Aurora, Texas 1897

An airship hit a windmill; the pilot, "not of this world," was buried in the town cemetery. The grave marker keeps disappearing.

April 17, 1897: the Dallas Morning News reported an 'airship' striking Judge Proctor's windmill in Aurora, Texas, its pilot — 'not an inhabitant of this world' — buried in the local cemetery. The story belongs to the 1896-97 mystery airship wave, much of it newspaper hoaxing; the correspondent later reportedly admitted invention, though a 1973 MUFON dig request was refused and a marked grave was claimed. It stands as the pre-Roswell prototype: crash, occupant, burial, and a town that has never fully disowned the story.