Strange Angel (44 page)

“do some calculating for them.” Rypinski, oral history interview. “It was a lousy planet.” Winter,
Prelude to the Space Age,
77.

 

3: ERUDITION

“a near-religious dedication.” Starr,
The Dream Endures,
62.

“but without pants.” William A. Dodge et al.,
Legends of Caltech
(California Institute of Technology, 1982) 16.

“must be the smartest students.” William Sears,
Stories from a 20th Century Life
(Stanford, Calif.: Parabolic, 1994) 49.

“a technical school of the highest class?” Judith Goodstein,
Millikan's School: A History of the California Institute of Technology
(New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1991) 47.

“tell you about in an hour.” Ibid., 72.

“What man can imagine, he can do.” Frank Malina,
The GALCIT Rocket Research Project, 1936–1938,
first presented at the 18th International Astronautical Congress, Belgrade, September 1967; Frank Malina Collection, CALTECH. Also appears in
First Steps Towards Space,
1985, 113.

“flexible sort of attitude.” Malina, oral history interview by Wilson.

“liquid propellant rocket engine.”
The GALCIT Rocket Research Group,
113.

“The great Robert Goddard.” Goddard had in fact got a liquid fueled rocket to reach 7,500 feet (1½ miles) in 1935.

However, fearful of both derision and the theft of his ideas, he kept this secret until his Smithsonian Institute report
Liquid-Propellant Rocket Development
alluded to it in 1936.

“long shadow.” Frank Malina,
Excerpts from Letters ‘Written Home by F. J. Malina on Rocket Research at the California Institute of Technology between 1936 and 1947,
Frank Malina Collection, CALTECH.

“In desperation.” Theodore von Kármán, with Lee Edson,
The Wind and Beyond
(Boston: Little, Brown, 1967) 235.

“freewheeling brain.” Frank Malina, oral history interview by Wilson.

“Irish blue eyes.” Phyllis Seckler, “Jane Wolfe: The Sword: Hollywood,” in
In the Continuum,
Volume III, No. 7 (Oroville, California: College of Thelema, 1985) 38.

“I was a teaser if you will.” Helen Parsons Smith, author interview.

“even when he tested rockets.” Ibid.

“without the vest.” Liljan Wunderman, author interview.

“how much I loved you.” John Whiteside Parsons, letter to Helen Northrup, 11 August 1934, STARR.

“Oh, where's Helen.” Helen Parsons Smith, author interview.

“more scared using it than losing my ring.” Helen Parsons Smith, interview by Michael Bloom, 22 November 1998, OTO.

“Perhaps its some trick.” John Whiteside Parsons, letters to Helen Northrup, 31 July-3 September 1934. STARR.

“I turned my face to him and nothing happened.” Helen Parsons Smith, author interview. Martin Starr provides an alternative reason for the missed kiss in
The Unknown God: W. T. Smith and the Thelemites
(Bolingbrook: The Teitan Press, Inc., 2003). He states that Jack and Helen were not fond of public displays of affection and thus chose not to kiss beforehand.

“He just wanted to work on rockets.” Robert Rypinski, oral history interview.

“They were dangerous places.” Helen Parsons Smith, author interview.

“happy but haphazard.” Starr,
The Unknown God, 257.

“Even Malina felt rather uncomfortable.” Frank Malina,
The GALCIT Rocket Research Project, 1936–1938,
120.

“reasonableness of the capitalistic system.” Malina,
Letters,
8 March 1936.

“they didn't make any sense to me.” Frank Malina, oral history interview by James H. Wilson, 8 June 1973, JPL.

“The three men and Helen also tried marijuana.” Helen Parsons Smith, interview with Michael Bloom, 22 November 1998, OTO.

“remainder of the concert in style.” Malina,
Letters,
21 February 1936.

“a pair of good intelligent friends.” Ibid., 18 July 1936.

 

4: THE SUICIDE SQUAD

“nothing was heard of their recent developments.” Winter,
Prelude to the Space Age,
49.

“the only practicable approach to space travel.” Ibid., 19–53.

“become something in the nature of a race.” Lehman,
This High Man,
123.

“I am convinced it is a hopeless task.” Malina,
Letters,
29 June 1936.

“constantly putting his nose down to the paper.” Frank Malina, oral history interview by Wilson.

“Their attitude is symptomatic.” Malina,
The GALCIT Rocket Research Project, 1936–1938,
114.

“I am rather reluctant to specify.” Lehman,
This High Man,
191.

