William L. Moore is an American researcher and former teacher whose work sits at the center of two of ufology's most consequential stories: the revival of Roswell and the Majestic-12 papers. See Wikipedia.
Roswell Reopened
- With Charles Berlitz he wrote The Roswell Incident (1980), the first book on the 1947 crash, based largely on interviews begun with Stanton Friedman after Friedman located Major Jesse Marcel.
- Moore also co-wrote The Philadelphia Experiment (1979) with Berlitz, another enduring legend.
MJ-12
In December 1984, his research partner Jaime Shandera received a roll of 35mm film in the mail containing the purported Eisenhower briefing on “Operation Majestic 12.” Moore, Shandera and Friedman released it in 1987. See our Government UFO Documents page for the record and its disputed authenticity.
Obscure and Underappreciated Threads
- At the 1989 MUFON symposium in Las Vegas, Moore admitted he had passed information on fellow researchers to Air Force intelligence contacts in exchange for access — and that he watched disinformation being fed to Paul Bennewitz, contributing to Bennewitz's breakdown.
- His key handler was AFOSI agent Richard Doty; Moore and Shandera's informants were code-named after birds (“Falcon,” “Condor”).
- “Falcon” and “Condor” appeared in silhouette in the 1988 TV special UFO Cover-Up… Live!.
- After 1989 Moore largely withdrew from public research.
Why Moore Still Matters
Moore's career is the clearest documented case of intelligence agencies shaping UFO research itself — the contamination risk Jacques Vallée warned about. Any credibility score must account for provenance as much as content.
