Cryptozoology, as you know, means “the study of hidden animals.”

In 1955, Belgian zoologist Bernard Heuvelmans wrote a groundbreaking book in French, a now classic opus entitled (in English) On the Track of Unknown Animals. But in the 1955 French and the 1958 English editions, you will not find the word “cryptozoology,” in any language.

The first (known) published use of the word “cryptozoology” in French, occurred in 1959 in a book by wildlife biologist Lucien Blancou, dedicated to “Bernard Heuvelmans, master of cryptozoology.”

In 1961, Ivan T. Sanderson’s Abominable Snowmen: Legend Come to Life was first published.

Sanderson’s book is where we first see the premiere utilization of the term “cryptozoological,” in English.

In Heuvelmans’ 1968 book In the Wake of the Sea Serpents, it is clear that the word “cryptozoology” had been around for perhaps over twenty years before it came into print in 1959. This is easy to decipher from what Heuvelmans wrote briefly. Speaking of two articles on water monsters written in 1947 and 1948 by Ivan T. Sanderson, Heuvelmans wrote: “When [Sanderson] was still a student he invented the word ‘cryptozoology,’ or the science of hidden animals, which I was to coin later, quite unaware that he had already done so.”

Intriguingly, Heuvelmans left this paragraph giving credit to Sanderson out of all earlier and later French editions of his Sea Serpent book. It is only found in the English edition for 1968, where you can find Heuvelmans saying it was Sanderson who first coined “cryptozoology.”

Cryptozoological research should be actuated by two major forces: patience and passion. - Bernard Heuvelmans, Cryptozoology, Volume 7, 1988.

So here are the research questions of the day:

Are there other early uses of “cryptozoology” in print between 1947 and 1959, undiscovered to date? When? Where? By whom?

Are there other published examples, in English, from Sanderson or anyone else, of the use of “cryptozoology” or “cryptozoological” before 1961, published in any newspaper, journal, magazine or book?