Solway Firth Spaceman

The Solway Firth Spaceman (also known as the Solway Spaceman or the Cumberland Spaceman) is a figure seen in a photograph taken in 1964 by fireman, photographer and local historian Jim Templeton (13 February 1920 – 27 November 2011).

The picture was taken on Burgh Marsh, situated near Burgh by Sands, overlooking the Solway Firth in Cumbria, England. Templeton claimed the photograph shows a background figure wearing a space suit and insisted that he did not see anyone present when the photograph was taken. The image was reproduced widely in contemporary newspapers and gained the interest of ufologists.

A contemporary analysis concluded that the figure was the photographer's wife, standing with her back towards the camera, her dress appearing white due to overexposure.

On 23 May 1964, Jim Templeton, a firefighter from Carlisle, Cumberland (now part of Cumbria), took three photographs of his five-year-old daughter while on a day trip to Burgh Marsh. Templeton said the only other people on the marshes that day were a couple of old women sitting in a car at the far end of the marsh. In a letter to the Daily Mail in 2002, Templeton stated, "I took three pictures of my daughter Elizabeth in a similar pose – and was shocked when the middle picture came back from Kodak displaying what looks like a spaceman in the background." Templeton insists that he did not see the figure until after his photographs were developed, and analysts at Kodak confirmed that the photograph was genuine.

According to UFO author David Clarke in 2014, the "spaceman" is most likely Templeton's wife, Annie, who was present at the time and was seen on other photographs taken that day. "I think for some reason his wife walked into the shot and he didn't see her because with that particular make of camera you could only see 70% of what was in the shot through the viewfinder", said Clarke. Annie Templeton was wearing a pale blue dress on the day in question, which was overexposed as white in the other photos; she also had dark bobbed hair. It has been argued that, when using photo software to darken the image and straighten the horizon, the figure increasingly appears to be a regular person viewed from behind. Of its impact, Clarke said: "People will still be talking about it in another 50 years."

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