I'm trying to find a photo I saw in a Fortean Times issue around 20 years ago, and I figured this would be a great place to ask!
When I was a kid, we had a family friend who knew I was into aliens, UFOs, cryptozoology, and the like, and he was too. He had a subscription to Fortean Times, and he started giving me his old issues after he’d finished them. This was an ideal situation for tiny me, and it fed my imagination greatly. I can’t tell you how many hours I spent leafing through the pages and imagining what was out there.
I was frequently enthralled by interesting accounts of strange phenomena as well as some weird and sometimes shocking photos. There’s one photo and story in particular that lodged itself in my brain, though, for some reason. It wasn’t a photo of a purported alien, or a shot of Bigfoot, or anything like that. It was a relatively unassuming picture of a specter of an old man standing right outside of someone’s screen door.
It’s been about 20 years since I saw the photo and read the accompanying story, so some details might differ from what’s actually there, but here’s how I remember it. A reader claimed that they were visited by someone at their home. When they answered the door, an older man was there, or at least what at first appeared that way. I vaguely remember them trying to talk to the old man and being immediately put off by his appearance. The thing was that all of his proportions seemed off, particularly his head. They managed to get a photo of the figure, and sure enough, there was a profoundly uncanny appearance to him. His head was far too large when compared to the screen door in front of him, and I seem to remember that you could almost see through him.
The photo itself is typical of digital photos from the late-90s to mid-2000s, with blurriness and compression artifacting, but the face itself looks blurrier than it should be and blurrier than the rest of the photo. The face is close, very large, and takes up a good portion of the photo, framed by the left and right sides of the screen door. The head is a bit misshapen, squarish, and far too large, but apart from the fact that it seems you can slightly see through it, you’d be forgiven for assuming this was a living person standing in front of you. Behind the old man was greenery, I want to say woods. I don’t remember eyes, or other facial features. It was more like the suggestion of facial features. I don’t remember him having any hair, and I can’t stress enough how absolutely huge his head was. It seemed to be roughly in proportion to the rest of him, which I think contributed to not realizing at first that something was off, but when compared to the size of the screen door, you could immediately see that this made no sense.
I sadly lost all my Fortean Times issues in a move long ago, but I’ve gone through quite a few issues after the fact and included a list below of ones the photo is NOT in. A rough year range for the search would be 1997-2004. It could’ve been from an issue a bit older than that, but I don’t remember receiving many with the logo seen here: https://ft.gjovaag.com/w/FT118. I remember more with the logo seen here: https://ft.gjovaag.com/q/images/b/b0/FT129.jpg. I’ve checked up until May of 2004, but it could’ve appeared in an issue slightly later than that. I remember him giving me FT issues starting around 2001 and continuing to give me them until around 2004. I’m positive this was a reader-submitted story and photo, and I’m fairly certain it appeared in the “letters” section toward the end of the issue. I tried to have AI generate this photo, and while they’re not super close, these were the ones that were closest: . The top left photo has the most accurate screen door effect, background, and overall color grading, while the others capture the uncanniness and strange proportions better. I’ve been thinking about this photo since I first saw it half a lifetime ago. If anyone with old FT issues could find it (or even add to my list of issues it’s not in), I would be incredibly grateful. Thanks in advance for your help!
List of Fortean Times issues the uncanny old man photo is NOT in:
Fortean Times 104 (Dec 1997)
Fortean Times 142 (Jan 2001)
Fortean Times 164 (Dec 2002)
Fortean Times 165 (Jan 2003)
Fortean Times 166 (Feb 2003)
Fortean Times 167 (Mar 2003)
Fortean Times 168 (Apr 2003)
Fortean Times 169 (May 2003)
Fortean Times 170 (Jun 2003)
Fortean Times 171 (Jul 2003)
Fortean Times 172 (Aug 2003)
Fortean Times 173 (Sep 2003)
Fortean Times 174 (Oct 2003)
Fortean Times 175 (Nov 2003)
Fortean Times 176 (Dec 2003)
Fortean Times 177 (Special 2003)
Fortean Times 178 (Jan 2004)
Fortean Times 179 (Feb 2004)
Fortean Times 180 (Mar 2004)
Fortean Times 181 (Apr 2004)
Fortean Times 182 (May 2004)
When I was a kid, we had a family friend who knew I was into aliens, UFOs, cryptozoology, and the like, and he was too. He had a subscription to Fortean Times, and he started giving me his old issues after he’d finished them. This was an ideal situation for tiny me, and it fed my imagination greatly. I can’t tell you how many hours I spent leafing through the pages and imagining what was out there.
