Until the mid-1960s, NICAP gave little attention to close encounters of the third kind (where animated beings are purportedly sighted in relation to a UFO). However, longtime NICAP member Richard H. Hall related privately that this position was "tactical and not doctrinaire." In other words, NICAP did not necessarily dismiss occupant reports out of hand, but elected to focus on other aspects of the UFO phenomenon which would be perceived by mainstream observers as less outlandish and more believable. The attention given to the contactees of the 1950s such as George Adamski and Truman Bethurum (who typically claimed ongoing contact with benevolent "Space Brothers") was almost certainly a factor in NICAP's reluctance to study UFO occupant reports too closely. But with the 1964 New Mexico Lonnie Zamora UFO encounter — regarded by researchers as one of the most reliable UFO occupant reports — NICAP loosened its restrictions on studying UFO occupant reports.