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Santa Muertre, insect stowaways, fairy music, Golden Yeti awards, EmDrive updates, penis-picking preacher, gay hunters, time travel tales, weeping Virgin, amazing art world CONTENTS discoveries, Florida monster sighting – and much more. 05 THE CONSPIRASPHERE 16 GHOSTWATCH 12 ARCHAEOLOGY 21 ALIEN ZOO the world of strange phenomena 13 CLASSICAL CORNER 23 MYTHCONCEPTIONS 14 SCIENCE 26 THE UFO FILES features

COVER STORY 30 NOSEWITNESS: THE SMELL OF HIGH STRANGENESS Research into strange phenomena has concentrated on visual and audio data, but witness accounts of everything from UFO encounters to monster sightings often contain references to supernatural scents and pongs. JOSHUA CUTCHIN argues that it’s time we took olfactory evidence for forteana seriously… 38 THE BLACK TIDE: WAS FREUD AFRAID OF THE OCCULT? DIKARA / AFP / GETTY IMAGES

KO Psychoanalysis was meant to shine a wholly materialistic light on the mysteries of the human mind and banish

ISHARA S. the supernatural forever. But, asks GARY LACHMAN, 30 SUPERNATURAL SMELLS was Sigmund Freud secretly troubled by the strange Sniffing the olfactory evidence for strange phenomena phenomena he publicly disavowed? 42 FORESEEING A DISASTER? FORGOTTEN DREAMS OF ABERFAN In October 1966 the village school of Aberfan in South was buried under a mountain of coal waste, with the loss of 144 lives. Many people claimed to have dreamed of the tragedy before it happened, and now ALAN MURDIE opens a long-forgotten fi le of terrifying premonitions. forum

55 Is Donald Trump an alien? by Simon Wilson 56 The explorer and the dancing devils by Ben Radford GETTY IMAGES 42 ABERFAN FORESEEN? 55 IS THE PRESIDENT AN ALIEN? Prophetic dreams of the Welsh disaster Donald Trump and the ET doomsday reports

28 BLASTS FROM THE PAST No 66. Weirdness on wheels 52 BUILDING A FORTEAN LIBRARY No 18. Underground literature 76 TALES FROM THE ILLUSTRATED POLICE NEWS No 54. Marian, the Giant Amazon Queen regulars PIZZOLI / AFP / GETTY IMAGES TO 02 EDITORIAL 78 READER INFO ALBER 8RELIGIOUS ROUND-UP 16 WHO YOU GONNA CALL? 59 REVIEWS 79 PHENOMENOMIX Mad preachers and bad omens The Gay Club of Ohio 71 LETTERS 80 STRANGE DEATHS

COVER IMAGE: DAVID NEWTON FT350 1 www.forteantimes.com fortean Times

editor dAVid SUttoN ([email protected]) foUNdiNg editorS bob rickArd ([email protected]) pAUl SieVekiNg ([email protected]) Art director etieNNe gilfillAN ([email protected]) editorial book reViewS editor VAl SteVeNSoN ([email protected]) reSideNt cArtooNiSt HUNt emerSoN Smells like teen spirits SUbScriptioN eNqUirieS ANd bAck iSSUeS www.subsinfo.co.uk [email protected] WEiRd WhiffS snowflakes” and so on. FORTEAN TIMES is produced for by Wild Talents Ltd. Postal address: Fortean Times, A flick through some old copies of FT yields a Forteans display as wide a range of political PO BOX 71602, London E17 0QD. wide variety of stories concerning anomalous opinion as anyone else, and we allow our You can manage your existing subscription through smells: a couple driven from their home by contributors complete freedom of expression in http://www.subsinfo.co.uk/ – this should be your first port mysterious fumes (FT8:11); the odour of sanctity their work, certainly not “leaning on them”(as of call if you have any queries about your subscription. surrounding an incorrupt corpse (FT29:9); another correspondent suggested) to ensure Change your address, renew your subscription or report problems a sulphurous cloud causing nosebleeds and that some imaginary FT party line is maintained. UK subscriptions: 0844 844 0049 sore throats (FT53:14); the nauseating niffs SD Tucker, self-confessed “grovelling capitalist USA & Canada subscriptions: (+1) 800-428-3003 (toll free) attributed toVirginia’s maniacal gasser in the lickspittle”, is clear that his his ongoing Strange Fax (+1) 757-428-6253 email [email protected] Other overseas subscriptions: +44 (0)1795 592 909 early 1930s (FT131:32); or an overpowering Statesmen series in these pages is meant to offer Fax: +44 (0)1795 414 555 scent of maple syrup “comic explorations of spreading across NewYork weird things, ideas and LicEnSinG & SYndicATion Fortean times IS AvAILABLE FOR City (FT205:21). As well events centring around INTERNATIONAL LICENSINg AND SYNDICATION – CONTACT: as constituting mysteries politicians worldwide”, Syndication Senior Manager ANj DOSAj-HALAI TEL: +44- (0) 20 7907 6132 in their own right, these not propaganda or [email protected] paranormal pongs also political advice.The series Licensing Manager CARLOTTA SERANTONI TEL: +44- (0) 20 7907 6550 appear to accompany all has drawn praise from [email protected] kinds of other fortean most readers, and angry Licensing & Syndication Assistant NICOLE ADAMS TEL: +44- (0) 20 7907 6134 phenomena, from alien responses from a few. Mr [email protected] encounters (Adamskian Tucker sums up his, and YoU cAn REAch fT on ThE inTERnET Space Brothers smell our, position perfectly in www.forteantimes.com nice, sneaky Greys not so this month’s letters pages: much) to sweet-smelling “Please don’t read these © Copyright Dennis Publishing Limited spectres and memorably articles thinking I’m telling malodorous Sasquatches. you which side to back pUbliSHed bY prodUctioN execUtiVe Smell might be a constant or vote for on any given lAwreNce brookeS deNNiS pUbliSHiNg, 020 7907 6062 presence in forteana, but issue… surely no one reads 30 cleveland Street lawrence_brookes@ it’s also an elusive one, FT looking to find serious london w1t 4Jd, Uk dennis.co.uk notoriously unamenable political guidance?” tel: 020 7907 6000 AdVertiSiNg director SteVe NicolAoU to easy description or pUbliSHer 020 7907 6633 categorisation, impossible ERRATA dHArmeSH miStrY steve_nicolaou@ to capture as physical "Bewitching top notes of lily, rose FT347:39+41: In Paul 020 7907 6100 dennis.co.uk evidence, disappearing on and gardenia, with base notes of Sieveking’s extensive circUlAtioN mANAger SAleS execUtiVe wet earth and putrefaction" JAmeS mANgAN brAdleY beAVer the breeze and leaving only summary of creepy clown james.mangan@ 020 7907 6701 memories. It’s a subject sightings, he inadvertently seymour.co.uk bradley_beaver@ ripe for further exploration, so we’re pleased quoted a passage from ’s latest export circUlAtioN dennis.co.uk to present a taster of Joshua Cutchin’s new book Bad Clowns without acknowledgement. mANAger SAleS execUtiVe gerAldiNe grobler imogeN williAmS book The Brimstone Deceit, which attempts to We’d like to apologise to Ben for this inadvertent geraldine.grobler@ 020 7907 6247 do for supernatural scents what his earlier A plagiarism: the problem arose because news seymour.co.uk imogen_williams@ Trojan Feast (see FT332:42-47) did for fortean reports used in Paul’s summary themselves made dennis.co.uk foodstuffs.Turn to page 30 for an introductory extensive use of Ben’s excellent book (see our PRinTEd BY WILLIAM gIBBONS & SONS LTD sniff. review, FT349:61). For more from Mr Radford, diSTRiBUTion turn to this issue’s Forum section for a little distributed in UK, ireland and worldwide oRdER, oRdER! known fortean episode in the life of a celebrated by Seymour Distribution Ltd. 2 East Poultry Avenue, London EC1A 9PT Politics has been a subject hard to avoid in American explorer. Tel: 020 7429 4000 / Fax: 020 7429 4001 recent months, whether here in Europe or Queries on overseas availability should be emailed to [email protected] across the pond in the USA, and divisiveness FT348:24: Martin Jenkins of London pointed out Speciality store distribution by Worldwide Magazine has followed in its wake – even entering the that the magazine cover shown here is certainly Distribution Ltd, Tel: 0121 788 3112 Fax: 0121 788 1272 hallowed halls of Fortean Towers. We’d just not French, as described in the caption. “If you STAndARd SUBScRiPTion RATES 12 issues: UK £39.98; EU £47.50 like to say that FT is not, and never has been a look carefully it says, ‘Raport UFO Romania’, and political organ of any persuasion; but we take then helpfully translates this as ‘Romanian UFO fortean Times (USPS 023-226) is published every four weeks by Dennis Publishing Ltd, 30 Cleveland Street, London, W1P 4JD, . weirdness where we find it, and – as usual, but Report’. So, presumably Romanian, not French.” The US annual subscription price is $89.99. more so – there’s been no shortage of the stuff Airfreight and mailing in the USA is by Agent named Air Business, C/O Worldnet Shipping USA Inc., 149-35 177th Street, Jamaica, emanating from the world of politics.

New , 11434. What seems to have changed is that the sort of daVid r SUTToN Periodical postage paid at Jamaica, NY 11431, USA. combative responses one finds below the line on US Postmaster: Send address changes to: Fortean Times, 3330 Pacific Avenue, Suite 500, Virginia Beach, VA, 23451-2983, USA. newspaper websites have been finding their way bob rickard PaUL SiEVEkiNG REST OF THE WORLD £55; US $89.99 ($161.98 for 24 issues) onto fortean message boards and in a growing dEnniS PUBLiShinG LiMiTEd number of angry emails and furious letters GRoUP cfo/coo BRETT REYNOLDS denouncing FT for (variously): making digs at ExEcUTivE diREcToR KERIN O’CONNOR chiEf ExEcUTivE jAMES TYE Donald Trump; not being nice aboutVladimir Why fortean? coMPAnY foUndER Putin; publishing anti-Russian propaganda at Everything you always wanted to the behest of our publishers; acting as useful Member of the Audit Bureau of Circulations. know about Fortean Times but Circulation 14,320 (jan-Dec 2015) idiots for the Western elites; having “some sort were too paranoid to ask! Printed in the UK. ISSN: 0308 5899 of lefty Social Justice Warrior/Guardianista” © Fortean Times: jANUARY 2017 as editor; providing “a safe space for libtard SEE PAGE 78

2 FT350 www.forteantimes.com LISTEN IT JUST MIGHT CHANGE YOUR LIFE

LIVE | CATCH UP | ON DEMAND a digest of the worldwide weird strangedays

by the empty power of the world, praise illusions and embrace Our Lady of Holy Death their macabre symbols to commemorate death in exchange for money.” The skeletal saint whose cult is spreading across Mexico and beyond However, many devout Catholics see no contradiction in embracing the cult. For instance, Tepito, after which Santa Muerte Amalia Cordero, 55, spoke of it became mainstream. Sacrificial with the passion of a born-again Masses are held at the Tepito Christian coming to Jesus. She shrine on the first day of heac had “complete faith” from the month, when pigeons and farm moment she first laid eyes on animals are slaughtered on the a lit figurine of the “Beautiful altar. Worshippers believe their Lady” on the side of a road; offerings of fruit, tequila and and while she’s been Catholic cigarettes bring them protection. all her life, she never truly felt Romero is often regarded as the God until finding Santa Muerte. cult’s ‘high priestess’. Defending the saint’s association More forgiving than the with narcos, she said: “Santa Catholic Church – she is said Muerte herself isn’t bad. We not to punish traditional sins – make her bad. We make her do Santa Muerte grew popular in those things. She’s an angel God Mexico’s prisons and became created and each person can ask the patron saint of drug cartels. OSTA / AFP / GeTTy ImAGeS what they want of her. It’s sad AC In ‘prisoner Masses’, families of when people use her for evil.” LUIS inmates pray to Santa Muerte to A rival patron saint for ABOVE: Devotees pray at the saint’s shrine in the Iztapalapa shantytown, mexico City. unlock their cells.The cartels’ Mexican drug traffickers is Jesús mass beheadings and lynchings Malverde of Sinaloa, known as The cult of Nuestra Senora de la Commonwealth University might be ritual offerings to the “Angel of the Poor” or El Santa Muerte (Our Lady of Holy and author of Devoted to Death: Santa Muerte rather than simply Narcoanton (the Big Narco Saint). Death) is probably the fastest Santa Muerte, the Skeleton warnings to rival gangs.The He was a common criminal, growing religion in the Americas. Saint. “In 2001 when devotion Mexican government briefly though not a drug trafficker. Holding a scythe in one hand to the folk religion first went tried to suppress the cult, with Soon after he was hanged in and a globe in the other, Santa public in Mexico, Saint Death the army demolishing some 40 1909, locals began attributing Muerte could easily be mistaken was unknown to 99 per cent of roadside shrines close to the US to him. They made for the Grim Reaper; but millions Mexicans. In just 15 years she border in 2009. But by 2013, the plaster busts of his likeness and believe the smiling skeletal saint has attracted an estimated 10 to Santa Muerte had come to rival built a shrine of rough-hewn – affectionately nicknamed la 12 million devotees, primarily in theVirgin of Guadalupe, the wooden planks in Culiacan, Flaquita (the Skinny Lady), or la Mexico, Central America, and the country’s “national patroness” capital of the Pacific coastal Madrina (the Godmother) – can US.” There are also followers in in popularity. Today, statues of state of Sinaloa. In the early heal illness, bring prosperity and the UK, , and Japan. both are often sold side by side even help find velo , but the most Historians say the Santa in shops. 1990s some of Mexico’s most common plea is for a peaceful Muerte cult has its roots in the In May 2013, Cardinal powerful drug traffickers joined death and safe delivery to the Aztec worship of Mictecacihuatl Gianfranco Ravasi, President of locals in paying homage at his afterlife. She is depicted as a (“Lady of the Dead”), but its theVatican’s Pontifical Council shrine, leaving bullets and dollar grinning skeleton swathed in a modern iteration incorporates for Culture, said worshipping bills. Meanwhile in Venezuela, hooded cloak, often made of red many of the rituals of the Santa Muerte was “anti- gangsters of the Maria Lionza velvet, embroidered lace or black Catholic Church. Worship was religious”, adding: “Religion cult leave offerings to Ismael sheeting. Objects associated with initially clandestine, the prayers celebrates life, but here you and his Holy Thugs (Santos her image include scales (for and rites quietly uttered at have death. It’s not religion Malandros); see FT317:53-54 for justice), an hourglass (mortality), domestic altars. Her cult was just because it’s dressed up more. Rocky Mountain News, 4 an owl (wisdom), and an oil lamp documented in working class like religion; it’s a blasphemy Sept 1995; [R] 4 Mar; Houston (lighting the way). neighbourhoods in against religion.” During his trip (TX) Chronicle, 25 Aug 2005; “From Chile to Canada, and Mexico City in the 1940s, and to Mexico in 2016, Pope Francis Lorado (WV) Morning Times, Santa Muerte has no rival in the Mexican state of Hidalgo included a cryptic admonishment 29 July 2007; BBC News, 9 May in terms of the rapidity and in the 1960s. It went public in of Santa Muerte in an address to 2013; Sun, 15 Dec 2014; Catholic scope of its expansion,” said 2001, when Enriqueta Romero Mexican bishops, saying he was Herald magazine, 6 Nov 2015; Andrew Chesnut, Professor of founded a shrine to the saint “particularly concerned about businessinsider.com, 17 Mar; Religious Studies atVirginia in her Mexico City suburb of those many persons who, seduced D.Telegraph, 25 Dec 2016.

4 FT350 www.forteantimes.com the aNother dog cash iN the of doom iN the wall attic Pesticide-spraying Russian pup Lost Leonardo preacher, and rescued after and further other recent three-year surprising art religious oddities immurement world finds Page 8 Page 10 Page 22

The Conspirasphere Extra! Extra!

Mind-controlled Pentagon killer, Russian hackers, and Nibiru spotters: FT’s FavouriTe headlines Noel rooNeY considers three tall tales that have surfaced in the mainstream media. FroM around The world

As I’m writing this column, orbit, which means the last the news is running with the time the Annunaki came to visit story of a mass shooting at was somewhere around 1,600 the Fort Lauderdale Airport in BC. Competent astronomers Florida, USA. The perpetrator, operated in that period and a 26-year-old army veteran, they seem to have missed took a gun out of his luggage what modern organs such as Toronto Star, 24 Sept 2015. in the baggage claim area the Daily Mail (not universally and started shooting. By the recognised for its coterie of time he had run out of ammunition, and boffins) did not.’s It tough out there. lay down, a passive pentagram, to await meanwhile, the much-touted efforts arrest, five people were dead and dozens of Russian hackers will have paid off by wounded. The media are now suggesting the time you read this, and the Donald (a that the young man, when arrested, man recently compared, a tad unfairly, to claimed that the Pentagon was controlling Hitler by his defeated opponent) will be in his mind; in particular it was forcing him charge. Isn’t it strange that, when some to watch Islamic State videos. A small cove in a tin-foil hat claims the Annunaki Palm Beach (FL) Post, 5 Oct 2015. reminder that the Conspirasphere is not are coming to get us, we just giggle and always and only an arena for sceptical ask where the evidence is, but when an entertainment, perhaps; or further proof, entire layer of the US political class makes if more proof were needed, that the up a fairy story about Russia manipulating Conspiracy is real. the US election process, the only people Further proof is a theme much loved asking for concrete evidence are the same by the adherents of the ‘Nibiru is Coming’ blokes in tin foil hats? Post-modernity school of eschatology. you can dismiss (‘disappointment raised to the level of high D.Telegraph, 14 Oct 2015 them easily enough, on the (to me culture’) is sometimes just a little too good incontrovertible) grounds that the late at irony for its own (and our) good. Zechariah Sitchin got it all wrong; but plenty The gradual shift of the Conspirasphere of perfectly respectable religious groups into the mainstream is both an additional and institutions were founded on similarly layer of irony, and an irony in itself; in the fallacious grounds, and we don’t (all) treat post-truth world, para-truth is an essential them as space fairies. This year, there are element of our media landscape, and already a couple of celestial candidates makes that landscape both more and less heaving into view, and it seems that believable. It makes the world funnier, of elements of the mainstream media have course (though I don’t think mr Fort would Stratford Observer, 16 Oct 2015. seen them too; further proof that what be laughing); but if you ask those victims was once the province of the marginal, the of a troubled man claiming the Pentagon maverick and the mad is now the stuff of colonised his brain and made him shoot, news. I suspect the word ‘tragedy’ would be the At the very least, you have to admire operative term. the fortitude of the Nibiru spotters. To scan the skies, and analyse the output of http:// www.sltrib.com/home/4789389-155/ various establishment space agencies for veteran-who-said-the-government-was; anomalies, all in a quest to demonstrate http://www.dailymail.co.uk/wires/ap/ Metro, via Irish Independent, 29 Aug 2015. finally that this is the year it all happens; article-4096940/Report-election-hacking-says- and then to do it again, year after year, Russia-plans-more.html; takes a kind of that is usually http://www.thetruthseeker.co.uk/?p=145100; reserved to the most apocalyptic of http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/ churches. And the faithful are not helped article-3292170/Is-alien-probe-Strange-object-set- by history; Sitchin’s suggestion (I know, but sweep-past-earth-2017-just-space-junk-Apollo-12- mission.html that’s where it started) was a 3,600-year Asahi Shimbun (Japan), 29 Sept 2015.

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SIDELINES... Extra fingers and heads, earfuls of FLORIDA MONSTER medical bag insects and the longest ever human tail Steven Smith, 31, was fish- ing with his cousin off New Smyrna Beach in Florida when they allegedly encountered a sea serpent. Smith described it as a “jet black” plesiosaurus “three to four feet tall” with “bloodshot round eyes”, an S-shaped long and stocky neck, thick tail and flippers. The sighting only lasted about three seconds. - news.com, 13 Nov 2016. BIRTHDAY CLUSTERS A baby born on 5 August is the fourth in his family – from Brecon, Mid-Wales – to be born on that date, joining grandfather David Jones, 53, father Ashley, 27, and uncle Adam, 25. Ashley had a twin, but he died aged six

months in 1992. On 1 August, iA PrESS Libbie Ballingal was born in AS Evesham, Worcestershire. Her COvEr parents, Jodie and Mark, were ABOVE: Krishna Choudhary, from Bihar, and some of his family, 25 members of which have 12 fingers and 12 toes. also both born on 1 August. D.Express, 8 Aug; D.Mirror online, 9 Aug 2016. PRODIGIOUS DIGITS toes but also needs reconstructed AUTO-EROTIC Krishna Choudhary, 50, who “i don’t have thumbs. Opposable thumbs are lives in a small village in Bihar, essential because they give people On 16 August, a man was northern India, has six fingers on the ability to grasp objects. [CNN] observed attempting to have any problems each hand and six toes on each 5 May 2016. sex with the front grill of a red foot – just like his father and van parked in Dayton, Ohio. with my extra The man subsequently “lay siblings. In fact, 25 members of his TwO IN ONE down and possibly passed family each have 12 fingers and 12 fingers” A two-headed baby boy, weighing out” before rising and walking toes. “I don’t have any problems 2.5kg (5lb 7oz), was born on in circles. Police came upon with my extra fingers, but my 3 October 2016 at Jawaharlal Michael Henson, 35, who children and grandchildren suffer Nehru Medical College in Ajmer, “appeared under the influence a lot,” said Krishna, 50, a daily mother also has polydactylism, Rajasthan, northern India. He was of some type of narcotic” and wage labourer. “I’ve had boys that with six fingers and toes. said to be in a “healthy state” but was wearing only gym shorts have refused to marry the girls of Polydactyly is fairly common, had “severe breathing issues”. and shoes. He was arrested my family after learning of their affecting about one in every 1,000 Against medical advice, he was for public indecency. condition. Four people rejected my live births, according to Children’s taken home by his parents, but the smokinggun.com, 18 Aug daughter after finding out she had Healthcare of Atlanta. Often, sadly died 32 hours after birth. Dr 2016. 24 digits.” He said it was difficult the extra digits are removed Jaiprakash Narayan admitted the for him and his children to find surgically, and last May Hong boy was actually conjoined twins, footwear that was comfortable, Hong’s parents, who live in the city but separation was thought to be and they were obliged to wear of Shenzhen, were trying to raise “nearly impossible”: despite the flip-flops. Krishna’s sister-in-law enough money to reduce their twins having two pairs of all of Sitbiya Choudhary considers the son’s digits – requiring as much the internal organs, they were all condition a blessing, while other as 200,000 Chinese yuan (about in one body, with only one pair of members of the family feel they £24,000) – although he would have arms and legs. dailymail.co.uk, 5 have been cursed. dailymail.co.uk, to be a bit older, according to his Oct; mysteriousuniverse.org, 10 Oct 18 Nov 2016. father, Zou Chenglin. Doctors 2016. have given the family differing • Hong Hong, a Chinese boy, was advice, with some saying the TAIL REMOVED born in January 2016 in Pingjiang surgery is much more complicated An 18-year-old boy from Nagpur County, Hunan province, with 15 than originally thought because in the Indian state of Maharashtra fingers, 16 toes, two palms hon eac Hong Hong requires not only the with a 20cm ‘tail’ growing at the hand and no thumbs.The boy’s removal of his extra fingers and bottom of his spine has undergone MArTiN rOSS

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SIDELINES... surgery to have it removed. It started to appear on his back just LEG RETRIEVED after his 14th birthday. He and Elliot Fuller and Jason Franklin his family had kept it a secret spotted a prosthetic leg stick- because they were worried he ing out of a beaver dam while would be bullied, but finally paddling between a pair of sought medical help after it lakes near Wabeno, Wiscon- grew too long to hide – and had sin, on 4 August. A search on begun to develop a bone inside. Craigslist yielded an ad from “It became a problem when the Mark Warner, 49, who lost tail grew outside the body,” said the limb when his own canoe his mother, who declined to be tipped over during a July fishing named. “He would just lift the trip on range Line Lake in tail every time he needed to Wabeno, three miles from the change his clothes. I could see beaver dam. The canoeists that it was very annoying and returned it to Warner, netting a painful for him, so I took him $50 reward. [AP] 8 Aug 2016. to a hospital.” It’s thought to be AwAY wITH THE FAIRIES the longest ever recorded on a TErS NEWS CA According to the Spiritual human – although cases are very Science research Foundation rare [see FT52:52-54]. Although (founded by indian hypnothera- surgically removing a tail isn’t pist Jayant Balaji Athavale), a very complicated procedure, 85 per cent of homosexuals it must be carried out by a are not gay – just possessed neurosurgeon as the growth of by of the opposite sex. tail involves a part of the spinal The Foundation also claims cord. It normally develops when that “hormonal changes” ex- the end of the spine is flattened plain the behaviour of five per in some way. BBC News, 7 Oct cent of homosexuals. D.Star, 2016. 10 Dec 2016. See Ghost- watch, p16-18 for more. INSECT STOwAwAYS NOT A COUNTRY In August 2016, a 12-year-old Indian girl called Shreya Darji, Kiwi tourist Chloe Phillips- from Deesa, Gujarat, complained Harris, 28, was detained at Almaty Airport, Kazakhstan, of ringing in her ears. At the after immigration officials local hospital, doctors removed refused to believe that New some dead ants from her ear iA PrESS

AS Zealand was a country and canal and thought that was the not part of Australia. She end of the problem, but she was COvEr was held two days and inter- still discovering around a dozen TOP: The 18-year-old boy from the indian State of Maharashta with a 20cm-tail. rogated for hours. A map in ants a day crawling out of her ABOVE: This two-headed boy was born in rajasthan, but sadly died 32 hours later. the room did not show New ears. Following various trips to Zealand, making it tougher the hospital and the removal of to persuade the guards that over 1,000 ants, experts were worried about her future and at Newton Beach several times a her country existed. She was baffled. Both MRI and CT scans how this will affect her studies,” week, thought the spider might eventually able to enter after came back normal. Doctors tried said her father, Sanjay Darji. have been in her hoodie as she contacts helped her to secure flushing her ears with antiseptic “Other children in her school was getting changed in a beach a new visa and a US passport to drown the ants, and attempted and community are teasing her.” hut one evening and lurked in (as she has dual nationality). several times to locate the queen Medical Daily, 11 Feb; ripleys.com/ her hair when she got home. telegraph.co.uk, dailymail. ant with laparoscopic cameras blog, 13 Feb; D.Express online, 25 “When I went into the shower co.uk, 5 Dec 2016. and kill her. Dr Jawahar Talsania, Nov 2016. the first thing it wanted to do DESPERATE MEASURE the leading ear, nose and throat was find somewhere warm and Lawrence ripple, 70, passed surgeon at the hospital in • Victoria Price, 42, from dry, so it went into my ear,” Price a note to a bank teller in Gujarat, also used an endoscopic Porthcawl in South Wales explained. “I think the pain must Kansas City, Kansas, demand- camera to look inside the girl’s complained of earache and her have been him dancing on my ing cash and warning he had ear canal; apart from finding husband Huw spotted a live eardrum.” The intruder did not a gun. He was given $3,000, dead ants, her organs were all creature lurking in her ear canal. appear to have caused any lasting and sat in the lobby, telling a unharmed.The family even She went to the Princess of Wales damage. Neither did it lay any security guard: “i’m the guy consulted witchdoctors, but hospital in Bridgend, where nurse eggs, as Price said she had been you’re looking for.” When the they were unable to help. It was Sarah Gaze removed a large furry repeatedly asked. theguardian. police arrived, ripple told a mystery how the ants got into spider from her inner ear. Price, com, 9 June; Western Mail, 10 June them that he would rather go her ears in the first place. “I’m a lifeguard who swims in the sea 2016. to jail than live with his wife. D.Mail, 10 Sept 2016.

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SIDELINES... lAchrymOsE lAdy, BlOOdy BAd OmEn ReligiOUS NeWS And A PEckEr-Picking PrEAchEr AVIAN PORTENT Thousands of birds were detected on Doppler radar MOTHER MARY wEEP in Lourdes. I’ve been there 20 accepted, but not officially taking flight from Oklahoma FOR US times.” Locals are adamant they recognised by the Church. City about 6:47am, 16 minutes December reports of a have seen the statue move her The liquefaction is believed before a 5.6 magnitude weeping Virgin Mary in Ireland’s hands and change colour. Some to happen at least three earthquake struck near County Kerry. Seven years ago have witnessed a prominent blue times a year: on the Saturday Pawnee, Oklahoma, (about the slightly damaged statue was vein standing out in her neck. before the first Sunday of 93 miles/150km northeast of destined for the skip as it was sundayworld.com, 10 Dec 2016. May (commemorating the Oklahoma City) at 7:03am on missing several fingers, but self- reunification of the saint’s 3 September 2016. The US professed spiritual healer Tom OMINOUS PORTENT relics); on the saint’s feast Geological Survey states that Powers, 73, rescued it from a An ancient ampoule of blood day, 19 September; and on the earliest record of animals convent. Mr Powers, who claims to failed to liquefy on 16 December, 16 December, the day Mount fleeing before an earthquake is hear God’s voice, insists the statue a bad omen for 2017, thought Vesuvius erupted in 1631. from Greece in 373 BC, when has turned “miraculous”. He said to portend war, famine, disease During the , the dried, rats, weasels, snakes, and the white paper flowers laid at the or other disaster. One of the red-coloured mass confined centipedes reportedly headed feet of the statue have changed to most famous recurring miracles to one side of the reliquary for safety several days before a destructive quake. Strange a gold tint to match the statue’s is the liquefaction of the becomes blood that covers the Sounds, 7 Sept 2016. dress. During December, dried blood of St Januarius entire glass. The announcement several hundred people came (Gennaro in Italian), of the liquefaction is greeted HEMINGwAY CLONE to see the statue in a flat patron saint of Naples with a 21-gun salute at the For the first time in its 36-year above Domino’s Pizza in the and former bishop of the 13th-century Castel Nuovo. The history, the Hemingway look- centre of Tralee. city, believed to have December failure to liquefy was a-like contest in the Florida Teresa Roche described been martyred during the first since 19 September Keys – with 140 contestants in seeing a tear falling from the rule of Emperor 1980, which allegedly portended 2016 – was won by some- the eye of the statue. Diocletian around the Irpinia earthquake on 23 one called Hemingway. Dave On another occasion, AD 305. His bones November that year. Hemingway, 65, from North she saw the statue’s and a reliquary On 21 March 2015, Pope Carolina, insisted he was not features come to life. of his blood are Francis met with priests and related to the Nobel Prize-win- “I could see the preserved in seminarians at the cathedral ning author. telegraph.co.uk, real features in the cathedral. and gave a blessing with the 25 July 2016. her face. She The reputed relic. Cardinal Crescenzio Sepe SERPENT IN THE TREE was young and miracle, first of Naples then received an On 18 December, a woman her skin was so recorded ampoule back from the Pope identified as Cheryl from soft.You get in 1389, and, noting that some of the the Melbourne suburb of the same kind is locally blood was still solid, remarked: Frankston discovered a ven- of feeling known and “It seems that St Januarius omous, metre-long tiger snake entwined with the tinsel on her Christmas tree. it was col- lected by snake catcher Barry Goldsmith and relocated to a friend’s bush property nearby. abc.net.au, 19 Dec; (Sydney) D.Telegraph, 20 Dec 2016. MArTiN rOSS PiZZOLi / AFP / GETTy iMAGES TO ALBEr TOP: ireland’s latest miraculous statue of the virgin Mary. ABOVE: Cardinal Crescenzio Sepe, archbishop of Naples shows the ampoule containing the blood of Saint Januarius to Pope Francis during a visit in March 2015.

8 FT350 www.forteantimes.com strangedays

loves the Pope, because the SIDELINES... blood is already half liquefied.” Pope Francis quipped in RUST IN PEACE response: “You can see that the A 73-year-old man drove his saint only loves us a little. We Audi into a pit filled with 12,000 have to convert more.” litres of Coca-Cola in Sheder, The last time the blood Latvia, hoping to get rid of its liquefied in the presence ofa rust. However, the £7,000 Pope was in 1848 when Pius IX test was ruined when he drove the car too fast and hit the op- visited. It didn’t happen when St posite side of the pit. Metro, 1 John Paul II visited the city in Nov 2016. October 1979, or when Benedict XVI visited in October 2007. FAUX ZEBRA The relic failed to liquefy in Someone broke into a stable September 1939 when World in the Czech village of Stary War II broke out and during Hrozenkov and spray-painted a cholera outbreak in Naples a seven-year-old black stallion in 1973. However, Monsignor with white stripes to make it Vincenzo De Gregorio, the look like a zebra – as well as Abbot of the Chapel of the snipping its tail. if caught, the Treasure of San Gennaro, took prankster faces up to three a philosophical view. “We must years in jail. Metro, 3 Oct 2016. not think of disasters and TOP: Lethebo rabalago – let us spray. BElOW: Bishop Daniel Obinim. DAIRY ATTACKS calamities,” he counselled. “We Alison Nurton, founder of a are men of faith and we must haberdashery business in pray.” The prophet HANDS-ON PREACHER Sherborne, , was arriving Sceptics have asserted Bishop Daniel Obinim, who at her new premises on Cheap that the supposed blood is a claims the founded the International God’s Street to teach a crochet thixotropic gel, one that is Way Church in the Ashanti region workshop at around 7pm on 20 relatively solid but liquefies pesticide can of Ghana, claims to make men’s January 2016 when a yoghurt when stirred or agitated; this penises larger by massaging was thrown at her and the remains unproven as the Church them with his hands. He has entrance to the shop by some- forbids the ancient seals on heal cancer been filmed performing a ritual one driving by in a convertible. the two phials to be broken. where he moves around a room The report in the North “To presume that it must be full of men, grabbing them each Journal (16 Sept 2016) said it a sleight-of-hand trick simply PROPHET OF DOOM by the crotch. In some cases, he was one of two “drive-by dairy because the effect can be Lethebo Rabalago, a South will keep hold of their penises attacks”. replicated by stage magicians is African prophet who runs the and give them a little shake. BORING FOR ENGLAND rash, unfair, and flies in the face Mountzion General Assembly Graciously, he also offers to Mark Leigh, 48, from Long of sound eye-witness testimony,” in Limpopo province, claims a massage women’s breasts in order Ditton in , has arguably wrote Bob Rickard (‘Seeing Red: pesticide called Doom can heal to enlarge them too. Britain’s most boring hobby: the Blood Miracles of Naples’, people. In photos circulating on In a scene broadcast on his taking photos of lost gloves. in FT65:36-41). “If a ‘mediæval’ Facebook and Twitter, Rabalago own channel, Obinim TV, the three years he has amassed hoaxer created the trick back is seen spraying the insecticide bishop says: “If you do not like more than 300. He was intro- in he 14th century… how has directly into the eyes and various the looks of any part of your duced to the Dull Men’s Club the substance kept its vigour up body parts of his congregants. body, come to me. What do you by fellow member Hugh Barker, to the present through so many He said he had sprayed the face want that I can’t offer? If you a box hedge enthusiast, and liquefactions or performed of one woman because she had want big buttocks I can do it was named Mr November in the so successfully under such an eye infection and claimed the for you. If you want big breasts, club’s calendar. Metro, 24 Nov a variety of conditions? As woman was “just fine because she I can help. If you have a small 2016. Alban Butler exclaimed: ‘The believed in the power of God”. manhood, I can change them chemical secret would be not He also claims the spray can heal all when I come to the spiritual SPOOKED RESIDENTS only a notorious fraud but also a cancer and HIV. Tiger Brands, realm.” Bishop Obinim has been According to a survey con- wonderful discovery’.” the company that produces criticised for his controversial ducted by Towergate insurance, The last word should go to the Doom, warned of the risks of practices before. In August he nearly 10 per cent of Britons Jesuit Father Herbert Thurston: spraying the substance, saying was filmed whipping have moved because they thought their house might be “The inability to explain such the practice was “alarming”, teenagers while haunted, and nearly two-thirds things does not force us to the while a government commission accusing them of being of buyers will not contemplate alternative of either denying urged anyone effected to sexually promiscuous. a property near a graveyard the facts or declaring them to lodge complaints. In another He is now facing or a spooky-looking church. be miraculous.” Catholic News incident, a pastor convinced charges over the However, nearly a third would Agency, 19 Dec; , 20 Dec members of his church to eat incident. Metro, 6 Dec buy a ‘haunted’ house if the 2016. See also FT16:5, 51:23, snakes and grass, and drink fuel 2016. seller dropped the price by 20 52:4, 82:48, 117:8. for healing. BBC News, 21 Nov per cent. Mail on Sunday, 30 2016. Oct 2016.

FT350 9 www.forteantimes.com strangedays

Another brick in the wall...

