Tiffany Thayer

Tiffany Ellsworth Thayer (March 1, 1902 – August 23, 1959) was an American actor, author and founder of the Fortean Society.

Born in Freeport, Illinois, Thayer quit school at age 15 and worked as an actor, reporter, and used-book clerk in Chicago, Detroit, and Cleveland. Aged 16, he toured as the teenaged hero in the Civil War drama The Coward. Thayer contacted American author Charles Fort in 1924. In 1926, Thayer moved to New York City to act, but soon spent more time writing.

In 1931 Thayer co-founded the Fortean Society in New York City to promote Fort's ideas. Primarily based in New York City, the Society was headed by first president Theodore Dreiser, an old friend of Fort who had helped to get his work published. Early members of the original Society in NYC included such luminaries as Booth Tarkington, Ben Hecht, Alexander Woollcott and H. L. Mencken. The first 6 issues of Doubt, the Fortean Society's newsletter, were each edited by a different member, starting with Theodore Dreiser. Thayer thereafter took over editorship of subsequent issues. Thayer began to assert extreme control over the society, largely filling the newsletter with articles written by himself, and excommunicating the entire San Francisco chapter, reportedly their largest and most active, after disagreements over the society's direction, and forbidding them to use the name Fortean. During World War II, for example, Thayer used every issue of Doubt to espouse his politics. He celebrated the escape of Gerhart Eisler, and named Garry Davis an Honorary Fellow of the Society for renouncing his American citizenship. In particular, Thayer frequently expressed opposition to Civil Defense, going to such lengths as encouraging readers to turn on their lights in defiance of air raid sirens. In contrast to the spirit of Charles Fort, he dismissed not only flying saucers as nonsense but also the atomic bomb as a hoax by the US government.

Thayer also wrote several novels, including the bestseller Thirteen Women (1930) which was filmed as Thirteen Women (1932) and released by RKO Radio Pictures. Thayer wrote a number of novels which contain elements of science fiction or fantasy, including Dr. Arnoldi (1934) about a world where no-one can die. He also wrote "America Needs Indians" and "Raped Again!", the latter described as a blueprint for enslaving entire populations. Thayer also wrote an edition of François Rabelais for children, Rabelais for Boys and Girls (1939).

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