Crayon sketch of Charles Fort from The New York Herald, June 5, 1932.

Philosopher of the Damned

The pioneering voice of Charles Fort

Almost unclassifiable in nature, the enduring work of paranormalist writer Charles Fort (1874–1932) served to poke holes in the straight story of materialist science and provide a framework for documentation of oddities and the unknown.

Fort’s four books on anomalous phenomena — starting with The Book of the Damned in 1919, followed…