A mysterious voice, a canine prisoner freed, and a surprise immurement

For three days last December, ABOVE: Volya emerges at long last. tenants of a building in the Oduduwa Area of Ondo State in Nigeria were troubled by a mystery was heartbreaking. The authorities voice seemingly coming from a wall. refused to help, but eventually a Many of them believed that the public campaign and media exposure house was haunted, and actually managed to secure the dog’s release considered moving. Eventually, they last October. Animal rights activists alerted the police since the owner and local people considered smashing of the property was unreachable. through the wall but were worried With the help of neighbours and the dog could be hurt or even killed. passersby, the wall was broken Welder Andrey Chernov tried to widen down on 9 December to reveal an the feeding hole, but the dog refused to emaciated 16-year-old boy called come out. Aduragbemi, who had been trapped Karina Dombrovskaya said: “We between two walls a mere 10 inches studied the structure of the basement, (25cm) apart. One of the residents and looked for options. The dog was not who identified herself simply just sitting in the opening; she had a as Becky said: “We never knew narrow area under the basement of the anyone was there, so when the noise shop. Naturally, over the years, she had refused to stop and was unbearable, I told my dug some passages and could move there.” friends to start looking for accommodation for Her howling was Eventually they found Darya Stepantsova, 27, me because it was becoming scary hearing a who was slim enough to squeeze through the strange voice coming out of a wall for three heartbreaking, narrow hole. “I thought I could just get inside, days, non-stop... Could it be a ghost? I asked throw a loop round the dog’s neck and pull myself. Initially, we laughed when the person her out,” she said. “But when I got there, I was was talking incoherently, because he was fond especially in the shocked. For years the dog had dug tunnels of repeating anything people around said. there. I was scared, it was difficult. There was “We, in our compound, thought the voice winter months no space for a person under the basement and was from the shops on the other side, so we I had to dig trenches with my bare hands. I confronted them to know who was doing it, was breathing only cement dust and sand. I but they said they thought it was from our into the wall was unexplained, it was thought crawled closer to the dog, threw a loop over compound... That was when we sensed trouble. that he had climbed their fence and fallen her head, and tied her muzzle with a bandage. We also realised that in the night when the into the wall cavity. According to Saturday At one point I got into a dead end and thought shops had closed, the voice persisted and the Punch, Aduragbemi was “an Indian hemp that I’d never get out. I pulled myself together person was saying meaningless things, like smoker” and had been undergoing treatment and pulled out the dog.” The animal was given ‘My name is Judas Iscariot; I’m Jesus; I was for mental illness for three years. pulse.ng a new name – Volya – meaning ‘Freedom’. She the one who killed Jesus, bring your gaari (Nigeria), 17 Dec 2016. was checked over by vets and found to be in [cassava flakes], etc’. It became unbearable good health. At the time of the report, she and I couldn’t wait to run away. We thought • Aduragbemi was lucky he was trapped for was living in a temporary shelter and getting we were being haunted by some ghosts.” only three days; a dog was trapped in a hole acclimatised to life above ground. She was Becky recalled how they had been unable to between a shop and a nine-storey apartment scared of people, open spaces and light, and sleep at night and ended up sitting outside. block for three years in the town of Khabarovsk continually tried to find an enclosed space to “It was scary to remain indoors, with the kind in eastern Russia’s Khabarovsk Krai region. hide. D.Express (online), 11 Oct; Metro, 12 Oct of things he was saying at that time of night, She was cruelly thrown in as a puppy and 2016. so sometimes we all came out to sit down came to be known locally as the prisoner of outside; it felt safer.” Chateau d’If, after the fortress jail in the • A man in central tried to leave Aduragbemi was taken to the local police Bay of Marseille. The nervous animal would his house by the front door on 2 January, station before his mother arrived at the scene not let anyone get close enough to rescue only to find a brick wall there. Unidentified and was directed there as well. “We learnt her from the cramped and dark cavity and perpetrators in Mainhausen, near Offenbach, the boy had mental issues because people eventually she grew too big to get out on her had bricked it up during the night. The police who knew him confirmed that he was fond of own. She would poke her nose out of the hole said the wall could have been built within going to hide and doing strange things,” said and people had long tried to lure her out minutes. The motive was unclear – possibly a Becky, adding that one of their neighbours into the open, but she always backed away joke, an act of revenge, or a bet. Police were claimed to have seen the naked boy running when anyone came near. Residents would searching for “several people”. The damage to towards their compound at about 11pm on leave food for her every day, saying that her the property was estimated at £425. BBC News, 7 December. Although how the boy had got howling, particularly in the winter months, 3 Jan 2017.

10 FT350 www.forteantimes.com MAN AND BEAST

Vijay Parsana, 44, takes a selfie with his two-year-old cow Poonam, on the eve of her marriage in Ghuma village, near Ahmedabad, India. Parsana was marrying Poonam off to an ox named Arjun from Bagdana village, 155 miles (250km) from Ahmedabad, on 24 March 2016 in an elaborate ceremony that aimed to highlight the revered status enjoyed by cows in Hindu-majority India. PHOTO: SAM PANTHAKY/AFP/ GETTY IMAGES.

12-year-old Chiquinho the cat goes everywhere with his owner, Alexan- dre Goulart, accompanying him to church, on shopping trips and for walks on the beach. It’s Chiquinho’s motorcycle jaunts, though, that have made the shades-sporting cool cat something of a local celebrity in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Father-of-four Gou- lart explains: “I’ve looked for a mean- ing in life without Chiquinho, and not found it. He is the love of my life. I ask God to give many years of life to him.” For an earlier motorcycling moggy, see FT85:5. D.Telegraph, 20 June 2016. PHOTO: YASUYOSHI CHIBA/AFP/GETTY IMAGES.

FT199 11 www.forteantimes.com PAUl SIEVEKInG MATT PATTInSOn www.forteantimes 1 2 F T 350 n ivratfcsfo tl,EsenEurope Eastern Italy, from artefacts silver and from coins Merovingian whetstone Sweden, a from place: the over all from objects came the craftsmen, local by made jewellery Ag this considering gr spectacular The ship the between stuffed rope) (tarred oakum is Caulking I caulking, which some unearthed I day One rope. with replica reinforced resin polyester a enabling of ship, construction the the of cast plaster a made and dimensions three in rivet each plotted rivets. iron rust-bloated of with hundreds studded sand darkened of layer to a reduced timbers its long, (27m) 89ft leaf-shaped ghostly the revealed Museum. 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lADy AnnE HIll CLASSI CAL CORNER

FORTEANA FROM THE ANCIENT WORLD COMPILED BY BARRY BALDWIN 208: JUST KIDDING

“We marvelled at little girls” – Fort, Many ex-Argonaut hubbie Jason for playing away Parts, p104 – rather more drastic than just cutting up his Today’s children (the cliché runs) are feral, shirts and suing the pants off him. have everything, want more, their Christmas Thucydides (bk7 ch29) rightly singles out as mornings awash in techno-toys and wrapping the greatest atrocity of the Peloponnesian War paper. Usually the opposite for ancient the slaughter of all the schoolchildren at their kiddiwinkies. Literature, Myth, and Real Life desks by a gang of Thracian mercenaries – such paint a sorry tale, with Juvenal’s (Satire 14 abominations nowadays too often paralleled in v47) Maxima debetur puero reverentia (The African civil wars. JIJI PRESS / AFP / GETTy IMAGES greatest possible respect should be paid to a Not every child victim draws tears. Caligula ROMAN COINS IN JAPAN child – Englished without acknowledgement by was delighted that infant Julia Drusilla showed In December 2013, 10 eroded coins Samuel Johnson, Rambler 4) largely ignored. herself his true daughter by scratching at were unearthed during an excavation of Slaughter of the First-Born and Massacre playmates’ eyes and faces with her nails. Katsuren Castle on Okinawa Island in of the Innocents are universally remembered When he was bumped off, she jumped on Japan. They languished unremarked in child holocausts, respectively crimes of a god an assassin’s shoulder, biting and gouging, storage for over two years until spotted and a king.The Old Testament frequently whereupon he understandably dashed out her by a visiting archæologist. Four were accuses others (notably the Canaanites) of brains on a wall (Suetonius, Life of Caligula, chs ancient Roman bronze coins, one from religious infanticide: Deuteronomy 12. 31, 25 & 59). the reign of Constantine I (AD 306-337), Ezekiel 16: 20-1, Jeremiah 7: 30-4, 2 Kings 17: A couple of child prodigies to alleviate while a fifth, dating from 1687, came 17-8, Psalm 106: 37-8. this litany. Pliny (Natural History, bk 7 ch52 from the Ottoman Empire. The coins The Carthaginians had an especially para175) says the boy Epimenides of Crete came from a layer a metre underground malodorous reputation for roasting babies anticipated RipVan Winkle by falling asleep believed to date from the 14th or 15th as offerings to Baal. Modern scholarship for 57 years, immediately turned old, but hung century – which make the Ottoman variously accepts or denies: Shelby Brown, Late on to 157 – “All Cretans are liars, said the coin’s presence particularly puzzling. Carthaginian Child Sacrifice (1991); Lawrence Cretan” (ancient proverb). The remaining five coins are still being Stager, ‘Child Sacrifice at Carthage,’ Biblical A friend of Neo-Platonist Porphyry (On studied. The castle, which was built in Archeological Review 10 (1984), 31-51; M’hamed Abstinence, bk3 ch3) had a slave boy who could the late 13th century and abandoned Hassine Fantar, ‘Were Living Children understand the language of birds – prefiguring in 1458, was known to have been the Sacrificed to the Gods in Punic Carthage?’ – Snoopy in Peanuts – until his mother, fearing focal point of commerce with China vigorous online denial. he’d be sent away as a present to the emperor, and other Asian countries, but there is Negation involves rejecting a depressingly destroyed his gift by pissing in his sleeping no evidence of a Europe connection – large number of respectable ancient sources, ears – no more birds in his shell-like. apart from the coins, the first from the conveniently assembled online by Roger There being little or no law on sexual Roman Empire ever found in Japan. Pearse.Take Diodorus Siculus, Universal consent, children were even more vulnerable [CNN] D.Mail online, Independent History, bk20 ch14 paras6-7: “Their city had a then than those in the ‘care’ of Catholic online, 27 Sept; [AP] 18 Oct 2016. bronze image of Cronus, extending its hands, priests.Tiberius, not content with raping palms up and sloping toward the ground, so two boys and then breaking their legs, had CHINESE IN AFRICA that each child when placed therein rolled infants (nicknamed ‘minnows’) trained to A team of Kenyan and Chinese down and fell into a gaping pit filled with fire.” fellate him whilst swimming (Suetonius’ Life, archæologists have found a remarkable Other accounts, from Alexander’s ch43 – writing in ‘Disgusted from Tunbridge coin that seems to confirm that a biographer Clitarchus to the Byzantine Suda Wells’ style. Commodus’s harem of 300 females Chinese expeditionary fleet under encyclopædia, claim the burning children and as many males, included his favourite, the eunuch admiral Zheng He (or seemed to be smiling, thereby producing an an eight-year-old lad (Strato compiled an Cheng Ho), reached East Africa in the etymology for ‘Sardonic laughter’. entire book (Greek Anthology 12) of epigrams 1420s, about 80 years before the first Baby barbeques were also political (“You’re extolling pæderasty – cf. Daryl Hines’s 2002 Europeans (Portuguese and Dutch). The not going to kebab me!” – Neil Kinnock). As I Puerilities translation – joyfully pointing out team has been excavating a number described in FT302:27, Alexander’s ferocious that the Greek words for bottom and gold of sites in the village of Mambrui on mother Olympias – she was Albanian, which were numerically identical. Happy ending, Kenya’s north coast that they believe explains a lot – roasted rival royal infants for once.The cute catamite innocently gave might be the original site of the Caranus and Europe.The equally earthy Commodus’s mistress Marcia a list of intended ancient Sultanate of Malindi. Until now, Amestris, wife of King Xerxes, buried 14 executees, including herself, thus allowing her Vasco Da Gama was believed to be children alive for dynastic reasons (Herodotus, to forestall by getting his personal trainer to bk7 ch114). strangle him in the bath. responsible for opening up the region. Astyanax, infant son of Hector, was flung Things could be as bad in Christian The notion that Zheng He also explored from the walls of Troy: sources include Byzantium, the nadir reached by Irene who the American coastline, as proposed Euripides, Ovid, Pausanias, and Arctinus’s secured the throne (797-802) by having son by Gavin Menzies, is more contentious Capture of Troy which (as do some vase Constantine blinded, thus disqualifying him (see FT160:6). For evidence of Chinese paintings) has Neoptolemos (son of Achilles – from succession, an atrocity postluded by contact with the Americas from the third that great heel) club old King Priam to death a 17-day solar eclipse and total darkness, century BC onwards, see FT134:12. BBC with the infant corpse. supposedly signifying Heavenly horror – Irene, News, 18 Oct 2016. Medea murdered her children to spite Goodnight!

FT350 13 www.forteantimes.com TTINSON

PA scieNce MATT

in the West. The Chinese researchers have the emdrive space race been quiet, and have not made any public comment since their DaviD Hambling brings us the latest updates in the saga of the emdrive, the physics- first results in 2008. In February defying propellantless space drive that might just be making the leap into the mainstream. 2016, Yang’s team published a paper on testing the thruster with a sensitive new type of he EmDrive, a torsion balance, concluding propellantless space that: “independent microwave drive invented by British thruster propulsion device did not engineer Roger Shawyer detect significant thrust”. In the T(see FT332:14), absence of any other news, some continues to gain strength, in suspected that this meant the spite of the efforts of respectable end for the Chinese EmDrive. scientists to destroy it. In fact, However, in a surprise move, the EmDrive seems poised to China’s Science & Technology make the giant leap into space, weekly magazine ran a story on shooting up from four different the EmDrive in December. This directions. described a press conference The EmDrive is a truncated staged in Beijing by the China metal cone filled with resonating Academy of Space Technology microwaves. For reasons that are (CAST), and the manufacturer of not fully understood, or at any the Dong Fang Hong satellites, rate are highly disputed, there in which they discussed EmDrive appears to be a difference in the research and plans to develop the force exerted by the microwaves ABOVE: Roger Shawyer, the British engineer and inventor of the EmDrive. technology. on the two ends. Incredibly, it BELOW: The science behind the EmDrive has been rejected by most physicists. Dr Chen Yue, head of CAST’s seems to produce a net thrust in communication satellite division, violation of Newton’s laws. Most other glitches created by air. said that several prototype physicists reject the device out The thrust measured was tiny thrusters had been built and of hand, assuming that there is – a matter of millinewtons, not proven to produce thrust. The an error in the experimental set- enough to push a toy car – but it next stage was engineering: the up or that the researchers are was consistent. designs need to be optimised and fraudsters. Sceptics now say that just the Q-factor of the resonant cavity Any conventional rocket has to because there is a peer-reviewed (equivalent to how long a tuning have propellant – material which paper, it does not mean the fork rings when struck) has to be is ejected out the back to push results are valid. There is still improved to increase thrust. Once the rocket forward. Satellites argument over how the EmDrive SpaceQuest Ltd. Theseus exists a satisfactory drive is built, it will have abundant Solar power, but might work. The paper suggests it to launch a Cannae thruster on a be sent up on a satellite and its their useful life is dictated by the is pushing against a flux of ‘virtual shoebox-sized satellite into a low effectiveness proved in space. supply of propellant required to particles’ that pop in and out of orbit 150 miles above the surface The timing of this adjust their attitude and orbit. existence. This, of course, is not of the Earth. announcement is interesting. Half the launch weight of a typical easy to reconcile with existing Fetta expects the satellite While the NASA paper and Fetta’s satellite is reaction mass. If the physics. NASA regards the to stay on station for at least Theseus announcement have EmDrive works, a satellite could maverick Eagleworks team as an six months, rather than the six received a lukewarm reception have half the weight and half the embarrassment and it is not clear weeks that would be typical for here, the Chinese might have felt launch cost – and an indefinite if the team will continue. But while a satellite this size. The longer compelled to break cover – and lifespan. It would transform the they may be the most prestigious, the satellite remains in orbit, the they must be reasonably confident multibillion-dollar satellite market, these NASA developments might more convincing a demonstration of winning the EmDrive space race as well as providing a quick not be the most important in the it will be of thrust without to go public. transit to Mars. EmDrive story. propellant. The launch date has The final contender is none Sceptics have complained Other researchers intend to not been set but is expected to other than British EmDrive inventor about the lack of peer-reviewed cut through all the arguments be before the end of 2017. Roger Shawyer, who has set up a journal papers on the EmDrive, by launching an EmDrive into “Once demonstrated on new joint venture called Universal as these are the gold standard space to prove that it really orbit, Theseus will offer our Propulsion. He is backed by the for scientific evidence. Then, in produces thrust – and that it can thruster platforms to the satellite Gilo Industries Group, whose December, a paper was published carry on doing so for longer than marketplace,” says the Theseus other unusual projects include by NASA’s Eagleworks team. any satellite equipped with a website. Whether there are any a flying dune buggy called the The paper, which appeared conventional system. takers is another matter. Parajet Skyquad. Shawyer is not in the American Institute of Guido Fetta’s Cannae Drive It may not be the only EmDrive able to give details yet, but hints Aeronautics and Astronautics is similar to, but distinct from, in orbit. As previously described that a major announcement is (AAIAA) Journal of Propulsion and Shawyer’s design, but is still (FT320:12), Shaywer’s claims forthcoming. This could mean a Power, was titled “Measurement another propellantless drive inspired a Chinese team led by space launch. of Impulsive Thrust from a based on microwaves in a Juan Yang at Xi’an Northwest 2017 could prove to be a big Closed Radio-Frequency Cavity in resonant cavity. The Eagleworks Polytechnic University to replicate year for Shawyer’s invention – and Vacuum”. Vacuum is important, team tested an earlier version. his experiments. They achieved the next time you read about as critics have suggested that the Now Fetta has formed a company the same results, measuring the EmDrive it might be in a less apparent thrust in previous tests called Theseus with industrial thrust and publishing a series of exclusive publication than Fortean was caused by thermal effects or partners LAI International and papers which have been ignored Times.

16 FT350 www.forteantimes.com a gReat Way to fight PoveRty fRom caRe inteRnational uK

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ALAN MURDIE finds that there’s nowt so queer as folk when it comes to psychical research.

GAY GHOST HUNTERS Back in 1954, veteran psychical researcher and criminologist Professor Donald West observed: “It is a human failing among investigators that each one thinks himself the right man to look into a spontaneous case. The task is in practice a delicate one, requiring not only skill in understanding and handling different temperaments, but also a critical judgment of evidence” (Psychical Research Today, 1954, 1962). I was reminded of this sage advice with an item brought to my attention in December 2016, which proved a marked departure from the usual seasonal ghost story. Appearing under the headline “We’re Here,

We’re Queer, We’re Ghosts”, it reported on S: QUeer GHOST-HUNTING CLUB OF OHIO the US-based Stonewall Columbus Queer TO PHO Ghost-Hunting Club of Ohio, which seeks to link ghostly phenomena, same-sex cemetery and at a former convent site. Part I ABOVE AND BELOW: The Queer Ghost-Hunting Club attraction and the denizens of the spirit begins by airing their suspicions that lesbian of Ohio have taken their investigations online with world. Promoting itself via the Internet, the nuns have existed from the 4th century AD episodes such as the two-part Lesbian Nun Ghosts. club presents itself as the first organisation and – with a leap of logic – conclude that “dedicated exclusively to hunting queer they must therefore have been present at back to their former convent home (now spirits” and recalls “a successful year of their local former Ursuline convent site in an arts centre) to facilitate further contact hunts… from lesbian convents to theaters, Toledo (there is no hard evidence and discuss their experience of mansions, insane asylums, prisons.” A they admit, but much optimistic lesbianism by means of divining Youtube web series, Queer Ghost Hunters, supposition). Then with a breezy rods and ‘spirit boxes’. (See records their adventures, declaring their lack of sensitivity, the group ‘The surprisingly serious stated mission as being “to make contact travel to a nun’s cemetery to search for gay spooks’ by with gay and lesbian spirits”, and “help ‘gay’ bawl out invitations to the Matt Baume in Vice, 19 Dec ghosts come out”, apparently all part of a ghostly lesbian sisters, dead 2016 at https://www.vice. wider ideological or political goal of “resisting and buried in excess of 80 com/en_uk/article/were- the often presumed heterosexuality of years, asking them to come here-were-queer-were-ghosts; ghosts”. and join them, and even offering https://www.youtube.com/ For instance, their two-part broadcast the spirits a free ride in their car. watch?v=bcopH6ppN-0) Queer Ghost Hunters: Lesbian Nun “Hop in!” declares group leader Lori Gum, Needless to say, inviting any ghost, let Ghosts Parts 1 & 2 shows various female/ swinging the vehicle door open in readiness alone the shade of a Sapphic nun, to take a transgender members embarking on a for spectral lesbian passengers. The group’s ride in your car is not a scientific technique search for ghostly lesbian nuns in a Toledo objective then becomes ferrying the spirits recognised by psychical research. But obviously, for the Columbus Group, things have moved on since Harry Price tried observing the ghostly nun of Borley in the 1930s (though casually offering rides to spirits may provide a potentially new and exciting approach to the phantom hitchhiker phenomenon). However, arriving back at the centre, suitably wired up and speaking in hushed, awestruck tones, things don’t exactly go as planned since the group believe they are channelling a deceased nun who is “angry”. Group member Shane McClelland believes this contributes to preserving social history, enabling gay spirits to share their past experiences. “Queer history is largely unrecorded,” said McClelland. “There isn’t a tradition of passing down stories. If you were recording stuff, you were putting yourself and your friends at risk of being discovered.” Any doubts over whether spirits actually display sexual characteristics, or that women in the past may not have identified themselves in such explicit lesbian terms (see Surpassing The Love of Men: Romantic Friendships and Love between Women from

16 FT350 www.forteantimes.com the Renaissance to the Present, 1983, LEFT: Medium eva C (Marthe Beraud), by Lillian Faderman), that before 1925 here photographed materialising a spirit the word lesbian would have been whilst in the nude (the photo has clearly little known beyond classicists, or that been retouched to remove any troubling there may not actually be any spirits of boobage), was one of a number of probably any orientation present outside their queer figures in early psychical research. imagination, inhibit the group and their hopes of talking with such beings not accumulated over the centuries. one bit. Sisters at the current Ursuline There is also much evidence Convent in Toledo, founded in 1854, collected by psychical researchers are not approached for comment. suggestive of reincarnation, an idea Clearly, if American graveyard antics current since the 6th century BC and ghost hunting with a touch of and shared by millions of Buddhists lesbianism is your cup of tea, these and Hindus worldwide, many of may be ideal films for you. Otherwise, them deep thinkers, mystics and sincere and self-convinced the group profound scholars. But it does may be, these films really serve only not necessarily follow, nor should as a permanent memorandum of the it be considered proved beyond continuing accuracy of Professor West’s reasonable doubt, that apparitions 60-year-old observations. It remains are spirits of the dead or that the long-standing problem of ghost discarnate entities have powers investigation, and paranormal research to influence or control the sexual in general, that they are bedevilled characteristics of the living. Not by self-deception and by those who only ought other possibilities be seem incapable of refraining from considered, but it is essential that distortion, exaggeration and unfounded they are, not least because there interpretation arising from their own is great deal of the data that might pre-existing notions. be interpreted as pointing in wholly Further proof of this problem was opposite directions. amply demonstrated a week earlier in Philosophically it is difficult the British press, with claims made by enough to identify the self in the another organisation fixing on the topic living, a whole strand of modern of same-sex attraction and ghosts, albeit philosophy, from 19th century determinism one with whom the Columbus group are “PEOPLE ARE GAY and Gilbert ryle’s ‘Ghost in the Machine’ unlikely to agree. “People are gay because (in The Concept of Mind, 1949) seeking to they’re possessed by ghosts” was the stark BECAUSE THEY reject even that. But if something equating headline in Metro (10 Dec 2016) announcing to human personality survives after death a report emerging from an organisation (whether in some disembodied form, styling itself the Spiritual Science research ARE POSSESSED reincarnated or possessing another), then Foundation. Proving just how easy it is to be we are obliged to face what we mean by duped by ornament, the appearance of the BY GHOSTS” saying that the surviving portion is identical word “science” in this Institute’s title proved with the deceased person. In the absence enough for Metro to declare their claims of a body and brain, this becomes rather as originating from “paranormal experts”. simplistic pre-existing beliefs and ideology difficult especially since many personality However, alert readers would have noted in easily find a platform in today’s fast-moving traits and characteristics evade objective taking inspiration from Buddhist philosophy and sensationalist pop media. measurement in life. and by professing to be “spiritual”, the The problem of a priori beliefs is rife in Numerous studies have revealed the Institute could not simultaneously be termed research (though not by any means confined complex and multi-faceted nature of human “scientific” within the ordinary meaning to ghosts). For example, some ghost sexuality. essentially, human beings are and usage of the word, at least as applied hunters believe it is possible for thermal biosocial animals with a make-up influenced in english-speaking countries. Bluntly, the cameras and infra-red technology to detect by biological, psychological and social Institute attributed many instances of same spirits, an idea derived from speculation factors, all flowing together like eddies sex attraction displayed by living humans to paranormal activity is linked to changes in and currents in a river and producing possession by ghosts of the opposite sex, temperature, both being reported in séance widely varying and unpredictable diversity declaring: “The main reason behind the gay rooms and haunted premises. But any within individuals. Whole sexual categories orientation of some men is that they are such connection is frankly tentative, there remain ill-defined or controversial, with still- possessed by female ghosts. It is the female being no undisputed evidence for ghosts or flourishing disputes as to what qualifies ghost in them that is attracted to other spirits (again presuming they exist) actually as normal or abnormal behaviour. With men. Conversely, the attraction to females possessing any thermal properties. Thus, such uncertainties about the living – not experienced by some lesbians is due to the if we can’t be sure spirits have thermal to mention the unresolved mystery of presence of male ghosts in them.” Not only properties, we should show great caution consciousness itself – we can scarcely be is sexual orientation thus warped by the before attributing any other quality to confident about what may happen following invading spirit, but their hosts display their them. even presuming spirits exist, we lack physical dissolution of brain and body. We symptoms in a “shameless and aggressive conclusive proof of post-mortem persistence step into the very fortean territory of trying manner” manifested by participation in “gay of sexual characteristics. to address one unknown by reference to parades”. This is not a plea for scepticism but another. Unsurprisingly, not a scintilla of evidence instead a call for taking these topics more That “sex remains the last mystical is supplied for these pronouncements. seriously. People undoubtedly experience experience” in the materialist West is a view rather it provided yet another depressing apparitions, and there is a vast literature endorsed by a range of modern thinkers illustration of how, when it comes to ghosts, concerning so-called possession states – e.g. satirist turned religious apologist

FT350 17 www.forteantimes.com S / GeTTY IMAGeS TO X PHO FO

ABOVE LEFT: Lady Troubridge (seated) and her lover radclyffe Hall were members of the SPr. ABOVE LEFT: Daniel Home, giving the Gay Gordons a whole new meaning.

Malcolm Muggeridge (1903-1990) in century medium Daniel Home agreed he had Conferences of Parapsychological Studies, Time and Eternity (2011) to contemporary homosexual tendencies, an opinion also 1957; ‘A n experimentally Testable Model for philosophers such as Bryan Magee in expressed 70 years ago by eric J Dingwall Spontaneous Psi events (I). extrasensory Confessions of a Philosopher (1997). This is (1890-1986), distinguished in both psychical events’ (1974) by rex Stanford, Journal of also one reason why potential links between research and sexology (see Some Human the American SPR, vol.68, 34-57). psychic phenomena and sexuality have Oddities, 1947). Similarly, investigators Nor, in this regard, is the old complaint been relatively little studied by psychical into the trance mediumship of the teenage that “A cademics do nothing and investigators researchers and parapsychologists (see ‘Psi Schneider brothers in Austria in the 1920s know nothing” sustainable. Although rivals in and Sexuality’, 1985, by Michael K Macbeath considered the boys expressed erotic their Ghost Club days, British ghost hunters in the SPR Journal, vol.53. 65-77). Another feelings towards male sitters as a channel Philip Paul and Peter Underwood were alert to reason is that such investigations were for homosexual desires (The Haunted Mind, sexual issues affecting residents of haunted discouraged by the ‘father of ’ 1959, by Nandor Fodor), although rudi houses. As early as the Ash Manor case JB rhine (1895-1981), worried that such Schneider later married a girl named Mitzi, in Kent in 1934, Nandor Fodor recognised associations would impede the acceptance whereupon his powers waned. sexual issues were beneath the surface of of parapsychology as a science (see During the same period Una Lady what appeared to be a traditional haunting Unbelievable, 2013, by Stacy Horn). But to Troubridge, and her lover Marguerite where a married couple heard ghostly noises imagine that there has been a complete lack (later ‘J ohn’) radclyffe Hall, author of the and the wife witnessed the apparition of a of awareness surrounding sexual issues lesbian novel The Well of Loneliness (1928) small, wizened man resembling a tramp. on the part of psychical researchers, and banned after an obscenity trial, were active Investigating their psychological make-up, particularly concerning the presence of members of the SPr, holding numerous Fodor realised the marriage was a sham, homosexual or lesbian individuals, is wholly sittings with mediums (see Proceedings of between a heterosexual woman with a mistaken. the SPR, vol. XXX). Lady Troubridge served homosexual husband. The wife was left In its early years, psychical research on the SPr Council whilst Hall harboured unhappy and unfulfilled with feelings of attracted a number of pioneers of scientific ambitions of developing mediumship (The personal failure. Fodor interpreted the studies of human sexuality; for instance, it Trials of Radclyffe Hall, 1999, by Diana apparition as a representation of her has been forgotten by most psychoanalysts Souhami). As well as conducting extensive impotent husband. In 1967 William roll that Freud’s first paper in english appeared psi research, Professor DJ West, cited above, identified repressed homosexual tendencies in the Journal of the Society for Psychical authored the landmark study Homosexuality in a 19-year-old Cuban named Julio, the Research in 1911. Another was Baron von (1955), influencing reform of thew la focus of the well-observed poltergeist that Schrenck-Notzing, an author who conducted and the decriminalisation of homosexual manifested in a Miami warehouse (see The extensive investigations of medium eva C acts achieved by the Sexual Offences Act Poltergeist, 1972). (Marthe Beraud) and Juliette Bisson, the 1967. The view that a high percentage Then there was also the unusual case woman with whom she lived during the height of gifted sensitives and mediums were from Sussex in 1973, of the haunting at of her mediumistic career, and whom it is homosexually inclined has been postulated the country home of a well-known TV actor, considered “almost certainly had a sexual by a number of parapsychologists (e.g. known to be gay, and investigated by ghost relationship” (The Spiritualists, 1983, by Paper to the International Study Group hunter Andrew Green (1927-2004). But ruth Brandon). of Unorthodox Healing, April 27-May 1st that, like Sherlock Holmes’s ‘Great rat of A number of observers of the 19th 1954 by Alan Assaily in Proceedings of Four Sumatra’, is a story for another time.

18 FT350 www.forteantimes.com

ALIEN ZOO presents his regular round-up from the cryptozoological garden vED AHMED JA

FAR LEFT: The Golden Yeti. LEFT: Karl Shuker and his late mother visiting Grand Canyon in 2004. ABOVE: The newly-named Sorting Hat spider Eriovixia gryffindori, its

REN COLEMAN name deriving from JK Rowling’s books LO KARL SHUKER

MY GOLDEN YETIS Potter novels. And indeed, when describing this Describing time spent on the Polynesian island My personal cryptozoological highlight of 2016 dramatic new species in their Indian Journal of Nukuheva in the Marquesas group, he was to receive in December two prestigious of Arachnology paper, the team included the included the following memorable passage: Golden Yetis – the highly-coveted, veritable following explanation for the scientific name “A s for the animal that made the fortune of Oscar, Emmy, or Bafta of cryptozoology – given to it by them: my lord mayor Whittington, I shall never forget awarded by and the International “This uniquely shaped spider derives its name the day that I was lying in the house about Cryptozoology Museum (ICM) in their annual from the fabulous, sentient magical artefact, the noon, everybody else being fast asleep; and cryptozoology round-up. One was awarded to sorting hat, owned by the (fictitious) medieval happening to raise my eyes, met those of a me as ‘Cryptozoologist of the Year 2016’, and wizard Godric Gryffindor, one of the four founders big black spectral cat, which sat erect in the the other to my newest book, Still In Search Of of Hogwarts School of and Wizardry, doorway, looking at me with its frightful goggling Prehistoric Survivors (Coachwhip Publishing, and stemming from the powerful imagination green orbs, like one of those monstrous imps 2016), as ‘Cryptozoology Book of the Year of Ms JK Rowling, wordsmith extraordinaire, that tormented some of the olden saints! I am 2016’. In addition, my previous book, Here’s as presented in her beloved series of books, one of those unfortunate persons, to whom Nessie! A Monstrous Compendium From Loch featuring everyone’s favorite boy-wizard, Harry the sight of these animals is at any time an Ness (CFZ Press, 2016) also made Loren’s Potter. An ode from the authors, for magic insufferable annoyance. top 10 ‘Best Cryptozoology Books of 2016’ lost, and found, in an effort to draw attention “Thus constitutionally averse to cats in list. I would like to thank Loren and the ICM for to the fascinating, but oft overlooked world of general, the unexpected apparition of this one bestowing such a great honour upon me. invertebrates, and their secret lives.” in particular utterly confounded me. When I also wish to dedicate my awards to my late Moreover, in response to receiving this tribute I had a little recovered from the fascination mother, Mary Shuker, who would have been so to her work, on 11 December Rowling personally of its glance, I started up; the cat fled, and proud, as she always was of all that I achieved. tweeted the following message on Twitter: “I’m emboldened by this, I rushed out of the house It was she who bought for me so very long ago truly honoured! Congratulations on discovering in pursuit; but it had disappeared. It was the the humble little paperback edition of Bernard another #FantasticBeast!”. What a magical only time I ever saw one in the valley, and how Heuvelmans’s classic On the Track of Unknown discovery for all concerned! it got there I cannot imagine. It is just possible Animals that fired what became my life-long https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/ that it might have escaped from one of the ships passion; and without her constant love and morning-mix/wp/2016/12/13/harry-potter- at Nukuheva. It was in vain to seek information encouragement none of this would ever have loving-scientists-find-spider-that-looks- on the subject from the natives, since none of been possible. amazingly-like-the-sorting-hat-name-it-eriovixia- them had seen the animal, the appearance of http://www.cryptozoonews.com/czist-2016/ gryffindori/?utm_term=.16be500ef055 13 which remains a mystery to me to this day.” 7 Dec 2016; http://www.cryptozoonews.com/ Dec 2016; http://indianarachnology.com/ija/ What I find intriguing about this report ishow czbksof16/ 9 Dec 2016. wp-content/uploads/2016/12/ija_2016_v5_ Melville ostensibly changed his opinion as to n1_2_p7_24_27.pdf Dec 2016. the nature of the cat during his description. THE SORTING HAT SPIDER Whereas in the first paragraph he referred to it Many new species of spider are discovered MELVILLE’S MYSTERY CAT as spectral and likened it to a saint-bothering and described every year, so it takes a very It’s always particularly interesting to learn of a imp, thereby implying that it appeared to be special example to attract international media possible cryptozoogical encounter featuring a some form of paranormal entity, in the second attention, but Eriovixia gryffindori is certainly famous person, so I am greatly indebted paragraph he suggested that it might one such example. Formally described and to German mystery beast investigator have escaped from a visiting ship, named in December 2016, this small, brown, Ulrich Magin for kindly bringing the thus indicating that it was merely but very remarkable-looking nocturnal spider following, hitherto unpublicised some absconded kitty of the was found in a sacred grove within the unique example to my attention. The corporeal kind. True, his ‘spectral’ ‘Kans’ forestlands of central Western Ghats, in eyewitness in question is none description may simply have been the Shivamogga district of Karnataka, India, by a other than Moby-Dick author metaphorical, but whatever it was, team of Indian scientists that includes one of my Herman Melville (right), who it was apparently not native to Facebook friends, Javed Ahmed. What makes it documented his intriguing Nukuheva, and does indeed remain so distinctive is its body’s extraordinary, vertically sighting in one of his non-fiction a mystery, 170 years after Melville’s triangular shape, irresistibly reminiscent of the books, namely Typee: A Peep book was published. Ulrich Magin, speaking Sorting Hat from JK Rowling’s Harry At Polynesian Life (1846). pers. comm., 10 Jan 2017.

FT350 21 www.forteantimes.com strangedays

Gainsborough’s earliest painting, a Leonardo amazing art finds study and a tapestry commissioned by Henry VIII PEZ / AFP / GEtty ImAGEs LO PHILIPPE

ABOVE LEFT: the earliest known painting by Gainsborough. ABOVE RIGHT: this study of st sebastian included optical studies and Italian right-to-left script on the reverse.

