---
category: "Scientists & Researchers"
tags:
  - Person
  - Engineer
  - AMSAA
  - GrillFlame
  - RemoteViewing
summary: "Army Materiel Systems Analysis Activity engineer who was its Grill Flame project officer and rebutted the Gale committee's call to end the Army's remote-viewing work."
born: 1935-10-30
died: 2026-01-19
location: "Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland"
relations:
  - type: employed_by
    with: "[[Army Materiel Systems Analysis Activity]]"
    role: "Grill Flame project officer; chief, Ground Warfare Division"
    fn: 1
  - type: participant_in
    with: "[[Stargate Project]]"
    start: 1978
    end: 1980
    role: "AMSAA Grill Flame project officer"
    fn: 4
created: 2026-09-22
updated: 2026-09-22
---

John Winston Kramar was born in [[Chicago]] and moved with his parents to Edgewood, [[Maryland]], at fourteen. He graduated in mechanical engineering from [[Purdue University]] in 1957 and became chief of the Ground Warfare Division of the [[Army Materiel Systems Analysis Activity]] (AMSAA) at [[Aberdeen Proving Ground]] and a charter member of the Army's Senior Executive Service. He died in [[Lancaster, Pennsylvania]], on January 19, 2026.[^1]

### Grill Flame

Kramar and Colonel Albert De Prospero of AMSAA were named as discussants, with [[Dale Graff]] of the Foreign Technology Division, in the "Sensory Technology Assessment" of November 14, 1978.[^2] AMSAA's interim note of July 1979 on its [[Stargate Project|Grill Flame]] phase I efforts listed "Mr. John Kramar" among its participants, with [[Evan Harris Walker]] and [[Lewis Walt]].[^3]

As AMSAA's Grill Flame project officer, Kramar wrote for the record on February 13, 1980, that the report of the [[Grill Flame Scientific Evaluation Committee]], "transmitted to AMSAA January 1980, was found to be somewhat ambiguous and confusing," and took "exception" to its recommendation to "Terminate all AMSAA GRILL FLAME efforts": "This recommendation, as best as can be determined, is based only on a partial understanding of AMSAA's initial effort, which was terminated before the SEC came into being. There is an apparent mistake by the SEC in considering the AMSAA challenge/validation efforts to be an integral part of the [[Stanford Research Institute|SRI]] contract." He copied [[Manfred Gale]] and DARCOM.[^4]

### Footnotes

[^1]: "John Winston Kramar," obituary, McComas Family Funeral Homes, January 20, 2026. https://www.mccomasfuneralhome.com/obituaries/john-kramar
[^2]: "Sensory Technology Assessment," November 14, 1978, CIA-RDP96-00787R000500120001-5. Read in the archive.org mirror of the CIA FOIA Reading Room STARGATE collection.
[^3]: U.S. Army Materiel Systems Analysis Activity, "Project Grill Flame AMSAA Phase I Efforts," Interim Note No. 15, July 1979, acknowledgements, CIA-RDP96-00788R001100080005-8. Read in the archive.org mirror of the CIA FOIA Reading Room STARGATE collection.
[^4]: Kramar, John W., AMSAA Grill Flame Project Officer, memorandum for record, "Scientific Evaluation Committee (SEC) GRILL FLAME Report, Dated November 1979," February 13, 1980, CIA-RDP96-00788R001200230026-7 (copies at R002000250025-7 and R001100080007-6). Read in the archive.org mirror of the CIA FOIA Reading Room STARGATE collection.