John Michell (25 December 1724 – 29 April 1793) was an English natural philosopher and geologist whose work spanned a wide range of subjects from astronomy to geology, optics, and gravitation. He was both a theorist and an experimenter.

Michell was educated at Queens' College, Cambridge and later became a Fellow of Queens'. He obtained his M.A. in 1752 and B.D. in 1761.^[1] In 1760 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society, in the same year as Henry Cavendish. In 1762 he was appointed Woodwardian Professor of Geology, and in 1767 he became rector of Thornhill, West Yorkshire, near Dewsbury, where he died.

He was thus described by a contemporary commentator:

John Michell, BD is a little short Man, of a black Complexion, and fat; but having no Acquaintance with him, can say little of him. I think he had the care of St. Botolph’s Church Cambridge, while he continued Fellow of Queen's College, where he was esteemed a very ingenious Man, and an excellent Philosopher. He has published some things in that way, on the Magnet and Electricity.’

(Cole MSS XXXIII, 156, British Library).

Work[link]

Gravity, magnetism & light[link]

Michell conceived, sometime before 1783, the experiment now known as the Cavendish experiment. It was the first to measure the force of gravity between masses in the laboratory and produced the first accurate values for the mass of the Earth and the gravitational constant. He invented and built, independently of co-inventor Charles Augustin de Coulomb, a torsion balance for the experiment but didn’t live to put it to use. His apparatus passed to Henry Cavendish, who performed the experiment in 1798. In 1987, gravity researcher A.H. Cook wrote:

The most important advance in experiments on gravitation and other delicate measurements was the introduction of the torsion balance by Michell and its use by Cavendish. It has been the basis of all the most significant experiments on gravitation ever since. ^[2]

In 1750 he published at Cambridge a work of some eighty pages entitled A Treatise of Artificial Magnets, in which is shown an easy and expeditious method of making them superior to the best natural ones. Besides the description of the method of magnetization which still bears his name, this work contains a variety of accurate magnetic observations, and is distinguished by a lucid exposition of the nature of magnetic induction.

At one point, Michell attempted to measure the radiation pressure of light by focusing sunlight onto one side of a compass needle. The experiment was not a success: the needle melted.

Geology[link]

In scientific biographies written during the early 20th century, Michell's historical importance is ascribed to his work on geology. His most important geological essay was entitled "Conjectures concerning the Cause and Observations upon the Phaenomena of Earthquakes" (Philosophical Transactions, li. 1760), which showed a remarkable knowledge of the strata in various parts of England and abroad. In this paper he suggested that earthquakes were experienced as seismic waves of elastic compression travelled through the Earth. He was able to estimate both the epicentre and focus of the 1755 Lisbon Earthquake. He may have been the first to suggest that a Tsunami is caused by a subterranean earthquake. In addition to his work on earthquakes, Michell drew on geological observations collected on many European travels to advance the understanding of sedimentary stratigraphy and was the first to define the Mesozoic stratigraphy in the UK^[3].

Effect of gravity on light[link]

More recently, Michell has become known for his letter to Cavendish, published in 1784, on the effect of gravity on light. This paper was rediscovered in the 1970s and is now recognised as anticipating several astronomical ideas that had been considered to be 20th century innovations. Michell is now credited with being the first to study the case of a heavenly object massive enough to prevent light from escaping (the concept of escape velocity was well known at the time). Such an object, which he called a dark star would not be directly visible, but could be identified by the motions of a companion star if it was part of a binary system. The classical minimum radius for escape assuming light behaved like particles of matter is numerically equal to the Schwarzschild Radius in general relativity. Michell also suggested using a prism to measure what is now known as gravitational redshift, the gravitational weakening of starlight due to the surface gravity of the source. Michell acknowledged that some of these ideas were not technically practical at the time, but wrote that he hoped they would be useful to future generations. By the time that Michell's paper was rediscovered nearly two centuries later, these ideas had been reinvented by others.

The mathematician Pierre-Simon Laplace soon after suggested the same idea of high-gravity objects trapping light in his book Exposition du Systeme du Monde in 1796. This sort of high-gravity object under Newtonian theory is commonly referred to as a dark star, and can be thought of as being the predecessor of the modern idea of a black hole under general relativity.

Some of Michell's contributions[link]

• Observations On the Comet of January 1760 at Cambridge, Philosophical Transactions (1760)
• Conjectures Concerning the Cause and Observations upon the Phaenomena of Earthquakes, ibid. (1760)
• A Recommendation of Hadley's Quadrant for Surveying, ibid. (1765)
• Proposal of a Method for measuring Degrees of Longitude upon Parallels of the Equator, ibid. (1766)
• An Inquiry into the Probable Parallax and Magnitude of the Fixed Stars, ibid. (1767)
• On the Twinkling of the Fixed Stars, ibid. (1767)
• On the Means of Discovering the Distance, Magnitude, &c., of the Fixed Stars, ibid. (1784).

External links[link]

Wikisource has original works written by or about: John Michell

• Alan Ellis, Black Holes - Part 1 - History,Journal of the Astronomical Society of Edinburgh, 39, (1999). Description of Michell's theory of black holes
• Mystery at the Rectory: some light on John Michell by Richard Crossley
• John Michell biography, SEDS

References[link]

• John Michell "On the means of discovering the distance, magnitude etc. of the fixed stars ..." Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society (1784) 35-57, & Tab III

• Russell McCormmach and Christa Jungnickel, Cavendish, American Philosophical Society, Philadelphia, 1996, ISBN 0-87169-220-1.

• Clyde R Hardin, "The scientific work of the Reverend John Michell", Annals of Science, 22 27-47 (1966)

• Russell McCormack, "John Michell and Henry Cavendish: Weighing the stars", British Journal for the History of Science 4 126-155 (1968)

• Gary Gibbons, "The man who invented black holes [his work emerges out of the dark after two centuries]", New Scientist, 28 June pp. 1101 (1979)

• Simon Schaffer, "John Michell and black holes", Journal for the History of Astronomy 10 42-43 (1979)

• Jean Eisenstaedt, "De l'influence de la gravitation sur la propagation de la lumière en théorie newtonienne. L'archéologie des trous noirs", Archive for History of Exact Sciences, 42 315-386 (1991)

• Jean Eisenstaedt, Avant Einstein Relativité, lumière, gravitation, Paris: Seuil (2005)

 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. 

