Kerry Thornley

Kerry Wendell Thornley (April 17, 1938 - November 28, 1998) is perhaps best-known as the co-founder (along with childhood friend Greg Hill) of Discordianism. In this context he is usually known as Omar Khayyam Ravenhurst, a name he derived from Omar Khayyám. He and Hill authored the religion's seminal text Principia Discordia, or, how I found Goddess, and what I did to her when I found her. This work is copyrighted. ... This work is copyrighted. ... April 17 is the 107th day of the year (108th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1938 (MCMXXXVIII) was a common year starting on Saturday (link will take you to calendar). ... November 28 is the 332nd day (333rd in leap years) of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1998 (MCMXCVIII) was a common year starting on Thursday (link will display full 1998 Gregorian calendar). ... Greg Hill (a. ... Discordianism is a modern, chaos-centered religion founded circa 1958–1959 by Malaclypse the Younger with the publication of its principal text, the Principia Discordia. ... Ghiyās ol-DÄ«n Abol-Fath Omār Ibn EbrāhÄ«m Khayyām NeyshābÅ«rÄ«, (Persian: غیاث الدین ابو الفتح عمر بن ابراهیم خیام نیشابوری, born: May 18, 1048 in Nishapur, Iran (Persia) – died: December 4, 1131), was a Persian poet, mathematician, philosopher and astronomer. ... The Loompanics Yellow Cover combined 4th & 5th Edition Principia Discordia, (1979). ...

Less known is a series of Zenarchy articles, originally written in the late 1960s for Thornley's broadsheet newsletter of the same name, under the pen name Ho Chi Zen. "Zenarchy" is described in the introduction of the collected volume as "the social order which springs from meditation," and "A noncombative, nonparticipatory, no-politics approach to anarchy intended to get the serious student thinking." Zenarchy is a political philosophy put forth by Kerry Thornley in a book of the same name. ... Zenarchy is a 1991 book by Kerry Thornley, in which he puts forth a counter-cultural, Zen and Taoist-inspired theory of politics called Zenarchy Bibliography and references Thornley, Kerry; Zenarchy, IllumiNet Press, June 1991 ISBN 0962653411 (on-line version at [[1]] ... Anarchism is a political philosophy or group of doctrines and attitudes centered on rejection of any form of authoritarian relationship, hierarchical institution or compulsory government (cf. ...

Raised Mormon, in adulthood Kerry shifted his ideological focus frequently, in rivalry with any serious countercultural figure of the 1960s. Atheism, anarchism, objectivism, neo-paganism, Buddhism, and the memetic inheritor of Discordianism, The Church of the Subgenius, have all been the subjects of close conceptual scrutiny throughout his life. Mormon is a term used to describe people who are adherents, practitioners, or constituents of Mormonism, and who are identified with the Latter Day Saint movement formally established in 1830. ... This article needs additional references or sources to facilitate its verification. ... The 1960s decade refers to the years from January 1, 1960 to December 31, 1969, inclusive. ... “Atheist” redirects here. ... Anarchism is a political philosophy or group of doctrines and attitudes centered on rejection of any form of authoritarian relationship, hierarchical institution or compulsory government (cf. ... Objectivism is the philosophical system developed by Russian-American philosopher and writer Ayn Rand. ... Neopaganism or Neo-Paganism is any of a heterogeneous group of new religious movements, particularly those influenced by ancient, primarily pre-Christian and sometimes pre-Judaic religions. ... This article needs additional references or sources to facilitate its verification. ... The term meme (IPA: , rhyming with theme; commonly pronounced in the US as , rhyming with gem), coined/popularized in 1976[1] by the biologist Richard Dawkins, refers to a unit of cultural information which can propagate from one mind to another in a manner analogous to genes (i. ... J. R. Bob Dobbs The Church of the SubGenius is a postmodern religion, originally based in Dallas, Texas, which gained popularity in the 1980s and 1990s subculture, with a large presence on the Internet. ...

