Chapter 62 - Meet the Browns of Ka-Lae-Hau

[greggvizza]

Taught by the same man that taught Howard Hughes to fly, and the same man that possibly has ties to the Nassau part of this story. All I can say is WOW.

GV

[grinder]

You have to realize that Dean Franklin was THE MAN when it came to those planes. For years and years and years. If you wanted a part for a Goose you had to come to him because he had bought up all the other planes from the factory and the parts too. (Probably why Buffett got to know him. I think that his Hemisphere Dancer is an Albatross, but I could be wrong on that. Anyway. In some fields there are giants and I am sure any pilot will tell you, if he has ever set down in water that Dean Franklins name is legendary.) and you would lose much of the history of Nassau without those planes too. grinder

[Martin Calloway]

Regarding Dean Franklin. Like you said, anybody who got his feet wet during a landing (intentionally) knows that name. Now THERE Paul is a person who could probably tell some really wild true stories about the goings on in and around Nassau and Miami, and all those wonderful islands. ( And that even includes Catalina!)

He is quite an old man now I believe but still sharp as a tack. Don't involve yourself in a game of chance with the man! Mr. Franklin, are your ears burning? Martin

[Mikado14]

Regarding Dean Franklin. Like you said, anybody who got his feet wet during a landing (intentionally) knows that name. Now THERE Paul is a person who could probably tell some really wild true stories about the goings on in and around Nassau and Miami, and all those wonderful islands. ( And that even includes Catalina!)

He is quite an old man now I believe but still sharp as a tack. Don't involve yourself in a game of chance with the man! Mr. Franklin, are your ears burning? Martin

Isn't he got to be pushing...100? Almost old enough to be Mr. Twigsnappers Father.

Mikado

[greggvizza]

I know this is taking things a bit off course, but I am an aviation addict and can’t control my urge to share.

The Hemisphere Dancer: http://www.lpba.org/buffett.html

All of Buffett’s aircraft: http://www.buffettworld.com/p_aircraft.html

I would personally be happiest with the Stearman. You got to love a good snap-roll every now and then.

GV

[Elizabeth Helen Drake]

We have strayed a little<g> from the subject of the Browns in Hawaii but I guess in this strange rabbit hole stories of pilots and seaplanes and Islands scattered in the sun .... well I guess its all related, I'm not just sure how. But I found this, regarding Mr. Dean and Howard Hughes, which substantiates some of the other stories . This site is from the fellows in North Carolina who are rebuilding and running many Gooses ( right, Gooses, not geese!)

http://www.antillesseaplanes.com/biznc.htm

"When they arrived in Miami in November 2000 to buy the plane from Franklin Aviation Enterprises, a broker of old aircraft, they discovered the company was the sole source of spare Goose parts. Owner Dean Franklin made them an offer. He was 92 and had been trying to sell his business. “I sat there for three days listening to stories he was telling about the aviation industry,â€

[grinder]

Langley,

I am still chewing on all of the information that you lobbed in our direction.

You included paths that I might never have considered. I guess this area is something you definitely know something about and I sure appreciate your input. And I took a quote directly from you. " Logical consistency isn't proof" but I have to add to that " But it beats the hell out of illogical inconsistency" which is what books on Brown have offered, to this point.

It could be that PROOF of all of this activity is just going to be beyond Paul AT THE MOMENT and maybe even for years after his book is published. Its pretty damned obvious that some of these programs are still operating under a cloak of secrecy. I can be alright with that. As long as someone has made note of it for the future. Like, SOMEDAY the whole truth will be known.

Like those Richard Nixon phone tapes that were just released. We finally get a chance to see what was going on with all of the protective or propaganda rhetoric stripped away. For history we are finally getting to know the man.

And thats what Pauls book is all about I think for me. I guess I have gotten caught up in trying to find out what was so very important to Brown (and to the people working around him ) that he would do all of the things that he (and they) did to protect that information.