The neutrality of the style of writing in this article is questioned. Please see the discussion on the talk page. (October 2010)

Charles Fort
Charles Fort in 1920.
Born	Charles Hoy Fort (1874-08-06)August 6, 1874 Albany, New York, United States
Died	May 3, 1932(1932-05-03) (aged 57) The Bronx, New York, United States
Occupation	Researcher

Charles Hoy Fort (August 6, 1874 – May 3, 1932) was an American writer and researcher into anomalous phenomena. Today, the terms Fortean and Forteana are used to characterize various such phenomena. Fort's books sold well and are still in print today.

Biography[link]

Charles Hoy Fort was born in 1874 in Albany, New York, of Dutch ancestry. He had two younger brothers, Clarence and Raymond. His grocer father was something of an authoritarian: Many Parts, Fort's unpublished autobiography, relates several instances of harsh treatment – including physical abuse – by his father. Some observers (such as Fort's biographer Damon Knight) have suggested that Fort's distrust of authority has its roots in his father's treatment. In any case, Fort developed a strong sense of independence in his youth.

As a young man, Fort was a budding naturalist, collecting sea shells, minerals, and birds. Curious and intelligent, the young Fort did not excel at school, though he was quite a wit and full of knowledge about the world – yet this was a world he only knew through books.

So, at the age of 18, Fort left New York on a world tour to "put some capital in the bank of experience". He travelled through the western United States, Scotland, and England, until falling ill in Southern Africa. Returning home, he was nursed by Anna Filing, a girl he had known from his childhood. They were later married on October 26, 1896. Anna was four years older than Charles and was non-literary, a lover of films and of parakeets. She later moved with her husband to London for two years where they would go to the cinema when Charles wasn't busy with his research. His success as a short story writer was intermittent between periods of terrible poverty and depression.

In 1916, an inheritance from an uncle gave Fort enough money to quit his various day jobs and to write full time. In 1917, Fort's brother Clarence died; his portion of the same inheritance was divided between Charles and Raymond.

Fort wrote ten novels, although only one, The Outcast Manufacturers (1909), was published. Reviews were mostly positive, but the tenement tale was commercially unsuccessful. In 1915, Fort began to write two books, titled X and Y, the first dealing with the idea that beings on Mars were controlling events on Earth, and the second with the postulation of a sinister civilization extant at the South Pole. These books caught the attention of writer Theodore Dreiser, who attempted to get them published, but to no avail. Disheartened by this failure, Fort burnt the manuscripts, but was soon renewed to begin work on the book that would change the course of his life, The Book of the Damned (1919) which Dreiser helped to get into print. The title referred to "damned" data that Fort collected, phenomena for which science could not account and was thus rejected or ignored.

Fort's experience as a journalist, coupled with high wit egged on by a contrarian nature, prepared him for his real-life work, needling the pretensions of scientific positivism and the tendency of journalists and editors of newspapers and scientific journals to rationalise the scientifically incorrect.

Fort and Anna lived in London from 1924 to 1926, having moved there so Charles could peruse the files of the British Museum. Although born in Albany, Fort lived most of his life in the Bronx, one of New York City's five boroughs. He was, like his wife, fond of films, and would often take her from their Ryer Avenue apartment to the nearby movie theater, and would always stop at the adjacent newsstand for an armful of various newspapers. Fort frequented the parks near the Bronx where he would sift through piles of his clippings. He would often ride the subway down to the main New York Public Library on Fifth Avenue where he would spend many hours reading scientific journals along with newspapers and periodicals from around the world. Fort also had a small circle of literary friends and they would gather on occasion at various apartments, including his own, to drink and talk which was tolerated by Anna. Theodore Dreiser would lure him out to meetings with phony telegrams and notes and the resultant evening would be full of good food, conversation and hilarity. Charles Fort's wit was always in evidence, especially in his writing.

His books earned mostly positive reviews, and were popular enough to go through several printings, including an omnibus edition in 1941.^{[citation needed]}

Suffering from poor health and failing eyesight, Fort was pleasantly surprised to find himself the subject of a cult following. There was talk of the formation of a formal organization to study the type of odd events related in his books. Clark writes, "Fort himself, who did nothing to encourage any of this, found the idea hilarious. Yet he faithfully corresponded with his readers, some of whom had taken to investigating reports of anomalous phenomena and sending their findings to Fort" (Clark 1998, 235).

Fort distrusted doctors and did not seek medical help for his worsening health. Rather, he focused his energies towards completing Wild Talents. After he collapsed on May 3, 1932, Fort was rushed to Royal Hospital in The Bronx. Later that same day, Fort's publisher visited him to show the advance copies of Wild Talents. Fort died only hours afterward, probably of leukemia.^[1]

He was interred in the Fort family plot in Albany, New York. His more than 60,000 notes were donated to the New York Public Library.

Fort and the unexplained[link]

Overview[link]

Fort's relationship with the study of anomalous phenomena is frequently misunderstood and misrepresented. For over thirty years, Charles Fort sat in the libraries of New York and London, assiduously reading scientific journals, newspapers, and magazines, collecting notes on phenomena that lay outside the accepted theories and beliefs of the time.

Fort took thousands of notes in his lifetime. In his short story "The Giant, the Insect and The Philanthropic-looking Old Gentleman," published many years later for the first time by the International Fortean Organization in issue #70 of the "INFO Journal: Science and the Unknown", Fort spoke of sitting on a park bench at The Cloisters in New York City and tossing some 60,000 notes, not all of his collection by any means, into the wind. This short story is significant because Fort uses his own data collection technique to solve a mystery. He marveled that seemingly unrelated bits of information were, in fact, related. Fort wryly concludes that he went back to collecting data and taking even more notes. The notes were kept on cards and scraps of paper in shoeboxes, in a cramped shorthand of Fort's own invention, and some of them survive today in the collections of the University of Pennsylvania. More than once, depressed and discouraged, Fort destroyed his work, but always began anew. Some of the notes were published, little by little, by the Fortean Society magazine "Doubt" and, upon the death of its editor Tiffany Thayer in 1959, most were donated to the New York Public Library where they are still available to researchers of the unknown.

