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So, you want the 1950s to come back, you say?
				You&rsquo;re tired of pandemics, politics and urban disorder?
				Well, then, I&rsquo;ve got some good news for you. One big part of that well-remembered decade has returned with a bang.
				It&rsquo;s &mdash; drum roll, please &mdash; flying saucers.
				Yes, after countless years of inactivity, the mysterious lights and shapes that once enlivened our skies and our conversations in those long-ago days of little black-and-white TVs and Canasta parties seem to be paying a return visit.
				Why? Don&rsquo;t ask me! All I know is that we&rsquo;re seeing a renaissance of the UFO.
				&ldquo;Sightings are rising and 2020 is shaping up to be a banner year for close encounters,&rdquo; said the very un-radical publication &ldquo;The Wall Street Journal&rdquo; this summer.
				Perhaps sensing a growing public interest, the Pentagon (another organization not given to sensationalism) released last month a compilation of videos taken by military pilots in recent years of weird craft they&rsquo;d spotted near them.
				If you do your own online search, you&rsquo;ll find lots and lots of videos of lights and other objects moving through the day or night skies since January. Some appear close to home. One is datelined &ldquo;Plains, Pa.,&rdquo; though I can&rsquo;t tell if that means the township just north of Wilkes-Barre.
				Whatever happens by year&rsquo;s end, though, will have to be pretty spectacular to equal the flying saucer mania of the 1950s.
				While UFO (unidentified flying object) is a standard military term, &ldquo;flying saucer&rdquo; was coined in 1947 by journalists describing the sighting made by businessman Kenneth Arnold as he was flying his plane near Mt. Rainier. Other sightings quickly followed, including a claim that a &ldquo;saucer&rdquo; had crashed in Roswell, NM.
				The true decade of the UFO then got off to a rousing start with publication of Donald Keyhoe&rsquo;s 1950 book &ldquo;The Flying Saucers are Real,&rdquo; which quickly became a best seller. Soon jumping on the saucerwagon were a host of authors, some of whom claimed they&rsquo;d met the occupants of the mysterious craft and had even gone for rides in them.
				It seemed like you couldn&rsquo;t go wrong with UFOs as entertainment. Movies like &ldquo;The Day the Earth Stood Still&rdquo; (1951), &ldquo;The War of the Worlds&rdquo; (1953), &ldquo;The Thing from Another World&rdquo; (1953) and &ldquo;Earth vs. the Flying Saucers&rdquo; (1956) packed the theaters and got everyone casting their eyes heavenward.
				Did I ever see one myself?
				I don&rsquo;t remember the exact date, but I do recall being told by my parents one day in the late 1940s to come outside with them because there was something strange up in the sky. I found a crowd of our neighbors looking upward at a little dark shape that, if it was moving, was doing so only very slowly.
				Well, back to the present. We live in an era when the skies are pretty crowded with jetliners, the space station, satellites, spy craft and drones of all shapes and purposes. So how can we tell a saucer from a store-bought device taking Facebook pictures?
				I guess we just have to train ourselves. Search out the online videos and see if you find them explainable or mysterious. If you see a light or craft yourself, run through a checklist in your head. Is it odd-shaped, darting about, possibly something simple?
				I don&rsquo;t think it will be easy to solve the burgeoning mystery of UFOs 2020. But, as the guy in &ldquo;The Thing&rdquo; says in his famous warning to humanity, &ldquo;Keep watching the skies.&rdquo;

Remember When: UFOs were big in pop culture ….