I have wondered how many others might still be out there, doing the same? And I have wondered if the path they are being offered is still as important? Wondered what it was like to have that hand placed on your shoulder?

Early morning thoughts. sleepless nights.

Gregg! Who needs snap rolls? Try sleeping when thoughts like these bang on your head! grinder

[twigsnapper]

Mikado! Dean Franklin? Old enough to be my father? Indeed! Its a comfort to know that there is SOMEONE out there who is older than I am.

To all of you aspiring biographers out there with a love of flight, especially infected with the love of the sound of those Goose engines roaring alive and the spray going everywhich way. You really should investigate Dean Franklins life story. If he hasn't told it yet someone out there should contact him. Too much good information at the mans fingertips to be lost to history. Pauls a little busy right now so perhaps someone else?

During World War II Mr. Franklin and his ships kept the lines of communications going in South America and many plots were broken in half which, if allowed to continue, could have cut the United States in half.

I don't know if he is ready to talk about all of that and some of those "midnight missions" but it would make a grand story if he is.

And grinder. You are right of course. Look at the span of years. Is a longstanding thing. You have to be able to accept that. You do what you can do for the amount of time that you are given. But you have to learn how to sleep in between son. twigsnapper

[Langley]

What a cool piece of information. And odd too. I agree with you Langley.

And I especially appreciate the way that Mr. Twigsnapper comes out of nowhere with a link that is so important and so on the mark. Are you sure you were never a fighter pilot Sir? You really know how to lock onto a target.

So with all of this new information and my attention focused now properly <g> I have to ask too " What the blank were they really doing? "

And now that we know that someone strongly associated with Dr. Brown was involved himself in the beginnings of the Manhattan Project ( Bradford Shank?) I am just wondering if we aren't looking at the vestiges of some sort of " Caroline "onion skin " operation?

You know, an operation within an operation! These research guys were so highly compartmentalized during this time I am not sure any of them would be able to put anything together. If there was an alternate program being runright alongside them, could they tell? Something at the Philadelphia Navy yard would recieve the highest attention to security. And if something went wrong, either in the development of the bomb, or something else, I am sure in the years to come there would be a massive disinformation campaign to cover things up. Is that what happened actually?

When William Moore repeated what HE had heard about the story of the " Philadelphia Experiment" it was rather ornate with visions of terrible things happening to the crews. Could this " accident" at the Philadelphia Navy yard have been the core of that myth? just asking. And where was Dr, Brown in 1944 again? (edit, edit, edit ..... in 1944 he ws supposed to be living in Burbank and working for Vega? right?)Supposedly contemplating moving his entire family to Hawaii came much later in 1945? and it took to 1947 to get moved?) Even his mother. Now fellows, a person doesn't do that for the sheer joy of it. I don't think he wanted his family anywhere where they could be "reached" and perhaps kidnapped. I am sure that the move was a matter of security for his organization.

But if he was not on the island as Paul mentioned and he was closer maybe to Washington(???) then what the heck was happening? Meanwhile what was Mr. Shank doing? Seems like, while Dr. Brown was at Vega Mr. Shank was up to his eyeballs in the Manhattan Project. Where did they meet again? At Vega in 1944? Anybody seeing some correlations here maybe folks!

And I always have wondered who the heck said it was "Project Rainbow" anyway. How did Moore come to call it that in his book? That Project Sunshine gave me the shivers.

Great response Langley. You sure know your onions! <g> grinder

Its 2.30am here. Im up because Ive got a cold sore thats really irritating.
I think its important that the spiritual transcendental side of things Kevin.b and others raise are really important. Im not good at it. All of this technical stuff is just that - technique - a way of using something. The crux is "what is that stuff". Information is a great tool to control people with.

From the point of view of the Manhattan boys - the inner ring - the very construction of the cosmos inspired a weapon. But as Kevin. b and everyone else knows, its much more than that.

