During a recent trip to LA circlemaker Rod Dickinson met up with the American Ufologist Michael Lindemann to chew the fat about crop circles. The following article was printed in Michael's news letter CNI News and relates Rod's main contentions about the 1996 crop circle season. The interview wasn't taped but we feel that the core arguments are accurately represented...
 
During the meeting a significant amount of money was offered to 'The Circlemakers' to create a formation of equivalent scale and geometric complexity to the Stonehenge 'Julia Set'. Lindemann has stated that one of the conditions is that "the authors of the Stonehenge Julia Set must identify themselves to us." 'The Circlemakers' ARE willing to accept the challenge if they don't have to claim the Stonehenge formation...
 
Crop Circle "artist" declares 'Julia Sets' man-made
By Michael Lindemann
 
On July 7, 1996, in a field just south of Stonehenge, separated from that famous monument by the busy A303 highway which traverses the Salisbury Plain in southern England, a spectacular geometric formation appeared in the standing wheat. Quickly dubbed the Stonehenge Julia Set [a Julia Set is a particular kind of shape derived from fractal geometry], this formation was undeniably the most intricate and impressive "agriglyph" ever seen. It consisted of 149 separate circles arrayed in a huge spiral, measuring over 500 feet in width and approximately 915 feet in length along its curving spine. The constituent circles in this formation measured from less than six feet to over sixty feet in diameter.
 
Topping off this astonishing find, it was reported that a doctor in a private plane flew over the field at about 5:30 pm that day and again about 45 minutes later. On his first pass, the doctor later said, the formation was not there -- but on his return, it was. He was among the first to report the new formation. If his report is accurate, then it seems the Stonehenge Julia Set was created in under 45 minutes, in broad daylight. The mind boggles.
 
And keeps on boggling... for less than a month later, on July 29, an even larger and more complex formation was discovered on the slope of Windmill Hill, facing the A4 motorway in Wiltshire. [See ISCNI*Flash vol.2 no.11 of August 16.] The pattern was a three-armed spiral composed of three Julia Sets, totalling 194 individual circles and measuring approximately 1,000 feet in diameter. Like its predecessor, its intricacy was confounding, its artistry seemingly paranormal.
 
Crop circle researchers and casual bystanders alike struggled in vain to adequately express their admiration for these pictograms. By mid-August, the Julia Set images adorned websites, posters and T-shirts across Europe and America. Believers in the paranormal genesis of crop circles waxed triumphant. Here at last -- or so it seemed -- were formations so vast and intricate and beautiful that they simply couldn't be human creations. Noted researcher Colin Andrews expressed the sentiments of many when he said at several public conferences in September and October, "If these Julia Sets can be proven to be made by humans, then we can all pack our bags and go home. If these are human-made, I won't be giving speeches on this subject next year."
 
Thus it is with some trepidation that I write this report of an interview I conducted on October 27. On that day I spoke face to face for some three hours with Rod Dickinson, an Englishman known to belong to a tight fraternity of circle "artists," persons who deliberately create large formations in the grain fields in the dead of night, preferring anonymity yet laying claim to a large number of impressive crop glyphs found in England over the past ten or more years.
 
Despite the acknowledged activities of these "circle hoaxers" or "crop artists," there remains a widespread and fervent belief that the "real" crop circle phenomenon is somehow paranormal. Attempts to identify tell-tale signs of anomalous energies in the formations, tests which would separate fakes from truly paranormal events, have produced dubious results. The unanswered question remains: are ANY of the crop formations NOT made by humans? I wanted Rod Dickinson's answer to that question; and, particularly with respect to the famous Julia Sets, he responded with absolute confidence.
 
RD: "They were made by people. Definitely."
 
ML: "Do you know who?" I asked.
 
RD: "Yes."
 
ML: "Do you think they could be, um, enticed to identify themselves, perhaps to demonstrate to the press how they could do such a thing?"
 
RD: "I really doubt they'd be willing to come forward," Rod said, and he explained why. But let's return to that point later.
 
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