Granger Taylor's spaceship was built from scrap metal and two satellite dishes. Photo / Supplied
Granger Taylor's spaceship was built from scrap metal and two satellite dishes. Photo / Supplied
A note, two wills, a spaceship and an unhealthy obsession with alien life.
Those are the clues left behind the day Granger Taylor disappeared without a trace on November 29, 1980.
Those same clues will be re-examined 38 years on as a new documentary explores how the 32-year-old from a small farm in Vancouver, Canada vanished.
The filmmaker behind the project says it's a story that continues to grip the imaginations of space watchers and true crime buffs because it remains unsolved. And because Mr Taylor's take on the world was so out there, reports News.com.au.
"He was a genius," Stacey Jenkins told local newspaper The Columbia Valley Pioneer. "But he started to imagine ... He told his friends that aliens had spoken to him, and he started to fantasise about being taken by aliens."
Not only did he "fantasise about" aliens taking him, he actively pursued the possibility. He built an alien spaceship in his backyard using scrap metal and two giant satellite dishes and penned a disturbingly casual note about his "interstellar voyage" before disappearing.
"Dear Mother and Father," he wrote, according to Tyler Hooper, a VICE journalist who spoke at length with his family and friends.
"I have gone away to walk aboard an alien spaceship, as recurring dreams assured a 42-month interstellar voyage to explore the vast universe, then return. I am leaving behind all my possessions to you as I will no longer require the use of any. Please use the instructions in my will as a guide to help."
Hooper told news.com.au the story remains "shrouded in conspiracy theories ... ones I thought were interesting, but not necessarily true or possible".
The Times Colonist, a local newspaper which first wrote about Mr Taylor's disappearance in 1985, reported that in his will the 32-year-old scratched out the word "death" and instead wrote "departure". On the back of the note he left for his parents, Taylor also drew a map.
The newspaper reported that given Mr Taylor's promise to "return", his parents left his belongings untouched.
"They are much the way Granger left them," the article reads. "The Taylors have tried to keep everything the same. His bed in his bedroom next to the kitchen is untouched ... his books are there too, paperbacks mostly, with titles like Black Holes, The Secret Forces Of The Pyramid, Flying Saucers Here And Now and From Outer Space.
The last person to see him alive was a waitress at a small restaurant on the night he vanished. He drove away in his truck — a vehicle that was found six years later at Mount Prevost, a dense area of thick trees not far from the Taylors' home.
The truck had been blown up by dynamite that was being transported in the back. A coroner ruled that human bone fragments found at the site could be Mr Taylor's.
"Until further evidence is found, (we are) assuming these are Taylor's," the coroner said according to the Montreal Gazette.
It's about as inconclusive as it gets. The verdict that the bones were "assumed" to be Mr Taylor's only fanned the flames for conspiracy theorists who trawled over tiny details of the case in the hopes of cracking it.
Granger Taylor went missing in 1980 and has not been seen since. Photo / Supplied
Hooper says one theory in particular had him "hooked".
"A blog I initially stumbled upon said he blew up his truck so he could launch himself into space. This is what hooked me," he told news.com.au.
Mr Taylor's sister told Hooper he'd dabbled with drug use and that acid had played a role in his life.
"He was taking acid a few times a day during the last few months," Grace Anne Young said.
His cousin, Jaclyn, admitted he and his friends took acid but "had no bad trips". In a letter to Mr Taylor's mother, Jaclyn wrote that her son told friends "he would be leaving soon" and that he was "so matter of fact about it" that they believed him. She believed him, too.
"They all seem to accept that Granger has done what he said he was going to do — he has a reputation for being honest, and after checking it all out, I think so too."
Hooper says behind the theories there is a bigger story.
"Once I got in touch with Granger's family, it became clear that there was a really interesting human interest piece here. Personally, I felt a — and feel — a strong connection to Granger given that he seemed like an outcast in his society, yet he seemed to really care about those around him."
He says his personal belief is that Mr Taylor, "perhaps under the influence of psychedelic drugs like acid, drove up a mountain near his home and either purposely or accidentally blew himself up with dynamite".
The documentary, currently in the research stage, is expected to be ready by the end of the year. Jenkins, from Alibi Entertainment, told the Columbia Valley Pioneer her team will treat the film and its protagonist with respect.
"We're not trying to present him like a nut," she said. "We're trying to portray an intriguing kind of a Canadian, a genius, that we think other Canadians would want to know about."
