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Post by dem bones on Sept 2, 2020 14:54:16 GMT
Peter Haining - The Monster Trap & Other True Mysteries (Armada, 1983: originally 1976) Introduction
The Monster Trap The Vampire of Cumberland The Green Children on Banjos The Prince who saw 'The Flying Dutchman' The Mystery Mummy of Wyoming The Secret of 'The Devil's Stone' The Cat that had Wings The Army that Disappeared into Thin Air Captured by the Bigfoot Creature The Master of WitchesBlurb: INCREDIBLE - BUT TRUE!
The ghastly loch monster ... the terrifying journey with the abominable Bigfoot ... the ominous sighting of the phantom ship ... the cat with wings ... the bizarre disappearance of a whole army ... the bloodcurdling evil of the Vampire of Croglin Hall...
Ten breathtaking mysteries that have baffled the world. Lovely dedication: The Monster Trap: Caithness, April 21 - May 4 1923. Colonel Arthur Trimble and Bruce the spaniel meet their respective gory ends while hunting the Loch Watten monster, "a kind of neck with a huge flat head." Series off to a cracking start. Top cryptozoologist Karl Shuker has plenty to say about this extraordinary episode, and for a bit it seems as though Peter has been up to his old tricks, but then the mystery grows murkier still. The Vampire of Cumberland: Faithful regurgitation of Augustus Hare's dubious history of the Croglin Grange Vampire. Provides postscript. In 1965, during modification work at the Hall, workmen demolished a bricked up window in what may have been "Amelia Cronswell"'s room, to reveal an alcove and "the crumbling bones of a skeleton" The Mystery Mummy of Wyoming: October 1932. Gold prospectors in the Colorado Mountains discover a tiny, shrivelled mummy in a cave. Possibly prehistoric in origin, might it be but one of "a whole race of barbaric dwarf people who once lived in the region"? Captured by the Bigfoot Creature: British Columbia, 1924. Seeking a lost gold mine at the head of the Toba Inlet, Albert Ostman is carried off by a Sasquatch and help captive in a cave for six days before he escapes. Nothing about their treatment of Ostman suggests the Yeti and family wanted him for food, so why abduct him?
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Post by humgoo on Sept 2, 2020 17:34:59 GMT
Top cryptozoologist Karl Shuker has plenty to say about this extraordinary episode, and for a bit it seems as though Peter has been up to his old tricks, but then the mystery grows murkier still. It's a bit of a let-down to find out that PH didn't make it up after all, don't you think? (And It would be handy to have a list of PH's noms de plume (only "Ric Alexander", "William Pattrick", "Richard Peyton" and "Sean Richards"??), to avoid the "whether so-and-so and Haining were the same person" predicament!)
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Post by Dr Strange on Sept 2, 2020 17:54:41 GMT
The Monster Trap: Caithness, April 21 - May 4 1923. Colonel Arthur Trimble and Bruce the spaniel meet their respective gory ends while hunting the Loch Watten monster, "a kind of neck with a huge flat head." Series off to a cracking start. Top cryptozoologist Karl Shuker has plenty to say about this extraordinary episode, and for a bit it seems as though Peter has been up to his old tricks, but then the mystery grows murkier still. I think I may have mentioned this before, but I was born in Caithness and lived there until my mid-20s. I still have family up there and go back a couple of times a year to visit. I've never heard any mention of "Wattie". As well as being rather shallow (little more than 12 feet at its deepest), Loch Watten is also famously "crystal clear" - if you google it, that description comes up again and again. It's a very unlikely place for a large monster to be hiding.
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Post by dem bones on Sept 2, 2020 18:12:00 GMT
Top cryptozoologist Karl Shuker has plenty to say about this extraordinary episode, and for a bit it seems as though Peter has been up to his old tricks, but then the mystery grows murkier still. It's a bit of a let-down to find out that PH didn't make it up after all, don't you think? (And It would be handy to have a list of PH's noms de plume (only "Ric Alexander", "William Pattrick", "Richard Peyton" and "Sean Richards"??), to avoid the "whether so-and-so and Haining were the same person" predicament!) He was 'Alexander Peters' for The Devil in the Suburbs (NEL, 1972) and he spent some time as 'Alfred Hitchcock' for a series of Four Square anthologies. Didn't he also compiled a series of books on tombstone humour, bizarre death's and legal strangeness as 'Richard D'eath' or was that a different speed hack? And I agree; it's devastating when you reach the bit that exonerates PH from (much of the) blame.
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Post by dem bones on Sept 2, 2020 18:14:09 GMT
The Monster Trap: Caithness, April 21 - May 4 1923. Colonel Arthur Trimble and Bruce the spaniel meet their respective gory ends while hunting the Loch Watten monster, "a kind of neck with a huge flat head." Series off to a cracking start. Top cryptozoologist Karl Shuker has plenty to say about this extraordinary episode, and for a bit it seems as though Peter has been up to his old tricks, but then the mystery grows murkier still. I think I may have mentioned this before, but I was born in Caithness and lived there until my mid-20s. I still have family up there and go back a couple of times a year to visit. I've ever heard any mention of "Wattie". As well as being rather shallow (little more than 12 feet at its deepest), Loch Watten is also famously "crystal clear" - if you google it, that description comes up again and again. It's a very unlikely place for a large monster to be hiding. Now I'm torn between accepting the word of someone with experience of the area who knows what they're talking about, or the facts.
