Fortean Times is the largest UK-based publication specialising on unusual tales. It is the brainchild of Bob Rickard, starting publication in 1973 as "The News", later becoming "Fortean Times" in 1976.
But what is "Fortean"?
Fortean is a term to encompass all sorts of anomalous phenomena, not to dissimilar from "high stangeness". The term is inspired by the work of Charles Fort, a New York researcher specialising in such oddities. Truly a man after my own heart, his work formed a cult following, creating an entire genre of research and reporting into weirdness, which, to this day, bears his name. Unfortunatelly, he died at 57 in The Bronx. Truly, living there must have been a fate worse than death.
Why are you publishing the articles here, cap?
It's fun! It's an interesting challenge trying to re-create the layout of a magazine as a website. Plus, these are stories I find interesting, so I would love to share them with others. Users who may already have access to the issues containing articles presented here will have the benefit of a fully hypertextualised version of the article they read! I intend to link archives of news articles referenced, any peculiarities which readers could use with further reading on, as well as make my own personal notes on the subject. This project aims to truly bring these articles into the hypertext era by emplyoing the tools availabe to weave each article into a greater tapestry of knowledge.
If you enjoy that which you read about on here, and wish to discuss it with others, I have linked the Fortean Forums above! I think it would be neat if they got some more traffic. DO NOT, HOWEVER mention this page to them. This is an exclusive club for those who find it organically. Keep it that way ;)
Also attached is a glossary for aiding with the understanding of terms that may require background knowledge.
"New" articles, pulled from my Fortean Times collection, will be added each Friday, with the occasional Fortean Wednesday article thrown in as a bonus every now and then. I hope you enjoy, and manage to derive some use out of this, one way or another!
Yours Truly,
capstasher