Driftless Times Media

Madison, Wis. – Today marks the launch of Driftless Times Media, a new online platform dedicated to exploring the strange and unusual with a focus on Wisconsin folklore and odd history. Founded by Walker Jaroch, a journalist and editor with nearly a decade of professional experience, Driftless Times Media aims to serve as a hub for those fascinated by the paranormal and enjoy intellectually stimulating content.

“The idea to do something had been knocking around in my head for a while, and years ago, I dreamt of starting a publishing house. Driftless Times Media is really the culmination of the two, combining my interest in these subjects with that old dream,” said Jaroch. “Right now, our focus is on our home turf of Wisconsin as we explore the strange and unusual.”

Driftless Times Media launches with two feature articles: “Lake Mendota’s Myths: From Sea Serpents to UFOs and More” and “The Mineral Point Vampire: A Challenge to Credulity,” as well as the essay “Hypernormalisation and the Paranormal Media Trap.” These pieces are ready for readers to dive into.

The feature articles include narration by their authors for those who prefer to listen along. Currently, essays do not feature a narration.

“Driftless Times Media’s features are both informative and entertaining. We have a ‘it’s fun to learn’ philosophy about them. As such, if you choose to listen rather than read, you’ll miss out on the images and captions that add to the features’ stories, but we make up for it in the narrations via sound design to ensure they’re equally engaging for the listener,” Jaroch explained. “Essays are where our writers critically hash out their thoughts on topics. Thus, at this time, we’re excluding them from narration to ensure people engage with the ideas fully, but we are always open to feedback from the Driftless Times Media audience.”

Readers are also encouraged to subscribe to Driftless Times Media’s newsletter, The Side Bar, on Substack. As its name implies, The Side Bar offers more frequent, shorter-form content revolving around the same topics Driftless Times Media is known for.

“Daily newsletters were a large part of my last job, and I learned to love them and the flexibility they offer. While I can’t promise The Side Bar will go out daily, it will publish frequently, giving readers insights into the research we’re undertaking and sharing the fun tidbits we discover along the way that may not be fit for a main article, but we want to share anyway. It will also be a home for general musings on the esoteric, paranormal, and horror media,” said Jaroch.

While Driftless Times Media launches with a slew of content ready for readers and listeners to enjoy, Jaroch is hard at work researching and writing the next features and essays for the website and looks forward to growing Driftless Times Media into a home for like-minded people.

“I’ve loved the strange and unusual for as long as I can remember, and it’s a joy to be contributing my thoughts and research to the topics I’ve long loved. But I don’t want Driftless Times Media to only be about me. We’d love to publish and act as a home for anyone who shares the same values we do and has something interesting to say. As the website grows, we also hope it forms a community,” Jaroch said.

Learn more about Driftless Times Media here. To contribute to Driftless Times Media, contact us here.