STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
Sometimes a joke takes on a life of its own like this one, from a woman in Colorado who created a roadside attraction that decades later draws about 10,000 visitors per year. Colorado Public Radio's Dan Boyce has the story.
DAN BOYCE, BYLINE: The San Luis Valley is a vast, high desert plain ringed by sweeping mountain ranges. It's just a little bit smaller than the state of New Jersey, but only about 50,000 people live here. And back in the late '90s, Judy Messoline and her partner were out here barely getting by raising their 75 cows.
JUDY MESSOLINE: They don't eat sand real well, 'bout broke us from having to buy the hay for them.
BOYCE: They weren't sure what they were going to do.
MESSOLINE: And one of the farmers came in one day and he said, you know what? You need to put up that UFO watchtower you giggled about. You'd have fun.
BOYCE: People in the Valley have been reporting UFO sightings since the '60s. Now, Judy, she wasn't fueled by this alien fascination or conspiracy theories. She just wanted to earn a few extra bucks.
MESSOLINE: It was a joke. That's what it was. Initially, it was a joke and hoping to pull the tourist traffic off the highway, you know?
BOYCE: That was 25 years ago.
MESSOLINE: I can't believe it's been that long.
BOYCE: Yeah.
Beside the highway, a green alien made of sheet metal points the way.
MESSOLINE: Well, I have had fun, but in the same token, we have had 304 sightings from just here.
BOYCE: Have you had your own proper UFO sighting - seeing anything that looks weird?
MESSOLINE: I've had 30. The closest one was between here and the mountains and part way down. I called it cigar shaped. It was narrow, really long, and it went zip like that.
BOYCE: Visitors by Little Green Man merch in the gift shop, look through a binder packed with handwritten accounts of the UFO sightings here. And beneath the watchtower - offerings. People leave their shoes and license plates, keys, hats in a swirling rock garden protected by two alien statues.
MESSOLINE: So, I started telling people - and I don't know if it was a good idea or not, but I told them to leave something in the garden and get their energy there, as well.
BOYCE: Judy is planning a 25th birthday party for the Tower this Memorial Day. She's in the process of handing management over to her son, but you'll still find her working the weekends this summer, selling alien stuff, chatting with overnight campers.
MESSOLINE: You got to tell them the stories, you know? You got to entertain. That's the whole thing.
BOYCE: For NPR News, I'm Dan Boyce in Hooper, Colorado.
(SOUNDBITE OF ALAIN GORAGUER'S "LE BRACELET") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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