DecemberOn AboveTopSecret.com I posted the following information.... within 6 hours of this post the thread recieved over 39,500 views, 104 flags and 56 stars... and it even drew the attention of Space writer James Oberg. Visit ATS to follow the interesting and sometimes heated debate about the following 'press release'

NASA Scientist Fired - Promises Disclosure
Posted November 01, 2007

Originally posted by zorgon Post ID 312623
We have all been waiting a long time for this news...

Wednesday, October 31, 2007
U.S. scientists unveil NASA’s secrets about cities on the Moon and microbes on Mars

Excerpt...

"The former manager of the Data and Photo Control Department at NASA’s Lunar Receiving Laboratory during the manned Apollo Lunar Program, Ken Johnston, has released quite a number of sensational statements recently in the USA. The specialist said that U.S. astronauts found ancient ruins of artificial origin and a previously unknown technology to control gravitation when then landed on the Moon. Astronauts took pictures of the objects that they found, but NASA ordered Johnston to destroy the images. Johnston did not follow the order. He said that the U.S. government had been keeping this information a secret for 40 years."

"Johnston's startling Apollo allegations have recently appeared in a new book, "Dark Mission: the Secret History of NASA," co-authored by former NASA consultant and CBS Science Advisor, Richard C. Hoagland and Mike Bara, an aerospace engineering consultant. According to Kay Ferrari, JPL Director of the SSA Program (in a phone call to Johnston last week), it was Johnston "being quoted [as] criticizing NASA in Hoagland's new book, 'Dark Mission,'" that prompted her to ask for Johnston's resignation from the SSA Program. When Johnston refused, citing First Amendment protections of free speech afforded all NASA employees, even those at JPL, Ferrari apparently decided to remove him arbitrarily from the SSA Program this week without cause."

SOURCE: Pravda.ru

NASA Dismisses Former Apollo Photo and Data Manager from JPL Educational Program Missing Apollo Data to be Shown at National Press Conference

Excerpt...

"Dr. Ken Johnston, former Manager of the Data and Photo Control Department at NASA's Lunar Receiving Laboratory during NASA's manned Apollo Lunar Program, was abruptly terminated Tuesday morning, October 23rd, from JPL's prestigious "Solar System Ambassador" (SSA) Program. All evidence of Dr. Johnston's exemplary 4-year participation in the NASA outreach effort to "communicate the importance of NASA aerospace programs to the public around the world" has been scrubbed from the official JPL SSA website, without formal notification of Dr. Johnston as to cause."

SOURCE: http://www.sys-con.com/read/450055.htm

Dr. Johnston will present documentation of his claims, credentials and key role at NASA October 30th

Enterprise Mission to Hold Press Briefing on Possible Connection Between Next Space Shuttle Discovery Mission and Classified NASA Findings, at the National Press Club on Tuesday, Oct. 30

Excerpt...

"The subject: Why is NASA Determined to Launch Space Shuttle "Discovery" October 23rd, Despite NASA Engineering and Safety Center Warnings NOT to Launch?  Has NASA Learned NOTHING from the Previous Schedule-Driven Disasters of Challenger and Columbia?  Are Classified NASA Lunar Findings Secretly Pressuring the Aging Shuttle Program to Completion by 2010, to Make Way for "Constellation" -- and the New "Space Race" to the Moon?

Why this abrupt international focus on a 21st Century Moon Program -- after over 30 years of the Moon being totally ignored?  Did Apollo find "something" of major importance on the Moon, which NASA just forgot to tell the rest of us?  And is this somehow connected with NASA's inexplicable urgency to launch Discovery "on schedule," despite the safety issues?  The October 30th NPC briefing will present startling answers to these major public policy questions - which could significantly affect the future of the VSE and NASA."

SOURCE: Earthtimes.org

“I have nothing to lose. I have quarreled with NASA and I got fired,” Ken Johnston said.

In a related issue Congress had to step in to order NASA not to destroy data on a recent safety study...

U.S. government hides alarming air-safety report

Excerpt...

"NASA should focus on how we can provide information to the public, not on how we can withhold it," NASA Administrator Michael Griffin said in a statement. He said the agency's research and data "should be widely available and subject to review and scrutiny."

Last week, NASA ordered the contractor that conducted the survey to purge all related data from its computers. Congress intervened Monday, saying it will launch a formal investigation and instruct NASA to keep all its data. Griffin said he already was ordering that all survey data be preserved."

So what is going on here? Has NASA just been so accustomed to doing things their way that they think they are above the law?

I think the next few months should prove very interesting indeed... Naturally John and I will be following this story closely, even though Richard Hoagland has the scoop on us... 

While the battle rages as to who is right or wrong, who is lying and who is showing disclosure, we will focus on the few images that have been revealed... The ones above are labeled at Dark Mission Blog as Ken's version on the left and NASA's version on the right...

Originally posted by zorgon ATS Post ID 3786467
Okay here we go....

This whole thread has been about the release of Ken's pictures... and that afterall is why we are here... 
waiting for them 

First though a little snip from M Bara  (It appears he and Jim have been at this for some time) I clipped the section relevant to the press release that this thread is about

"Oberg has continued to insist in both private emails and public forums that Ken -- and indeed our entire premise -- should be rejected, because in his mind we made an “error” in our second press release promoting the October 30th National Press Club event.

Forgetting for the moment that I had nothing to do with the composition of that press release (I was merely the contact person listed on it), ..." - Mike Bara

So where are these pictures? Well here is one from Dark Mission blog... (See Above) On the left is one labeled from Ken on the right is one from NASA... Fortunately this time the image numbers are included and both are available from NASA so we have a comparison 

Full Res... NASA AS14-66-9279HR.jpg

Full Res... NASA AS14-66-9301HR.jpg

Now maybe one of the team can try to match the technique they used to bring out those details...

Personally I find the 'Blue Flame" with the two pinpoints of light more interesting and there is a smaller one as well...
..

