object is literally above them, still pursuing them, essentially right. And after a few minutes, Betty and Barney could hear a buzzing sound. And then they felt a strong vibration. And a few minutes later, they heard the buzzing again. Louder now, followed by a much stronger vibration. And this is when they said there was haziness.

They're like, this part is kind of missed time because they later said that they would they were. They were called encountering some kind of roadblock and seeing a large red orb on the ground, but they couldn't like the details were really fuzzy.

They were like, I can't, I don't, I can't put these pieces together. So the next thing they really remember was feeling this desperate need to be around other people. They just didn't want to be alone. Oh, and so. Barney drove for a while searching for a restaurant that would be open, something that other people would be around, but they couldn't find anything open at that time.

So they were like, let's just get home. So, based on when they left Montreal and how long they'd been driving, they expected to reach Portsmouth around 3 a..m. But when they did reach home, they were surprised because the sun was coming up. What? And Betty wrote in her diary? We entered our home, turned on the lights and went over to the window and looked skyward.

We felt very calm, peaceful, relaxed. We sat at the kitchen table, looked at each other, shook our heads in puzzlement, and asked each other, Do you believe what happened? We agreed It was unbelievable, but it had really happened. So they're exhausted, yeah.

Confused, they don't know what happened to this chunk of time. And Benny and Barney decided, You know, let's get some sleep, let's have a little nap, like sleep it off. See how we feel in the morning when we wake up in a few hours.

Sure, and when they woke up a few hours later, Barney said, You know what? This is still bothering both of us. So he said, Why don't you go into another room? I'll sit here and we're going to draw what we saw.

OK, so they did that and they drew what they saw, and when they reconvened a few minutes later, they saw that. It was remarkably similar with Adrian, so they they took that as OK. We both saw this like this, it wasn't a hallucination, we saw it.

Now, as far as Barney was concerned, though, even through this, he was like, this story, even though I believe we saw it is beyond belief. And he was like, for our jobs and for our reputation in the community, we should just keep this to ourselves. I get that just have this experience with each other, especially that time period. You don't want to like, go stern with No.

And of course, Betty, who was never one to give in to any public pressure, very much disagreed with this. But she was like, This was incredible, like we can't just keep this to ourselves, but she was like, You know what? I respect and understand your concern.

And so she was like, you know what, I'm not going to run wild, but can I tell my sister? He was like, Of course you can. The other thing is, technically he's like a government employee, so he's probably like, I'm not about to talk about this shit.

And he was. They were both very active in the civil rights community, yeah, and activism. And they didn't want this to overshadow or take away from any of the work they were doing.

So they were worried about that, which is really sad, it is really sad. So she called her sister Janet, and who she called the only person who she could tell her story to, without prejudice. Janet listened and she was like, Wow, this is wild, but I believe you, and then she was like, OK, I'll call you back.

So after hearing her sister's story, Janet Miller phoned her neighbor, who's a physicist, and asked for advice about like anything he could tell him. You know, but physicists that seems like a right person to talk to. He's like, she's like, I don't know, you're really smart, yeah.

And, coincidentally, the neighbor had guests over that night, and one of them was the former chief of police from the nearby town of Newton. OK, he said. No, this isn't crazy. Like, don't worry. And he said all UFO sightings should be reported to the Peace Air Force Base.

Like, that's what we do. So, like, tell her to report it, OK, so Janet thanked him, hung up, told Betty, You know, this is what you need to do. And also gave her a basic experiment that the physicist had suggested that she try, OK.

Now, according to the physicist, Betty was to take a compass out to the car and walk slowly around the vehicle and just make note of any unusual changes in the compass as she walked. Now, Barney was like, I'm not doing that, He was like, I'm done with this, He was like, I want this behind us, I don't even want to do this.

So he refused to go outside. So Betty did it by herself and she said nothing unusual happened as she walked around the car. And then she said, and then she reached the trunk. And she said. She noticed a bunch of unusual shiny spots on the surface. And she said, about a size of a half dollar or silver dollar.

