UFOs in the daily Press:

They don't joke around in Arc-sous-Cicon:
the "little black man" really does exist

[Photo caption:] In the foreground, little Marie MAIROT who was the first to meet the black man. Behind her, Joelle RAVIER who drew us a robot portrait of the "Martian". At her side is her brother Rémy
(Ph.: P. BAUDOZ)

PONTARLIER. -- A giant bolide observed in Besançon, a meteor spotted in the Haut-Doubs, inexplicable celestial phenomena... It's more than enough to stir up the minds least inclined to fantasy. Such events have also, it goes without saying, had their repercussions among the under-twenties who are eager for anything related to science fiction. And yet, Joëlle Ravier, 15, daughter of the carpenter of Arc-sous-Cicon (Doubs) has no desire to joke. No more than her friends, she was not the victim of a hallucination.

Let us recall the facts which are at the very least disturbing:

The other afternoon, a little girl from the locality, little Marie-Reine Mairot, was returning home, crying hot tears. Her voice broken with sobs, she explained that, while riding her bicycle, she had seen a little man appear, barely taller than her (she is four years old), dressed entirely in black, who was threatening her. No one was worried.

At that age, some say, one would be afraid of one's shadow. The matter had to be taken seriously when less than two hours later, Joëlle Ravier and her brother Rémy, who were at the edge of the woods at a place called "Les Clairières", where they had seen smoke rising into the sky, rushed back to the village, claiming to have encountered a being entirely dressed in a dark-coloured uniform and who, despite his small size (a little over a meter) was moving extremely quickly from one bush to another. Listening only to her courage, Joëlle tried to catch up with the stranger, but in vain.

When she told us the story of the rather bizarre encounter she had had a few kilometres from her home, Joëlle Ravier did not go into incredible details. "The black man" was not wearing the space suit that has so often been given to the Martians whose adventures are told in comic strips.

Dark skin, dark canvas clothes also, big eyes, prominent belly, such is the description of the unknown to whom the legendary gnomes seem to have left the place in the thickets near a pretty little village of the Haut-Doubs.

Editor's note -- Let us recall that in her first statements, Joëlle had spoken of "four small mysterious beings, with a head as big as a potato who exchanged a musical language."

In the second version, which is no longer about a small man in the description after all is quite close to a dwarf.