• Browsing a regional auction visited thaddée Prate, director newly discovered drawing “exactly catalogue, Robert mulraine, a of old master pictures at the Could the pen- complemented the Hamburg st retired company director, fulfilled tajan auction house in Paris, and sebastian,” she added, referring every buyer’s dream: picking up showed him 14 unframed drawings and-ink study to how that pen-and-ink study an Old master for a song. With that had been collected by his of the saint tied to a tree also the help of his son James, an bibliophile father. Prate spotted really be by included inscribed optical studies art restorer, as an “extra pair a vigorous pen-and-ink study on the reverse, and very similar of eyes”, he paid £2,600 for a of st sebastian tied to a tree, mirror writing. “the attribution is misattributed portrait of a woman. measuring 7.5x5in (19x13cm) Leonardo? quite incontestable,” she said, It has now been reliably identified and inscribed on the mount even though the drawing has as the earliest known painting by “michelange” (michelangelo). no pre-20th century ownership thomas Gainsborough, created “I had a sense that it was an A third opinion was sought from history. the Paris drawing is around 1742 when he was 15. It interesting 16th century drawing Carmen C Bambach, curator of the most highly developed and will be included in the forthcoming that required further work,” he Italian and spanish drawings at attractive of the three known catalogue raisonné by Hugh said. He consulted Patrick de the metropolitan museum of Art studies associated with what may Belsey, the art historian and Bayser, an independent dealer and in , who organised the have been a lost painting. Unlike world authority on Gainsborough. adviser in Old master drawings, met’s 2003 exhibition “Leonardo the monochromatic Hamburg Previously, the earliest known who noted the drawing was by a da Vinci, master Draughtsman”. drawing, it is executed in two painting by the suffolk master left-handed artist (like Leonardo), that show included two studies shades of ink, features several was one of a dog painted in 1745. and that on the reverse were from museums in Hamburg and alterations in the pose and has D.Telegraph, 28 Dec 2016. two diagrammatic studies of Bayonne that related to the “eight a mountainous landscape in candlelight with notes in a minute, st sebastians” listed by Leonardo the background. the drawing, • One day last march, an Italian Renaissance right-to-left in his Codex Atlanticus notebooks. estimated to date between 1482 unnamed retired doctor from script (again, just like Leonardo). “my eyes jumped out of their and 1485, is now valued at £12.5 somewhere in central France Could it really be by Leonardo? sockets,” said Dr Bambach. the million. the highest price to date

22 Ft350 www.forteantimes.com mythconceptions by mat Coward 208: tHE COOLing CUPPa

for a Leonardo drawing sold at several pieces from later weavings auction is £9.5 million, at Christie’s from the same designs are still in 2001, for a silverpoint study of extant and were made during the a horse and rider. NY Times (Int. 1560s and 1570s; mr michel, edition), 13 Dec 2016. however, is convinced it is the original commissioned by the king, • While surfi ng the Internet, and hopes it can be returned to Professor mary Beard, the Oxford Hampton Court. It is thought to be classicist, discovered what might worth £40,000 in its present state. be a long-lost 16th century tapestry Professor Beard said: “I was in the Persian Gallery, a shop searching for an image for a selling antique carpets in mid-town lecture and I put ‘Cæsar tapestry’ manhattan. the giant tapestry, into the search engine and saw it depicting Julius Cæsar crossing on Google images. [the tapestries] he Rubicon, was one of a set of were colossally valuable. they 10 depicting the life of the Roman were the most prized possessions hero commissioned by Henry VIII of the royal household. When and said to be one of his greatest the property of Charles I was treasures. Last seen in the inventoried after his execution, background of a portrait of Queen these tapestries were the second Caroline painted at Kensington most valuable thing in the whole Palace in 1819, the tapestries of the royal collection [valued at

subsequently disappeared. £5,022].” made by highly skilled ILLUstRAtIONs: HUNt EmERsON “Where did they go, how could craftsmen, they took years to they possibly have been sold off design and weave. Each individual The myth without anyone knowing?” asks piece from the Cæsar set was Roger michel, director of the more than 9ft (2.7m) high by 25ft On a hot day, a hot drink will cool you down. Institute of Digital Archæology. (7.6m) long and, hung end to end, “One possibility is there are measured 258ft (79m). Denying The “truth” frequent references to tapestries that she was some sort of online being sent for repair or rehanging Indiana Jones, Professor Beard there are three stages to this story. It begins with children wilting in and perhaps they were never sounded a sceptical note on social the summer heat being told that, no, they can’t have money to buy collected.” mr michel has media, tweeting: “FFs. If one more a can of fi zzy pop – what they need is a nice hot cuppa. the idea is that as you drink the hot liquid, your body will react by trying to discovered that the New york newspaper report claims I’ve negate its effect. you’ll sweat more, and the blood vessels closest tapestry was in the collection of found priceless set of Henry VIII to the surface of your skin will expand to shed heat. then came the the smithsonian Institution, which tapestries in New york rug shop, I’ll debunking: the laws of thermodynamics insist that if you add heat sold it at auction about 15 years explode!” to a system, that system must become hotter overall – not colder. ago. It might not be the original Times, dailymail.co.uk, 26 Dec; this statement of the obvious stood as the ‘truth’ for many decades, from Hampton Court Palace, as D.Telegraph, 27 Dec 2016. until experiments on sweaty cyclists, conducted by the University of Ottawa, found that subjects who drank hot water stored less body heat than those who didn’t – but only under certain circumstances. the amount of extra sweat caused by the hot drink is more significant than the extra heat, so there is a net loss of heat – provided all that sweat is free to evaporate. On a very humid day, or if you’re wearing too many clothes, the sweat won’t evaporate; on a very hot day, you might produce so much sweat that the extra will drip off you before it can evaporate. Under any of those conditions, you’re better off with a cold drink – and to hell with what your granny says. Incidentally, the same research found that hot drinks don’t, after all, raise core body temperature; it’s thought to be ‘thermosensors’ in the mouth and throat that trigger the increased perspiration. Sources www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/a-hot-drink-on-a-hot-day- can-cool-you-down-1338875/?no-ist; https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/ pubmed/22574769 Disclaimer In this column’s experience, once a myth has been debunked and rebunked, it’s unlikely to lie still for long. If anything about our tentative ‘truth’ gets yoyouu hot under the collar, feel free to tell the letters page. BOOK tHE PERsIAN GALLERy tHE mYtHCOnCEPtiOns ABOVE: mary Beard stumbled upon this tapestry online and identified it as a long-lost 16th dOn’t miss century work commissioned by Henry VIII, or at least a slightly later copy of the same. BOOKsHOPs OUt nOW OnLinE and in aLL gOOd

Ft350 23 www.forteantimes.com strangedays

This month, a veteran cryptozoologist who became FT’s very fi rst columnist hits the trail NECROLOG for the great unknown and a miraculous woman who fell to Earth heads for the heavens.

and colleague Loren Coleman of the Iceman. He remained a VESNA VULOVIĆ described him as “an old- director of Sanderson’s Society Air stewardess Vesna Vulović was fashioned patriot who allowed for the Investigation of the not supposed to be on board a himself to question the scientific Unexplained (SITU) until the early Yugoslav Airlines Douglas DC-9 establishment”. Always helpful 1970s, when Sanderson died. Hall on 26 January 1972, but a mix- to younger correspondents, Mark and Coleman made a few other up with another stewardess also was a ‘quiet American’, cherishing radio appearances in 2005-2006, called Vesna meant she joined his privacy while actively laying the mainly to explain the phenomenon the Belgrade-bound fl ight at foundations of cryptozoology for of Mothman. Hall, in particular, Copenhagen. The last thing that the generations ahead. would reference American she could remember was greeting Mark had extensive fi les and Indian legends of giant owls and the passengers. An hour into the a large library. Before he died he ‘Thunderbirds’; the huge owls, said journey the plane disintegrated shipped more than 10 large boxes Hall, are reportedly “man-sized above Srbská Kamenice, now of his binders of original research with 10-foot wingspans”. Accounts in the Czech Republic. A Czech materials to Loren Coleman’s of giant birds go back to the 19th secret service investigation International Cryptozoology century, said Hall, reminding his concluded that a bomb had been Museum (ICM) in Portland, Maine, audience of the 1977 case in planted in the baggage hold, where the archive will form part Lawndale, Illinois, in which a young supposedly by Croat nationalists, MARK A HALL of his living legacy. Loren said boy was picked up and carried but no arrests were made. Vulović Mark Hall was already established that Mark “wanted his research briefly by a huge bird. was pinned into place by a food as one of the USA’s pioneering to fi nd a home where future Mark was a bold theorist, cart in the plane’s tail section as cryptozoologists when he became generations could learn from his noted Coleman. “He believed it plummeted to earth from an FT’s very fi rst columnist – his work.” He recalled that he had fi rst that North America is home altitude of 10,000m (32,800ft) in series ‘Forteana USA’ appearing corresponded with Mark “when not only to the of the freezing temperatures. Pine trees in FT5 (July 1974) to FT7 (Nov Ivan T Sanderson introduced us Patterson-Gimlin footage, but also and snow cushioned the fi nal 1974) – an early step in helping through letters in the late 1960s. to remarkably different primates impact. Her screams were heard FT become a truly international Mark was in Minnesota, and I was such as the ‘True Giant’ (probably by woodsman Bruno Honke, who publication. living in Illinois. Before long, we Gigantopithecus, he thought) and had served as a German Army Mark’s interest in nature’s visited each other and engaged in the ‘Taller-hominid’ (which he saw medic in World War II and knew anomalies began before he was long conversations about unknown as survivors of the historical fossil how to treat her bleeding. None a teenager. A thorough fortean, hominoids, cryptozoology, and our known as Homo gardarensis). It of the other 27 people on board cryptozoologist, author and latest theories. On his fi rst visit was Mark’s incredible memory survived. theorist, he travelled extensively, to my home, Mark and I stayed for detail, recalls Coleman, that After arriving in hospital, pursuing fi eldwork, historical up into the early morning hours allowed him to separate out the Vulović fell into a coma for almost records and eyewitness testimony talking and talking, and completely ‘Marked Hominids’ (as the ‘Taller- a month. She had a fractured concerning cryptozoological forgot about sleeping. He was one hominid’ came to be known) from skull, three broken vertebræ (one phenomena. From 1992, for of the most intellectual thinkers the Bigfoot/Sasquatch group. This crashed completely), and two almost a decade, he published an in the fi eld, and we fed off each was the topic of his book True broken legs. The 3in (8cm) heels occasional journal called Wonders other’s ideas via visits, letters, and Giants: Is Gigantopithecus Still had been torn off her stilettos. “I – covering mystery cats, hairy phone conversations, long before Alive? (2010). was broken, and the doctors put hominoids, surviving anthropoids, emails and the Internet.” His other published titles are me back together again,” she said ancient civilisations, ‘fresh-water Ivan Sanderson had encouraged Natural Mysteries (1991), Living in 2008. “Nobody ever expected squid’ and hundreds of other Hall and Coleman to keep track of Fossils (1999), Thunderbirds: me to live this long.” She was topics. Some of these journals the notorious ‘Minnesota Iceman’ America’s Living Legends of Giant temporarily paralysed from the were later expanded into books exhibited at carnival sideshows Birds (2004, 2009), and The waist down but in time she made a and republished. throughout the Midwest during Yeti, Bigfoot & True Giants: An near-full recovery and returned to Mark was raised in the 1968-1969. Loren’s interview with introduction (1994, 1997, 2015). work for the airline in a desk job. heartland of America, near Mark about this period of their Hall will also be remembered for She never regained any memory Bloomington, Minnesota (except investigations appears in Loren’s advocating a more compassionate for one brief attempt at living in ‘A fterword’ in Neanderthal: The approach to the study of cryptids, North Carolina). During the Cold Strange Saga of the Minnesota without the unnecessary cruelty War, he served in Army intelligence Iceman (Anomalist, 2016), the fi rst of shooting a Bigfoot or keeping as a Russian linguist in West translation from French of Bernard a Lizardman in captivity. Instead, Berlin. Besides being an editor for Heuvelmans’s original 1960s study he promoted ‘telebiology’, an an archæological society based of this enigmatic ‘fossil’ humanoid approach that “studies cryptids at in Minnesota after his military (which appeared to have been a distance, using our brains and

service, he worked in human shot and preserved in ice). technology.” TO relations in various branches of Mark tended to avoid media Mark Anthony Hall, fortean the federal government, mostly appearances; apart from a few and cryptozoologist – born for the Department of Agriculture radio interviews, one exception Minneapolis, Minnesota 14 June and the Customs Service of his was Unsolved Mysteries, for whom 1946; died from cancer 28 Sept

home state. His long-time friend he detailed his investigations 2016, aged 70. CTK / ALAMY STOCK PHO

24 FT350 www.forteantimes.com strangedays

of the accident or of her rescue, and continued to fly as a passenger. , “People always want to sit next to me on the plane,” she said. She even enjoyed watching films featuring air disasters. She was, however, very scared of cockroaches. The fall gained Vulović a place in the Guinness Book of Records of 1985 for the highest fall survived without a parachute, and she was presented with the award by Paul McCartney. Her survival was not unprecedented; in 1944, for instance, Nicholas Alkemade has recovered from a fall of 18,000ft (5,500m) in similar circumstances after jumping from his stricken Lancaster bomber. However, no one had escaped from such a height before. Tito, the Yugoslav dictator, turned her into a national heroine, and she channelled her fame into Fairies, and Forteana campaigning for political causes. She was fired from her job at the airline in 1990 after taking part in protests Simon Young FiLES A nEW REPoRT FRom THE inTERFACE oF STRAngE PHEnomEnA AnD FoLK BELiEF against President Slobodan Milošević, but her fame saved her from arrest. She continued for two more decades analysis. In a few instances there are very exact to fight against the resurgence of the musicat night references. For example, one child reports how far right in Serbia. “I am like a cat, I Beware! The following paragraph could an invisible brass band marched between raths; have had nine lives,” she said. “But cost you – particularly if you enjoy forteana another had heard of martial music being if nationalist forces in this country and folklore – hours of your life. The Irish played by the Sidhe. Most references, though, prevail, my heart will burst.” She National Folklore Collection website (http:// are to wind instruments: bagpipes, pipes and ascribed her survival to St Sava, www.duchas.ie/en) has now digitised much of also to high-pitched whistles (sometimes given the founder of the Serbian Orthodox the Schools’ Collection and put it up online as a warning). Nocturnal birds? There are Church, on the eve of whose feast for general use. The Schools’ references to bells. There are day she was saved. “It made me an Collection was an inspired Irish also references to noise rather optimist,” she said of her experience. project dating from 1937-39, is nocturnal than music: lots of feet dancing “If you can survive what I survived, you whereby children from the or walking; the thwack of a can survive anything.” 26 counties in the Republic Fairy music football being kicked (this on In January 2009 German ARD gathered folklore from their several occasions – frogs or toads radio correspondent Peter Hornung- families and neighbours. The an aural calling?); and in one memorable Andersen together with Dutch and result was an incredible half case cutlery being laid on an Czech journalists published a theory a million manuscript pages in equivlent oF underground table. I wonder that the plane had been shot down English and Gaelic. Why should whether nocturnal fairy music in error by the Czechoslovak Air Force you care? Well, this was not being pixy-led is not an aural equivalent of only a few hundred metres above the just ‘There once was a king…’ being pixy-led at night – the first ground, while the evidence suggesting material. Frequently, first-hand at night? depending on the ears being an explosion at high altitude had been supernatural experiences were misled, the second on the eyes. forged by the Czechoslovak secret taken down. This must be, In the dark, someone half asleep police. Vulović referred to the claims for example, one of the most or slightly inebriated finds that that the plane attempted a forced substantial collections of ghost sightings in the their senses narrow in the blackness. In a landing or descended to such low world. Why, just this morning I was reading a heightened condition, they misconstrue sounds altitude as a “nebulous nonsense.” little girl’s lovely curvy handwriting describing and create a human melody where there is The Czech Civilian Aviation Authority how her grandfather had, as a young man, been just a run of natural noises and silences. There dismissed the , and kidnapped by the fairies. It happens even in is good science for explaining how our sight Hornung-Andersen himself stated the best families… plays tricks on us in the dark, but I’m not that it was based on “circumstantial One type of fortean phenomena that is aware of any explanation in otology. I have, evidence, not proof”. Furthermore, it amply recorded is music from fairy forts. We though, very occasionally, had the experience appeared to be contradicted by data all know the story. Person X is walking past of hearing beautiful music in the night or while from the black boxes, independently a rath or fairy fort at midnight when a tune waking up, only to discover that it is a drunk analysed in Holland. starts up from the shadows. These stories are so arguing on the street, a child gently snoring, Vesna Vulovic, miraculous survivor, frequent that it has been suggested that there or a slurred clock radio… Is this a common born Belgrade 3 Jan 1950; died is a natural explanation for such nocturnes experience? Simon Young writes on folklore Belgrade 23 Dec 2016, aged 66. and here we have a usefully big sample for and history and runs www.fairyist.com

FT350 25 www.forteantimes.com the UFO files FORTEAN TIMES presents our monthly section featuring regular sighting reports, reviews of classic cases, entries on major ufological topics and hands-on advice for UFO investigators. The UFO Files will benefit from your input, so don’t hesitate to submit your suggestions and questions.

To contact The UFO Files, email: [email protected] UFO CASEBOOK ON TIME TRAVEL, CLOSE ENCOUNTERS AND OTHER RIPPLES IN REALITY

TIMELESSNESS they found near Avignon that seemed to exist classic ‘Oz Factor’ experience, long recognised Television seems to be loving the concept 60 years in the past. The proximity of the town as a state of consciousness that seems to of time travel at the moment, and several of Avignon (phonetically pronounced as ‘having precede the onset of close encounters. new shows explore how reality changes if we you on’) has always stood out to me as a The witness then recalled a bright light that interfere with the space-time continuum. The reason to be suspicious, though the witnesses seemed to keep pace with her car during this biggest budget entry is Timeless, in which a have all stood by their story and assured me of ‘silence’, and how her vehicle started to behave US government craft ferries a historian back its veracity when I met them; it would be very erratically and then a strange, old-fashioned to key moments of the past, such as Lincoln’s fortean for this remarkable time travel claim to vehicle appeared out of nowhere, dangerously assassination. Someone is changing the involve a wickedly appropriate place name. close. This ‘apparition’ distracted her mind from outcome of these events and (it turns out) I have been fortunate enough to discuss the UFO, but then suddenly ‘vanished’. She tried altering reality as everyone else then perceives this case with those involved several times. to get help by swerving into a petrol station and it. Only the time travellers are aware that our Most curiously, two of them volunteered to be kept pointing into the sky and babbling about present world is being constantly reshaped in hypnotised and taken back to the events by what had happened to the man who was fi lling this way, and the rest of mankind thinks that the a doctor in Manchester to see what further up her tank. But in a confused state she did present in which they are living is the same one insights might emerge. Whilst this experiment not recall much else until arriving home feeling as before. The UK has taken a lighter approach, was not my idea it was done because a UFO nauseous and lacking any memory of what reviving the 1990s BBC sitcom Goodnight researcher thought it possible that the ‘time seemed to be a large chunk of the evening. Her Sweetheart, where a man stumbles on a portal travel’ memory was actually a cover story reality that night had been drastically altered. that lets him go back 54 years in time. Originally, planted in the witnesses’ minds to deflect It is easy to suspect hat there might be he voyaged to war-torn London, but in the revival attention away from an otherwise blocked alien hidden memories here that could be teased he starts off in 1962 (the series left him in 1945 abduction. out via hypnosis; but instead, what seemed when it was cancelled 17 years ago) and travels This idea is something that American UFO to emerge in this case was a baffling set of forward into the confusing future of 2016. researchers have long argued over, and I have images, highly unlikely to relate to a real event But just how closely does fi ction match watched as several people were subjected to from that night, including a tall man in a white what ‘really’ happens during fortean incidents regression seeking out a ‘missing’ abduction suit who led her to a room with a pool where a where witness perceptions of time and space that might be lurking behind otherwise non- ‘sick’ dolphin was swimming towards her touch. confound our everyday impressions? UFO-related recall. One typical case involved a Regardless of which, if any, of these images The idea for Goodnight Sweetheart was young woman who was travelling by car through are real or screens for something still hidden or created after the writers heard about a true-life , heading back to Manchester after plucked from a period of unconsciousness – or, ‘timeslip’ case in which witnesses stumbled a day out in January 1981. Her conscious indeed, something more exotic still – they do upon a gate into the past. I suspect this was memory of what ‘really’ happened was of the reveal the remarkably fl uid nature of how people the case of two couples from Kent, who, whilst usually very busy road suddenly becoming can experience reality during such an anomaly. travelling through the south of France by car in deathly quiet and the sounds around her This is common during UFO close 1978, spent a night in an out of the way hotel muting as the car drove forward. This is the encounters. Think back to my recent FT series about police officer Alan Godfrey in Todmorden, West , who was stopped while driving his patrol car by a hovering ‘UFO’ over the road ahead (FT325:27 et seq). PC Godfrey’s memories afterwards were a confusing mixture of what he was sure had really happened, what appeared to be fl ashbacks that might be real or might have emerged via dreams, and confusing imagery that popped into his head during subsequent regression hypnosis. In this case, they featured bizarre elements such as fi tted carpets inside the UFO and a bearded alien, little Buck Rogers type and a large as an alien pet. One fi nds disjointed elements such as these in too many alien contacts for them not to be significant, although they are hard to use in any meaningful objective narrative of the case. As you can see, our evidence from abduction cases mirrors the time travel TV shows where reality morphs in confusing ways due to influences beyond our perception: mess ABOVE: The US show Timeless is one of the recent television series to take up the theme of time travel. with space-time and it wreaks havoc with the

26 FT350 www.forteantimes.com continuity of present existence, and we scramble The hypnosis of the French timeslip to make sense of the scattered fragments of witnesses changed no significant details, but reality and reconstruct the world in a linear way. it did add some interesting nuances about the Interestingly, this pattern also appears in other feelings and sensations that they reportedly areas of fortean study. A Mancunian called Phil underwent. There was a sense of calm, told me of his experience in Portland Street, rather like the Oz Factor, as well as a sense of Manchester, in the summer of 1985. As an avid heaviness and electrical energy tingling in the autograph hunter he met singer Toyah Wilcox, air – also common in close encounters. There who agreed to sign his book; but as their eyes was also a degree of ‘reality contradiction’ that met he experienced that tell-tale sign of reality teased the encounter away from what we might shifting as the Oz Factor struck. Phil told me how accept as everyday reality. We see this all the “the busy midday street scene disappeared time in close encounters. Several witnesses and the noise around me faded and the traffic even describe feeling in the aftermath as if they all vanished. Everything went hazy apart from are ghosts trapped in a world of living people, Toyah’s eyes.” Suddenly, reality shifted changing trying to interact with reality but struggling to the appearance of the singer as well as Phil’s root themselves back in the universe they had surroundings. Her renowned and rather extreme left. In the French timeslip case the witnesses punk hairstyle and make-up disappeared, tried to use cameras to take pictures of the replaced by a surprisingly sedate style and past, but these ‘malfunctioned’ and no photos

KEYSTONE / GETTY IMAGES colour. Phil blinked and after a few moments all resulted. In several UFO cases much the same returned to normal; perhaps it had been just ABOVE: Toyah Wilcox and her memorable hairstyle. has happened: witnesses claim to have taken a daydream or an hallucination. However, the the photo that they thought would change the ‘new look’ Toyah that Phil had seen did become chair to let the badly shaken lady sit until help world… but the image never comes out or just part not just of his reality but also of the singer’s arrived. The chair she was given was just like the shows a dark sky with nothing alien to be seen. when, soon after, she adopted just such a style one she had sat in earlier, and was placed on In we seek reasons to explain such after taking on more mainstream acting roles. the roadside just as hers had been as she had misfortune: perhaps the aliens stopped the Another example of this shifting reality was waited for her husband to drive home. The car pictures from coming out and exposing their described to me by the late actress Shirley that had struck the unfortunate pedestrian was presence. But this seems needlessly complex Stelfox, who was well loved for her long-running parked right next to her now, awaiting the arrival and such anomalies could just be another way role as Edna Birch in the ITV soap Emmerdale. of the police. It was a large white car, exactly in which the reality we were living through whilst In the 1980s she was married to actor Don like the one Don Henderson had ‘seen’ parked taking those photos is different from the one to Henderson who was the lead in several hit drama beside his wife that morning. which we ultimately return. series and even had a role in Star Wars. They “I really don’t know what to make of all this,” Something is causing fortean phenomena to lived on a busy main road in Stratford-upon-Avon Shirley told me in one of our discussions. “It happen, but we are not sure what. In fact, we and parking outside was a constant headache. was truly extraordinary the way these things all are really just giving these phenomena labels One Summer Saturday morning Don was driving blended together.” that fi t the cultural context of our era. Gods their daughter to Brownies and, as was usual, I have found that we UFO researchers often and fairies were once as credible a resolution Shirley took a chair and sat on the side of the tend to fi nd what we are seeking. We settle on to anomalous experiences as time travel and road to await his return and preserve the parking some version of reality compatible with what spacefaring aliens seem to a more modern age. spot. She did so alongside their neighbour, we think should be the solution to the mystery: But it is by no means a given that any of these whose daughter was being driven to the same aliens or spaceships in one kind of case, things are the underlying cause: they are simply place by her own husband. After a pleasant chat timeslips and premonitions in others. But are the topical pigeon holes that we choose to help in the sunshine the neighbour’s husband drove we being seduced into anchoring anomalous us describe what is, more accurately, just an up and parked but Don, driving right behind, things in our shifting reality because to us they anomaly outside of our present comprehension. slowed, and, instead of stopping, edged past a seem ? Are we trying to create some sort The cause of these things could be a force of startled Shirley and accelerated away. As Shirley – and sort – of order rather than face our own nature, an energy that warps our perceptions of and her neighbours looked on in puzzlement befuddlement in a reality that might not be as the fabric of space/time, or another intelligence they concluded that Don must have driven fi xed as we’d thought? The problem is that if we that fl its between dimensions and by doing so back to collect something he had left behind at are building our jigsaw based on what we decide alters our reality. Or there could be some other the Brownie venue. As the two women stayed is supposed to be the picture on the box, we are cause that lies far beyond the ken of even the outside chatting and waiting for his return, the also creating – not just perceiving – the reality we brightest 21st century minds, because in order phone rang and Shirley rushed inside to fi nd her see. We are building the universe in the image to unravel it we need 31st century knowledge. husband at a call box asking in frustration why of our presumptions – perhaps even coaxing it Just as the thinkers of ancient Greece could she had not kept their parking slot free. Despite down certain paths as we do so. make guesses about things that from today’s her protestations that she was still doing so, So how much more trustworthy is our perspective seem remarkably prescient, even now, her husband insisted he had driven conclusion that we have been abducted and they were still hamstrung by limited scientific past because she had let a large white car park examined by little aliens than a ‘screen memory’ understanding. We may be in a similar situation there instead. “There has never been a white of tending to a sick dolphin in a pool? Might we today. We do the best we can and try to fi nd an car here. I have sat in this spot since you left,” even have created an alien encounter out of the interpretation that boxes up the problem in a Shirley insisted. She had to get her neighbours events in Stratford if, for some reason, we judged way that we can live with. Quite possibly, this is to back her up on this, so adamant was Don Don Henderson or Shirley Stelfox to have had just what witnesses are doing too: following our that he’d had to go on a hunt for a parking spot their strange experience to block a UFO event? lead and interpreting reality-shifting paradigms because of the presence of the car he described, The scenario tends to be through neat concepts that make some sense and only with their confirmation that there was no considered more ‘real’ as an explanation in terms of the culture of 2017. such vehicle did Don agree to return home. because it matches our collective theory based So we may just be guessing, and like those A couple of hours later Shirley headed to a on past events. Yet those past events, and the ancient Greek philosophers some of our local store to get some groceries. The traffic whole abduction concept, began as a perception guesses will be wide of the mark while others was bad, as the popular tourist town was full of someone had that was, at the time, just as will come to seem prescient. Either way, the visitors. At the store Shirley noticed an elderly contrary to everyday reality as all the oddities we process allows us to store the events in the couple trying to cross the road between gaps in today dismiss as screen memories. Maybe we attics of our lives and get on with the stuff that the traffic and was horrified to witness at close ought to be treating all of these shifting versions we can deal with day to day. Happily, we forteans quarters the woman being struck a glancing blow of reality as equal and not pre-selecting one glimpse the bigger picture through the pages of by a car on her blindside, which sent her crashing that matches the outcome we hope to fi nd; and this monthly chronicle and grasp the real awe of to the fl oor. As someone called an ambulance perhaps we should extend this thinking into other what might be going on as it manifests around Shirley went back into the shop to bring out a fortean events and not just alien contact cases. us as a carnival of absurdities.

FT350 27 www.forteantimes.com Blasts from the Past fortean tImes brIngs you the news that tIme forgot

66 weIrdness on wheels

Theo Paijmans fastens his seatbelt and goes in search of some road encounters of the strangest kind PUCINE DESLOUIS CA

Once, phantom hearses thundered along lonely moonlit The next morning, they found no traces – “no marks of roads. Headless horsemen galloped down country wheels or horses’ feet on the soft grass or gravel road; and we lanes and ghostly carriages materialised out of nowhere never again heard of the carriage or its occupant...” before vanishing again. “Specially baffling are some of the house, and was going at a signs of life. The carriage, which unpleasant wraith had been of the cases where a carriage, rapid rate towards a path which they did not recognise, drove plaguing the house since 1842: as well as human beings, has leads to a stream… The carriage away. The next morning they “Occupants for generations appeared”, note the authors stopped abruptly when it came found no traces – “no marks of have told of hearing an of Phantasms of the Living. A to the running water, turned, wheels or horses’ feet on the equipage come charging down ‘Major W’ who lived near Conon and in doing so, drove over the soft grass or gravel road; and the lane, first accompanied Bridge, Ross-shire, related a lawn… Neither of the men on we never again heard of the by the sound of horses’ hoofs, particularly eerie example to the box had spoken and there carriage or its occupant…” 1 but now with the exhaust them. The night of 23 August was no sound from the inside of With the advent of the of an automobile engine”, a 1878 was still and dark. Around the carriage.” The Major’s son, industrial age, a novel breed newspaper reported a century midnight, before retiring to who had now joined him, looked began to replace these spectral later. 2 his bed, the Major stepped in and all he could see was modes of transport. Cart gave Embedded in the canon of out onto the porch to observe “a stiff-looking figure sitting way to car, carriage to bus and phantom carriage tales is a the weather. Suddenly, he saw up in a corner, and draped, horse to motor. In the case of a collection of puzzling stories coming round a turn in the apparently, from head to foot haunted house in Charleston, that differ from the typical drive a large, close carriage and in white.” They were struck by South Carolina, the transition ghostly sighting formula. Some a pair of horses with two men the stillness of the men and the from old to new was observed are so odd that the question on the box. “It passed the front female figure that wesho d no at the very same spot. An arises: just what phenomena are these descriptions attempting highway near Lomo, California, had been some accident, and man dressed entirely in white to depict? in 1926. 6 In 1929 a ghost, “but a quickly reached the spot. There with the exception of a dark- One night in 1873 Thomas very modern one – in the shape was no sign of the coach or its coloured mask. Behind him was Inman and his son, returning of an old Ford car”, frightened passengers and no disturbance placed a motor and a propeller. home, were near the village of villagers of Roscommon in of the road’s surface. There Nightly, the strange vehicle Taylorsville, Ohio. Suddenly South Australia. The phantom were no side turnings and sped through the town at speeds they saw an intensely bright Ford was ablaze with light and no trace of it having crashed ranging from a few miles per light descending rapidly on one occasion, the villagers into the rough common on hour to those associated with towards the Earth with a loud, said, “phantom men and women either side of the road. I can a high-power motorcar. It was roaring noise. It struck the got out of the car and danced advance no explanation of suggested that the mysterious ground a short distance ahead. through walls and hedges to the this extraordinary, but true, figure was an inventor testing a “The blazing object flickered sound of weird music”.7 In 1930, incident.” 9 new motor. 12 and flared for a few moments Mr Stuart Rodger, the district Another ‘blazing car’ with As to more recent sightings and then faded into darkness, coroner of Hyde, Cheshire, eerie occupants terrorised of similarly weird wheeled as a man dressed in a complete solemnly advanced the theory the villagers of Athleague contraptions, speculation suit of black and carrying a at an inquest that “a phantom and Mount Talbot in Ireland: ranges from visitors from the lantern emerged from it. The motor-lorry had appeared “Witnesses in the locality state future, 13 other dimensions or man walked a few paces and at a haunted spot on a main that on many occasions about parallel planes of existence. stepped into a buggy, which road and caused a long list of midnight a mysterious vehicle These modern phantom car had not been observed before accidents there during the past somewhat like a high-powered reports also fit comfortably by either Mr Inman or his son. two years.” 8 motor-car ablaze with lights in UFO- 14 with its Men There was no horse attached In this wave, certain dashes noiselessly through the In Black driving around in to this supernatural vehicle, accounts stand out for their roads. There is apparently no old yet brand-new looking but no sooner had the man otherworldliness. One of driver, but seated in the car cars. As it stands, stories of taken his seat than it started to these describes a very curious are a number of white-robed encounters with phantom run, noiselessly but with great encounter that occurred in 1927 figures. Walls, ditches, fields, vehicles belong to the folklore velocity, along the highway, and or 1928 on a road somewhere in and plantations present no of our industrial culture. 15 this it continued to do until England. A man was riding his obstacle to the car.” 10 Perhaps more attention should it reached a deep gully, into motorcycle when he suddenly Further back in time, we be directed to who is driving, which it plunged, when buggy, heard behind him the humming find occasional mentions of rather than the vehicle itself, man and lantern suddenly sound of a car. “Its lights were things that appear on roads when a high strangeness road disappeared as mysteriously as soon reflected on the road in exhibiting the characteristics of encounter occurs. Take the they came.” 3 front of me, and in a minute it motorised vehicles but leaving case of Mr and Mrs Snead. In For several nights in was on me. I noticed as it passed the eyewitnesses perplexed 1911, the newlyweds were on 1881, at a railroad junction that it was an ultra-modern as to the design or identity their honeymoon and their in the neighbourhood of type of motor coach travelling of the object. These are not, car had run into a ditch near Lawrenceburg, Indiana, Joseph at high speed and swaying from say, old Model T Fords or any Medford, Oregon, and – as if it Slater encountered “a flaming side to side. It was filled with other recognisable vehicles, had been despatched just for light as long as a railroad car. men, every one of whom was but something quite different. this purpose – a mysterious Around it he saw several forms holding a match to a pipe. Seen In 1911, the citizens of West car emerged on cue and out of flitting with lanterns”. It was through the glass sides and Springfield saw an extremely nowhere: “Just at the proper said that several fatal railroad through the transparent panel fast-moving ghostly automobile moment another automobile accidents had occurred there in in the back of the hood they in different parts of town. drew up, bearing four men, all the past. 4 A man identified only looked weird in the flickering The vehicle was “of unusual of solemn, unsmiling mien and as Charles C briefly recounted light of the matches. A little length and its colouring is dressed in black.” It made such how one night in 1884 in County way ahead of me a policeman pure white. The lights on an impression on the married Carlow, Ireland, he was passing stepped into the road as the machine appeared to be couple that Mrs Snead noted a mansion when he saw “two if to stop the coach, which feeble, and all that was seen the strange encounter down in men ride out of the carriage was certainly travelling at a was a flash of white as the her diary: “They appeared just shed. They were sitting in a remarkable speed. In a flash, automobile whirled past”. 11 In as if they had dropped from fire which carried them along however, it passed him and 1917, residents of West Duluth, the heavens, in the very nick of to the graveyard, where they turned a bend in the road. Soon Minnesota, remembered the time, and they acted just like disappeared”. 5 after I also turned this corner, mysterious ‘Phantom Sky four spooks; they never said The late 1920s and early and saw the motor coach, a Rider’ that regularly flew over, a word, nor answered when 1930s mark a peak in reports blaze of light, some distance sometimes with and sometimes spoken to; they just hopped of spectral cars, which were along the road. Then there was without lights, because now out of their car, took hold of seen far and wide. A ‘ghost a flash, a loud explosion, and they were perplexed by the ours, boosted it out of the ditch, automobile’ was frequently the road before me lay clear visits of a ‘Phantom Sled’. This jumped back into their own, encountered by night travellers and deserted in the moonlight. vehicle was a long, low, motor and were gone. We batted our approaching the notorious The motor coach had vanished. sled painted white with a seat eyes, and thought we might be ‘death curve’ on the state I accelerated, thinking there at the front, in which sat a dreaming…” 16

Notes York, NY, 8 April 1873. Democrat, Woodland, Liberal and Macquarie Daily News, Springfield, published, 2012. 1 Edmund Gurney, 4 ‘Hoosier Goblins’, CA, 22 Oct 1926. Advocate, NSW, MA, 18 May 1911. 15 A novel approach Frederick Myers, Frank The Dallas Daily Herald, 7 ‘Phantom Ford. Australia, 17 Aug 1928 12 ‘Night Rider In is offered in the Podmore, Phantasms Dallas, TX, 8 Jan 1881; Ghostly Motorists’, (citing the London Phantom Sleigh’, Duluth unfortunately short-lived Of The Living, Kegan National Police Gazette, Observer, Adelaide, SA, Express). News Tribune, Duluth, BBC television series Paul, Trench, Trubner & New York, 22 Jan 1881. 2 Feb 1929. 10 ‘Villages Terrorized MI, 30 Jan 1917. The Living And The Co, 1918, pp481-482. 5 ‘Ghosts In All parts 8 ‘Phantom Motor-Lorry By Apparition’, Western 13 Peter Hassall, Dead. 2 ‘Tale of Phantom Of The World’, Boston Terror Of Haunted Road Morning News, 22 Jan ‘Motorists From The 16 ‘A uto Trip Visitor Mystery After Post, Boston, MA, 24 In England’, Kingston 1927. Future’, Fortean Times, Honeymoon’, 100 years’, Hopewell April 1921. Gleaner, Kingston, 11 ‘A uto-Ghost Is 241, Oct 2008. Oregonian, Portland, Herald, Hopewell, NJ, Jamaica, 13 Mar 1930. New Sensation. West OR, 24 Sept 1911. 14 Oct 1942. 6 ‘Ghost Auto Explained 14 Albert Rosales, By Sutter Farmer’, 9 ‘There Was A Loud Springfield Walkers Cosmic Cars And Other 3 ‘Very Like A Whale’, Woodland Daily Explosion’, Dubbo Wonder at Ubiquitous Road Oddities, privately New York Herald, New White Car’, Springfield www.forteantimes 30 co siege under itself Illinois southwest in Murphysboro re Mud Big the aytwsokatiue oteri the to attributed townsfolk many t namesake. its I wa uigteBgMud Big the during corridor. lc n26 on place • wa hair tall, “real as described Rath creature manlike couple the noise, the in Upon bushes. nearby the rustling heard in boyfriend her and she when Ray) (née frightening colours. oie ltl lelgti h k quite sky the in fa light blue “little a noticed i pteisd ftehue I I house. that the of inside the up lit windows and doors the All re arr startling a strobe to began and size UFO interview obser whom aselo a,lk upu”drn the during incident. sulphur” like gas, of smell “a Pratt the corroborated home, r nowned ald “It called. vere n ftemore the of One Icudha uzn sound, buzzing a hear could “I e osnadsister-in-la and cousin Her FT sn the using s dirty s NOSEWITNESS Fi awa 350 h ml fhigh of Smell The eye ve gr reve ra ve e itri-a hnsesuddenl she when sister-in-law her witness ev São near stench re n ih-ardmn dubbed man” light-haired and d y. u ION n in and CICOANI oup n i ne bed.” a under hid and n lati nn n1978. in ening eClemência te y. re ” , 1 .c ldta both that aled atd thda had It matted. intriguing by si prahdtehuewith house the approached it As witne wa hn it think I fo r earlier ars om ve Ju ra ve dy se its r wa ebr fteBl Horizonte Belo the of members traigo e akpor back her on stargazing s nonee nunearthl an encountered s They wa pidity e1973. ne wa h betuo their upon object the d Monster on rudadaround. and around going s rhin arch terw ove ln ntehm of home the in alone s by ss fa pcltdtebeast the speculated dy wa , rp , 7t[m tall “7ft-[2m] a h anomaly the osencounter mous wa ay h onof town the ac Fe Vi Monster rusta it that argues owe ht,bt[h hair] [the but white, s Th Wi . mzdt see to amazed s ev satransportation a as 2 et,Bai,one Brazil, cente, wo ieadher and lipe re co to 23-year-old e ns hrlRath Cheryl tness Th n.A ent. re igodour ring we e detected men fe ve lbdodour bad al un w, beast e st re ve tgtrBob stigator re wa ohof both fl ra ts stigating ht u it but shut, ” fo ptook ap nc oscared so s gr Fe g hnmn has phenomena nge llow-up fo ve of ew mu wa lipe und , es s of r whic re ay s in ev d- a turn y y . to ch of ’s h rtigfo f encoun Ufo from erything supernatural time HAD IT MATTED... HAIR “THE A ODOUR” BAD we to kolfactory ok A sc te en nded REAL ts and to ev co pa esto ters idence WA cnrt nvsa n ui aa but data, audio and visual on ncentrate ST ra omlpongs. normal S mons fo ra r fo te rt tro upybr,Ilni,hsbe commemo- been ra has Illinois, Murphysboro, of ster LEFT: pno htit that opinion tn,Cet ag Creath stink, Wh and turned simply Monster lm”co slime” ieit.” like It ove ro gr his transported been 125 had he though as battle, surrounded Mar in park historical the whose man a Coleman, K Christopher author to According occasion. Jo General Confederate and Sherman General Major Union the marking Carolina, Mar 21 and 19 between itr afi history park. of preser Battle been the has of Bentonville site the State, North Old States. the Between effecti Lee, E Robert General Confederate of the with coupled defeat, • re i terror. his gunpowder” of smell acrid “the and appeared smoke Swirling passing audibly artillery and e nafrmr peln oa rf beer. craft local appealing more far a in ted ea pcsor spects tno se or tten ud terrified ound, wa sightings r ehE seph fe e oet,teBgMud Big the moments, few a After stelretCivil largest the As Th nakdlater asked en the r ch ye ngene h -ttl n olseln i ud Mon- Muddy Big foul-smelling and 7-ft-tall The s na ateo etnil okplace took Bentonville of Battle e To iswadfl eiei nthe on it beside fell and ainsaw r aki ie trld edropped he Startled, time. in back ars re ve ch da JOSHUA ally ye ly ve 90we he when 1990 Jo se indscoming cionados y, ars mar wa re igtebat te witnesses Other beast. the ring hnston. by it ra riously… li ge-like. we wo k ne I nk. wa ve h onsadsel of smells and sounds the ke re cmstosnsof thousands lcomes by l ecieteselas smell the describe uld h n fthe of end the d u oala a to due s h at–qievividl quite – past the dwt h common the with ed of ab wa Jo h esto fbullets of sensation the u the out te fi uiycutting busily s Wi Wa ntnssubsequent hnston’s ve fi CU ldteair the lled ch fo n a ls between clash nal mle anything smelled r lliam Ap atei the in battle r fa n himself und 85i North in 1865 co TC opytheir pay to mbordered rm i surrender ril wa ve ove ove ye nt Te sastate a as d lked HIN SS rp f“ri of r cumsah him. r ain , Wa owe digto adding awa dy r wo ring ve y, y. od r on

ILLUSTRATION BY DAVID NEWTON

THE PRINT COLLECTOR / GETTY IMAGES

ABOVE: In March 1990, a man whose farm bordered the site of the Civil War battle of Bentonville suddenly experienced some kind of timeslip anomaly in which not the sights but the sounds and smells of the 1865 battle, including the “acrid” odour of gunpowder, appeared to be all around him.

