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The Gervais-Irene
| 1945-1982 ID'd 'Gervais-Irene' shown in 1965. |
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| AKA "Irene Craigmile" AKA "Irene Bolam" after her 1958 marriage. |
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The Gervais-Irene
| 'Gervais-Irene' (Craigmile Bolam) 1963. |
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| News photo, taken in Japan. The Irenes to the right were different women... |
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The Non Gervais-Irene
| Different Irene (Craigmile Bolam) c. 1947 |
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| Young 'Non Gervais-Irene' identified by the original Irene Craigmile's son in 2006. |
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The Non Gervais-Irene
| 1982 New Jersey News Tribune photo. |
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| Older version of the 'Non Gervais-Irene' also ID'd as 'Irene Craigmile Bolam.' |
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The Original Irene
| The orginal Irene Craigmile, 1930... |
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| ...no longer seen after the 1930s, she and Amelia were past friends. |
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| 1985, Amelia's sister Muriel & Grace McGuire. |
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| Grace is advanced as intricately linked to Amelia's hidden true story. |
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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
Tod 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 invented at that time. Mr. Swindell 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]
Amelia Earhart Investigative Researcher
Born in Tyningsboro, Massachusetts in 1924, Joseph A. Gervais
was of French ancestry. After WWII broke out he enlisted in the United States Army Air Corp at the age of twenty. 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 War and Vietnam campaign. 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 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 requested 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 during her entrance to the event, upon his request 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. Word had it she was also a 'past friend' of
Amelia Earhart's. Joe Gervais took note of all of this. Then, when he looked into her eyes and gazed at her visage as he was
meeting her, he felt he recognized 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 Joe 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 he met her 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. Ever curious,
in 1967 Gervais wrote to Mrs. Bolam suggesting his belief of who she really was, or had previously been. In her reply she
politely steered clear of his suspicion writing in the present tense, "I am not she." Yet her handwriting was eerily
similar to Amelia Earhart's, and she also referenced two of her friends to him (Viola Gentry & Elmo Pickerill) 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 renamed person of 'Irene' remained. (Or, as Monsignor Kelley later mentioned
of his dear friend Irene, 'she didn't want to be Amelia Earhart anymore.') In the 1967 reply letter to Gervais from Elmo Pickerill
(the Early Birds secretary) he confirmed how Irene Craigmile, Viola Gentry, and Amelia Earhart had all been 'Long Island flying
pals' in the 1930s. Mrs. Bolam somewhat curiously
ended her own 1967 letter to Gervais this way: "It has always been my feeling the [sic] Amelia Earhart has not passed
away completely, so long as there is one person left alive who still remembers her." According
to writer Joe Klaas during a 2001 interview, after Gervais met Irene in 1965 he conveyed his story to Klaas. Fascinated by
Gervais, 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 that would be published by McGraw-Hill in 1970. In it, a photo
Gervais took of the Irene Craigmile Bolam he met 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. This added to her evasiveness, Amelia's past
relationship with the original Irene's family, decades of research and the later forensic study gestated by Tod Swindell,
to ultimately discover how three different people used the same identity of Irene Craigmile Bolam, and how the one Gervais
encountered not only aligned with Amelia but was seen nowhere identified as Irene prior to 1945; yes, so much enabled Joe
Gervais to always maintain his belief in how the Irene Craigmile Bolam who he met and photographed in 1965... most assuredly
had been the 'former' Amelia Earhart. In 2005 Joe Gervais passed away in his sleep, still believing it. Tod Swindell
Forensic Argument Analyst/Researcher/Writer & Film Producer
USAF Colonel Rollin
C. Reineck, (Ret.) [1920-2007]
Investigative Researcher/Author
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 the Gervais-Irene herself fought against its
acceptance. From the 1970s until he died in 2007, Colonel Reineck was a long time supporter of the research of Joe Gervais. 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 while doing so.*
* *
'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.
| Amelia Earhart, 1923 |
|
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| Shown at age twenty-six, almost five years before she became famous. |
| From the Beyond 37' forensic study... |
|
|
| ...true morph blend of the 1945-1982 Gervais-Irene shown in 1978, and Amelia Earhart. |
|
