My youngest brother, Jerry D. Coleman, on the Sunday night earlier than Labor Day, September 1, 2024, went out to his patio to benefit from the night air, take a look at the timber behind his Harvard, Illinois residence, and have a smoke.
Neighbors noticed him there after supper and the subsequent morning, September 2, 2024. Curious, they checked on why he had not moved. About 10 am, they found he had handed away, of what the authorities mentioned was a coronary heart assault.
Born in Decatur, Illinois, Jerry was 73, and his demise was a shock. He had been defeating his well being problems with late. A dozen years in the past, his medical doctors have been discussing two separate sorts of throat most cancers overtaking his physique. He’d struggled with medical recommendation, and continued smoking, whereas refusing suggestions to hold round an oxygen tank. Regardless of not driving, he felt good sufficient to stay alone.
As to the youthful Brothers Coleman, they have been, from L to R, Invoice, Jerry within the center, and Loren.
“Expeditions” occurred all through the “jungles” of central Illinois, in the hunt for the elusive “uncaught apes” of the Midwest. Right here is our brother, Invoice, who died January 21, 2014, and Jerry, who died September 1, 2024. Loren took the photograph.
Susan and Jerry have been the youngest, and really shut.
Cousins have been by no means too distant. Older than us all was our cousin Mark Chaney, who turned a police officer and a member of the Illinois Bureau of Investigation. Family members labored with the fireplace division, police division, and state police. It was no marvel that we have been eager about cryptozoological and Fortean investigations too.
Jerry Dale Coleman was the writer of two books, Unusual Highways: A Guidebook to American Mysteries and Extra Unusual Highways, because of writer Troy Taylor. An unique assortment of true unexplained tales from hauntings to monster birds, Jerry’s books revealed circumstances, hoaxes, crucial evaluation, and launched unique tales of phenomenon. His first e book was revealed on Halloween in 2003 from Whitechapel Press. His second e book was launched in January 2006.
Jerry turned an investigator of unusual phenomenon and weird occasions within the Nineteen Seventies, and contributed to quite a few books within the Nineteen Seventies and Nineteen Eighties. He wrote a number of newspaper articles, was a visitor of quite a few radio broadcasts, traveled the continental United States, from coast to coast, in addition to to Hawaii, Mexico, Canada, Europe, and the Bahamas Islands, establishing his distinctive model whereas analyzing the unexplained. His first article was revealed within the December 1983 concern of Destiny Journal. He then created and produced the earliest of its variety in collector playing cards, Fable or Actual Playing cards, in 1994.
These playing cards contained Jerry’s artwork, and his curating decisions for what must be included; a lot of the textual content was by Loren. It was a mixture that labored properly. It additionally contained circumstances of particular curiosity to Jerry.
Before everything, Jerry D. Coleman will all the time be recognized for his in-depth investigative work on the 1977 Lawndale, Illinois, Thunderbird case.
Jerry Coleman’s Fable or Actual Card contained his illustration of the occasion.
Jerry D. Coleman was the primary researcher to speak to Ruth and Marlon Lowe concerning the Thunderbird abduction. The outline he obtained from the eyewitnesses was exacting and has been repeated usually within the cryptozoological literature.
Jerry, previously of Decatur, Illinois, was capable of interview Marlon, Ruth and Jake Lowe on two events in 1977, inside hours of the incident. Loren returned in 1979, with Jerry, to re-interview the Lowes. Because of Jerry’s involvement, he was quoted usually by the media, in newspapers and in actuality tv applications.
The most effective supplies on the Lawndale incident, from the Coleman brothers’ area examinations, are discovered within the following sources:
(1) Creatures of the Different Edge (NY: Warner Books, 1986; Anomalist Books, 2006). Incorporates the primary, unique 1977 notes from Jerry D. Coleman.
(2) Mysterious America (Boston: Faber and Faber, 1983; NY: Simon and Schuster, 2007). Chapter Two is partially the revised unique Fortean Instances article on the primary interviews with the Lowes.
(3-4) Unusual Highways (Alton, IL: Whitechapel, 2003) and Extra Unusual Highways (Alton, IL: Whitechapel, 2006). These books have chapters on Jerry Coleman’s recollections of his interviews with the Lowes in 1977, 1979, and his documentary tv experiences.
(5) Thunderbirds: America’s Dwelling Legends of Big Birds (NY: Paraview, 2004). Mark A. Corridor’s overview of the whole Lawndale incident is positioned within the context of the opposite sightings occurring all through central Illinois and the Midwest in 1977. Corridor’s use of unique supply materials units it aside from different concurrent and later discussions from non-Coleman books, on these issues.
(6) “The 1977 Lawndale, Illinois Thunderbird Case” (2007; misplaced in our on-line world). Jerry D. Coleman’s timeline on the kidnapping together with his detailed footnotes on the incident.
(7) Birdzilla (MonsterQuest, November 21, 2007) Jerry did the consulting work for this Discovery Channel particular on the Thunderbird “assault”, and assisted in involving Marlon Lowe in this system.
Janice Carter allegedly assembly “Fox” within the Carter Farm’s basement, April 2002.
Jerry Coleman additionally traveled extensively speaking to eyewitnesses who noticed “Black Panthers” within the Midwest, and debunking the tales related to the situation of the Carter Farm “Bigfoot” incidents.
A Life Nicely Lived
Born in Macon County, Illinois, October 3, 1951 at a whopping 11 kilos 14 and a half ounces, his mom known as Jerry a phenomena! In his life as the daddy of 4 (he misplaced his son Jerry Denton to SIDS), JDC tended to agree together with his mom’s first impression. Jerry liked his children and being a dad.
An skilled outdoorsman and completed information, his commonsense strategy to the world round him served him properly. He took satisfaction in carrying no labels from organized teams, thus giving him the true freedom to talk his thoughts.
When Jerry wrote his books’ “Concerning the Creator,” he summarized how he needed to be remembered. Jerry had labored as a paramedic in Illinois, put in alarm techniques in California, and ran a trucking firm in Tennessee. However in overviewing his life, he talked concerning the quite a few articles he’d written on the “unexplained” and the way he’d traveled “everywhere in the nation, in addition to South America and Europe, in a quest for the unknown.” Jerry ended this abstract by mentioning his work “as a counselor for troubled teenagers.”
Jerry usually would say he acquired his schooling “the onerous knocks means,” as a result of he by no means attended school. He turned often known as a candid, neutral, and nice interviewer, and a severe veteran monster hunter.
Jerry’s humorousness was alive to the top. He informed me in 2010 that he had lastly been “admitted to a college,” figuring out this present day would come.
I requested him what he meant, and he mentioned that the College of Tennessee had accepted his last stays within the forensic Physique Farm at Knoxville. This was the identical spot that had taken Grover Krantz’s physique (1931-2002) too.
Jerry’s smile and laughter can be dearly missed.
I’m in shock.
One final cup of tea with Jerry….
Goodbye, brother. I like you.
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My because of Tara, Stephanie, Nick and Susan, with images and information.