The entire occurrence stopped just as Smells seem quite inconsequential upon the most common “ufonauts” reported to abruptly as it had begun, as if a switch had cursory examination, a mere by-product, an the USAF were the “little, green, luminous, been fl ipped.The witness fl ed, his chainsaw afterthought to bigger, much grander, events. smelly types”. 6 In The Encyclopedia of remaining where it had fallen for weeks Upon examining the literature, however, Ghosts and Spirits, researcher Rosemary before he summoned the courage to retrieve certain patterns take shape, some more Ellen Guiley wrote that “distinctive, it. 3 immediately apparent than others; and, if unusual, and out-of-place odours are one of consistent odour trends between various the most common phenomena associated THE NOSE KNOWS paranormal encounters can be established, it with hauntings,” often appearing foul in If “seeing is believing”, then smelling is certainly implies a deeper meaning to their poltergeist and demonic cases. 7 trusting; for, as the adages go, “the nose appearance in eyewitness (nosewitness?) If , a Pentagon spokesman, and knows” when something “fails to pass the testimony. Rosemary Ellen Guiley feel paranormal smell test”. “A rose by any other name would Those collecting data on esoterica have smells are worth noting, then perhaps we smell as sweet,” wrote the Bard, and it is long noted the consistency of supernatural should pay attention – they are neither for this reason that scent is often regarded odours. Over the course of his career as a uninformed nor alone in noticing the as something of an intuitive sense, able to paranormal writer, the late John Keel paid a prominence of odours in strange and unusual parse the true nature of things even when great deal of attention to the consistency of cases. Perhaps this line of research is worth deception occludes truth.Thus, it should smells in his investigations, dedicating space pursuing. come as little surprise that forteana has its in several of his books to his observations. If we are truly dedicated to deciphering reality reinforced when accompanied by “With the exception of the European the nature of all things unexplained, it odours, as the gullible eye is more easily stories and some of those reports from behoves us to scrutinise every possible fooled than the sceptical nose. Canada, it seems that the majority of these aspect of these encounters. No stone is too The three contemporary examples above creatures are accompanied by a pungent, small to leave unturned, yet many ghost are a mere handful of the cases detailing very unpleasant odour,” he wrote of hairy hunters, ufologists, and Sasquatch seekers scents in conjunction with the supernatural. hominids in The Complete Guide to Mysterious frustratingly gloss over the importance On some level, it isn’t particularly surprising Beings. “This stink seems to exceed of minute details when preparing their that encounters with the unknown are normal animal smells and could, reports, neglecting these (possibly accompanied by specific odours – lots of eventually, offer some kind of clue crucial) bits of evidence in favour of the experiences have closely associated smells, to the body chemistry of the Sisyphean goal of “proving” such from visits to the hospital to walking into a creatures.”5 phenomena. humidor – and it wouldn’t be at all rude to Similar observations were But what does a Sasquatch question why we should even bother looking made by Captain Robert White, reeking of rotten eggs have to do into this niche subject in greater detail. Pentagon spokesman for the United with the smell of a ghostly cigar, or But, as CS Lewis once wrote of the fairy States Air Force’s UFO study, the odour of ozone accompanying a folk: “If I may risk the oxymoron, their , who admitted in fl ying saucer? unimportance is their importance.” 4 a 1955 press conference that Perhaps UFOs are

32 FT350 www.forteantimes.com extraterrestrials in nuts-and-bolts craft, ancestors assumed an upright position, noses Solomon is replete with positive olfactory ghosts are the spirits of the deceased, and lifted farther from the fragrant ground, imagery – the New Testament seems less Sasquatch is a fl esh-and-blood giant ape. allowing smell to take a backseat to vision. tolerant. In the latter half of the Bible “we Perhaps they aren’t. Lines blur and cross Sexually stimulating odours were surpassed continually sense a veiled criticism of the with uncomfortable irregularity: visitations in favour of visual arousal – olfaction was, to profane use of scent,” wrote historical fromVenusians are occasionally nigh Freud’s mind, a base, animalistic sense. anthropologist Annick Le Guérer, citing indistinguishable from visions of the Blessed Millennia before Civilization and Its Judas’s objections when Mary fragrantly Virgin Mary (BVM); Sasquatch can appear Discontents, Plato laid the groundwork for anointed the feet of Christ. 11 alongside a UFO; fairies consort with the Freud’s theory, declaring the eye and ear Early Church officials, who condemned all spirits of the deceased. superior organs to the nose; to the Greek Earthly delights, adopted this aversion. Even It would be easy to interpret this catchall philosopher, vision and hearing, which though it sought to upset the status quo of approach as a tacit declaration that all allowed mankind to appreciate geometry thought, the Age of Enlightenment continued paranormal phenomena are merely multiple and music, were “noble” senses. 9 Plato to degrade olfaction, which it held could lead faces of a singular phenomenon. Although cited the source of smell’s shortcomings as the intellect astray. It wasn’t until the 18th this is a possibility, the reader is invited to inferiorities in the nose’s “veins”, too narrow and 19th centuries, with the renewed interest consider whether these different phenomena to accommodate the “particles” of water and in medicine, that smell came to the forefront merely utilise similar methods (e.g. though earth, too wide for those of air and fi re. 10 of scholarly attention.12 fairies, angels, and aliens are presaged by a Aristotle elaborated on the notion in his Misguided doctors and researchers bright light, this doesn’t necessarily mean the short treatise Sense and Sensibilia, pointing determined that diseases were caused by foul entities are one-and-the-same – perhaps it out the inferiority of olfaction in mankind as smells, or miasmas. The idea was by no means only means that their modes of manifestation compared to beasts. He placed smell between new – ancient India had its own version, while are the same, or that our limited senses the tactile senses of touch/taste and the second century physician and philosopher perceive them similarly).The patterns medium-delivered senses of sight/hearing – it Galen of Pergamon had pioneered the in paranormal smells may only indicate was the most liminal of all senses, generated concept in the West (as early as the 1300s commonalities, not the substructure of some neither within nor without. scholars attributed the Plague to a “deadly underlying pan-supernatural theory. Ergo, it While both Plato and Aristotle wrote corruption of the air”). Nor was the notion may be more useful to think of our approach extensively on the subject, smell received restricted to the Old World: the native people as less of a pie chart and more of aVenn scant philosophical attention until the of upstate New York held that around 700 diagram. Christian era.Though the Old Testament BC, a horned serpent rose from the depths of unabashedly relishes smell – the Song of Lake Ontario, spreading disease and killing SMELLING THE UNKNOWN by the score with its foul breath.13 The nose is nature’s chemical receptor. In short, smells were ascribed supernatural It categorises the unseen, allowing us to powers. Hateful beliefs from mediæval “identify friend, foe, or quarry, and further “THIS STINK Christianity re-emerged in popular culture, differentiate between edible and nonedible where “menstrual blood, the Devil and Jews, foods”, in the words of environmental SEEMS TO for example, were all believed to have a engineering professor Paul N Cheremisinoff. distinctive smell, thus sneakily invading the The affect may be unconscious, like subtle Christian male through his nostrils.” 14 During arousals when smelling the opposite sex, or EXCEED NORMAL the alleged four-year possession of Ursuline it may be overt, as when the scent of smoke nuns known as the Loudun Possessions of alerts us to fi re. It isn’t until we are faced with 1630, the scent of “a bouquet of musk roses” the terrifying notion of dangerous, odourless ANIMALSMELLS” was blamed for allowing Satan access to the substances like carbon monoxide that we fully appreciate olfaction’s alerting power. Alarming smells may well be our fi rst indicator of the unexplained. In November 1999, a semi truck driver near Holtville, California, pulled off the road to relieve himself around 10pm. He immediately noted a “strong dead decaying skunk smell” and left his headlights on to avoid stepping in anything unpleasant.The witness had just reached the vehicle’s passenger side when the stench intensified to “a gagging type of a smell”. At that instant, something with long hair and a large frame rushed down the mountainside, grunting as it passed through

his headlights and across the road. TO The panicked driver vacated the area immediately. 8 MIASMAS AND MEDICINE In 1929, neurologist Sigmund Freud published Civilization and Its Discontents, a seminal work highlighting the inherent tension between the individual’s desire for independence and civilisation’s need to impose order. In his classic fashion, Freud posited that one of the

main sources of this friction was mankind’s MARY EVANS PICTURE LIBRARY / ALAMY STOCK PHO primitive sexual drives, further speculating that the diminished role of smell in modern ABOVE: The USAF Project Blue Book team; apparently the commonest type of UFO occupant reported was “little, green, luminous” and “smelly”. OPPOSITE: John Keel was one fortean researcher who paid attention to smells. man was thanks to evolution: as human

FT350 33 www.forteantimes.com sisters (the events were likely LEFT: A bouquet of roses exaggerated by the Church). allows Satan to possess the 15 By the 1800s, European Ursuline sisters of Loudun. miasmatic beliefs were so widespread that fi res were lit hopeful Carl Paladino to cleanse the air during times trounced his rival in the of pestilence, jars of bodily Republican primary by odours were collected for issuing fl yers infused examination, and – naturally with the smell of rotting – pleasant smells were garbage that read “end ascribed positive, curative the stink of corruption in effects, a notion that survives Albany.” 19 in modern aromatherapy “Unconsciously practice. influenced by a smell, we Eventually, miasma theory may be prompted to do gave way to modern concepts or avoid doing or feeling of germs and viruses, and the something without fully study of smell evolved into understanding why,” a scientific examination of wrote Dutch psychologist olfaction. In the modern era, PietVroon. 20 Odours the Mad Gasser of Mattoon can even influence the and the character of dreams – in would illustrate that the key one study, dreamers conceits of miasma theory exposed to rose scent were not entirely without (phenyl ethyl alcohol) had basis. Smells can, in some more pleasant dreams sense, harm the smeller. than those exposed to TO the scent of rotten eggs THE SCIENCE OF (hydrogen sulphide). 21 SMELLS Despite its importance When we smell, scent and ability to viscerally molecules bind to specific impact us, olfaction sensory cells high in our remains largely under- nose; this interaction has researched and poorly been described as a sort of understood. Science still key-lock configuration, with lacks a consensus opinion each cell corresponding to on exactly how the key- specific molecules. If a “key” lock system of odour MARY EVANS PICTURE LIBRARY / ALAMY STOCK PHO (molecule) and “lock” (cell) coding and perception are compatible, the ensuing stimulation is water for a drink, he noticed an unpleasant functions; some posit that molecular shape eventually relayed to the olfactory bulb, a dizzying odour. Ivanov immediately feared determines which cells react, while others neural structure in the brain. Once here, this asphyxiation and tried to claw his way out of have begun to invoke more controversial stimulation fi res electrical impulses at the the gully but was paralysed. After blacking theories including quantum effects. amygdala, a neuron cluster that serves as out, he awoke in a surreal, tropical location, A key concept in olfactory science is that the hub for memory, emotions, and decision- complete with pink sky and unrecognisable of hedonics. Hedonics describe the pleasant making.This complex brain-body interaction wildlife. Ivanov claimed that when he tried or unpleasant nature of a smell.Though some links directly with the limbic system, a series to move again, he suddenly found himself might assume that universal hedonic values of nerves and networks governing visceral and back in Russia.The entire experience, to are present in every human from birth (e.g. behavioural reactions. Olfaction is the fi rst his estimation, had taken no more than a garbage smells bad, bacon smells good), the sense to become dominant in infants – the few hours. Ivanov was purportedly of sound truth of the matter is that specific odours entire nervous system is affected by odours, mental health, and some reports claimed the are only perceived as pleasant/unpleasant from our pulse and breathing to more complex soil samples taken from his boots were not because they possess corresponding learned digestive, sexual, and emotional responses. native to the area. 17 associations.To the garbage man, trash smells Smell’s deep, refl exive triggers regularly of money, but to a vegan, bacon smells of cause paranormal witnesses to experience • Chilean citizen Cariaga Gonzales noticed death (in an exception to this rule, research physical reactions. Reports of nausea and a large, monkey-like animal by the side of indicates that unknown odours are generally dizziness are among the most common effects the road the evening of 24 June 2000. When less likely to be deemed pleasant).22 This attributed to smells and the unknown. he stepped out of the vehicle to investigate, factor is one of the main reasons for the he was nauseated by a strong smell. “It’s inability of the military to • Two luminous fi reballs landed in the cow something similar to a decomposing animal,” create a universal stink bomb; with few pasture of a pregnant housewife in Bowling he said later. Gonzales came within 25ft exceptions, a representative sample of the Green, Missouri, one summer evening in (7.6m) before a blood-curdling howl forced world’s ethnic groups cannot agree upon a July 1972.The event was accompanied by him to fl ee. 18 consistently revolting odour. a nauseating stench of decomposition and This same associative logic extends to strange, unearthly grunts and screams. 16 Was it the sound that made Gonzales encounters with the unknown: generally fl ee, or the smell? Studies have shown time speaking, benevolent entities – BVMs, • Russian city leaderVA Ivanov returned and again that human beings are highly angels, female ghosts, Adamski-style space abruptly after disappearing for 11 months susceptible to scent manipulation. For brothers – smell pleasant, while malevolent in 1987. Ivanov claimed that he had been example, the aroma of cleaning products can beings like devils, demons, and Grey aliens returning home when, on a whim, he stopped make people more honest and fair in business smell unpleasant.These hedonic associations by a favourite childhood haunt, a gully near dealings. Foul smells have an even greater extend to near-death experiences (NDEs) as the River Irtysh. Dipping his hand to the impact. In October 2010, New York governor well. Pope Gregory wrote in the sixth century

34 FT350 www.forteantimes.com of a soldier who had died and returned, It is imperative to understand that psychologist Trygg Engen, “or, rather, the but not before seeing the intersection of phantosmia does not refer to spirit smells. memory of a terrible situation associated with Heaven and Hell: “He said that there was Unfortunately, some paranormal researchers an odour?” 25 a bridge, under which ran a black, gloomy have begun erroneously using the term river which breathed forth an intolerably to describe any odour without a source, MEMORY AND LANGUAGE foul-smelling vapour. But across the bridge particularly in haunted locations.The Benjamin Davidson was travelling from there were delightful meadows carpeted difference is simple: phantosmia generates Portsmouth, Ohio, to Cincinnati on a spring with green grass and sweet-smelling fl owers. odours detected only by an individual, while evening in the mid-1960s when he was forced The meadows seemed to be meeting places several witnesses can notice spirit smells. By to a halt. In the middle of the road sat an for people clothed in white. Such a pleasant definition, phantosmia is a neurologically elliptical metallic craft, fl ashing a dazzling odour fi lled the air that the sweet smell by generated medical condition that is entirely array of multi-coloured lights. Despite itself was enough to satisfy the hunger of the internal. It is individual-based and not this startling scenario, he remained calm inhabitants who were strolling there”. 23 location-based, though it may provide an as several tall, praying mantis-like beings Mystics have long spoken of odours of explanation for odours in single-witness escorted him from his vehicle to the waiting sanctity, and today the hedonic associations of sightings and accounts of clairscent (psychic structure. Heaven and Hell remain engrained in culture. smells). Once inside the well-lit interior, he One NDE collected by psychologist Margot It is possible for the power of suggestion allegedly met 20 of the creatures, which Grey told of a survivor who, after attempting to create imagined scents. In one such placed him on a table and began examining suicide, was suddenly “in a place that I can example, painter and Holocaust survivor him.They performed a variety of procedures, only describe as Dante’s Inferno. I saw a lot of Avigdor Arikha, upon reopening his old including scraping skin from his hands, other people who seemed grey and dreary and concentration camp sketchbook, was hit with clipping his fi ngernails, and extracting blood. there was a musty smell of decay.” 24 the overpowering stench of corpses.Those Most chillingly, he noticed the body of a dead Scientists steeped in the materialist around him denied the stench. girl on an adjacent table. “I know she was paradigm have long sought to write off NDEs “Did he actually experience the odour dead,” he later said. “I didn’t know who she as last-minute misfirings within the brain. of the concentration camp,” wrote odour was or where she came from, but it was quite The appearance of uncommon odours would obvious that she was dead.” not be out of place in such explanations, as He reappeared several hours later at a there are a variety of olfactory disorders, traffic light near Portsmouth before returning mostly of neurological origin. Anosmia is the IVANOV NOTICED home to a very upset and suspicious wife. He inability to smell; dysosmia, a distortion of claimed no recollection of the event until, smell; cacosmia, the unpleasant interpretation AN UNPLEASANT while smoking at his kitchen table in the of pleasant smells. Not inconsequential to our early 1990s, his cigarette singed the hair of discussion is phantosmia, the hallucination his arm.The odour of burnt hair brought of odours in the absence of noticeable smells. DIZZYING ODOUR back memories of the unwelcome medical These phantom scents are often unpleasant examination he had repressed for nearly three (cacosmic) and are frequently caused by brain AND FEARED decades. 26 damage or seizures in the temporal lobe. As Few senses have a more profound effect such they are common in schizophrenics and upon memory than smell. Any adult who has those suffering from brain tumours. ASPHYXIATION experienced a fragrance from childhood is N ARCHIVE / GETTY IMAGES TO HUL ABOVE: The exhumed body of Saint Padre Pio lies in the Catholic church of San Lorenzo fuori le Mura, Rome, in 2016. Like many saints, Padre Pio was associated with the ‘odour of sanctity’ and it was said that the blood issuing from his stigmata gave off the scent of fl owers.

FT350 35 www.forteantimes.com well aware of the tight coupling between scent recollections. Notably, Alzheimer’s patients Abductions: The Measure of a Mystery, Thomas and memory, and it is not at all uncommon show a severe impairment in odour memory. Bullard lists smells that are “sharp-smelling, to have memories fl ood back, unbidden, So why is our sense of smell – in actuality, sickly, burning,” or, even more frustratingly, on catching a nostalgic whiff. Memories robust and powerful, inviolable in memory – “strange” or “odd”. of odours are persistent and permanent, so often overlooked and taken for granted? A good example of such nebulous especially when the associated event is The confounding element masking the power descriptions comes from “Jane”, one of particularly significant to our lives. British of human olfaction lies not in our physiology the abductees studied by the late Karla veterinarian James Herriot, who served in the or psychology but rather, unsurprisingly, in Turner. On 2 December 1992, she noticed Royal Air Force, used a popular soap in the our language. Olfactory researchers playfully an “unrecognisable odour” in the air of her shower the fi rst night of his service; the day’s call this the “tip-of-the-nose” phenomenon, home: “‘acrid, strong, heavy, sharp, pungent, events, which included medical examinations, a riff on the phrase “tip-of-the-tongue”; and tangy,’ unrelated to food or smoke odours, ornery corporals, and saying goodbye to his like a word on the tip of our tongue, we can and unlike anything she’d ever smelled.” That wife, made him unable to use the soap again recognise odours and yet have their names evening she witnessed a UFO, and was taken the rest of his life. 27 elude us. On average, we experience this early the following morning. 28 “It is actually better to think of this once out of every 10 scents we perceive. This ability in terms of not forgetting rather than occurrence is compounded by the difficulty of ODOUR AND THE OCCULT remembering,” writes Engen. “While visual identifying odours in the absence of context The role of scents in occult rituals can and auditory memory usually decrease with clues. Our language actively affects the way be traced back to prehistoric sacrificial time, often exponentially in light of new we perceive smells: unknown odours are rites. Ancient faiths worldwide embraced experiences, odour memory remains intact.” more likely to be perceived as negative, while the concept of burnt offerings, wherein a In many cases this recall is a primitive, any smell that can be named will actually be sacrifice – exclusively an animal in Abrahamic protective act, designed to safeguard us perceived more sharply. religions, occasionally a human in pagan against repeating unpleasant encounters The difficulties of language are endemic ceremonies – was burned as an offering to of the past. Not only does scent memory in the descriptions provided by paranormal supernatural forces. Being invisible, these fail to diminish, but it is also impervious to witnesses, as odours are described in equal deities found solid food unfit for consumption retroactive interference, the tendency for newer parts “strange, foul, or unpleasant.” In and thus relied upon fi re to release the memories to overwrite and mix with older his unparalleled two-volume work UFO essence of the food, changing the tangible into the ethereal. (These concepts, studied in depth in my book A Trojan Feast, are echoed in the Celtic faerie faith, wherein earth elementals consume not the physical food, but rather its essence, or foyson. See FT332:45) When the ritual was complete, the burnt husk would remain, but the essence itself had risen to the Heavens in the form of smoke. Naturally, the odour of the smoke and the offering itself were conflated. Even older religious rites used incense to similar effect.The ancient Egyptians used perfumed smoke not only to please the gods, but also for pragmatic purposes like removing odours, a practice mirrored in Babylon and later Greece and Rome, where incense was used while praying to divining oracles. In some sense, the burning of incense is a variation on the burnt offering writ small; it is the immolation of plants instead of fl esh, essential oils combusting in the place of blood and fat. The Christian church adopted the use of incense in mediæval times, though not without criticism – smell, as it has been noted, was viewed suspiciously. Again, the decision was partly spiritual and partly practical, as the smoke no doubt helped to alleviate the smell of dozens of unwashed congregants crammed in for Mass. The ability of scent to transcend the physical plane naturally appealed to those dabbling in magic. Occult communities seized upon this attribute along with the entrenched hedonic qualities of odour: the rituals for fell deeds required foul scents, while conjuration for a positive outcome demanded pleasant perfumes. The purpose of incense in magic was two- fold, not only carrying prayers to the Heavens but also focusing the mind of the magician and providing an atmosphere conducive to their goals.We can see similar thematic parallels in modern psychedelic use, which emphasises how set and setting – the user’s state-of- NIVERSAL HISTORY ARCHIVE / UIG VIA GETTY IMAGES mind and surrounding environment – are as ABOVE: A priest stands before the altar of burnt offering, on which a ram’s head is consumed by fl ames. important to the experience as the substance

36 FT350 www.forteantimes.com IC / AFP / GETTY IMAGES OV DALIBOR DANIL ARIF ALI / AFP / GETTY IMAGES

ABOVE LEFT: Burning incense at the shrine of a Sufi saint in Pakistan. ABOVE RIGHT: Garlic, with its pungent odour, was traditionally employed to ward off vampires.

itself. to repel harmful health problems), “Present-day writing on astral magic also and it is not uncommon to fi nd modern AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY emphasises perfumes,” writes Le Guérer. wiccans, demonologists, and ghost hunters “According to one theory, odours created by participating in “smudging” ceremonies, using JOSHUA CUTCHIN is a native the volatilisation of particles of matter emit burned sage to cleanse an area of evil spirits. of North Carolina and works in vibrations that have a profound effect on the Lesser known is the purported ability of public affairs. He is the author behaviour of all living creatures and on one’s saffron oil and henna to repel the Arabic djinn, of A Trojan Feast: The Food astral twin.” These “vibrations” – conceptually 30 that the odour of pomade frightens Japan’s and Drink Offerings of Aliens, familiar to anyone with any experience in the kuchi-sake-onna, 31 or the fact that duendes, Fairies and Sasquatch as well New Age community – supposedly reinforce South America’s fairy folk, cannot abide the as a composer and jazz and the natural abilities provided to us by our odour of “culantro,” the regional term for the rock tuba player. zodiacal sign. 29 herb Eryngium foetidum. 32 Such techniques extend to the summoning Olfcation occupies an integral place in This article is extracted and of demons and in witchcraft. our psychology and perception of the world edited from The Brimstone Conversely, smells have long been used to around us, worthy of the attention of anyone Deceit: An In-Depth Examination repel supernatural entities. Popular culture interested in the unexplained; for, when taken of Supernatural Scents, Otherwordly Odors and tells how vampires are repelled by garlic (a in aggregate, all existing research points to Monstrous Miasmas, published curious bit of folklore when compared to olfaction as a sense ripe for exploitation by by Anomalist Books, $18.95. garlic’s newfound popularity as a “superfood” occult forces.

NOTES (Class A): Truck driver has a short but 17 H Chaloupek, Case 159. In A 23 C Zaleski, Otherworld Journeys: 1 B Pratt, UFOs still haunting Brazil’s memorable encounter, 23 Mar 2004, Rosales (Ed.), 1987 Humanoid Sighting Accounts of Near-Death Experience in Valley of the Old Women. MUFON UFO www.bfro.net/ Reports, www.ufoinfo.com/humanoid/ Medi- eval and Modern Times, Oxford Journal 430, 2004, pp3-8. 9 Piet Vroon, Smell: The Secret humanoid-1987.pdf University Press, 1987. 2 “Big, muddy ‘critter’ sighted at Big Seducer, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 18 J Trainor, UFO Roundup Volume 24 C Carter, Science and the Near- Muddy”, Southern Illinoisan, 26 Jun 1997. (Original work published 1994 as 5, Number 28, July 2000, http:// Death Experience: How Consciousness 1973, p3. Verborgen verleider). ufoupdateslist.com/2000/jul/m13-012. Survives Death, Inner Traditions, 2010. shtml 3 CK Coleman, Ghosts and Haunts of 10 Annick Le Guérer, Scent: The 25 Engen, 1991. the Civil War, Thomas Nelson, 1999. Essential and Mysterious Powers of 19 R Herz, “Smell Manipulation: The 26 K Young, “The Last Deed”, MUFON Smell, Kodansha International, 1994. subliminal power of scent”, 2011, UFO Journal 418, 2003, pp3-4. 4 CS Lewis, The Discarded Image: (Original Work published 1988 as Les www.psychologytoday.com/blog/smell- An Introduction to Medieval and Pouvoirs de L’ Odeur) life/201101/smell-manipulation 27 James Herriot, All Things Wise and Renaissance Literature, Cambridge Wonderful, St Martin’s Paperback, University Press, 1964. 11 Ibid. 20 Vroon, op cit. 1976. 5 John Keel, The Complete Guide 12 Vroon, op cit. 21 D Mitzman, “Do people experience 28 K Turner, Taken: Inside the Alien- to Mysterious Beings, Tom Doherty 13 Native Languages of the Americas, smell in their dreams?”, 2014, www. Human Abduction Agenda, Rose Associates, 2002 (Originally published Legendary Native American Figures: bbc.com/news/magazine-27590756 Printing Company, Inc, 1994. 1970 as Strange Creatures from Time Oniare (Oniont), http://www.native- 37 JD Spengler, JF McCarthy, JM 29 Le Guérer, op cit. and Space). languages.org Samet, Indoor Air Quality Handbook, 30 Ibid. 6 John Keel, “Savage Little Men From 14 B Bildhauer, Blood, “J ews and McGraw-Hill Professional Publishing, Outer Space”, Saga, March 1969, in Monsters in Medieval Culture”, in 2000. 31 MD Foster, The Book of Yokai: AB Colvin (Ed.), The Book of Mothman: B. Bildhauer & R Mills (Eds.), The 22 T Engen, The Perception of Odours, Mysterious Creatures of Japanese Everything You Wanted to Know About Monstrous Middle Ages, MPG Books, Academic Press, 1982; Odor Sensation Folklore, University of California Press, Reality Distortion But Were Afraid to 1993, pp75-96. and Memory, Praeger Publishers, 1991; 2015. Ask, New Saucerian Books, 2002. 15 Le Guérer, op cit. DD Dilks, P Dalton & GK Beauchamp, 32 LN Castillo, Case 83, in A Rosales “Cross-cultural variation in responses (Ed.), 1987 Humanoid Sighting 7 Rosemary Guiley, The Encyclopedia of 16 M Moravec, The UFO Anthropoid Ghosts and Spirits, Facts on File, 2007. to malodors”, Chemical Senses 24, Reports, www.ufoinfo.com/humanoid/ Catalogue, Australian Center for UFO 599, 1999. humanoid-1987.pdf 8 R Hucklebridge, Report #8345 Studies, 1980.