I dont want to be dogmatic, or go beyond my knowledge, but fundamentally, everything about Brown's work and everything about the Manhattan Project revolves around the Spectrum in one way or another.

"From daylight to DC" has been used more than once here. Well, I am now pretty convinced that that Brown was aligned with the antinukers. And there were plenty of them in the MP. And when the US government started considering managing the information about the hazards of atomic testing - the big post war thing - from the very beginning, the CIA and RAND were there to help the AEC manipulate the information. And I think Brown was very aware of it. atomic radiation is just part of the Spectrum. So from Brown's point of view anything to do with the Spectrum was part and parcel of what he was doing. Im not well versed in gravity waves or sideral radiation, but again, fundamentally, its part of the Spectrum. Brown was a researcher without compartments. But from the governments point of view that made him a risk because he was capable of having an overview. He could see through the onion. The layers being artificial. While the Spectrum is broken up into power, coms, weapons, etc, by the authorities, to people like Brown they saw a unified thing. So its not inconsistent to be working on all sorts of different projects. And Im sure Brown had to be protected or gained protection from somewhere. Not everyone who had an overview and a humanitarian outlook fared as well. At this point I refer to :
http://www.ratical.org/radiation/CNR/OHofJWGforDOE/

This is the official transcript of Dr John Gofman for the DOE Oral history project undertaken as part of President Clinton's Openness Order.

The difficulties experienced by Gofman reflect the tenor of the times and the nature of the control of information. People in power at the time had aims other than open scientific discourse in view, and this conflicted with scientific priniciples.

Quote: "I said, "Well, Mr. Holifield,(of Congressional Hearings) I'll look into it. I'm surprised, but that doesn't square with our findings." He said, "That's what they told me." Then he turned to me and said, "There are people like you who have tried to hurt the Atomic Energy Commission program before.
(NB: and dig this:)
We got them, and we'll get you." He didn't mean to kill us, but he meant they could take care of our reputation. That's a long story.

Now that was a Congressman threatening a scientist who helped set up the Lawrence Livermore Labs.

Now Brown was running a lab doing biological/radiation studies in cahoots with an ex MP person who was of the Gofman school.

So what was protecting Brown? He was far enough away from the centre so as not to be an official expert, and he was portrayed as an eccentric researcher, a boffin, who lay people would never understand.

But there's something very Pugwash about Brown; and he was very aware of what not to talk about.

If they could kill your reputation, and hence career,
via information control, well, one had better have a reputation which originated and propagated through circles of power other than that of government.

The down side was of course, the authorities, not needing you directly for the purposes of information control, would not have an interest in promoting you or your work.

The electromagnetic spectrum is a pretty adaptable thing. You can use it for myriad things. From DC to daylight to gamma . And all these frequences can exist in the same space at the same time. Which doesnt mean that there are not other spaces and other times cohabiting next to ours.

My itch has eased a bit.

The Manhattan Project suppressed cancer researched from 1942 to 1953 (source: Brucer A Chronology of Nuclear Medicine). An explosion in an isotope separator (ie one of them things the Iranians are stirring up the world with at the moment) in a shipyard - no way would Groves allow any inkling of that to get out - it would have been BLACKED out.

The Soviets were happy to sign Kennedy's Limited Test Ban Treaty, which came into effect in 1963. The average Russian got double the dose of Radio strontium from fallout than the average American, due to dietary differences. (with some exceptions) The Russians knew it, the USA knew it.
(See, the biology of radiation is important and somewhat counter intuitive. And Brown had his lab near LA to look into that, I think, doing his own checks of the official pronouncements. The US was after all being affected, and its most definately was not perfectly safe. And while it was Teller and Pauling going head to head in public, many scientists silently held their own skeptical views).

From WW2 onward to 1989, the main aim of the military industrial complex was the defeat of first the Axis powers and then the Soviet Union. That paradigm covers the latter part of Brown's work. That was his matrix. So long as he was some use, his annoyances would be tolerated. So long as he kept his mouth shut.