Military life

Having already been a US Marine Corps reservist for about two years, Thornley had been summoned to active duty in 1958 at age 20, soon after completing his freshman year at the University of Southern California. Incidentally, it was also around this time that he and Greg Hill—alias Malaclypse the Younger or Mal-2—shared their first Eristic vision in a bowling alley in their hometown of Whittier, California. United States Marine Corps Emblem The United States Marine Corps (USMC) is the second smallest of the five branches of the United States armed forces, with 170,000 active and 40,000 reserve Marines as of 2002. ... Year 1958 (MCMLVIII) was a common year starting on Wednesday (link will display full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... Doheny Library. ... Malaclypse the Younger (short Mal-2) is the author of the Principia Discordia, a character in the Illuminatus! trilogy, and most likely a penname used by Greg Hill, comrade of Kerry Thornley (aka Lord Omar Khayyam Ravenhurst). ... Eris (ca. ... A bowler releases the ball. ... Location of Whittier in Los Angeles County Coordinates: Country United States State California County Los Angeles Government  - Mayor Cathy Warner Area  - City  14. ...

Thornley had served for a short time in the same radar operator unit as Lee Harvey Oswald in the spring of 1959 at MCAS El Toro in Santa Ana, California. Both men had shared a common interest in society, culture, literature and politics, and whenever duty placed them together, had discussed such topics as George Orwell's famous novel Nineteen Eighty-Four and the philosophy of Marxism, particularly Oswald's interest in the latter. This long range radar antenna, known as ALTAIR, is used to detect and track space objects in conjunction with ABM testing at the Ronald Reagan Test Site on the Kwajalein atoll. ... Wikisource has original text related to this article: Lee Harvey Oswald diary Lee Harvey Oswald (October 18, 1939 – November 24, 1963) was, according to four United States government investigations, the assassin of U.S. President John F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963. ... 1959 (MCMLIX) was a common year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Marine Corps Air Station El Toro was a United States Marine Corps Air Station located near Irvine, California at . ... Location of Santa Ana within Orange County, California. ... Official language(s) English Capital Sacramento Largest city Los Angeles Area  Ranked 3rd  - Total 158,302 sq mi (410,000 km²)  - Width 250 miles (400 km)  - Length 770 miles (1,240 km)  - % water 4. ... Young people interacting within an ethnically diverse society. ... Culture (from the Latin cultura stemming from colere, meaning to cultivate), generally refers to patterns of human activity and the symbolic structures that give such activity significance. ... Old book bindings at the Merton College library. ... The Politics series Politics Portal This box:      Politics is defined as a group of people who are influenced to change laws and other such things to make the world a better place the process by which groups of people make decisions. ... This article is about the Orwell novel. ... The philosopher Socrates about to take poison hemlock as ordered by the court. ... Marxism takes its name from the praxis (the synthesis of philosophy and political action) of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. ...

Some time after the two men parted ways as a result of routine reassignment, Thornley read of Oswald's autumn 1959 defection to the Soviet Union in the US military newspaper Stars and Stripes while aboard a troopship returning to the United States from duty in Japan. 1959 (MCMLIX) was a common year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar. ... In politics, a defector is a person who gives up allegiance to one state or political entity in exchange for allegiance to another. ... Flag ratio: 10:19; nicknames: Stars and Stripes, Old Glory The flag of the United States of America consists of thirteen equal horizontal stripes of red (top and bottom) alternating with white; there is a blue rectangle in the upper hoist-side corner bearing 50 small, white, five-pointed stars...

1960s

Released from Marine Corps' active duty in September of 1960, Thornley relocated with Greg Hill to New Orleans in early 1961 and began to write about his experiences as a peacetime Marine both stateside and in Asia in a book titled The Idle Warriors, which used Lee Harvey Oswald as the template for its main character. The aspiring novelist viewed Oswald as the metaphorical embodiment of an intelligent peacetime GI: deeply dissatisfied with the monolithic, totalitarian structure of military life which stood in distressingly sharp contrast to the professed American ideals of individual liberty and free enterprise. 1960 (MCMLX) was a leap year starting on Friday (the link is to a full 1960 calendar). ... New Orleans is the largest city in the state of Louisiana, United States of America. ... 1961 (MCMLXI) was a common year starting on Sunday (the link is to a full 1961 calendar). ... A novel (from French nouvelle Italian novella, new) is an extended, generally fictional narrative, typically in prose. ... Look up metaphor in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Liberty is generally considered a concept of political philosophy and identifies the condition in which an individual has immunity from the arbitrary exercise of authority. ... Free Enterprise is am economic system characterized by private or corporate ownership of capital goods; investments that are determined by private decision rather than by state control; and determined in a free market. ...