Pretty big. And she said she'd never seen them before, so she placed the compass on the spots and it would spin wildly. And she said, As I was watching this, I was filled with an unexplained feeling of absolute terror. I was standing there in the rain under the streetlight and telling myself, Don't scream, keep calm and don't be afraid.

Everything is all right. I would be scared, too. So a few days later, Betty did, as her sister suggested as well, and called the Peace Air Force Base to report the whole experience. Barney's probably like, you better stop, Barney's like Jesus.

So they gave a basic description of what they'd seen, you know, but they. But he insisted they leave out the part about seeing the humanoid figures looking at them out the window. Because he was like, I'm, I don't want to sound like he was like, very ashamed of this and it was very sad. So a few hours later, they got a call back OK from Major Paul Henderson, who had several follow up questions.

And later, Betty and Barney would learn that Henderson had taken detailed notes and submitted their description to Project Blue Book. Yes, which is a study of unidentified flying objects conducted by the U..S Air Force between 1952 and 1969. So Major Henderson's report to Project Blue Book is basically what we described. It's almost exactly that.

Just it includes, but it also included a comment that provides a little more insight into after their trip. In the report, he notes, during a later conversation with Mr. Hill, he volunteered the observation that he did not originally intend to report the incident. He says that on looking back, he feels that the whole thing is incredible and he feels somewhat foolish. He just cannot believe that such a thing could or did happen.

So, in 1961, Barney Hill was the local chairman of the NAACP OK. And a strong, proud civil rights activist who is working tirelessly to advance the cause of equality in the community. And in a community that wasn't very receptive to begin with, so he was, he was working fucking hard, like overtime.

And so. He was also the founding board member of the Rockingham Community Action Program, which is an organization that provides social and financial support to those in need. Wow, and one that is still a vital part of the social service network on the Seacoast today. And he's also a Black man from the south who was married to a white woman. In a state where many residents were not going to accept or were actively speaking out against interracial marriage, right?

So because of all that, to Barney, the UFO incident was it was distracting from all his work he was doing, and he said it was embarrassing. And he was worried that any tabloid kind of publicity that came along with it would tarnish the battle that both of them were fighting for equality and dignity. So, as far as he was concerned, they'd done their duty. They reported the sighting to the proper authorities.

And now he was like, we're moving on right now. Betty, on the other hand, was she wasn't like, forcefully doing anything, but she just was having trouble letting the experience go. Which I can understand that side of it too, yeah.

How could you not have trouble with that? Exactly? So, just days after reporting the incident, she went to the library and started checking out books about aliens and Ufos. And she just wanted to hear other similar experiences. Just I think she was also just trying to convince herself.

I didn't like, have a lapse of, you know, hallucination. Yeah, so her motivation was definitely just like, you know, Betty was a was a stubborn gal, strong willed.

Yeah, she was strong willed, but also strange things have been had been happening since this whole situation that she didn't know what to do about. Even aside from those like half dollar things, yeah, so about 10 days after coming home, Betty started having nightmares about the experience, and she would also have these really scary early morning flashbacks.

Ooh, and these flashbacks were really scary experiences from that evening, but ones she didn't initially remember. OK, So they were like, she wasn't certain if they were real, if they were a dream, what was happening, but they were very vivid flashbacks.

Yeah, and she said, at first I didn't tell anyone about them, they were so weird. Oh so. From her reading all the library books, Betty eventually came across a report written by Donald Keough, which was he was a former major with the U.S.

Marines and was the director of the National Investigations Committee on on Aerial Phenomena, which is NICAP. This is a civilian group dedicated to investigating reports of UFOS. O.K. In October 1961, Betty wrote a letter to Nicap. Told them about the experience and was just like, I just want to let you guys know about this. If you can, just take a look into things, see if it's similar to something else.

Yeah, so she got a response a few weeks later and they let her know that they would be that she was going to be contacted by Boston-based Nicap member Walter Webb. They were very interested.

