What happened
The Yates Center Farmer's Advocate printed Hamilton's account of a cigar-shaped airship, about 300 ft long, hovering over his cattle pen. A lit glass carriage beneath it held "six of the strangest beings." A red cable was looped around a heifer's neck, and the ship rose and carried the animal off. A dozen local notables signed an affidavit to his honesty. The story was rediscovered by ufologists in the 1960s and called the first cattle mutilation. In 1943 the paper's former editor said he and Hamilton had made the story up. In 1976 Ethel Shaw, then 93, remembered Hamilton as a prominent member of the local Liars' Club, and researcher Jerome Clark later tied the tale to a club contest for the most outlandish story.