The one above with the two "lights"was found by ArMaP ATS Post ID 3786829
 

So this is one of the promised pictures from Ken Johnston... Tomorrow I will show another one... 

Perhaps this "Blue Flame" is a Soul on its way to the Tower 

Full Res... NASA AS14-66-9295HR.jpg

Originally posted by ArMaP ATS Post ID 3786829

"If I am not mistaken, I have seen another photo with blue lights like those but in a way that showed them more like a camera or lens effect. I will try to find."

Originally posted by Zorgon

I don't know if this is the same one you were talking about but this is one Zarniwoop had found earlier in the Moon thread....
 

Here is the "Blue Flame" from this image... this one appears to actually have an object in it and shows much better detail. I find this one of the best anomalies we have in the collection... An early version of this image was found bt Zarniwoop and we have that already listed with the "Peekaboo" pages
..

Full Res... NASA AS14-66-9295HR.jpg
 

Closeup from this version...

Hey there Zorgon, how you be?...........
I been curious of your opinion on this here blue light and its source (other than RCH's theory - and I know you are good for it).  I think I got the direction of the reflections of the 'rays' correct. Thanks Z.
 

Attention Kmart shoppers................. 
 

Do you suppose its the same object reflected in the astronauts helmet/faceshield? 
 

First Released by Enterprise Mission
Full Res... AS12-48-7071HR.jpg
..

Closeup of the "Helmet Artifact"  (above) with the "Blue Flame Artifact" inserted below.
 

Originally posted on ATS by spikedmilk ATS Post ID 3787795

Caption:
"Color Fig.16 - AS15-88-12013 Post TEI view looking back toward Moon. Color enhancement shows blue 
rayleigh scattered light encircling the Moon, identical to atmospheric "airglow limb" seen on Earth.
Such scattering is flatly impossible on an airless body like the moon, leaving shattered transparent lunar  dome model as a viable explanation for this photographic phenomenon."

The image above is clipped from the version of the same photo that is available from http://eol.jsc.nasa.gov/ Sorry no direct linking is available. Below is the full size version that the above clip is taken from. (Click on image below to see full size)
 

Source Image: LPI AS15/88/12013.jpg

Source Image: Smithsonian Apollo Collection AS15-88-12013

Now which version did R. Hoagland et al use? Or does Ken Johnston have another print that is different?

The image above is clipped from the version of the same photo that is available from http://eol.jsc.nasa.gov/ Sorry no direct linking is available. Below is the full size version that the above clip is taken from. (Click on image below to see full size)
 

Lunar and Planetary Institute (LPI). Still lousy quality images but they still favor the "Saffron" look... Maybe this was taken at Sunset from Earth and THAT is the big "disclosure'  Well at least the greenish Atmosphere "air glow" is visible...
 

Source Image: LPI AS15/88/12014.jpg

If picture is worth a thousand words... THIS one would fill an encyclopedia... This one is PROOF POSITIVE

Here you see for the first time... direct from NASA History website... the true conditions on the surface of the Moon.
 

Source Image: NASA.HISTORY.GOV

Ha! I can here the Skeptics already " This is FAKE"  Now we alll know here that NASA doesn't ever 'manipulate' photos... the above presentation just proved that

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Michael Bara

Despite our recent posting of Dr. Ken Johnston’s credentials, certificates and awards, including his doctoral certificate from the Reform Baptist Theological Seminary of Denver, granted in 1985, NASA shill James Oberg has continued to attack Ken on several fronts. From the ridiculous accusation that Ken was not “in charge” of the photographs in his possession at NASA’s Lunar Receiving Laboratory, to attacking the doctorate itself, Oberg has been -- inexplicably for a guy who says he wants to “move on to other things” -- persistent. By his own account, Oberg has been burning up the phone lines trying to find something – anything – to discredit a man he has known for over 30 years, while continuing to pretend he’s never even met Ken Johnston.

The purpose of these vicious and personal attacks is multi-faceted, and designed to achieve several nefarious goals.
 

Any objective observer would have long-since concluded that Ken is exactly who he says he is, and that he has provided more than sufficient documentation verifying his resume. Yet, in his unrelenting attempts to assassinate Ken’s character, Oberg has hidden behind the lie that he is simply doing what any other journalist would do in his shoes. In reality, Oberg’s attacks have nothing to do with journalism. Oberg has no intention of ever writing anything for NBC or MSNBC on the questions raised by Dark Mission or the testimony Ken has given. He’s simply using this as an excuse to attack an honest American who served his country with honor in the Marines and at NASA in order to satisfy the blood thirst of the creeps who inhabit the CSICOP (now “CSI”) end of the spectrum, and to serve those at NASA who are threatened by Ken’s testimony.

This is clearly proven out by the pettiness and irrationality of the specific attacks themselves.

For instance, Oberg continues to argue that Ken was not “in charge” of the photographic datasets in his possession at the Lunar Receiving Laboratory, despite the memo from NASA’s Dr. Jeffery L. Warner, which states that “the data and photo facilities in Room 105 that is run by Ken Johnston… is an order of magnitude better than when I left it.” It’s hard to understand how someone who “runs” a data and photo facility is somehow not “in charge” of the data and photos that he is given oversight of. Only a twisted agenda like Oberg’s can manage to turn this into some sort of “discrepancy.”

Furthermore, it wouldn’t matter if Ken had been merely the janitor at the LRL during the Apollo Program, much less “in charge” of anything. All that matters is that he was, in fact, in a position to have access to the official Apollo photographs he has now provided to the world (as Dr. Warner’s memo, among many other documents, clearly establishes); that he was subsequently ordered to destroy these photographs (a story we recount in “Dark Mission”), and that he chose instead to preserve some of the images -- to the ultimate betterment of mankind.

So given these indisputable facts, why is Oberg still pursuing a subject he claims he’d rather not be spending time on? Perhaps the answer lies in the legal entanglements which potentially arise from NASA’s original order.
 

