HPLHS News & Events Spring 2021

Featured Member

• June 15, 2021

Our Member of the Month for June, 2021 is William "Ike" Eisenhauer of Omaha, Nebraska.

Ike says: “’What if the shadows are real?’ ‘Of course, shadows are real.’ ‘No, I mean what if the THINGS you think ARE the shadows are real’. ’Shut up Billy, you are freaking me out‘. A simple childhood conversation at night was the start of my twisted fascination with what is really out there, beyond the perceptions and of the objective and rational. Of course this path leads one quickly to the works of Lovecraft, and so I joined those already on that journey to a hellish destination.

Like many others, imaginations on this level for those of a young age also gravitate to role playing games, like D&D. Where these seeds of insanity can grow to full-on jungles of madness. Amplified by a similarly deranged, but in a "good" way, 5th grade teacher who felt that exploring the works of Lovecraft along with Tolkien, Howard, and Poe along with a healthy dose of fantasy role playing as education entrenched me in this love of the works.

Fast forward to much later in life and finding the love of my life, my wife Dawn, who I merged into a joint shared insanity for the last 29 years. I could not be happier. During our time as the owners of a now defunct escape room company (thank you pestilence with the cursed name of COVID), I joined the HPLHS. After the wrath of the pandemic stripped us of all material possessions we fled to the midwest from our coastal abode with our two androgrous spawn, who also have been entwined in the collective madness. Where I sit in my semi-retirement and permanent delusional reality and continue to inflict a different kind of punishment on my college engineering students at the school where I attended many decades before."

DART at work

• May 26, 2021

Some of the stalwart Dark Adventure gang gathered on Zoom to do an initial table read of "The Horror in the Museum". This reading serves as a test-drive of the script before we finalize it for production. We used to do them at HQ, but for the last few episodes we've done them over the internet to keep everyone as safe as can be. It's always fun, but we look forward to returning to the old-fashioned way!

The Horror!

• May 13, 2021

We are very pleased to announce that the next episode of Dark Adventure Radio Theatre will be "The Horror in the Museum", based on the collaboration between HPL and Hazel Heald.

The show is now in the early phases of production, and is planned for release on Lovecraft's birthday, August 20th. You can pre-order your copy on CD or download here!

The Long Letters

• May 13, 2021

We are beyond happy to tell you that the long-sought collection of letters from HPL to Frank Belknap Long is now secured at the library of Brown University!

The acquisition proved more difficult than originally anticipated. Just when we thought we had raised the needed funds, the seller raised the price from what had previously been agreed, but Hippocampus Press, S.T. Joshi and the HPLHS and its members rose to the challenge, and the purchase is now a done deal. It was a vexing surprise, but it was a complicated situation and in the end Brown University did get an institutional discount, paying less than a private collector would have done. The librarians at Brown tell us they will start scanning the documents presently, and hopefully by summer they'll be available for your enjoyment at the Brown Digital Repository. There's a lot of great things about running the HPLHS, but one of our favorites is to see an opportunity like this, marshal a legion of fans from around the globe and see our community accomplish something really significant for Lovecraftian scholarship.

Featured Member

• May 1, 2021

Our Member of the Month for May, 2021 is Nathan Sells of Ottawa, Canada.

Nathan says: "I first found my way to Lovecraftiana in 2007. I perused the stacks of my local library beset with the questions that haunt all middle-schoolers, like “Who’s this guy my D&D books keep referencing?” and “What the heck is this word? Why does it have so many consonants?” I found the answers tucked away in a book of short stories where I first read 'The Dreams in the Witch House', a story that remains one of my favourites to this day. That was enough to hook me. I quickly read all the other stories the library system had to offer me, and like any good cultist I began spreading what I found. Lovecraft quickly became a way to connect with new friends, an inspiration for the roleplaying that had drawn me to him in the first place, and a lens through which to explore history.

At some point early in my explorations of Lovecraft I found my way onto the HPLHS website, and…well, there’s a reason I’m still here. Suddenly there weren’t just books to read, but props and movies and radio plays and a whole community of like-minded weirdos. It propelled me deeper into the hobby. The HPLHS is also directly responsible for one of my favourite Lovecraft memories.

When I worked at an overnight camp, I was known to have the best cabin to watch at night. Where other cabins were likely to be full of rambunctious children battling against sleep, the children of mine were quietly gathered around speakers to listen to a chapter of a DART show. Not only did this give me ample time to engage in nameless rituals, it was amazing to watch the general confusion in the dining hall, as a group of ten-year-olds arrived discussing what exactly an Elder Thing looked like, instead of the day’s activities.

I now feel confident answering the questions of my younger self (well, I’m still not sure how to pronounce a few names…) and I prompt fun ones from friends like “Nathan, what’s that on your shelf?” and “Was that NPC Nyarlathotep, again?” It a stage I could never have reached without this wonderful and august community."

An HPL postcard

• April 9, 2021

We are very pleased to announce that we have come into possession of a very nifty postcard from HPL to Clark Ashton Smith, postmarked August 2, 1933!

