Why Beyond 37’
Was Formed
Beyond
37’ was formed for two reasons: (1.) To group the major Amelia Earhart disappearance theories into a single fold, and
(2.) To determine the forensically plausible ones among them. [For review see the 'Investigative Books' list found in The History of Amelia Earhart Mystery Research link.]
The name “Beyond 37’” itself signifies U.S.
history’s awareness, of how although Amelia Earhart was said to have ‘vanished’ in 1937 many credible accounts
of her non-publicly realized 'continued survival' did later surface.
As well, from ambiguous sources, accounts ranging from alien abduction stories to Amelia
becoming a prostitute in Japan have also surfaced over the years. Such ideas are not given any attention here. But the most
regarded explanations, backed by accounts emanating from the region of Earhart's disappearance, profiles of her life and psyche
as she readied for her final 'world flight,' her friend & family attitudes and beliefs, and a few opinions of various
personnel involved with Earhart's last flight were closely re-evaluated by Beyond 37'.
It is necessary to realize how most all 'Earhart mystery'
theories managed to employ the same factual elements to yield their different story versions. [Refer to International News Journalist Rosalea Barker's 2002 Stateside New Zealand article
in the 'Press Notices-Testimonials' link,"I felt like I was trying to
separate black sheep from white in a computer game that randomly kept changing the colour of sheep. Just when I thought all
the facts had been marshalled in support of one theory, those same facts would be marshalled in support of another completely
opposite one." ] Here, Beyond 37' displays
the most viable reality concerning Amelia Earhart’s 1937 misadventure.
Indeed only one truth ever did exist, and this website responsibly and without fanfare offers the most
realistic portrayal of what became of Amelia Earhart after she was said to have ‘vanished’ in 1937. However many
people, (to include most mainstream academic scholars) being as misinformed as they have been over the years courtesy of the
controlled and 'dumbed down' plane-hunting media, will still have a hard time seeing the forest for the trees in the realities
portrayed here. Then again it helps to always bear in mind, no matter what Amelia Earhart disappearance theories the national
media promoted over the years, none of them authoritatively represented an officially stated
historical viewpoint. So much is important to understand.
What People Fail To Recall About Amelia
Earhart's 1937 Disappearance
It is evident the general public does not recall how the governments of the United States, Japan, and England
never 'officially commented' on Amelia Earhart's loss, beyond the July of
1937 U. S. Government's conveyed approximation of she and her navigator Fred Noonan 'likely'
having perished. People also fail to recall how there has never been an 'official investigation' launched into their disappearance.
As well, people forget how (according to the long questioned 'official' record) all communication with Amelia Earhart's plane
ceased while she and Noonan were still safely airborne.
Also de-emphasized later and all but forgotten, were the 1960s statements made by Admiral
Chester Nimitz about Earhart and Noonan surviving a ground-fall in the Marshall Islands, how the same Marshall Islands were
never permitted to be combed by the massive U. S. military search effort for Earhart and Noonan, and how the communication
lines and the general relationship between Japan and the United States suddenly grew more tenuous a mere five days after the
duo turned up missing; a result of the July 7, 1937 start of the Sino-Japanese war.
So how and why did the public end up so misled? Some investigators
still believe today, the public had been orchestrated to be misled through the media dating back to the time the event occurred.
[Recall U. S. Secretary of the Treasury Henry P. Morgenthau Jr.'s May 13, 1938 reply words to First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt's
query about Amelia Earhart's loss, "I hope I've just got to never make it public."]
So it made sense, after some of the true controversial story
elements began to surface in the 1960s and 1970s, new disappearance theories were injected into and promoted equally, if not
more by the national news media. So much steered the growing-curious public
away from what had been the rising fire of truth. And within a short time, certain 'promoted' individuals and their theorized answers evolved into convenient and safe 'media reliables,' even though they lacked
presenting anything close to the forensic reality.
Those 'Safely' Promoted By National
Media Outlets
In the late 1970s one Elgen Long, a private
citizen who would ever support his own crashed-and-sank claim, began receiving the most national media attention afforded
to the Amelia Earhart disappearance case. From then on, consistent media adulation's were steered his way well into the 2000s.