From this research, Fort wrote four books. These are The Book of the Damned (1919), New Lands (1923), Lo! (1931) and Wild Talents (1932); one book was written between New Lands and Lo! but it was abandoned and absorbed into Lo!.

Fort's writing style[link]

Understanding Fort's books takes time and effort: his style is complex, violent and poetic, profound and occasionally puzzling. Ideas are abandoned and then recalled a few pages on; examples and data are offered, compared and contrasted, conclusions made and broken, as Fort holds up the unorthodox to the scrutiny of the orthodoxy that continually fails to account for them. Pressing on his attacks, Fort shows what he sees as the ridiculousness of the conventional explanations and then interjects with his own theories.

Fort suggests that there is, for example, a Super-Sargasso Sea into which all lost things go, and justifies his theories by noting that they fit the data as well as the conventional explanations. As to whether Fort believes this theory, or any of his other proposals, he gives us the answer: "I believe nothing of my own that I have ever written." Writer Colin Wilson suspects that Fort took few if any of his "explanations" seriously, and notes that Fort made "no attempt to present a coherent argument". (Wilson, 200) Moreover, Wilson opines that Fort's writing style is "atrocious" (Wilson, 199) and "almost unreadable" (Wilson, 200). Wilson also compares Fort to Robert Ripley, a contemporary writer who found major success hunting oddities, and speculates that Fort's idiosyncratic prose might have kept him from greater popular success.

Jerome Clark writes that Fort was "essentially a satirist hugely skeptical of human beings' – especially scientists' – claims to ultimate knowledge".^[2] Clark describes Fort's writing style as a "distinctive blend of mocking humor, penetrating insight, and calculated outrageousness".^[3]

Wilson describes Fort as "a patron of cranks"^[4] and also argues that running through Fort's work is "the feeling that no matter how honest scientists think they are, they are still influenced by various unconscious assumptions that prevent them from attaining true objectivity. Expressed in a sentence, Fort's principle goes something like this: People with a psychological need to believe in marvels are no more prejudiced and gullible than people with a psychological need not to believe in marvels."^[5]

Fortean phenomena[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Forteana

Despite his objections to Fort's writing style, Wilson allows that "the facts are certainly astonishing enough" (Wilson, 200). Examples of the odd phenomena in Fort's books include many of what are variously referred to as occult, supernatural, and paranormal. Reported events include teleportation (a term Fort is generally credited with coining);^[6][7] poltergeist events; falls of frogs, fishes, inorganic materials of an amazing range; unaccountable noises and explosions; spontaneous fires; levitation; ball lightning (a term explicitly used by Fort); unidentified flying objects; unexplained disappearances; giant wheels of light in the oceans; and animals found outside their normal ranges (see phantom cat). He offered many reports of Out-of-place artifacts (OOPArts), strange items found in unlikely locations. He also is perhaps the first person to explain strange human appearances and disappearances by the hypothesis of alien abduction and was an early proponent of the extraterrestrial hypothesis, specifically suggesting that strange lights or object sighted in the skies might be alien spacecraft. Fort also wrote about the interconnectedness of nature and synchronicity. His books seem to center around the idea that everything is connected and that strange coincidences happen for a reason.

Many of these phenomena are now collectively and conveniently referred to as Fortean phenomena (or Forteana), whilst others have developed into their own schools of thought: for example, reports of UFOs in ufology and unconfirmed animals (cryptids) in cryptozoology. These new disciplines per se are generally not recognized by most scientists or academics however.

Forteana and mainstream science[link]

Frequently in his writing, Fort posits a few basic points that were decades ahead of mainstream scientific acceptance, and that are frequently omitted in discussions of the history and philosophy of science:

• Fort often notes that the boundaries between science and pseudoscience are "fuzzy": the boundary lines are not very well defined, and they might change over time.
• Fort also points out that whereas facts are objective, how facts are interpreted depends on who is doing the interpreting and in what context.
• Fort insisted that there is a strong sociological influence on what is considered "acceptable" or "damned" (see strong program in the sociology of scientific knowledge).
• Though he never used the term "magical thinking", Fort offered many arguments and observations that are similar to the concept: he argued that most, if not all, people (including scientists) are at least occasionally guilty of irrational and "non scientific" thinking.
• Fort points out the problem of underdetermination: that the same data can sometimes be explained by more than one theory.
• Similarly, writer John Michell notes that "Fort gave several humorous instances of the same experiment yielding two different results, each one gratifying the experimenter."^[8] Fort noted that if controlled experiments – a pillar of the scientific method – could produce such widely varying results depending on who conducted them, then the scientific method itself might be open to doubt, or at least to a degree of scrutiny rarely brought to bear. Since Fort's death, scientists have recognized the "experimenter effect", the tendency for experiments to tend to validate given preconceptions. Robert Rosenthal has conducted pioneering research on this and related subjects.

There are many phenomena in Fort's works which have now been partially or entirely "recuperated" by mainstream science: ball lightning, for example, was largely rejected as impossible by the scientific consensus of Fort's day, but is now receiving new attention within science. However, many of Fort's ideas remain on the very borderlines of "mainstream science", or beyond, in the fields of paranormalism and the bizarre. This is unsurprising, as Fort resolutely refused to abandon the territory beyond "acceptable" science. Nonetheless, later research has demonstrated that Fort's claims are at least as reliable as his sources. In the 1960s, American writer William R. Corliss began his own documentation of scientific anomalies. Partly inspired by Fort, Corliss checked some of Fort's sources and concluded that Fort's research was "accurate, but rather narrow"; there were many anomalies which Fort did not include in his books.^[9]

Many consider it odd that Fort, a man so skeptical and so willing to question the pronouncements of the scientific mainstream, would be so eager to take old stories – for example, stories about rains of fish falling from the sky – at face value. It is debatable whether Fort did in fact accept evidence at face value: many instances in his books, Fort notes that he regarded certain data and assertions as unlikely, and he additionally remarked, "I offer the data. Suit yourself." In Fort's books, it is often difficult to determine if he took his proposals and "theories" seriously, but he did seem to hold a genuine belief in the presence of extraterrestrial visitations to the Earth.