One unspoken motivation for Oberg’s bumbling attempts at intimidation and highly invasive attacks on Ken’s character may be the desire to discredit him as a potential first-hand witness. Given the highly questionable legality of the order given to Ken to destroy key Apollo photographic data, a future courtroom appearance or Congressional inquiry is not out of the question. Several former NASA employees, all probably drawing pensions from their days at the Agency, are potentially implicated. That these same ex-NASA employees are now (according to Oberg anyway) denying that Ken Johnston was ever actually involved in the management of any LRL facilities or in charge of any photographs is hardly surprising. However, given their signed memos to the contrary (from over 30 years ago), it’s clear that they are most likely simply trying to cover their own rear ends, since they are directly threatened by Ken’s first person testimony regarding what they ordered him to do in those critical Apollo years.

This relentless smear campaign will also have a chilling effect on anyone else inside NASA thinking about coming forward. If they were to do so, as Ken has, and tell the truth about what they saw and did at the Agency all those years ago, they can expect the same sort of threats, intimidation and character assault that Ken has now experienced. Oberg, from his position as science reporter at NBC news, has already shown -- by getting Ken fired from his position as JPL Solar System Ambassador -- that he will use his power as a “journalist” to wreck the reputation of anyone who dares stand up to the NASA “family.”

However, as an obviously unintended consequence of Oberg’s one-man smear campaign against Ken, we now know that there were several other NASA photo labs, most notably “Building 8” at NASA’s (then) MSC in Houston, where early generation Apollo photographic prints and negatives were also stored and analyzed. So the question now arises, who was in charge of those official NASA photographs? And were they also ordered, as Ken was, to destroy their sets of photographic data from Apollo around the same time Ken was given his specific orders?

Perhaps someday (Congressional), inquiring minds will want to know…

But we must not lose sight of the most significant underlying reason for Oberg’s increasingly desperate efforts to attack Ken Johnston -- to distract readers of this blog (and anyone in the mainstream media) from the real, far more significant policy questions that are raised by Dr. Johnston’s disturbing first-person testimony. Namely, why was he told to destroy four priceless sets of lunar surface and orbital photography from the Apollo missions, and what was on them that NASA was so interested in hiding that they refused to allow the photos to be preserved or simply donated to academic institutions, to whom they would have been invaluable?

What Ken’s meticulously preserved first-generation prints showed was massive artificial “scaffolding” towering over the astronauts as they worked around the Lunar Module “Antares,” on Apollo 14. Later comparisons with Apollo 12 images from that landing site (only 122 miles away) confirmed these same towering glass-like structures, literally “over the horizon,” -- as seen from both landing sites. But without confirmation from NASA’s own image archive, some 30 years (and who knows how many photographic generations) later, Ken’s heroic act of disobedience might have gone unrewarded. As it is, thanks to the scanning efforts of NASA’s own archivists, we can now confirm that these artificial structures are clearly visible in NASA’s current database posted on its own official websites – even if they are degraded by the passing of more than a generation since Ken obtained his original prints and refused the orders by NASA Headquarters to destroy them.

So again, the issue is not “Ken Johnston,” an American hero who served his country when called and who was a true pioneer in the development of the Apollo program itself, but rather the data he preserved and showed the world.

As to Mr. Oberg, who, not satisfied with getting Ken fired from his well deserved position as a JPL Solar System Ambassador, has continued to attack Ken and complain about his own treatment in these pages, we have only one thing more to add. Oberg has continued to insist in both private emails and public forums that Ken -- and indeed our entire premise -- should be rejected, because in his mind we made an “error” in our second press release promoting the October 30th National Press Club event.

Forgetting for the moment that I had nothing to do with the composition of that press release (I was merely the contact person listed on it), Oberg has also attacked me personally because the press release mentions that Oberg was “a colleague of Johnston’s at NASA’s Manned Spacecraft Center during the Apollo Program in the 1970’s.” Note that the release never said that Oberg “worked on the Apollo program itself, or anything else implying that he was directly involved in Apollo when employed at NASA. Oberg, however, has continued to insist that he was never even at the (Johnson) Manned Spacecraft Center “during the Apollo program.”

Oberg buttresses his argument by writing that he started at JSC (the renamed “MSC,” in 1973) in late July, 1975 -- after the splashdown of the final Apollo mission, the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project (ASTP). He actually states his “start date” at JSC as July 28th, one week exactly after the splashdown of the Apollo-Soyuz mission.

This is, at best, a Clintonian prevarication.

As anyone who has ever worked in aerospace well knows, programs don’t “end” with the splashdown of a spacecraft or final flight of an aircraft. They go on for months, and sometimes years, afterwards. There is data to be gathered, scientific and engineering reviews to be published, and lessons learned to be applied to the next program.

Apollo was no different. In fact, the Apollo Program Office continued to stay open well beyond the July 21st splashdown of the last Apollo spacecraft. This official NASA history (SP-4209) shows that the Apollo Program Office was still open as late as October, 1975, when it was refitted to accommodate the shuttle program, which Ken and James both worked on.

It is not surprising to us that James Oberg continues to make outrageous charges and false claims about Ken, or is deceptive about his own employment history in a lame attempt to cover up the simple fact that he and Ken Johnston, indeed, both worked together at Johnson “during the Apollo Program.” We implore our readers to cut through the noise created by Oberg’s ongoing fallacious claims, and focus instead on what’s really important here – the amazing Apollo lunar ruins that NASA has tried, and now obviously failed, to keep secret for so long.

And to focus on the courage of one real American -- who has dared to stand up to an unending barrage of personal attacks at the hands of one of NASA’s own “hit men,” for simply trying to tell everyone the truth.

Posted by Mike Bara at 8:56 PM
http://darkmission.blogspot.com/2007/12/despite-our-recent-posting-of-dr.html

JimO
Member
Registered: 20-8-2006

Posted on 26-11-2007 @ 10:36 AM  Post ID 3742208

If we can return to the theme of the top of this thread, there are some interesting developments you might be interested in. Bara's own blog no longer posts my research results, so here they are:

Jim Oberg responds: Re “The Dark mission Blog”, by Michael Bara
darkmission.blogspot.com...

