Monster Rambles 19 : The Unexplained Magazine
The third part in the paranormal entertainment of Dansmonsters Childhood!
Hi everybody, here is the final post in my Strange Tales of Dansmonsters Paranormal Childhood entertainment trilogy!
The Unexplained Magazine. This was an incredibly popular magazine that was published in the UK by Orbit Publishers between 1980 and 1983 and ran for a total of 157 issues. It was a must-read among my friends at the time, much like the Peter Underwood Ghost Hunters book that I spoke about last time, and Arthur C. Clarke's Mysterious World .
Published at a time when magazines were king, and in a world without the internet and all its add-ons, conspiracy theories, and way too much information didn’t exist, it was a “just the facts” approach to explaining UFOs, ghosts, Bigfoot, and all other mysteries of the mind, space, and time, as the cover said. It dealt with many things, including (big breath) UFOs, the Bermuda Triangle, ghosts, spontaneous human combustion, the Cottingley Fairies, ancient knowledge, sea monsters, the Yeti, weird coincidences, stone circles, contact with the dead, and notable historical characters linked to the occult. Plus much, much more!
Published as a journal, every week, each issue continued the page numbering from page 1. So, 157 issues, 26 volumes, making about 3,768 pages in total! Each volume could be collected in a leather-style cover that you purchased from Orbit, making it look like a large encyclopedia on your shelf! It had several different articles inside, full of black and white and colour imagery.
The magazine series started at the same time as Arthur C. Clarke’s Mysterious World TV series on ITV, which was a big hit. Someone in the marketing department at Orbit even knew or just got lucky as the magazine became incredibly popular, usually selling out pretty quickly! The first issue came with the second free and a flexi disc of recordings of EVP (electronic voice phenomena). It had a black folder encasing the first two issues. We all collected it, and at 50p an issue (£2.50 in today’s money), it was cheap entertainment! I often took a few issues to read in the car on our summer holidays to Cornwall. I’m sure I would not have read all the articles, as they were pretty dense and had small type, packing a lot in. Articles had magnificent titles such as:
Was Hitler a black magician? Man, myth or monster? The Devil's Scapegoat? The strange unnatural fire? and Images of the unseen? to name but a few.
The titles just dragged you in, and the accompanying images made for glorious fun.
They did not try and debunk anything and just presented it as simple facts. However, the articles were certainly in-depth and researched, somewhat wasted on my 12-year-old brain. We just wanted images of UFOs, dead bodies, Bigfoot, and the Yeti, and those images of the partially burned remains of spontaneous human combustion. Everyone was grimly fascinated with a horrifying image of a single foot, the charred stump, and the pile of ashes that was once a human!
We would share the issues among ourselves; someone always managed to miss one, and we always compared it to what had been on Mysterious World, which invariably crossed paths with similar subjects (especially the Bigfoot stuff; I mean, who doesn't love the Sasquatch?!). The conversations would buzz with excitement!
Nothing beat hitting the local newsagents for 2000AD, Dr. Who Weekly, The Unexplained, and a bag of sweets! Nothing beat getting home and scanning through those volumes, looking for the latest updates on Borley Rectory and new facts about Loch Ness. These were never meant to be for a young audience, just an everybody audience, and I would often find my dad reading the issues.
Now, not to sound too much like an old fart, but today, with the internet and its hundreds of mad theories, easily available at the click of a button, it takes the mystery away from all these phenomena. Now everyone can have a theory about Bigfoot and just throw it out there, no matter how bonkers it sounds. Nothing seems to have the joy of just being unexplained anymore! Now, everything is over-explained and always has a theory. We just had the facts and made our own decisions without needing to share them with the world. Simpler times (old fart mode deactivated).
I had stopped collecting it before the final issues came out. The paranormal fever had started to fade, and people had moved onto the next thing. It was republished a couple of times in complete volumes over the years. Eventually, magazine publishing went to the search engine of Google, I suppose.
I’ll pop some links in the description, but you can find full copies of these on the Internet Archive that some chap has found in his attic and scanned in. You can find them readily on eBay cheap if you fancy a punt. My nostalgic collecting brain may kick in if I am not careful. All my issues went to the charity shop in the end when I moved out, all contained within the blue and gold leatherette covers. They would look great on my shelf today!
I you want to reasd them, some kind chap has scanned a bunch of the magazines he must have found in his attic here!
Anyway, there you go. Hope you enjoyed this little 3 part ramble through the paranormal entertainment of my childhood!
Thanks again! Any support is greatly appreciated!
All of the links!!!
Dansmonsters Library of Doom - Pulp reviews from my stupid collection
You Tube- Join the Monster Bomb Club
Kofi - Buy stuff so i can buy more pens or just a brew! Thanks!
My website! I need to update to be honest!
Instagram ( a necessary evil i suppose )
Here are a couple of links to buy some actual books:
Come on , you know these rules by now!
1. They are not real, so draw them any damn way you want.
2. Forget stuff like anatomy. Who cares.
3. Use any tool and as many as you like as long as it makes an unholy mess.
4. Most importantly, have some bloody great fun!