“What jet velocities.” John Whiteside Parsons, letter to Frank Malina, c. 15 August 1936, Theodore von Kármán Collection, CALTECH.

“appeared to suffer keenly.” Frank Malina,
The GALCIT Rocket Research Project, 1936–1938, 117.

“took himself too seriously.” Kármán and Edson,
The Wind and Beyond,
240–242.

“it sounded like fun.” Apollo Smith, oral history interview by Dick House, 23 September 1996, JPL.

“most likely ‘borrowed' from GALCIT.” Clayton R. Koppes,
JPL and the American Space Program: A History of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory
(New Haven: Yale University Press, 1982) 5.

“the test was successful.” Malina,
Letters,
1 November 1936.

“behind their sandbags and cheered wildly.” Ibid., 29 November 1936.

“definite delusions and hallucinations.” Taken from the Clinical Record of Marvel H. Parsons, St. Elizabeths Hospital, F.S.A, 10 May 1950.

“It was a bit of a shock.” John Whiteside Parsons, letter to Helen Parsons, 26 March 1943, STARR.

“cut throats for.” Ibid.

“for a few hundred dollars.” Helen Parsons Smith, author interview.

“work with me to make it soon.” John Whiteside Parsons to Helen Parsons Smith, 9 September-15 September 1937, STARR.

“Son of Heaven.” Iris Chang,
Thread of the Silkworm
(New York: Basic Books, 1995) 78–79.

“really arrogant.” Apollo Smith, oral history interview.

“he didn't ostracize himself from them.” Frank Malina, oral history interview by Wilson.

“five dollar bills wrapped in newspaper.” Although $500 is the amount that Malina remembered in his memoir on the GALCIT Rocket Research Project, his letters from the time state that Arnold originally brought them the still sizeable but lesser amount of $100.

“flabbergasted.” Malina,
The GALCIT Rocket Research Project, 1936–1938,
120.

“He told me I was a bloody fool.” Frank Malina, oral history interview by Mary Terrall, 14 December 1978, CALTECH.

“great fun ... head scratching.” Malina,
Letters,
26 July 1937; 1 August 1937.

“distance the pendulum swung.” Despite its seeming impracticality, the test had been developed by Friedrich Sander in Germany and had also been used by Robert Goddard.

“The Suicide Squad.” Malina,
The GALCIT Rocket Research Project, 1936–1938,
121. While Theodore von Kármán refers to the group of young rocketeers as “The Suicide Club” in his autobiography,
The Wind and Beyond,
I have chosen to use Frank Malina's term “The Suicide Squad.”

“a very strange bunch.” Hans Liepmann, author interview, 6 December 2002.

“The $1000 fund is rapidly diminishing.” Malina,
Letters,
19 February 1938.

“the department fantasy expert.” Ibid. 3 September 1937.

“prohibited slot machines were scattered across the city.” Kevin Starr,
The Dream Endures: California Enters the 1940s
(New York: OUP, 1997) 167–8.

“Parsons was their best bet.” Helen Parsons Smith, author interview.

“caused turmoil at the trial.”
Los Angeles Times,
10 May 1938.

“contained explosives or not.”
The Pasadena Post,
10 May 1938.

“the young expert.”
Pasadena Star-News,
10 May 1938.

 

5: FRATERNITY

“
FASCISM OR COMMUNISM.
“
The California Tech,
27 May 1937.

“The Nazis are really devils!” William Rees Sears,
Stories from a 20th-century Life
(Stanford: Parabolic Press, 1993) 96.

“he was something of a Renaissance man.” Chang,
Thread of the Silkworm,
80.

“he was known for his pro-Soviet harangues.” Sidney Weinbaum, oral history interview by Terrall.

“he deals in chemistry and communism.” Hans Liepmann, author interview.

“organize a Communist group at Caltech.” Frank Oppenheimer, oral history interview by Judith R. Goodstein, 16 November 1984, CALTECH.

“they felt for the people.” Wunderman, author interview.

“townspeople congregated at Weinbaum's house.” Frank Malina, Federal Bureau of Investigation file.

“He was soon providing the students with books and pamphlets.” John Whiteside Parsons, Federal Bureau of Investigation file.

“political romantic.” Frank Malina, oral history interview by Terrall.

“joined the party under a pseudonym, as did Tsien.” For a fuller discussion of Tsien's involvement, see Chang,
Thread of the Silkworm.

“the unifying thing with our group was rockets.” Malina, oral history interview by Wilson.