1. Central to the highlighting of the importance of Johnston’s lunar image stash is the claim that he was in CHARGE of Apollo mission imagery, and so had direct access to all of the original photographs – scenes that are advertised as confirming existence of anomalous lunar structures.

2. Johnston certainly worked IN the ‘Lunar Receiving Laboratory’ in bldg 31 during the later Apollo landing missions – that has never been in dispute. Nor has it been disputed that he received several sets of mission imagery – from the REAL imagery team in Building 8, the folks who were REALLY in charge of all mission imagery.

3. Posted credentials [on Bara's blog] support Johnston’s presence at the LRL, but make no mention of him being in CHARGE of anything image-related. The ABSENCE of such documentation can be surmised to imply that such documentation does not exist, since if it did, you can bet Mr. Bara would have posted it here, by now.

4. Contemporaries of Johnston’s at the LRL tell me that he, as a junior employee with no experience in astronomy, imagery, or other relevant skills, performed an important but low-level clerk task associated with distribution of lunar samples to scientists, samples that were accompanied by photographs of the samples taken in the LRL as well as any scenes showing the samples on the lunar surface. As far as I can tell, it was only such images – obtained by Johnston from the real imaging team elsewhere – that he worked with. It was important work and we are all grateful to him for doing it, but it was NOT the kind of responsibility -- and SPECIAL access to scenes unavailable to everybody else on the Apollo team – that has been widely misreported.

5. Validating Johnston’s professional credentials, especially in light of the wildly exaggerated nature of widespread claims over his most important job function, is a standard process of any investigation, whether journalistic, scientific, or even merely personal. First one checks out the published claims with other sources, and then (and usually, ONLY then) do you ask the individuals making such claims about any discrepancies.

6. The mere fact of even performing this validation checking has been attacked by Mr. Bara on the grounds that it is unethical to ask questions about somebody’s background, especially in the alleged circumstances that I “was a colleague of Johnston’s during the Apollo program” and hence “already knew” all his reported credentials were authentic.

7. The only conceivable source of this assertion is Johnston himself. And since it is patently false, and easily debunked (I did not arrive at the NASA Houston center until after the final Apollo mission in 1975), it ought to raise questions about the accuracy of Johnston’s memories and statements. Mr. Bara has been provided all relevant evidence about my career timeline but has to date still refused to retract his erroneous allegation.

8. Two secondary but still significant claims regarding Johnston’s professional skills and accomplishments dealt with his status as a “Marine jet pilot” and as the holder of a PhD degree in “Meta Physics” (per his JPL-posted biography). I felt it appropriate – and now in hindsight even more strongly feel that way, in light of what my checks uncovered – to ask around, prior to contacting Mr. Johnston directly.

9. I discovered, for example, that the institution that Johnston claims to have earned a PhD from does not, and has never, granted PhDs. There has been no response to this from Mr. Bara, although I provided him with that institution’s website. He has ignored this revelation.

[actually he did later respond, and provided a facsimile of a diploma (spelled 'deploma' on the jpg name) claiming a PhD from the "Reform Baptist Seminary" of Colorado. I have been unable to even confirm the existence of this alleged institution, much less the requirements or accreditation of such a degree]

10. I also had found Johnston’s pre-Apollo timeline too compressed to be credible – considering his age, I could not see how he could insert a jet pilot stint into his life, during the 1960s, and asked around regarding any existing documentation that supported the as-published career timeline. Mr. Bara’s has posted ‘credentials’ (darkmission.blogspot.com...) that fully confirm my initial suspicion: Johnston only completed ‘pre-flight’ pilot orientation in early 1965, and by 1966 he was starting work as a LM pilot training specialist in Houston
(darkmission.blogspot.com...) – no time for 13 months of jet school and a duty tour. I also note with great interest Mr. Bara’s inability to post ANY documentation on supposed jet school graduation and specific jet aircraft qualifications. The implications of the absence of such ‘credentials’ are eyebrow-raising.

11. In any case, the [Bara blog visitor] comment that “you are being swamped with documents that attest to … his having flown (solo) a multitude of aircraft,” has baffled me, because I haven’t seen a SINGLE such document in the series that Mr. Bara has posted that gives ANY indication of Mr. Johnston soloing in ANY aircraft. If somebody can help me resolve this reality clash, I’d appreciate the help.

[Ditto Johnston's claims to having been a NASA test pilot -- apparently without ever having had to leave the ground]

12. Regarding earlier posts laying blame on me for consequences of some of these inquiries, I have to repeat my incredulous question at the preposterous notion that somehow it was me, and me along, that let the ‘cat out of the bag’. Mr. Bara seems to propose that NASA otherwise would never have caught on that Mr. Johnston, while desiring to maintain his honorable status as a designated ambassador of NASA to the public, was secretly for years been opining to the public that NASA was falsifying the fundamental history of the Apollo program. Supposedly – and this is ROTFLOL moment for sure – NASA never realized this.

13. Bottom line: is the origin of the Apollo photographs provided by Mr. Johnston in any way ‘privileged’? Do they deserve to be described as ‘internal’ or ‘original’ versions? That is, should those prints (and the fundamental interpretations based on them) be given higher credence than other currently-available versions of them? Based on what I have discovered about the credibility of professional claims attributed to Mr. Johnston, that issue is subject to dispute.

It must also be added that I have been drawn much more deeply into this dispute than I originally intended, and as a consequence have found – and now am distributing – much more interesting background information about principals in this debate that I might not otherwise have taken the energy, or interest, to discover. The only reason for this is that Mr. Bara chose, arguably based on existing long-standing personal animus (see for example his essay and its accusations: www.lunaranomalies.com... and my rebuttal at www.jamesoberg.com...), to make me personally an issue and a target, arguably as a smokescreen to distract attention from questionable features concerning his own ‘expert witnesses’ and ‘whistleblowers’. He chose to create and distribute delusional defamations about me, and when confronted with refutations, refused to retreat or retract.