She struck him with her motor vehicle, she had been under the influence, and then she left him there. In January 2022, local woman Karen Reed was implicated in the mysterious death of her boyfriend, Boston Police Officer John O'Keefe. It was alleged that after an innocent night out for drinks with friends, Karen and John got into a lover's quarrel en route to the next location. What happens next depends on who you ask. Was it a crime of passion?

If you believe the prosecution, it's because the evidence was so compelling. This was clearly an intentional act and his cause of death was blunt. Force trauma with hypothermia. Or a corrupt police cover up, if you believe the defense theory, however, this is all a cover up to prevent one of their own from going down.

Everyone had an opinion, and after the 10-week trial, the jury could not come to a unanimous decision to end in a mistrial. It's just a confirmation of just how complicated this case is. Law and Crime presents the most in-depth analysis to date of the sensational case. In Karen. You can listen to Karen exclusively with Wondery Plus.

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Now, a few weeks later, Webb did come in contact with the Hills and recorded their story for NYCAP. In a report titled A Dramatic UFO Encounter in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. Now, the description of the experience in Webb's report is again the same one that was given to Project Blue Book. But this time, Barney allowed them to include the part about seeing the humanoid creatures in the window. But they? It was like it was really the the missing time, that was the thing that was really bothering the hills.

Like that time period, it was like, this is all weird, yes, but like, we're more concerned. What the fuck happened in this time period that neither one of us can remember, right? And it was Webb's report that brought Betty and Barney's story to the attention. Of Robert Homan, who was a former interrogator for the U.S. Army, who is now working for IBM.

In the 1960s, Homan was really interested as well in that missing time element of their story. And as a former interrogator, he knew there were plenty of ways of recovering memories or forgotten details that could be useful. Right? Had to do it.

But contrary to apparently popular belief about this, it wasn't Homan who eventually suggested hypnosis as a way of figuring this out. It was actually his friend and fellow NICAp member Jim McDonald, who suggested that Jim McDonald was a former member of the U.S military. And the CIA. Shit.

He met the hills through Homan, and in the later half of 1961, he became very interested and very involved in filling in those gaps of missing time. For them, he would go back to the scene of the encounter like they really went for this. So these efforts eventually led them to a hypnosis session, and this is when the details were uncovered.

So throughout 1962 and 63, Betty, and to a much lesser extent, Barney, dove way deeper into the investigation. Into their experience, they were very encouraged by the members of NICAP and former military members who had taken intense interest in this. So they were still, you know, Barney was still very conscious about how this could make them look if the story really got out. So he was a little reluctant to spend time diving into the investigation, but he tried to help whenever he could. Yeah.

And unfortunately, about a year after the initial experience, Barney's health took a turn. Oh, no, and he started experiencing debilitating headaches and nausea. And what's worse is his primary care doctors couldn't figure out why. Radiation.

So believing the cause of Barney's symptoms was probably largely psychological. His doctor referred him to Dr. Benjamin Simon, who is a very well-known, renowned and celebrated neuropsychiatrist and had a practice in Boston, Boston's Back Bay neighborhood. OK, so. According to Betty's niece, Catherine Marden, Dr.

Simon Quote, was skeptical about the existence of UFOS as extraterrestrial aircraft. But he agreed to work with Barney because he was worried, and he truly believed that this problem was psychological in nature. Oh, no, so. When Barney and Betty actually went to Boston for his initial consult with Dr. Simon in December 1963, they both told the story together.

And it was so elaborate and they were so insistent on it. That Dr. Simon was like, I'm going to insist that you also receive treatment with me. To Betty, OK, and she was like, You know what?

I want to help Barney get better, so I'll do it so sure like I'll absolutely go through this, OK?

So, he was one of the country's leading neuropsychiatrists at the time. So he made a name for himself with a lot of things. But one of the things he made a name for himself with was incorporating hypnosis into his treatment plans. Well, that's cool, but he was quick to let the hills know.

