Obscure Occurrences : The Betz Mystery Sphere

 The Betz Mystery Sphere has a rather unassuming history, but nevertheless, it has remained at the centre of a bizarre theory for decades. The sphere, which measures just under eight inches in diameter and weighs around twenty-one pounds, first came to light in the mid-1970s, when the Betz Family discovered it on their property in the aftermath of a brush fire.

Discovery

 Situated on Fort George Island, the Betz family’s property held 88 acres of land, mostly used for raising trees for Timber. In the middle of the property sat the Betz home, a mansion that was named “The Castle” by the family, and it was inhabited by Antoine Betz, a marine engineer, his wife Gerri Betz, an artist, and their six children. The Betzs were an educated well-to-do family and they were not fortune or fame seekers.

 One day in the Spring of 1974, a raging, destructive fire visited the Betz property. While assessing the damage caused by the inferno, Terry Betz, the 21-year-old son of the Betz couple, spotted a highly-polished metal sphere lying amidst the smouldering grass. The strange object was eventually named the Betz Sphere.

 Slightly smaller than a bowling ball but much heavier, the sphere neither had any seams or weld marks nor showed any signs of machining. Excluding a few minor scuffs and scratches, it had no dents or signs of damage. Furthermore, a three-millimetre triangle had been etched or stamped into the sphere.

(Source: Florida Times-Union Archive/WJCT)

 Intrigued by the oddity it emitted, Terry brought the metal sphere back into the house and set it on his windowsill. However, over the course of the days that followed, he and his family would come to regret their decision.

Strangeness of the Souvenir

 A few weeks later, Terry and his friend were playing their guitar in his room before they started noticing an eerie humming sound. Trying to track down its origins, the duo stopped playing their instrument, but the humming immediately faded away. They shrugged and resumed playing only for the humming to return. As Terry walked around his room strumming his guitar, he realized that the humming was caused by his newly found sphere, which vibrated in tandem with the notes he played. To add to the strangeness, the intensity of the vibration matched the volume of his guitar. At this point, the family dog started winning as if the sound emanating from the sphere was causing discomfort. 

 Fascinated by the way this sphere reacted to sound, Terry grabbed it and took it out to the living room to show it to his family. After everyone gathered around, he sat the ball down and went to grab his guitar, following which the sphere started moving on its own. When the other members of the family tried forcefully rolling it across the floor, the sphere allegedly rolled away, stopped, vibrated, changed directions on its own and then came back to the person who rolled it. Sometimes it rolled for just a few seconds, but up to five minutes in other instances with the maximum being twelve minutes.

 Initially, the Betz family assumed the sphere to be a Gyroscope, thus accounting for its movement. To validate their assumption, they placed the sphere on a coffee table with a glass top and pushed it forcefully. The sphere rolled around the edge of the table without falling off it and then to the middle of the table, rolling in the direction opposite to the push. Baffled by the anomalous behaviour of the metallic structure, the family lifted one end of the table and tried to get it to roll onto the floor, but the sphere started rolling up the incline, seemingly trying to protect itself from the fall.

 Gerri picked up the sphere and started shaking it, but the inanimate object allegedly did not like this. In a newspaper report Jerry's quoted as saying, “if you shake the ball vigorously and place it on the ground, it feels like a huge Mexican jumping beam, which is trying to get away from you.”

Antoine and Gerri Betz (Source: Gerri Betz Jackson)

 The Betz family eventually realized that the sphere had a magnetic field, whose strength depended on the time it rolled. Furthermore, the sphere seemed to be more active when exposed to sunlight, causing the family to believe it was solar-powered. When sat in the sun, they could feel a gentle vibration and hear a low hum, as if caused by a motor within it. A few days later, a family friend reached out to the Jacksonville Journal, which reluctantly sent Lon Angart, a long-time photographer. The sceptical photographer had a first-hand experience of the inexplicable movement of the sphere before turning into a firm believer, thus causing the paper to publish the story.

Introduction of the US Military

 The Story of the Betz Sphere became an overnight sensation and journalists from all over the world began calling the Betz family for interviews. While the family were not particularly interested in giving interviews, they did want to help identify the sphere. With time, the United States military expressed their desire to have a look at the sphere and despite their reluctance, the family agreed to loan it to them for two weeks. However, Gerri made them sign a contract which stated that the sphere has to be returned if it can’t be identified as government property in two weeks.

 Navy scientists performed a number of tests. They measured the sphere at exactly 7.96 inches in diameter and it weighed 21.34 pounds. Its shell was made of some kind of magnetic stainless-steel alloy and it could withstand extreme heat and pressure. According to the spectrograph, it was made of stainless steel grade 431.

 The Navy discovered that the sphere was intensely magnetic. It had four magnetic poles (two positives and two negatives) and the magnetic fields varied in strength, displaying an unusual pattern. At the end of the two weeks, the Navy confirmed that it wasn't government property and returned it to the Betzs.

 A Navy serviceman arrived at the Betz's doorstep with the sphere and an envelope. Although the Navy claimed that they were unable to x-ray the sphere, the envelope contained x-rays images of the sphere. It revealed that the sphere had a half-inch-thick outer shell and inside it was different layers of steel with varying densities. At the core of the sphere was a hollow space which contained three smaller spheres with wires attached to them. While the identities of the internal spheres are mysteries by themselves, how they got inside the metallic shell is an even bigger inexplicability.

