My interest in the moon began in the 50's as a teenager. I was never satisfied with simple optical observations, however. I always had this vision of a control room searching for evidence of ETI, but not with radio signals. My parents, brother and two sisters lived in the country back then, and the evening skies were exceptionally clear. The skywatches involved several neighbors, so the interest was more than just my own. I had a small telescope, but what I did with it was surprising. We had a coal bin that was next to the house and underground. It had a man-hole-type cover so that the coal in the winter could be fed in by conveyor. In the spring and summer I moved the remaining coal out and used the empty concrete block room for an "observatory". By sticking the scope out of the "man-hole" during the day and closing up the light space around it, I was able to make a dark room that projected a very large image of the sun, using a microscope tilt mirror, right on the west wall. Everyone was amazed at the giant yellow star (the sun) with the beautiful blue sky all around it, with all the detailed spots (umbra and penumbra).

As a young man I met a scientist, a person who had worked on Project Sign, the original Air Force UFO project. Before long I got involved in UFO investigation. By November of 1960 this man's scientific credentials had made it possible for me to set up a rapid response team for the National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena. I later served with MUFON when NICAP shut down and was MUFON State Director up until the time I set up The Lunascan Project in August of 1995. My interest in SETI took me 35 years from that November of 1960 before I seemed to make any kind of progress. I investigated hundreds of sightings and had over 4,000 incidents in the six state region researched and catalogued on computer. In 1994 I released my book, "Regional Encounters: The FC Files" to make sure my life's work didn't fade after my eventual demise. The big change had began with the advent of the computer in the mid-80's, but really took off when I got "online" in 1996.

Fifteen years before Lunascan was the late 70's and the age of the videotape recorder and the video camera. My first VHS recorder was $1500 and weighed about 75 pounds. I was too financially challenged at the time to buy a good color video camera, but found a used black & white surveillance camera at a Radio Shack for $75. It was for home and family use, but soon after that my imagination took over and the temptation was too great. If you could see the moon through a telescopic eyepiece, why couldn't I put the camera's eye up to that same eyepiece and see the moon on TV? It worked. I didn't have the time, funds, or patience in the late 70's to build the necessary camera mounts, etc., but I had "filmed" some strange objects streaking above the lunar surface. Some were birds; others were not. The videtapes produced very poor images and none survived. For fifteen years a vision haunted me, a vision of a better telescope, adequate mounts for cameras, and some way to control them from inside a control room of sorts. One night I dreamed about taping the moon and seeing something like the obelisks from "2001" floating in space . If ET existed, and I was as convinced then as much as I am now, there was always the possibility of catching them with their ET pants down, and I would have the evidence, maybe even the proof. But the timing was wrong. In 1995 the timing changed. I wanted out of the UFO "business" and wanted to enjoy astronomy, especially my dreams about scanning the moon. I resigned from MUFON, but stayed on as a special investigator for the J. Allen Hynek Center for UFO Studies, and had all the time in the world. I was an independent contractor and did PR work out of my home for Mid-Tech. I still didn't have the kind of money needed to mount such an ambitious moon scanning project, but the ideas began to mount and the doors started to open. And I was dragged, screaming and kicking, into the internet and email.

Several attempts to create a telescopic camera system in late summer of 1995 caused me to search the catalogs for a better, more reliable system. By late August I had ordered a gigantic "light bucket", a huge 16" Meade f/4.5 with an 1830mm f/l. I had two years of payments and the old original b&w Panasonic WV-450 camera and no way to mount it. I decided to set up a full-time project with a play on the outdated term . "TLP", which stood for "Transient Lunar Phenomena". The new term had been replaced by "LTP" ("Lunar Transient Phenomena), but the project would be called "The Lunascan Project." The project would be worth the effort if nothing ever happened other than improved imaging of the lunar surface using state of the art technology. The definition of an LTP, of course, is a short lived phenomenon observed on the Moon. This can consist of red glows, flashes, obscuration, and abnormal albedo and shadow effects. They didn't mean evidence of ET, but could manifest themselves in that way. Geologically speaking, LTPs were a legitamate topic for a comprehensive study.

Later on in the project, the entire July 1968 NASA Technical Report, R-277, of over 1500 reported LTP events would be linked from our website. A copy of the report is hosted on MUFOR's web page by J.J. Mercieca. But there was more than LTPs. There were reports of Extra-Lunar Objects (ELOs), objects near (but not on) the moon. There were "fastwalkers", objects moving rapidly across the field of view and apparently near the moon. Other strange and anomalous features were found in NASA images, for example. And more recently many scanning teams had filmed meteorite impacts on the moon, something I had always predicted based on the fact that meteorites still strike the Earth. One of the goals of the project was even more ambitious. We needed to go back to the moon, and soon we found several reasons for going there that the public would probably support.