As they were, Elgen Long continuously described to the American public how he believed he had self calculated the area where
Earhart's plane crashed and sank in deep Pacific Ocean waters. Many private citizen dollars were
invested in his various expeditions to locate it. National news sources were always anxious for his results. Except Mr. Long
never found Earhart's plane. It simply did not exist where he said it did, if it even existed anymore at all. Still, for years
Mr. Long's non-controversial claim was favored as the one U. S. national media reps could always safely rely on.
Since the late 1980s Richard Gillespie and TIGHAR have received
a near-equal to Elgen Long measure of national media attention, Earhart plane-search wise. Mr. Gillespie's claim offered how
Amelia Earhart and Fred Noonan safely ditched on the island of Nikumororo hundreds of miles south of their destination, and
they died there as castaways. Mr. Gillespie is also a private citizen, who self-formed and promoted his TIGHAR club [AKA 'The
International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery'] to the American public. TIGHAR also received investments over the years,
supporting what eventually became viewed as another errant claim. In time though, the shepherded by the national media public had
learned to accept and support Mr. Gillespie's efforts alongside Elgen Long's, well and above any controversial investigative research offerings. In said way, by mainly covering the Long and Gillespie offers,
the national media fairly conditioned the American public to prefer the simple solution [Long's 'crashed and sank' version]
or the romantic solution [Gillespie's 'desert island castaways' version] over something that appeared complicated and/or factually
buried, such as the well protected Irene-Amelia reality.
[Another more
recently promoted enthusiast, described how Earhart's Lockheed Electra airplane was lying somewhere in a mountain jungle on
the Island of New Britain, northeast a ways from where she and Noonan last took off from Lae, New Guinea. Though it was once
rumored she might have flown directly there, any New Britain airplane 'evidence' was never substantiated.]
So what enabled Elgen Long and Richard Gillespie to receive
such consistent national media attention they did year in and year out? The answer was simple: Again, they offered well presented
harmless solutions, to a serious historical quandary the American public remained transfixed on.
To hesitate before questioning the above summation, and as
referenced earlier, recall in 1965 how Admiral Chester Nimitz had described to CBS Radio Journalist, Fred Goerner that it
was "known and documented in Washington" how "Earhart and her navigator went down in the Marshall Islands and
were picked up by the Japanese." [1966 Goerner book, In Search of Amelia Earhart
research, and later Fred Goerner/Muriel Earhart Morrissey letter exchanges.]
On the other hand, even though since the 1960s the most research,
forensic logic, and solid reasoning has supported the information presented by Beyond 37'; over time Elgen Long, Richard Gillespie,
and Bill Prymak (another private citizen) of the Amelia Earhart Society always derided Beyond 37's consistent backing of the
Irene-Amelia conveyance, to their media contacts and to their sedulous devotees. It seemed they wished for the never disproved
Joe Gervais Irene-Amelia claim to simply go away, as it questioned all plane hunting cottage industry heads, who would otherwise
proceed unencumbered by true history opposition.
As well, such 'plane searching cottage industry heads' may have been observant enough to realize how when
it came to Amelia Earhart, the national media itself was long ago steered away from and disabled of its ability to dig for
the true controversial answers, concerning her real disappearance story.
A Change That Occurred In The
1990s
In
the mid-1990s a change in the Earhart investigation matter began to occur. It happened after filmmaker and investigative researcher Tod Swindell met and formed research alliances
with two of the most lauded 'truthful' Amelia Earhart research scholars; one in best selling Author Randall Brink, and the
other in the aforementioned famous Earhart disappearance investigator, Joe Gervais.
It was then clarification on how the wool had been pulled
over the eyes of the public for many years about Amelia Earhart's disappearance story, finally began to emerge. Before, it
had been recognized by the most informed how the history of Amelia Earhart’s disappearance had been plagued by euphemisms
and obfuscations. Or, how the media touted 'theorists' who claimed Earhart, after her odd non-receiving radio stopped transmitting
as well while she and Noonan were still safely airborne..., simply crashed and sank (Long's), or how she ditched on a desert
island and died after the tide pulled her plane out to sea where it sank in deep water (Gillespie's), or... how on Saipan
or on another of Japan's mandated islands, Earhart either died by execution or sickness after being detained, as in 'held
captive' or 'jailed.' It grew to be, where these three different theorized solutions comprised the main ideas used to slant
public opinion away from the historical reality of it all; that being of course, Amelia Earhart's name-changed survival.
