A Quick Stop at Venus

“Captain” Mark Richards affirmed the story of Val Thor, who came from Venus, a planet is habitable in 65 other dimensions apart from our own. (Cassidy Interview 3.) In the early days of flying saucer contact reports, Venus was one of the popular places of origin and Mark may have sought to explain why so many came from such an inhospitable planet.   

 

 
Most famously, the early contactee George Adamski met Orthon from  Venus who eventually took him aboard a saucer and introduced him to beings other planets. Adamski wrote a number of books about flying saucers and took some some of the most famous photographs from that era. Although he gained a devoted following, he had to keep upping his story until wrote about astrally attending conferences on Saturn with beings from every other planet — many decided they could no longer support such claims. It is a lesson that Mark and others should have learned.^[1] In 1957, Jim Moseley devoted a special issue of Saucer News to exposing Adamski. In many ways, this site follows that example.  See also Why I Can Say That Adamski is a Liar.

Buck Nelson also wrote about his trip to Venus, Mars, and Moon. Buck was a farmer from the Ozarks. The aliens he described lived in peace, wore overalls, and ate a lot of fruits and vegetables. The Venusians had a very religious morality and followed the Twelve Laws of God . You knew that his reports were true because Buck made drawings of the buildings he saw on Venus and a Venusian clock.  Buck started a number of clubs and spoke at gatherings, selling hair that came from a large Venusian dog. He is our favorite contactee, but it’s hard to see what Buck might have had in common with Orthon or Valiant Thor.

Thousands came to Giant Rock near Joshua Tree to hear the contactees, tales of Venus and various adventures.^[2] People still come to visit.  When we were last there, a secretive and unfriendly Ancient Aliens television show was filming.

The gatherings were hosted George Van Tassel who had been awakened one night to find a man standing at the foot of his bed.  Van Tassel wrote, “Beyond the man, about a hundred yards away, hovered a glittering, glowing spaceship, seemingly about eight feet off the ground.” The person was Solganda from the planet Venus. Van Tassel went aboard the ship, where he learned about of the Integratron, which was to hold secrets of time and immortality. Its construction became Van Tassel’s focus for the next 25 years, but he died shortly before it was completed. The machinery mysteriously disappeared and its secrets were lost. Today it offers “sound baths” due to its acoustic qualities.

 

 

Valiant Thor

The story of Valiant Thor is the Venusian most relevant to this page. Kerry Cassidy (Project Camelot) writes:

 

I asked Mark about Val Thor who came from Venus and who was said to have gone to meetings in the Pentagon many years ago. He said that Val Thor was a legitimate visitor from space; that he was from Venus, and that he met a female from that group and got to know her a bit. . . . The Venus that he came from is in another dimension.

Valiant Thor  was first introduced by Dr. Frank Stranges in his 1968 book, Stranger at the Pentagon. According to this account Val and his companions (Jill, Donn, and Tanyia) landed in a field near Alexandria, VA, on March 16, 1957. Val used thought transference to convince police officers that he meant no harm and eventually he was brought to meet President Eisenhower and Vice President Nixon, who housed him in an apartment at the Pentagon.  

The Venusians lived below the surface of their planet. They had superior psychic abilities, with powers such as the thought transference that were used during the initial encounter.  Val wore indescructable clothing that closed with a wave of the hand. He could apparently walk through walls. They left no fingerprints since that was a mark of humanity’s fall from God.^[3] Stranges was very religious and stated that the Venusians are a race of people created by God before Adam and never suffered the fall.  Some believe that Stranges used the account as a means to spread his religious message. It would not be the first time that Venusians were … Continue reading 

“You have certainly caused a stir . . . for an out of towner.”   
  
– Richard Nixon, upon meeting Val Thor

Val had been sent to Earth by the High Council after earth achieved nuclear capabilities that could lead to destruction. He gave Eisenhower a letter from the Council offering a plan that would enable us to live without war, sickness, or even death. The President told Thor that disarmament would destroy earth’s economy. He believed that people were not prepared for what would happen if the Venusian offer was accepted.

 This kind of warning was a common theme of the contactees: the space people wanted to prevent a nuclear war.  Edward Ruppelt, the former head of Project Bluebook wrote “the common undertone to many of these [contactee] stories … is  Utopia. On these other worlds there is no illness, they’ve learned how to cure all diseases. There are no wars, they’ve learned how to live peacefully.”  The FBI responded by investigating Adamski to see if he was a communist.

Even if the Venusian offer was rejected they were invited to help American scientists who were working on medical projects related to space science. Val and his crew met with leaders, provided advice, and shared some technology.  