With internet email and the new Lunascan Email List of over 200 members, the interest in the project fluorished and the funds started rolling in. Not a whole lot in terms of other SETI research, by any means, but $3,000 got us the telescope, several 400-line CCD cameras, T-C adaptor mounts, and a DOB Driver II computerized telescope control system. We were now able to control the scope (which later became a double scope system) from down in the control room and watch the moon live on a TV monitors as well as tape the sessions for later processing. In a short time we were able to purchase a WWV receiver for audio time-dubbing (Coordinated Universal Time signal from Fort Collins, Colorado) and  TG-105 time date generator for on-screen video time/date dubbing. In this manner we were able to document any image we obtained. Later we purchased a Snappy frame grabber and were given two Aperture Video Correction Devices so that we could process the images from high quality recorded VHS tapes. By the end of  the year I was really into serious lunar research and was really enjoying it.

Early in the project I had started a database on NASA images of the moon to help us locate specific items. There were the images from Ranger, Orbiter, Surveyor, Apollo, and Clementine. Many of these great images gave no clue as to where the features were exactly located on the Moon. And how many people knew where the six Apollo landings took place? Or where all the Surveyor spacecraft touched down?  There were many great telescopic lunar photos on the internet that cried out for a single place to catalog their presence. For these images I created the acronym, "EBTI", to represent "Earth-Based Telescopic Images". For my own use I termed any photo that exhibited the entire moon as an "LPS" image, meaning "Low Power Scanning". "MPS stood for "Medium Power Scanning" and represented any image that contained only part of the moon, but still not considered "HPS", or "High Powered Scanning". HPS was considered to be over 300 power.

The need for a localized "bulletin board" and filing system for our work resulted in the Lunascan Project web site. It was sponsored several times by different individuals, but the drawback was in the reaction time between a submission and the actual posting, plus corrections. Originally the site was very simple, but soon the Lunascan Project. had a new goal, to educate the public about the Moon. By the summer of 1997 I had mastered the art of web-page making and had set up the site pretty much as it is today. The new site was launched on September 14,1997:

The best part of the site, in my opinion, is the nearside directories.  I've always had a great interest in filing information and I selected the 76 Antonin Rukl directory locations for all the nearside data. Although imaging the moon was the main mission in the beginning, the filing of image links and reports into the 76 directories became the most useful part of the Lunascan Project.  To facilitate the search I created a nearside click-on directory showing the Rukl divisions or sections at:

As an example, after going to this page and clicking on Section 64 (which is Tycho) one finds:

This directory has a bried discription of the area it represents, links to the best EBTI (Earth Based Telescopic Images) on the internet and BY the Lunascan Project that involve targets from that region, all the available Ranger, Orbiter, Surveyor, and Apollo images of the lunar surface for that region, plus all the appropriate research updates or reports, 14 at last count. I created all 76 directories, then began work on the farside.

But, lets' back up to the beginning again and discuss the imaging. The Lunascan Project was to use the efforts of others who had telescopic systems similar to ours. Very soon after the beginning of the project there was a definite need to operate the system by remote control. I had to design a flatbed-type system to roll the scope out to its scanning location. The idea became known as the STU, or Scope Transport Unit. While some of the hardware was being constructed by a colleague nearby, the Lunascan Project purchased a DOB Driver II computer system to provide the needed controls. With the DDII you could scan the moon as we always had, by panning the scope to the lunar limb, then allowing the Earth's rotation to scan the moon in slices, then panning the scope back to the limb again. Slight changes in the altitude adjustment under the "pan" mode created slightly different, but very smooth, scanning sections. And if one wanted to park over a feature, the DDII could be put into "tracking mode" and park right over the targe crater. It was, and still is, a remarkable system I highly recommend to anyone. 

By late summer of 1996 the STU was completed and imaging began in August. Some of the best images obtained were made during this month as we searched for a possible repetition of an anomaly on the peaks of Tycho predicted by colongitude by ALPO's David O. Darling. I had become a member of ALPO and David and I struck up a very good relationship. David has fought for 20 years to keep LTP's a serious area of lunar research . Our search began and involved over forty sessions. Our cameras recorded 1800 images per minute and most sessions were two hours, sometimes four.

One of our accomplishments ( I say, "our", because I had help from day one) by The Lunascan Project was able to solve the initial mystery of where the Blair Cuspids were located. I had seen a small photograph and a brief report in 1971 in a NICAP publication showing what looked like "towers" on the moon. They were explained as boulders sitting on crater rims with the low sun angle producing the long shadows that made them look like obelisks. In the June 1971 issue of the NICAP UFO Investigator, someone wanted copies of the photos. The response from NICAP was that they didn't  have copies of these pictures available for general distribution. They had been taken in November1966 by NASA's Lunar Orbiter spacecraft (not Ranger, as stated by NICAP's interviewer) and were available only from NASA. The principal photograph showing the "towers" was listed as picture No. 86-H-758, and the report stated that scientists now believed that the lunar features casting the strange shadows were not as tall as originally assumed and therefore could not properly be described as "towers." They were probably more like cubes or pyramids in shape. The shadows appeared elongated because the terrain on which they fall slopes downward, away from the protuberances, distorting the shadows' true shapes. Or so said the brief report.