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Post by Shrink Proof on Sept 2, 2020 18:34:54 GMT
The Monster Trap: Caithness, April 21 - May 4 1923. Colonel Arthur Trimble and Bruce the spaniel meet their respective gory ends while hunting the Loch Watten monster, "a kind of neck with a huge flat head." Series off to a cracking start. Top cryptozoologist Karl Shuker has plenty to say about this extraordinary episode, and for a bit it seems as though Peter has been up to his old tricks, but then the mystery grows murkier still. I think I may have mentioned this before, but I was born in Caithness and lived there until my mid-20s. I still have family up there and go back a couple of times a year to visit. I've ever heard any mention of "Wattie". As well as being rather shallow (little more than 12 feet at its deepest), Loch Watten is also famously "crystal clear" - if you google it, that description comes up again and again. It's a very unlikely place for a large monster to be hiding. You beat me to it Dr Strange! If you believe that a monster could be living in Loch Watten, I have a bridge you might like to buy.
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Post by jamesdoig on Sept 2, 2020 21:10:03 GMT
I have a bridge you might like to buy. Done and done!
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Post by dem bones on Sept 3, 2020 7:55:23 GMT
The Green Children of Banjo: A village near Barcelona, 1887. Two sobbing, bright-green skinned children appear as if from nowhere in a harvest field. The youths were taken in and cared for by chief landowner, Ricardo da Calno. They refused all food offered them bar green beans. The boy sickened and died soon after discovery. His sister lived for five years, her skin gradually paling down to white. She learned enough rudimentary Spanish to communicate with her guardian but was unable to recall anything about her past other than she may have lived in a cave. Who were these mysterious children? Journeyers from the centre of the Earth? Martians? visitors from the fourth dimension? something to do with Extinction Rebellion? #The Illuminati? As with title story, Haining's primary source for his information is John Macklin ( Strange Destinies, 1965). Inevitably, the welter of irrefutable evidence meticulously compiled by Mr. Macklin is not enough for the "Moaning Minnies" and "Dismal Jimmies" - as exemplified in this instance by those serial naysayers, Anamolies - who complain entire case history is blatant rehash of twelfth century legend, The Green Children of Woolpit. To their small minds, Haining, via Macklin, has merely updated and relocated the episode to sunnier climes. It's "political correctness" gone mad! The Secret of 'The Devil's Stone': Mallow, Co. Cork, 1937. Timothy O'Brien finds a stone bearing a strange inscription on his way to school. Is it the Devil? The Cat that had Wings: Pinesville, West Virginia, May 1959. Douglas Shelton, 15, discovers the long haired, winged cat up a tree while out hunting with Roamer, the dog. A feature in the Beckley Post-Herald led to a number of TV appearances for boy and strange pet until its wings fell off. Haining valiantly attempts to spice up mediocre source material by introducing a "was it a vampire-bat-like-cat?" angle.
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Post by Jojo Lapin X on Sept 3, 2020 8:56:16 GMT
until its wings fell off. Glue is not sufficient for this kind of thing; you need to sew them on.
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Post by andydecker on Sept 3, 2020 9:16:21 GMT
It's a very unlikely place for a large monster to be hiding. So it is evil as well as devious!
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Post by samdawson on Sept 3, 2020 10:45:24 GMT
Also the early 70s Pan S is for Space and R is for Rocket (can be seeing by Googling: s is for space, pan, r is for rocket)
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Post by dem bones on Sept 3, 2020 14:31:48 GMT
The Prince who saw 'The Flying Dutchman': In 1865, Prince George, grandfather of our current monarch, encountered the phantom ship "glowing with an eerie phosphorescent light" off the coast of Sydney. George, sixteen, was serving aboard The Inconstant at the time. He recorded the sighting, which was witnessed by many, in the ships log. The Army that Disappeared into Thin Air: During the disastrous Gallipoli campaign of 1915, the decimated 5th Norfolk regiment pressed on through what appeared to be a cloud of mist - and vanished, never to be seen again. Poignant. Even clutching-at-straws suggestion of 'abduction by flying saucer' failed to lift sombre mood. The Master of Witches: Hadleigh, Essex Coast, eighteenth and nineteenth century. James 'Cunning' Murrell, 1780-1860, powerful wizard, super-smuggler and, according to regulars at the Crown public house, trafficker with Satan. A poacher turned gamekeeper, Murrell accepted money to reverse the dark mischief of fellow witches and cause gypsies to spontaneously combust. His exploding "witch bottles" were a menace to friend and foe alike. Artist unknown, detail from illustration accompanying John Macklin's The Trap he set was for a Monster ...., Leicester Mercury, 28 March 1966. Via ShukerNature, to whom grateful thanks. At time of writing, I've yet to read two of the five True Mysteries books, so am in no position to speculate if the series again reaches similar heights of insanity as title story - can vouch that The Vampire Terror, recently revisited, is subdued in comparison. Thank you, Captain Armada!
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Post by humgoo on Sept 3, 2020 16:12:39 GMT
To their small minds, Haining, via Macklin, has merely updated and relocated the episode to sunnier climes. It's "political correctness" gone mad! What, another round of Haining-bashing (and you're only reviewing the second book of the series)!? The only consolation is that in this war between PH and REST OF THE WORLD, we here on Vault know which side we're on!
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Post by dem bones on Sept 3, 2020 17:09:11 GMT
The only consolation is that in this war between PH and REST OF THE WORLD, we here on Vault know which side we're on! Would that were the case, friend Humgoo. Fair to say that we are not all singing from the same hymn sheet where Peter is concerned, and leave it at that.
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Post by Shrink Proof on Sept 3, 2020 18:32:16 GMT
Despite what you might think, I've thoroughly enjoyed many PH books. But now and then I find it hard to suspend disbelief. The price one pays for a Manchester upbringing I suppose....
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