When discussing the history of the Foolish Chicken, it is helpful to begin from a modern point of reference, rather than a chronological fashion. The basic reasoning for this is hindsight. Many artifacts and stories of the Foolish Chicken have been overlooked in the past because of lack of context. However, if we take what we know of the Foolish Chicken now, and gaze back over history, we find that many "random" occurrences of the past, have a fresh, new meaning now. Thus begins our journey into the Foolish Chicken Phenomenon, in a reverse orientation.

2003: January - Thou Art A Foolish Chicken website launched, to detail a catalog publically any evidence of the Foolish Chicken.

1999: November - The "Chicken Feet Chronicles" are destroyed when their storage vault was destroyed in a fire. The Chronicles contained several thousand documents pertaining to the Foolish Chicken including fingerprints lifted from "Thou Art a Foolish Chicken" documents, the documents themselves, and research materials gathered over the past 50 years (see 1998). The cause of the fire is unknown, as is the precise date of destruction. The Chronicles were placed in the vault the previous year and had not been inspected for some time. When the researcher returned to the site of the vault to intake more materials, he discovered the remnants of the structure and the vault. No documents were recovered. The new documentation has been stored at a secure facility waiting funding for further research.

1998: October - A large trunk was shipped to a business address in New York City and addressed to one of the foremost Foolish Chicken researchers, "S.N." The trunk contained several volumes of materials, both paper documentation, and artifacts. This collection of materials became known as the "Chicken Feet Chronicles." The letter addressed to the researcher indicated that the materials were being supplied by another like-minded individual who had become aware of his New York colleague through an unexplained phenomenon ‘zine publish in the Pacific Northwest. This other researcher did not indicate his name or location but it is assumed he lived in the Seattle area because of the mention of the ‘zine and the postmark on the shipping container. In his letter he indicated that he could no longer continue his research because of his age, and wished to leave his collected materials to the New York individual. Having become somewhat dissuaded in his research attempts the previous year, the New Yorker took the Chronicles and interred them in a vault in the Finger Lakes region. He did however place a classified ad in the ‘zine the other researched had mentioned vowing to continue the research within the year. The next issue of the ‘zine contained a response "I pray that you do."

1997: January - A recent college graduate, "S.N." proposed a post-graduate research paper to the Folklore department at large southern university that would deal with the Foolish Chicken phenomenon. The response he got back from the administration was negative and they actually requested that he re-evaluate his place in the department as a serious researcher. Despondent, S.N. withdrew his application, and moved to New York City and began searching for a new career/passion.

1990 - 1992: Several teenagers a small, southern, high school began receiving visitations from something calling itself "The Foolish Chicken." These visitations occurred in dreams, and hallucinations, with the chicken itself only visible vaguely, and being described differently by each individual. The more common form of contact was via hand-drawn notes delivered invisibly to these individual’s lockers, notebooks, textbooks, etc. The notes were always vague and rambling beginning with "Thou art a foolish chicken..." Sometimes they’d seem threatening, other times humorous, but almost always nonsensical. These students initially were convinced other students were messing with them with the notes, but as the notes became more complex they became aware that something or someone else were providing these messages. Using the limited resources available to them, they began to research the foolish chicken, beginning with the phrase "thou art a foolish chicken." They were able gather information that pointed to similar notes that had been delivered in the 1960’s. By the time they were graduating that had also began corresponding with an individual in the Midwest who had claimed to have information pointing towards a conspiracy regarding the Foolish Chicken.

1964: April - The only document surviving a fire at a bank in south-eastern Illinois was a hand-scrawled note inside an otherwise empty basement vault. The note began, "Thou art a foolish chicken who has betrayed me. You fool are the one who squirms." The owner of the vault never returned to claim his property. This was the first modern document associated with the Foolish Chicken.

???? - 1963: Documents containing evidence of the existence of the Foolish Chicken have been recorded throughout history. Many of these documents were lost before being cataloged in a fire in 1999. As new documents appear or are cataloged, their history will be printed here.