“teenagers ‘chiseled' while noone was looking.” Walter Daugherty, author interview, 10 March 2003.

“imagination instead of the telescope.” Jack Williamson, author interview, 16 September 2002.

“some had even corresponded.” Walter Daugherty, author interview.

“Assorted Services.” The science fiction author Robert Heinlein would write a short story inspired by Ackerman's company entitled “We Also Walk Dogs,”
Astounding Science Fiction
(July 1941).

“my god and my religion.” Forrest J. Ackerman, author interview.

“awe-inspiring examples of his skills at hypnotism.” Ibid. “He was a super hypnotist,” remembered Ackerman; “He hypnotized about everybody in the club except me. I never wanted to lose control of myself, and I remember one member coming round and showing us the little kangaroo that he said he had hopping around in his hand.”

“a young Ray Bradbury.” Bradbury would go on to write such seminal science fiction books as
The Martian Chronicles
(Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1950) and
Fahrenheit 451
(Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1953).

“asked him a barrage of questions.” Ackerman, author interview.

“the rocket society the gentleman spoke of.” Ray Bradbury, letter to Frank Malina, 31 August 1980, Malina Collection, CALTECH.

“the rocket motor starts functioning.”
Pasadena Post,
15 July 1938.

“looking for the spectacular.” Malina,
Letters,
7 June 1938.

“better imaginations than we do.” Ibid., 5 July 1938.

“The Human Rocket.” Malina Collection, CALTECH.

“develop better munitions.” Malina,
Letters,
15 May 1938.

“He is beginning to run short of money.” Ibid., 1 August 1938.

“completely vanished.” Malina,
The GALCIT Rocket Research Project, 1936–1938,
124.

“Parsons is doing some experimenting.” Malina,
Letters,
19 February 1939.

 

6: THE MASS

“A gong sounded.” Stuart Timmons,
The Trouble with Harry Hay
(Boston: Alyson, 1990) 76. For more background on the characters and internal politics of the Agape Lodge, see Phyllis Seckler, “Jane Wolfe: The Sword: Hollywood,” from
In the Continuum
Volume 3, No. 6–10 (Oroville, California: College of Thelema, 1984–86) and
In the Continuum
Volume 4, No. 1–10 (Oroville, California: College of Thelema, 1987–91). Also see Martin Starr's
The Unknown God.

“We're all going upstairs.” Wunderman, author interview.

“taken a shine to Helen.” Starr,
The Unknown God,
257.

“like real water to a thirsty man to Jack.” Robert Rypinski, oral history interview.

“social misfits at the time.” For a fuller picture of Wilfred T. Smith, see Starr
The Unknown God.

“Explain me the riddle of this man.” Crowley's description is drawn from the following: Charles Richard Cammell,
Aleister Crowley: The Man, The Image, The Poet
(London: Richards Press, 1951); Aleister Crowley,
The Confessions of Aleister Crowley: An Autohagiography,
eds. John Symonds and Kenneth Grant (New York: Hill and Wang, 1969); John Symonds,
The King of the Shadow Realm—Aleister Crowley: His Life and Magic
(London: Duckworth, 1989); Martin Booth,
A Magick Life: A Biography of Aleister Crowley
(London: Hodder and Stoughton, 2000); Lawrence Sutin,
Do What Thou Wilt: A Life of Aleister Crowley
(New York: St. Martin's Press, 2000).

“his personal spiritual mediums.” The “Scarlet Woman” referred to the New Testament's Revelation, specifically the woman “arrayed in purple and scarlet.” This woman rode on the back of a “great beast.” As such, it seemed a suitable term for Crowley's own consort.

“the age of the child.” A concise description of Crowley's cosmology has been given by John Symonds in his introduction to Crowley's
The Confessions of Aleister Crowley
(New York: Hill and Wang, 1969): “There have been, as far as we know, two aeons in the history of the world. The first, that of Isis, is the aeon of the woman; hence matriarchy, the worship of the Great Mother and so on. About 500 B.C. this aeon was succeded by the aeon of Osiris, that is the aeon of the man, the father, hence the paternal religions of suffering and death—Judaism, Buddhism, Christianity and Mohammedanism. This aeon came to an end in 1904 when Aleister Crowley received
The Book of the Law,
and the new aeon, that of Horus the child, was born. In this aeon the emphasis is on the true self or will, not on anything external such as gods and priests. The choice of Egyptian names for the aeons is purely arbitrary.”