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“Our Space Age,” written by Otto Binder and illustrated by Carl Pfeufer, was distributed by the Bell-McClure Syndicate from 1960 to 1969. The week of March 20, 1967, was devoted to material by John Keel, drawn particularly from his columns for the North American Newspaper Alliance. I hope you enjoy them!
Chapter 21 of Strange Creatures from Time and Space is devoted to “The Great Sea Serpent of Silver Lake, New York.” As readers may recall, John tells the story of an 1855 hoax, in which A. B. Walker, proprietor of the Walker House hotel, and a few co-conspirators, made a rubber lake monster to boost business. What’s more, it all happened in John’s home town, Perry.
This charming old postcard depicts the inflatable beast — although its actual appearance was probably much less spectacular.
Our old friend Mark Pilkington has a new book out, and it looks quite interesting. He’s started a blog to promote it, and to post material on its subject, “folklore and deception in the UFO age.” Take a look at www.miragemen.wordpress.com. It’s dedicated to Keel; and Mark has posted some relevant ruminations, as well as a photo that John took of Mark sitting in John’s favorite armchair. Congratulations, Mark!
An article entitled “Does NICAP Really Exist?” appeared in Saucer News #72, Summer 1968 (edited by Gray Barker), under the byline of “Winston F. Gardlebacher.”
The article attacks one of the more active UFO groups of the time, the “National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena.” “Gardlebacher” closely analyzes one of its financial statements, which he calls a “model of deception and padding”; compares the budget for postage and for UFO investigations, and charges that it’s really a mail-order business, selling memberships; and concludes, “It has failed as a lobby, as a publisher, and as a profit-making mail order business. It is mismanaged on all levels by untrained personnel…”
And who was “Gardlebacher”? I suspect Keel: the animosity to old-guard ufology and the close financial analysis are typical; he saved three copies of the issue, in one of which the article is clipped out; and the name is similar to such Keelian personae as Thaddeus T. Farnboggle and Thornton M. Vaseltarp. So — unless anyone out there can correct me — I’ll add it to John’s bibliography. Welcome aboard, Winston!
The Ullage Group (a loose collection of forteans and others) will mark the anniversary of John’s death with an event on Sunday, July 11, at 3 pm, at the Jalopy Theatre, 315 Columbia St., Brooklyn.
Some of John’s friends and fans, including Doug Skinner, Anthony Matt, Lisa Hirschfield, Larry “Ratso” Sloman, and probably others, will offer readings, audio and video clips, and other memorabilia from his long and sometimes unbelievable career. As usual at these Ullage Group events, we charge a pittance (a $5 pittance), just to cover our expenses. More info on Jalopy can be found at www.jalopy.biz, and on the Ullage Group at www.ullagegroup.com.
As I mentioned in an earlier post, John printed a number of flyers, ad sheets, and booklets in the 1980s — mostly for his own amusement. Here, for example, is that informative journal “The Unicorn Review,” in its entirety. Stand up and be counted!
John was a teetotaller most of his life. But here he is hoisting one with some friends back in 1963. Cheers!
The Fickle Finger of Fate (Fawcett, 1966) isn’t as well known as John’s other books, and may puzzle readers who know him only as a reporter of the unexplained. It’s the only novel he published under his own name (although he also used his real name for a number of short stories). It’s really more of a humor book than a novel: a spy and superhero spoof much like such TV shows of the time as “Batman” or “Get Smart,” or the broad take-offs of MAD magazine. In fact, there are exaggerated cartoon sound effects, like those in “Batman”:
and illustrations by veteran MAD cartoonist Al Jaffee:
Satyr-Man, a sexually insatiable superhero in a “jet-age plastic helmet,” battles G.Y.P. — “Global Yokel Put-On” — “the dastardly organization of international swindlers, smugglers, assassins, and hubcap thieves.” As you might suspect, his career is mostly farcical sex and slapstick violence. “Camp” and “kitsch” were the bywords then; in fact, even Jerry Siegel (see the last post) put out a paperback of High Camp Superheroes that same year. College humor magazines were filled with parodies like “Fratman” and “Captain Crud.”
As usual, John included some of his friends in cameos. Dick DeBartolo (prolific MAD writer) appears as a ship captain, since he was a boating enthusiast; and Paul Krassner (writer and editor of the satirical magazine The Realist) shows up as the ship’s “token atheist.”
There’s an interesting connection to Mothman in all of this. The creature was originally known as the Mason County Monster; and the popularity of camp superheroes — including Satyr-Man — probably inspired its re-christening as Mothman.
There was also a movie called The Fickle Finger of Fate in 1967. It starred Tab Hunter. I’ve never seen it; but the reviews I’ve read indicate that its plot owed nothing to John’s book.
By the way, the British edition had a different cover. Here it is:
As John’s 1965 résumé mentions, he wrote scripts for comic books in the late ’40s and early ’50s. One of the editors he worked with was Jerry Siegel, one of the creators of Superman — as John recalled, this was a thrill for him, since he’d been a Superman fan as a boy.
Much comic book work of the time was strictly buyouts without bylines, so John’s work is hard to trace. However, his own file of published material included this copy of Cinderella Love #10, published in 1950 by Ziff-Davis, and edited by Siegel.
Elly Graham falls hard for Clay Rickard, a carefree and unsuccessful artist. But then she finds out that he has a rich family and a fiancée, and flees, eyes streaming. By the fifth page, they’ve reconciled; his paintings are selling; and she accepts his marriage proposal as she melts into his arms. John, of course, lived in Greenwich Village, and loved the neighborhood and its history.
Here’s the rest of it, as well as a short story John wrote for the same comic, “Love’s Confession,” with his marginal comments. (more…)
Here for you to ponder is John’s résumé, from 1965. At this time, he was working mostly in television, and had only dabbled a bit in ufology. All that was about to change!
And there are a couple of mysteries here. I’ve found no trace of the two novels; although John had mentioned them to me a couple of times. Were they working titles for Three Women and Town Tease? “Midtower Books,” too, might have been a provisional name for Midwood Books (a division of Tower), which published those two; at any rate, I can find no info on it. Nor have I a clue to what happened to Snooperscope or World of the Living Dead.
Maybe some of you pop culture mavens out there can clear all this up…
ADDENDUM: Further rummaging through John’s papers has confirmed that Bed of Nails was indeed the original title for Three Women.
The script for “Snooper Scope” has also turned up. It seems to have been a cartoon about a detective, Snooper Scope, and his three assistants, Billy, Pokey, and Flutter, who prevent the evil Disc Spicable from stealing all the water in the world. It was written for Copri Films (not Copril), a company that specialized in dubbing and distributing Japanese animation; so I suspect John wrote his script for that purpose. I swapped a few e-mails about it with animation historian Jerry Beck, who never heard of it. It looks as if Snooper and his pals may not have made it to production or distribution.
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