On the evening of August 21, 1955, the Suttons, a large farm family, frantically ran in the Hopkinsville police station in southwestern Kentucky. Based on reports given to the police, at about 7 p.m. on a hot Sunday night. The Sutton family friend Billy Ray Taylor was fetching water from the backyard well when he saw a silvery object, “real bright, with an exhaust all the colors of the rainbow.” The object came silently toward the house, passed over the house and stopped in the air. Next it would drop straight to the ground.
Taylor, 21, and his 18-year-old wife had come from Pennsylvania to visit Lucky Sutton. At first, the Suttons didn’t take Billy Ray seriously, laughing off his UFO account. Billy Ray and Lucky had a history of playing pranks on one another. After some time, the group realized Billy Ray was truly worried and the family speculated that he had seen a meteor.
About an hour later the family dogs began barking. Lucky and Billy Ray went to the back door and saw a strange glow. Within this glow they saw a small humanoid creature. The alien was about three-and-a-half feet tall, had an “oversized head…almost perfectly round, the arms extended almost to the ground, the hands had talons…and the large eyes glowed with a yellowish light.”
Terrified, the two men grabbed a 20-gauge shotgun and a .22 rifle and fired at the “little green man”—as it walked toward the back door. They reported that it then flipped and fled into the darkness.
Soon, the men saw a similar alien appear in a side window. They fired through the window screen. Still unable to hit it, the “little man” again flipped, then disappeared.
The next few hours the group reported that they would fire shots as somewhere between 10-15 creatures kept peeking through the windows.
Things then escalated when Billy Ray Taylor went outside under the small overhanging roof, and his family behind him saw a claw-like hand reach down and touch his hair. Everyone screamed and Taylor was pulled back inside. Lucky then stepped out and fired rounds at the creature. Lucky then shot at an alien he spotted in a nearby tree. The creature floated to the ground and then ran into the woods.
After these events, the Suttons and their friends moved inside and spent a few hours watching for the aliens, and mostly hearing scratches on the roof. At 11 p.m., the decision was made to run for the cars and get to the Hopkinsville police station. The group fled and speeded the entire way there.
Without question, when the group arrived at the police station everyone was terrified. A bit overwhelmed and somewhat amused, police chief Russell Greenwell called for backup and soon officers as well as state police and military police descended on the farm. They found no evidence of the visitors and also couldn’t make sense of the event. One officer did spot something glowing in the trees but after searching the area nothing was found. Neighbors would state that they saw a light in the woods but thought it was just the Suttons looking for their livestock.
Glennie Lankford, the matriarch of the Sutton family, stated that once the police left, she would spot one of the creatures glowing through her bedroom window and its claw like hand on the screen. The creatures had returned and would stay until daybreak. Scared and exhausted, the group would leave their home.
The next day, as investigators returned to the farmhouse, searching for any evidence of a saucer landing, footprints, blood or scratch marks on the roof. They again found nothing.
Bud Ledwith, a local radio station employee, interviewed the adult eyewitnesses and made sketches based on their accounts. As the story circulated around town, The story would then take a circus like turn next. In the next few days, radio stations and newspapers (including The New York Times) reported the incident, and hundreds of people descended on the farm. It soon became apparent to the Suttons that many people were there just to ridicule the group. Some claimed the Suttons were ignorant or fraudulent. The Suttons tried to discourage people from coming by putting No Trespassing signs, and even charging admission but these proved useless.
Since this time the event has been controversial with many believers and many skeptics.
Ufologist Isabel Davis was impressed by their consistent details among stories, even though the men were away from the farmhouse all day and would have been unable to coordinate with the others.
Davis acknowledged the lack of physical evidence; her belief was that the event had occurred. Davis pointed out that Mrs. Lankford was a no-nonsense matriarch who hated the limelight and had no reason to lie. None of the witnesses, Davis said, had any history of making up stories like this.
Ufologist Allan Hendry wrote: “This case is distinguished by its duration and also by the number of witnesses involved.”
Still others found the story suspicious:
Joe Nickell, a paranormal investigator, reviewed the evidence in an article entitled “Siege of the ‘Little Green Men’: The 1955 Kelly, Kentucky Incident.” In the article. he questioned Billy Taylor’s testimony. He says Taylor’s UFO sighting coincided with similar reports from that day from other people. And he suggests a small meteor was in the vicinity.
He goes onto to say he believes the group saw great horned owls, which are nocturnal, fly silently, with yellow eyes, and aggressively defend their nests.
The Suttons moved away from the property several months after the events occurred. There was a constant fear that the creatures would return one day, and the constant media harassment became too much for them.
The story of this terrifying siege by these creatures would become one of the most detailed and baffling accounts of an alien close encounter. Its notable for the large number of witnesses, the length of the encounter, and the close proximity between the witnesses and aliens. Over the years writers have pointed out just how similar and how the consistent the story has remained.
This event has inspired much UFO culture today.
This event has remained one of the most well-known UFO cases today. The term “little green men” was coined after this strange occurrence. Prior to this sighting, aliens were called “little men”
It’s been nearly 70 years since this event occurred, and it shares in common the characteristic that many ufo and alien cases have: no physical evidence. Still, the large number of witnesses and the genuine fear displayed by the group that nights raise many questions as to why they would make it up? How would they get 12 witnesses to tell the same story and stay consistent over the years? Surely, if someone was trying to play a prank the gunfire would have scared them off?
In conclusion, we may never know why the creatures only revealed themselves to the Suttons and friends that night. We do know that a similar incident happened almost 60 years later, and we will cover this case later.