In late 1962, Thornley completed The Idle Warriors, the only book written about Lee Harvey Oswald before Kennedy's assassination in 1963. Due to the serendipitous nature of Thornley's choice of literary subject matter, he was called to testify before the Warren Commission in Washington DC on May 18, 1964. The Commission subpoenaed a copy of the book and stored it in the National Archives. In 1965, Thornley published another book titled Oswald, generally defending the "Oswald-as-lone-assassin" conclusion of the Warren Commission, which met with dismal sales. In his later years, Thornley became convinced that Oswald had in truth been a CIA asset whose purpose was to ferret out suspected Communist sympathizers serving in the Corps. Year 1962 (MCMLXII) was a common year starting on Monday (the link is to a full 1962 calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... John Fitzgerald Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), also referred to as John F. Kennedy, JFK, John Kennedy or Jack Kennedy, was the 35th President of the United States. ... Year 1963 (MCMLXIII) was a common year starting on Tuesday (link will display full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... Warren Commission report cover page The Presidents Commission on the Assassination of President Kennedy, known unofficially as The Warren Commission, was established on November 29, 1963, by Lyndon B. Johnson to investigate the assassination of U.S. President John F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963. ... Flag Seal Nickname: DC, The District Motto: Justitia Omnibus (Justice for All) Location Location of Washington, D.C., with regard to the surrounding states of Maryland and Virginia. ... May 18 is the 138th day of the year (139th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... 1964 (MCMLXIV) was a leap year starting on Wednesday (the link is to a full 1964 calendar). ... A subpoena is a writ commanding a person to appear under penalty (from Latin). ... The National Archives building in Washington, DC The United States National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) is an independent agency of the United States federal government charged with preserving and documenting government and historical records. ... 1965 (MCMLXV) was a common year starting on Friday (the link is to a full 1965 calendar). ... The Lone gunman theory (a. ... Warren Commission report cover page The Presidents Commission on the Assassination of President Kennedy, known unofficially as The Warren Commission, was established on November 29, 1963, by Lyndon B. Johnson to investigate the assassination of U.S. President John F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963. ... The CIA Seal The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) is an American intelligence agency, responsible for obtaining and analyzing information about foreign governments, corporations, and individuals, and reporting such information to the various branches of the U.S. Government. ... Communism is an ideology that seeks to establish a classless, stateless social organization based on common ownership of the means of production. ...

Epistle to the Paranoids

In January of 1968, New Orleans district attorney Jim Garrison, certain there had been a New Orleans-based conspiracy to assassinate John F. Kennedy, subpoenaed Thornley to appear before a grand jury once again, questioning him about his relationship with Oswald and his knowledge of other figures Garrison believed to be connected to the assassination. Garrison charged Thornley with perjury after Thornley denied that he had been in contact with Oswald in any manner since 1959. The perjury charge was eventually dropped by Garrison's successor Harry Connick, Sr. Image File history File links Download high resolution version (750x1100, 53 KB)Principia Discordia, pg 69 Epistle to the Paranoids by Kerry Thornley. ... Image File history File links Download high resolution version (750x1100, 53 KB)Principia Discordia, pg 69 Epistle to the Paranoids by Kerry Thornley. ... Year 1968 (MCMLXVIII) was a leap year starting on Monday (link will display full calendar) of the 1968 Gregorian calendar. ... Earling Carothers Jim Garrison (November 20, 1921 - October 21, 1992) — who changed his first name to simply Jim in the early 60s — was the Democratic District Attorney of Orleans Parish, Louisiana from 1962 to 1973; he is best known for his investigations into the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. ... Perjury is the act of lying or making verifiably false statements on a material matter under oath or affirmation in a court of law or in any of various sworn statements in writing. ... 1959 (MCMLIX) was a common year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar. ... This page meets Wikipedias criteria for speedy deletion. ...

