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Jack Parsons - Occultist father of rocketry 'written out' of Nasa's history
OLIVIA SOLON wired.co.uk Jack Parsons was a founding member of Nasa's Jet Propulsion Lab, with some crediting him as being one of the "fathers of rocketry" and others joking that JPL was actually Jack Parsons' Laboratory, but you won't find much about him on Nasa's websites. Parsons' legacy as an engineer and chemist has been somewhat overshadowed by his interest in the occult and, and has led to what some critics describe as a rewriting of the history books.
"He's lived in the footnotes since his death. He's a forgotten figure," says biographer George Pendle, author of Strange Angel: The Otherworldly Life of Rocket Scientist John Whiteside Parson(Jack's full name).
Pendle did an "archeological dig" into Parsons' life after finding a mention of him in a science book. "The more I dug, the more bizarre and extreme the story seemed."
In short: Parsons played a critical role in the formation of rocket science and was instrumental in building the rockets that were eventually used in the Space Race. However, he also believed in magic, was involved in the early stages of Scientology... For that reason, Pendle speculates, Parsons' was a figure who didn't fit into the mould of the Industrial Complex. "Wernher von Braun -- a former Nazi -- was much a much easier fit than Parsons," says Pendle. "A lot of people would be shocked to find out that the space programme was founded by a man who held orgies in his Pasadena mansion."...
In the late 1930s, Parsons started to develop an interest in esotericism, attending something called The Gnostic Mass at the Church of Thelema. Parsons came to believe in magic, a force that he felt could be explained through quantum physics, as espoused by Thelema's founder Aleister Crowley... At the same time -- 1941 -- Parsons started to have a sexual relationship with his wife's Helen's 17-year-old sister Sara -- something that was encouraged by his church. His wife started a relationship with one of the church's most senior members, Talbot Smith. The four of them, along with other Thelemites ended up moving into a large house together in Pasadena. Drugs flowed freely, as did sexual partners. The lodge attracted negative attention, with the police and FBI receiving allegations that it played host to a cult involved in sexual orgies and black magic -- although upon investigation, it was deemed not to represent a threat to national security... In 1945, science fiction writer -- and later the founder of Scientology -- L Ron Hubbard moved into the Pasadena lodge. Sara took an interest in Hubbard, which made Parsons jealous. He developed a deeper interest in witchcraft and the darker side of magic, becoming fascinated by poltergeists and ghostly apparitions... Parsons' financial fortune fell apart after he invested his life savings in co-founding a company with Hubbard and Sara -- his ex-girlfriend and her current primary partner. Hubbard convinced Parsons he was going to buy yachts and resell them at a profit, but this never happened. Parsons lost the vast majority of his money in the scam, the company fell apart and eventually Hubbard and Sara went on to found Scientology together... As the Cold War set in, any academics suspected of being communist sympathisers were frozen out. Parsons and many of his colleagues lost their security clearance, leaving him unemployed. He found himself earning money as a manual labourer, a hospital orderly and a car mechanic. Having been pushed out of science, Parsons became even more deeply entrenched in the occult.He ended up applying his skills to create pyrotechnics and explosives for the film industry. Just before a planned trip to Mexico in 1952, Parsons -- who was 37 -- received a large order of explosives for a movie. While preparing the order, there was an explosion involving mercury in which Parsons suffered fatal wounds -- some of his friends suspected a state-sponsored consipiracy although it was ruled an accident.
To mark the centenary of Jack Parson's birth in 1914, Fulgur Press is publishing a collection of Parsons' poems --Songs for the Witch Woman -- which he wrote about Marjorie Cameron. It provides an intimate glimpse into the final years of their relationship which was cut short by his untimely death. Cameron provides the illustrations. "In the poems, he's writing to what he saw as a magical creature," explains Pendle.
"Parsons uses imagery that is pretty far out," says Pendle, mentioning a "vision of a girl and goat dancing together in a satanic ritual", where the girl is more fearsome than the goat she's dancing with. "This is how he saw his relationship with Cameron. She was a girl he'd summoned but he was also terrified of her."
to read more: wired.co.uk
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