The theories and conclusions Fort presented often came from what he called "the orthodox conventionality of Science". On nearly every page, Fort's works have reports of odd events which were originally printed in respected mainstream newspapers or scientific journals such as Scientific American, The Times, Nature and Science. Time and again, Fort noted, that while some phenomena related in these and other sources were enthusiastically accepted and promoted by scientists, just as often, inexplicable or unusual reports were ignored, or were effectively swept under the rug. And repeatedly, Fort reclaimed such data from under the rug, and brought them out, as he wrote, "for an airing". So long as any evidence is ignored – however bizarre or unlikely the evidence might seem – Fort insisted that scientists' claims to thoroughness and objectivity were questionable.

It did not matter to Fort whether his data and theories were accurate: his point was that alternative conclusions and world views can be made from the same data "orthodox" conclusions are made from, and that the conventional explanations of science are only one of a range of explanations, none necessarily more justified than another. In this respect, he was far ahead of his time. In The Book of the Damned he showed the influence of social values and what would now be called a "paradigm" on what scientists consider to be "true". This prefigured work by Thomas Kuhn decades later. The work of Paul Feyerabend could also be likened to Fort's.

Another of Fort's great contributions is questioning the often frequent dogmatism of mainstream science. Although many of the phenomena which science rejected in his day have since been proven to be objective phenomena, and although Fort was prescient in his collection and preservation of these data despite the scorn they often received from his contemporaries, Fort was more of a parodist and a philosopher than a scientist. He thought that far too often, scientists took themselves far too seriously, and were prone to arrogance and dogmatism. Fort used humor both for its own sake, and to point out what he regarded as the foibles of science and scientists.

Nonetheless, Fort is considered by many as the father of modern paranormalism, not only because of his interest in strange phenomena, but because of his "modern" attitude towards religion, 19th-century Spiritualism, and scientific dogma.

Darwin and evolution[link]

Regarding Darwin and evolution, Charles Fort wrote:

"Darwin & Evolution In mere impressionism we take our stand. We have no positive tests nor standards. Realism in art: realism in science – they pass away. In 1859, the thing to do was to accept Darwinism; now many biologists are revolting and trying to conceive of something else. The thing to do was to accept it in its day, but Darwinism of course was never proved: The fittest survive. What is meant by the fittest? Not the strongest; not the cleverest – Weakness and stupidity everywhere survive. There is no way of determining fitness except in that a thing does survive. "Fitness," then, is only another name for "survival." Darwinism: That survivors survive." (Damned, pp. 23-24)

The Forteans[link]

Fort's work has inspired very many to consider themselves as Forteans. The first of these was the screenwriter Ben Hecht, who in a review of The Book of the Damned declared "I am the first disciple of Charles Fort… henceforth, I am a Fortean". Among Fort's other notable fans were John Cowper Powys, Sherwood Anderson, Clarence Darrow, and Booth Tarkington, who wrote the foreword to New Lands.

Precisely what is encompassed by "Fortean" is a matter of great debate; the term is widely applied from every position from Fortean purists dedicated to Fort's methods and interests, to those with open and active acceptance of the actuality of paranormal phenomena, a position with which Fort may not have agreed. Most generally, Forteans have a wide interest in unexplained phenomena in wide-ranging fields, mostly concerned with the natural world, and have a developed "agnostic scepticism" regarding the anomalies they note and discuss. For Mr. Hecht as an example, being a Fortean meant hallowing a pronounced distrust of authority in all its forms, whether religious, scientific, political, philosophical or otherwise. It did not, of course, include an actual belief in the anomalous data enumerated in Fort's works.

In Chapter 1 of Book of the Damned, Charles Fort states that the ideal is to be neither a "True Believer" nor a total "Skeptic" but "that the truth lies somewhere in between".

The Fortean Society was founded at the Savoy-Plaza Hotel in New York City on 26 January 1931 by his friends, many of whom were significant writers such as Theodore Dreiser, Ben Hecht, Alexander Woolcott, and led by fellow American writer Tiffany Thayer, half in earnest and half in the spirit of great good humor, like the works of Fort himself. The board of Founders included Dreiser, Hecht, Booth Tarkington, Aaron Sussman, John Cowper Powys, the former editor of "Puck" Harry Leon Wilson, Woolcott and J. David Stern, publisher of the Philadelphia Record. Active members of the Fortean Society included journalist H.L. Mencken and prominent science fiction writers such as Eric Frank Russell and Damon Knight. Fort, however, rejected the Society and refused the presidency which went to his close friend writer Theodore Dreiser; he was lured to its inaugural meeting by false telegrams. As a strict non-authoritarian, Fort refused to establish himself as an authority, and further objected on the grounds that those who would be attracted by such a grouping would be spiritualists, zealots, and those opposed to a science that rejected them; it would attract those who believed in their chosen phenomena: an attitude exactly contrary to Forteanism. Fort did hold unofficial meetings and had a long history of getting together informally with many of NYC's literati such as Theodore Dreiser and Ben Hecht at their various apartments where they would talk, have a meal and then listen to short reports. Reports of these meetings mention lively discussions accompanied by great good humor and quantities of wine. Fort was not a joiner of established groups and, perhaps, it is ironic that many such Fortean groups have been established.

Most notable of these are the magazine, Fortean Times (first published in November 1973), which is a proponent of Fortean journalism, combining humour, scepticism, and serious research into subjects which scientists and other respectable authorities often disdain and the International Fortean Organization (INFO). INFO was formed in the early 1960s (incorporated in 1965) by brothers, the writers Ron and Paul Willis, who acquired much of the material of the original Fortean Society which had begun in 1932 in the spirit of Charles Fort but which had grown silent by 1959 with the death of Tiffany Thayer. INFO publishes the "INFO Journal: Science and the Unknown" and organizes the FortFest, the world's first, and continuously running, conference on anomalous phenomena dedicated to the spirit of Charles Fort. INFO, since the mid-1960s, also provides audio CDs and filmed DVDs of notable conference speakers (Colin Wilson, John Michell, Graham Hancock, John Anthony West, William Corliss, John Keel, Joscelyn Godwin among many others). Other Fortean societies are also active, notably the Edinburgh Fortean Society in Edinburgh and the Isle of Wight.

