INFO Fortfest Nov 7 & 8, 2026 !
About this Event
All Presentations Both Days will be at Dave & Buster's Hanover-Arundel both Saturday and Sunday. The official hotel is Holiday Inn Express BWI Airport West | 7481 Ridge Road, Hanover, MD 21076. The Hotel is easy walking distance to Saturday night's Italian dinner known as FortFeast. Lectures are Open to the Public ~ Must be 16 Years or Older. Details Below.
INFO honors the legacy of Charles Hoy Fort and his studies of all things Fortean. We look at UFOs, Scientific enigmas, Cryptozoology, Ghosts, Synchronicities, Weird Archaeology, Spontaneous Human Combustion, Consciousness and much more! Two Days of Fantastic Presentations, with Lunch Buffet included both days and DOOR PRIZES!
FIRST order of business is to RESERVE A HOTEL ROOM NOW!
>> THE GROUP RATE WILL EXPIRE AT MIDNIGHT SAT OCT 31 ! <<
THE OFFICIAL HOTEL IS:
Holiday Inn Express BWI Airport West | 7481 Ridge Road, Hanover, MD 21076.
BE SURE TO GET THE RIGHT HOTEL! MATCH UP THE ADDRESS AND THE NAME WITH “WEST” AT THE END.
>> FREE SHUTTLE TO/FROM BWI. FREE SHUTTLE TO/FROM ARUNDEL MILLS MALL TO FORTFEST VENUE <<
You’ll want the convenience of a Shuttle from the Hotel to/from Dave & Buster’s. You’ll want the convenience of an easy walk over to the Italian Dinner FortFeast Saturday Night.
Reserve a Room by doing one of the following:
Click on this link below:
OR
Call the hotel directly at 410-684-3388 and mention the INFO-FortFest Group Room Block.
Call IHG Central Reservations at 1-877-335-4093 and mention the INFO-FortFest Group Room Block.
If the Group Block isn’t helping much, mention AARP, AAA, Senior Discounts. This Hotel is worth it due to the Shuttle to Arundel Mills and proximity to the Dinner option.
ABOUT ARUNDEL MILLS MALL, HANOVER, MD:
Dave & Buster's Emporium is located at Arundel Mills Mall in Hanover, MD. The parking is free, and is no problem until about Noon on Saturday. Best to get there on time for the 10:30 start.
The Mall was built on a grand scale, clearing out untold acres of deep forest. This forest was the home to a Bigfoot, who was not happy when his habitat was taken away. We'll discuss that crazy but true story that became a media sensation. Also at the Mall is a HUGE theater complex that has an Egyptian theme with 30-foot columns and 10-foot tall Anubis statues. Then there's Live! Casino which was the third largest Casino in the country at the time it was built. No kidding! This Mall also has a Medieval Times Horse Complex. It nearly outdoes Vegas!
>> GET YOUR FORTFEST TICKETS NOW! I NEED TO GET A HEADCOUNT FOR THE MEALS ! <<
DETAILED INFORMATION ABOUT EACH LUNCH BUFFET IS LISTED WHEN YOU ORDER TICKETS. READ THOSE DETAILS BEFORE YOU PURCHASE. HIT THE RED BUTTON IN THE UPPER RIGHT TO REVIEW AND ORDER TICKETS!
>> SIGNED AUTHOR BOOKS - OTHER FORTEAN BOOKS FOR SALE . .<<
CASH IS BEST FOR PAYING-AT-THE-DOOR FOR ATTENDANCE OR BOOKS. OR BUY YOUR TICKET EARLY SO YOU'VE PAID.
>> SPEAKING SCHEDULE BOTH DAYS SUBJECT TO CHANGE DUE TO SPEAKER TRAVEL NEEDS. <<
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SATURDAY SPEAKERS at Dave & Buster's, Arundel Mills Mall:
Dave & Buster's Emporium, 7000 Arundel Mills Circle,
Arundel Mills Mall, Hanover, MD 21076
~ 10:30AM to 5:30PM ~
10:30 - SUE SWIATEK > Welcome & Arundel Mills Mall Bigfoot
11:00 - AMY GILLESPIE DOUGHERTY > Irigenics®: Eye Readings Reveal Your Traits and Ancestral Patterns
12:00 - Capt. JAMES L McCORMICK II (ret.) > The Missing Science: Psychic Spies, UFOs, Ghosts, Cryptids and the Questions No One Will Study
1:00 - LUNCH BUFFET: Smoked Pork Ribs, BBQ Chicken, Spicy Sausage, Mac & Cheese, Baked Beans, Potato Salad, Coleslaw, Cornbread, Fruit. Sodas, Tea & Coffee included. Alcohol available from your Waiter.