Stranges was taken to the Pentagon in 1959. Val had heard of him, perhaps because of the religious connection, and wanted to meet. The Venusians also met at the home of Howard Menger who was a longtime contactee.^[4] Menger eventually stated that the aliens he met did not originate from Venus, but were passing through and using the planet as a base. Thor and his companions (pictured) spoke any language that was known to the audience. 

At the end of his mission, Val returned to Venus but continued to be involved with earth.  He stated that a group from a distant planetary system would be coming to give aid and data to help our progress. He also returned to earth and lived with his crew of 200 aboard their craft, Victor One, near the shoreline of Lake Mead in Nevada. It was surrounded by a force field and could not be seen — although a person might notice dust or bugs blowing against the ship during a windstorm. Val was the commander and his primary crew included others from the original story, plus Doc who only went by that name.

Stranges was invited aboard the ship and one of the first things he described was having to use a Venusian version of a bidet.  At one point government agents were trying to follow Stranges and Vice Commander Teel, who pressed an invisibility button in the car and they disappeared, leaving the agents mystified.  According to another story, Stranges and Donn met Alan Alda on a commercial flight and they had a long talk about UFOs and Venus.

Stranges often spoke about Val  at events. It struck a broad chord. It is said that people even today go to the lake to try to find the ship using the general directions that he gave.

Phil Schneider, who was involved with claims of an underground alien base at Dulce NM, said he met Val and offered a different version, with Val beginning his work for the government in 1936.  Schneider suggested that Val may have crashed here and perhaps worked duress.

Val looked human but had few unique characteristics that differ from the Stranges account. Most notably, he had six fingers on each hand and an IQ around 1200.  He wore a special suit to prevent biological contamination.^[5] Some web sites combine the accounts and state that Val had six figures while using the photos published by Stranges that clearly do not establish this. Stranges never mentioned this detail and his photos show five fingers. The fingers are hidden in the Schneider photo.

Schneider released a photo of Val that bore no resemblance to the Stranges photo.  He identified the person in the bottom middle with the lighter colored hair as Val and stated that his own father, Oscar Schneider, is to his right.  The photo was allegedly taken in August, 1943 in the “Ready Room” of the USS Eldridge in a meeting that included a number of nuclear scientists.^[6] The Eldridge was the ship said to be involved in the Philadelphia Experiment. Mark Richards claimed that his grandfather was one of the electrical inventors who worked on the project.  Jacque Vallee’s article on the alleged experiment, Anatomy of a Hoax, could apply to … Continue reading

The story and pictures have been criticized for a number of internal inaccuracies, with details of the ship not matching the time frame that Phil asserted.  Regardless, they take us full circle to the Dulce claims that brought Mark Richards to attention.

The Evolving Tales of Val Thor

In Gray Barker and Valiant Thor’s book In Days to Come: The Escape of the Stranger at the Pentagon, it is said that he sneaked out of the Pentagon several times to speak with contactees about the necessity of peace.

In the end, Thor was successful in convincing world leaders to end the atmospheric testing of nuclear weapons, and after he was “released” from the Pentagon, persuaded U.S. President John F. Kennedy to pull back from all-out nuclear war with Russia over the Cuban Missile Crisis. 

In some ways the Val reported by Stranges represents one of the last great links to the early era of the contactees, where the aliens were space brothers and sisters seeking world peace. He was also part of the contemporary world.  Val later watched the murder of Robert Kennedy from a viewing device on his craft – after he had warned Kennedy not to try and run for office.  

The modern era was getting closer but the kind of fact checking that could be done through the internet had not been developed.  Stranges did not have to worry about what might be discovered online.  Val could create his own legend.  

The primary echo from the golden age of contactees is that Val sought for humanity to be something more.  We could live without war.  Barker urged his readers to support this mission so that we could enjoy our birthright as citizens of this galaxy.

The Val depicted by Phil Schneider was closer to the evolving myths of the modern world, including the type of stories told by Mark. Phil only mentioned Val in passing, but the overall picture he presented of secret underground bases, abductions, battles, and the possibility that Val worked under duress had little in common with the alien quest for peace. It was part of a major transition as an increasing number of accounts associated aliens with dark matters and deep state conspiracies.   

Like Mark’s stories, the tale of Val Thor exists in its own world, without further proof. Yet, the legacy endures with a number of books written by him, stories of romantic relationships, a film, a climbing route, a fan club. Much of this interest is based on the Stranges version, which was much more complete. Indeed, it might continue to offer hope in a troubled time for those who seek otherworldly answers.

Five or six fingers?  Or none?  All things considered, Val is the ultimate friendly neighborhood Pentagon alien. However, if there is a Valiant Thor who reads this, we would love to talk to him, Donn, Jill, or even Doc.