Departures of note

In 1958, Otis T. Carr struck a deal with the owner of Frontier City, an amusement park in Oklahoma City, to build a full-scale, 45-foot mockup of his flying saucer, the OTC X-1, as a ride. He relocated there, provided the dummy craft, and announced that a 6-foot prototype would make a demonstration flight at the fairground on April 19, 1959, rising to about 500 feet. He also promised that on December 7, 1959, he and contactee Wayne Sulo Aho would pilot a working 45-foot saucer from the same site to the Moon and return in a few hours. The demonstration never took place; Carr claimed he felt unwell and did not appear, and visitors to his factory saw only a small, motionless wooden model of his ideas. He disappeared shortly before the scheduled launch.

Carr had first emerged into the 1950s flying saucer scene in Baltimore, Maryland, where in 1955 he founded OTC Enterprises, a company meant to advance technology he claimed was originally suggested by Nikola Tesla. He obtained a patent for an "Amusement Device" resembling a flying saucer and asserted he was working on a full-size version that could fly to the Moon and return in less than a day, using two counter-rotating metal plates, spinning electromagnets, and large capacitors that, when charged by a battery, became 'activated by the energy of space.' He named this device the Ezechiel Wheel. He also claimed to have invented 'The Gravity Electric Generator,' 'The Utron Electric battery,' 'The Carrotto Gravity Motor,' and 'The Photon Gun.'

Carr and his promoter, Norman Evans Colton, appeared frequently on Long John Nebel's radio and television talk show, where Carr's explanations were often incoherent; describing his 'Utron Coil,' he said, 'This is a dimensional object. It was designed with the dimensions of space itself. We say it is truly the geometric form of space, because it is completely round and completely square.' Ray Palmer's Fate Magazine gave Carr free publicity, and Carr and Aho toured flying saucer clubs across the United States touting the propulsion system. They sold considerable stock in the enterprise, though Carr's business affairs were generally considered fraudulent.

In January 1961, Carr was convicted in Oklahoma of selling securities without registering them and fined $5,000. He appealed, but his appeal was denied on March 1, 1961. Unable or unwilling to pay the fine, he served part of a 14-year jail term. After his release, he fled the state and eventually settled in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, still selling non-working 'free energy' technology. In 1966, he claimed his earlier demonstrations had failed because he had not had enough time to perfect the device. Carr died in 1982; Aho was believed to be an innocent dupe.