FT350 37 www.forteantimes.com 38 www.forteantimes BlackTide otres in poltergeist We Carl successor his in particular he rubbish, superstitious of load while vie common a con a W fa up jumped men both and bang loud td fparapsychology of study fa spirit”. “noisy circumlocution winded ex an is that si it if as at looked h hl ujc snnes,something Ju nonsense, as subject whole the oehn gis him”. against something it him at looked on moment at looked another that bang predicted and head his shook ifiutt o h at ie No line. party the toe to difficult ow lo i hoe n ehad he and throne, his been had After he feelings. all, his back hold to difficult re con the gr As accept. not could it, Wa ve vo lo them. on ll ain with lations ew eirsto phenomenon, teriorisation g h a a ample had had who ng, uigavstto visit a During o ogatrti,aanin again this, after long Not Ft eisadabtosand ambitions and genius n a ali tecrosicdn fthe of incident curious “the it call can 350 , rddisciple. ured fo ve heated, wo sigmund re Fr we i mentor his r ih nthe on light rs ainhpwt i erstwhile his with lationship u imse h cutas occult the dismissed eud l soon uld GA to with ation .c re Fr Ju ex ly ex om dis wa u efl i iprg glo diaphragm his felt he eud g“gat,adfo that from and “aghast”, ng ml fas-aldcatalytic so-called a of ample becoming fado it. of afraid lddin ploded ru Fado h oc the oF aFraid Freud s RY Ju Ju w, Fr Fr itutu fhspr his of mistrustful s Fr Ju av gsi to said ng occult? as ftehmnmn is mind human the of the to approach scientific no-nonsense, took psychoanalysis of g who ng, u’ bookcase.” eud’s n tsget that suggests it and wa ch u cordial, eud eud gmysgetotherwise. suggest may ng fo Ju Fr owe LACHMAN, osen Vi Fr . a fIhddone had I if “as s llo Fr But u fado the of afraid eud gsi the said ng re nai 1909, in enna w. u’ new eud’s eud re gr Fr otd“Bosh!” torted Th fo . Ye by wa Wh ?adwa bu ugadthe and Jung about what and d? Ju my -o.Suddenly d-hot. eat Fr u’ bookcase, eud’s , otres or poltergeist a r Fr tthe at ex fadit afraid nepisode an t ab gas a his had also ng tdto nted Fr u dismissed eud ni did, it en u:“There, eud: eineof perience re st ” fo u h ne the out u oinherit to eud Vi Ju ve spect, n it und fo eries my wa fa w, enna, wa rs gslong- ng’s n it und ther ke ation y steries she as wo Ju sn’ ev a wa ‘s Fr ep Fr ev ghad ng uld Ju t iousl a cienc eud of w eud en s ng a w, Fr h ua idand mind human the y eud e’ BOOkcaSe FReUd’S iN eXPlOded a of se ps OdBaNG lOUd cr yc et hoanalysis ytroubled ly ca ba se wa by ihtesupernatural the nish of meant s the h otres ntebook the in poltergeist the st ra to g hnmn epublicly he phenomena nge hn hlymaterialistic wholly a shine imn ru htgahdi 1935. in photographed Freud bookcase? sigmund the in lurking poltergeist a ABOVE: Ju re uigwhich during hthe that fi,a nhkal bul unshakeable an it, of neurosis. told of origin the of theory that aldapcla con peculiar a called goc oevisited more once ng Ju Fr Freud u pk ntetnsi which in tones the in spoke eud gta they that ng wo fo l ne uld ’s re td in study Fr ve u asked eud ve r. r mu cu vi Bu ab ca na rud1905. around enna, tmk adogma “a make st ve no h sexual the andon Fr t, se? wa rs u,adh later he and eud, Ju asks to hyhad they ation rk gt promise to ng ”. lt? Ju Fr FA CING eud gsaid ng PA a Wa GE: s

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LEFT: sigmund Freud (front row, left) and Carl Gustav Jung (front row, right) at a conference at Clark university, massachusetts, in 1909, with abraham Brill, stanley Hall, ernest Jones and sandor Ferenczi. not long after this the relationship between Freud and Jung, his chosen successor, would break down irretrievably. father would ask his son to promise that of the poltergeist in his bookcase, Freud he would go to church every Sunday. When iTWaS iN HiS admitted to being strangely moved by the Jung asked Freud why they had to affirm experience and there is reason to believe the sexual theory so vigorously, and against that he felt that Jung had somehow made what they had to make it a bulwark, Freud laST decadeS it happen. This was perhaps why he looked replied: “Against the black tide of mud of at Jung “aghast” and took the “catalytic occultism.” By this time Jung knew that he exteriorisation phenomenon” personally. could never assert the sexual theory with the THaTJUNG caMe Yet after Jung returned to Switzerland, same fi nality that Freud did. He already had Freud soon reverted to type. He quickly reservations about it, but had kept them to OUT OFTHe reduced Jung’s “exteriorised libido” to himself. This request to collaborate with him simple imagination. In a letter to Jung, on erecting a dogma was a sign that these Freud explained that “the phenomenon was reservations would soon have to come out. As OccUlT clOSeT soon deprived of all significance for me” we know, they did (see FT171:46; 264:40-45). and his “readiness to believe vanished along with the spell of your personal presence [my JUNG’S SPOOKERY and minimised his public appreciation of italics].” While Jung was there, the sceptical, Jung had grown up with the occult. As it. It was only in his last decades that he hard-nosed Freud was somehow moved his autobiography Memories, Dreams, and came out of the occult closet, as it were, enough to accept that Jung could have been Reflections shows, his family was steeped and spoke openly about , alchemy, right. But with Jung gone, Freud snapped out in it. His mother, grandmother, and other spirits, synchronicity, and other occult or of it, and got to work explaining the incident relatives attended séances regularly. Jung mystical subjects now associated with him. in purely rational terms. himself attended many, drawing from them Yet those who knew him also knew that Freud’s emotional investment in Jung as the material for his doctoral dissertation, occult phenomena tended to happen around his chosen successor may have accounted for On the Psychology and Pathology of So-Called him.Visitors to his hideaway at Bollingen the mistrust he began to feel toward Jung Occult Phenomena. Jung’s mother went into remarked that when Jung was deep in after the incident. It may also explain why trance states and spoke in strange voices and thought, the pots and pans would rattle, and Freud asked Jung to take, in effect, a loyalty his cousin frequently “channelled” departed at his home in Küsnacht, the furniture and oath. But was there more than this? Did relatives. Jung himself experienced a woodwork would creak, evidence of what Freud mistrust Jung because he recognised period of “split personality”, in which as an one guest called his “exteriorised libido”. that he somehow possessed the kinds of adolescent he would fi nd his psyche being There is every reason to believe that when powers that Freud so easily dismissed? taken over by what he called Personality No Jung tells us his diaphragm got red-hot, with Without his presence, Jung’s “mana” faded, 2, an austere masterful older gentleman of the inference that it then somehow caused and Freud could easily convince himself the 18th century. the bang in Freud’s bookcase, he is telling that nothing had happened. But with Jung Throughout much of his career Jung the truth. around this was not so easy. played his occult cards close to his chest Freud, at least, thought so. At the time Jung replied to Freud’s letter, apologising

40 Ft350 www.forteantimes.com for his “spookery,” yet at the same time interesting one, in fact, which we will get to remarking darkly that these in some way he affirmed it as an expression of what further on – so he was forced to work with undermine “the objective trustworthiness he called a “special complex” associated other material. The paper begins with a of science”. What Freud means is that these with the “prospective tendencies in man”; note of paranoia. “We are not destined, so new developments were undermining the he spoke about this in a way that seems to it seems,” Freud told the faithful few, “to kind of science that he was comfortable with, presage his later ideas about synchronicity devote ourselves quietly to the extension of namely the 19th century mechanistic variety or “meaningful coincidence”. Jung also told our science.” which Einstein, radium, and quantum physics Freud that his “spookery” helped him get Here Freud is referring to recent attacks had by this time already made obsolete. rid of a father complex he had toward Freud. on him by the apostates Jung and Adler. But Freud seems to be hinting that, in some way, He then goes on to talk about the “objective they are not the only threat. It has come to occultism is in league with Einstein and effect of the prospective tendency”, by which Freud’s attention of late that an association Madame Curie in a plot to overthrow the he means its ability to arrange events in between psychoanalysis and occultism is kind of cause-and-effect universe in which he the outside world. If for “objective effect being made in some quarters. He would felt at home. of the prospective tendency” we read “the rather not speak about this but it is no longer Freud recognised that psychoanalysis mind” – which in plain English is what Jung possible to avoid it. and occultism both broke with conventional means – we are talking about something There are, he admits, some superficial thinking, causing them to be singled out occult indeed. Jung is saying that somehow, similarities between psychoanalysis and for a certain amount of opprobrium from the human mind can arrange events in the occultism. Yet while he recognises that a the establishment – to the popular mind, outside world. Next to precognition, this study of occultism may be unavoidable probably deservedly – and that both aimed has to be one of the strangest of all occult – if only to clarify its differences from to widen and broaden their appeal in the phenomena. psychoanalysis – it can also have a damaging face of fi erce resistance. They could in this effect. Psychoanalysis should avoid being sense be seen as fellow travellers. Yet while AGAINST THE OCCULT tarred with occultism’s brush, and in order this is true, there is an absolute, fundamental Freud himself had an experience of this – to do this Freud tells the faithful that he has difference between the two. Occultists, Freud and it was precisely about this that he felt even had to decline several offers to write for says, place much trust in faith – although the strongest resistance. various magazines and journals specialising which occultists he had in mind and how they Freud had an upbringing very different in the occult. would respond to this remark we don’t know. from Jung’s and his attitude toward the Freud then refers to Einstein’s theory However, psychoanalysis, Freud continues, supernatural was also very different. of relativity and the discovery of radium, is motivated by “an extreme distrust of the Although, as mentioned, Jung was circumspect about his occult interests throughout much of his career, he fi nally did speak openly about it, and in his last decades he became a very vocal advocate of various occult ideas. More than anyone else Jung, I think, is responsible for the widespread popular acceptance of occult, mystical, and paranormal ideas that has been with us since the 1960s. Jung even agreed with the hippies about the coming age of Aquarius; the Beatles were fans of his, just as they were of Aleister Crowley. Freud was never so forthright about his own occult interests, which he certainly had, all public dismissal of it notwithstanding. Even more than Jung, Freud kept the few occult interests he had very much to himself and shared them only with a small band of followers. He allowed himself only a few, very muted and unsatisfying expressions of his fascination with the “black tide of mud” that he wanted his crown prince to help him keep at bay. Freud’s writing on occultism makes up a few papers and some remarks scattered here and there in other works. The best known of these writings is “Psychoanalysis and ”. This paper was not published in Freud’s lifetime – although the material did appear in some other places – and was fi rst read at an informal gathering of Freud’s closest followers in the Harz Mountains in August 1921. Freud’s other papers on the occult include “Dreams and Telepathy” (1922), “The Occult Significance of Dreams” (1925), and “Dreams and Occultism” (1937). “Psychoanalysis and Telepathy” was originally supposed to report on three cases,

but Freud told his select audience that Dmitri Kessell / Getty imaGes in classic Freudian style his resistance to ABOVE: Jung reading in his home at Küsnacht, switzerland, where visitors reported that the furniture and talking about the occult made him leave woodwork would creak – was the psychologist’s “exteriorised libido” at work again? behind the material for one case – the most

Ft350 41 www.forteantimes.com power of human wishes and the temptation of the pleasure principle.” Here we can say that Freud is advocating a “hermeneutic of suspicion” well in advance of the philosopher Paul Ricoeur’s coining of that phrase. And indeed Freud is one of the modern thinkers, along with Marx and Nietzsche, on whom Ricoeur based the idea. Unlike faith-besotted occultists, analysts, Freud tells his own faithful, are fundamentally “incorrigible mechanists and materialists”. They study the occult so as to “finally exclude the wishes of mankind from material reality”. If they attended to occult phenomena, rather than ignoring or denying them, it “would mean surrendering the impartiality, lack of prejudice and prepossessions” that make up their “analytical armour”. Even worse, if they attend to occult phenomena, analysts would soon see that they actually did happen. Psychoanalysis would then be involved in a practice that proved the reality of the occult. We must take note here. Freud is saying to his closest confederates that occult phenomena are real. They do occur. But knowing this, psychoanalysis must not in any way assist in this truth being revealed. It must even ignore what it knows to be true and do its best to maintain the opposite. It must do this because if occult phenomena were revealed to be true, this would have a damaging effect on the populace. It would, in effect, make them weak-minded – something, we should note, that some critics of psychoanalysis accused it of doing itself. For Freud, admitting the reality of occult phenomena would “extend belief in whatever explanation and to those easiest and most to their [the public’s] taste.” If we accept that telepathy or clairvoyance is true, what’s next? n arCHive / Getty imaGes

Angels and Devils? Relativity and radium to are already breaking windows in Newton’s Hul universe. Do we really want to break more? ABOVE: Freud was determined that his work No, we must remain steadfast, and form should be a bulwark “against the black tide of a bulwark of 19th century rationalism. mud of occultism”. LEFT: Hp lovecraft, despite Occultism is bad because it panders to our his horror fi ction, maintained a similarly material- readiness to believe. It is “joyfully acclaimed istic position. FACING PAGE: British author John by all the credulity lying ready to hand Galsworthy, whose Forsyte Saga Freud had been since the infancy of the human race and the introduced to by his patient ‘Herr p’. childhood of the individual”. As far as Freud is concerned, credulity is something to avoid. various occult devices, Lovecraft maintained But if occultism is true, as Freud suggests, a ferociously materialist view of the world, how can it be credulous to believe in it? denying in fact the metaphysical terrors that But never mind such quibbles. They pale he created in fi ction. Like Freud he believed in comparison to the threat waiting in the that too much knowledge about the occult wings – namely the “fearful collapse of could be a bad thing – as the protagonists critical thought, of determinist standards and of many of his tales discover to their woe. of mechanistic science” that would result if As his letters show, Lovecraft preferred the truth about the occult were to be told. Adler to Freud, but he agreed with him that For Freud, accepting the reality of the occult too much knowledge is dangerous… and would mean the end of the world as he knew that knowledge of the occult is the most it, and he was not giving up without a fi ght. dangerous of all. They both would agree with TS Eliot’s dour dictum that “humankind DANGEROUS KNOWLEDGE “metaphysics of dunces” and that its embrace cannot bear too much reality”. In many ways Freud’s fear in the face of signalled a “flight from reason” in the Yet while Freud warned against a public the occult is similar to the reaction to it historian of the occult James Webb’s famous affirmation of the occult, in private he hit of other severe rationalists, such as the phrase. For Adorno it marked a regression in a different note, saying his interest, though neo-Marxist philosopher Theodore Adorno critical thinking and kept the populace happy genuine, was “personal”, like his cigars and, oddly enough, the horror writer HP with astral bread and circuses. and his Jewishness, and had nothing to Lovecraft. Freud would agree with Adorno’s Although he was the author of several do with psychoanalysis. It was a kind of characterisation of occultism as the classic horror tales, many of which employ hobby. This doublethink clearly indicates a

42 Ft350 www.forteantimes.com profound ambivalence, one he feared and – in effect saying to Freud: “Don’t neglect sought to resolve through sheer force of me. I am a Forsyth too”. Strangely, Herr P dogma. We can see this ambivalence in his had earlier introduced Freud to the work of writings. As his daughter Anna remarked: the novelist John Galsworthy, specifically the “The subject fascinated, as well as repelled novels of his Forsyte Saga. him.” His biographer Ernst Jones said that To Jung, this would have represented a Freud enjoyed telling stories of strange classic example of synchronicity; that is, coincidences and mysterious voices, and the “acausal connecting principle” at work that these things maintained a hold on him. in “meaningful coincidence”, accounts of Freud once even “propitiated the gods” by which can be found in many places in Jung’s sacrificing one of his cherished antiques, work (see FT171:42-47). Freud too believed when his daughter Mathilde was ill. If Freud’s that something more than coincidence own “credulity” was enough for him to make was at work in this case, but he preferred an offering to supernatural powers in order to rationalise this as an effect of the to secure his daughter’s health, we must transference going on between him and the agree that between his public and private unfortunate Herr P. Freud indulges in some relation to the occult there was a profound word juggling, but in the end he accepted n arCHive / Getty imaGes dissonance, far more than in the case of Jung. that some kind of “thought transference” to This ambivalence can be found in Freud’s between himself and Herr P must have Hul other occult writings. In “Dreams and taken place. But Freud was so troubled by Telepathy”, Freud tells us that we will this that he terminated the analysis shortly not learn anything about telepathy in the Why was Freud unwilling to talk about this after Herr P’s “Forsyth” episode – no doubt paper, not even whether he believes in it or case? something that Herr Vorsicht himself must not. He had, in fact, no opinion on it, one It concerned a patient Freud was seeing have foreseen. way or another, which might suggest to an during a fallow period following the First That Freud mislaid the notes for this story unsympathetic reader that he should not World War. Freud had agreed to see Herr P, suggests, as Freud said himself, a profound have bothered to write it. Yet in 1925, a but only on a limited basis, and it was clear resistance to it. Its subsequent history only few years after announcing his diffidence to Herr P that Freud was not that interested adds to this impression. The original notes toward telepathy in this paper, Freud and in him and that once Freud’s practice picked were missing for some time. In 1933, a Anna conducted “informal” telepathic up again, he would terminate the analysis. definitive text was fi nally put together, but experiments. According to Peter Gay, another Herr P, we can assume, was not happy with it would not be published until 1941, two biographer of Freud, their exact nature is this arrangement, but Freud would not budge years after Freud’s death. The original copy unknown but they had something to do with and his patient was forced to accept what of this version also went missing until 2010. hunting for mushrooms. Yet, even after this, he could get. One day, just before Herr P’s That Freud mislaid material for what seems a Freud advised Sandor Ferenczi not to read a session, Freud received a message that his remarkable case, and then for the text of the paper on these experiments to an upcoming British disciple David Forsyth had arrived talk also to go missing for decades, suggests psychoanalytical congress. in Vienna and was eager to catch up. Freud that something very powerful was at work Freud, it seems, could not let the occult would have seen him immediately, had it not here, repressing what for Freud must have go, but neither could he embrace it seriously, been for Herr P, but he couldn’t cancel his been a very uncomfortable thought. I suggest in the way that Jung did. He did a neurotic appointment, and so he told Forsyth that he that the poltergeist in Freud’s bookcase, two-step with it, indulging his interest, but would see him when his patient had left. revealed or introduced by his one-time heir then declaring that it was fundamentally At their next session, Herr P suddenly, and apparent Carl Jung, so shook the revered unimportant and not necessary for quite out of the blue, started to tell Freud master that for the rest of his life, he was psychoanalysis. Unlike Freud, Jung brought about a woman he knew who used to call him always a little frightened of the occult. FT the occult into his work; or rather, his work “Herr Vorsicht”. Vorsicht in German means grew out of it. Where Freud wanted to plug caution or, as it is in English, “foresight.” REFERENCES a hole in the psyche’s dam, so that the black, Freud was struck by the coincidence of his theodore adorno “theses against occultism” muddy tide of the occult would not leak patient telling him that he was once called www.autodidactproject.org/other/adornocc.html through, Jung not only pulled his fi nger out, Herr Vorsicht, or “Mr Foresight”, when Freud sigmund Freud, Collected Works vol. Xviii, he positively knocked down the dyke. The was happy to have renewed his contact with Hogarth press, 1975 Oedipal agon doesn’t get more serious than his own Mr Forsyth. The similarity in sound of peter Gay, Freud: A Life For Our Time, little this. “foresight” and Forsyth seemed remarkable, Books, 2006 “Dreams and Telepathy” was read to as was the fact that Herr P had never marsha aileen Hewitt, Freud on Religion, another gathering of a select few. In it mentioned his strange nickname before, routledge, 2014 Freud relates two cases of fortune telling and had done so only after Freud’s own Mr Carl Jung Memories, Dreams, Refl ections, – precognition – which did not come true. Forsyth had turned up. Herr P, of course, Flamingo, 1989 He tells us his attitude toward the cases is did not know of Freud’s British student and Gary lachman, Jung the Mystic, tarcher/ “unenthusiastic and ambivalent”, and that the coincidence of Freud’s student arriving penguin, 2010 he is “disagreeably affected” by them. He and his patient claiming to, in effect, have relates the cases “under the pressure of the the same name as him, was, to say the least Hp lovecraft Selected Letters I, arkham House, 1965 greatest resistance”. And he concludes that, remarkable. We might say that Herr Vorsicht “nothing can be done against such clear displayed a strange foresight about Mr resistance”. What was Freud resisting? Forsyth. AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY Freud believed that Herr P had somehow MR FORESIGHT intuited that Freud was happy about Forsyth’s GARY LACHMAN is a regular I think he was resisting synchronicity. arrival – which marked the end of the fallow contributor to Ft. a founding This becomes clear, I think, if we look at time following the war and the return of member of Blondie, he is the case Freud left out of his paper on his foreign students – and also that he was the author of many works on “Psychoanalysis and Telepathy”, given to his impatient with having to continue treating esoteric subjects. His new inner circle in the Harz Mountains, having him. Herr P already knew that he was, in book, The Lost Knowledge conveniently left his notes about it behind. In Freud’s eyes, really only “second best,” and of the Imagination, will be psychoanalysis, resistance is a sign that the in order to secure Freud’s attention, he published this spring by Floris patient is unwilling to talk about something. transformed himself into his own Mr Forsyth Books.

Ft350 43 www.forteantimes.com aLeXaNDer: ‘meNtaL mystiCs paNeL’ CirCa 1915 CoUrtesy oF NieLseN magiC CoLLeCtioN www.forteantimes 30 Ft 349 .c om a foreSeeinG FO RG diSaSter? OT E RASO ABERFAN OF DREAMS TEN hortly after 9.15am on the for answers to such questions went far morning of Friday, 21 October anavalanche beyond the bounds of the technical and 1966, the worst disaster in post- legal inquiries commenced by Parliament SWWII Welsh history struck the and in the media. In the weeks following village of Aberfan, Glamorgan. ofcoalwaSte the tragedy public appeals were launched An avalanche of coal waste from the with the aim of discovering if Aberfan MerthyrVale Colliery poured down the had been foreseen by anyone on a psychic mountainside, engulfing Pantglas Junior poured down level, in premonitions or precognitive School and killing 144 people, 128 of dreams. them children in their classrooms.The the mountain fact that victims were so overwhelmingly Dr Barker’s Dream survey children imbued the calamity with a sense The man largely responsible for launching of horror which marked it as exceptional, Yet in the immediate aftermath of investigations into premonitions of the even in the long history of Welsh mining the disaster in the autumn of 1966, the disaster was Dr JC Barker, a consultant disasters. Indeed, so traumatic was the nationwide sense of shock and grief was psychiatrist at the Shelton Hospital in impact of Aberfan that, far from persisting acute. In its wake, the anguished questions Shrewsbury who, on the day after the in public consciousness, the tragedy so frequently ventilated after man-made tragedy, had travelled to Aberfan to offer seemed almost expunged from collective calamities were voiced. Officially and help. Shocked by the devastation and memory, until the 50th anniversary privately, numerous people asked if the by the trauma suffered by survivors, the approached in October 2016 and disaster could in any way have been bereaved and rescue teams, Barker found : jim gray / getty images to

commemorations were held across Wales. foreseen or averted. For some, the search himself wondering if anyone could have pho experienced a premonition of the events. Driven by this notion, he approached Peter Fairley, Science Correspondent for the London Evening Standard, who became an immediate ally in what developed into a nationwide investigation. One week later, Fairley published an appeal in the newspaper on 28 October 1966, requesting any persons who had experienced a premonition or dreamed of the tragedy before it occurred to get in touch. Widely syndicated in the national and psychic press, over the following two months Barker and Fairley received letters from 76 people all claiming to have experienced dreams or premonitions of the Aberfan disaster before it occurred.1 Some of the reported premonitions were so vague and indefinite that keBar r judged there was nothing linking them with Aberfan, but 60 were deemed worthy of further investigation. Barker stated: “I was impressed by the sincerity and co-operation of the vast majority of correspondents. Many seemed delighted to be able to relate their experiences to an interested party, having previously been ridiculed if they had mentioned them to relatives or friends.” 2 Some 36 correspondents reported dreaming of the disaster in the weeks before, with the remainder recounting visions or to psychic forewarnings in other ways, including an intense feeling of anxiety or unease not long before it occurred. In a few instances, impressions of the impending tragedy were received clairvoyantly at spiritualist ‘home- circle’ gatherings. graphy / aLamy stoCK pho

To obtain some degree of corroboration to that the premonitions occurred before 21 October 1966, Barker wrote to all 60 correspondents requesting the names and addresses of witnesses who might confirm the writer’s experiences had been related prior to the disaster. Confirmation arrived in 24 cases. Several of the reported predictions struck Barker as particularly significant. A Chris hoWes / WiLD pLaCes pho Mrs Grace Eagleton stated: ABOVE: the Western Mail reports on the aberfan disaster on the morning of 22 october 1966. the death “I have never been to Wales nor do I possess a toll would rise to 144 in the following days. BELOW: peter Fairley, science Correspondent for the London television set. One week before the disaster I had Evening Standard, became involved with Dr jC Barker’s appeal for dreams and premonitions. a vivid horrible dream of a terrible disaster in a coal-mining village. It was a valley with a big building fi lled with young children. Mountains you talk of dying, and you so young; do you 9.00am. As a result, her mother mistook the of coal and water were rushing down the want a lollipop?” “No,” Eryl said, “but I shall time, delaying her and saving her life. 4 valley burying the building. The screams of the be with Peter and June” (two schoolmates). As well as dreams, spiritualists from children were so vivid that I screamed myself. The day before the disaster she said to her and came forward with Everything all happened so quickly. Then it all mother: “Mummy, let me tell you about my stories of messages involving working in went black.” dream last night.” Her mother answered mines, Wales and “an avalanche of coal” Her account was confirmed by a neighbour gently: “Darling, I’ve no time now. Tell me coming down a mountain. with whom she had shared details of her again later.” The child replied: “No, Mummy, Barker later published extracts from the dream, a Mrs Rollings. Mrs Eagleton you must listen. I dreamt I went to accounts and an analysis in the Journal of stated: “I have had many dreams school and there was no school there. the Society for Psychical Research. He may and premonitions which have come Something black had come down all have planned further analysis but any such true.” 3 over it.” The next day her daughter intention was curtailed by his own sudden One of the saddest and most went off to school as happy as ever. death, two years later, at the early age of 44. poignant dreams had been noted That morning her mother was Posthumously, his study has become a classic, by the family of Eryl Mai Jones, also due to go into Pantglas being frequently cited in the literature of 5

o / getty images aged 10, a pupil of Pantglas Junior school soon after precognitive dreams. ot school who was killed in her daughter, but the disaster. Two weeks curiously, just as mOre BaD Dreams before, she had suddenly Eryl Mai Jones left However, it has been all but forgotten that told her mother: “Mummy, her home for the a second public appeal for premonitions of I’m not afraid to die.” Her last time, the the Aberfan disaster was also made in the

roLLs press / popperF mother replied: “Why do clock stopped at autumn of 1966. Launched three days after

46 Ft350 www.forteantimes.com the Barker-Fairley appeal, it was initiated by the Oxford Institute for Psychophysical Research, a private research organisation interested in anomalous experiences. Its Aberfan appeal was promoted by articles published in the Sun and Thompson’s Weekly6 and although never attracting the same level of subsequent attention as the Barker initiative, it swiftly received 74 letters from some 72 different correspondents around England and Wales. Like the Barker-Fairley appeal, the respondents all reported disturbing dreams, forebodings or visions that they felt had anticipated the Aberfan disaster. Unfortunately, this second collection of premonitions was never published anywhere in full, nor subjected to any detailed examination or comparative study with Barker’s material. Fortunately, photocopies of the letters received by the Institute have survived, having been deposited with the Society for Psychical Research in 1972.Today they are preserved at Cambridge University Library, KeystoNe / getty images in a fi le that had gone unexamined for 44 ABOVE: miners and rescue workers take in the years until I came to view it in the autumn of scale of the disaster. BELOW: eight-year-old geoff 2016. 7 Details from some of the letters are “womenwere edwards was the last of the children from pantglas now published here for the fi rst time. junior school to be pulled alive from the rubble. A spiritualist from Stockton claimed to diGGinG inthe have had forewarning of Aberfan as early She then saw “a crowded square and a sunken as 10 months before, at a séance held on 28 garden full of neat rows of coffins”. December 1965. Messages were received BlacK meSSand Some correspondents described physical by the circle that included “All Wales will sensations. A lady from Westerham felt she as mourn”, “the moving mountain”, “Look ScreaminG” if been trapped “in wet soggy clay”, an “awful after the children”, “Nothing would stop feeling”. the disaster” and a mention of “moving A dream left another writer with “a most buckets”. It was recalled that rescuers cleared peculiar feeling. One I do not like… I saw the the debris, removing bucket after bucket of greyness of the dust and the awful quietness material from the buried school. and a boy in good school clothes carried out Another account came from Mr Thomas and no breath in his body and then I felt it Barnett at Chapplefields, , stating magnified many, many times… It was all so that some three weeks before the disaster a silent.” message had been received from a medium: One of the most detailed dreams was “Something coming from the ground… reported as having happened on the earth… dear little bodies… I can hear Wednesday before the disaster, by a lady water… very, very cold… never happened in Ely, Cardiff who dreamed of being a before… you will all be shocked… never schoolteacher. The dream began with “a never happen… these men dabbling with sense of shock like something very heavy nature… they can’t understand what harm falling” and children crying “like frightened they are doing… will shock the whole nation.” sheep” and “a man, 28, face white with fear” One lady from Basingstoke reported (notably, 28 adults died at Aberfan although dreaming of being in a village where there she did not refer to this). In her dream the would be “a mine explosion” but she “could air darkened, and all the windows, save not explain the women digging in the black one, blacked out. “With one window visible mess and screaming… As I walked towards the desire to get to the light was terrible, I the village I realised the mud was getting reached frantically for the window but in a worse until I could go no further” and that “in fl ash it darkened, something struck me, I was front of me was mud everywhere”. fl ying back into now pitch darkness.” She A lady from Hipperholme, Halifax, had a wondered if via her dream “I experienced disturbing dream two days before Aberfan, somebody’s dreadful fear”. Wpa pooL / getty images which made her think that “something In other dreams the connection was vaguer, terrible was going to happen to a mine or Jehovah’ in a way that only Welsh people as with one experienced the week before similar. Normally, I never remember if I can sing,” reported a lady from Cwmbran, by a lady who reported having previous dream but all day on the Wednesday I felt who had awoken feeling “very exhausted premonitions. She described it as “dark, black quite ill as a result of what I had seen… [I] and depressed” afterwards. She thought it and very noisy” and involving being on a road wondered if amongst those children was a relevant she was the daughter of a miner sticky with black tar, someone crying for help distant relative of mine. My grandmother was (though descendants of mining families in and a high wall “which I interpreted as the from Wales.” Wales are common). Another respondent from mountain”. A 64-year-old factory nurse from Other correspondents had dreams of Leeds described how on the Tuesday night Garstang, Preston, Lancashire, had a dream mass funerals. “I dreamt I was at a mass before the disaster, “I had a very upsetting the night before Aberfan, “which seemed to funeral on a hillside where hundreds of and confusing dream. A woman dressed in stick in my memory” of a “huge heap of bricks people were singing ‘Guide me O my Great black told me I must attend a mass funeral.” and rubble in my backyard… [I] thought a

Ft350 47 www.forteantimes.com LEFT: rescue and relief efforts in aberfan in the immediate aftermath of the disaster.

dreaming several dreams a night, “it would indeed be surprising if they did not produce a few dozen premonitions of doom amongst them.” Nevertheless, he proposed that the Aberfan disaster was an extremely unusual one, so that dreams resembling it were likely to be fairly improbable. The same critique has been advanced again more recently by Professor Richard Wiseman (see his ‘Dreaming the Future’, FT273:36- 39) who argues against the possibility of precognitive dreaming on the basis that “the science of sleep and the study of statistics suggest that precognitive dreams may well be due to anxiety and the law of large numbers (basically that unusual events are likely to happen when there are lots of opportunities for that event)”. 8 In advancing this, he postulates a dreamer (whom he calls ‘Brian’) and applies a series of assumptions: (1) that Brian dreams each night of his life between the of age 15 to 75; (2) that over 60 years this amounts to 21,900 nights of dreams; (3) that an event like the Aberfan disaster will only happen once on a randomly assigned date in each generation; (3) that Brian only remembers dreaming about the type of terrible events associated with such tragedy once in his entire life. From this the o / getty images ot “chances of Brian having his ‘disaster’ dream the night before the actual tragedy is about a massive 22,000 to 1.” Wiseman again highlights the fact that with a British population in excess of 45

roLLs press / popperF million in the 1960s, “this same set of events could have happened to any of them.” Then by chimney had fallen.” She was so impressed presuming that each of the 45 million people that she actually went and checked a tall “i thouGht of dream in the same way as the postulated chimney overlooking her own back yard. dreaming Brian, Wiseman makes the further A Port Talbot correspondent reported how assumption that the chances of “anyone she had dreamed of being at home and seeing BlacK lava... i having the ‘disaster dream’ one night and the blood. In her dream, on going to the window, tragedy happening the following day is about drawing back the curtain and looking out, she felt farawaY 22,000 to 1”; so “we would expect one person had seen a “field of small coal”. in every 22,000, or roughly 2,000 people, Some correspondents mentioned religious to have this amazing experience in each elements and symbols. A lady at Tupsley, and cold” generation.” Herefordshire, reported that three weeks Superficially this seems an impressive before the disaster she had undergone a statistical demolition of dream precognition. vision during a church service of a mountain building and looking in various rooms.That is But a moment’s thought indicates an moving in front of the children’s altar and as much as I can remember. A few hours later I hypothesis resting upon wholly speculative, Mothers’ Union banner. “I thought of black learned of the Aberfan disaster.” untestable and unfalsifiable assumptions. lava… I felt far away and cold. All day I These elements of religion and spaceships Leaving aside the fact that ‘dreaming suffered this vision.” also fi gured in one of the weirdest visions, Brian’ is purely hypothetical, we have no A male writer from Blackpool who claimed some six years later as an omen of other data on what individuals actually described himself as “a man of mature the Aberfan disaster (see ‘The Tenby UFO dream through the course of a lifetime, or years” recounted a dream as follows: “The Connection’ on the opposite page). any way of ever knowing what the entire action in the dream was centred about a UK population dreamed about on the nights rain-soaked town or village.The sky was a sLeeP aND sTaTIsTICs before 21 October 1966, nor at any other time. leaden dark colour. Then to the foreground Of course, both the Barker-Fairley and Oxford It is difficult enough to count a population, came a neighbour of mine, name of Thomas, Institute collections, in common with many let alone discover anything about millions of a schoolmaster. We were walking together anecdotal cases of precognition, suffered subjective night-time experiences. when my attention was focused on what the disadvantage of being recorded after the Furthermore, given that the range of seemed to be a background of a panoramic disaster. This reduced their evidential subjects to dream about is potentially picture of numerous spaceships travelling at weight, and rendered testimony vulnerable infinite, one might equally say it yis highl fantastic speed. On drawing my neighbour’s to hoaxing or post-event rationalisations improbable that anyone would ever dream attention to this they seemed to change into or distortions. Critics also raised a lack of of any particular subject or specific event in very large biblical fi gures.The scene then controls and Barker himself recognised “most the course of a lifetime. Indeed, statistical changed to when I seemed to be trying to take of them might be regarded as rather vague objections collapse if the infinite number of a bucket out of my neighbour’s hand, and then prognostications of doom,” and that given subjects to dream about is introduced as a lifting the roof of what seemed to be a model the size of the UK population and people factor in the calculations. But this also takes

48 Ft350 www.forteantimes.com us into the realm of the statistically absurd, as celebrated in Douglas Adams’s Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy whereby the population of THE TENBY UFO CONNECTION the Universe can effectively be counted as zero! There is, of course, a fi nite number of beings on Earth (and possibly a number on other worlds yet to be discovered). But any fi nite population exists within what appears to be infinite space. Statistically, any fi nite number divided by infinity is not exactly zero, but would be so tiny as to be virtually indistinguishable from zero… Ultimately, it is far better to admit the limitations of statistical techniques in this area. With one-off or rare events there is really a limit to what statistics can ever usefully tell us. 9 Indeed, one need not involve the whole of the UK population in any statistical refutation of precognitive dreaming. If an individual experiences only one potentially precognitive dream in a lifetime – amid some 22,000 non- precognitive dreams (adopting the Wiseman formula) – the one deviation is a statistically insignificant and essentially meaningless event. Furthermore, the problem is compounded by the fact that no time limit or deadline is necessarily placed on fulfilment. Floods, hurricanes, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, one of the most extraordinary aberfan starting to occur.” although he admitted wars and all manner of human disasters such as visions, involving a UFo and postulating a that, “lacking evidence we can only say aircraft crashes and building collapses all occur divine source of other premonitions and that the object may have pursued a straight with tragic frequency. One may anticipate them dreams, was claimed by journalist and Loch course,” possessed by this notion, holiday somewhere without any recourse to paranormal Ness monster hunter FW holiday in an article speculated “that it reached aberfan some powers. entitled “Was god at aberfan?” published in 13 days before the disaster.” he wondered Rather it is far better to admit that Review in 1972. 1 if his sighting represented a manifestation quantitative techniques are wholly unsuited holiday described his experience on 8 of entities aware of the impending landslip when examining what are essentially qualitative october 1966 when, around 7pm, he was and seeking to warn the population in and subjective personal experiences like fi shing for whiting on the lifeboat slipway at dreams and premonitions “obtained by a dreams. A rather more demanding approach is tenby harbour in south Wales. Noticing “an telepathic link with a mind or minds which to examine an actual dream report and try to undercurrent of excitement” amongst other themselves are doing the overlooking”. the identify veridical elements within it – facts or fi shermen, he saw above their heads what year after publishing this account holiday features which apparently correspond to the appeared to be “a small, bluish, luminous wrote the book The Dragon and the Disc reality of a later specific event. cloud… a self-luminous lump of cotton wool” (1973) suggesting that both lake monsters This type of assessment was proposed the moving in a circle about three times its and UFos were connected to a greater year before Aberfan by psychical researcher own diameter. the object was opaque and psychic dimension of the mind, a theme he Guy Lambert (1889-1983), who listed a set of blotted out the stars and appeared “about expanded in his posthumously published provisos he termed the ‘desiderata’ to be sought the size of a 10p coin held The Goblin Universe if a precognitive dream was to be treated as at arm’s length”. holiday (1986), a work linking evidential: also heard someone ghosts, poltergeists, the 1.The dream should be reported to a credible talking about ‘lights’ and reincarnation of serial witness. ‘coloured lights’ but after killers, the Loch Ness 2.The time interval between the dream and a while he resumed his monster, cryptozoology the event should be short. fi shing. however, about and UFos in an eccentric 3.The event should be one that, in the 10 minutes later there and confusing mix. circumstances of the dreamer, seemed were exclamations and in hallowe’en 2002 extremely improbable at the time of the dream. cries when a dark object i made enquiries in 4.The description in the dream should be of emerged from the cloud tenby to see if there was an event destined to be literally fulfilled and not “beaming a brilliant ruby any recollection of the merely symbolically foreshadowed. light down on us”. the incident described by 5.The details of the dream should tally with ‘cloud’ then moved west holiday. Unsurprisingly, i the details of the event. 10 and the red light object learned nothing beyond Applying these ‘desiderata’, weaknesses moved south-west. holiday the opinion of some can at once be found in many, if not all, of the raced for the binoculars locals that the British precognitive dreams collected by the Aberfan in his car, but by the time government had tested premonition appeals. If narrowly and literally he retrieved them both objects had moved rockets and aircraft in the area during the applied, provisos four and fi ve effectively out of vision range. he declared: “Until this 1960s. however, local reports of UFos are exclude most, if not all, of the dreams, if incident occurred my interest in alleged UFo still occasionally being published on the symbolic (or what appears to be symbolic phenomena was marginal”. internet in the 21st century but without any material) is rejected. Later, following the direction of the cloud apparent links to contemporary disasters.2 For example, in the Oxford Institute object and plotting its presumed course collection, a lady from Burton upon Trent with a map, holiday noticed that after 57 1 Flying Saucer Review vol.18, no.4, july-aug reported dreaming a week earlier “of an miles (92km) it would have “arrived over 1972. earthquake and could plainly see ruins of or very near the village of aberfan about 2 see for example: www.ufomaps.co.uk/ buildings and climbing over the rubble and the time the precognitive dreams were sightings/tenby/ LiamBerriDge.php?id=829; www.uk-ufo.co.uk/tenby-south-west-wales-29th- helping to carry people over the debris was

Ft350 49 www.forteantimes.com jim gray / getty images ABOVE: rescue workers search for survivors among the waste and rubble. BELOW: author jB priestley, who in 1963 speculated about premonitions in his book Man and Time.

a young man I thought was my boss”. noticed a similar pattern, taking the view Explaining the Welsh connection to the that premonitions might generate anxiety imagery she stated: “I work for a publican symptoms affecting the waking self, 12 a whose son is at Cardiff University and is possibility that parapsychologists have married to a Welsh girl who is a teacher”. more lately begun to explore in laboratory Similarly, one of Barker’s correspondents, experiments involving pre-sentience effects.13 a Mrs Hoffman of Ealing, dreamed two weeks The existence of such patterns suggests before of standing with a woman and children the operation of more than the purely at the foot of a dark a mountain. Suddenly random factors envisaged in the hypothetical hundreds of beautiful black horses came ‘dreaming Brian’ scenario. Similarities that thundering down and engulfed them. In the Barker found in accounts following Aberfan herd was an old-fashioned funeral hearse. led him to propose that “some future major This “terrible dream” was followed by people disasters, particularly those with unusual

N arChiVe / getty images running to the same place with “terrible features, should perhaps be examined to expressions”. carefully in the light of possible associated

s / hUL Nonetheless, certain patterns in the two premonitions. It would be interesting to to premonition collections concerning Aberfan ascertain whether the same type of pattern

