Zeta Reticuli

1950-1960

In the wake of the Kenneth Arnold sightings, the 1950s saw an increased public awareness of ETH and Flying saucer in America; leading to a corresponding increase in the appearance of Grey-like creatures in cinema and television.

1960-1970

Until the 1960s, the image of the Grey primarily existed in popular fiction, but this began to change in 1965 when the Boston Traveler published the purportedly true story of abductees Betty and Barney Hill. The story included details from a hypnosis session, conducted a year earlier by Dr. Benjamin Simon, in which the Hills described being taken aboard a pancake-like craft by small hairless men with no noses and slanted eyes that wrapped around to the sides of their heads.

Coincidentally on the 10th of February 1964; 12 days prior to the Hill's undergoing hypnosis, the science fiction series The Outer Limits ran an episode entitled "The Bellero Shield", which featured a hairless, noseless alien with a bulbous head and 'wrap-around eyes'.

However, these similarities of greys to the TV episode being are disputed, mainly because the TV being is as tall as a human, does not have a very big head, his eyes are not that big, has no black eyes, and has a glowing body. Furthermore, Betty Hill maintained that she had not seen the Outer Limits, and said that it was unlikely that her husband had seen the episode, because he would either have been working, or performing community activities, during the series' time slot.

In 1968, Greys became associated with the Zeta Reticuli system, after amateur astronomer Marjorie Fish compared a Star Map drawn by Betty Hill to astronomical charts, and determined that the twelve stars depicted on the map showed the aliens home to be a planet in the Zeta Reticuli system, situated approximately 39 light years from Earth. This lead to Greys sometimes being referred to as 'Zetas' or 'Reticulians' in popular culture.