More than a few modern authors of fiction and non-fiction who have written about the influence of Fort are sincere followers of Fort. One of the most notable is British philosopher John Michell who wrote the Introduction to Lo! published by John Brown in 1996. Michell says "Fort, of course, made no attempt at defining a world-view, but the evidence he uncovered gave him an 'acceptance' of reality as something far more magical and subtly organized than is considered proper today." Stephen King also uses the works of Charles Fort to illuminate his main characters, notably "It" and "Firestarter". In "Firestarter", the parents of a pyrokinetically gifted child are advised to read Fort's Wild Talents rather than the works of baby doctor Benjamin Spock. Loren Coleman is a well-known cryptozoologist, author of "The Unidentified" (1975) dedicated to Charles Fort, and "Mysterious America," which Fortean Times called a Fortean classic. Indeed, Coleman calls himself the first Vietnam era C.O. to base his pacificist ideas on Fortean thoughts. Jerome Clark has described himself as a "sceptical Fortean".^[10] Mike Dash is another capable Fortean, bringing his historian's training to bear on all manner of odd reports, while being careful to avoid uncritically accepting any orthodoxy, be it that of fringe devotees or mainstream science. Science-fiction writers of note including Philip K. Dick, Robert Heinlein, and Robert Anton Wilson were also fans of the work of Charles Fort.

Fort's work, of compilation and commentary on anomalous phenomena reported in scientific journals and press, has been carried on very creditably by William R. Corliss, whose self-published books and notes bring Fort's collections up to date with a Fortean combination of humor, seriousness and open-mindedness. Mr. Corliss' notes rival those of Fort in volume, while being significantly less cryptic and abbreviated.

Ivan T. Sanderson, Scottish naturalist and writer, was a devotee of Fort's work, and referenced it heavily in several of his own books on unexplained phenomena, notably Things (1967), and More Things (1969).

Louis Pauwels and Jacques Bergier's The Morning of the Magicians was also heavily influenced by Fort's work and mentions it often.

The noted UK paranormalist, Fortean and ordained priest Lionel Fanthorpe presented the Fortean TV series on Channel 4.

P.T. Anderson's popular movie Magnolia (1999) has an underlying theme of unexplained events, taken from the 1920s and '30s works of Charles Fort. Fortean author Loren Coleman has written a chapter about this motion picture, entitled "The Teleporting Animals and Magnolia," in one of his recent books. The film has many hidden Fortean themes, notably "falling frogs". In one scene, one of Fort's books is visible on a table in a library and there is an end credit thanking him by name.^[11]

Quotations[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Charles Fort

• "Now there are so many scientists who believe in dowsing, that the suspicion comes to me that it may be only a myth after all."
• "One measures a circle, beginning anywhere."
• "My own notion is that it is very unsportsmanlike to ever mention fraud. Accept anything. Then explain it your way."
• "But my liveliest interest is not so much in things, as in relations of things. I have spent much time thinking about the alleged pseudo-relations that are called coincidences. What if some of them should not be coincidence?"
• "If any spiritualistic medium can do stunts, there is no more need for special conditions than there is for a chemist to turn down lights, start operations with a hymn, and ask whether there's any chemical present that has affinity with something named Hydrogen."
• "The Earth is a farm. We are someone else's property."
• "Do you want power over something? Be more nearly real than it."
• "I conceive of nothing, in religion, science or philosophy, that is more than the proper thing to wear, for a while."

A quotation often attributed to Fort is "If there is a universal mind, must it be sane?" This quote is from Damon Knight's 1970 biography, Charles Fort : Prophet of the Unexplained.

Partial bibliography[link]

Wikisource has original works written by or about: Charles Fort

All of Fort's works are available on-line (see External links section below).

• The Book of the Damned: The Collected Works of Charles Fort, Tarcher, New York, 2008, paperback, ISBN 978-1-58542-641-6 (with introduction by Jim Steinmeyer)
• The Outcast Manufacturers (novel), 1906
• Many Parts (autobiography, unpublished)
• The Book of the Damned, Prometheus Books, 1999, paperback, 310 pages, ISBN 1-57392-683-3, first published in 1919.
• New Lands, Ace Books, 1941 and later editions, mass market paperback, first published in 1923. ISBN 0-7221-3627-7
• Lo!, Ace Books, 1941 and later printings, mass market paperback, first published in 1931. ISBN 1-870870-89-1
• Wild Talents, Ace Books, 1932 and later printings, mass market paperback, first published in 1932. ISBN 1-870870-29-8
• Complete Books of Charles Fort, Dover Publications, New York, 1998, hardcover, ISBN 0-486-23094-5 (with introduction by Damon Knight)

See also[link]

• William R. Corliss
• Fortean Society
• Fortean Times
• Ghost Stations
• Inoue Enryō
• International Fortean Organization
• Leonard George
• List of haunted locations
• List of magazines of anomalous phenomena
• Paranormal Magazine
• Philosophy of science
• Philosophical skepticism (Pyrrho, Sextus Empiricus)
• Scientism

References[link]

There are very few books written about Fort. His life and work have been almost completely overlooked by mainstream academia and the books written are mainly biographical expositions relating to Fort's life and ideas.