What was going on was information control.

I mean, you dont have Teller as drop guest on the one hand and covort with signers of the Dont drop the Bomb partition without some sort of line in the sand being drawn for you.

[Elizabeth Helen Drake]

Deinitely something to be said for not being able to sleep. Langley, I am so appreciative for the time you have spent here. You too grinder. You both are AMAZING. I can barely keep up.

I am saving my comments until after Paul has had a chance to plug back in after the weekend. As he said .... you offer alot to chew on.

I have been paddling around in another pond sort of, Can't exactly explain what got me there but I have been working on .... connecting points .... connecting people.

One of them of course was an industrialist by the name of Floyd Odlum. We got so "into" planes during another conversation ,and of course Howard Hughes was mentioned so it was not a big leap for me to get to Mr. Odlum (He owned Convair and his wife was Jackie Cochran, famous for record breaking flights . Their ranch in Indio became a "watering hole" for influential and powerful individuals. Teller, Curtis LeMay, presidents, heads of state, they were host to all .... and one gentle scientist ( and his daughter)during April of 1967. Long story real short because of those connections I "happened to find" this notation regarding the official records of meetings held between Odlum and President Truman. ( because I was looking for them)

http://www.trumanlibrary.org/calendar/m ... werlimit=0

Number of record(s) found: 2 Page 1 of 1

1. Date: 10-20-1948 Time: 11:00 am
Mr. Floyd Odlum
(At the request of Colonel Louis Johnson and arranged by
him)

2. Date: 4-5-1949 Time: 10:30 am
Mr. Floyd Odlum
(Arranged through Ambassador James Bruce).......................................

Paul, just trying to throw this into your bag of information regarding things that were happening around Dr. Brown late 1948- early 1949. Or at least, what other people were doing at the time.

And thank you so much Langley for all of your wonderful thoughts. Like you said, there was probably a line drawn in the sand somewhere. Elizabeth

[grinder]

Getting back to the chapter a little because I have no expertise in anything atomic. Leaving that discussion to you guys. Love to read it, just can't contribute!

But maybe I do know something about the feelings of a young kid who does not have his father around. And I read about Joseph Brown and I really felt for the kid. First he has to deal with a kid sister being introduced into the family ( can I send her back?) and then he is uprooted from a cool California surfing dude town with probably plenty of friends, to a " camp" isolated in some Hawaiian valley. And who are his immediate contacts. His Mother, his kid sister , and a Grandmother that apparently was not his favorite all time person and who used to pick on him. ( because I am sure he could NEVER be as good a boy as her favorite son Townsend, was. Boy! I feel for the kid. And then does his Dad ever tell him anything, about anything? Does that mean that he wasn't worth sharing stuff with? Not worth coming back for? Huh? Alot of questions going about like this " How could you leave me behind? You know I loved you. Didn't you love me?

Curious to see how Joseph handled all of that. This is a rough road. I appreciate what he went through. grinder.

[Victoria Steele]

Everybody. Notice how quiet things are from Paul. He must be busy writing and I'll bet its going to be good so I don't want to stress him out unfairly. I figure when you come up for a breath of air I would be curious about your response to some of the things that have been written here on the forum in the last week.

Oh and notice that NBC ( I think?) is coming out with " The Journeyman" which is about a fellow who " time travels" or " jumps dimensions" or whatever they are calling it this fall! Of course I wondered who the writers were and what some of the lines are going to be. Should be really interesting.

Grinder. I thought that your last message on the forum was very touching. Its got to be rough not having a Dad around. You know I was thinking of some of the real heartaches that kids like Joseph must have gone through. A little earlier alot of kids were missing their Dads. The ones that made it home didn't necessarily want to talk about it either so it had to have been a hard time.

Type, type type Paul! <g> Victoria

[Mikado14]

Everybody. Notice how quiet things are from Paul. He must be busy writing and I'll bet its going to be good so I don't want to stress him out unfairly. I figure when you come up for a breath of air I would be curious about your response to some of the things that have been written here on the forum in the last week.