X pho are noticeable. Firstly, the respondents were emerges from the possible precognitive Fo overwhelmingly female in both collections. material and to determine whether the Secondly, a number of the writers claimed temporary symptoms of anxiety manifested to have experienced fulfilled premonitions PrIesTLey’s PaTTerNs by certain individuals are a reliable index in the past.Thirdly, and above all, the Interestingly, just such a pattern had been of impending calamities.” 14 His opinions emotional content and report impact is noted with an earlier dream collection actually resulted in the foundation of a very strong in many of the dream accounts. by playwright and author JB Priestley in short-lived ‘Premonitions Bureau’, which Judging by the letters preserved, the personal his book Man and Time (1963). 11 Priestley endeavoured to collect dreams from the impact of dreaming of a disaster that goes considered that in this kind of case, the public, though hopes that it would become on to occur can be significant. From the apparent message from the future might an established disaster early-warning statements provided and the language used, not simply be limited to a dream or any system were never fulfilled. 15 Interest in these dreams frequently made a disturbing consciously recognisable information, but premonitions waned following the death of impression, over and above what might also be experienced as a physical reaction Barker, whilst the accounts gathered by the ordinarily be expected from a nightmare. A within the body of the person. Oxford Institute went unstudied, and were number of correspondents reported powerful Priestley called this effect FIP simply fi led away and forgotten. and lasting feelings of anxiety and distress (‘Future Influencing the Past’) proposing the In the decades since, the theory that that they could not account for in any other body could respond to future events before predictive dreams do not relate to any future way. This is an aspect that those simply the mind did, and even if the conscious event but represent a perception of the dismissing such experiences as random mind of the person did not understand what dreamer’s own state of mind in the future is occurrences ought to consider. was taking place until afterwards. Barker also one that has received attention. Rather

50 Ft350 www.forteantimes.com rLoNg / getty images FU Christopher ABOVE: the sun rises over the valley as people arrive for a memorial service at aberfan cemetery on 21 october 2016 to mark 50 years since the tragedy. than foreseeing the event itself, it is proposed increase our understanding of how dream 6 Sun, 1 Nov 1966; Thompson’s Weekly, 3 Nov 1966. the dreamer is actually apprehending states influence waking perceptions, and 7 spr archive, aberfan predictions File 3, Folder 42, their own future mental reactions.Thus, how premonitions are socially constructed. 1972, Cambridge University Library. With thanks to Dr melvyn Willin, archivist for the spr and the staff of on awakening, the dreamer is effectively Certainly, if it could be established that the manuscripts Department, Cambridge University remembering experiences that have yet to precognitive dreams represent perceptions Library. be laid down in their own memory, but will of one’s own future consciousness, this 8 richard Wiseman in Paranormality: Why We See be after learning of the future event after it alone would have tremendous medical and What Isn’t There, macmillan, 2011. occurs. scientific significance, regardless of whether 9 a point made by the late stan gooch in The This idea is one now receiving serious premonitions could ever provide a psychic Paranormal, Wildwood house, 1978. consideration from researchers, both in ‘early warning system’ of disasters yet to 10 guy Lambert (1965) ‘a precognitive Dream about Britain and Spain. 16 If this scenario is happen. FT a Waterspout’ SPR Journal, vol.43, 1-10. 11 Barker, correct, it would explain examples in which op cit; File 35 premonitions spr Collection, Univ. of correspondents connected dream images with auTHOr BIOGraPHy Cambridge the shock they felt on seeing Aberfan images 11 jB priestley, Man and Time, aldus Books, 1963. For on television or in the press. One woman in ALAN MURDIE is a lawyer and a discussion of these letters – also left unexamined for decades – see Katy price, ‘testimonies of Yeovil wrote: “I dreamed of Aberfan before writer with a longstanding precognition and encounters with psychiatry in letters it happened… About a fortnight before the interest in fortean phenomena. to jB priestley’ in Studies in History and Philosophy of disaster I visited Aberfan in my dreams. I had a former president of the ghost Science, 48, aug 2014. not been to Wales, but I know from television Club, he compiles Ft’s monthly 12 jC Barker, ‘the pre-disaster syndrome’, J. Amer. pictures that it was Aberfan”. In other cases, ghostwatch column as well as Med. Ass. 1967. correspondents stated they had recognised being a regular feature writer. 13 adrian parker & Bjorn sjoden, ‘Do some of Us groups of rescue workers or individual people habituate to Future emotional events?’ in Journal of from their dreams appearing in later media Parapsychology, vol.74, spring 2010, pp99-113; Daryl coverage. In Barker’s collection, a spiritualist, REFERENCES Bem, ‘Feeling the Future: experimental evidence for anomalous retroactive influences on Cognition and 1 jC Barker, ‘premonitions of the aberfan Disaster’ in Mrs Milder of Plymouth, said she had a vision affect’ in Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, SPR Journal, vol.44, Dec 1967: 168-181 and File 35 of a boy amid a rescue operation; later she 2011. a version of this text has also been published premonitions spr Collection, University of Cambridge. believed she saw the same scene and child by Bem on his personal website. see http://dbem.ws/ in TV coverage of the disaster broadcast the 2 Barker, op cit. FeelingFuture.pdf following Sunday. 3 Cited in Barker, op cit. 14 Barker, (1967) op cit. Much research remains to be done on the 4 Barker, op cit. 15 ian stevenson, ‘precognition of disasters’. Journal premonition accounts collected by the Oxford 5 For example andrew macKenzie, Frontiers of the of the American Society for Psychical Research, Institute half a century ago. With such a gap Unknown, 1968; Benjamin B Wolmar, Handbook vol.64, 87-110, 1970. in time, the chances of now obtaining any of Parapsychology, 1977; ivor gratton-guinness, 16 Fernando De pablos, ‘spontaneous precognition corroboration of any of them are slight. But Psychical Research: A Guide to its History, Practices During Dreams: analysis of a one year naturalistic and Principles, 1982; Dennis Bardens, jule eisenbud, although some might provide – at most – study’ JSPR 62, pp.423-433, 1998; El Cerebro en la Parapsychology and the Unconscious, 1983; Dennis Noche Fundamentos de los Suenos Precognitivos, suggestive evidence for possible precognitive Bardens, Ahead of Time: The Mystery of Precognition, edited by murcia Diego, spain, published in english as dreams, analysis of such reports may 1991, and numerous others. The Brain at Night (2011).

Ft350 51 www.forteantimes.com THE HIEROPHANT’S APPRENTICE PRESENTS cbUilDinG a c fortean library 18. UNDERGROUND LITERATURE

Sales of the magazine jumped by about A recurrent trope in conspiracy literature of all kinds is the proposition that some 30 per cent, and letters arrived – in ‘truths’ are so shocking or bizarre or indeed downright daft that they have to be the tens of thousands, Palmer claimed, presented as fiction. Which, unsurprisingly, is what they usually are. But there are unverifiably – describing readers’ own enough people out there who by nature are prepared to go “Hmmm” for long enough to experiences of the Deros, who still lurk germinate first a grain of sense and then a bushel of plausibility in such tales. It seems beneath our streets and oceans and that some have taken the fictions of Richard Sharpeve Sha r seriously, and that others delight in mayhem and cruelty. A hard(er) continue so to do to some degree or another. Shaver (1907–75) was to say the least a core of science-fiction fans objected loudly fascinating character, who comes across as one of those harmless lunatics who manage and continuously to Shaver’s tales being to rationalise their own and others’ very strange ideas creatively, according to their own presented as (more or less) fact, as over self-contained logic, and so perhaps avoid disappearing entirely into their own isolated the next five years scarcely an issue came worlds. That’s why the man deserves to be taken seriously: as an illustration of a certain out without a Lemurian story. Palmer’s aspect of the human condition, rather than for his rather remarkable claims. He is dedication to Shaver eventually cost him best remembered for his idea that in underground cities there live ‘deros’ (detrimental his job at . robots) who have been living there for aeons and are responsible for pretty well all We won’t entirely spoil your pleasure the ills and misfortunes of humanity (see Bruce Lanier Wright, “From Hero to Dero”, by giving away the whole tortuous plot of FT127:36-41). This first appeared in print inch Mar 1945, in Amazing Stories magazine, I Remember Lemuria!, but some features under the title “I Remember Lemuria!” To this classic text we now turn… of Lemurian society, and Shaver’s implied interests in them, bear description. For a start there is the matter of women, The story began life as a 10,000-word particularly those in the deep, deep exposition titled “A Warning to Future underground city of Tean. As they Man”. It described some of Shaver’s increase in age, they increase in size (as former life as Mutan Mion, which he do the men), but it seems the women remembered in remarkable detail, and amplify the power of their sex appeal without the usual stimuli of hypnosis or in proportion – this regardless of the trance state. Mutan lived “many thousands Lemurian tendency to have cross-bred of years ago in Sub Atlan, one of the with animals or otherwise modified their great cities of ancient Lemuria”. This is persons in curious ways, sometimes to from his foreword, so sceptical antennæ no obvious advantage. On arriving in begin to twitch rather early. The story of a Tean, Mutan Mion is bowled over by a vanished landmass called Lemuria is itself videophone operator: “The image of a convoluted: it started in the mid 1800s tremendous six-armed Sybyl female filled as the respectable if short-lived scientific the screen and the electrically augmented hypothesis that a land bridge had once ABOVE: , explorerer of inner body appeal of the mighty life within her stretched between southern Africa lost continents and subterranean mythologies. seized the youth in me and wrung it as no and southern India, so explaining the embrace from lesser female ever had.” similarity among various flora and fauna of the scampering land by implying that In the street he passes “the figure of a (including the lemur) in these places. Lemuria was the name for the entire variform female… whose upper part was After that it was, as they say, downhill Earth, and Sub Atlan was a mighty city the perfect torso of a woman and whose all the way. In the 1880s, the matchless built beneath Atlantis; indeed all cities in lower part was a sinuously gliding thirty Helena Blavatsky single-handedly turned those days were underground. Sunlight, feet of brilliantly mottled snake. You could the land bridge into a ‘lost continent’ and for reasons to be revealed, was not deemed never have escaped her embrace of your shifted it from the Indian Ocean to the beneficial to life. own will once she had wrapped those life- mid-Pacific, to make a nice balance with Amazing Stories publisher Ray Palmer generating coils around you!” Atlantis. Others of eccentric disposition considered all this a bit too dry for his Shaver clearly finds being squeezed took up the theme, and Lemuria soon readers (“a dull recitation”, he called out of his brains by weird females an stretched from India to New Zealand, it), and added another 20,000 words or appealing prospect, and their animal but at one time took up residence in the so, incorporating Shaver’s original ‘facts’ aspect is surely symbolic: Shaver, one north Pacific. Just to confuse matters, into what he thought an exciting plot. The suspects, would quite like to be raped by JZ Knight’s channelled entity Ramtha result is a stupendous space opera, quite a woman with ravening pheromones. Or maintains he is a Lemurian and that in keeping with Amazing Stories’ other at any rate psychologically crushed. When Lemuria is but a section of Atlantis. content (covers tended to feature scantily he meets Vanue, Elder Princess of Van Continental drift? More like continental clad, leggy blondes with unavoidable of Nor, who is 80ft tall, he observes that kangaroo. Insofar as he may have been bosoms, in poses that suggested either her “sex aura” is “a visible iridescence aware of it, Shaver solved this problem ecstasy or terror, or maybe both at once). flashing about her form” and “I yearned

52 FT350 www.forteantimes.com water, albeit in ways to us that seem quaint and curious. It’s equally logical that, when they discover that all this radiation has corrupted and perverted many of their number, and that they have penetrated to the heart of government, that they decide to vacate Lemuria/Earth for a planet circling a pure young star. Whether they resume their troglodytic way of life when they get there, we don’t know – this is the first episode of what was to become a huge saga, after all. But we do know that some Teros (‘integrated robots’) were left behind, and that the Deros live on to this day, causing all the world’s problems with their mind-control devices and death rays, and nabbing surface- dwellers from time to time to help with their hobbies of rape and torture. Shaver’s version of solar history and the suggestion that we owe our mortality to solar radiation is, let’s say, unconventional. Shaver seems to have had a problem toward that vast beauty which was not with daylight: the most advanced race in hidden for in Nor it is considered impolite nearby space are the Nor, who inhabit “a to conceal the body greatly, being an “eVeryboDy group of sunless planets 0.16 light years offense against art and friendship to take away”. No wonder we can’t see them. beauty out of life. I was impelled madly DoeS HaVe a But all Mutan’s accounts of Lemurian toward her until I fell on my knees before ‘science’ are passing strange. “When her, my hands outstretched to touch the booK in tHeM, Newton was hit on the head by an apple, gleaming, ultra-living flesh of her feet.” it was by an apple that was pushed down The girl Mutan finally falls for seems to be bUt in MoSt upon his head, rather than pulled down; part pony, with a “rosy pale purple skin”, since gravity is the friction caused by the cloven hoofs, and a frisky tail that he finds CaSeS tHat’S fall through matter already existent of irresistibly sexy. All this rortiness seems condensing exd. Obviously a condensation to be unrelated to actual reproduction: WHere it is a falling together of a finely divided Lemurians’ (or at least Teans’) progeny element into a grosser state,” he explains are grown in baby factories: Mutan visits a SHoUlD Stay.” blandly. Lemurian technology is a little “great room… designed only to chemically more predictable: 3-D video kit, telepathy and electronically nourish and develop Christopher Hitchens augmenters, anti-gravity devices, beam the many human embryos that moved weapons, faster-than-light travel, and so and grew in synthetically duplicated on. Shaver’s plea (in the Foreword) that mother-blood in sealed bottles.” Which is barbecue, and this was good for everyone. “such great minds as Einstein, Carrel, reminiscent today, and perhaps proleptic, Then a walloping great meteor smacked and the late Crile check the things that I of the ‘hybrid nurseries’ beloved of certain into it, and the Sun began to exude heavy- remember” and that the “final result may unhinged abductologists. metal radiation. As a Tean professor well stagger the science of the world” fell Then there is the Lemurians’ truly explained it to Mutan: “The particles of on remorselessly deaf ears. bizarre science, whose basis defies radium and other radioactive metals are Shaver said that he first became aware logic, ancient and modern knowledge the poison that causes the aging of tissue. of the Deros in 1932, when he was 25, and, largely, description. Like other These particles are thrown out by all old working in a car factory, through voices alternative ‘sciences’ it’s a closed system, suns whose shell of carbon has been partly he picked up from his welding equipment. self-consistent but divorced from reality or altogether burned away, permitting the Such experiences are usually a signal of as commonly understood. Essentially disintegrating fire to reach and seize upon paranoid schizophrenia, and he did spend it’s founded on the binary principle of the heavy metals at the sun’s core. Our some time in a mental institution: perhaps ‘integration’ versus ‘disintegration’. The sun has begun to throw out great masses as long as eight years. As remarked former explains why human–animal of these poisonous particles. They fall earlier, Shaver’s finding an audience for hybrids are regarded as superior upon [us] in a continual flood, entering his private myth-making (alias fantasies) creatures: “a strong integrative field with into living tissue and infecting it with the may have kept him on the sociable side of a rich exd [“energy ash… the principal radioactive disease we call age. madness, along with his probably cathartic content of the beneficial vibrants. It is the “Through the years, the centuries, dedication to painting. Allusions to his space dust from which all matter grows these poisons accumulate in the soil of the work crop up in and even into being”] supply cause[s] all matter to planet, and are continually being washed in Dungeons and Dragons (see FT129:53); grow at an increased rate, but would also out of it by the rains with the result otherwise his influence has been minimal. cause even the most dissimilar life-gens to that all the water on Mu is becoming Shaver was no fortean, but he did unite... Most of the crosses by this method increasingly contaminated. When these illustrate and illuminate an important had resulted in an increased strength and waters are drunk, the poisons accumulate corner of forteana. FT fertility. They now were more numerous in the body, finally becoming numerous than four-limbed men, and often superior enough to completely halt all growth and Richard Sharpe Shaver, I Remember in mental ability.” Okay… still worse, to prevent any effectual use of Lemuria!, Venture Press 1948; The loopiest of Lemurian lore is exd, which is the food of all integration.” available online at www.globalgreyebooks. reserved for the nature of the Sun. It follows, of course, that Lemurians com/Pages/i-remember-lemuria.html. For Apparently it was once a mass of burning thus prefer to live underground, and much more fascinating material on Shaver pure carbon, a kind of monstrous cosmic expend enormous efforts to purify their and his work, visit www.shavertron.com.

FT350 53 www.forteantimes.com

SEND FORUM SUBMISSIONS TO: THE EDITOR, FORTEAN TIMES, PO BOX 71602, LONDON E17 0QD, UK, OR TO [email protected] HAVE YOUR SAY forum sdsdsvdsvs Is Donald Trump an alien?

SIMON WILSON finds the Trump presidency unexpectedly foreshadowed in Whitley strieber’s Communion

what further cultural changes he is SIMON WILSON is a Senior cooking up in his Tower. Lecturer at Canterbury Christ This is far from the alien-inspired Church University, where he currently teaches on the Myth, New Age utopia Strieber seemed to Cosmology and the Sacred be predicting. As I read on, however, MA. I realised that I had been maligning him. It became apparent that in fact his torments had made him remarkably s Donald Trump an alien? I do not prescient about the future. His horrific mean in any literal sense, such “abductions” foretold precisely the Ias one might find breathlessly kind of culture we now live in. “The peddled on the Internet, supported emergence of the UFO phenomenon,” by all manner of indistinct video he writes, “is, at its core, a foray into footage. I mean, rather, that the alien a sort of subconscious anarchy that, abduction reports of the 1980s and paradoxically, seeks some sort of control 1990s, with their nasty little Greys that will replace social systems that are doing unspeakable things to minds being perceived as betrayers.” and bodies, seem somehow to have Aliens, he seems to be suggesting, offered early signs and portents of his are psychic symptoms of the terrors coming. They seem to have foretold the unleashed by the disintegration of a man and his message – to have been society that has lost confidence in its miniature versions of the life-size figure ideals. They reveal – “paradoxically” himself. And this all seems to have been – that it will be by terror that we will understood decades ago by Whitley seek to re-assert some sort of sense Strieber. of control or order. “The culture has These unsettling thoughts occurred failed,” he argues, “and we know it, and to me the other day while reading we are desperate to somehow survive Strieber’s foreword to The Omega Project and near-death experiences alike are 1. Kenneth the consequences of the failure.” So 1 by Kenneth Ring. Strieber devotes transformative events which serve to Ring, The desperate, it seems, that we may remain much of it to speculating on the causes move individuals and society as a whole Omega Project: fixated on suffering and terror, rather behind his terrifying but strangely onto a higher evolutionary level. As a Near-Death than working through confusion and enlightening experiences of alien result, we will live ecologically sound Experiences, UFO instability to possibly achieve new abduction, as related most famously in lives and reject the trappings of the Encounters, and insights. Mind at Large, his 1987 best-seller Communion. As ever, consumer society. New York: William This thought evidently tortures he is careful to repudiate the assertion As I read Strieber’s hyperbole, then, Morrow and Strieber as much as the aliens that he was abducted by real, flesh I could not help scoffing somewhat. Company, Inc., themselves, and he asks: “Must the and blood aliens from outer space (or, He was writing in 1992, and one does 1992. Quotes liberal, expansive, hopeful, and rational indeed, that he was abducted at all). not have to be cynical or jaded to see are taken from view that we have spent the past pp18-19. What caught my eye, however, was that culture – in its broadest as well as 2,000 years achieving now be replaced his extraordinary statement that “the narrowest sense – has hardly taken a by the cruel anarchies of the UFO coming of the UFO means, quite simply, turn for the better. Celebrity-obsessed, phenomenon, with its message of doom that the curtain to the temple has been addicted to the spectrally glowing and its depressing array of demonic or rent, and culture is about to undergo screens of electronic media, nervously coldly indifferent entities?” History’s profound change.” awaiting the next terrorist atrocity, we answer to this agonised question has At first sight, these words seem to watch, with varying degrees of delight or been:“Yes, it must.” This becomes be describing momentously positive horror, as ‘truthiness’ replaces informed abundantly clear if we replace the word changes. A whole new culture is to social and political debate and thuggish “UFO” in Strieber’s sentence with the emerge, and with it higher levels of insults replace truthiness. word “Trump.” consciousness for those who live through Indeed, many evidently rejoice as Trump was hallucinated into the transformations. Alien abductions something called “the élite” gets what existence on the back of a UFO. He is are the pangs of this spiritual rebirth. is coming to it. Clacton, Middleburg the apotheosis of the aliens. Strieber The argument of Ring’s book, which Heights and Fréjus cheer as another foresaw all this, and feared what he Strieber’s words introduce, offers plenty boot goes in – and the biggest boot of all foresaw. What the aliens once did to of support for such an interpretation. is currently worn by the President-elect him, Trump is now poised to do to the Ring claims that alien abductions of the USA. One can only speculate entire planet. FT

FT350 55 www.forteantimes.com forum travellers’ tales

The explorer and the dancing devils

Benjamin radford finds that US naturalist George K Cherrie’s many adventures across South America included encountering numerous fortean phenomena – and perhaps even creating some of his own…

Benjamin RadfoRd is the author readers a bizarre encounter with the ‘Yes, I use my lantern, but somehow or co-author of nine books on seemingly supernatural in which he it doesn’t always serve to attract the fortean topics, including Scientific was personally involved: things I want.’ Paranormal Investigation and “The native is always in a receptive “For a few moments my friend Tracking the Chupacabra. His latest book is Bad Clowns. state of mind toward supernatural seemed engrossed in deep thought. things. At the slightest provocation Then suddenly he sprang to his feet he concludes that the Spirit of and with true Latin enthusiasm, he British Empire has spawned Evil is about. One summer night I exclaimed: ‘I have it!’ many of the world’s greatest reached Caicara, a tiny village nearly “He led me by the arm to the corner texplorers, among them Sir surrounded by jungle... We had the of the garden from which we had a Richard Burton, John Speke, usual reception committee of barking view of a rocky hillside. The entrance Mary Kingsley, Ernest Shackleton, and dogs, naked and half-naked children to the path leading to the summit was Henry Morton Stanley. and indolent natives. Some of the about 200 yards away across the plaza But not everyone can find the source women had brought chickens and in front of the village church. In the of the Nile, and there are many others fruit for sale.” haze of the twilight I could see near whose notable accomplishments have As it happened Cherrie recognised the summit of the hill what looked been overshadowed by their better- in this speck of a Venezuelan jungle like a low white cloud. ‘The graveyard,’ known predecessors and contemporaries village, “a previous acquaintance whispered the trader. from across the pond. One of them is of mine, a local trader, a half-caste “Then I remembered the local celebrated American naturalist and European who had gone native” and cemetery was on top of the hill and explorer George K Cherrie (1865–1948), welcomed him. Cherrie writes: that it was surrounded by a white- who in his 1930 book Dark Trails: “He led the way up a smooth path washed adobe wall about 10ft high. Adventures of a Naturalist (GP Putnam’s to the village, followed by a motley ‘Why not try your lantern on that?’ Sons, 1930) wrote about his adventures, procession. The trader and I dined “Instantly I saw what he meant. If I primarily in Central and South America. outside, waited on by his native wife could illuminate a section of the white Cherrie engaged in many expeditions, who, despite an untidy one-piece wall it would attract multitudes of perhaps most famously accompanying costume, served us with a delicious insects and when they flew within the Theodore Roosevelt on his nearly dinner. Over our coffee I described rays of my lamp I should have them disastrous 1913–1914 jungle descent my journey and spoke of my work silhouetted against the white wall of Brazil’s Rio da Dúvida (“River of collecting animals, birds, and other beyond. In this way I could identify Doubt”, later renamed the Roosevelt creatures. ‘Just at present I am and capture just the specimens I River). Dark Trails provides a fascinating especially interested in night-flying wanted. The trader reminded me at first-hand look at a prominent explorer’s insects,’ I told him. ‘There are an the same time that the villagers didn’t ethnographic, botanical, and zoological abundance of these, but they are not make it a practice to visit the cemetery studies. Cherrie’s memoir reflects a always the ones I want.’ BELOW: Cherrie’s at night. So there was little likelihood 1930 book Dark generally hard-nosed scepticism, as ‘Not even with your light?’ he Trails offers a that I would be disturbed. one would expect to find in a man of asked. He had seen me using a fascinating first-hand “On the following night I set out science. For example, in a section where lantern as a lure for insects on a account of his just after dark, using a flashlight to he recounts being a witness to faith previous occasion. expeditions. follow the winding trail that led up healing in a South American tribe, to the burying Cherrie could be channelling James ground. I took Randi half a century later: “Of course with me my it was a piece of crude prestidigitation. insect net, But the widespread success of such cyanide bottles, charlatanry testifies to the high value of containers of mental suggestion; on the other hand, various sorts, suggestion of evil [e.g., a curse] works and a large with equal efficacy” (p48-49). three-burner Amid the interesting anecdotes of lamp which I had exploration and scientific enterprise, fastened inside Cherrie also speculates on various a box with a fortean topics, including ghost beliefs reflector behind and superstitions – even, at one point, it. It was like seeming to tacitly endorse what to an automobile modern eyes is clearly a version of the lamp, the light . being visible In a chapter titled “Death and only from After Death,” Cherrie recounts for his directly in front.

56 FT350 www.forteantimes.com forum travellers’ tales

“When I had reached the wall it was LEFT: George K Cherrie. The old man excitedly related the an easy task to prop the lantern up terrible details. ‘It was late when we on an old stump and light its wicks as saw the first light,’ he said. ‘This light a beacon for the moths, beetles and could only have been that of the Evil scores of other insects which I hoped One. No man’s torch was ever so bright. to capture. I was not disappointed with It illuminated only one spot and that the results. Scarcely had I turned up on the wall about the sainted dead. In the first wick when I heard a buzz and, its gleam danced many demons. One turning my head, received a stinging would disappear and another quickly blow in the face. It was a head-on take its place. Only devils from hell collision with a mole cricket! Of course ever danced so fearfully.’ I could have done my collecting by ‘How large would you say this picking up such specimens as flew into demon was?’ asked my host. the lamp if I had simply turned its rays ‘Oh, of colossal size; with very long out toward the tangled thicket about arms and legs.’ me. But this would have been a slow ‘Did he have a tail?’ and unsatisfactory method and have ‘Opinion is divided. Some say they left my choice largely to chance. saw it plainly. Others not.’ “My attention was fixed on the “After a good deal of cross- adobe wall in front of me. Rays from examination the trader permitted the powerful lantern illuminated a “The endless the old man to go. Then he turned to white disk on the wall fully 10ft in me with a laugh, saying: ‘So you’re a diameter. Between the lantern and procession devil – nay, a whole pack of devils!’ the disk, a distance of from 15 to 20ft, He caught his breath presently. ‘With was a cone of light sharply defined a tail!’ he laughed. But of a sudden he against the blackness of the night. of whirling became serious, and warned me not Within a few seconds this cone became to admit that I had had anything to do populated with hundreds of flying, little bodies with the phenomenon. He explained buzzing, circling, darting insects. Could that if I succeeded in convincing I have magnified the size of the little fascinated me” the villagers I had been up at the animals and by some magic reduced cemetery the night before they would their relative speed, I should have also be convinced that I was in league gazed upon a graceful dance of bodies my way slowly back to my lodgings with Satan himself, and so not to which varied both in size and colour. and dropped contentedly into my be trusted. As violence to a white “For some time I made no effort to hammock. man on some such pretext was a not use my net. The endless procession of “The Sun was just breaking unheard-of occurrence I was glad to whirling little bodies fascinated me. through the mist over the river when take advantage of his advice and keep Only when a beautiful big moth circled I awakened. But instead of the Sun’s silent.” lazily into the light and his wing- rays awakening me, it was the sound Cherrie’s choice to remain spread was shadowed large against the of many footsteps and excited voices silent about the true nature of the white wall behind him, did I make a outside my door. Sliding out of my phantasmagorical sight was a wise wide sweep with my net and begin the hammock, I hurried over to a hole one. Longtime readers of Fortean Times real work of the evening. in the wall that gave a view of the well know that rumours – especially “The simplicity and fruitfulness of street. What I saw was a surprise to involving outsiders – can have dire my device seemed to hypnotise me. me. The somnolent little village had consequences in the developing Fatigue of the day’s labours fell away. suddenly come to life. Little groups world. In my articles and research into In my enthusiasm I felt as if I could of excited, gesticulating people organ snatching legends, for example, go on swinging my net all night long. held my astonished gaze. My first (see “Kidney Devils,” FT138:34- I could not get my specimens into the thought was another revolution. The 39)I found several examples of containers fast enough. In fact, my only thing the setting lacked was a innocent Westerners being accused of gyrations, for all their clumsiness and ‘general’ on horseback. witchcraft and other evil deeds based mediocre speed, were on the order “My morning coffee came, also on little more than just such a sighting. of those described by the insects my host, accompanied by an old man And mob-led killings of suspected themselves. Little by little I gave up whom I recognised as one of the witches (and others assumed to be in the proper technique of insect netting. important elders of the settlement. league with the Devil) continue to the The graceful sweeps and twists with The look on my host’s face was a present day in countries such as Brazil, which I normally tried to imprison curious mixture of emotions which I India, and Tanzania. the insects in flight vega way to wild could not decipher. After bidding me One wonders what beliefs lunges and gnomelike jumps. Never in good morning he turned to the old and legends Cherrie’s nocturnal my life had I spent so riotous a time at man and began a colloquy something entomological antics may have collecting. When fatigue did come it like this: ‘You say the whole village is accidentally spawned in the region; came with a rush. I had lost all account in a panic?’ it would be fascinating to return to of time. I was not even sure what I had ‘Yes. The place has lost its peace Caicara and interview local elders collected. In any event, I felt it was for the first time since the great about the colossal, long-limbed and the most successful evening’s work plague.’ tailed demon seen dancing with with insects I had ever spent. Having ‘And why should the people be so swarming devils in an unholy light in a extinguished my lantern, I made distressed?’ cemetery a century ago… FT

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SEND REVIEW COPIES OF BOOKS TO: BOOK REVIEWS, FORTEAN TIMES, PO BOX 2409, LONDON NW5 4NP, UK. Thisreviews month’s books, films and games Ain’t she just Theodorable? A witty biography of Theodora – courtesan turned empress of the man accused of murdering a trillion people turned saint – encapsulates the events of her period

Whatever the intent, it is special attention going to Sarah readable – and notorious for “…imagine Britain Bernhardt in Sardou’s 1884 play. lubricious details of Theodora’s under the joint Potter could have done more here. hectic sex life as a prostitute, I easily instance novels by Robert then as a grande horizontale. sway of Rowan Graves and Stephanie Thornton, Potter provides the full Monty, the long-running mystery series but never admits that she is Williams and Millwall by Eric Meyer & Mary Reed, and simply a woman who liked sex supporters” – the classiest piece of cinematic Theodora and was exceptionally good at it. rhubarb – the German-inspired Actress, Empress, Saint Traditional hyperbole attends. Last Roman (1968), with Sylvia Potter cites – thanks, Dave!– my Koscina as Theodora and Orson David Potter ‘Sexual rhetoric in Procopius’, religious matters – she was a Welles as Justinian, plus Honor Oxford University Press 2015 pointing to the same stories being theological as well as a sexual Blackman, not here challenging Hb, 277pp, illus, maps, bib, ind, $29.95, ISBN9780199740765 told about, for instance, Roman maverick – until her death in the empress as Byzantium’s Pussy Another Theodora biography? empress Messalina. 548. This is often attributed to Galore. There was also Charles We have half a dozen, though Before we dismiss them, breast cancer, although the one Busch’s 1984 New York play, those by Bridge, Browning and consider (Spectator, May 22, source – not Procopius but the Theodora – She-Bitch of Byzantium. Underhill are not mentioned 1999) Annabel Chung who “for Latin chronicler Victor Tunnensis Add, too, her presence in Judy here. Theodora also stars in the purposes of a sociological study” – does not specify her disease Chicago’s feminist crockery set, swelling number of feminist had sex with 251 men in 10 hours as such. If it was that scourge ‘The Dinner Party’. surveys of Byzantine empresses. whilst keeping her lawyer’s day of women, she’d be perhaps the There are few sins of Still, Potter – a distinguished job. earliest documented case, though commission, though it is mealy- ancient historian – provides a When Gibbon famously wrote archæologists have detected mouthed to talk of Constantine’s lucid, jargon-free and often witty of Theodora’s sexploits: “But skeletal indications from earlier wife Fausta merely “deceasing” account that ranges far beyond her murmurs, her pleasures periods, cf. (e.g.) Fred Harding, when he had her suffocated in straight biography to a wide- and her arts, must be veiled Breast Cancer, 2007. a sauna, also sheer mumpsimus ranging, detailed panorama of in the obscurity of a learned Sports fans will relish the (after Alan Cameron’s classic cultural, military, political and language” (Latin), this was not space lavished on chariot-racing article) to continue believing religious events and personalities, prudery, but a dig at the 1623 and fanatic devotees of the Justinian closed down Plato’s both influencing and influenced first edition, which left out the Blues and Greens (including the Academy in 529. by our heroine. racy stories, as did the 1663 Paris royals) who combined English- Potter doesn’t pursue Potter fortifies his cleanly- one. Potter notes that Gibbon style hooliganism with running what I consider the obvious printed text with 30 pages of end- found “gold mixed in with the affairs of state in tandem with the modern parallel: Eva/Evita notes; an 11-page bibliography manure”. Runciman blamed Church – imagine Britain under Peron, who slept her way to a with some omissions and the Constantinople’s climate for the joint sway of Rowan Williams controversial marriage with odd error; a mainly onomastic its inhabitants’ ‘melancholy’, and Millwall supporters. Colonel Perón, a joint rule that index; dramatis personæ and whereas Byron opined: “What Some might classify Theodora’s saw her championing the poor in timeline; and a dozen maps and men called gallantry, and Gods boudoir epics as quasi-fortean. charitable (including Theodora- illustrations, though only one adultery / Is much more common Other exotic items – some in style rescuing of ‘fallen women’) gives a glimpse of Theodora from where the climate’s sultry.” Potter, others not – include and political ways, before also her famous Ravenna mosaics. Potter steers us from Justinian’s floating head, his dying young of cancer. Theodora fans face the Theodora’s early life in the city’s killing of one trillion people, Perhaps Theodora is best $64,000 question: how to take raffish world of bear-keepers the bizarre dietary and sexual summed up by actress Sharon her contemporary Procopius’s and actresses and subsequent prescriptions of fashionable quack Stone: “Having a vagina and Secret History: Potter dubs it bed-hopping, to her meeting Herophilus, Emperor Zeno’s a point of view is a lethal “a collection of scandalous with and marrying the future lack of kneecaps allowing him to combination.” misrepresentations”; others take emperor Justinian – a complex outrace chariots, and arch-heretic Barry Baldwin it as an example of Byzantine character superbly delineated by Arius exploding Mr Creosote-style samizdat pamphleteering. I’m Potter. Theodora, now outwardly in a public lavatory (FT133:17). Fortean Times Verdict drawn to Averil Cameron’s notion respectable, often dominated The last chapter explores dAvid poTTEr iS no hArry buT that it is satire. in their joint reign except in Theodora’s cultural Nachleben, hE hAS hiS own brAnd of mAgic 9

