The Ritual & Decorative Arson Newsletter (1972)

The Ritual & Decorative Arson Newsletter was published between 1970 and 1976. Its editor was Trevor Vestige who also managed the petrol station where Joe and Oliver Bush disappeared in 1970 (see Discovering Scarfolk for more details).

This copy was banned by the council after marauding children wearing ceremonial masks torched and laid waste to half of Scarfolk on Halloween, 1972. Despite the ban, the council torched the other half of the town the following spring because it "looked uneven".

Because the public information office had burned down citizens weren't warned and many perished in the flames. Grieving family members, however, were compensated with splendid, top-of-the-range trowel and funerary urn sets.

Happy Halloween from everyone at Scarfolk Council.

PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENT: Scarfolk Television

Watch this short film about a very important development in Scarfolk. For more information please reread.

"This is...Scarfolk" (date unknown)

Many people will remember Miroslav Šašek's "This Is..." series of illustrated guide books for children. Following his famous works on London, Edinburgh, Ireland, Paris and New York, Šašek turned his attention to 1970s Scarfolk.

He worked on “This is…Scarfolk” for several months and included many recognisable places and people: the pagan Officist cult deity, Mr Johnson (see Discovering Scarfolk for more details); Kak the bird, mascot of the 'Don't' public information campaign, and the Council Christmas Boy.

However, when Šašek submitted the manuscript to the BCWA, the council's Board of Censorship and Whimsical Annihilation, he found himself facing legal obstacles.

The council felt that the book contained "untruths which could cast the town in a bad light". Firstly, the council complained that the front of the Scarfolk Death Bus on the book's cover was blood splattered, "which suggests that [the bus] wilfully drives at people with the intention of knocking them down, whereas, in actual fact, community Death Bus drivers prefer to back up over pedestrians who are dilly-dallying on pavements or in the doorways of shops".

The council also complained about the depiction of a nuclear mushroom cloud. A devastating accident at the local nuclear plant had not been scheduled for at least three more years.

Finally, the Council Christmas Boy did not like to be looked at under any circumstances and cursed the project. When a test print run of 20 copies was made, mysterious falling figures appeared on the covers. One week later 20 people connected with the book inexplicably threw themselves from the roof of the council building. They survived, but only briefly, as they were all quickly backed over by the Scarfolk Death Bus. It is perhaps these events which in part led to the Falling Disorder campaign.

The publication was cancelled and all that remains of it is the cover above.

"Surgical Toy Insertions Catalogue 1973-1974"

In August 1972 the BBC broadcast a documentary about how overcrowded prisons were forcing the authorities to address alternatives such as house arrest and electronic monitoring. At least a decade before homing devices in the form of ankle monitors or bracelets were first used, a Scarfolk inventor called Matthew Shipton set out to find a solution, drawing upon his years of experience working for toy manufacturer, Scar Toys.

Working with Dr. Hushson of Cavalier Pharmaceuticals, who had made his name hybridising children with kitchen appliances for the catering industries (see Discovering Scarfolk p. 121 for more details), Shipton surgically implanted his daughter's musical box into a lesser-favoured nephew. Whenever the boy released adrenalin (a sure sign of wrongdoing) the musical box opened and played Debussy's Claire de Lune, warning those nearby of potential ill intent on the boy's part.

The documentary had unexpected repercussions. Children up and down Scarfolk wanted to be fitted with their favourite toys. The demand was so great that Scar Toys and Cavalier Pharm went into production. Their Surgical Toy Insertions were the #1 Christmas gift five years in succession.
Meanwhile, the prison system adapted Shipton's musical boxes so that, instead of containing twirling ballerinas, they housed bulldog clips which nipped at the vital organs of criminals if they transgressed. Clare de Lune, however, was retained for its calming effects.

See more from Scar Toys here: Lung Puppy
See more from Cavalier Pharm here: Mindborstal

"Mindborstal" Psychological Detention Drug

Following the publication of Children and Hallucinogens: The Future of Discipline in 1971, several products were developed by Cavalier Pharm, Scarfolk's largest pharmaceutical company.

In addition to Panopticon, a truth serum designed for minors (see Discovering Scarfolk p.65 for further details), Cavalier Pharm also manufactured a drug called Mindborstal which, as the advertisement above indicates, induced children into a mental state that functioned as a psychological prison.

The detention hallucinations produced by the drug were so potent that they were indistinguishable from reality and children under its influence sat motionless for days and even weeks, locked in delirious trances. They were convinced that they were incarcerated within physical spaces policed by intimidating entities tailored to their own personal fears.

Yet for all of the drug's obvious benefits, it was ultimately recalled when several children were reported to have escaped on imagined giraffes, which their subconscious psyches had somehow conjured into existence. At least, that was the official explanation. Sceptics weren't convinced, even when hundreds of dead giraffes conveniently washed up on Scarfolk beach. Recently leaked documents suggest that the real reason for the recall was a desperate attempt by the council to cover up its covert plan to have the drug renamed and introduced to the town's water supply.

"Ritual & Invasive Mind Control" (Mayflower Books, 1978)

From children to teachers to pensioners; from secretaries to factory workers to black propaganda operatives secretly working for the government disguised as school dinner ladies, mind control was all the rage in 1970s Scarfolk.

Everyone was at it. Dozens of 'DIY' books flooded the market and there was a schism over which was the better method: occult ritual magick, the use of precision medical implements such as straightened wire coat hangers, or television advertising.

Because the government had already employed potent thought-control techniques to cap the cognitive abilities of citizens, most people didn't master much more than the basics, such as the Disco Leech Maneouver (see the book cover below), which reduced the mental age of a subject by up to 4 hours.

An except from chapter one:

"...Carefully insert a finger or medical (non-musical) instrument into the nasal cavity. The opening is quite narrow but about 2 metres in it opens out into a larger chamber. Here you will encounter a marsupial called Zimbardo, who guards the entrance to the brain. You will not be able to pass him unless you agree to a wrestling match (Blavatsky rules). Let him win. Once you have access to the brain you will see that its interior resembles bubble wrap. Use your finger/instrument to pop as many of these 'think pockets' as you feel is appropriate. If the subject begins to gurgle or talk backwards, immediately exit the brain via the nostril, ensuring that you take any litter with you..."

"Discovering Scarfolk". Out Now.

Investigation & Prosecution Pigeons (1973-1979)

In the 1970s the government realised that more crimes were being committed than was technically possible. This was partly due to the fact that 31% of crimes were fabricated by the government to keep citizens in a constant state of anxiety. To maintain its own credibility, the government banned the use of contraceptives for 3 months per year in the hope that the population would rise and thus generate the citizens required to meet the implausible high crime figures.

The scheme backfired when the new population proved to comprise largely blameless, model citizens. However, the government was not convinced of their apparent virtue and created a special, combined investigation & prosecution squad. It invested birds, insects and other animals with the full power of a law court and trained them to spy on citizens, assuming that guilt would inevitably be detected.

In addition to pigeons (see below), there were crack teams of sparrows, cats, butterflies, stoats and tuna, but there were also 'lone wolf' operatives, the most infamous of which was a ladybird who everyone knew as Two-Spots Bailey, though his real identity remains a mystery to this day.

For more about animals being converted into surveillance devices please see the book "Discovering Scarfolk"