You may have seen stage hypnosis, or like on late night shows or on, You know, these little things, but this is very different. And he said, he had actually pioneered the use of hypnosis to treat PTSD and soldiers returning from World War Two. Oh shit, so to Simon? He said. Barney's symptoms bared a striking resemblance to the trauma related symptoms of soldiers, which led him to believe that this could be beneficial for both of them.

Now, beginning in late February 1964, they began a three week period of very intense hypnosis sessions to try to uncover these memories. So for the first session, Dr. Simon was very pleased, he said, because it seemed like Betty and Barney were excellent subjects for this, he said. They had a great ability to fall into a deep, trance like state pretty quickly and easily. And he put them in different soundproof rooms so that they couldn't influence each other, of course.

And in the earliest sessions, both Betty and Barney described the drive from Niagara, or to Niagara, of looking for a motel. Of Barney's apprehension. Because he was very uncertain of the civil rights situation in Canada, so he was a little nervous, OK? And in the second session, Simon moved forward in time and started asking about their experiences while in Niagara Falls. And it was during the second session that Betty and Barney's descriptions of events kind of differed a little bit.

Betty stated they got lost after asking for directions, and Barney stated that he misread the map. OK, insignificant difference in the grand scheme of things. Yeah, I don't think that's like a big thing. So through the first few sessions with Dr.

Simon It was clear that Betty and Barney's accounts of the trip differed in a lot of very insignificant ways. This is kind of hinting at the unreliability of hypnosis, because emotions factor into our perception and memories. Of course, yeah, everybody perceives things differently.

And this is what's interesting because they definitely had different priorities and different, different focuses on this trip, right? And I think it it really colored their experience. Because in the transcripts of Barney's hypnosis sessions, it's clear that the trip to Canada, or anywhere at that time, was really stressful for him. And dominated by anxiety and concerns over how them, as an interracial couple, would be received in unfamiliar parts of the USA and Canada. I hate that he had to even go through that while he was on his honeymoon. Yeah, that, like that, was his main concern.

Or that anybody has to go through that? And in Betty's accounts, hers are focused on the logistics of travel and the anxieties about reaching their destination. Right? So this is, I don't believe they're in, you know, their inconsistencies and discrepancies are like, deceit. I mean, it's because they're very insignificant, not like the deceit wouldn't make sense.

And it's not the details of, like the the incident or whatever, I think. It's just that. There's obvious differences in their priorities and fears and worries. And it makes sense, and it comes out during hypnosis.

Right, which is interesting, yeah, now. By late March, Dr. Simon had done a ton of sessions to establish a baseline.

OK, and he was finally ready to go into the experience. So, Betty and Barney, at first, both described the scenario the exact same way that they did to the authorities at Peace Air Force Base and NiCap. And still under hypnosis. So that's cool and like, interesting.

And Barney said, while the craft was following down the highway, following them down the highway, he said I began to feel very alarmed and hope for some traffic. So again, I wanted other people to be around right now. When he came to the part of the story where they had rounded Indian head, Barney became visibly distressed, and he actually asked to be woken up. Oh.

And Dr. Simon assured him, You're safe, you're in my office, nothing's going to happen to you. Like, please continue.

Right, and so, Barney said in a very anxious tone. It's right over my head, God, what is it? And I try to maintain control so Betty cannot tell I'm scared.

God, I'm scared. Oh, that's like heartbreaking now. Clearly upset at this point, he became screaming uncontrollably, Oh, my God, and then became hysterical and needed several minutes to compose himself before they went on.

Holy shit, did he have to get woken up? And well, I think he, I think they composed him while asleep, but then he continued and he said this.

This is the transcript, this is ridiculous. Oh, it's huge. Oh my god, I can see it.

It's there and there are lights. Oh, geez, I don't believe this, I don't believe this.

I don't believe this. It's huge and there are people there and they're looking back at me. Oh my God, help me, if there is a God, help me.

Coming closer, I'm coming closer, there's a man up there and he's not going to let me go away. Oh, it's big 80 feet.

Look at it, oh, look at it, two red lights, they're on the side of it. It's like it's like a pancake.

