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John Lennon Sketched the UFO Mentioned in “Nobody Told Me”

In John Lennon’s solo song Nobody Told Me, he talks about all of the various scenarios he just wasn’t pre-warned about when growing up. From war to mindless mass media, to meaningless interaction and a lack of awareness, he had some insightful points to make about the way we live our lives.

Strange days indeed!

The Lyric Line That Caught The World’s Attention

There was one line that always threw people for a loop, in which he proclaimed “There’s UFO’s over New York, and I ain’t too surprised…”

It came at the end of the last verse, nonchalantly, just before the final chorus, as heard in the song here:

Click Here to Download John Lennon’s Nobody Told Me

Now, even with the Beatles increasingly immersing themselves in the spiritual and psychedelic cultures, and openly singing about Hinduism, Transcendental Meditation, psychedelic hallucinations, and more, people were still caught off guard by this line of lyrics. What was the hidden meaning behind it?

Turns out there was no hidden meaning. Lennon was speaking as plain as day about a UFO he witnessed in New York in 1974.

The John Lennon UFO Sketch

The story as reported by Lennon is as follows… He was standing on his apartment balcony on August 23, 1974 with his ex-girlfriend May Pang. They looked up to witness a UFO hovering above them, making no noise.

The silence of the craft caught them off guard. If one is to take the proportions and distances drawn on the sketch as somewhat accurate, the craft was either very close, or very far away but gigantic.

John Lennon ufo sketch
John Lennon & May Pang featured in the sketch by Lennon detailing the 1974 UFO sighting.

This unidentified flying object featured white lights around the rim of the craft at the widest point of it’s circular diameter, and a red light at the top. It appears to have been cone shaped craft, featuring a flat bottom which rises to a pointed top.

John Lennon in Elvis Jacket
John Lennon, member of The Beatles and witnesser of a UFO!

The Back Story of the John Lennon UFO Sketch

A gentleman named Russ Kellett has made a name for himself for his thorough investigation of the Berwyn Mountains UFO incident in 1974, where it is reported that an extraterrestrial spaceship crashed in North Wales. He is also an avid Beatles fan and collector.

Due to this double interest, he was always interested in the Lennon sighting, knowing that it occurred in the same year and time period as the Berwyn Mountains incident.

When he learned that the opportunity was arising to acquire this sketch, Kellett said:

“A friend of mine told me it was becoming available from a private collector and I thought, this was a double dream for me. I am a massive collector of all things UFO and have a huge archive and am a collector of Beatles memorabilia. I have a leather jacket worn by John Lennon in 1969 up until 1974. So this was fantastic. It is one of a few [sketches] he made he made of the incident. This one shows him on the balcony pointing into the sky at the object which says UFO on it.”

Currently, Kellett won’t share how much he paid for this drawing and says it is safely stored in a deposit box in a bank vault.

The Relation to the Berwyn Mountains Incident

The story, which is well documented by many public, personal, governmental, and research facilities, is that the local residents of Llandderfel and Llandrillo heard a very loud “bang” noise, followed by tremors in the ground. Above the direction of the bang was a bright light illuminating the sky over the mountain range.

berwyn mountain range
The Berwyn Mountain Range

This event, on January 23, 1974, measured a 3.5 on the Richter scale. Other locals report seeing a brilliant light shining on the mountain side. A nurse detailed that she saw a red glow on the mountain, which orange lights pulsating within it.

The “officially accepted” story is that the “bang” was produced by the cracking of rock due to the earthquake that caused the ground to shake. The bright lights were caused by a meteor shower that happened at the same time in the same location, which happened to have poachers in it using their cars and flash lights to capture their prey. Sounds pretty convenient to me…

Kellett believes that this crashed vehicle could be related to the very same one that Lennon witnessed over New York seven months later.

As you’d expect, John Lennon isn’t the only musician to have seen a UFO up close and personal. There are countless, but if you want to read about the 15 most high-profile cases, check out that link here on Ledger Note.