A declassified FBI file, released under the Bureau's Automatic Declassification Guide issued May 24, 2007, documents a 1966 exchange in which a New Hampshire resident wrote directly to Director J. Edgar Hoover asking whether her membership in a UFO newsletter organization could associate her with communist activity. The file, catalogued under case number 62-83894, contains the original handwritten letter, a typed transcription, and Hoover's formal response dated September 6, 1966.
The Letter and Its Concerns
Florence C. Dow of Goffstown, New Hampshire, wrote to Hoover on August 31, 1966, explaining that she was a member of NICAP — the National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena, one of the more prominent civilian UFO research organizations of the era — and had recently subscribed to the AFSCA Report, a publication of the Amalgamated Flying Saucer Clubs of America, Inc. She had sent three dollars for a twelve-issue subscription after noticing the organization's stamp on a piece of business mail received by a colleague.
After reading her first issue, Dow wrote, she became uneasy. According to the file, she stated her concern plainly:
"Having received and read my first issue I feel it isn't just what it appears on the surface. I can't say just why, but with my limited idea of how communists operate it strikes me it is backed by them."
Dow, who noted she would turn 63 in a few days and had worked as manager of the Reinsurance Department at the New Hampshire Insurance Company in Manchester for 44 years, framed her inquiry as a matter of patriotic concern. She described herself as a "true American" and expressed worry that her name might, through the subscription, become "aligned with the communist party." She asked whether there was any way to "get things straightened out" should that be the case.
Hoover's Response and Bureau Records
Hoover's reply, signed in his name and dated six days after Dow's letter, was brief and procedurally formulaic. The Director declined to offer any assessment of the organization in question.
"This Bureau is strictly an investigative agency of the Federal Government and, as such, neither makes evaluations nor draws conclusions as to the character or integrity of any organization, publication or individual. I am sorry I cannot be of assistance to you; however, you may be sure your communication will be made a matter of record."
A handwritten administrative note appended to the file states: "Buffiles contain no record of correspondent or Amalgamated Flying Saucer Clubs of America, Inc." — indicating that neither Dow nor the AFSCA had an existing FBI file at the time of her inquiry. The letter was processed internally under the notation "ED:jeg (3)," consistent with standard Hoover-era correspondence handling.
Context and Significance
The document is one of many released through the FBI's ongoing declassification of its "flying saucers" investigative files, a collection that spans roughly the late 1940s through the 1970s and reflects the Bureau's sporadic engagement with the UFO phenomenon during the Cold War period. The files demonstrate that citizen correspondence on the subject was routinely logged and retained, even when, as in this case, the Bureau took no investigative action.
Dow's letter is notable for what it reveals about the cultural atmosphere surrounding UFO interest in mid-1960s America. For a segment of the public, curiosity about unidentified aerial phenomena carried a perceived social or political risk — particularly given that some UFO advocacy groups of the era operated outside mainstream institutional frameworks and attracted suspicion from both government agencies and private citizens. NICAP itself, the organization Dow identified as her primary affiliation, had a complex relationship with official Washington and was known to include former military and intelligence personnel among its leadership.
The file does not indicate that any follow-up investigation was conducted, nor does it suggest that the AFSCA was ever formally scrutinized by the Bureau in connection with this inquiry. The source document carries a trust rating that warrants caution in drawing broad conclusions; the file's provenance as a scanned FBI record appears consistent with known declassified materials from this collection, but independent verification against the Bureau's public reading room archives would be the appropriate next step before treating any details as fully confirmed.
The exchange ultimately stands as a minor bureaucratic footnote — a window into the anxieties, civic instincts, and institutional reflexes of an earlier era of American public engagement with the UFO question.