• Gardner, Martin has a chapter on Charles Fort in his Fads and Fallacies in the Name of Science 1957; Dover; ISBN 0-486-20394-8.
• Knight, Damon, Charles Fort: Prophet of the Unexplained is a dated but valuable biographical resource, detailing Fort's early life, his pre-'Fortean' period and also provides chapters on the Fortean society and brief studies of Fort's work in relation to Immanuel Velikovsky.
• Magin, Ulrich, Der Ritt auf dem Kometen. Über Charles Fort is similar to Knight's book, in German language, and contains more detailed chapters on Fort's philosophy.
• Louis Pauwels has an entire chapter on Fort, "The Vanished Civilizations", in The Morning of the Magicians.^[12]

There has been more recent interest in Fort:

• Bennett, Colin (2002) (paperback). Politics of the Imagination: The Life, Work and Ideas of Charles Fort. Head Press. pp. 206. ISBN 1-900486-20-2. 
• Carroll, Robert Todd. "Fort, Charles (1874-1932)" (pp. 148–150 in The Skeptic's Dictionary, Robert Todd Carroll, John Wiley & Sons, 2003; ISBN 0-471-27242-6)
• Clark, Jerome. "The Extraterrestrial Hypothesis in the Early UFO Age" (pp. 122–140 in UFOs and Abductions: Challenging the Borders of Knowledge, David M. Jacobs, editor; University Press of Kansas, 2000; ISBN 0-7006-1032-4)
• Clark, Jerome. The UFO Book, Visible Ink: 1998.
• Dash, Mike. "Charles Fort and a Man Named Dreiser." in Fortean Times no. 51 (Winter 1988-1989), pp. 40–48.
• Kidd, Ian James. "Who Was Charles Fort?" in Fortean Times no. 216 (Dec 2006), pp. 54–5.
• Kidd, Ian James. "Holding the Fort: how science fiction preserved the name of Charles Fort" in Matrix no. 180 (Aug/Sept 2006), pp. 24–5.
• Lippard, Jim. "Charles Fort" (pp. 277–280 in Encyclopedia of the Paranormal, Gordon M. Stein, editor; Prometheus Books, 1996; ISBN 1-57392-021-5)
• Skinner, Doug, "Tiffany Thayer", Fortean Times, June 2005.
• Steinmeyer, Jim (2008) (hardback). Charles Fort: The Man Who Invented the Supernatural. Heinemann. pp. 352 pages. ISBN 0-434-01629-2. 
• Wilson, Colin. Mysteries, Putnam, ISBN 0-399-12246-X
• Ludwigsen, Will. "We Were Wonder Scouts" in Asimov's Science Fiction, Aug 2011

Footnotes[link]

External links[link]

• International Fortean Organization
• The Charles Fort Institute
• TopFoto - Representing The Fortean Picture Library
• The Sourcebook Project homepage
• The Skeptic's Dictionary: Charles Fort
• A Wild Talent: Charles Hoy Fort, Ian James Kidd's pages on Fort.
• Charles Fort's House at 39A Marchmont Street, London
• Edinburgh Fortean Society
• Forteana: The Fortean Wiki
• Google Earth Anomalies- Satellite imagery of documented, scientific anomaly sites including mound sites and unexplained circular features via Google Earth.

The following online editions of Fort's work, edited and annotated by a Fortean named "Mr. X", are at "Mr. X"'s site Resologist.net:

• Book of the Damned
• New Lands
• Lo!
• Wild Talents
• Many Parts (surviving fragments)
• The Outcast Manufacturers

John Neal (August 25, 1793–June 20, 1876), was most notably an author and art/literary critic. He was also a man of diverse talents and objectives, many of which were pioneering in his day. For example, he is credited as being the first American author to employ colloquialism in his writing, breaking with more formal traditions in literature.^[1] However, he was also undisciplined and often rambling, so despite its period significance, his literary work has drifted into obscurity. He was also an early women's rights advocate, prohibitionist, temperance advocate, opponent of dueling, accomplished lawyer, boxer, and architect.

Boyhood, young adulthood, and early business[link]

Born in a yellow frame house on Free Street at the corner of South Street in Falmouth (now Portland, Maine) of Quaker parents, he attended school until the age of twelve whereupon he entered into business.^[2] For nine years he made a living as haberdasher, clerk, dry goods dealer, traveling penmanship tutor, and miniature artist, among other things, before entering law school in Baltimore, Maryland in 1815. Neal supported himself while in school by writing for local periodicals, and he helped found a literary society, The Delphian Club. Neal wrote for and eventually edited the journal the Delphians created—a short-lived but influential and admired monthly journal titled The Portico.^[3] In short time, he turned to novels and poetry, publishing some six novels and two epic poems (under the pseudonymous 'clubicular' name, "Jehu O'Cataract," a nickname given to him by the Delphians because of his rapid production). He was proud of the speed with which he threw off his volumes, often taking only a week to finish an entire novel. He wrote during this stage in his life that, "I shall write, as others drink, for exhilaration."^[4] Neal left for England in late 1823.^[5]

English stint[link]

John Neal's time in London (1824–1827) was a mission: to win recognition in Europe of American literature and demystify the land of his birth in the eyes of the British literary elite. He attempted to fulfill this mission through his work for Blackwood's Magazine, and one novel, published in England: Brother Jonathan, or the New Englanders. He wrote in his column for Blackwood's about American life and critiqued American authors. After a falling out with the editor of Blackwood's, Neal wrote for several other leading periodicals including the Westminster Review, and as part of a debating society, he met Jeremy Bentham, who invited Neal to live with him in London. After a short trip to Paris, Neal returned to Portland, Maine.

Life back in Portland[link]

When he returned to Portland in 1827, he was rather ill-received, as some of his writing, perhaps Errata (1823) or "Keep Cool" (1817), a kiss and tell story about his experiences in Portland as a youngster, was found offensive by many locals. Unbeknown to his denouncers, his return to Portland was planned as merely a visit, but faced with such opposition, he decided to stay. In his autobiography, Wandering Recollections of a Somewhat Busy Life, he writes, “'Verily, verily,' said I, 'if they take that position, here I will stay, till I am both rooted and grounded–grounded in the graveyard, if nowhere else.'”^[6] Indeed he spent the rest of his life in Portland, re-establishing his law practice and a short-lived literary periodical called The Yankee. He guided many an author or artist through critique and encouragement, among them Edgar Allan Poe,^[7] Benjamin Paul Akers,^[8] and Charles Codman.^[9] In addition to his literary work, Neal also helped found several gymnasiums in Portland and throughout the state of Maine. He is often referred to as "The Father of Organized Maine Athletics." He maintained a solid physique into old age, which he demonstrated when he threw a stubborn cigar-smoker off a non-smoking street car at the age of 79.^[10]