It looks, I'm not going to say it. I don't believe flying saucers are. I'm not going to say it. I don't ever want to say that word again.

Oh, like, so stressed, even under hypnosis, I know I'm like, Oh my goodness. And he struggled to continue, but eventually composed himself enough to describe the feeling of panic he felt when he said the humanoid creatures. When he saw those humanoid creatures, he said, he saw one man who he believed to be the leader.

He was round face and reminded him of a redheaded Irishman, he said, was he was a not too big man? Dressed in a military style cap and black shiny jacket, with a scarf dangling over his left shoulder. Barney also said he noticed the man had almond shaped eyes, which he'd never seen before, and that he can fit. The eyes conveyed a terrifying menace, the likes of which he had experienced, but, he said, only with some of the worst people he had ever encountered.

And later, he remarked The man in black in the black shiny jacket reminded me of a Nazi. Oh wow, now really scary. In the session that followed, he Dr. Simon pressed Barney on what happened next.

And he said that they tried to get away but encountered a roadblock that he'd previously described as a fiery red ball. So the transcript says I made a turn and I never knew this. I don't know why I had to make that turn and I was lost. I saw I was on a strange area of the highway that I had never been before.

And I was being stopped, I was very uncomfortable. But somehow, the eyes of the men in the craft were telling me that I should be calm and I would not be harmed. And to relax. And I saw those men coming towards me. Oh, in her sessions, Betty's recollection was very similar.

OK, and to the dreams that she was having after they got home. So in her sessions, she described watching as the men emerged from the craft, took hold of Barney and led, almost carrying him into the craft and then came back to get her. And she said they had him under some kind of control and he couldn't get away. And she said, when they returned for her, she remembered walking voluntarily to the ship with the men.

She's like, My man is in there. Yeah, she was like, I'll go get him right. So she said, I was more or less walking under my own power. And then, she said, As we neared the door, she began fighting the men until they got a hold of her and marched her inside.

OK, she said. They bruised me a little bit. I had torn my dress in the struggle, it had a built in lining, and I was struggling so badly that the stitching on the inside of the dress had been torn out.

So in places, it was hanging down, Oh wow, now inside the ship. Betty described being taken to an examination room with Barney, which he described as being like a hospital operating room. And in Betty's recollection, she said her clothing were removed and they began examining her body. She said. And this is going to get like kind of graphic, just to let everybody know.

OK, I could feel them turning me over and putting something in my rectum. Oh, she said. I felt it go in very easily and then it was withdrawn. As they examined her body and collected specimens, she said Nothing hurt. She said she could hear them humming in a low tone.

And she said she believed they were communicating to each other that way. It sounded like a conversation, but hums OK, and later, Barney also described here seeing the men communicate with Hums OK.

And, he said, But he saw them open their mouth to make the noise. She hadn't seen them when they were communicating like that. Sure, so, like Betty, Barney also recalled being proked and prodded by the captors. And he said, I have the most peculiar feeling that something was placed against my genital parts.

And he said, it was more as if my parts were in a solution of something that was there, that had substance to it, that had body to it. So he claimed that the men took many samples from every orifice of his body. Wow, leaving him with the feeling of having been touched. So, in the final exam, Betty says the men performed what she understood to be kind of a pregnancy test by inserting a large needle into her navel.

And she said, I would say the needle was four inches long, six inches maybe. And she said there was a tube attached to it. And they didn't leave it in very long, just a second. What now? Once it was removed, she was left alone in the room with the man they believed to be the leader.

OK, and she started, she said. We had a conversation. So, according to Betty, the leader gave her a book to read and she said the text went up and down. It was different.

It had short lines and some were very thin, and some were medium and some were heavy, they had some dots and they had some straight lines and curved lines. And she asked the leader where they had come from, and the man asked how much she knew about the universe. And then got up and directed her attention to a large map on the wall. And she said the map looked like what she assumed were stars, or like the galaxy of some sort.

But, she said, Very different from any star map I've ever seen, it doesn't look like what you are picturing. But she said something about it felt like that's what it was, yeah.

