Texas L.O.W.F.I

Posts Tagged ‘Library’

“Tales of High Texan Strangeness”

“Out here we is stoned – immaculate” – The WASP: Texas Radio and the Big Beat, The Doors.

Welcome aboard the LOWFI network. I’m SMiles Lewis, your humble guide and Bureau Chief for the easternmost state in our League of Western Fortean Intermediatists.

I was born and raised here in Central Texas, having migrated north from San Antonio to Austin as a toddler – at the direction and with assistance of a parental unit, not hitch-hiking on my own mind you.

I’ve had a life-long interest (obsession) with all things anomalous, first devouring my elementary school’s library of books on UFOs, bigfoot and the Loch Ness monster. Eventually I learned of Charles Fort’s legacy which has enabled weird-seeking as both a hobby and life-path.

An early age ability to remember my nightly dreams is generally what I credit for sparking that obsession but it was equally spurred on by an assortment of personal paranormal experiences ranging from dream-switching, various synchronicities and apparent telepathic / empathic episodes.

Having been raised on lots of science fiction (I was 8 or 9 years old when Star Wars first hit) I was drawn to the UFO phenomenon above all other Fortean pursuits. This lead me to local UFO groups like Austin MUFON and the Austin Abductee Support Group. I’d eventually be requested to head both of these organizations and did so for many years. These organizations sponsored several local conferences at which I would audio and / or videotape the proceedings. Some of these videos have been posted online including the Austin Mufon 9/26/92 mini-conference with Ed Conroy – author of Report on Communion – Parts 1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 .

It was my own EHEs (after Rhea White’s Exceptional Human Experience Network) with strange phenomena, particularly anomalous information transfer (ESP, Psi, Remote Viewing, etc.) and lucid dreaming, that would drive me to investigate the field of consciousness research and parapsychology. I found a local non-profit group (The Institute for Neuroscience And Consciousness Studies) that had all the same interests as me in scientifically investigating. I currently serve as its VP, webmaster and librarian.

Years of voraciously reading and collecting books, paper files and magazines on the paranormal, consciousness, UFOs, Forteana, strange and mysterious phenomena, parapsychology and more led me to networking with various other publishers, researchers, seekers and writers like Greg Bishop, Robert Larson, and Peter Stenshoel of The Excluded Middle magazine (out in California), Wes Nations of Crash Collusion magazine (here in Austin), Adam Gorightly, Joan D’Arc and the Paranoia magazine crowd and many others.

Networking with so many publications and people inspired me to try my own hand at desktop publishing and I began doing limited print-runs of a zine focusing on electromagnetic aspects of the paranormal, UFOs, parapsychology and mind control lore. It was called E.L.F. INFESTED SPACES – Journal of Possible Paradigms. Less than half-way through its life-cycle I adapted it for internet distribution and thus was born the ELFIS Network which has served as a Portal to Possible Paradigms for over ten years now.

Eventually, I’d also become editor and content wrangler for a brand-new Austin tabloid news-magazine called Austin Para Times. (I’ll be posting shortly some rare archival articles from the print editions that have never appeared online before, including this Flashback: Guide to Para Texas.)

The ceaseless collecting of Fortean books on topics as diverse as UFOs, consciousness, the paranormal, parapsychology and more ultimately led me to found my own non-profit community organization, The Scientific Anomaly Institute and its Anomaly Archives lending library. The Anomaly Archives has hosted and helped sponsor a number of local events including The Prankster and the Conspiracy (a free public lecture by Adam Gorightly about the strange world of Kerry Thornley), Reading The Enemy’s Mind (free public lecture by Former Military Remote Viewer Paul Smith), Texas Ghost Lights Conference with Paul Devereux, Nick Redfern, James Bunnell, and Rob Riggs, and most recently a lecture by C.B. Scott Jones on UFO Disclosure.

Along the way I’ve spoken at a handful of public events and conferences on UFOs and related phenomena as well as organized one of “the Greatest UFO Conference that never occurred” wherein we were going to honor guerrilla ontologist Robert Anton Wilson with a lifetime achievement award. The 38th National UFO Conference would have been the 3rd time for the event to occur inside Texas. However, the tragic events of September 11th would cause the cancellation of that event. You can view television and movie trailers for this event that never happened here, here, here and here.

Nowadays I’m maintaining The Elfis Network of sites, writing articles for ANOMALY Magazine and doing regular installments of my 3 radioshows (Blue Rose Report, PreCognitive Dissonance and PsiOp Radio) on my Anomaly Radio Network. I am honored and excited to be hosting the LOWFI network and serving as the Texas Bureau Chief.

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Well, that’s gotta be it for now. Please do CONTACT US here at LOWFI and send us your strange experiences and encounters. We hope to chronicle and report on YOUR experiences while undertaking our own investigations of the strange and mysterious worlds of Fortean phenomena.

- SMiles Lewis