In time, it became
hard for the truly inquisitive not to notice how after first gaining steam in the 1960s and 70s, the Earhart 'continued survival'
research had been detoured away from by historical dictum guiding forces, where by the mid-1980s the other 'theories' had
all but taken over, all of them, incidentally, ending with Earhart and Noonan's sure deaths. (Minus any 'body' or 'plane'
evidence, of course.) This also left Elgen Long's and Richard Gillespie's offers to end up in the safely far-ahead media supported
lead.
Of course it had been observed for decades by Joe Gervais
alone, how private citizenry 'support' of the 'sure-death' angles marked the preference of any and all historical dictum guiding
influences of the United States, whom had otherwise remained quiet about the subject of Amelia Earhart's 1937 disappearance,
not to mention the subject of her subsequent underground return to the United States as a re-identified person. So ultimately,
and wary of it or not, the promoters of the 'Earhart definitely died somehow' theories
became the misguiding influences who prevented the media's realization of Earhart's true fate. Meanwhile, United States history
influences such as the Smithsonian Institute and the National Geographic Society would acknowledge the existence of the promoted
'Earhart demise' theories to news sources, while always back-door endorsing only one of them; how it appeared Amelia Earhart
likely made her way to her final resting place... somewhere on the bottom of the Pacific Ocean.
No matter. The true scholarly
recognized truth became, Amelia Earhart did not meet her demise akin to any of the above descriptions at all; she did
not crash at sea, she did not die on Nikumororo, and Japan's Naval Authority did not execute her or let her died of dysentery.
Rather, anymore the best available information described how she was somehow laid low after she was reported missing, she
subsequently changed her name and altered her familiar appearance, and she emerged from the WWII era to later resurface in the United States. There she lived out the rest
of her life in basic anonymity, all be her a still highly respected person by various people who already knew, and then came
to know her after she'd done so, until her death in July of 1982. It was later realized, while the world was still at peace she had even 'trial-flown' a few new aircraft
prototypes for Japan's naval authority. Amazing.
Hard to accept? Sure it is. Because the body public has been influenced by any and all
'official history' sources since the World War Two era, (foremost including the Smithsonian, a "ward" of the U.
S. Government) to accept how such a thing as Amelia’s post-July 2, 1937 'survival'
did not likely happen. By now though, the mountain of evidence gathered over the last forty year time span, and more controversially
since the forensic studies commenced in 1997 does speak for itself. In other words, it did happen… believe it or not.
Plain Speaking By The Clergy
And Others
Among her closest friends after Amelia became known as 'Irene' was Monsignor James Francis Kelley of Rumson, New Jersey.
Monsignor Kelley (1902-1996) was a legendary historical figure at Seton Hall University where he had served as its President
from the mid-1930s to the late 1940s. He spoke plainly enough in his 1991 recorded interview with Colonel Rollin C. Reineck,
Ret., when he mentioned he was "instrumental" in helping to "free" Amelia, when he assisted in 'bringing
her back from Japan.' Such a statement of his seemed to indicate the possibility of Amelia Earhart returning to the U. S.
at the war's end, as logic dictated it would have been more difficult to 'free' Amelia
before VJ Day. (To 'free' or to 'liberate' were interchangeable terms at the war's end, and all imprisoned Americans, to include
General Jonathan Wainwright were liberated after VJ Day.) A few people considered how Amelia lived among the Imperial Islands,
mostly at Maloelap and/or Kwajaeline of the Marshall Islands, before she ended up imprisoned in the Philippines in mid-1943.
Others felt she ended up in a civilian internment camp in China by the end of the war, 'quite ill.' And others still, believed no harm ever came her way at all, as unfathomable
as it might seem, that Amelia had been considering her public life exodus with Japan's pre-war understanding, perhaps not
realizing in 1937 how World War Two would eventually cause her such problems. It may have also been the case, where the hidden
demise and/or disappearance of the original Irene Craigmile ultimately turned into an 'out' for Amelia, thus enabling her
to continue living her life non-recognized for who she once was by virtue of her assuming said identity.