Context, clues. And the leader asked Betty where Betty thought she was on the map, what? and she laughed and said, I have no idea. And he said, If you don't know where you are, there wouldn't be any point in telling you where I am.

What which is like, chilling, that's so I don't even understand. He's like, I could point to you where I'm from, but if you don't know where you are right now, then what's the point? So creepy.

And I was like, OK, OK, Mr. Depth. yeah, for real, like that was like, philosophical.

Look at you little hipster. I was like, I liked that. But, according to Betty, she spoke with him for a little more, a little more time, about various aspects of human life on Earth. Until finally, the conversation ended and Betty and Barney were allowed to dress and were escorted back to their car by two men. And they regained what I guess could be described as consciousness at that point. And we're just driving along route three towards Portsmouth.

Weird, so the whole thing took like a couple hours, I guess, I guess, like the time, just like, jumped, yeah.

So, from the moment he began working with the Hills, Dr. Simon was very clear that he had little, if any, interest in UFOS. WOW. And was entirely motivated by his desire to just help Barney Hill relieve his stress symptoms. Yeah.

So when he was asked questions later, like years later, about this whole experience, he was very reluctant to engage in anything that could treat UFOs as a serious subject. He was like, like, in the introduction to a book about the Hills experience called The Interrupted Journey, he wrote. The charisma of hypnosis has tended to foster the belief that hypnosis is the magical and loyal road to the truth. In one sense, this is so.

But it must be understood that hypnosis is the pathway to the truth, as it is felt and understood by the patient. The truth is what he believes to be the truth, and this may or not be consistent with the ultimate, non-personal truth. OK, so, when the hypnosis session was done, Betty and Barney continued their relationship with Dr. Simon through more traditional therapy as well.

Over a year, actually, wow. They ended up being in correspondence for many years after, like they kept in touch they were, they kept the relationship.

Nice, and I think Dr. Simon is like, Listen, this is what was told. The transcripts are true. They both had genuine reactions.

Their emotions about it were genuine, they were in different rooms when they told these stories and they line up almost perfectly. And he said, And he's saying, they are not deceiving us. This could very well be the truth, like the absolute non-personal truth of reality, yeah.

Or it could be that both of them truly believe that this happened and that this is what they experienced in some way, shape or form. Whether it be whatever. You know what I mean, like, this could be just their truth, but we will not know.

Like, that's all we know is that they both came out with these things under hypnosis, in separate rooms, with very real emotions attached to them and no sign of deceit. That's crazy, which is like, that's really all you can take out of that.

Right, that's pretty incredible it is, that's, I think that's the perfect word for it, incredible.

And honestly, this probably would have been the end of their experience with, like the world of UFos and alien abductions like them going through this hypnosis session. But an unexpected newspaper item in The Boston Traveler in the fall of 1965 took them out of the ordinary. Citizens who just went through this and dealt with it on their own. Kind of thing to like the biggest names in the U.FO community, yeah, so in November 1963, the way it happened is really shitty, too. I feel bad for them.

They didn't seek this out. I hate that so. Betty and Barney were invited by the two state UFO study group to present their story to the group's members at a private event in Quincy, Massachusetts. The group had found out about the hills through Nicap and had reached out to Betty at the time when she was very desperate for answers. So she was like, I'll participate to this like private event.

Oh no, you're investigators like, you're all just like it's the same kind of thing as Nicap.

Like, this is, it's private, it's private. They're just trying to understand this, they're not here for publicity. And what sucks is that she didn't know, and a lot of other people didn't know that. A reporter for the Boston Traveler, John Littrell, was in the audience that night and recorded the entire presentation.

Isn't that illegal? It's a real shit move and it gets shittier because you can't record people without their consent. I don't know what the situation is there, huh? But two years later, in the fall of 65, Littrell was writing an article about another reported UFO incident in Exeter, New Hampshire, which is known as the Exeter Incident.

Yep, and he reached out to the Hills for comment on this, like talking about this other incident. And he said he wanted to include their story in the article to kind of beef it up, and they still wanted to remain anonymous. A little bit. They were like, we dealt with this on our own.

