Outer Edge Creatures and Archival Monsters
Posted by: Loren Coleman on November 10th, 2008
Archival material that I often share remotely while I am traveling reflects ongoing research being conducted by my old friend Jerry Clark. For other classic items that Jerry and I have mined in old newspaper articles, I want to thank Anomalist Books for republishing our initial efforts and adventure into the book world. It only seems like yesterday, whoa, 33 years ago now, when we worked on those for Warner Books.
Therefore, just to answer continuing questions about my first two books, The Unidentified and Creatures of the Outer Edge, with Jerome Clark, yes, they have been republished. And yes, they reflect our youthful theories, long thrown overboard. But the reports, sightings, and some connections still ring true, decades later. Some have even written that “Clark and Coleman” set off the psychosocial ufological theorizing in Europe and the surviving zooform movement in the UK today, with our books and writings on such things as the tulpas, way back in the 1970s.
First appearing in 1975 and 1978, these two paperbacks were republished in 2006, as a special double edition with a new introduction. The Unidentified and Creatures of the Outer Edge: The Early Works of Jerome Clark and Loren Coleman is a combined quality paperbound book from Anomalist Books.
The Unidentified has intriguing, limited, and marginal information on cryptozoology. Historically, Creatures of the Outer Edge is more significant, in terms of looking at strange critters at the time it was published. Creatures of the Outer Edge surveys the cryptozoologically bountiful decade of the 1970s (and, of course, related cases of the past) with accounts on Mothman, Owlmen, Thunderbirds, Phantom Panthers, Devil Dogs, Texas Big Birds, and, yes, of course, Bigfoot.
Some of the individually "named" local Bigfoot creatures first appeared in Creatures of the Outer Edge, including Momo (Missouri Monster), Lake Worth Monster, Murphysboro Mud Monster, the Enfield creature, El Reno Chicken Man, Noxie Monster, Navajo’s Skinwalkers, and Yukon’s Bushman. Creatures of the Outer Edge also introduced the now-iconic Dover Demon for the first time to the general public. The appendix is dedicated to “1977 - A Year Filled With Monsters.”
Table of Contents
Introduction to this Double Edition 1
Book One: The Unidentified
An Introductory Note 8
UFOland: Other Worlds and the Otherworld 9
Fairyland: The Magical Impulse 45
Voices from Heaven: The Religious Impulse 93
The Airships: The Technological Impulse 131
UFOs: The Mystery in the Machine 165
Paraufology: Understanding the Incomprehensible 225
Selected Bibliography 251
A Note on UFO and Fortean Publications 261
Index 263
Book Two: Creatures of the Outer Edge
Introduction 11
Chapter One: Mystery Animals 15
Chapter Two: The Bigfeet 28
Chapter Three: The Manimals 51
Chapter Four: Phantom Cats and Dogs 117
Chapter Five: Things with Wings 165
Chapter Six: Phantasms 195
Epilogue: A Year Filled with Monsters 208
Bibliography 228
To read part of the new introduction to Creatures of the Outer Edge and The Unidentified, see here.
If you want to purchase copies, you can pick ‘em up online, or email me via clicking on this hyperlink to my contact form for info on autographed copies. Thank you.
- Similar Phenomena:
Creatures of the Outer Edge and The Unidentified is a great book I own the republished verison and I have it autographed, although I didn’t order from Loren I bought it off of either ebay or half.com. It was a bit of a surprise when I got it in the mail and saw that it was autographed. I recommend that anyone thinking about buying this book you should get it straight from Loren, since he autographes them it makes the book alittle bit more special. The book it self is great I read it within a week a couldn’t put it down. Although I’ll have to reread it some day as I’m sure I missed some parts of it since I read it so fast.
I bought the ‘Creatures of the Outer Edge’ when I was a teenager, I am now 45. I still own that battered copy even today.
I think the reason I devoured books like these in my early years is because of personal experiences. It gave a name to the phenomena that already existed.
I now chase mystery cats all over the British Isles, and now run Big Cats in Britain. Yes all these early books helped to shape us, so its your fault Loren