Review: Charles Fort's Underrated Influence

The eccentric writer cast a long shadow, leaving a mark not only on the world of Bigfoot hunters and UFO buffs but in literature and radical politics.

Charles Fort lived a century ago but is still invoked fairly frequently today: the "inspired clown" (as the screenwriter and playwright Ben Hecht called him) who haunted the New York Public Library, collecting reports of anomalous events and devising wild theories to account for them.

Fort's influence after he died isn't as widely appreciated. But Joshua Blu Buhs makes a strong case in Think to New Worlds: The Cultural History of Charles Fort and His Followers that the eccentric writer cast a long shadow, leaving a mark not only on the world of Bigfoot hunters and UFO buffs but also in literature, where his fans stretched from the modernist avant garde to the science fiction pulps.

Fort had a political legacy too, if not in the mainstream left-right spectrum then on the outer edges of our ideological maps, where cartographers have scrawled "here there be dragons." A Fortean Society was formed near the end of Fort's life, and though Fort was wary of the group (he declared it a collection of "freaks"), its leader—the novelist and screenwriter Tiffany Thayer—kept it alive for decades. And while its members ranged from socialists to fascists, most had the anti-authoritarian impulses you'd expect from a group that touted its skepticism about everything. Thayer himself was a fierce pacifist (and prolific conspiracy theorist) who filled the Fortean publication Doubt with attacks on both World War II and the Cold War.

Buhs' engaging study displays the libertarian-leaning strains of Fort's following, from the San Francisco Renaissance to the Discordians, and it shows the milieu's less liberty-friendly sides as well. And it doesn't neglect the figures who rebuffed the Fortean Society. Thayer kept trying to get H.L. Mencken to join, for example, but Mencken considered Fort's work "highfalutin balderdash"—though he gave the man credit for managing "to make even the most extravagant nonsense palatable."

Comments

[Chumby]

Fortean Society you say? There’s some that would drink to that.

[CE]

There once was a society Fortean,
invented beside the accordion.
it outweighs a boulder,
the strap hurts your shoulder,
and that musical relic's Edwardian.

[Chumby]

There forty-an liquor of malt,
That sarcasmic oft would exalt,
He imbibed quite a few,
Then shilled for Act Blue,
A progressive, regressive death cult.

[Roberta]

I never attended the New York Forteans, but I did become friendly with their most prominent member, John Keel.

[MWAocdoc]

It's too bad enthusiasts gave such research a bad name. Looking for unexplained mysteries should be an honored profession. Trying to explain unexplained reports can - and has - led to scientific breakthroughs. The first step, of course, in any truly scientific endeavor is to verify the facts. The next step, generally, is to categorize them, looking for commonalities and possible explanations that can be tested empirically. The kooks tend to bypass those steps and jump straight to the conspiracy theories, chilling any possible serious efforts forever.

[CE]

The unexplained mysteries crowd is getting the last laugh.
Bigfoot, UFOs, Oak Island, ghosts and other unexplained mysteries now dominate the History Channel, the Science Channel, the Travel Channel, Discovery, etc., making wealthy celebrities out of the proponents, who only need to speculate and look for evidence they never find, week after week.

[Brandybuck]

Most of the "unexplained mysteries" were not mysteries at all. All of Fort's writing were anecdotes from the past that he credululously reported without the slightest hint of journalism. Just because someone told him something, does NOT mean it was true, or if it were true, unexplained.

The rain of meat! Turns out that vultures frequently vomit when startled. So it's highly unusual to wake up and see bits of meat scattered about the town square, but not not an "unexplained mystery". They didn't know that at the time, but didn't mean it was some sort of sign from God. Duh.

p.s. "Unexplained mysteries" is a redundancy, as by definition all mysteries are unexplained.

[Public Entelectual]

Mencken was far too kind.
Fort's ability "to make even the most extravagant nonsense palatable." set the stage for everything from Scientology to Tucker Carlson, who has invited UFO whisperers, climate cranks and antivaxxers to join him in chanting against consensus

[Brandybuck]

I'm old enough to remember when Art Bell was a slightly to the right late night commentator/talkshow. The Crank and Woo was only for this weekend shows.