We shared our story with the you know, with the private group so they could do their investigation to help them. But we're not looking to be in newspapers and shit. So they declined to speak with him. They were like, No, we would like, and they said, the only thing we will ask is, do not include us in the article at all.

Fair, we don't want our incident in there, we don't want any of it. So so, yeah, it's so.

And Betty said, I do not know this is what she had said. I do not know what effect publicity would have on Barney's position in so many of the things he is doing. That's what she had said to him. Yeah, I don't want publicity because it's going to ruin what he's done for the community.

And that's been his number one thing throughout this whole process. So it's a short deal being a slimy fuck. And ignoring the Hills request to remain anonymous, which was very black and white, like literally told him, do not include us in that, he still did. Littrell published the article in The Boston Traveler on October 25th, 1965, and he frequently referenced the Hills experience and quoted heavily from Betty's presentation at the conference in Quincy.

How did he get away with that? Not only that, it also very much trivialized and sensationalized their story for, like, his own gain. Yeah, and it also caused them to seriously question who the fuck they could trust anymore. They were like, What the fuck?

We told you not to include us. So, because aside from that presentation in 1963 to the private group and talking to the government agents they talked about with it. Betty had only told her sister and maybe like one or two close friends, about the incident. So the fact that he was doing this felt like a betrayal on like a massive front. What an asshole.

So the article in The Boston Traveler prompted a ton of calls from reporters all around New England, all wanting comments and interviews. And Betty recalled I took the newspaper and locked myself in the bathroom. I was stunned, unbelieving. I noted it was going to be a series to run for five days.

Oh, no, now. The next day, when she went to work Betty to work at the New Hampshire Division of Welfare. She was met at the door by a flurry of reporters, all trying to get a comment. And later, when Betty and Barney arrived home after work, the phone was ringing off the hook. And they just wanted to, like, go on with their lives. Yeah, they did their due diligence.

They did everything they were asked to do right. They didn't seek this, and the days after that, they were approached by strangers everywhere they went asking questions.

Some people wanted autographs. Oh, that's so weird and it sucks, it's so sad, and it's like, all of this.

They had no way of knowing that doing that private speech just to people who they were trying to help and not gain any publicity. That it was going to have the potential to compromise their jobs and undermine all the civil rights work that Barney and Betty had done up until this point, so seeing no other option at this moment, Betty and Barney were like, all right. We got to try to get in front of this. Now it's out, right.

So now we got to take control of it. So, they said Latrell's article included their story but also quoted them without their permission. So that was a serious misrepresentation, right? They had no way of controlling that.

And it misrepresented their experience, and it misrepresented them as people. So they were like, you know what? We'll go out and we'll tell the story and we'll be like, because now we have to, we have to now. So, on the evening of November 30th, 1965, they held their own event at the Garrison Inn in Dover, New Hampshire, which was only a few miles from their home in Portsmouth. And they talked to a crowd of more than 600 people who attended.

Oh my god, and we're probably so nervous, yeah. And Betty opened up the program by giving a brief overview of the history of UFO sightings. I love her.

She said Up until the 19th century, there have been over 300 scientific recordings of UFOS, and this rate has continued up until the present time. And as evidence, Betty shared stories of sailors and other respectable citizens who reported the sightings, including the recent sighting in Exeter. That had started this whole thing. So with the introduction. After the introduction, Betty and Barney began the presentation part, and they told their entire version of the events, Barney said. I thought it was probably a helicopter, but I heard no familiar whirring of the propellers.

I then became quite apprehensive, got back into the car and continued driving southward. He finished telling the story and then the audience just went nuts, asking questions, wanting to know whether they appeared threatening, hostile, like very normal questions. Sure, and they, and you know, they answered. They did not feel like at first they were scared, but they didn't come off as hostile or threatening, and they didn't hurt them.

And the audience was like, We're like, Did you suffer any ill effects from this? like, Were you hurt? did you, you know? And Barney said, No. We feel pretty fine and we both felt like we had just been in contact with something.