Thornley claimed that, during his initial two-year sojourn in New Orleans, he'd had numerous meetings with two mysterious middle-aged men named "Gary Kirstein" and "Slim Brooks". According to his account, they had detailed discussions on numerous subjects ranging from the mundane to the exotic, and bordering sometimes on bizarre. Among these was the subject of How one might assassinate President Kennedy, whose beliefs and policies the aspiring novelist deeply disliked at the time. Later, the former Marine came to believe that "Gary Kirstein" had in reality been senior CIA officer and future Watergate burglar E. Howard Hunt, and "Slim Brooks" to have been Jerry Milton Brooks, a member of the 1960s right-wing activist group, "The Minutemen". Thornley also claimed that "Kirstein" and "Hunt" had accurately predicted Richard M. Nixon's accession to the presidency six years before it happened, as well as anticipating the rise of the 1960s counterculture and the subsequent emergence of Charles Manson and what became his cult following. This led Thornley to believe that the US government had somehow been involved, directly or indirectly, in creating and/or supporting these events, personages and phenomena. New Orleans is the largest city in the state of Louisiana, United States of America. ... The Watergate building. ... Everette Howard Hunt, Jr. ... The Minutemen were a militant anti-Communist organization formed in the early 1960s. ... Richard Milhous Nixon (January 9, 1913 – April 22, 1994) was the 37th President of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. ... The counterculture of the 1960s began in the United States as a reaction against the conservative social norms of the 1950s, the political conservatism (and social repression) of the Cold War period, and the US governments extensive military intervention in Vietnam. ... Charles Milles Manson (born November 12, 1934; first proper name Charles Milles Maddox) was leader of what came to be known as the Manson Family, a cult commune that began to form around him in the U.S. city of San Francisco in 1967. ... This article does not discuss cult in its original sense of religious practice; for that usage see Cult (religious practice). ...

In the wake of this period, Thornley came to believe (among many other things) that he had been a subject of the CIA's notorious LSD-soaked MK-ULTRA mind-control research program. While skeptics may dismiss as flimsy conspiracy theory some of his later notions—such as having been a product of occult-based Nazi Vril selective breeding programs—his claims regarding participation in such highly-classified US government mind-control programs and foreknowledge of the John F. Kennedy assassination are somewhat more plausible, as they are consistent with the time period, his residences, and the nature and locations of his military service. The CIA Seal The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) is an American intelligence agency, responsible for obtaining and analyzing information about foreign governments, corporations, and individuals, and reporting such information to the various branches of the U.S. Government. ... Lysergic acid diethylamide, commonly called LSD, LSD-25, or acid. ... Wikipedia does not yet have an article with this exact name. ... A conspiracy theory attempts to attribute the ultimate cause of an event or chain of events (usually political, social, or historical events), or the concealment of such causes from public knowledge, to a secret, and often deceptive plot by a covert alliance of powerful or influential people or organizations. ... National Socialism redirects here. ... The Coming Race (original title), also reprinted as Vril: The Power of the Coming Race is a novel published in 1870 by Edward Bulwer-Lytton. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ... President Kennedy with his wife, Jacqueline, and Texas Governor John Connally in the presidential limousine just moments before his assassination The assassination of John F. Kennedy, the thirty-fifth President of the United States, took place on Friday, November 22, 1963, in Dallas, Texas, USA at 12:30 p. ...

