CRAIG CONLEY (Prof. Oddfellow) is recognized by Encarta as “America’s most creative and diligent scholar of letters, words and punctuation.” He has been called a “language fanatic” by Page Six gossip columnist Cindy Adams, a “cult hero” by Publisher’s Weekly, a “monk for the modern age” by George Parker, and “a true Renaissance man of the modern era, diving headfirst into comprehensive, open-minded study of realms obscured or merely obscure” by Clint Marsh. An eccentric scholar, Conley’s ideas are often decades ahead of their time. He invented the concept of the “virtual pet” in 1980, fifteen years before the debut of the popular “Tamagotchi” in Japan. His virtual pet, actually a rare flower, still thrives and has reached an incomprehensible size. Conley’s website is OneLetterWords.com.
"The imaginary horse isn't real, but your idea of it is real" (Marietta McCarty, Little Big Minds, 2006). Photo as scanned by the Costică Acsinte Archive.
"The first heaven, that of the Moon, is guarded by the lowest order of angels" (in Dante's Paradiso, as noted in The Seven Basic Plots: Why We Tell Stories), and here's what it looks like. A guard stands before Johann Friedrich Julius Schmidt's moon model at the Field Columbian Museum, 1898.
"It seems our pretty young royals are shrinking before our eyes" (A Current Affair, July 13, 2011). Pictured, Brisbane decorates for Queen Elizabeth II in 1954.
"For when the frost comes, all will be safe till Spring" (R. H. Budd, The Complete Practical Farmer, 1835). Photo courtesy of the Costică Acsinte Archive.
You've heard that a person has a light side and a shadow side. However, "you must remember that you have two light sides instead of just one" (Popular Science, Sept. 1941). Our photographic proof is from a 1939 yearbook scanned by Miami University Libraries.