Oh and notice that NBC ( I think?) is coming out with " The Journeyman" which is about a fellow who " time travels" or " jumps dimensions" or whatever they are calling it this fall! Of course I wondered who the writers were and what some of the lines are going to be. Should be really interesting.

Grinder. I thought that your last message on the forum was very touching. Its got to be rough not having a Dad around. You know I was thinking of some of the real heartaches that kids like Joseph must have gone through. A little earlier alot of kids were missing their Dads. The ones that made it home didn't necessarily want to talk about it either so it had to have been a hard time.

Type, type type Paul! <g> Victoria

Ok, here is another, "I've been waiting" things. Been waiting on this one ever since the chapter on "structure of space". Does anybody here ever watch science fiction on the tube?

Ever hear of "Sliders"?

Mikado

[Langley]

This is all very intriguing... great angles, gotta be careful they don't become tangents or long dead ends in the rabbit hole. At the moment, this is the one thorn that's catching me:

What the heck are they doing building an isotope separator in the Philly Naval Dock yard?

How do we even know for sure that the "event" being described was, indeed a "diffusion isotope separator" ?

I don't have a whole lot of background on either the peripheral operations of the Manhattan Project or the specific (and obviously classified) goings-on at Philadelphia Navy Yard in the 1940s. But my understanding is that such experiments and operations were being conducted at places like Oak Ridge in Tennessee or Hanaford in Washington (check me on that last one, I might have the name confused/wrong).

So right now I'm in Langley's camp, wondering why they'd be separating isotopes at the Philadelphia Navy Yard.

--PS

On 20 March 1939, about 3 years before the Manhattan Project was even a gleam in Groves eye, the Naval Research Laboratory recieved funding to undertake fission propulsion research for submarines. The Navy did not have a weapon as its primary goal. It seems that the Naval personnel involved in the U enrichment plant established at the Philadephia Naval Shipyard were on the whole pro propulsion and anti bomb. (http://caliber.ucpress.net/doi/abs/10.1 ... 3.33.2.217
Citation
Historical Studies in the Physical and Biological Sciences
2003, Vol. 33, No. 2, Pages 217-236
Posted online on December 1, 2003.
(doi:10.1525/hsps.2003.33.2.217)
Clink on the pdf link to down load it.


A nightmare scenario for Groves, who by 1943 have clamped severe restriction even on civilian cancer treatments which used radioisotopes. (lifted in 1953)
(Brucer).

I would bet that Brown's mate Bradford Shank was originally Naval Research Labs, seconded to the MP by Groves, when Groves had the chore of controlling the security of the Naval Project. I suspect that Groves had a natural antipathy toward the pre existing Naval research Labs fission research, not withstanding the fact that the Naval enrichment plant located in the Phily Naval shipyard was used as an abortive training ground for MP employees. Trained by the Navy until the explosion. (Source: JOSEPH – JAMES AHERN
“We had the hose turned on us!â€

[Elizabeth Helen Drake]

Here I am just picking up the faint scent of the fox as Mr. Twigsnapper might say. Meaning that some things here call out, but so far we con't have a solid connection. Still they are here and need to be made note of.

Langley, You mentioned the Naval Research Lab and Ross Gun with his statement " we had the hose turned on us"

Don't know what it means but here is something from an earlier chapter

https://www.ttbrown.com/defying_gravity ... tlast.html

especially this part but all of it of course helps get a better handle on what was happening in the early thirties, involving both Gunn and Townsend Brown.

"Despite his enthusiasm for the assignment, Brown still encountered resistance to his novel ideas:

Equipment was built and all manner of tests were conducted. But, as history of science always seems to show, the results were controversial — even with Dr. Hulbert and Dr. Ross Gunn (Hulbert’s assistant). I even heard it remarked at one point that Brown’s work wasn’t worth ‘the powder to blow it up.â€