Fortean Times, named after maverick American writer Charles Fort, is one of the world’s most individual and best loved magazines. For over 35 years FT has been chronicling the stranger side of life, delivering a heady mix of weird world news, up-to-date reports and features on every aspect of the unexplained: myths, monsters, ghosts and UFOs rub shoulders with ancient wonders and future science, while expert columnists bring you the latest on everything from cryptozoology to conspiracy theory. Open-minded, well informed and maintaining a healthy sense of humour, FT is the only place to go for a sensible look at our mad planet – it will change the way you see the world.
Fortean Times
POLTERGEISTS AND PORTALS
A MINIATURE MYSTERY • Why did the “tiny humanoid-shaped figure” cross the road?
NAVY’S ‘SCIENCE FICTION’ PATENTS • Is the technological research of Dr Salvatore Cezar Pais gibberish or genius?
COVID CORNER • The WHO provides China with a PR coup, while Dorset Knob throwers are cancelled
SIDELINES…
MEDICAL BAG • Mushroommalady, Indian illness, lurcher’s limp, and the man with a penis on his arm
DANISH DICK DRAMA • Prehensile penis sparks children’s TV controversy
CLASSICAL CORNER • FORTEANA FROM THE ANCIENT WORLD COMPILED BY BARRY BALDWIN
ARCHÆOLOGY • PAUL SIEVEKING admires a long-lost royal figurine, some trippy cave art and some lockdown finds
Spaceship ‘Oumuamua? • DAVID HAMBLING reports on the latest controversy caused by our recent interstellar visitor
SIGNAL FROM SPACE • Does a mysterious radio signal from Proxima Centauri mean that ET is calling? Plus, teleportingmouse brains
Gentlemen prefer ghosts • ALAN MURDIE finds Marilyn Monroe continues to haunt Hollywood locations from beyond the grave
ALIEN ZOO • KARL SHUKER investigates the mystery of a South American macaw on a Roman mosaic
MISTAKEN IDENTITY • Sex party mix-ups, a furry false alarm, and the strange case of the woman the French authorities insist is dead
M is for mantis and missile • NIGEL WATSON surveys the latest sightings and ufological news from around the world
The art of saucery • JENNY RANDLES looks back at half a century of attempts to render the UFO experience in images
THE BATTERSEA POLTERGEIST • DR CIARAN O’KEEFFE takes a fresh look at a ‘cold case’ that has baffled investigators for decades. Between 1956 and 1968, a normal family home at 63 Wycliffe Road in Battersea, south London, became the centre of an astonishing and frequently terrifying array of phenomena focused on a 15-year-old girl called Shirley Hitchings. Could this be Britain’s best poltergeist case?
PARAPSYCHOLOGY AND THE POLTERGEIST
DONALD LIVES: EVELYN HOLLOW ON SHIRLEY AND THE MEDIA
THE BATTERSEA POLTERGEIST 1956-1968
THE HIDDEN SIDE OF THE PRADO • The links between the artistic and the esoteric have been the subject of much interest in recent years, and nowhere more so than Spain, where Javier Sierra’s bestselling novel The Master of the Prado has brought ‘occulture’ out of the shadows. CLIVE PRINCE travelled to Madrid for a personal tour of the Museum with Javier, exploring the borderlands between artistic practice and arcane meaning.
GIANTS IN THE EARTH • Did fallen angels once disobey God, descend to Earth and mate with mortal women to produce a race of gigantic beings? TED HARRISON explores our fascination with the mysterious Nephilim of the Bible, which now finds expression in fantasy fiction, Internet hoaxes and alien conspiracy theories.
ONE FOOT IN THE GRAVE • In search of the crooked general who lost a leg in history’s ultimate food-fight, SD TUCKER follows in the footsteps of a master of Magical Realism, finding in Latin America a region so full of mad...