Originally, in 1970 even Gervais and Klaas suggested the far-out possibility of Earhart
having been smuggled out of Japan right after VJ Day by Archbishop Spellman and Jackie Cochran, while disguised as a catholic
nun. But one thing definitely remained clear: Without access to true records, it proved impossible to ascertain the
full scope of where Earhart was and what she was doing Japan, U.S. intelligence, and Catholic Church wise between the years
of 1937 and 1945. Indeed, the entire reasoning for it all may have been far more, or far less intricately founded than people
have thus far conceptualized.
It was once surmised how an earlier return to the U. S. could have enabled the former Amelia Earhart the time needed
to quietly adjust to her future life as Irene Craigmile. But no matter when she returned, pre-VJ day or post-VJ day, there
is no doubt she did so with the aid of her dear Zonta Sister friend, Attorney Irene Mary Rutherford O'Crowley who was the
original Irene Craigmile's Aunt; and as mentioned with the help of Monsignor James Francis Kelley. Both persons lived in proximity
to each other in northern New Jersey. And it appeared in 1945-1946, when Zonta photographs first started displaying her as
the new, healthy, and smiling 'Irene Craigmile' in public, (with her nose procedure done, and cosmetic and sartorial differences
applied) she was already well accustomed to her new identity, one that belonged to a past acquaintance of hers who was the
original, Irene Craigmile. [The no longer attentive Niece of Attorney Irene O'Crowley.]
In essence, the real person to have vanished forever long
ago was the original Irene Craigmile, who it appeared had turned up missing around the mid-late 1930s. If one questions this,
just realize the photographic historical record of Irene Craigmile’s person reveals such a reality in no uncertain terms.
Note as well, if the original Irene ‘died’ back then there appears to be no record of it. So much and more amounted
to Amelia being able to acquiesce her new identity. And it does appear that in closely guarded circles the United States,
Japan, and England were quietly aware of the dupe having taken place years ago. Today however, it is certain very few public-office
servers in any of these three mentioned countries... knows much, if anything about it.
* * *
How
Beyond 37' Came To Be...
The
brainchild of long time Earhart researchers Joe Gervais, Rollin Reineck, and Tod Swindell… Beyond 37’ was initially
named “The World War Two Veteran’s Coalition of Researchers, The Earhart-Craigmile Chapter.” Retired USAF
Major Gervais and Retired USAF Colonel Reineck, both World War Two vets and Earhart researchers since the 1960s, were members
of the 1989 founded Amelia Earhart Society. However, their changed identity claim about Irene Craigmile Bolam was never endorsed
by the AES. Therefore Swindell, who had consorted with different AES constituents but was never himself a member, suggested
they subdivide and form their own outside alliance of truth concerning the Irene-Amelia subject matter.
When Swindell embarked on his documentary film project on
the Irene-Amelia realities under the heading of "Beyond 37’," a new name for the coalition was also invented
at that time. He filmed extensive interviews of both Gervais and Reineck, of 1970 Amelia
Earhart Lives Author Joe Klaas, famed Amelia Earhart researcher Ronald Reuther, various 99s representatives and more.
Joe Gervais passed away in 2005, Reineck and Reuther in 2007. Their departures left said filmed testimonials among their last,
and Tod Swindell to carry on with their long time collective pursuit of truth recognition.
USAF Major Joseph A. Gervais
(Ret.) [1924-2005]
Born near Lowell, Massachusetts in 1924, Joseph A. Gervais was of French ancestry. After WWII broke out he enlisted in the United States Army Air Corp while
still in his teens. He became an excellent pilot during World War Two while participating in campaigns over Africa and Europe.
In his distinguished military career he also served as a pilot during the Korean and Vietnam campaigns. He logged nearly 20,000
hours of flight time before retiring as an Air Force Major in 1963.