I was frequently enthralled by interesting accounts of strange phenomena as well as some weird and sometimes shocking photos. There’s one photo and story in particular that lodged itself in my brain, though, for some reason. It wasn’t a photo of a purported alien, or a shot of Bigfoot, or anything like that. It was a relatively unassuming picture of a specter of an old man standing right outside of someone’s screen door.
It’s been about 20 years since I saw the photo and read the accompanying story, so some details might differ from what’s actually there, but here’s how I remember it. A reader claimed that they were visited by someone at their home. When they answered the door, an older man was there, or at least what at first appeared that way. I vaguely remember them trying to talk to the old man and being immediately put off by his appearance. The thing was that all of his proportions seemed off, particularly his head. They managed to get a photo of the figure, and sure enough, there was a profoundly uncanny appearance to him. His head was far too large when compared to the screen door in front of him, and I seem to remember that you could almost see through him.
The photo itself is typical of digital photos from the late-90s to mid-2000s, with blurriness and compression artifacting, but the face itself looks blurrier than it should be and blurrier than the rest of the photo. The face is close, very large, and takes up a good portion of the photo, framed by the left and right sides of the screen door. The head is a bit misshapen, squarish, and far too large, but apart from the fact that it seems you can slightly see through it, you’d be forgiven for assuming this was a living person standing in front of you. Behind the old man was greenery, I want to say woods. I don’t remember eyes, or other facial features. It was more like the suggestion of facial features. I don’t remember him having any hair, and I can’t stress enough how absolutely huge his head was. It seemed to be roughly in proportion to the rest of him, which I think contributed to not realizing at first that something was off, but when compared to the size of the screen door, you could immediately see that this made no sense.
I sadly lost all my Fortean Times issues in a move long ago, but I’ve gone through quite a few issues after the fact and included a list below of ones the photo is NOT in. A rough year range for the search would be 1997-2004. It could’ve been from an issue a bit older than that, but I don’t remember receiving many with the logo seen here: https://ft.gjovaag.com/w/FT118. I remember more with the logo seen here: https://ft.gjovaag.com/q/images/b/b0/FT129.jpg. I’ve checked up until May of 2004, but it could’ve appeared in an issue slightly later than that. I remember him giving me FT issues starting around 2001 and continuing to give me them until around 2004. I’m positive this was a reader-submitted story and photo, and I’m fairly certain it appeared in the “letters” section toward the end of the issue. I tried to have AI generate this photo, and while they’re not super close, these were the ones that were closest: . The top left photo has the most accurate screen door effect, background, and overall color grading, while the others capture the uncanniness and strange proportions better. I’ve been thinking about this photo since I first saw it half a lifetime ago. If anyone with old FT issues could find it (or even add to my list of issues it’s not in), I would be incredibly grateful. Thanks in advance for your help!
List of Fortean Times issues the uncanny old man photo is NOT in:
Fortean Times 104 (Dec 1997)
Fortean Times 142 (Jan 2001)
Fortean Times 164 (Dec 2002)
Fortean Times 165 (Jan 2003)
Fortean Times 166 (Feb 2003)
Fortean Times 167 (Mar 2003)
Fortean Times 168 (Apr 2003)
Fortean Times 169 (May 2003)
Fortean Times 170 (Jun 2003)
Fortean Times 171 (Jul 2003)
Fortean Times 172 (Aug 2003)
Fortean Times 173 (Sep 2003)
Fortean Times 174 (Oct 2003)
Fortean Times 175 (Nov 2003)
Fortean Times 176 (Dec 2003)
Fortean Times 177 (Special 2003)
Fortean Times 178 (Jan 2004)
Fortean Times 179 (Feb 2004)
Fortean Times 180 (Mar 2004)
Fortean Times 181 (Apr 2004)
Fortean Times 182 (May 2004)
In a strange twist of fate, while searching for this photo (but before it was found), I came across this account on an old Angelfire site that I was particularly moved by (pasted and linked below). It turns out that account was an update to this original story!