1:40 - SUE SWIATEK > In Memoriam ~ Stephen E. Braude, Richard A. Leshuk, and Jim Boyd with Short Videos
2:15 – JUSTIN BAMFORTH > In Pursuit of the Men-in-Black and Other High Strangeness
3:15 --- DESSERT BREAK ---
3:45 - LENVAL LOGAN > How I Came to Serve on the UAP Task Force
5:00 – SUE SWIATEK > Until Tomorrow!
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FORTFEAST SATURDAY NIGHT WITH THE SPEAKERS!
Private Dining at Cantina Mamma Lucia Restaurant, Deval Room,
1350 Dorsey Rd (Rt. 176) Ste M Hanover, MD 21076 ~ A short walk from the Holiday Inn Express Hotel
Family Owned for Three Generations ~ Not Part of a Chain.
PRIVATE ROOM OPENS AT 8:10PM ~BUFFET WILL BE READY IMMEDIATELY
- Buffet Featuring Baked Ziti (Meatless), Sausage Napoletana, Chicken Cacciatore, Sauteed Vegetables, Garlic Bread, Caesar Salad, and Fountain Drinks. Beer and Wine available on a Cashbar basis.
- Surprises!
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SUNDAY SPEAKERS at Dave & Buster's, Arundel Mills Mall:
Dave & Buster's Emporium, 7000 Arundel Mills Circle,
Arundel Mills Mall, Hanover, MD 21076
~ 10:30AM to 3:30PM ~
10:30 - SUE SWIATEK > Welcome Back ~ Fortean Shorts and Memorial to Richard A. Leshuk
11:00 - LEONARD LESHUK, PhD > Pre-Columbian European Voyages to North America: How climate, currents, economics, politics, religion, and technology, influenced their inceptions
12:00 – DOUG CUPO > From High Strangeness to Structured Intelligence: A Framework for Investigating the UAP-Paranormal Continuum
1:00 - LUNCH BUFFET with Sodas, Tea & Coffee included. Alcohol available from your Waiter.
1:45 – SUE SWIATEK > More Fortean Shorts
2:15 - ANGELA DELLAFIORA FORD > Cold War ESP Wars: East vs. West
3:30 – SUE SWIATEK > Thank You Until Next Time!
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BIOS & ABSTRACTS:
SUE SWIATEK > Host and Organizer of INFO FortFest
Susan has been interested in UFOs and all odd things since she began reading The Book of the Damned by Charles Fort as a young child. The book was a showcase of the “damned data” that science refused to deal with. Whether it was a strange craft in the sky, a cryptid animal or an unearthed 12-foot human skeleton, the scientific minds of the day just couldn’t wait to bury it, as it “doesn’t compute.” Sue read all she could in the school library growing up in Colorado, and thoroughly enjoyed the many camper trips her family took out west into the Rockies. She cherished the big dark sky where she could observe specific features on the Milky Way. Susan reasoned that all those galaxies couldn’t just be empty space; here had to be intelligent life out there. After her family moved back East, Susan earned a BFA degree from the Maryland Institute College of Art and began her career in publishing. Manual layouts soon gave way to automated means of publishing large collections using SGML and XML. Susan spent most of her career as a contractor in structured publishing supporting the U.S. Army Publishing Agency and Navair producing Navy Flight Manuals (NFMs). Sue’s love for UFO studies led her to accept the role to become MUFON’s Virginia State Director in 2002. She has also held numerous small UFO conferences as well as INFO (Inter-National Fortean Organization) conferences. Her artwork has appeared in numerous UFO books and projects.
AMY GILLESPIE DOUGHERTY > Developer of Irigenics®
Amy often says “The Eyes Have It!” as your eyes are the window to your very essence. Using photos of your eyes, Amy can analyze what your eye markings tell about you: your gifts and talents, patterns from your ancestors, core beliefs, traumas, your “best partner,” peak career choices, and your personal energy pattern. Amy began her studies of the eye based upon systems of iridology which claim to see general health or diseases in the iris of the eye. Other practitioners used science to match up certain markers in the eyes with tested traits from standard personality tests. After absorbing the techniques from five practitioners, Amy went further and developed her own system of Irigenics®. After taking clear pictures of your eyes, she can discern a beautiful map of the person you were born to be – your most vibrant personality, inherent gifts and talents, how you respond to the energy of others, your natural response to your environment, and how you respond to challenges. They are a snapshot of your best life in motion. This map is built on the genetics and experiences of your ancestors, who often give you gifts and talents, but can also give you repeated negative patterns that you may need to acknowledge in order to break through. Amy is the author of an autobiographical book, Six Years in Mozambique; a fictional adventure, The Lost Scribe: Forgotten Channel of the Ancients; as well as a four-volume series entitled The Ancestors Within.