And they said, Alien. It's a very, very hard feeling to describe. So for Betty and Barney, so that worked out well because people were asking genuine questions and respected the story. So for Betty and Barney, who were very anxious telling their story publicly. The overwhelmingly positive response from the audience was definitely validation for their experience. They deserved that.

And this did begin a lifelong involvement in the pursuit of evidence of UFOS and extraterrestrial visits to Earth. It's really hard to say. In the years that followed, their experience became, you know, a popular book, The Interrupted Journey, which was adapted into a television film. The UFO Incident, starring James Earl Jones and Estelle Parsons as Betty and Barney Love. There were books, movies, lots of media that followed all that craziness.

Now, unfortunately, on February 25th, 1969, Barney Hill died unexpectedly from a cerebral hemorrhage. Oh my God, he was only 46 years old. Oh my God, they only got that much time together.

That's awful. And what's even worse is, despite everything he had done in his life for the civil rights movement, his community. His obituary and the Portsmouth Herald focused almost entirely on the UFO incident. That's really shitty. The opening paragraph describes his as a Portsmouth postman who maintained he and his wife were taken captive aboard a UFO in the White Mountains. It's like, OK, he did, like a gazillion other wonderful things.

Yeah, it's like, that's so shitty now. He died only a year after Betty's father died, Oh God, poor Betty, and a few months after their beloved Dash and Delsie died.

No, so she was devastated, and it took months before she could even, you know, function, yeah, but her lifelong friend Marianne Franklin, from college.

Said she always suspected that Betty never stopped grieving for her soulmate, like, just rip my heart out ruined me. They were soulmates.

They absolutely were now. In the years after Barney died, Betty threw herself into the world of UFO stuff. You know? Speaking at conferences, she gave interviews, she would, she investigated. She was like, I'm going to find answers.

Yeah, well, you probably spend the rest of your life wondering what the fuck happened to me? But she also maintained her full time job as a social worker for the New Hampshire Department of Welfare. Wow, and by the late 1990s. At that point, she was like, you know what, I'll just fade into the background in the UFO stuff.

Like, I'm going to gracefully bow out and just let someone else take that over. Yeah, and she was just kind of done with the attention at that point, and so she said, you know what? she said, I'm no longer really questions, consumed with questions about the universe.

So I feel like very content, peaceful. And so she was like, I decided to transfer into a new hobby, which is family genealogy, very cool. And she said she was just really interested that some of her ancestors met the pilgrims now. On October 17th, 2004, Betty Hill died from lung cancer in the Portsmouth home she lived in since the 1950s, the one that she bought for a dollar back.

Bought back for a dollar. She was 85 years old. Hell yeah, Betty. And although Betty and Bernie Hill will definitely be remembered by most for this fantastic tale that occurred in September 1961. It is very important to remember them as also hugely important in civil rights movements in their community. In equality, of course.

Like they committed their entire lives to that, like that should be also right up there, with this wild incident that happened perhaps above it. One might think exactly so.

That is the story of Betty and Bernie Hill. What a wild story. I believe something happened, man. I believe them, yeah.

I believe something happened. That shit is so scary. It'll be interesting to see what you guys believe and just be nice about it. Well, especially now so much more shit is coming out about.

Yeah, aliens, and if you don't believe it, that's fine, just don't. Yeah, just don't be mean.

Don't be mean to people who do or people who are interested in it. Yeah, exactly, there's plenty of things that people are interested in that you're not, and vice versa. Sometimes the internet can make it like, if you believe certain things, then you're a piece of dog shit. And I'm going to shit all over you for it.

Don't do that, don't be that person on the internet, don't be that guy. Have important discussions about it because this is interesting, it is interesting.

I agree, and Betty and Bernie Hill for life, I love their love. Yeah, wow.

So yeah, well, with that, we hope you keep listening, and we hope you keep it weird. But it's weird that you get abducted by aliens. Keep it that way, keep it that weird. But I.

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