A Rio Rancho man has spent years building a massive collection, and wants to leave his legacy behind for future ufologist.
From pictures and magazines, to newspapers and audio recordings; David Marler, a UFO researcher who lives in Rio Rancho, is fascinated with UFOs and has built up quite a collection.
“The unidentified object, which some sources thought might be a blimp, moved slowly down the Pacific Coast,” announces an old radio broadcast in Marler’s collection.
“Starting in 1990, I started amassing what was then a small library, and it has now grown to epic proportions,” Marler said.
Now 28 years later, he has traveled near and far, searching for things out-of-this-world.
“Italy, France, Germany,” Marler called out at he sorted through files of UFO related documents. “I mean these are Germany, Japan, and Poland.”
He has collected tens of thousands of items ranging in the tens of thousand of dollars.
“This one right here is one of my favorites,” Marler said, picking up a file. “It’s from a case from November 1957 at White Sands Missile Range where a UFO was actually, visually cited by military patrols landing at White Sands and then taking off.”
No matter how large the collection gets, he’s not looking to ever sell it, but instead donate it.
“I think that’s the most important thing is not collecting the data and hoarding it, but sharing it with other individuals,” he said.
That’s why he made the agreement to give it all to the University of New Mexico when he dies, in hopes the collection can one day be a destination for ufologist and UFO skeptics alike.
“UNM could have the premiere collection of UFO materials in the near future with this and other acquisitions,” he said.
One of Marler’s most recently collected pieces came from a dumpster-diver who found a letter about a UFO sighting signed by President Lyndon Johnson and FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover.