Capt. JAMES L McCORMICK II (ret.) > Decorated combat veteran, Author and Veteran Advocate
James has had a decorated military career, first as an enlisted soldier and later as a commissioned officer. A veteran of Operation Desert Storm and Operation Iraqi Freedom, he has spent 22 years in the Army and Army National Guard. He is the author of several books, including his latest release, The Missing Science: Psychic Spies, UFOs, Ghosts, Cryptids, and the Questions No One Will Study. McCormick saw many confounding things throughout his life and heard many stories. He often wondered why so many topics appear to be taboo and are not studied properly. This is not a book of campfire stories; every case is drawn from government records, sworn testimony, and published research, with more than 200 source notes. James himself took part in a drama in Iraq that involved a mysterious vortex that saved his men’s lives but remains unexplained. He also heard from reliable men that there really was a Giant in Kandahar. James calls for a model bill for Congress to create a national office that studies the unexplained in the open and protects the witnesses who come forward. James has received countless military and civilian awards including the Silver Star, three Bronze Stars with Valor, and three Purple Hearts. The Warrior TBI (Traumatic Brain Injury) organization named James McCormick Veteran of the Decade 2010-2020. He resides in West Virginia and has been active there with his non-profit that seeks to help traumatized veterans heal through their connection to agriculture. James was also instrumental in the rebuilding of the Point Pleasant River Museum. McCormick currently serves as the Executive Director for Government Affairs at the Vietnam Veterans of America. James holds a Doctor of Divinity degree, a MSc degree in Technology and a BA in History.
JUSTIN BAMFORTH > Creative force behind blogsite normalparanormal.org, Poet, Author & Researcher
Justin is a paranormal researcher who has put his theories behind covers in his book, The Spectrum. He asks the question: Do ghosts, aliens, and psychic phenomena all share a common source? He examines time slips, doppelgangers, precognitive experiences, paranormal activity triggered by emotional states, and the Men-in-Black phenomenon – just to name a few. It is this last phenomenon (MIB) that holds Justin’s attention for this presentation. Whether the MIB manifest in strange threatening phone calls or actually show up in person, one is left with the question in each case: Are the MIB fully human, and perhaps G-men on a disinformation campaign? Or are they something else, like non-human intelligences playing the role of threatening officials? There may not be one answer for all cases, as the answer may vary. Come and explore the MIB topic with Justin. When Bamforth is not chasing MIBs, he is a creative professional by day as an art director, mentor, copywriter and screenwriter. He holds two degrees in Graphic Design and Digital Arts and is multi-disciplined from print to digital and can often be found drawing up concepts for a new gig.
LENVAL LOGAN > Veteran U.S. Air Force, Member of the UAP Task Force (UAP-TF)
Logan is originally from the United Kingdom and enjoyed a twenty+ year career in the United States Air Force, and over fifteen years as a government contractor. For many years, he has been interested in unexplained and anomalous phenomena taking place around the world and has been looking for better ways to capture scientific evidence to better expose and understand the nature of UAPs, Cryptozoology, Paranormal sightings and activities. His goal is to move these subjects from the area of fringe science into mainstream science via evidence -based practices. He is an active member of the Mutual UFO Network (MUFON), Scientific Coalition for UAP Studies (SCU) and National Capital Area Skeptics (NCAS) in Washington, DC. Logan is co-founder and the Chief Technology Officer for a small start-up called Phenom, LLC, which has created Phenom, a citizen science, crowdsourcing, multi-function App to support the public and scientific communities in reporting, identifying and characterizing unusual phenomena, airborne or otherwise. Due to Lue Elizondo and Jay Stratton, Logan was able to support the Unidentified Aerial Phenomena (UAP) Task Force (UAPTF).