Partial bibliography[link]

• Keep Cool, 1817
• Battle of Niagara, 1818
• Goldau, or, the Maniac Helper, 1818
• Otho; a Tragedy in Five Acts, 1819
• Logan, 1822
• Seventy-six, 1823
• Randolph, 1823
• Errata, 1823
• Brother Jonathan, or the New Englanders, 1825
• Rachel Dyer, 1828
• Authorship, a Tale, 1830
• The Down-Easters, 1833
• One Word More, 1854
• True Womanhood. A Tale, 1859
• Wandering Recollections of a Somewhat Busy Life, 1869
• Great Mysteries and Little Plagues, 1870
• Portland Illustrated, 1874

References[link]

• Windsor Dagget; A Down-East Yankee From the District of Maine; A.J. Huston, Publisher; 1920
• Lease, Benjamin (1972). That Wild Fellow John Neal and the American Literary Revolution. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. p. 229. ISBN 0-226-46969-7. 
• Neal, John; Wandering Recollections of a Somewhat Busy Life; Roberts Brothers, Publisher; 1869

Further reading[link]

• Goddu, Teresa A (1997). Gothic America: Narrative, History, and Nation. New York: Columbia University Press. p. 226. ISBN 0-231-10816-8. 
• Nelson, Dana D (1998). National Manhood: Capitalist Citizenship and the Imagined Fraternity of White Men. New Americanists. Durham: Duke University Press. p. 344. ISBN 0-8223-2130-0. 

Notes[link]

External links[link]

• Perspectives in American Literature - A Research and Reference Guide
• Cambridge History of English and American Literature
• Photograph of John Neal from the Maine Memory Network

Selected Works Available online[link]

• Battle of Niagara: a poem, without notes; and Goldau, or, The Maniac Harper
• Otho: A Tragedy
• Randolph: A Novel
• Rachel Dyer: A North American Story
• Brother Jonathan (Vol I) and Vol II
• The Downeasters (Vol I) and Vol II
• John Beedle's Sleighride, Courtship and Marriage
• Wandering Recollections of a Somewhat Busy Life: An Autobiography
• A Down-east Yankee From the District of Maine

Robin F. Heath (born 8 May 1948) is a British historian, astronomer, archaeoastronomer, astro-archaeologist and author.^[1]

Biography[link]

Heath graduated with a degree in Science and is now an Honorary Research Fellow within the Department of Archaeology and Anthropology at the University of Wales, Lampeter. His early career was in electronics as a research and development engineer from where he moved to become lecturer then senior lecturer in Mathematics and Engineering for 15 years. He eventually became Head of Department at Coleg Ceredigion. He has also taught a module in sacred geography at Bath Spa University College and teaches astronomy at Oxford University Faculty of Astrological Studies summer school. He left secure, pensionable work to become an author and researcher in 1990.

He has a "Faculty of Astrological Studies Intermediate Diploma" and was the editor of the "International Astrological Association Journal" from 1995-1998, writing numerous articles for the astrological press. Heath has been a consultant for several television documentaries and worked on a series called "The Love Test"; 16 half hour televeision programs where advising couples on matters of the heart. He was also consultant for the "Ouroboros Research and Education Trust". Heath founded "Megalithic Tours" and runs his own website "Sky and Landscape" to promote a wider interest in neolithic and bronze age culture, running weekend site instruction in archaeoastronomy. He is now an active researcher and internationally published author about subjects of ancient science, prehistoric geometry, archaeoastronomy and megalithic culture of Europe. He is well known and widely respected on the UK lecture circuit at less formal venues.^[2]

He has written nine books on archaeoastronomy and architecture of prehistoric sites, including the best selling "Sun Moon & Stonehenge: Proof of High Culture in Ancient Britain", "Alexander Thom: Cracking the Stone Age Code" and "The Measure of Albion" with John Michell. He has also linked the megalithic yard to another ancient unit of measurement called the Drusian step.^[3]

Selected bibliography[link]

• A key to Stonehenge: a holistic look at the relationships between Stonehenge and the sun, moon and earth, together with the geographic siting of the monument, Bluestone Press, 1995 - 93 pages^[4]
• Sun, moon & Stonehenge: high culture in ancient Britain, Bluestone Press, 1998 - Science - 239 pages^[5]
• Stone Circles:A Beginner's Guide, Hodder & Stoughton, 1999 - 96 pages^[6]
• (with John Michell) The Measure of Albion, Bluestone Press, 1999 - 144 pages^[7]
• Alexander Thom: Cracking the Stone Age Code, Bluestone Press, 2003 - 256 pages^[8]
• Stonehenge, Text Publishing Company, 2004 - 64 pages^[9]
• Sun, Moon and Earth, Wooden Books, 2006 - 58 pages^[10]
• (with John Michell) The Lost Science of Measuring the Earth: Discovering the Sacred Geometry of the Ancients, Adventures Unlimited Press, 2006 - 143 pages

See Also[link]

• Psuedoscientific metrology - Robin Heath

References[link]

External links[link]

• Alexander Thom: Cracking the stone age code - secrets of the circle builders by Robin Heath, Press Pack
• The astronomy and astrology of the solar hero myth by Robin Heath
• Synchronicity of the Earth’s Rotation with the Moon’s Orbital Cycles and Solar Year by Richard Heath and Robin Heath
• Prehistoric land surveying by Robin Heath
• Megaliths and their locations in the landscape by Robin Heath
• An investigation into the Astronomical Significance of Llech y Drybedd, Moylgrove, Pembrokeshire by Robin Heath
• The Sky and Landscape - Robin Heath's website
• astro-archaeology.org profile of Robin Heath
• goodreads.com - profile of Robin Heath
• Robin Heath - Summer Lectures
• Robin Heath on the Honorary Advisory Consultant Group to the RGCSA

	Astronomy portal
	Britain portal

This biographical article needs additional citations for verification. Please help by adding reliable sources. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous or harmful. (November 2010)

Martin Barre
Barre performing in Jerusalem
Background information
Birth name	Martin Lancelot Barre
Born	(1946-11-17) 17 November 1946 (age 65) Kings Heath, Birmingham, England United Kingdom
Genres	Progressive rock, folk rock, hard rock
Occupations	Musician, songwriter
Instruments	Guitar, bouzouki, mandolin, flute, saxophone
Years active	1968–present
Labels	RandM, Fuel 2000, Chrysalis, Eagle, Roadrunner, EMI, Capital, Island
Associated acts	Jethro Tull, The Penny Peeps
Website	www.martinbarre.com
Notable instruments
Gibson Les Paul Custom Manson guitars [1]

Martin Lancelot Barre^[2] (born 17 November 1946, Kings Heath, Birmingham, West Midlands, England) is an English rock musician.

