In his youth, Manly P. Hall was known for devouring the contents of encyclopediae in the L.A. County Library (and others), where a young Charles Bukowski (who went to high school with Ray Bradbury, too, for a time) likely sat a few tables away, reading the medical journals that led him to John Fante in his own search for writing that felt real, but that’s another story. Hall was one of the first such advocates to catch on strongly in the West, and went on to establish the Philosophical Research Society in Los Angeles, where he served as minister to a much older Bukowski’s wedding, after performing the same service for Bela Lugosi and other notables priorly, including this book’s author.
Tamra Lucid has written a memoir of her years as a student at Hall’s Philosophical Research Society in L.A., its title taken from something he frequently advised, giving insight into Hall’s later years and his status as an effector of later generations. Read my review of her book in the new print issue of Rain Taxi Review, available here.
Manly P. Hall as a young occult lecturer.
Camp Elasticity 