ARCHIVAL UPDATES: OUT OF THIS WORLD

As our inaugural entry for 2026, John Macklin's classic Forteana collection Out of This World is now available to read and download at archive dot org! Here's a teaser chapter on "The Maltese Monster!"

Macklin was a bit of a mystery himself, as this article by cryptozoologist Karl Shuker attests: Loch Watten's Missing Monster - Whatever Happened to Wattie? 

Shuker attempts to fact check a random lake monster from a book by Peter Haining and falls down a rat hole of fabricated monsters and pseudonymous Fortean recycling which leads to Macklin! The saga continues in a series of updates to the article:

UPDATE #4
On 8 May 2010, I received a fourth response to my enquiry for Wattie information. This time it was a highly illuminating email from none other than [Fortean Time’s] own Paul Sieveking, who informed me that John Macklin was indeed a pseudonym – but not of Peter Haining! Instead, it was one of many pen-names used by another author of popular-format writings on mysteries – Tony James. The plot thickens! So did Tony James originate the storyline for the Wattie tale, or is there an even earlier version out there somewhere that he had read? If anyone has current contact information for James, I’d like to hear from you!

This twisting lake monster mystery is a suitable end to the Year of the Snake, and Macklin's Out of This World is a suitable reminder of where we've come from on the blog. Here's to more, worse, and better in the new year!

Courtesy Ace Books, 1972.

STRANGE WORLD: Monsters Along the Mississippi

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Monsters along the Mississippi ... and in Minnesota and Washington, too! It's another edition of Brad Steiger's "Strange World" column, with Brad recycling the Fremont, WI monster from his pseudonymous 1969 title The Abominable Snowmen, though he's off by one year on when it occurred according to his own original telling. Meanwhile, Warren Smith also used this anecdote in his own Strange Abominable Snowmen from 1970, and correctly dates it to 1968.

Everyone and their mother has written about the Minnesota Iceman, of course, and here Brad relays some of exhibitor Frank Hansen's evolving excuses/explanations for the creature. We're at the point where Hansen was claiming to have shot the monster dead himself in the Minnesota woods, which makes for a convenient cover story on why he's so reluctant to let the supposed corpse be properly analyzed. Nice sideshow zigzagging, Frank!

Brad finishes up with a 1970 Bigfoot expedition by National Wildlife magazine, headed by editor George Harrison. Harrison wrote his own account of this trip as "On the Trail of Bigfoot," for the October-November 1970 issue.

"AHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"

Clipped from the Santa Clarita Valley Signal, June 5th, 1972.

ARCHIVAL UPDATES: STRANGE ENCOUNTERS WITH GHOSTS & WEIRD UNSOLVED MYSTERIES

Two more by Brad Steiger are now available to read and download: Weird Unsolved Mysteries (as Eric Norman) and Strange Encounters With Ghosts, from Award Books and Popular Library, respectively. These are two of Brad's better books, with juicy stories and good organization, so check 'em out!

Original reviews are here and here.

STRANGE WORLD: Midwest Monster

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Here's a copy of Brad Steiger's syndicated "Strange World" column from the early '70s, which was "carried in 80 American newspapers and publications around the world." Here Brad reuses a Bigfoot story from prior work and adds a newer story on top.

Steiger had previously used the first story of the student outside Rochester, MN, in New UFO Breakthrough with Joan Whritenour, and The Abominable Snowmen, writing as Eric Norman. In these books the student is christened "Bob." The second tale is from 1970 and so postdates those works, though it does turn up alongside Bob's tale in a chapter on "Ghost Monsters of the Midwest" in 1972's Strange Encounters With Ghosts. In terror tale number two, truck driver John Hartsworth describes the creature he saw (and Mike Busby tangled with!) as looking like "a giant cat running on its hind legs" ... yowza!

Close up on that little scamp

Clipped from the Santa Clarita Valley Signal, March 3rd, 1972.

ESP AND YOU by Susy Smith

"An incubus is as good an excuse for hanky-panky as has even been invented."

Macfadden-Bartell's classy cover hides one sexy journey into the unknown from that "girl with the improbable name" (I still haven't figured out what that's supposed to mean) Susy Smith, as she uncovers incubi, succubi, ghost lovers, and mass sexual hysteria from the middle ages to modern day suburbia! That's only a part of her exploration of ESP, but man is it a heady brew to lead with.

Smith covers multiple cases of nuns (and Mohammedan girls too!) succumbing to sexual mania, lest we think the literature doesn't support the existence of incubi. Modern housewives and widows aren't immune either, though sometimes Smith says it's hard to tell whether they're being visited by departed lovers or by demons. This is one reason she advises against Ouija boards, as any old demon can call themselves whatever they want when you're pushing the planchette around. She also questions how many "genuine" cases of possession or visitation it really takes to kick off a fad or mania from otherwise unaffected ladies.