Such verbal viciousness, not unprecedented, has served to alert many journalists and investigators that it’s most prudent to avoid this subject entirely, and to just steer clear of this entire controversy, because debate and dissent creates venomous ferocity. This can be seen in the responses from many of Mr. Bara’s associates in recent blog postings here. They are to an alarming degree obscene and phantasmagorical (and embarrassingly misspelled – even Bara can’t spell correctly the name of an astronaut he cites as endorsing Johnston [he corrected the misspelling after my attempted post pointed this out]). This tends to isolate and ghettoize these themes even further, radicalizing proponents and raising questions of the degree to which they might be willing to go to vent their fury at heretics and to punish them for expressing their objectionable doubts and disagreements.

Those interested in the public debate might enjoy visiting Amazon’s discussion area on the book, at www.amazon.com...

Here's another message rejected by Bara -- about the alleged PhD diploma he posted for Johnston:

Reply filed by Oberg, 1:15 PM Nov 21 – rejected by Bara

Well, here's what my internet searching found -- or didn't. No documentary evidence of the existence of any "Colorado Reform Baptist Church" seminary.

I need to remind Mr. Bara that on his own blog, Mr. Johnston had stated, "I hold .. two advanced degrees from the Reformed Baptist Seminary, one in Theology and the other PhD in Metaphysics...".

Perhaps now Mr. Bara is criticizing me for carelessly believing that Johnston correctly named the school when I should have KNOWN he really meant the 'Colorado Reform Baptist Church' seminary of Denver, instead. My telepathic powers are clearly not as advanced as Mr. Bara insists they be. When Mr. Johnston posted a written message claiming a degree from the "Reformed Baptist Seminary", clearly I was unjustified in assuming he could remember the name of the school correctly (and if not, what ELSE has he not remembered correctly?).

Trying to track down the seminary of the ‘Colorado Reform Baptist Church’, I found this “Reformed Baptist Church of Northern Colorado” in Longmont (www.rbcnc.com...) and talked with the pastor. Mr. Doug Vanhorn.

I told him I was trying to locate “the seminary of the ‘Colorado Reform Baptist Church’, in Denver”, and his immediate response was, “The WHAT?? I’ve never heard of such a thing.” He continued: “We’re definitely not associated with anything like that, and I’ve lived in Denver my whole life.”

Some historical records do indicate the existence of a “Colorado Reform Baptist Church” in Denver, founded in 1981 and still in existence in 1993 (date of the report). A search of the current Colorado on-line directory assistance showed 77 entries for "Baptist" in the Denver area, but no “Reform Baptist” anything.

A call to the "Denver Association of Southern Baptist Churches" got the response that maybe that institution had merged with the "Colorado Christian University", but a search of that school's website (and the Wikipedia article about its history) showed no mention of it. Besides, the church is missionary-oriented and offers no PhDs, and no degrees in 'metaphysics' at all.

Johnston's diploma was signed by a number of individuals. "Charles Lee Meininger" was identifed as 'Bishop, Colorado Reform Baptist Church', but his obituary (he died May 14, 2007, in Wheatfield, Colorado) merely mentions that he "spent many years in radio broadcasting" - no mention of any church activity, or any seminary. "Robert K. Whitsit" was listed as "Chairman of the Faculty", but the only man of that name (even without the middle initial)on the Internet is now president of an auction company.

The piece of paper that Mr. Bara has presented, so far, stands only for its PDF image, with no independently verifiable background information that anything on it is accurate.

It could well turn out to be some short-lived diploma mill, non-accredited like those that used to be advertised on the back cover of 'Science & Mechanics', or even a genuine school that vanished too soon before the arrival of the Internet, to leave any paper trail at all (with all of its works vanishing without any ripples). But the burden of proof of its existence (and the true nature of the 'PhD') should now have shifted to those who claim it did exist -- in my view, sufficient 'reasonable doubt' has been raised. 

Here's another reply that Bara refused to post on his blog -- it goes to the center of the claim that Johnston had access to, and was ordered to destroy, special moon photos.

To thread "stupid blog posts - 2", sent 3:40 PM, Nov 23….

Rich_Riggs asks, "Lost in the attempt to obfuscate by focusing on the personalities involved are questions that I want JimO or someone to answer..."Is it true that Ken was told to destroy original material from the taxpayer funded moon missions?" And, "upon whose authority was that done?" And. "Why?", "

This is a good question and central to the importance of the claims. Here's what I've found:

The first item posted under 'A Question of Credentials - 3', references Dr. Jeffrey Warner, whose task Mr. Johnston took over beginning with Apollo-14.

Johnston has described his task as being in charge of all Apollo mission imagery (a status that supposedly gave him 'insider' access to unique Apollo imagery, as well as the power to delete imagery from the master archives -- Rich's question). Press reports based on Dark_Mission press releases describe Johnstone as 'director of Apollo photo archives'.

Warner does not remember it that way. In an email to me recently, he wrote:

"I was part of the Curator's office during all the Apollo missions. Over the
years I had different assignments. During Apollo 11 and 12, among other
things, I was in charge of lunar sample photographs in the Lunar Receiving
Laboratory (LRL). BRN [JEO: Johnston's employer] technicians took photographs of lunar rocks, the photographs were processed in the JSC photo lab, and the prints came to me. A BRN employee technician named Marion (I disremember his last name, but it must be in the records) was my assistant in dealing with rock photographs. I did this as part of my duties as Associate Curator - there was no special or identified office. For Apollo 14-17, dealing with photographs became quite routine, and was handled by the Curatorial BRN support staff... [JEO: I think Warner is referring to Johnston and his co-workers here]

"There never was an 'office of Apollo mission photography' in the LRL. As you know, mission photographs went directly to the JSC photo lab where
they were processed and where prints were made. Mission photographs were never curated in the LRL. The only mission photographs we had in the LRL were copies of prints that we used to document specific rocks on the lunar surface."

