In 2009 received in the mail a nondescript package containing two dozen brown plastic VHS tapes.
Each tape was labelled “Westcrest”, along with a series of episode numbers.
A handwritten note, in simple cursive, was stuck to the first tape. It said:
Sorry for dumping these on you,
but you seem like someone
who might be able to use them?
– A
(I believe I know who “A” is, though the answer does not make sense.)
I watched the tapes, which were plainly in a state of advanced decay. Each tape contained three episodes of an animated show called Westcrest, which was about a group of extraordinary characters who lived on an invisible island in the middle of a lake.
No record of the show exists and nobody I’ve spoken to remembers it. Yet here I was, in possession of two dozen episodes on VHS.
I transcribed the major events of each episode and inspired by them I compiled my own (incomplete and imperfect) version of Westcrest. Those stories are no longer plainly available, with the exception of Nessie.
Recently, amongst a box of old memories, I discovered some of my original notes about the Westcrest tapes, taken during my initial viewings. Now, the tapes only display garbled static.
Throughout the year I will be reworking these notes, not only to reintroduce the world to a lost classic of 80s animation, but to also to seek answers to that burning question:
What is Westcrest?
Michael Scott Hand 