Smith carries on with a racy theme through subjects such as ESP in twins, with showgirls Lou and Lee Gerick explaining their psychic connection: once they even purchased identical all white outfits at the same time, despite the two of them being separated in Idaho and Hollywood!

Twins Lou and Lee ... or is it Lee and Lou?

Picture from a 1964 USO show they did.

Their card!

Smith outlines Freud and Jung's ESP experiences, cites heavily from Aldous Huxley's The Devils of Loudun, and interviews a man developing his ESP through LSD under the pseudonym Melvin Mallory. Poltergeists, witches, and vampires all come in for guest roles as well, with Smith very interested in the interplay between psyche, culture, and forces from beyond - how much of any given phenomenon is culturally expressed, or projected out from one's self, or otherwise influenced in ways we might not appreciate?

After so much steamy research, Smith has to assure us that the psychically gifted aren't just a bunch of perverts, though "still, all in all, Nandor Fodor found a lot of psychics who were weirdos!" And there's always Aleister Crowley, too!

According to Fodor's research, Smith tells us that spirits and demons can change one's sexual orientation through possession, leading to lesbianism and homosexuality in heterosexual mediums! Smith also hedges that perhaps these are cases of repressed feelings. Throughout this text, Smith comes back to the idea that no matter what strange forces may be at work, we are all human after all.

Susy includes a nice bibliography in her usual practice, though her discernment as to the quality of various sources may be a bit lacking at times - she admits as much when repeating somewhat shaky stories such as the fraudulent medium Eusapia Palladino, who Smith believes possessed genuine powers while still resorting to trickery from time to time. Sometimes, Smith says, we just can't be sure as to the true facts of a case and can only take people at their word, and she concludes that many of the stories she's covered are just too subjective to prove something one way or the other.

Smith also cites cases and correspondence from her own previous books including World of the Strange, previously reviewed at this blog.

She ends her saucy psychic tour with some final words from author R. Dewitt Miller:

ESP and You is available to read and download at archive dot org.

Macfadden-Bartell Books, 1972

CRASH GO THE CHARIOTS by Clifford Wilson, M.A., B.D., Ph.D.

Zip, bang, boom, and CRASH GO THE CHARIOTS! Lancer Books releases another anti-Chariots reader the same year as Popular Library's anthology Some Trust in Chariots, and like that volume you'd be hard pressed to guess the critical content given the packaging which promises more and greater revelations in the wake of von Daniken's ancient astronauts. But author Clifford Wilson isn't going to take any of von Daniken's nonsense lying down, and he's got mainstream and Biblical archaeology on his side - Wilson was a young earth creationist and proponent of Biblical truth who takes extreme issue with von Daniken's warping of basic historical facts as well as Biblical interpretations.

Wilson is especially incensed at von Daniken's slurring of archaeologists as a bunch of close minded, hidebound "experts" and describes his own experiences in the field working alongside both secular and religious minded researchers who were all professional enough to go where the facts lead ... Wilson just happens to thinks they lead to an inerrant Biblical truth and a geologically young earth!

Author Clifford Wilson (1923-2012)

These old school creationists can be quite logical in their own way, and Wilson's background allows him to neatly filet von Daniken's crimes against the Bible, including old standbys like Ezekiel's wheel, the atomic destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, and the electrified, positized, nuclearized Ark of the Covenant.

During his fact checking episodes Wilson also lays out how von Daniken structures his own shaky arguments: railing at those nasty "experts," leaving out established answers to his many "mysteries," and always ending things with a giant question mark - meaning that von Daniken never has to stand behind any of his arguments and can always retreat to claiming to be "just asking questions."

I've already remarked how Lancer packaged their anti-Chariots books without any critical clues on the covers, as if they were worried readers wouldn't seek out a skeptical perspective. It seems like nowadays we don't even really have this soft pedaled "mainstream" counter to von Daniken, as the various Ancient Aliens shows churn on for year after year and alternate perspectives are limited to specific "skeptic" outfits like CSI (formerly CSICOP) and authors like Jason Colavito. Even Wilson's evenhanded religiosity is a thing of the past, as Creationism has long since been subsumed into the larger partisan right wing evangelical culture. This work is a snapshot of a time gone by, just as it describes ancient history and dusty archives.

Brad Steiger pops up in the backpage ads with his book on Paul Twitchell and Eckankar, alongside Twitchell's own work, Aleister Crowley, and some other occult and astrology guides that Wilson surely wouldn't approve. Some big name science fiction and a couple of Exorcist cash-ins fill out the ads.

If footmen tire you, what will horses do? Crash Go the Chariots is available to read and download at archive dot org.

Lancer Books, 1972