JimO resumes comment: It seems that there has been major misrepresentation and deliberate confusion regarding Mr. Johnston's duties and responsibilities regarding lunar photographs.

He reports having received a number of sets of Apollo imagery, clearly from the office responsible for it in another building. Once the LRL stopped receiving new Apollo samples, it went througfh a major down-sizing and consolidation of records and elimination of duplicative (and no longer useful) mutli-copy material. It was under those circumstances, apparently, that Johnston was directed to clean out the cabinets and trash the images.

I don't know why he would have been told he couldn't keep them -- perhaps there were regulations that material generated for NASA internal use was not for public release, and public access to lunar photos would be through the public information office. In any case, I've seen no indications that the LRL photo sets that Johnston seems to have been custodian of (but not originator of) were different in any substantive way from the master files, which have always been fully accessible to researchers (and the press) at depositories such as the Lunar Science Institute. 

I'm gonna date myself but that was MY pledge class year (different frat -- I was a Teke, alpha mu chapter). And I got my own pledge name, which will remain off the record for now...

I don't see any value in 'debating' for fun -- I'd like to see what we can find out about this Colorado Reform Baptist Church seminary that Mike Bara claims Ken Johnston got his PhD in "Meta Physics" from. It was when Johnston was asked by JPL about the bio data he had posted on their website -- about his advanced degrees and his jet pilot experience in particular -- that he suddenly offered to resign. So let's dig along those lines.

BTW, his given name is Ralph Kennedy Johnston, goes by "Ken", so that explains the false-positive 'hits' on earlier searches assuming his name was 'Kenneth Johnston'. Folks who knew him thought he also might have had a brother working at NASA -- he might be a useful witness to track down and interview. 

Here's where Bara posted the 'deploma', as he calls it:

bp1.blogger.com...

This looks about as legit as Dan Rather's
'Bush national guard' letter.... Naaah.... 

Here's another pair of messages I've submitted to Bara's blog -- with little expectation he will post them. Ity might be fun for readers here to actually try and locate the origin of Johnston's PhD 'deploma'.

------------
Message submitted Nov 28 // 11:52 AM CST

Let's review:

Thread started October 6, 2007 – Ken Johnston Answers Commentators Questions

Paragraph 3 line 6-7: “I hold …two advanced degrees from the Reformed Baptist Seminary, one in Theology and the other PhD in Metaphysics.”

Step one: Locate the “Reformed Baptist Seminary”, and ask if they grant PhDs at all. Academic dean Dr. Robert Gonzales says they do not (he does not even have to look of “Johnston” on a list, since the degree claimed by Johnston has never been granted by his school).

Step two: Bara posts “Stupid Blog Post - #2” on November 21, 8:23 AM, presenting a ‘deploma’ (right click the image, select ‘properties’, and read the file name – ‘deploma’) from a school NOW called “The Reform Baptist Theological Seminary” in Denver, Colorado.

Document image is here: bp1.blogger.com...

Deduction: Johnston merely misremembered or misspoke when he claimed the school was called the “ReformED Baptist Seminary”. In any case, Bara’s posting is tacit admission that Johnston’s original claim of the school’s name was untrue. Easy enough to fix – and no big deal, it’s why VERIFICATION is always a sensible, prudent policy.

Step three: some posters launch vicious verbal assault on Dr. Gonzales for being lazy, incompetent, arrogant, and a liar to boot.

Deduction: Dr. Gonzales’s statement was actually totally accurate, as Bara conceded in posting the corrected name of the school – another school entirely.

Step four: Having caught one error (of undetermined origin) in Johnston’s claimed credentials, just to be cautious, check out the nature of the PhD program at the institution called “The Reform Baptist Theological Seminary” in Denver, Colorado. I encourage anybody interested in the dispute to perform this step independently. The first step, I suggest, is to find it. Go and try.

===
submitted Nov 28, 12:01 PM CST

Completion of USMC jet school during the Vietnam era incurred a six year 'duty commitment' to actually fly airplanes and get a payback for the expensive program. What I can't figure out is why, a year after completing the PRE-flight portion of training, Ken is suddenly a civilian, working for Grumman -- where he becomes a "test pilot" who somehow never gets off the ground again. Now, those circumstances strike me as suggestive of significant issues that are being withheld by the parties involved. 

It's also illuminating to google the names listed as school officials. 

For Meininger I found his obit, he 'spent a lot of years in radio broadcasting', his sister said. No church work. And Whitsit is listed as president of an auction house. I hadn't recognized 'Conklin', that might be a stretch...

reply to post by Tuning Spork

Tuning Spork, you are an exemplary internetinvestigator!!!

Conklin is EXACTLY the guy who founded and ran the 'Theological Seminary'. We talked by phone this morning.

Here's a note I've just posted on Bara's blog:

submitted 2:30 pm CST, Friday, Nov 30

Well, now that I have located and talked with the man identified on the 'deploma' as "Dean of the Seminary", I have a much better understanding of what the piece of paper represents. To begin with, he insisted that a 'Doctor of Metaphysics' degree is NOT a 'PhD' and nobody has any right to term it as such. We also discussed what the requirements had been for obtaining this piece of paper from the corporation he had set up and operated for about a decade, in the 1980s.

Time to take a deep breath and step back. Cool off. Ken Johnston, despite (as Mike has stated) not agreeing with most of the fundamental claims in Dark_Mission, has been sucked into this conflict with his specific Apollo-era allegations. Maybe deeper than he had originally intended.

It's time to ask Ken to clarify, in the light of highly inflated claims made by others about him, three things:

1. What was his real degree of responsibility and authority over Apollo mission imagery while he was doing his duties at the Lunar Receiving Lab? How many people (if any) worked for him? Did he have any responsibility for 16-mm motion films? I have already talked with Dr. Mike Duke and Dr. Jeffrey Warner, mentioned in the certificates, and with the chief of the LRL, Dr. Bryan Erb.