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Lord of Strange A saucerful of secrets deaths The fiendish world of Sax rohmer Witnessing Adamski’s encounter with a Venusian is only one act of Eds: Phil Baker & Antony Clayton,

an eventful life – it’s a pity Williamson’s biography is not definitive Strange Attractor Press 2015 Hb, 367pp, illus, notes, bib, ind, ISBN 9781907222252 So, Dr Fu Manchu, many outside-the-mainstream ideas about early space visitors, we meet again… interests and laying plans to re- his channelling, his observations This collection of emerge with new books following about Adamski. Though their essays often astounds, up on the earlier ones. association was short (they parted amazes and amuses, Only those with long memories company in part over the efficacy but it’s a mixed bag. recall him now. Two who of channelled contacts, which Arthur Henry Ward (1883– remember better than most are Adamski rejected in favour of 1959), aka Sax Rohmer, remains a the authors of The Incredible Life physical ones), Williamson never cipher. His most famous creation of George Hunt Williamson, Michel seems to have doubted Adamski’s birthed in the romance and foggy Zirger (a Frenchman who lives in truthfulness. The present authors, squalor of Limehouse opium The incredible Life Tokyo) and Maurizio Martinelli taking the same view, regale us dens, lived long enough to take of george hunt (an Italian). They have produced with further esoteric speculations, part in the age of flying saucers, the first attempt at a Williamson first aired in Williamson’s 1957 thanks to his magical elixir. Fu williamson biography. One hopes, frankly, book Other Tongues – Other Flesh, Manchu – equal parts Arthur mystical Journey: itinerary of a that somebody more skilled in concerning the symbols visible in Conan Doyle and imperialism privileged ufo witness the art of biography takes up Venusian footprints Williamson – can perhaps be excused Michel Zirger & Maurizio Martinelli the project down the road. Still, preserved in the aftermath of the as an example of the casual Incredible Life told me much I, a supposed 1952 encounter. Here, as racism of his era’s birth, but as Verdechiaro Edizioni 2016 Williamson admirer, didn’t know. at other points where the authors decades passed he has become Pb, 395pp, illus, bib, $21.99, ISBN 9788866232629 The authors have done their step into especially wide-eyed increasingly embarrassing. The If 1950s flying-saucer culture research, but they haven’t realms, the reader’s attention will problem is that Rohmer was such produced a more fascinatingly organised it well. One longs for a wander elsewhere. a damned good storyteller! How complex character than George linear narrative rather than near- Even when I first read UFO can we sit down to consume his Hunt Williamson (1926–1986), random skips in time and space. and saucer books (two separate literary feast, while setting aside that name does not come to mind. Sometimes it’s hard to grasp how genres) as an adolescent, the entrée? Perhaps the least of it, though one idea or adventure followed Adamski’s tales struck me as Many of the essays are that’s not easy to believe, is that another. Also the authors are feeble science fiction. Today, I am apologist (read “context”). The he was among the six witnesses to … well, believers, which means able to accept that he may have most shallow entry is by Alan George Adamski’s fabled meeting they embrace even Williamson’s been sincere about something. It Moore, co-creator of The League with a Venusian in the California most outlandish ideas and wasn’t, however, about Venusians, of Extraordinary Gentleman. At desert on 20 November 1952. experiences. Not that one would “scoutship” photographs, its best, however, nuggets of While that alone would have want a debunking book, of course; and trips into outer space. pure research call for a complete assured him immortality in saucer Williamson’s extraordinarily Williamson always said that he reassessment of Rohmer. His legend, it was to Williamson creative imagination merits had witnessed the desert meeting persona, for example, was not only a passing moment in a unironic respect, so long as one with Orthon – the name later created to be a vaguely occultist melodramatic career spent on the understands that what went on in given the then-unmonickered literary figure. Instead, Ward mid-century fringes. his brain and what happened in Space Brother – from a mile away. created his pseudonym to write Back then, if you were part consensus reality did not always Nobody, including the authors music hall doggerel. of the crowd, you occupy the same space. of the present volume, seems to Contributing writer couldn’t toss a stone without Zirger and Martinelli establish have asked if that is physically Christopher Frayling places Ward/ hitting Williamson: North and what all thoughtful observers – possible, though it’s true that Rohmer so firmly in the music South America, Europe, Asia, prominently excluding American Williamson testified only that hall tradition that it’s difficult to hobnobbing with tribal peoples, UFO personality James W he saw Adamski talking with a see Fu Manchu as anything but channelling alien communications, Moseley, who engaged in a strange “figure” (still...). The footprints, yet another – far more ambitious constructing rich histories of lost decades-long campaign of slander, on the other hand, had to have – turn upon the stage whose advanced civilisations, conjuring even charging (falsely) that been prepared beforehand. The popularity surprised even its up more than a Williamson murdered his first book doesn’t address this and author. decade before Erich von Däniken wife – can agree on: Williamson other obvious questions, as a Frayling has redefined Rohmer, profited from them. In 1960, was an unusually intelligent man more critically minded biography who essentially co-created ‘Little after renaming himself Michel and a sincere one. I would have would do. Nonetheless, this often Tich’, the music hall luminary d’Obrenovic (to honour Serbian loved to hear first-hand about informative volume will have to Harry Relph. royal ancestors), he dropped out his association with Dorothy do till the real thing comes along. Lord of Strange Deaths is a of sight. Many thought he had Martin and the Laugheads largely interpretative celebration died, but he lived on, a California (under pseudonyms, the leading of Fu Manchu. Rohmer will resident married for a time to a characters in the celebrated Fortean Times Verdict remain a mystery, yet the authors Hollywood actress, until January sociological treatise When A fAnTASTic LifE dESErvES bETTEr and editors have perhaps allowed 1986, still quietly pursuing his Prophecy Fails), the genesis of his – buT whAT A fAnTASTic LifE… 7 the evil genius to be revisited

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and enjoyed in context by a new generation. Jay Rath non-science fiction Fortean Times Verdict The symbiotic genres of science fiction and ThE doggErEL mErchAnT bEhind fu mAnchu rEvEALEd 8 aim to entertain… but readers tend not to believe SF is true ireland’s immortals A history of the gods of irish ‘un-scientific’. On the other hand, is the conspiracy theory of myth others who accept UFO stories ‘predictive programming’ that Mark Williams as evidence of ET or paranormal divines hidden agendas behind Princeton University Press 2016 visitations tend to regard aliens, blockbuster SF movies like Close Hb, 608pp, illus, bib, gloss, ind, $39.50, £29.95, flying saucers, mind control Encounters of the Third Kind and ISBN 9780691157313 and faster-than-light travel not Arrival, placed there by some Late Celtic Era as theoretical possibilities – or shadowy elite to prepare the scholars and forteans fictional science – but as actual public for future revelations may know Mark facts. May argues that popular concerning future ET contacts. Williams’s Fiery pseudoscience and non-fiction writings should Each chapter of this excellent Shapes: Celestial Science fiction be more accurately labelled book examines sub-genres that Portents and Astrology Andrew May pseudoscience, “not because overlap between science and in Ireland and Wales, 700–1700, pseudoscience, beginning with Springer Books 2016 [their] assertions are false in which he merged archæology Pb, 181pp, illus, refs, ind, £15.00 (£11.99 ebook), (although they often are), but Fort and pulp magazines of and Celtic poetry, and slew some ISBN 9783319426044 because they are arrived at by the early 20th century, tracing dragons of pseudo-scholarship non-scientific method”. the pseudoscientific ideas and along the way. He makes clear Robert Heinlein once tried to Andrew May has read beliefs inspired. Tracing the that native Irish gods emerge explain science fiction (SF) extensively in both genres history of these ideas, May not from creation myths but as ‘realistic speculation about and explains that SF and inevitably finds a rich seam of from an enigmatic and patchy future events’. Others have tried pseudoscience have little in literary antecedents for modern archæological record; the earliest to define it as a combination of common with academic science pseudoscientific speculations in written evidence comes from science, romance and prophecy. In beyond their subject matter the stories published by Hugo early Christian sources, as part this meticulously researched and and the superficial jargon ythe Gernsback, John W Campbell of their co-option of the pagan richly illustrated book Andrew employ. What they do share is the and Ray Palmer, whose clever deities. The new mythologies May defines SF as any work of desire to entertain and to please promotion of the ‘Shaver mystery’ in the middle mediæval period fiction ‘that stretches the reader’s their audience. The difference in and flying saucers did much to necessitated a narrative to imagination beyond the current the case of pseudoscience is the influence the future direction of integrate biblical, native and limits of science’. Common audience tend to have a ‘will to ufology. classical sources, and pagan gods SF motifs such as spaceships, believe’. As a result, both have Other chapters examine high- were transformed into the last aliens, ESP and voyages to other cross-fertilised each other, with tech paranoia, mind-power, space pre-Gaelic, prehistoric people worlds and dimensions also SF authors drawing upon popular drives and anti-gravity, ancient to have conquered Ireland. The figure prominently in books, pseudoscientific theories tod ad astronauts, conspiracy theories Tuatha Dé Danann are cast down TV programmes and films that credibility to their plots. Fort’s and End Times prophecies. from Heaven to become human describe themselves as ‘non- writings and wilder speculations What becomes apparent is that or, perhaps (given their later fiction’. In bookshops, the have been a particularly rich topics such as timeslips, alien fairy incarnation), fallen angels. output of writers such as Erich source of ideas for the early SF invasions, aircraft abducted by In the Celtic revivals of Ireland von Däniken, Whitley Strieber writers. For example, Eric Frank aliens, ancient technology and and Scotland, the mysticism of and Tim Good are categorised Russell drew upon Fort’s idea End Times prophecies were all Yeats and Russel were central under ‘paranormal’, ‘unexplained of the Earth as ‘property’ in anticipated by science fiction to the modern redefinition of phenomena’, or ‘mind, body and his 1939 novel Sinister Barrier, authors before a significant the Pagan pantheon. Augusta spirit’, not as science fiction. Yet a book he described as ‘a work number of people claimed these Gregory in Gods and Fighting Men despite sharing similar themes of fiction based on fact’. May things were true or, indeed, had wrote the definitive (pseudo-) and obsessions – and occasionally notes that Whitley Strieber happened to them. May does history of the Tuatha Dé Danann, the same authors – the two genres used a very similar phrase to a fine job of tearing down the who were transformed once more, (if they can be thus described) tip- introduce his 1989 novel Majestic artificial barriers between the this time into Fairy Folk behind toe around each other; never the that was presented as a fictional two genres and his exploration of “hidden walls” that they could twain shall meet. Why should this narrative based upon a real the similarities and differences see and pass through. be so is an interesting question. historical event: the crash of that exist between stories that Ireland’s Immortals is academic Few studies have tried to an unidentified ‘something’ at we habitually categorise as ‘fact’ but enormously entertaining. It understand why this dichotomy Roswell in 1947. and ‘fiction’ will be a revelation to comes with a pronunciation guide exists. In my own experience Pseudoscience has in both newcomers and to seasoned and scholarly apparatus. friends who enjoy reading turn borrowed from, or been researchers alike. Páiric O’Corráin SF don’t tend to be familiar influenced by, SF. The most David Clarke with, or sympathetic to, the obvious example is the on- Fortean Times Verdict contents of books about UFOs going symbiotic relationship Fortean Times Verdict ArchæoLogy, poETry, hiSTory, and ‘unexplained phenomena’ between Hollywood and the Lucid AccounT of ThE LinKS pSEudo-hiSTory, mySTiciSm… 9 because they regard them as UFO industry. The most bizarre bETwEEn ficTion &‘non-ficTion’ 9

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Everything you A prince among men Know about London is wrong Skint toff, family deaths, insurance fraud, popular press, pitch- Matt Brown black comedy – William Palmer was a perfect modern baddie Batsford 2016 Hb, 192pp, illus, bib, ind, £9.99, ISBN 9781849943604 Matt Brown is the far away as Manchester, Liverpool previously unseen letters from editor-at-large of and Birmingham bring so many Palmer, is full of memorable Londonist (londonist. people to Stafford to witness and striking details. Cook’s com/), a grab-bag of his hanging that the town’s horrific death – with convulsions London miscellany population of 15,000 was swollen causing hands to clench, eyes to – history, news to twice its normal size. bulge from their sockets, and an and must-go events – and a As to why the case was such agonisingly arched back – was guaranteed time-suck. And a media sensation at the time, such that when his body was laid now he’s debunked some of my Bates explains how newspapers out, his limbs had to be tied down favourite factoids (or ‘lies’, if were suddenly enjoying greatly with string before he would fit in you’re feeling judgmental) in a The poisoner increased circulation figures; the coffin. short and very snappy book that the previous year, the abolition Cook’s post-mortem is starts by stating that London The Life and crimes of victorian of stamp duty and taxes on portrayed as having elements of does not exist. The City of London England’s most notorious doctor advertisements had led to a black comedy amidst the horror. and the City of Westminster Stephen Bates marked reduction in newspapers’ It took place in the Talbot Arms’ do, but they make up only 1.5 Duckworth Overlook 2015 prices. But the case itself had assembly room, not an unusual per cent of the area of Greater Pb, 342pp, illus, refs, ind, £9.99, ISBN 9780715649572 several features which made it practice at the time. From the London, a ceremonial county and In 1856, William Palmer, of the perfect news story. Journalists start, it was shambolic; the the administrative term for our Rugeley, , was tried attending the trial remarked surgeon appointed to conduct the collection of towns. at the Old Bailey for having upon Palmer’s inoffensive and post-mortem arrived without his Disappointingly, the model of poisoned his friend John Cook at unremarkable facial features; surgical instruments, thinking Napoleon’s nose, which passing Rugeley’s Talbot Inn the previous previously, criminals had been he was there only to witness the squaddies tweak for luck, and the year. He was found guilty and believed to be easily recognisable proceedings, which Palmer made Seven Noses of Soho, which bring publicly hanged at Stafford by their villainous demeanour. various near-farcical attempts to infinite wealth to the people gaol. Palmer was suspected of Here was something novel and, as disrupt. who find them, are the work of having poisoned up to a dozen such, it may be read as a literary Cook’s internal organs were guerrilla artist Rick Butler and other people (including his wife, device, a disturbing twist in placed in a jar to be sent to casts of his own nose rather brother and mother-in-law), the the ‘plot’ to shock and unsettle London for analysis by Professor than historical artefacts. It’s not motive invariably being to cash its readers. Reportage of the Alfred Taylor of Guy’s Hospital, illegal to die within the Houses of in on life insurance policies he story as real-life melodrama ran the pre-eminent pathologist Parliament. had hastily taken out against his parallel to the current vogue and poisons expert at the time. Panto hero Dick Whittington unfortunate victims’ lives. for serialised sensation novels, Palmer, amongst the throng who probably did not have a cat Ostensibly a respectable often featuring murder. Poisoning were milling around the table, (“Oh yes, he did…” “Oh no, he doctor, Palmer was actually was fast becoming known as unsuccessfully sought to steal the didn’t”), but he was responsible a fully paid-up member of the archetypal English mode of jar. Before this, he had attempted for the Whittington Longhouse, England’s gambling, womanising murder. An insurance company’s to jostle the surgeon who was a 128-seat public lavatory. The demi-monde. Many of these investigation into the death of dissecting Cook’s body. basement of the Viaduct Tavern ne’er-do-wells had inherited and Palmer’s wife – suspiciously, after Bates concludes with a visit does not include cells from squandered money. Palmer was only only a single premium had to the present-day Talbot Arms, Newgate Prison. The seats on the no different. Having disposed of been paid – constituted a further now having changed its name but Underground may well contain a not-insubstantial bequest, he blurring of fact and fiction. Their still a pub. It has come down in traces of semen, fæces, vomit and proceeded to run up enormous inspector was one Charles Field, a the world, gaining local notoriety the other components of a decent debts. At the time of the Cook former policeman, and something for having more bouncers than Friday night out, but the Science murder, he owed some £25,000 of a celebrity detective at the drinkers. The current landlord reference quoted is untraceable. – around £1.5m today; 170 years time, being the inspiration for allows Bates to inspect the room The rose-ring parakeets that now ago, a gentleman’s word was Dickens’s Inspector Bucket in where Cook died, where he finds plague London weren’t released sufficient to enable him toow borr Bleak House. no atmosphere or presence, by Jimi Hendrix or escapees such sums. The London correspondent despite some tales of ghostly from the set of The African Queen. Engagingly written, with a for the New York Times saw the activity in the pub. And Aphex Twin does not live wry humour (the young Palmer, case as a crime facilitated by the Still today notorious as the in the grey box in the middle of having eloped with a sweetheart, innovations of progress, recently- Prince of Poisoners, Palmer the Elephant roundabout; it’s a gets only as far as Walsall – “not discovered strychnine and life lives on in other ways than the memorial to Michael Faraday. necessarily the most romantic insurance policies. The media supernatural. An unchallenging book, but fun. of destinations even then.”), furore surrounding Palmer’s Christopher Josiffe Val Stevenson the book begins with Palmer in crimes was unprecedented, the death cell at Stafford gaol anticipating that of Jack Fortean Times Verdict Fortean Times Verdict during his last night on Earth, the Ripper. This thoroughly- hE LooKEd LiKE Such A nicE mAn, drAT… bAng go your fAvouriTE whilst excursion trains from as researched book, which includes ThE princE of poiSonErS 9 AnEcdoTES for TouriSTS 7

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We leaf through a small selection of the dozens of books that ALSo RECEIVED have arrived at Fortean Towers in recent months...

The Menagerie of Marvels UFOs or aliens. This is preceded sons, and the early organisation fourteen layers of the etheric” to Karl Shuker by a clear analysis of the issue adopted Masonic-style rituals and clean your skull. CFZ Publishing Group 2016 of hybrids in history and in UFO incorporated elements of Greek Pb, 265pp, illus, bib, ind, £7.99, ISBN 9781909488205 literature. The last part of the and Roman mythology. It is these Shamanism book tackles the issues that are latter elements that inspire the Christa Mackinnon FT regular Dr Karl Shuker’s third raised by the testimony of the authors’ argument that there was Hay House Basics 2016 compendium spans animal interviewees. When one says an underlying agenda to elevate PB, 285pp, notes, ind, £8.99, ISBN 9781781805879 mythology and the rarest crypto- that her mother was impregnated the divine feminine values – they zoology in 22 articles, the majority with an embryo composed of her use the term ‘Venus families’ – in In the traditions of most historical previously unpublished. He tells mother’s egg, her father’s sperm a ‘secret’ lineage they claim to cultures, shamans claim to have of the ‘reverse mermaid’ (fishy and two types of ET DNA so she have traced back to the mysteries been ‘chosen’, undergoing a head and female legs), which was is “38% Anunnaki and 28% Zeta”; of Eleusis. The authors demon- psychological and spiritual crisis, claimed in 1973 to have been when another claims to have been strate how the Grange influenced during which their body, mind, caught off Egypt and was widely “off communing with ETs since the Founding Fathers, the Revo- personality or ‘soul’ is symbolically believed there to be real. It was a the age of 6”, it certainly seems lutionary War and the design of dismembered and rebuilt. This hoax based upon René Magritte’s wrong to be dismissive; in fact the America’s sacred monuments and metamorphosis is imposed upon 1935 painting ‘Collective Imagina- authors react more like psychia- city plans. There is even a link to them over long periods of time to tion’. An account of the Shamir, trists to the uninhibited comments the lore of Rosslyn Chapel and facilitate communion with spirits a tiny worm-like creature with a of their couched clients. From the Templars. Nearly every Ameri- and to journey into the Otherworld laser-like gaze, also caught our their early days they feel “differ- can city “has a temple to the – and is studied by folklorists, eye. It remained under guard in ent”, are relieved to find others Goddess hidden in plain sight” anthropologists and psychologists. the Garden of Eden and emerged like themselves, worry that their say the authors – the baseball The type of shamanism referred to only when God borrowed it to etch hybrid relatives might be being diamond on an enclosed playfield. by Mackinnon and similar guides the names of the tribes of Israel “weaponised” by “the military” It is well argued and will interest to ‘shamanism’ caters for those onto gems in their high priests’ and so on; but all say consistently the followers of sacred geometry. who, for whatever reason, want breastplates. There are too many that this is part of a process of to use ‘shamanistic’ ideas, ritu- cryptobeasts to list: our favourites healing the Earth and that a day Crystal Skulls als and imagery, to be like, well, were the Earth Hound of Scotland, will come “soon” when their alien Judy Hall shamans, whom they visualise which looks like a mole-rat/pig parents and “star families” will Red Wheel / Weiser 2016 as noble spiritual warriors. It is cross); unidentified marine car- reveal themselves openly. Is this PB, 197pp, notes, illus, bib, $16.95, ISBN 9781578635948 indulged in as a New Age lifestyle cases found on the south coast; part of an unconscious but grow- choice. Consequently the chapters the ‘giant rat of Sumatra’, as ing development in the psychology Ever since Anna Mitchell-Hedges are about choosing (or ‘designing’) mentioned in a Sherlock Holmes of modern man as Whitley Strieber claimed, in Honduras in 1924, to your behaviour, thought processes, story; Argentina’s armoured fairy and Jeffrey Kripal believe? We have discovered the most famous outlook, even your spirituality to armadillo; and flying (gliding, really) don’t know! of the many humanoid skulls fit an image of yourself you may toads. Excellent. carved in quartz crystal, these think desirable. While the involun- America enigmatic objects have become tary shaman is transformed into Meet the Hybrids Nation of the Goddess the home of all sorts of claims being a valuable part of an archaic Miguel Mendonça & Barbara Lamb for supernatural doings. Their society (yet usually placed on the Alan Butler & Janet Wolter www.meetthehybrids.wordpress.com 2015 followers lap up the stories – the periphery), the modern Western Destiny Books 2015 Pb, 287pp, bib, £11.99, ISBN 9781518741012 Pb, 353pp, illus, bib, ind, £9.95, ISBN 9781620553978 wilder the better – and Gaia wor- ‘shaman’ aims to integrate better ship. Judy Hall, a “trained healer” within today’s fast-moving and self- This anthology references the A while back books exposing and Skullkeeper, peppers this obsessed world. Akashic Record, the Third Eye, ‘secret histories’ came thick and slender book with often interest- To be fair to Christa Mackin- Gaia, raising consciousness, and fast, but this is the first ’vwe e ing nuggets of skull history and non (a psychologist and hypno- encounters with spiritual as well seen for a while and concerns a folklore, but they are lost in a twee therapist), she claims to have as extraterrestrial entities. fraternal organisation of American guide to owning and using skulls undergone her own spiritual The authors make a serious farmers – The National Grange for those who think this is a real dismemberment and subsequent effort to present and analyse of the Order of Patrons of Hus- subject. Skullkeepers are shown re-training. While it adds nothing interviews with eight people who bandry (the Grange), formed after how to commune with their new to our understanding of authentic believe they are human–alien the US Civil War to promote the noggins and let them tell you their shamanism, it is well written, and hybrids and to whom are put 10 interests of rural communities. It true names, or rather those of the fairly comprehensive, with most questions about how they came to successfully lobbyied local and entities that inhabit them. And you of the ‘ritual’ aspects drawn from this conclusion and how it might national government to pass can buy skulls ready populated! Amerindian culture, modern Wicca have changed their lives and out- significant legislation (eg. Farm The handy closing compendium and self-help routines. This will be looks. Credit and free rural mail delivery) includes sections on different of interest only to those wanting Their comments on the latter and pushed causes such as quartzes and their properties, to take a journey with her or, as aspect says more about this temperance and female suffrage. totemic animal shapes, and she puts it, if you need “meaning” crazy world we live on than about Its founders included Freema- recommends Z14 which “clears brought back into your life.

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Tutankhamun and he doesn’t find the tomb till Flinders Petrie (character actor Agent Carter: The Dir Peter Webber, UK 2016 1922, and it’s probably easier for RupertVansitartt) – who emerges Complete Second ITV Studios Home Entertainment, £14.99 (DVD) make-up artists to make an actor from his dig stark naked. Petrie look older than younger – but he often dug in the nude to ensure he Season ITV’s four-part drama Tutankha- still looks young for the role. wouldn’t be pestered by tourists – Created by Christopher Markus & Stephen McFeely, US 2016 mun impresses on a number of More serious is Carter’s affair a nuisance which plagued Carter Walt Disney Studios, £19.99 (Blu ray), £14.99 (DVD) levels.The setting is stunning, with Lord Carnarvon’s young throughout his time in Egypt. despite theValley of the Kings daughter Evelyn (Amy Wren, Despite the scorn of other It’s doubtful that anyone at Marvel being filmed in South Africa.The Bethany Brassington in Silk). Con- archæologists Howard Carter is Studios envisaged Agent Carter characterisation is interesting, in sidering the real-life Evelyn was determined to find the tomb of – wartime SOE operative and that the leading characters are born in 1901, she was only just of a lost king, and eventually his Steve Rogers’s English girlfriend shown as heavily flawed. And the age at the very end of the story, intuition and years of experience – enjoying a further career after plot – well, I don’t need to worry and probably only 17 or less when lead him to it; there’s a magi- her appearance in the 2011 Cap- about spoilers! they got together. The present- cal moment when he first looks tain America film, but there was Max Irons (Edward IV in The day Lord Carnarvon insists the through a hole into a room that something about Peggy... Fans White Queen) is excellent as the friendship between Carter and his hasn’t been opened for millennia, couldn’t get enough of her, and she tetchy and obsessive Howard great-aunt was purely platonic – and discovers “wonderful things”. continued to show up on screens Carter, who constantly has to be but writer Guy Burt has said there But Carter’s digging is interrupted big and small until last year, which reminded to be polite to people – was a “persistent rumour” of a by the First World War, and then witnessed the double whammy of or even to notice them. Sam Neill romance between them. It’s prob- politics get in the way again when her preseny-day funeral in Cap- (Peaky Blinders, The Tudors) plays ably more the case that you can’t the Egyptian authorities turn tain America: Civil War and the Lord Carnarvon, the maverick have a costume drama without against the British. cancellation of her 1940s-set ABC aristocrat who knows little of how a bit of sex. Before Lady Evelyn And then Lord Carnavon’s TV series following disappoint- archæology works, but as a gam- there’s a (probably fictional) death, from blood poisoning from ing ratings for its second season. bler is prepared to sink his money American archæologist from the an infected insect-bite, triggers That was a great shame, as fangirls into funding Carter. New York Metropolitan Museum, the nonsense which is still with and boys have made clear in any It’s probably naïve to expect Maggie Lewis (Catherine Stead- us today – “the curse of Tutankha- number of online petitions, but at a TV drama about an historical man, Mabel Lane Fox in Downton mun’s tomb” – created out of least we can now enjoy what may event to stick closely to reality, Abbey), who again isn’t put off by whole cloth, the drama makes well be Peg’s last outing on Blu ray. and some critics have slammed it Carter’s irascible nature. clear, by the sensation-hungry This time around, the action for this. Howard Carter was in his But some of the odder details press. shifts from the Strategic Scientific late 40s when he discovered King in this mini-series are definitely David V Barrett Reserve’s New York headquar- Tutankhamun’s tomb, but Max based on fact.There’s a delight- ters to sunny Los Angeles, where Irons (son of Jeremy Irons and ful moment when Carter goes in Fortean Times Verdict Agent Sousa (Enver Gjokaj) is Sinéad Cusack) is only 31. Fair search of the famous archæologist sexeD-up but Fun portrayaL now running the SSR’s West Coast enough, the drama begins in 1905, and probably the first Egyptologist oF DoggeD persIstence 8 office and Howard Stark (Dominic

64 FT350 www.forteantimes.com reviews FILM & DVD

Cooper) and loyal butler Jarvis (James D’Arcy) are installed in one of the playboy inventor’s many mansions. Peggy Carter The Reverend’s Review (Hayley Atwell) flies in to help out with a baffling case involving FT’s resident man of the cloth reVerenD peter LaWs dons a frozen lady in the lake, and soon his dog collar and faces the flicks that Church forgot! finds herself embroiled not just in (www.theflicksthatchurchforgot.com; @revpeterlaws) murder but political conspiracy, atomic age scientific skulduggery and a threat from what might be ALFRED HITCHCOCK be the next victim of a local the Dark Dimension glimpsed in PRESENTS: SEASONS 1-7 strangler. It’s a show that Doctor Strange. Created by Alfred Hitchcock, US 1955-1962 revels in darkness, especially There’s less emphasis on taking Fabulous Films, £65.99 (DVD) when polite, well-to-do people down everyday sexism than in the do bad, and sometime sav- first series – after all, we know by THE ALFRED HITCHCOCK age, things. Not all the stories now that Peggy knows her worth. HOUR: SEASONS 1-3 work, of course, and I person- Sexual politics are still to the fore, ally prefer the Gothic focus of Created by Alfred Hitchcock, US 1962-1965 though, thanks to a pair of fantas- Fabulous Films, £79.99 (DVD) shows like Night Gallery (also tically twisted femmes fatale in available from Fabulous). Yet the form of Whitney Frost (Wynn Good evening, and welcome both of these shows offer solid Everett), a scientific genius hiding to the 1950s and 60s, a time seasons packed with thrilling behind the fading mask of a Hol- when directorial genius Alfred and expertly constructed tales: lywood actress (taking her cue Hitchcock dominated cinematic Alfred Hitchcock Presents was from the similarly unsung real-life thrills. Yet making classics like ranked by the Writers Guild of Tinseltown boffin Hedy Lamarr) Vertigo, Psycho and The Birds America as number 79 of the and, returning from Season One to clearly wasn’t enough for the top 101 Best Written TV Series muddy the waters, the deliriously roly-poly showman: he wanted to ever made. deranged Dottie (Bridget Regan), conquer the small screen too. Hitchcock’s talking-head proto-Black Widow and all-round Fabulous Films have released intros and outros are an iconic away with it – like Barbara Belle bad egg. Compared to these two, the results: the complete col- treat in themselves, especially Geddes (Miss Ellie from Dallas), the male villains prove a pretty lections of both Alfred Hitchcock when he’s frequently so sarcas- who smashes her husband’s hopeless and easily manipulated Presents (seven seasons) and tic about the ad breaks. “Seeing skull in with a frozen leg of bunch. The Alfred Hitchcock Hour (three a murder on television can help lamb (‘Lamb To The Slaughter’, Tonally, there’s a far greater seasons) are locked and load- work off one’s antagonisms,” Presents, S3, Ep28) and then emphasis on comedy this time ed, and ready for your TV. says Hitch. “A nd if you haven’t feeds the murder weapon to around, making this – despite the There are some cracking any antagonisms, the com- the cops. Here, Hitch bows to Chandleresque settings – more episodes here, and some pretty mercials will give you some.” convention, adding unconvinc- reminiscent of The Thin Man scary ones too – like ‘The Glass Cue a washing powder ad. This ing conclusions that the stories than The Long Goodbye. Not all Eye’ (Presents, S3, Ep 1), where kind of constant mickey-taking don’t need: “She was eventually the gags land, but the amusing William Shatner tells a heart- of a network show’s sponsors caught and brought to justice”. interplay between these larger- breaking and nightmare-inducing is not something we see very Such ‘crime does not pay’ than-life characters sparkles for story of a lonely woman and often; even today, shows mostly asides feel forced, a reassur- the most part.Ten episodes rather a ventriloquist. ‘The Sign of avoid biting the hand that feeds ance to audiences of the time than eight means that the overall Satan’ (Hour, S2, Ep 7) has them, The Simpsons being that the moral compass of the effect, given the single storyline, Christopher Lee being stalked one of the notable exceptions. show (and, by implication, the is perhaps less tightly focused by a Satanic cult in Hollywood, But Hitchcock rips the Mad network) were not as skewed as and impactful than the previous while ‘The Creeper’ (Presents, Men crowd a new one at every these tales implied. season. Still, it’s irresistably old S1, Ep 38) profiles a housewife opportunity. Many of the shows People like their box sets fashioned fun, with gorgeous For- who’s terrified she’s going to end with murderers who get these days, but put these two ties stylings and clothes to die for, bad boys together and you’re put over by a fantastic ensemble talking hardcore binge watch- led, but not dominated, by the ing: a total of 366 episodes on lovely Hayley Atwell. Props to her 59 discs, clocking in at 11,167 for taking a minor character and minutes. Maybe this could be turning her into a feminist geek your daily watch for the rest of icon through sheer bloody charm. the year, or you could always What a pity we won’t now get binge them all in one sitting to see the formation of SHIELD, – just under eight days, without discover the truth about Peggy’s pressing stop. And with that brother, or find out who shot Jack thought, I bid you… goodnight. Thompson... David Sutton Fortean Times Verdict Leytonstone’s FInest auteur Fortean Times Verdict conQuers tHe sMaLL screen 9 gooD-LooKIng 1940s roMp WItH tHe LoVeLy Ms atWeLL 8

FT350 65 www.forteantimes.com reviews FILM & DVD

The Neighbour clash of political ideologies on show Dir Marcus Dunstan, US 2016 suggests the inherent dishonesty SHORTS Arrow Fims, £7.99 (DVD) of the government and the military, and yet patriot Dell is willing to HoLIDays What could be worse than living murder innocents in a nuclear Arma- Kaleidoscope Home Entertainment, £9.99 (DVD) next door to drug dealers? What geddon. It’s a pretty improbable John Carpenter probably had no clue that when he if you are the drug dealers? What narrative, but a bold film with a good changed the title of his movie from ‘The Babysitter if you’re planning to give up the deal more on its agenda than being Murders’ to Halloween he’d be starting a trend. criminal life and go straight, but just another bog-standard liberal Forty years later and horror films are still tying your wife goes missing? Do you conspiracy thriller. The run-time is a themselves to the calendar, as Holidays, a patchy check out the creepy neighbour next little long and perhaps the material anthology which offers the usual Christmas and door? Better be careful – you might would have been better suited to Hallowe’en segments, demonstrates. Yet it’s the other dates discover they’re far nastier than you a television drama, but the perfor- that provide most fun here. Standouts are ‘St Patrick’s Day’ – a could ever be… mances are certainly solid. wacky folk story about a school teacher’s extremely strange preg- That’s the set up of Marcus Dun- Nia Jones nancy – and ‘Easter’, with its ominous twist on the Easter Bunny. stan’s The Neighbour, a creepy slow- ‘Father’s Day’, an audio cassette-based tale, pretty much throbs burn horror thriller. Dunstan has Fortean Times Verdict with dread too. pL 6/10 form in the field, having directed sLIgHtLy exHaustIng 1970s trap-driven Collector series of conspIracy FLIcK 7 InstruMents oF eVIL movies, and along with screenwriter Available from Eyecatcher Video (www.eyecat.com), $20 (DVD) , he contributed to Cocoon The Viking God Loki crosses time and space to four of the successful Saw series. If hunt down four musical demons that have pos- that’s your thing, then this should Dir Ron Howard, US 1985 Eureka Entertainment, £14.99 (Blu ray) sessed some 1980s hip hop singles and deadly, satisfy. There are echoes of the likes serated violins. This ultra-low-budget horror of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre First released in 1985, Cocoon comedy is utterly ridiculous, but it’s something else and Wolf Creek in The Neighbour’s isn’t the only Sci-Fi film based on too: genuinely fun. Perhaps it’s the enthusiasm, rural horror, but there’s little here the pursuit of the “Fountain of or the sheer absurdity of it all. Or maybe it’s just hard not to feel to distinguish the film from a host Eternal Youth” and its implica- affection for a movie with zombies who breakdance so hard their of similar efforts.There’s enough tions, but getting old remains limbs come flying off. I LOL’d. pL 7/ 10 gore to keep the ‘grindhouse’ audi- a theme not often explored in ence happy, but if you’re looking for youth-obsessed Tinseltown. In more than that, you’re likely to be Ron Howard’s fondly remembered frustrated. film, the Antareans, a group of Brian J Robb aliens disguised as humans, arrive in Florida on a rescue mission. Mean- GAMES Fortean Times Verdict while, residents from the retire- scrappy, gore-DrIVen ment community next door come Horror For SAW Fans 5 across the visitors’ alien pods in a barroW HILL: tHe DarK patH nearby swimming pool – and they Iceberg Interactive, £14.99 (PC DVD) Twilight’s Last Gleaming soon discover that contact with This is an interesting game, but somewhat of a these aliens provokes a wholesale mixed bag. It’s a sequel of sorts to Barrow Hill: Dir Robert Aldrich, US 1977 rejuvenation of body and soul. Curse of the Ancient Circle, which came out about Eureka Entertainment, £19.99 (Dual Format) The narrative is highly calcu- a decade ago, and in many ways it’s as if that Based on the pulp novel Viper Three lated and extremely sentimental, intervening decade in gaming hasn’t happened. by Walter Wager, the film’s title is its strong emotional undertones You see, The Dark Path is a classic, old fashioned, taken from US national anthem paired with some super tear-jerk- point-and-click horror adventure, with all the pros and cons that (“what so proudly we hailed at the ing moments.The plot is a bit uneven the genre has always had. And when I say ‘old fashioned’, that’s twilight’s last gleaming”). Director in development, and some might find exactly what I mean. When you think of a modern day point-and- Robert Aldrich teams up once again it dated and even derivative in retro- click, it would be something like Life is Strange, with its 3D envi- with longtime collaborator Burt spect, while the comedic highlights ronments, superb voice acting and complex storyline. The Dark Lancaster, who plays an idealistic are both predictable and completely Path, on the other hand, is deliberately,even stubbornly, retro, yet unhinged mad-dog military man, charming. Cocoon still makes several with static images as backgrounds, across which the player General Lawrence Dell. Escaping salient points about society’s atti- has to slowly move the cursor, pixel by pixel, to find out where from military prison, he takes over a tude towards elders in their ‘twilight to click. Despite this throwback feel, the game has some nods to modernity, with clues to puzzles to be found in video clips on silo near Montana, holding the Presi- years’, Howard’s direction is clever mobile phones and tablets. The storyline – three teenagers go dent to ransom with nine nuclear and the musical score by James missing in a forest while performing a druidic ritual – is interest- missiles and demanding he reveal a Horner is exceptional. Seen in its ing enough, and there are a few genuine scares, with a creepy top-secret document regarding the context as a light-hearted feel-good ghost which appears and disappears every now and then. The Vietnam War. movie with a stellar cast of Holly- shadow of Blair Witch looms large over the whole thing, which can Stylistically speaking, Aldrich wood veterans (Don Ameche, Hume hardly be described as original. It’s an undeniably interesting and keeps things simple and straight- Cronyn) it more than does its job. even entertaining enough game, but you should probably add or forward, apart from a tendency to Nia Jones remove a point depending on your love for point-and-click adven- make (probably too much) use of a Fortean Times Verdict tures. richmond clements 6/10 split-screen to show different strands extraterrestrIaL eIgHtIes of the storyline simultaneously. The nostaLgIa 8