LEONARD LESHUK, PhD > Author, Intelligence Analyst and Mariner Leonard has spent the past 25 years sailing and maintaining archaic-style square-rigged sailing vessels while engaging in archaeology-by-experiment, analyzing the stories and physical evidence of the pre-Columbian voyages in the context of the nautical realities and the societal factors of their times. He is focussed on the who, why, where, and how of the known, reputed, and inferred voyages of Europeans to North America. There is even potentially evidence that Columbus made it to the Americas earlier than 1492, the year that every schoolchild has memorized. The comparison to Thor Heyerdahl certainly comes to mind. Leonard’s first research project was his PhD dissertation produced at King’s College London on the Soviet Union from 1921 to 1946, questioning how a nation perceived to be so weak and backward before World War II could, in the space of a few years, challenge the USA militarily on a global scale. This work was later published as a nearly 300-page book. In the more recent past, Leonard’s project has been to clear out his brother Richard’s house of the mountain of INFO books and files stored there. He has been a delight to work with and has been clear that he wishes to protect Richard’s Fortean legacy. Richard’s house is remembered fondly by all the Forteans as a place where so many happy gatherings took place.
DOUGLAS E. CUPO > Senior Intelligence Analyst for VA MUFON and at-large
Doug is a retired U.S. Navy Captain (Naval Intelligence), senior defense intelligence officer, and former defense-industry systems engineer with more than four decades of experience supporting U.S. defense and intelligence organizations. A graduate of Villanova University, Penn State, and the U.S. Army War College, Doug currently serves as a Senior Analyst and Researcher with MUFON Virginia and has presented numerous briefings on a wide range of UFO-UAP topics. This briefing introduces two complementary methodologies: the High-Strangeness Analytical Framework (HSAF) for examining multidimensional patterns and the Anomalous Aerospace Assessment Framework (AAAF) for evaluating individual UAP events through scientific inquiry, intelligence tradecraft, and systems engineering. Three influential models—Jacques Vallée’s Adaptive Control System, John Keel’s Ultraterrestrial hypothesis, and John Mack’s Experiential Transformation model—are critically examined alongside representative historical and contemporary cases. The objective is to demonstrate how structured analysis can distinguish documented observations from interpretations, evaluate competing hypotheses, and identify evidentiary limitations without presuming extraordinary origins. The UFO/UAP phenomenon extends beyond conventional aerospace observations, encompassing unusual physical manifestations, psychological experiences, and cultural influences that challenge traditional investigative methods. Guiding Principle: Follow the evidence—not the narrative. Doug has also presented at San Diego MUFON and Maryland MUFON meetings, conferences, and radio shows. Doug’s research integrates intelligence tradecraft, scientific inquiry, cognitive psychology, and structured analytic techniques into the investigation of UFOs and unidentified anomalous phenomena. His most recent, two-part article, “UFO/UAP Ecosystem Contamination: Reclaiming Analytical Rigor in the Age of Disclosure,” appeared in the March and May 2026 issues of the MUFON Journal.
ANGELA DELLAFIORA FORD > Remote Viewer / Project STAR GATE
Angela was born and raised in Western Pennsylvania and holds a Bachelor’s degree in Political Science from Indiana University of Pennsylvania. She served for over 32 years in the U.S. Intelligence Community in Washington, D.C. While assigned to the Defense Intelligence Agency, she participated in the U.S. government’s psychic intelligence research initiative known as the STAR GATE program. From 1986 to 1995, she worked as a remote viewer within the structured protocols developed under that initiative. During the Cold War, the battle between global superpowers extended beyond missiles and espionage—it entered the realm of the mind. Governments on both sides quietly explored psychic phenomena, remote viewing, telepathy, and consciousness research as potential intelligence tools. In this talk, Angela Dellafiora Ford explores the hidden history of psychic research programs in the United States and the Soviet Union, the cultural differences in how each side approached ESP, and what these experiments reveal about power, belief, and the limits of human perception. Angela’s work in anomalous cognition has been referenced in public accounts of operational remote viewing, including the book Unconventional Method by Scott Carmichael and Annie Jacobsen’s Phenomena: The Secret History of the U.S. Government’s Investigations into Extrasensory Perception and Psychokinesis. She also received special acknowledgment in former Secretary of Defense William Cohen’s book M**der in the Senate, and her work has been featured in Newsweek and on CBS Sunday Morning. Angela collaborates with Dr. Edwin May at the Laboratories for Fundamental Research in California and teaches at the Monroe Institute in Virginia. Her ongoing work explores the historical, methodological, and interdisciplinary dimensions of consciousness research. Angela also teaches at the Monroe Institute in Faber, Virginia, a leading education center for studying human consciousness.
Where is it happening?
USD 32.00 to USD 120.00