2. Dark_Mission portrays Ken as a "Marine fighter jock" and "test pilot". Realizing that graduation records from military flight school are on the public records, Ken should specify the level of flight training he actually achieved, including what (if any) aircraft he ever actually flew (as pilot). Flying simulators and ground trainers, alas, does not count as 'flight time' in most official books.

3. Dark_Mission and this blog refer to him as "Dr. Johnston". Ken should specify what it actually took for him to obtain the certificate posted here, and on what basis that certificate as written justifies use of the academic title (especially as the school involved doesn't seem to ever have been accredited -- according to the guy who founded it!).

I urge him to be forthcoming on these details, rather than wait for somebody else to publish the public record information (albeit often difficult to obtain) that differs in so many substantial ways from the widely-circulated claims (many of them NOT Ken's fault).

Then we can properly assess the testimonial evidence that Ken has offered about this controversy.

Please forward this note to Ken for his own consideration of a response. Stop exploiting his enthusiasm and generosity (and genuine contributions to the space program in many ways) for promoting a cause that he actually may have little in common with. And less and less, as his reputation is exploited for book promotional purposes.

I'm going to give Ken the chance to initiate full disclosure on this -- IF Bara will allow him to.

It will diffuse the hysteria if he does it. 

This might be related to the question at hand...

quackwatch.org...
“A.. large gray area is the one dealing with religious schools. Because constitutional safeguards in the United States guarantee separation of church and state, most states have been reluctant to pass any laws restricting the activities of churches -- including their right to grant degrees to all who make an appropriately large donation. In many states, religious schools are not regulated but are restricted to granting religious degrees.

Also see:
Diploma Mills FAQ:
www.wes.org... 

Here's why Johnston's credentials and credibility are central to Dark_Mission's theme:

Dark Mission -- The Secret History of NASA
Richard Hoagland and Mike Bara
Feral House publishers, 2007
pp. 144-148
 

Johnston later moved [to the LRL].. Ken’s key function was as ‘supervisor of the data and photo control department’ This was the section of the LRL that handled all of the photographic and written documentation related to Humanity’s first returned pieces of the Moon; after processing elsewhere in the Lab, the films and samples also went through Johnston’s office for cataloguing and long term storage.

Johnston explained that, as head of the LRL photo lab, it was his responsibility to catalog and archive ALL of the Apollo photographs. As part of the archiving process, the LRL eventually developed four complete sets of Apollo orbital and hand-held photography, comprising literally tens of thousands of first-generation photographic negatives and prints.

nip>

...[I]n 1972, near the end of the manned lunar program. Johnston was called into the office of Ben Laskawa, Johnston’s lead at the LRL records division. At the meeting, Laskawa told Johnston that orders had come down from NASA headquarters (through Dr. Michael Duke, Laskawa and Johnston’s NASA boss) to destroy all of the copies of the original NASA photography that he had been protecting and archiving for the past several years. Johnston was dumbfounded that anyone could order the destruction of the official record of Mankind’s first venture beyond the earth. He protested, and begged to be allowed to donate the photographs to various universities or foundations, but was told there was ‘no chance’. The orders were explicit -- he was to destroy all four sets of the literally ten of thousands of Apollo lunar photographs taken by the astronauts.

Johnston found this situation unconscionable. Eventually, after further protests, he relented and destroyed three full sets of the data -- but with his guilt eating away at him, he decided to save one complete set ‘elsewhere’. Some of the images and negatives he kept for himself. However, since the collection was so vast, he eventually decided to donate the rest to his alma mater, Oklahoma City University, where the data quietly resided -- out of NASA’s oversight -- for over thirty years...

Hoagland was saddened and repelled, all at the same time, by the whole tragic affair. That the extremely limited number of high-quality, first or second generation copies of the unique photographic record of Man’s first voyages to the Moon could be so blithely -- so deliberately -- destroyed, and by an official NASA order, infuriated him almost beyond words. Obviously, after years of looking at the remaining database... Hoagland finally had his ‘smoking gun’. He was now totally convinced of a deliberate Apollo coverup of ET artifacts -- coming officially from NASA headquarters in Washington, DC.

A careful study of Ken’s surviving photographs reveal overwhelming evidence that Hoagland’s darkest fears -- about ‘deliberately concealed lunar artifacts’ -- were definitely well-founded...

So this 'purloined data', Dark_Mission claims, is safe?

"... [H]e eventually decided to donate the rest to his alma mater, Oklahoma City University, where the data quietly resided -- out of NASA’s oversight -- for over thirty years..."

It was trivially easy to determine that this statement, as so many others, is false.

I called Christina Wolf, OCU Archivist and Special Collections librarian (located via internet search in 2 minutes), and she was familiar with the material -- "about two cubic feet, but way before my time..."

It was never donated to the Dulaney-Browne Library's 'spacial collections', but directly to the science department in Loeffler Hall.

"But when they renovated the building in 1988, a professor took it home with him. When he died, we never got them back. The materials are presumed lost."

She added that Ken Johnston has been in contact with her trying to locate the material, so far without success.

So -- the box sat in a professor's office for fifteen years, and was never missed when he took it home -- where it presumably ended up in the trash after his death.

Is there anything that has been claimed about Johnston's experiences that has actually checked out to be true? 

More claims:

Russian Media Publicity Part Two: Updated 11/26/07!
www.enterprisemission.com...

Moskovsky Komsomolets
www.mk.ru...
22.11.2007 01:00 aticle
??????? ????????, ??????? ?????????

Q&A BETWEEN 'MK' AND RICHARD C. HOAGLAND
And now, the moment we've been waiting for... the actual Q&A "Moskovsky Komsomolets" sent to me, along with my answers. This is where the real 'meat' of our article comes into play, as much of this content was edited down for publication [JEO: including all references to Oberg]:
nip>

MK: Are you afraid that NASA or USA government could be after you because of the fact that you've disclosed this secret?

nip>

Getting back to the thrust of your question, we have seen one case of open retribution against Dr. Johnston. This appeared in the sad efforts of one former NASA contractor, James Oberg, who is now a science consultant for the NBC network.

