Bruce spent his early year in Rutland, Vt. After high school he studied physics at Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Worcester, Mass (B.S. in physics) and then at The American University, Washington, DC (M.S. and Ph. D. in physics). In 1972 commenced his long career at the Naval Surface Warfare Center, presently headquartered at Dahlgren, Virginia. He has worked on optical data processing, generation of underwater sound with lasers and various aspects of the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) and Ballistic Missile Defense (BMD) using high power lasers. Bruce Maccabee has been active in UFO research since late 1960s when he joined the National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena (NICAP) and was active in research and investigation for NICAP until its demise in 1980. He became a member of MUFON in 1975 and was subequently appointed to the position of state Director for Maryland, a position he still holds. In 1979 he was instrumental in establishing the Fund for UFO Research and was the chairman for the about 13 years. He presently serves on the National Board of the Fund.
His UFO research and investigations (which are completely unrelated to his Navy work) have included the Kenneth Arnold sighting (Jun 24, 1947), the McMinnville, Oregon (Trent) photos of 1950, the Gemini 11 astronaut photos of September, 1966, the New Zealand sightings of December, 1978, the Japan Airlines (JAL1628) sighting of November 1986, the numerous sightings of Ed Walters and others in Gulf Breeze, Florida, 1987 - 1988, the "red bubba" sightings,1990-1992 (including his own sighting in September, 1991), the Mexico City video of August, 1997, the Phoenix lights sightings of March 13, 1997 at 10 PM, the Mexican Air Force case of March, 2004, the Iran Jet Case of Sept. 1976 and many others. He has also done historical research and was the first to obtain the "flying disc file" of the FBI (the REAL X-Files!).
Dr. Maccabee is the author or coauthor of about three dozen technical articles and more than a hundred UFO articles over the last 25 years, including many which appeared in the MUFON Journal and MUFON Symposium proceedings. He wrote the last chapter of "The Gulf Breeze Sightings" by Edward and Frances Walters (Morrow, 1990). He wrote the UFO history chapter of the book "UFOs: Zeugen und Zeichen," published in Germany in 1995. He is co-author with Edward Walters of "UFOs Are Real, Here's The Proof," (Avon Books, 1997), he is the author of "The UFO/FBI Connection" (Llewellyn Books, May, 2000) and he is the author of novel, "Abduction in My Life," (November, 2000). He is listed in Who's Who in Technology Today and American Men and Women of Science an he has appeared on numerous radio and TV shows and documentaries.