HPL writes: 109°! I am convulsed with envy! Would that a blast from (Haon-Dor) might reach these ice-bound shores — I had to light my oil stove last night! ¶ Yes — Hornig told me of his new job.... I asked him whether Hugo really pays his staff! ¶ Mrs. Heald has written to Miss Weber about that collection business, but Miss W. can't take the case just yet, seven others being on her programme ahead of it. ¶ Young Melmoth has just sold a story to the revived Astounding for 95 bucks. That ought to be a magnificent market for you. The Asst. Ed. Desmond Hall speaks as if real literary standards would be followed. ¶ Wright has just turned down the collaborated Silver Key sequel — as I expected! ¶ Am experimenting with a new story, but am not sure whether I'll show it to anybody. If I can keep my programme clear I may try to start (somewhere). Yrs for the sign of Maal (Owit) —Éch-Pi-El

Featured Member

• April 1, 2021

Our Member of the Month for April, 2021 lives in San Francisco, Cal.

His name is Guillermo Uribe, a Miskatonic University dropout. Rumors say that he was found being held in an asylum, his sanity shattered.

It all began in Old Aztec lands, where hideous human sacrifices were held in the name of blood lust gods. An ordinary person, curious about the secrets of nature and mysteries beyond. It was around 2007 when he was playing in a psychobilly band when he became aware about a writer called HP Lovecraft, rumors say that one song from their set depicted stories about unimaginable creatures and horrors; little did he knew the venomous seed was planted in his soul.

It was around 2010 when he befriended some mysterious beings who lured him to become one of the first members of the cult called "Círculo Lovecraftiano & Horror". For some years he kept studying dark and eerie stories regarding unthinkable horror, sharing them with other members of the cult in one of their many monthly pagan rituals. It wasn’t long after, on a cold winter, he became aware of another group of people far away called the HP Lovecraft Historical Society. He started to show symptoms of madness after he spent days hearing hideous melodies about Christmas carols and old documentaries regarding sea expeditions. He needed to know more, he couldn't stop anymore.

Fever dreams about infinite dimensions and non-Euclidean geometry, indescribable beings called him from beyond. He learned to play the bass guitar every evening to make those voices go away, to appease them off. Last time he made contact with relatives he said he was lured by the call from the sea, that he needed to go to a far away place called California, to find the answers to his never ending nightmares.

For many years, nobody heard from him until now.

Our Twitter Account

• March 31, 2021

About a month ago the HPLHS Twitter account was hacked and stolen by some miscreant. Repeated efforts to get help from Twitter Support were met with complete silence. Within hours of our discovery of the issue, we were approached by an unknown person offering to "help us get our account back": all we had to do was send this person a DM. We declined to do so, because we feel fairly certain that this person is the thief and was simply trying to shake us down. Since Twitter itself never helped, we have decided to simply start over. Although the hacker stole all our followers and our entire timeline of messages, we still have our original handle, @HPLHS. Thanks to the brave stalwarts who have followed us anew. Apologies to anyone who might have found themselves spammed by the thief. May hordes of Nightgaunts descend upon him/her/them.

Equinox

• March 20, 2021

Wishing our Northern Hemisphere friends a very happy Spring, and those in the Southern Hemisphere a lovely autumn! We are cooking up several new projects here at headquarters and hope to be making some fun announcements here very soon!

Featured Member

• March 1, 2021

Our Member of the Month for March, 2021 is Joshua Willenbring, of Kenosha, Wisconsin.

Joshua says: "In one form or another horror has almost always been a part of my life. Growing up my father was — and still is — a big fan of B-list horror movies. So watching all those overly gory, jump scare style movies you would think I was a huge horror buff. What happened was exactly the opposite; it actually put me off horror. It all felt too samey: scary man kills dumb teenagers, dumb teenagers escape or all die. I eschewed the genre entirely until high-school. It was there I started seriously reading Poe, and found out that I actually did enjoy horror. The difference being that I could put my own imagination to work on what was happening. This only got better as “Cthulhu Fever” hit my school. I had been on the fringes of that fever and didn't really dive into it. I enjoyed the surface knowledge and jokes my friends and I made. It wasn't until a few years ago that I told myself it was time to knuckle down and actually read the mythos stories. My progress has admittedly been slow but I understand more of the jokes now!

I actually found out about the HPLHS because I started running Call of Cthulhu online for some friends. I was looking for The Masks of Nyarlathotep module and found the prop set here. Then found the D.A.R.T. plays, and before I knew it I was planning listening sessions for my gaming group. It's been a lot of fun writing out scenarios for my players, as most of them have no background with Lovecraft's work. So just about anything I throw at them is shocking and new, and I haven't even touched most of the mythos creatures...yet. I do hope one day to properly emulate a mythos story into a session, and achieve the same mind bending horror the story conveys. ​

Overall my admittedly short time in the society has been great. I love the creativity and memorabilia that's sprung up from the group (I absolutely love the Innsmouth Sea Shanties). I really only have two concerns about my continued membership. One, that I find enough shelf space to accommodate my new addiction. Two, that I never see any slightly hunched dark figures emerging from Lake Michigan (I live very close to the shore).”

2021 Member Stamp

• November 27, 2020

The official membership renewal stamp for 2021 is now available. With the rod of Asclepius and a pair of shaking hands, the design is meant to convey a hope for healing and unity in the year ahead. All members who join or renew after today's date will be getting the new stamp on their documents.