June 2, 2003 -- What with the New Mexico legislature passing a bill honoring all extraterrestrial beings with a special day of observance, what could the UFO-friendly town of Roswell do, other than to celebrate the fact? So, on the second Tuesday of February, the state will celebrate Extraterrestrial Culture Day, "to enhance relationships among all the citizens of the cosmos, known and unknown."
To beat others to the punch, however, Roswell, a longtime center of the weird, is holding its annual UFO Festival on July 3 to 5, 2003, 55 years after the original "mystery" of a supposed alien spacecraft crash nearby occurred. Tickets for the festival are just $2 a person, a price that is also out of this world.
Tickets provide access to all the on-site events, such as the UFO Independent Music Festival. Other events include the UFO Classic Sci-Fi Film Festival, with all-time great and/or loopy pictures such as Forbidden Planet, Invasion of the Body Snatcher and War of the Worlds, all shown on a big 20" by 40" screen. On Friday, there will be lectures for adults and crafts for kids, as well as a trade show and civic fair. The day ends with a fireworks display from 9 PM.
On Saturday, events include the Alien Chase Fun Run, an Alien Costume & Parade, and a planetarium show, "The Great UFO Mystery." One topic for discussion by a panel on Saturday is "What will happen with the 66 bags of "material" locked in a Roswell bank vault?" Said materials relating, somehow, to the alleged "discovery" of a spacecraft outside Roswell in 1948, with, it is claimed, bodies of extraterrestrials inside.
For more information, go to Roswell's website, www.roswell-nm.net, or phone the chamber of commerce at 505/623-5695.
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