While a Captain in the Air Force, Joe Gervais began researching the Amelia Earhart disappearance
story in 1960 after reading Paul Briand's new book, Daughter of the Sky. He
was stationed in the Pacific at the time. After gaining quite a name for himself as the purveyor of Operation Earhart with
his then partner, USAF Captain Bob Dinger, in 1965 Gervais was invited to New York, all expenses paid for his family of four
to fly from their home in Las Vegas, by the 1930s famous woman pilot and Amelia Earhart's old friend, Viola Gentry. Ms. Gentry
had asked for Gervais to discuss his five years of investigating Amelia Earhart's disappearance at a summer gathering of the
Early Birds of Aviation Club on Long Island. It was a great, well attended event featuring many famous pilots from the golden
age of aviation. And it was there upon her entrance to the event, Viola introduced Gervais to her friend, Irene Craigmile
Bolam who was being escorted by her British husband, Guy Bolam. Mrs. Bolam seemed to be a person held in high esteem by Viola
and other people attending that day. Joe Gervais noticed so much, and when he looked into her eyes and gazed at her visage
upon meeting her, he knew who she used to be right away. She was older, heavier, and her hair was gray and different, but
he could still see beyond those things.
After arriving back at his Las Vegas home Gervais set out to investigate the past of Irene Craigmile Bolam.
(He would continue to do so for years.) He soon began to realize how the woman known as Irene Craigmile had been a virtual
nobody in the 1930s, and she had only flown planes for a very brief period of time. When Gervais wrote to the Irene he met
in 1965 she politely denied his suspicion in a letter, and declined to personally cooperate. Yet a 1967 letter to Gervais
from an Early Birds secretary affirmed Irene Craigmile, Viola Gentry, and Amelia Earhart were all Long Island flying 'pals'
back in the early 1930s.
In 1965 after he asked her, Mrs. Bolam affirmed to Joe Gervais how she used to "know" Amelia "rather
well," and she had even "flown" with her. Two Years later, in handwriting eerily similar to Amelia Earhart's
in her denial letter to Gervais, she referenced two of her friends to him while all but cryptically writing, "because
they each knew us both well as Amelia Earhart and Irene Craigmile." Even to her it seemed Amelia was long gone, and only
her person as 'Irene' remained. Or, as Monsignor Kelley mentioned, 'she didn't want to be Amelia Earhart anymore.'
According to writer Joe Klaas during a 2001 interview, after
Gervais met Irene in 1965 he conveyed his story to Klaas. Joe Klaas gestated a book idea designed to profile the long term
Earhart investigative research of Gervais and Dinger and Operation Earhart. Klaas recalled how he heard Gervais relay his
account to him about his meeting with Irene, and soon the two were collaborating on their book, Amelia Earhart Lives published by McGraw-Hill in 1970. In it, a photo Gervais took of Irene Craigmile Bolam
when he met her in 1965 appeared. After enlisting the services of a former Robert F. Kennedy attorney in one Benedict Ginsberg,
Mrs. Bolam sued Gervais and Klaas and McGraw-Hill, and she was successful enough to have the book removed from the stores
after only seven weeks of shelf life. No matter, the law suit dragged on for five years until it was settled by a ten dollar
consideration paid by both sides, after Mrs. Bolam refused to comply with Joe Gervais' request for her fingerprints. That
and so much more enabled Gervais to always maintain his certain belief, of how the Irene Craigmile Bolam who he met and photographed
in 1965, most assuredly had been the former Amelia Earhart. In 2005 he died in his sleep, still believing it.
USAF
Colonel Rollin C. Reineck, (Ret.) [1920-2007]
Rollin C. Reineck was born in 1920 and grew up in Van Nuys, California. He attended the
University of California at Santa Barbara before joining the Army Air Corp at the age of twenty-one in early 1942. He aspired
to become the Chief Navigator of the B29 fleet stationed on Saipan in 1944, was an adviser to the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and
flew the last raids over Tokyo just prior to VJ Day. He was a career military man who retired as a USAF Colonel. He lived
in Hawaii from that point on. He read about the research of Joe Gervais in the 1970s, mostly by way of the book Amelia Earhart lives. Knowing what he did about the military and its intelligence divisions during the war
years, Reineck found the Gervais claim to strongly potential the truth even though others, to include Irene herself fought
against its acceptance. From the 1970s until he died in 2007, Colonel Reineck was one of Gervais' main supporters.
