Watch the Skies (1955 - ) was a mid-20th century news magazine published by Schlitz Periodicals in Los Angeles, California.
History and specifics[]
The magazine launched in 1955 with a focus on fantastical events such as UFO sightings, with an aim towards accuracy and truthfulness. It had a loyal but small readership.
To reduce expenses, illustrations for its stories were created by the same in-house artist who illustrated articles for the company's science fiction magazine Startling Universe, and in some cases the same image appeared in both publications.
Calvin Sutherland was given the magazine's sole staff writing position after he'd worked on its sister publication Tinseltown Tattler for a year. He intended to maintain journalistic integrity and high standards in the publication. Newsstand sales and subscriptions were boosted by articles about events like those in Roswell, New Mexico and Carbon Creek, Pennsylvania, and drew the attention of personnel such as James Wainwright, who felt that some of the photos in the magazine were better than ones taken by the United States Air Force. Majestic 12's Professor Jeffrey Carlson occasionally leaked information to the magazine in order to take advantage of Sutherland's tenacity and acumen.
On 23 February 1968, Watch the Skies received detailed photographs of an alien through the mail from Joshua Langsford, a loyal subscriber who worked at McKinley Rocket Base in Florida. The photos were the clearest Sutherland had ever seen, and he immediately alerted Wainwright. But before he could mail copies of the photos to Wainwright, Sutherland was killed in his office by a Certoss. (TOS novel: From History's Shadow)
Staff[]
- Calvin Sutherland, editor in chief, staff writer