Within months of the launch of The Lunascan Project, the catalog of items and possible anomlies reported in the past mounted, and included the "Blair Cuspids". So in 1995 I pondered these questions: Where were these towers on the Moon? Were they on the nearside or the farside? On what Rukl Chart (lunar section) did they fall in and what were they near? And most of all: What were they? Richard Hoagland had never mentioned them, yet he HAD mentioned something similar, "the Shard." Were these objects the same things or something else? Or, even more interesting, were these alleged objects or artifacts in the same area or region? It didn't take us too long to find out. After 24 years the "Blair Cuspids" were "re-discovered". With the help of the VGL group (SPSR's own Lan Fleming, and Jon Floyd, Mike Lomax, and Bill Kohler) and David Williams of NSSDC (National Space & Science Data Center), the Lunascan Project was able to solve the initial mystery of WHERE these towers were located, but many new questions and mysteries cropped up. Maybe the explanation put forth in 1971 was a little too simple an answer. My discovery of an additional image of the Cuspids, immediately investigated by the VGL team may have proved the sun angle hypothesis inadequate. The report on the Blair Cuspids is Status Report No. 2. 

On September 21, 1996, a little more than a year after The Lunascan Project began, we tracked an unknown object near moon. Although a detailed report on ULO-092196  is planned for a separate paper to SPSR, suffice it say that at no time during any of the 40 two-hour-long (or more) sessions had we observed or videotaped anything like this object. It was tracked for about 20 seconds right near the SE limb of the moon and in space. An EZC computer check showed no planets or anything else that would be large enough or bright enough to be detected with the bright lunar limb washing it out. Our immediate concern was a dangerously close asteroid which might be able to strike the Earth, if not the moon. If our calculations were right the object was about 2 miles in diameter. On October 1st  I reported the tracking to David Williams, of NSSDC (National Space & Science Data Center) in Greenbelt, Maryland. He requested that I contact Steve Pravdo, JPL's (Jet Propulsion Lab) task master for the Near-Earth Asteroid Tracking program. Within a day or so a quick email response from NEAT told us that ULO-092196 was not an asteroid. That left us with an unidentified object near the moon! The full report on ULO-092196 is the basis for Status Report No. 3.

Images in general from the huge 16" f/4.5 were not as satisfactory as desired, but most of this was due to the combination of the size of the very flat mirror and  the poor atmospherics of the midwest. Being a "light bucket", and designed more for deep space work on galaxies than lunar imaging, the 16" Meade produced images too bright and with little contrast, plus it was a very heavy piece of equipment. At the time, some of the best images on the internet came from Charles Genovese. Thomas Dobbins had probably succeeded more with this type of imaging and was a friend of Genovese, and I was always jealous of Charles' and Tom's famed 10" f/6's. Another advisor to the project was Jack Wolfe, who had some great long focal length telescope inventions. All suggested a major change in optics. By the summer of 1997 we seriously considered building a 10" f/6, almost from scratch. By January of 1998 we decided to go for it and we sold the 16" mirror of the giant Meade to get us started. With the aide of Charles Genovese and Milt Hayes, and donations from generous Lunascan members, we began preparations. In June we received, donated by Jack Wolfe,  a 10" Cassegrain mirror. Before the summer was over we had constructed the new 10" f/6 and it was online that fall. The power was less, about 320x (compared to the 16" 400x), but the contrast of the images was much better.

We later added a Medium Power Scanning unit to the system, using a 4-1/2" f/8 newtonian reflector. Originally the MPS  was mounted on the upper right of the main tube and the power we generated was about half that of the 10" f/6, about 160x. The temptation became too great for us and we added yet another scope to the array, an LPS (Low Power Scanning) unit that was a very good, high-res studio grade TV camera and telephoto lens. But set-up and alignment became a time-costly nightmare and the LPS (which was belly-slung) was eliminated. The array now has the MPS belly-slung and operates very well.

As stated earlier, I was an independent contractor and working for Mid-Tech on what is still a confidential project. By the end of 1999, funding to start that project had not been granted and I had to go to work like everyone else. About 15 scanning sessions which took considerable set-up and take-down time, now became less often and ceased for over a year. But this is about to change.

During the summer of 2001  I received permission and created separate pages with links to and from the Rukl directories on all the images and accompanying text from SP-362, "Apollo Over The Moon".  We already had the orbiter links. Now we had the best of the Apollo Metric and Panoramic images, filed right where they belong in the appropriate Rukl directory. Early in the project work on the Lunascan web site most of the lunar missions had been posted on our directory called "Moon Shot". But not all of the Russian space probes to the moon had been listed there. In September all of them were added and the Apollo pages were updated.