By early 2004 Colonel Reineck's book, Amelia Earhart Survived was available in stores. Published through The Paragon Agency, it added much credence
to the long held Irene-Amelia claim of Joe Gervais, while outright stating it as 'true.' It was also the first book to convey
the past singular identity shared by different Irene Craigmile Bolam individuals, crediting and drawing elements from Tod
Swindell's forensic analysis efforts in doing so.
DGA Member Tod E. Swindell, Writer/Film Producer
Tod Swindell
was born in Yonkers, New York in 1958. Raised in California and Pennsylvania, he lives in Los Angeles. A University of Arizona
graduate in Cinema Arts and a member of the Screen Directors Guild in Hollywood, he's also a past head of Research and Development
for Universal Pictures' 'Desperado Films.' He's been part of many film projects over the years serving on Producer levels
for several. On a more recent assignment he was an Associate Producer for the James Redford movie 'Spin,' a period plane flying
story starring Stanley Tucci and featuring vintage aircraft .
His interest in the Earhart story grew during the period of
1991 to 1993 while he was representing the FOIA researched screenplay, "Earhart: The Final Chapter" by WGA writer
David O'Malley. Although the screenplay was covered well and received good reviews, Swindell was not successful in selling
it. Later, during the Summer of 1996 he conferred with a former CIA intelligence operative in Los Angeles. After learning
how U. S. intelligence angles often can and do work, he began to more seriously consider the investigative research of Randall
Brink and Joe Gervais. (In 1994 W.W. Norton had published Brink's best-selling Earhart investigative book, Lost Star. See "The History of Earhart Mystery Research" link for more information.) After his
meetings with Brink and Gervais, in 1997 Swindell gestated what would become a long term 'in-depth' forensic study and analysis,
of the long asserted by Joe Gervais 'Irene-Amelia' claim.
After accomplishing the difficult task of gathering the substantial photographic data
enabling him to thoroughly advance the study, Tod Swindell's effort was credited for the breakthrough of having discovered
the past 'multiple identity' issue of ‘Irene Craigmile Bolam.’ (See the "Press Notices, Testimonials"
link.) The Associated Press also reported how his forensic analysis revealed a haunting physical congruence displayed between
the 1945-1982 identified Irene Craigmile and Amelia Earhart. The forensic analysis still continued on after that, thoroughly
examining the history of the original Irene Craigmile's family, to include the prominent O'Crowley family and township named-for
"Rutherford's" of Newark, New Jersey. (See the original Irene Craigmile's condensed biography in the lower portion
of the 1982 New Jersey Tribune link.) Ultimately the information gained by
the study after being added to nearly four decades worth of Gervais & Reineck accumulated research, revealed how Amelia
Earhart surely had continued to exist following her disappearance in 1937, as one of the post-1930s identified Irene Craigmile’s
...just as Joe Gervais long professed she had.
'There's An Elephant In The Living Room And
Nobody's Saying Anything'
The Irene-Amelia conveyance has been described as "the elephant in the room" of Amelia Earhart investigative
research. Both the Smithsonian Institute and the National Geographic Society try hard not to pay attention to it. If they
do it is usually done through some need to engage an opposing viewpoint that smites of credibility, to help keep the
story of Amelia Earhart’s final decades as someone else ensconced as a questionable reality at least, instead of a substantiated
one.
Therefore, one will not hear nor read either the Smithsonian
Institute or the National Geographic Society claim it as ‘factual’ how Amelia’s later survival as Irene
was ever something outright disproved. Rather, their efforts to combat the suggestion have always been embraced with an end
goal in mind to refer to it as ‘doubtful’ with a question mark. Said efforts notwithstanding, Amelia Earhart’s
survival as another identified person is now an obvious forensic reality no matter what. If tried in a court of law such a
reality would be clearly determined based on the amount of available evidence both physical and circumstantial, beyond the
logistical and medical realities afforded to the former Amelia Earhart to enable her life to continue as a non-famous and/or
non-publicly recognized person in the United States after the WWII era. It is clear anymore, such had become her own preference,
as well as the preference of those who helped to enable and support the endeavor. In the public sector, people need to move
past the historical dictum roadblocks that have long impeded their ability to correctly educate themselves about it through
national media influences, and responsibly accept such a credo of plain truth after doing so.