 Amidst the fog of mystery, people started suggesting that the sphere could be extra-terrestrial. Because it responded to sound, had a magnetic field and was almost indestructible, some people speculated it was an alien listening device. The Betzs didn't give much credence to these theories initially, but when the Navy came back with nothing, their stand changed. The Betzs reached out to scientists for answers but what they found only raised more questions.

Investigated by Scientists

 The first scientist to examine the sphere was Dr Carl Williston of the Omega minus one Institute. He spent six hours running tests and one of his strangest discoveries was that the sphere was emitting radio waves. He further confirmed the Navy's findings of four poles but like the Navy, he couldn't explain the pattern of the magnetic fields and claimed it defied the laws of physics. Although he confirmed that the exterior was made of stainless steel grade 431, he also found traces of an extremely heavy but unknown element.

 The next scientist the Betzs brought in was Dr James Harder, an engineering professor who became a trusted advisor to the family. Dr Harder confirmed Dr Williston's findings and said that the internal spheres were made of a material with an atomic number of 140. The highest atomic number that occurs in nature is 92, Uranium. While it is possible to artificially increase the atomic number artificially, the highest scientists have been able to achieve is 118. Thus, the material used in the internal spheres does not naturally occur on Earth and this aspect led Dr Harder to wonder if the sphere could be a damaged Alien Probe.

 The next scientist who had an involvement in the case was Dr J Allen Hynek, a well-known astronomer and Professor. Dr Hynek, however, was best known for being a UFO advisor to the US Air Force under three separate projects. He further confirmed the findings of the other scientists.

 During this time of chaotic activity, a group of scientists flew into Jacksonville, arrived at the Betz's home and offered Gerri 750,000 USD in cash for the sphere, an equivalent of four million dollars today. Something about these guys rubbed Gerri the wrong way and thus, she turned down their cash offer. After they left, the family checked their backstory only to know it was all a lie. The family suspected this was probably a foreign government trying to take the sphere into their custody.

Disappearance

 In the 1970s, the National Enquirer offered a cash award to anyone who could prove that there is life on other planets. Even though the Enquirer was not particularly reliable, the UFO panel they assembled contained a lot of well-respected people which included Hynek and Harder along with multiple PhD holders, a former Supreme Court Justice and a former United States Attorney General. The Betzs family decided to send Terry and the sphere to this gathering. While they didn't necessarily think the object was from outer space, they hoped that the experts could finally get some answers.

(Source: Abandoned FL)

 During their initial time with the Sphere, the members of the panel witnessed the sphere roll up a piece of Plexiglass from a dead stop. Despite witnessing it first-hand, Dr Hynek felt that the sphere was man-made. When the idea of drilling came up, Dr Harder warned that the sphere could cause a nuclear explosion.

 While at the Enquirer's office, Terry received a call that claimed that his mother had met with an accident. Terry tried to reach out to her, but as he couldn't get through, he flew back immediately, leaving the mysterious sphere behind. Upon returning home, he understood that Gerri had never gotten into an accident, thus realizing that someone had been trying to separate him from the sphere.

 When Terry returned to the Enquirer’s office, he noticed a difference in their behaviour. They failed to cooperate and told him that the sphere had been taken to New Orleans by the UFO panel. The sphere was guarded by the Navy, who refused Terry’s pleas for recovery. However, upon persistent verbal pursual, Terry was finally able to retrieve the sphere but unbeknownst to him, the sphere had been changed.

 Moments later, Terry noticed that the sphere had lost its locomotive and magnetic properties. Upon closer inspection, he realized that it had a pronounced seam on its surface. Furthermore, it no longer had four magnetic poles and the three small spheres in its interior had been replaced by dust. When the Betz confronted Dr Harder, he asked them to be careful. He suggested that Dr Hynek could have been involved in the foul play and it was accredited years later by Paul, Dr Hynek’s son.

 After Dr Hynek’s demise, Paul mentioned that the family had a silver sphere in their possession. In line with Paul’s statement, Hynek had claimed that it had something to do with a UFO case in Florida. However, the theory of theft remains mere speculation with no solid evidence.

 Constantly being hounded by the press and followed by what they thought were government agents, the case eventually became too much for the Betz family. Gerri allegedly was even physically assaulted by someone who pretended to be a repairman. Thus, the Betz family sold their house, left the island and quickly and quietly faded back into society. Neither did they give any more interviews about the sphere nor did they write any books. Unfortunately, the family never got the answers they had sought for years.

A Sceptical Point of View

 A mundane explanation is that the Betz Sphere was just a piece of industrial equipment. An artist named James Durling Jones claimed that he had lost the sphere a few years earlier. He had apparently been collecting scrap metal for use in sculptures when he discovered a ball check valve. According to his statement, the metal ball had fallen from the rack on top of his vehicle on his way back home.

 The island hosts only one factory and the valves they use only weigh downward of eight pounds, greatly lower than the 21 pounds of the Betz Sphere. Furthermore, the sphere was found a mile away from the nearest road, thus challenging the theory. Some believe that the sphere is a downed satellite or a fallen piece of space junk. The lack of a seam and connectors, however, suggests otherwise.

 When the locomotive abilities of the sphere are taken into question, sceptics believe that the Betz’s house had uneven flooring, causing the perfectly balanced sphere to roll around. However, the speculation fails to reason why the sphere came back to the person who rolled it.

Conclusion

 To this day, nobody really knows what the Betz Sphere is. Was it taken by the Navy or by Dr Hynek, we will never know. With the location of the real sphere shrouded in obscurity, the possibility of discovering the anomalous structure’s real identity and origin only seems to dwindle down the years.