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Baia oracle mention of the neo-Nazi elements Wedding who were an integral part of the I read with interest the article so-called uprising. by Mike Dash on the Oracle at crasher And fi nally, the supposed Baia, ‘A Visit To The ’ This is a photo of my surreal post-modern ideology of [FT346:32-37]. Robert Temple’s daughter and me about Putin’s Russia has its US equiva- Netherworld (2001) examines three years ago in a barn lent. It was neocon poster boy Karl the site in detail and relates its at a wedding venue in Rove who said of America: “We’re modern history. What I found most Hereford. There were no an empire now, and when we act, puzzling is how the tunnels are so children at the wedding we create our own reality. And straight and how they knew there and there was no one be- while you’re studying that reality was an underground river – but hind us when the photo – judiciously, as you will – we’ll act maybe the tunnels were dug with was taken as a selfie. again, creating other new realities, the intention of providing an arti- The image has been sent which you can study too, and that’s fi cial river before they found the to my iPad and is not as how things will sort out”. real one. Since the area is volcanic, clear as the original. Ian Callaghan the possibility that there was an Kirsty Johnson By email underground hot water river was Brighouse, a possibility that the Romans, who West Yorkshire SD Tucker replies: Oh dear, Mr were great engineers, might have Callaghan won’t have liked the thought possible.The thing that I subsequent entries in the series, fi nd most intriguing is why it was leader, the king of the Underworld of Cardinal Girolamo Simoncelli then. Whilst, like many people on fi lled in and by whom; not by the – Apollyon. (1522-1605) to support his bid the conservative right, I actually Romans, who believed in oracles, The Cumæan Sibyl prophesied for the papacy. This of course have some amount of sympathy but perhaps by the mediæval the return of the god Apollo, the does not detract from the ap- for the likes of Putin and Aleksandr Church, though the Church didn’t destruction of Rome and connect- parent accuracy of some of the Dugin myself as regards certain bother to do that with any other ed the End Times Islamic Mahdi post-1590 prophecies. limited issues; if you read the sites and converting it to a Dante- with a ‘Last Roman Emperor’ latter’s Fourth Political Theory, for like vision of Hell would, I think, believed to be pope #112 Francis Perspective on example, amidst all the gnostic be more likely. Maybe one day a (see The Final Roman Emperor by weirdness, impenetrable claims dusty archive will reveal a forgot- Thomas Horn and Cris Putnam, Ukraine about angels and strange ideas ten diary with the details. I also Defender Publishing, 2016.) The culled from Nazi philosophers, you have a copy of Oracle of the Dead by Cumæan Sibyl’s prophecies are Regarding SD Tucker’s piece on will fi nd much legitimate and sen- John Maddox Roberts (XII of the encoded on the Great Seal of the “War And Peace (Simultaneous- sible criticism of certain aspects SPQR series), a fi ctional account United States as well as in Catho- ly)” [FT347:50-53], I don’t read of ‘liberal’ Western society and of a murder mystery set in the last lic art including her appearance Fortean Times to hear the same neocon-style US-led ‘hegemony’ years of the Roman Republic and upon the ceiling of the Sistine old Putin-bashing propaganda with which I would not wholly disa- obviously based on the Baia site. Chapel. that the mainstream media gree. I’d stand by my basic theory, Margaret Pitcher Regarding the destruction of indulges in; I’d have thought FT expressed across the four articles, Waramanga, Australian Capital Rome, this will be an End Times was above such outright polemic. that it is blatantly obvious that Territory occurrence foretold in the Prophe- Tucker asserts thatViktor Yanuk- Russian ‘democracy’ is a gigantic cies of St Malachy: “In the fi nal ovich was ousted in “a revolution- sham, designed in some way to In ‘A Visit To The Underworld’ persecution of the Holy Roman ary uprising”, but he was clearly be a parody of the Western model, Mike Dash mentions the Cumæan Church there will reign Peter the ousted by a US-led putsch. Even with its comically cartoonish candi- Sibyl – an ancient prophetess who Roman, who will feed his fl ock George Friedman, the Founder dates like Vladimir Zhirinovsky. was offered one wish by the Sun among many tribulations; after and CEO of Stratfor, the ‘Shadow For example, I can’t help but no- god Apollo in exchange for her which the seven-hilled city will CIA’, says of the overthrow of tice that the referenda on Crimea virginity. I have described how be destroyed, and the dreadful Ukraine’s President Yanukovich, and parts of eastern Ukraine the scientists/physicists at CERN judge will judge his people.” (See “It really was the most blatant joining up with Russia were held are preparing to open wormholes The Prophecies of St Malachy & St coup in history”. What did the after Putin had in effect annexed connecting dimensions in the Uni- Columbkille by Peter Bander, Colin US and the neocon-controlled, these areas anyway, thus making verse despite pleas from Christian Smythe Ltd, 1969, 2005). US-funded National Endowment the results basically moot. Whilst evangelicals who warn that this Greg May for Democracy spend around I happily accept that many people will release demonic entities into Orlando, Florida $6 billion on? Cookies? And in Crimea and eastern Ukraine our world since Satan commands Tucker quotes the widespread probably would indeed prefer the Second Heaven [FT340:68]. Editor’s note: Prevailing opin- untruth that Russia annexed to be part of Russia rather than The ninth chapter of the Book of ion is that The Prophecies of St Crimea. Crimea saw Washing- Ukraine (as historically they often Revelation foretells the Abyss Malachy, fi rst published in 1590, ton’s meddling in Ukraine’s have been), if anyone thinks that being opened as demons rise from were not written by the Irish St affairs and democratically voted voters would have been allowed to it like ‘smoke pouring from a great Malachy, Archbishop of Armagh to ally themselves with Russia, decide otherwise once the votes furnace’; rising with them is their (1095-1148), but forged on behalf not Ukraine. Nor was there any had actually been counted, I would

FT350 71 www.forteantimes.com letters

suggest they are being somewhat to discern words from it is so naïve. Whilst geography, history inconclusive as to be a pointless and ethnicity perhaps suggest exercise.There are a number of that Crimea should never have freely available signal-processing been separated from Russia in tools on the web that can be the first place, the fact nonethe- used to remove white noise from less remains that Crimea was audio files and analyse what’s invaded and annexed. left without the subjectivity of a One final point, though; these credulous human listener. ‘Strange Statesmen’ articles are supposed to be essentially comic • ‘Phenomenomix’ [FT343:79] explorations of weird things, ABOVE: An EVP apparatus designed to help detect electromagnetic fluctuations. made me chuckle, but the pedant ideas and events centring around in me feels compelled to point out politicians worldwide; they’re that my surname doesn’t begin not meant to have any genuinely of George Meek’s ‘Spiricom’ or of electromagnetic phenomena with an ‘L’; and fundamental par- polemical, let alone propagan- Frank Sumption’s ‘Ghost Box’. reportedly associated with haunt- ticles do not become waves when distic, purpose, as Mr Callaghan As far as I can tell the ings. one attempts to observe them – suggests. In the current case, I ‘Spiricom’ is essentially a device If one is attempting to com- wave particle duality applies to didn’t write the pieces specifically which creates various audio municate with an entity that all things all the time. Heisenberg thinking ‘Now I can bash the evil frequency tones, converts them communicates by manipulating does, however, impose certain Mr Putin!’ but so I could write into electronic signals, transmits electric or magnetic fields, a mi- limits on the precision with which about amusingly silly things like these signals via radio (for some crophone is not optimised for this observations can be made.The Pokémon being labelled as West- reason), picks up the same signals purpose. For EVP experiments I ever-mischievous David EH Jones ern agents, cosmic calculators via a nearby antenna, converts therefore propose to substitute (writing as ‘Daedalus’ in Nature, protecting people from the forces them back into audio tones, then the conventional microphone for June 1988), speculates that the of gayness, or Darth Vader being records them via a microphone. an apparatus that is better able to uncertainty principle may pro- accused of electoral fraud. I’m The ‘Ghost Box’ appears just facilitate detection of electro- vide the essential cover for divine quite happy to repeat negative to be an AM radio that sweeps magnetic fluctuations. I propose a (and presumably other paranor- stories about politicians I like, as through a range of frequencies device that reacts to perturbation mal) interventions that are not well, if it makes for an interesting while recording the resultant in any of the three dimensions we detected by established scientific article. For example, like the grov- noise. In summary, the ‘Spiricom’ are aware of: an arrangement of methodology. elling capitalist lickspittle I am, creates noise and then transduces straight wires made of something Ian I’Anson I actually greatly admire Ronald it repeatedly before recording the suitably magnetically susceptible Sompting, West Sussex Reagan, but was quite happy to outcome, while the ‘Ghostbox’ such as soft (annealed) iron (see pen a mocking article about him just records the noise it gener- figure above). A magnetic field Baby-eating being anally-raped following an ates directly. Both devices are could also be applied perpen- imaginary car-crash some months basically ‘pareidolia machines’ dicular to the wires to emulate Jan Bondeson’s account from the back; given Mr Callaghan’s ap- – by their very nature they can’t the environment found within a Illustrated Police News [FT346:74] parent anti-US stance, perhaps produce anything conclusive (and conventional microphone, though of the pig which stole and ate a he wasn’t bothered by that. So, I suspect they aren’t intended to). it is not obvious whether this baby in 1870, and his statement in short, if you find a Left-wing Nonetheless, the concept would make it easier or harder that “it was noted that the prac- pro-Russian nutter being detailed intrigues me. I believe EVP for an external agency to induce a tice of leaving young children un- in one instalment, rest-assured enthusiasts frequently just set up detectable effect. attended was only too prevalent”, there’ll be a Right-wing, pro-Amer- recording devices with micro- As for generating tones or reminds me that in certain parts ican loon described in a future phones in supposedly haunted white noise: I see no reason to of the country this might have one. Please don’t read these buildings and then play back do so. The presence of a random been a deliberate practice! articles thinking I’m telling you whatever the devices pick up. A signal imposed on the recording My husband comes from the which side to back or vote for on microphone comprises a wire coil would make no difference to the Lye, near Stourbridge (in the any given issue… surely no one in close proximity to a permanent ease with which any additional Black Country), where, in the reads FT looking to find serious magnet.The vibration caused signal could be imposed via my mid-19th century: “The Lye Waste political guidance? by sound carrying through the antenna – indeed the noise would boasted that Coroners’ inquests air causes the coil to move with just obfuscate anything that was on infanticide were unknown... respect to the magnet, inducing there. If I were an intelligent en- There is truth in this despite the Ghost detectors a current in the wire. Since the tity attempting to communicate notorious immorality of the area, point of capturing EVP is that with someone who may or may but the truth is simple – most Lye Ghostwatch [FT347:16] express- one hears sounds on the playback not know what they’re looking Wasters kept pigs and if there ing a healthy scepticism towards that weren’t apparent at the time for, I would not attempt any form chanced to be a superfluous byba the “machine which could detect of recording, one can reasonably of speech; it would be much more the family pig was kept on short demons and poltergeists” got infer that any paranormally de- sensible to draw attention to my- commons for a day or so then the me thinking about Electronic rived signal that appears on the self via some simple, structured child (somehow) chanced to fall Voice Phenomena.The device playback was generated directly transmission, such as Morse code into the sty and in half an hour described in the article as “an by electromagnetic influence on or simply tapping out prime no coroner could have found any electrical gadget generating loud the recording device, rather than numbers. remains to ‘sit upon’”. static and white noise through an by vibrating the air at an audible Finally, there is the matter Thus wrote Walter B Wood- audio output fed into earphones” frequency. This seems plausible of signal processing. Listening gate in Reminiscences of an Old strikes me as rather reminiscent given the numerous instances to white noise and attempting Sportsman (1909), as quoted in an

72 FT350 www.forteantimes.com letters

excellent article on the Lye in The is something for which we pay a off by the substance, to enter the itualism in 19th century Britain Blackcountryman 49/4 (Autumn dreadful price in terms of broken person’s body in any way” (www. was linked to the high mortality 2016) by Eric Pritchard. Immedi- lives and unfulfilled potential. legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2016/2/ rates of life in early industrial ately after this quote is one from There is ample evidence the situa- section/2/enacted). societies; secondly, that the post- the Revd Sabine Baring Gould, tion is worsening, recent research David V Barrett WWII culture of UFO sightings whose long-forgotten Nebo the into the increasing rates of self- London was related to the “transformative Nailer (1902) is set in that same harm amongst teenage girls being potential” of the rapid technologi- location: “... on the Waste Moor the latest in a catalogue of alarm- ABC lore cal advances in this era (and the from time immemorial [there ing statistics. Although I would subsequent expansion of the hu- were] two or three families of he- take issue with some aspects of Aficionados of alien/anomalous man imagination into outer space reditary cripples. It was generally Mike Jay’s book – for example it big cat lore [FT344:20-25] may be due to the ‘shrinking’ of the Earth, supposed that they were without is a debatable whether our ap- interested in a distinctly fortean thanks to advances in scientific backbones, but this, of course, proach to irrationality is any more discussion of the topic in a main- knowledge). was not the case.Their backbones rational than that of our predeces- stream source: Feral, a 2013 book Building on these precursors, were contorted and... they ran sors – it is an essential read, an at- by prominent UK environmental- Monbiot posits that ABC sightings about for the most part on their tempt to humanise a set of issues ist and activist George Monbiot. are manifestations of a cultural hands and knees and displayed at the core of a dreadful malaise The book is a lyrical scientific and desire for a more primal engage- extraordinary powers of rapid that must be addressed. cultural discussion of the environ- ment with nature in our current locomotion in this manner”. Tony Creedon mental principle of ‘rewilding’, the era of ‘over-civilisation’: “As our There is much more of this sort By email remaking of degraded landscapes lives have become tamer and more of thing in The Blackcountryman and ecosystems into contemporary predictable, as the abundance and article – the Lye was a strange Illegal incense ‘wild’ spaces. In amidst discus- diversity of nature have declined, place indeed back then. I’m happy sions of many interesting topics as our physical challenges have to report that, although when he So far as I can see, every Catholic (such as the fact that the branch diminished to the point at which was a child my husband’s next church in the land has been break- design of many British tree species the greatest trial of strength and door neighbours still kept a pig, ing the law since 29 May 2016 may have evolved as a response ingenuity we face is opening a bad- the custom of feeding children to because of the new Psychoactive to the depredations of prehistoric ly designed packet of nuts, could them seems to have died out by Substances Act 2016. In 2015 I European elephants), Monbiot has these imaginary creatures have then. Nor does my husband get wrote a report in the Catholic a chapter entitled ‘The Never- brought us something we miss?”. around on all fours. Herald: www.catholicherald.co.uk/ Spotted Leopard’, dealing with He surmises that the cats “hint at Rosemary Pardoe news/2015/09/21/legal-highs-bill- ABC sightings in the UK. Begin- an unexpressed wish for lives wild- Hoole, Chester that-could-lead-to-banning-of-in- ning by relating his meeting with a er and fiercer than those we now cense-criticised-by-christian-bod- seemingly impeccable ABC witness lead”, this wish taking the form of An essential read ies/. I got a wonderful quotation (a county council officer and ex- large felines as such beasts, being from the great Professor David policeman), Monbiot expresses an one of the main predators of early For me a highlight of each Fortean Nutt, the former Government epistemological position similar to hominids, are deeply rooted in the Times is the book review section. “drugs tsar”, who said the Bill is Jerome Clark’s notion of experi- collective genetic memory of our The reviews are by and large “so poorly thought through that it ence anomalies [FT243:42-47]: he species as symbols of nature ‘red in thoughtful and thought-provoking is embarrassing to think educated believes that most witnesses are tooth and claw’. and their range impressive. I was politicians would support it. By truthful in relating their big cat While it is a relatively brief therefore disappointed with the targeting people’s mental and sightings and experiences, but also chapter, I was struck by Monbiot’s review of Mike Jay’s This Way moral wellbeing, this Bill is the believes that the cats themselves open-minded approach towards Madness Lies [FT348:57].Though worst since the Act of Supremacy are non-existent, due to the lack of the paranormal and non-material- elegantly written, it was little in 1559 banned the practice of the physical evidence for them. istic solution to the mystery (ABCs more than a partial synopsis and Catholic faith.” After a potted history of the as ‘experiential manifestations of an articulation of some of the A government minister wrote ABC phenomenon (with Merrily the social imaginary’ not being a book’s apparent conclusions, when to churches last year: “The use of Harpur’s Mystery Big Cats serving typical topic in books about envi- so much could have been said incense in religious services will as a major reference point), Mon- ronmentalism!) about the perspective the author not be covered by the bill” (www. biot comes to a conclusion based Dean Ballinger takes and the wider context of theguardian.com/society/2015/ upon the psychosocial premise Hamilton, New Zealand the issues he raises. Although the oct/02/church-incense-not-includ- that “certain para- book is lacking in some areas – ed-psychoactive-substances-bill- normal phenom- particularly regarding the politics home-office). But if you examine ena afflict every of theVictorian asylums and their the Act, it’s not specifically society, and these continuing legacy – and highly exempted: www.legislation.gov. phenomena ap- selective in some of its narra- uk/ukpga/2016/2/schedule/1/en- pear to reflect our tive threads, it is nonetheless a acted and www.legislation.gov.uk/ desires; desires phenomenal piece of work that in ukpga/2016/2/schedule/2/enacted of which we may the wider context of the crisis of – so by definition it’s illegal. A not be fully con- mental health services demands well-meaning letter from a minis- scious”. He begins to be read by all concerned with ter doesn’t constitute law. by describing a the issues of madness and stigma- And one clause in the Act says: couple of histori- tisation and what these mean for “(3) For the purposes of this Act cal examples of our wider social wellbeing. a person consumes a substance such a process at

The book raises fundamental if the person causes or allows work: firstly, that ROL ISAACS CA issues.The mental health crisis the substance, or fumes given the rise of spir- “A re we there yet?”

FT350 73 www.forteantimes.com letters

SIMULACRA CORNER: WOODEN PERSONALITIES We are always glad to receive pictures of spontaneous forms and figures, or any curious images. Send them (with your postal address) to Fortean Times, PO Box 2409, London NW5 4NP or to [email protected].

John Cunningham photographed this intriguing face on a dead tree in Adam Chamberlain saw this owl while walking beside Osler Lake, near Padley Gorge, Derbyshire. Peterborough.

Adrian Parker came upon this frog face on a gnarled old oak tree near Buntingford in A creature emerging from a split willow tree in the water . meadows west of Salisbury, sent in by Colin Smith.

74 FT350 www.forteantimes.com Have you had strange experiences that you cannot explain? We are always interested in reading of odd events and occurrences. it happened to me… CONTACT US BY POST: FORTEAN TIMES, BOX 2409, LONDON, NW5 4NP OR E-MAIL TO [email protected] Or post your message on the www.forteantimes.com message board.

First-hand accounts from FT readers and browsers of www.forteantimes.com

Meeting Nicola black helmet with a darkened visor. I couldn’t see his face but could I have kept an irregular journal and just make out the white of his eyes. have jotted down some of the more I was terrified. I hadn’t heard the notable incidents and at quiet times bike. Even if he had pushed it along it pleases me to flick through the the 150 yards of the pot-holed dirt now yellowing pages and reminisce. track we were on I would have heard One experience bothers me so something. I thought it might be much that not one day goes past her boyfriend or an over-protective without my thinking about it. The brother. ‘Frank,’ said Nicola. ‘Do following is an almost verbatim copy you just want to go on, I won’t be a of my journal entry, itself a copy of minute.’ the original notes I jotted down im- “Relieved, I gladly walked to the mediately after the event but which end of the lane, some 20 yards, have since been lost: where it turned to the right and “A t approximately 8:30am [on behind a big oak. I glanced back 21 June 1983] I left ––Dudley Road only once and then waited behind to walk along the River Thames the tree for a minute. Curious to get to Walton Bridge and the ‘Cowey another look at the bike and biker, I Sale’. I was hoping to see my friend popped my head around the corner. Joe–––, who was selling ice cream “The hairs all was gorgeous, I thought, and must There was no one there. for the summer. When I arrived at have been chatted-up so many “Refusing to accept anything approximately 9am his van was no- over my body times before; surely she must have supernatural, I strained my eyes and where to be seen. I decided to wait been aware of the dangers of going ears and sprinted (I am an 11 sec- and while I did so I walked along stood on end as off with strangers… and yet here ond 100 metre runner) to the end of the bank of the river, away from she was, alone, with a stranger (me) the lane and the 100 yard climb up the bridge and up to where there if I’d touched a in a dark (even though it was day), a hill where the lane joins the main was a sloping concrete launch for secluded spot. The hairs all over my road. Nothing and nobody was to be boats. I then turned and looked for live wire...” body stood on end as if I’d touched seen… and then I realised: Where my friend’s van which I expected/ a live wire and I stopped. I then – was the dog? It hadn’t followed us hoped to be parked in the car park to walk back home again. After just and I really don’t know why – asked on our romantic walk. We had left it and the usual spot. He had still a few strides I decided to go back the first thing that came into my in the water. I ran to the spot on the to arrive. The day was cloudy and and have a chat… from what I had head: ‘Do you know why the 23rd is bank. Nothing.” brisk and I decided that the weather seen she seemed quite attractive! I called mid-summer although today The account goes on to say how had put him off coming down to opened with the line: is the Solstice?’ I ran back home and then to my his pitch. I started to wander back ‘Hi, are you an art student on “It was a pathetic question. It cousin’s house, and how I described along the bank and home. Up to leave too?’ had come from nowhere and just everything that had happened. It this point, apart from the odd car ‘No,’ she said. ‘I’m just walking sounded stupid, but the affect it also states how for many years which had sped past, I had seen no my Nan’s dog.’ had on ‘Nicola’ was bizarre. She afterwards – at the same time and other person along what is usually “The girl had jet-black hair, very stopped in her tracks and her face place – I visited the site… with noth- a busy stretch of the river. The only white, faultless skin and plump, full became contorted and angry. Her ing unusual occurring. people I could see were a couple of red lips. Her eyes were stunning and eyes narrowed to slits and her The incident was in all probability fishermen who had set up right next were a true emerald green, spar- nostrils flared. ‘Why are you asking insignificant; no one was harmed to the bridge. kling in the murky light and piercing. me this?’ she demanded. ‘Why do and there was no real consequence, “A fter walking about 50 yards Of the dog that was in the water I you think I would know that? Do you but it was real. I actually touched from the concrete launch, I heard could only see its head. It was large, think I know?’ Nicola (albeit with my shoulder). I felt a loud ‘splash’ coming from behind menacing and black. We contin- “I was shocked, stunned and very that she was no phantasm, no prod- me on the left and the river. Think- ued chatting by the bank and she disturbed. I really did think I was uct of an overactive imagination, but ing it might be a large fish, I turned revealed that her name was Nicola with an escaped mental patient. I I don’t know what she was… and it and went to investigate. A fisher- and that she lived in Streatham. I was very scared even though I was frustrates me so. I came so close, man myself (and a lifelong visitor then suggested that if she had noth- 12 stone and heavily muscled and so close to finding out about some- along these banks), I knew the ing on we should go for a walk. She she was slim and of average height. thing which we are, it appears, not sound was coming from a small, agreed and I thought I was ‘in’. There was an awkward silence that allowed to know; fifth-dimensional semi-circular area of the bank that “We crossed over the road and seemed to last ages as we stepped beings, aliens, fairy folk? I consider had been worn away and allowed headed to Broadwater Lake, a great two or three paces forward. Sud- the facts and memories every day fishermen to wade out into the fishing spot for tench ande alak denly she turned round and said: and I will go to my grave without ever water quietly without having to step that was supposed to have been ‘Oh, hi, you’re here?’ knowing the answer… but the fact down into the river from the bank. created by Capability Brown. The “I turned and looked over my left that I came so close bothers me To my shock – I had only passed the chat was light and jovial and we shoulder and stumbled as I looked more than you can know. spot moments before – standing brushed shoulders as we walked. at something which wasn’t possible. Hopefully this letter will help ex- on the shingle was a girl, probably ‘Nicola’ seemed to be very relaxed. Immediately behind us, no more punge my feeling of having guessed a couple of years younger than me It was as we approached the end than a yard, was a giant of a man the six numbers and then lost the (18/19), bending down and looking of the rough, rutted lane which led standing astride a hefty black and ticket. out at a dog that was swimming in to the lake that I suddenly became chrome motorbike. He was dressed Francesco Scannella the water. I turned away and started very uneasy in her company. She in all black leathers and wore a Walton on Thames, Surrey

FT350 75 www.forteantimes.com STRANGE AND SENSATIONAL STORIES FROM

JAN BONDESON presents more sensational stories and startling Victorian images from the "worst newspaper in England" – the Illustrated Police News.

leading human curiosities of 54. MARIAN, THE GIANT London. She was depicted in the Illustrated Police News, along with AMAZON QUEEN her manager William Holland, and her portrait appeared on all the theatre posters for Babil Marian Wedde was born on 31 January and Bijou. One of the few people 1866 in the village of Benkendorf in who disapproved of her was the Thüringen, Germany. Her parents theatrical critic Clement Scott, were ordinary German country people, who wrote: “Suppose it had the father working as a fireman at been suggested to me that good a large distillery for spirits. She music would be put on one side, had nine brothers and sisters, all of good singers cold-shouldered, normal stature, but from an early age, beautiful ballets made a second Marian grew to be extremely tall. A consideration, our lovely English special stool had to be manufactured women rendered of no account, for her use at school. To prevent her singing, acting, decoration, head bumping into the low ceilings of spectacle, art, all made the farmhouse, she had to walk with subordinate to one abnormal a pronounced stoop. Once, she fell monster – well, I should have down heavily and hurt her ankle, an laughed the Barnum to scorn who injury leading to permanent lameness. had such faith in monstrosities In 1882, she was ‘discovered’ by and the eccentricity of the the German impresario Herr Kopf, English public. But, as it turns and exhibited for money in Berlin, out, I should have been extremely Hamburg and other cities. In July wrong. Mr William Holland, 1882, she was taken to London, where of the Alhambra Theatre, has the operetta Babil and Bijou at the proved that at any rate. He has Alhambra Theatre, Leicester Square, discovered in Germany a giantess had a part of an Amazon Queen who, massive, awkward, and purposely written for a gigantic actress. unwieldy as she is, has managed Marian spoke no English, but this to draw more people to the didn’t matter, since her role in the play Alhambra Theatre than have ever was a silent one. Dressed in an azure before been known to assemble tunic and a silver cuirass, she walked there at this time of year... No heavily about on stage, to audible one talks of anything else but admiration from the audience. A man Mr Holland’s giantess, with her of over six feet in height could easily amiable inexpressive face, her walk erect under her outstretched clumsy gait, and her speechless arm. Despite her size, she was not look of dismay. It does not unattractive: the theatrical critic amuse me to hear that she is still George Augustus Sala even wrote growing; I only pity the fate of that “Notwithstanding her colossal the poor girl so cruelly ill-used by height and build, she is very well Nature.” proportioned, and she is decidedly Marian carried on acting the handsome, possessing as she does the part of the Amazon Queen in true pre-Raphaelite maxillary angle.” Babil and Bijou throughout July Her English impresario Mr William and August 1882. In late August, Holland, of the Alhambra Theatre, pointed out to the journalists that since Marian was only 16 years old, she was LEFT: Marian the Giantess at the still growing. Alhambra Theatre, from the Illustrated Marian soon became one of the Police News, 29 July 1882. ANGE AND SENSATIONAL STORIES FROM

LEFT: Following Marian's appearance at the Alham- bra, the theatre burned down in december 1882; it was rebuilt and re- opened in 1884. BELOW: A handbill advertising Marian's appearance and pointing out that she "is still growing".

Liverpool, where she was joined by Herr Brostad, a giant who had just returned from Barnum’s circus in America, and by the midgets ‘Colonel Ulpta’ and ‘Major Tiny Tim’. Colonel Ulpta, who cracked jokes like a champion, and sang various comical

e iMAGes / GeTTy iMAGes songs, introduced AG Marian and her fellow performers to the gawping Liverpudlians; he of course pointed out that she was still growing. After leaving

GuildhAll librAry & ArT GAllery / heriT Liverpool in late May 1883, nothing was she held two receptions at the A Glasgow Herald journalist heard of Marian in the English Crystal Palace, in front of an found her handsome and papers for several months; there admiring crowd. The popular agreeable, although her hands were rumours that she had operetta carried on playing and feet were of an enormous been taken back to Germany throughout the remainder of size. Mr Holland introduced to be exhibited for money, or 1882, with the giantess taking her on stage, describing how that her health was failing. part in every performance. On she had been ‘discovered’ in Unfortunately, the latter rumour 3 December, she attended a Germany, and complimenting turned out to be true: Marian party at Marlborough House, her on her healthy appetite. died in Berlin on 22 January at the invitation of the Prince Marian remained in Glasgow 1884, just before her 18th and Princess of Wales. The for nearly a month, before birthday. The catchphrase ‘she is jocular Prince gave the young travelling on to Dundee and still growing’ was repeated even giantess a glass of champagne, Aberdeen. In February, she in her newspaper obituary, which and although she was normally was exhibited at the Newcastle added that her death had been a strict teetotaller, she emptied Town Hall; in March, at the somewhat unexpected and that it by Royal command. On Cutlers’ Hall in Sheffield. A she had been under engagement 16 December, the Morning journalist from the Sheffield to proceed to America. Post carried the following & Rotherham Independent Poor Marian was finally advertisement “Wanted, a thought her good-looking and free from the people who had respectable young man to the Alhambra.” well proportioned, and most exploited her; she would be accompany Marian, the Giant Marian’s provincial tour began pleasant in conversation, during spared the heartless stares from Amazon Queen, on her tour at the Trade’s Hall in Glasgow her six-month stay in London, the American sideshow ‘rubes’; through the provinces; must on 1 January 1883. She wished her stature had increased by she had reached her final height make himself agreeable; liveries the audience a Happy New four inches. In May, Marian in life, and would be growing no found. Apply to Mr W Holland at Year in a strong German accent. was at Reynolds’s Waxworks in more. reader info Why Fortean? how to subscribe ANNUAL SUB of 12 issues (inc p&p) UK £39.98; EC £47.50; USA $89.99 ortean Times is a monthly of all apparent phenomena, coined ($161.98 for 24 issues); Rest of World £55. Visit http://subscribe.forteantimes.com/ to subscribe online. magazine of news, reviews the term ‘teleportation’, and was F and research on strange perhaps the first to speculate that North America (US & Canada) phenomena and experiences, mysterious lights seen in the sky Subscribers should contact: IMS. 3330 Pacific Avenue, Suite 404, Virginia Beach, VA 23454, USA. Tel: 800-428 3003 (toll free); Fax: 757 428 6253; curiosities, prodigies and portents. might be craft from outer space. Or order online at www.imsnews.com. It was founded by Bob Rickard However, he cut at the very roots of UK, Europe & rest of world in 1973 to continue the work of credulity: “I conceive of nothing, in Major credit cards accepted. Cheques or money orders should be in sterling, (1874–1932). religion, science or philosophy, that preferably drawn on a London bank and made payable to Dennis Publishing. Born of Dutch stock in Albany, is more than the proper thing to Mail to: Fortean Times Dovetail Services, 800 Guillat Avenue, Kent Science New York, Fort spent many years wear, for a while.” Park, Sittingbourne, ME9 8GU, UK. NB: This address should be used for orders and subscriptions only. researching scientific literature in Fort was by no means the first Telephone payments and queries: 0844 844 0049. the New York Public Library and person to collect anomalies and Fax payments and queries: 0844 815 0866. the British Museum Library. He oddities – such collections have E-mail payments and queries: [email protected] marshalled his evidence and set abounded from Greece to China how to submit forth his philosophy in The Book of since ancient times. Fortean Times the Damned (1919), New Lands keeps alive this ancient task of Dennis Publishing reserves all rights to reuse material submitted by FT (1923), Lo! (1931), and Wild Talents dispassionate weird-watching, readers and contributors in any medium or format. (1932). exploring the wild frontiers between Illustrations He was sceptical of scientific the known and the unknown. Contact the art director by email ([email protected]) before sending explanations, observing how From the viewpoint of samples of work. We cannot guarantee to respond to unsolicited work, scientists argued according to their mainstream science, its function is though every effort will be made to do so. own beliefs rather than the rules elegantly stated in a line from Enid Article submissions of evidence and that inconvenient Welsford’s book on the mediæval Please send all submissions to David Sutton, Editor, Fortean Times, data were ignored, suppressed, fool: “The Fool does not lead a PO BOX 71602, London E17 0QD, UK or email drsutton@forteantimes. discredited or explained away. revolt against the Law; he lures us com. As we receive a large volume of submissions, a decision may not be immediate. He criticised modern science for into a region of the spirit where... its reductionism, its attempts to the writ does not run.” Letters Letters of comment or about experiences are welcome. Send to PO Box define, divide and separate. Fort’s Besides being a journal of 2409, London NW5 4NP, UK or email [email protected]. 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COMING Strange deathS NEXT UNUSUAL WAYS OF SHUFFLING OFF THIS MORTAL COIL

Five police officers in Ukraine were A manager with the BBC World Service killed by friendly fire during a botched threw herself in front of a train on operation to arrest burglars. The Hallowe’en after she said Star Wars MONTH overnight shoot-out between two sets of characters were contacting her. Anne police began when each side believed Barnsdale, 39, from Godalming in Surrey the other to be criminals. The gunfight said she was being “mindfucked” by the began when a burglar alarm went off Jedi. Her doctor, Steve Simons, said she by chance in the house next door to one had described having “weird thoughts” but being staked out by two undercover policemen. “recognised herself this as fiction and was not A separate unit then arrived to investigate the delusional or psychotic at the time.” She had alarm, in the small town of Knyazhychi near recently returned to work after having a daughter, Kiev, and detained the pair, mistaking them for but was not suffering post-natal depression, an robbers. But the back-up unit for the two men inquest in Woking heard. Sun, D.Mirror, 17 Dec apparently feared they had been confronted by 2016. the thieves and tried to rescue them. Interior ministry adviser Anton Herashchenko said those Anton Yelchin, 27, an actor best known for playing suspected of being the real burglars – who were Pavel Chekov in the most recent series of Star Trek nearby – heard the gun battle and fled in two films, was killed by his car on 19 June 2016 after it vehicles, but were arrested soon afterwards in rolled back and pinned him against a brick mailbox Kiev. BBC News, 4 Dec 2016. pillar beside his steep driveway in Studio City, the man of tomorrow The Gang of Fort is reminded of a 1970 UPI Los Angeles. The 2.5-ton Jeep Grand Cherokee the time-traveller who wire report that Studs Terkel had on his wall: was found in neutral with the engine running, “Police battled a gang of bandits in southern and police didn’t know why he had got out of the would be president Thailand Saturday. A police spokesman said the vehicle. Eve. Standard, 20 June; D.Telegraph, battle began when the bandit gang, disguised 20+21 June 2016. as policemen, challenged a group of policemen disguised as bandits.” At least 62 people died in the Siberian city of Irkutsk after drinking a bath essence called Gillian Sandle, 62, died when her scarf became Boyaryshnik (Hawthorn); more than 30 others caught in the wheel of a beach buggy in Havant, were seriously ill and only half were expected Hampshire. Passersby attempted to give her CPH to survive. The victims were poor people, aged before paramedics took her to hospital, where between 35 and 50, and were not drinking she was pronounced dead. This reminded us of together. The hawthorn-scented liquid was the tragic demise of the dancer Isadora Duncan consumed as if it were alcohol. Boyaryshnik in Nice in 1927, memorably portrayed in Ken labels said the content was 93 per cent spirit; Russell’s 1966 TV film about her. D.Telegraph, 21 but it was found to contain methanol, a toxin Dec 2016. found in antifreeze, that causes blindness and death. Analysts say up to 12 million Russians away with the fairies An amorous young couple died from carbon drink cheap surrogate alcohol, including monoxide poisoning while having sex in a car after perfume, aftershave, antifreeze and window the taking oF dr moore and turning on the ignition to keep warm. It is believed cleaner. Twelve people have been arrested in how he returned the couple, Artem S and Anna D, from Ufa in south- an investigation that has seen 1,500 premises central Russia’s Republic of Bashkortostan, went searched and thousands of bottles of spirits into a lockup garage being used to renovate the confiscated. While poisoning from alcohol is car. They had been having dinner in Artem’s home common, the Siberian Times said the Irkutsk + and told his family they were going for a walk. incident was “now the worst such case in modern When they didn’t return, worried family launched Russian history”. BBC News, 19+21 Dec 2016. least haunted, a search and found their naked bodies in each funeral museum, other’s arms inside the car. (Sydney) D.Telegraph, Dora Linda Nishihara, 69, an off-duty Sheriff’s (Queensland) Courier-Mail, 12 Nov 2016. Deputy, died after her car fell into a 12ft (3.6m) premature geniuses, sinkhole filled with water in San Antonio, Texas, and muCh mOre… Darrell Ward, 52, one of the stars of History on 4 December. The flow of water in the sinkhole Channel’s hit show Ice Road Truckers, died in a was caused by a ruptured sewer line. A second plane crash in Montana on 28 August. Suggesting vehicle also fell into the hole and two other people the cosmic trickster’s black humour, Ward was on were hurt. The driver of the second vehicle was his way to begin filming a documentary about the rescued by a witness, but Ms Nishihara’s vehicle Fortean recovery of plane wreckage. The Cessna 182 was had flipped on to its roof and was completely trying to land at Rock Creek Airstrip, a few miles submerged. [AP] BBC News, Independent online, 6 southeast of Missoula, but crashed ahead of the Dec 2016. runway. Both Ward, who was later identified as the pilot, and his co-pilot were killed in the crash. David Kervin, 51, was killed at 3.15am on 30 TIMES perezhilton.com, 29 Aug 2016. November in Indian Harbour Beach, Florida, when his motorised bicycle struck a turtle. Investigators A woman died in Caranavi, Bolivia, on New Year’s spotted the injured turtle several feet away. Eve after being mistaken for a car thief and tied to “[Kervin] apparently suffered a head injury and a tree infested with Brazilian fire ants. The 52-year- was already deceased when we arrived,” said a old was rescued by police but died in hospital fire worker. “It appeared he hit the turtle.” The 351 from breathing problems caused by severe throat small box turtle survived the crash with a minor swelling after her windpipe was bitten by the crack in the bottom of its shell, and managed to insects. Sun online, 5 Jan 2017. crawl away. Florida Today, 30 Nov 2016. ON SALE 2 mArch 2017 WhWhyNyNotot Be Be AWAWriter?riter?

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