Oberg got Dr. Johnston dismissed from his volunteer position in a current JPL educational program, strictly because of his public testimony in "Dark Mission."

Oberg felt that Dr. Johnston was criticizing NASA’s actions during and after the Apollo missions, and convinced Dr Johnston's boss, Kay Ferrari, to immediately fire him and remove all traces of his service from the public record online.

Any further examples of harassment, threats or intimidation towards either Dr. Johnston or me would simply politically confirm what we've been saying for eleven years:

That NASA has been officially hiding the REAL Moon all this time. 

I just got a response from a retired USMC pilot, general officer, and long-time 'space buddy' of mine. At my request he had asked his Pentagon contacts about any records of Ken Johnston ever being a Marine pilot.

He emailed me: "I just received some info back from the manpower folks at Headquarters Marine Corps. Following is an excerpt from the message I received:

"...our records show no record on an officer pilot named Johnston, - Ralph K, Ken, or Ralph Kenneth. My recommendation for any journalist or PAO looking to verify stories would be, 'show me your DD214'."

Now, I had asked about a 'Ralph Kennedy Johnston', but on his military certificates he was using the name "Ralph K. Johnston', which they did check and drew a blank. I suspect that if they had found a 'Ralph Kennedy Johnston" they would have flagged it, because they did point out another near-hit:

"There is a retired Major Ralph K Johnson, A6E pilot. Born 1935. Entered Oct 1955. Retired with 20 years Nov 1975. Currently lives in Minnesota. Age about 10 years+ difference for the guy [you are] is describing. ." That isn't our guy, because “our Johnston” wasn't on active military service in the 1970s, he was at the NASA center in Houston. But it indicates to me that any similar 'near miss' would have been flagged.

Here's what Hoagland/Bara had written in DM, page 144:

"In early 1995, Hoagland … met Ken Johnston -- a Boeing engineer at the time, and a former fighter-jock and test pilot for Grumman Aerospace. After his duty tour in the Marines as an F-4 pilot, Johnson had gone to work at NASA in the mid-1960s as the chief Lunar Module test pilot."

His own ‘official NASA bio’ in the “Solar System Ambassador” program claimed: “Ken learned to fly in the US Marine Corps and in the 1960's he was one of the 5 Test Pilots assigned to work with the Astronauts during the Apollo Moon Program at NASA in Houston.”

Now, here’s the problem with these claims – from the beginning, there was no credible timeline to accomplish them. If he ever was a pilot and served a duty tour, it must have been extremely brief and under a different name. He only completed 'pre-flight' pilot training on 26 February 1965. For pilot training, a cadet at this level would wait for a flight school slot – and that could take up to a year in the Vietnam era – and then complete the class in 13 months, followed by a six year duty commitment for flight operations.

Yet on October 10, 1966 (only 20 months after finishing pre-flight school), he is hired by Grumman Aerospace on Long Island (NY), on a contract that would include work as “a LM test crewman” [NOT “test PILOT”] and other interfacing with NASA trainers and astronauts. That job ended on August 1, 1969, as the contract was terminated after the success of Apollo-11 and all test and training functions transferred to NASA.

On Jan 28, 1970 he was assigned work in the “lunar sample and photo area” and spent the rest of the Apollo program there. But that’s another story.

What's the explanation for these disconnects? 

Here's Bara's response to my inquiry about Johnston's pilot status:

From: mbara
Sent: Wednesday, December 05, 2007 10:01 AM
Subject: RE: Johnston's "pilot" status
 

No Jim, the biggest difference between us is that you are a vile, vicious little man with a poisoned soul, who always assumes the worst about people he disagrees with and uses character assassination to try and win arguments he can't win on the facts alone. I on the other hand am a human being.

Mike 

"Waiting" for a reply from Johnston allows him to have veto power over any criticism of his claims, in effect.

He starts out by making claims. They are repeated in Dark_Misssion.

I do some investigation, and dispute those claims.

Bara, replying on behalf of Johnston, posts 'certificates', none of which refute my disputation.

Bara makes claims about me that are demonstrably false:
1. I was a colleague of Johnston's during Apollo and knew all his claims were valid. False.

2. Consequently my asking questions about those claims is an unethical personal 'attack' on Johnston, a smear. False and defamatory.

3. I contacted NASA JPL's 'Solar System Ambassador' program, on the instigation of the dark forces, with a demand that Johnston be expelled from the volunteer program ("fired"). False and defamatory.

4. Had I not raised those credentials questions, NASA would never have caught on the Johnston had 'spilled the beans' to Hoagland in his book.
Preposterous.

Even when directly challenged, Bara/Johnston fail to produce any evidence Johnston had authority over unique Apollo photo archives.

Even when directly challenged, Bara/Johnston fail to produce any documentation that Johnston earned a real "PhD".

Even when directly challenged, Bara/Johnston fail to produce any documentation Johnston ever graduated from, or even attended, military flight school.

Instead, the produce documents which show quite the opposite, while claiming that the documents show support for his claims.

They've made their best case, in attempted rebuttal of investigation results demolishing their original claims. It's time for a presumption of evidence to lead to preliminary conclusions -- not time to call 'time out' until Johnston comes up, if ever, with something better.

When he ever does, the evaluation of the conflicting claims can be reassessed. Keep in mind that the longer time he has to respond, the longer time he (or an associate) has to arrange bogus documentation.

If he HAD real documentation, seems to me he could have -- and would have -- posted it on Bara's blog weeks ago. The absence of any such posting should be indicative of something -- not proof he deserves an indefinite 'time out'.

Bara's response is here:
darkmission.blogspot.com...

Notice that to 'prove' Johnston was a Marine jet pilot, he posts a cadet portrait of Johnston with no wings. And his readers swallow it up and call for my head!