The Defunct Spanish Society for Cryptozoology By Scott Corrales
Latin America Correspondent
Source: Criptozoologia en España
Date: January 15, 2011
The Defunct Spanish Society for Cryptozoology
By Javier Resines
The Sociedad Española de Criptozoología was born on a day like this:
It was created in Valencia on 15 January 2003 in Valencia. SEC was the first serious effort at creating a national-level organization aimed at concentrating researchers interested in this discipline.
The Society’s goal was to popularize the study of mystery animals in a truthful and entertaining manner, seeking to promote cryptozoological research from a strictly scientific perspective, and with the hope of turning its website into the mandatory place of reference for all parties intereste in the subject.
The SEC’s Board of Governors was captained by two renowned researchers: zoologist Carlos Bonet and journalist Angel Morant, along with Vicente J. Marin, acting as treasurer, and Jose Vicente Morant and Jaime Garcia, acting as boardmembers.
The roster was rounded off with three prestigious Scientific Advisors who further burnished the organization’s core membership. We are referring to French biochemist and cryptozoologist Michel Reynal, Director of the Institut Virtuel de Cryptozoologie; paleontologist Alberto Prieto of the University of Talahassee, Florida; and Francois de Sarre, the Franco-German icthyologist, director of CERBI – Centro de Estudios de Bipedia Inicial.
It was thus, with a scant initial budget of twelve hundred Euros, that this pioneering association took its first steps in the world, disseminating numerous articles and documents of all kinds, mainly through its website.
This tool turned into the SEC’s means of keeping in touch with its enthusiastic followers until without any warning (and for unknown reasons, at least to us), the website ceased to be updated and eventually vanished.
All traces of the Sociedad also vanished, departing noiselessly only a few years after its birth. This disappearance deprived us of what could have been a great opportunity to promote Cryptozoology’s growth within our borders.
Maybe some other time…
(Translation (c) 2011 S. Corrales, IHU. Special thanks to Criptozoolgía en España)