Barre has been the guitarist for rock band Jethro Tull since 1969. He has appeared on every Jethro Tull album except their debut This Was. His sound has been marked by a blend of Jeff Beck and Eric Clapton style blues with the baroque complexities of early 1970s progressive rock and traditional European folk music sounds. He has also acted as a flautist both on-stage for Tull, and in his solo work.

Early career[link]

Barre began his career playing saxophone with the Birmingham band, The Moonrakers, in the early 1960s. During July 1966, he joined Beau Brummell's former backing band, The Noblemen, with fellow ex-Moonraker, Chris Rodger, and the group subsequently changed their name to The Motivation. The band also comprised singer Jimmy Marsh, bassist Bryan Stevens, keyboardist Mike Ketley and drummer Malcolm Tomlinson. The group appeared at London's legendary Marquee Club on two occasions and also supported Cream at the Upper Cut in the Forest Gate district of London. They also performed at the Piper Club in Rome for six weeks in mid-1967.

In the summer of 1967, Marsh and Rodger left and the others brought in former Clayton Squares singer Denny Alexander and became The Penny Peeps. Signed to Liberty Records, the band released two singles in 1968 — "Little Man With A Stick" backed by "Model Village" and "I See The Morning" backed with "Curly, Knight of The Road". By this point, Barre had switched to lead guitar and his impressive solo on "Model Village" has made the track a popular collectors' item.

Alexander left the band in mid-1968 and the group became a blues outfit under a new moniker — Gethsemane. The new band recorded further material which was never released, and broke up in mid December 1968, when after a brief career in Fat Matress with Noel Redding of Jimi Hendrix fame, Barre joined Jethro Tull.

With Jethro Tull[link]

Barre performing with Jethro Tull in Genoa,
14 February 2010 Photo: Pino D'Amico

By the end of 1968, Jethro Tull's Ian Anderson was going through conflicts with his then blues guitarist Mick Abrahams. After having a brief stint with Earth (and future Black Sabbath) guitarist Tony Iommi auditioned and joined Jethro Tull briefly, appearing on the Rolling Stones "Rock and Roll Circus" TV special miming to "A Song for Jeffrey". Additionally David O'List of The Nice auditioned for the Jethro Tull lead guitarist slot without success. Barre came to audition for Anderson, but was so nervous that he barely played. For his second audition, Martin Barre didn't bring an amplifier or a guitar cord. Even so, Ian Anderson still approved Barre as Abrahams' permanent replacement. Today, Barre is the next longest-standing member in Jethro Tull next to Ian Anderson.

For four decades, Barre's career focused on Jethro Tull. His best-known guitar work includes "Aqualung", "Cross-Eyed Mary", and "Locomotive Breath".^[3]

Recent work[link]

Barre performing at the Cropredy Festival, Oxfordshire 13 August 2004

In the 1990s Barre began to perform as a solo artist, and has recorded four albums: A Summer Band, A Trick of Memory, The Meeting and Stage Left. On these recordings, Barre combined rock and guitar oriented fusion in his sound.

On one track of 1994's A Trick of Memory, Barre plays a guitar given to him by friend Mark Mancina. The Meeting (1996) features the bassist Jonathan Noyce, who was then introduced to Tull vocalist and flute player, Ian Anderson by Barre and played with Jethro Tull in 1996-2007.

His most recent solo effort, 2003's Stage Left, saw Barre essay a number of blues, acoustic folk and even ambient electronic styles. In 2004 in support of Stage Left, he played a number of solo dates and played at all of the Tull gigs in 2005. According to his official website, he has also recorded work on the recent album by veteran British folk music outfit, Pentangle.

According to a diary entry on his website dated December 2006, Barre says he "has started work on an acoustic project" with Dan Crisp, a singer and guitarist and Alan Bray, a bassist. Barre states he will be playing a number of acoustic instruments with the group, including bouzouki and mandolin. The group has already played three shows and they will continue to collaborate in 2007. No mention is made of the group recording an album.

In 2012 he toured with a band which he called "New Day" which included Pat O'May, John Mitchell, Frank Mead, Jonathan Noyce and Geoff Dunn.

Recognition[link]

Barre's signature solo on the 1971 Jethro Tull standard "Aqualung" was voted by the readers of Guitar Player magazine as one of the top rock guitar solos of all time. Also, in 2007, this solo was rated one of the 100 Greatest Guitar Solos by Guitar World magazine. Dire Straits' leader Mark Knopfler, in a 2005 interview, called Barre's work with Ian Anderson "magical".^{[citation needed]}

Discography (solo)[link]

• A Summer Band' (1992)
• A Trick of Memory (1994)
• The Meeting (1996)
• Stage Left (2003)
• Martin Barre - 2 CD (one compliation, one live) (2012)

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Martin Barre

• Official website
• Biography on official Jethro Tull website
• The Meeting at Allmusic
• A Trick Of Memory at Allmusic
• Stage Left at Allmusic
• "The Martin Barre Interview". www.vintagerock.com. http://www.vintagerock.com/mbarre_interview.aspx. Retrieved 2009-12-12. 
• "Martin Barre: Running Free -- Jethro Tull's Guitarist Rocks on the Road". www.RunTri.com June 2010. http://www.runtri.com/2010/06/jethro-tulls-martin-barre-rocks-on-road.html.