Later life and death

For the next 30 years, Thornley traveled and lived all over the United States and was involved in a variety of activities, ranging from editing underground newspapers to attending graduate school. Spending most of the remainder of his life in the "Little Five Points" neighborhood of Atlanta, Georgia, Thornley became increasingly paranoid and distrustful in the wake of his experiences during the 1960s, both by his own accounts and those of personal acquaintances. For a time Thornley wrote a regular column in the zine Factsheet Five, until editor Mike Gunderloy stopped publishing the magazine. Struggling with illness in his final days, Kerry Thornley died of a heart attack in Atlanta on November 28, 1998, a Saturday, at the age of 60. The following morning, 23 people attended a Buddhist memorial service in his honor. His body had been cremated and the ashes scattered over the Pacific Ocean. Shortly before his death, Thornley reportedly said he'd felt "like a tired child home from a very wild circus," a reference to a passage by Greg Hill from the Principia Discordia: A graduate school or grad school is a school that awards advanced degrees, with the general requirement that students must have earned an undergraduate (bachelors) degree. ... Hotlanta redirects here. ... A zine—an abbreviation of the word fanzine, and originating from the word magazine—is most commonly a small circulation, non-commercial publication of original or appropriated texts and images. ... Factsheet Five is a periodical originally published by Mike Gunderloy of Albany, New York. ... Acute myocardial infarction (AMI or MI), more commonly known as a heart attack, is a disease state that occurs when the blood supply to a part of the heart is interrupted. ... November 28 is the 332nd day (333rd in leap years) of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1998 (MCMXCVIII) was a common year starting on Thursday (link will display full 1998 Gregorian calendar). ... This article is about the number 23. ... This article refers to the real life of Greg Hill. ...

Bibliography and references

• Malaclypse the Younger (Greg Hill); Principia Discordia, or, How I found Goddess and what I did to Her when I found Her, 5th Edition, September 1991, IllumiNet Press (Introduction by Kerry Thornley) ISBN 0-9626534-2-X
• Thornley, Kerry; Oswald, New Classics House, 1965
• Thornley, Kerry; Zenarchy, IllumiNet Press, June 1991 ISBN 0-9626534-1-1
• Thornley, Kerry; The Idle Warriors, IllumiNet Press, June 1991 ISBN 0-9626534-0-3
• Gorightly, Adam; The Prankster and the Conspiracy: The Story of Kerry Thornley and How He Met Oswald and Inspired the Counterculture, Paraview Press, November 2003 (foreword by Robert Anton Wilson) ISBN 978-1931044660
• Biles, Joe G.; In History's Shadow: Lee Harvey Oswald, Kerry Thornley & the Garrison Investigation, Writers Club Press, April 2002 (foreword by Robert Buras) ISBN 978-0595224555

Malaclypse the Younger (short Mal-2) is the author of the Principia Discordia, a character in the Illuminatus! trilogy, and most likely a penname used by Greg Hill, comrade of Kerry Thornley (aka Lord Omar Khayyam Ravenhurst). ... This article refers to the real life of Greg Hill. ... Robert Anton Wilson Robert Anton Wilson or RAW (January 18, 1932 – January 11, 2007) was a prolific American novelist, essayist, philosopher, psychologist, futurologist, anarchist, and conspiracy theory researcher. ...

External links

Wikisource has original works written by or about:

Kerry Thornley

• Introduction by Kerry Thornley to the Fifth (IllumiNet Press) Edition of Principia Discordia
• Impropaganda: Zenarchy
• Impropaganda: First 30 issues of Kultcha broadsheet newsletter
• 113 scanned and full-text issues of The Decadent Worker broadsheet newsletter
• The Dreadlock Recollections
• 23 Offerings of Prime Erisiana, Discordian enchantments as described to Sondra London
• In Defense of Libertarian Communism
• Appendix 5 of Warren Commission Report available at NARA (www.archives.gov)
• Warren Commission Hearings, Testimony of Kerry W. Thornley
• Orleans Parish Grand Jury Transcript, Testimony of Kerry W. Thornley
• Impropaganda: 1991 NY Press article on Thornley - "Oswald's Other"
• The Vril, the CIA, and Nazi Secret Societies, correspondence of Kerry Thornley
• Official Obituary Announcement by Sondra London
• Confession to Conspiracy to Assassinate JFK, posthumous account of the events surrounding and leading up to Thornley's alleged involvement with the JFK assassination, as told to Sondra London
• Excerpts from Gorightly's book The Prankster and the Conspiracy and Foreword by Robert Anton Wilson
• Hi-res scan of Thornley's Pope certificate