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Uncharter Waters · Operation Midnight Climax

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: On September twelfth, nineteen fifty three, Linda King visited George
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: White at his Bedford Street pad in New York. At
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: the time, the aspiring actress thought she was there as
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: a friend, a guest. What she didn't understand was that
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: White didn't have friends. He had subjects, people he drugged,
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: whose names he jotted down in his diary. The CIA
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: needed data on what LSD did too unsuspecting minds, and
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: that's what George White provided. White and King made small talk.
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: He fixed her a standard drink, chin ice a floater
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: of acid. An hour passed. It wasn't long before King
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: found herself roaming the New York City streets, her mind
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: entering dimensions she never knew existed. White didn't chase her.
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: He never chased anyone. His experiments lack curiosity. He only
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: cared about the short term reaction. What a person did
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: in the hours, days, weeks, or even years following their
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: dosing didn't matter to him. When Linda King climbed to
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: the rooftop of her apartment building that night, wondering if
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: she should dive off the edge to quell her sudden
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: feeling of despair, White wasn't around he was home, fast asleep,
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: but someone was there to help. Her name was Albertine.
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: Her friends called her team or Teeny. She worked as
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: a buyer for retail stores in New York. She was
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: friends with King. Together, the two of them drove to
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: Lenox Hill Hospital. King in a state of hysteria, Albertine
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: soothing her, It's going to be okay, relax. George did something.
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: He gave me something. What did he give me? Get
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: you checked out? Okay? Come on, come on in At
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: Lennox Hill, Linda couldn't articulate what had happened, only that
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: she felt drugged. There was nothing to do but let
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: it pass. As the hours ticked by, King kept telling
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: anyone who would listen that a man named George White
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: had done this to her. They needed to remember the
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: name George White. Eighty one Bedford Street, George White. Alberteen
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: stood by passively. She wanted to help her friend, but
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: she was growing uncomfortable with Linda's chant of George White,
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: George White, Someone find George White. Alberteen knew exactly where
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: to find George White. That's because she was married to him.
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: For I Heart Radio, this is Operation Midnight Climax, and
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: I heart original podcast I'm your host Noel Brown and
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: this is chapter four Uncharted Waters, Part one. Love and Marriage.
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: Albertin and George White were married in nineteen fifty one,
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: just before White relocated to New York. It was White's
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: third marriage. He'd been married briefly. In nineteen thirty three.
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: He divorced his first wife after just a year general incompatibility.
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: In the nineteen forties, he married his second wife, Ruth.
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: She left him while he was serving abroad. They weren't
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: a happy couple. For all of White's bravado, for all
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: the drug peddlers he pushed around, and all the gunfights
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: he got into, he wilted in front of Ruth. She
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: verbally abused him, insulting his weight, calling him a slob.
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: White would harbor a lifelong resentment over those slights. But
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: Albertine was different. She didn't see a callous narcotics cop.
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: She saw White as good at his job, effective, punctual.
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: She liked punctual. She liked that his picture made it
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: into the newspapers after big drug busts. She liked that
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: he was well read and well traveled, even if he
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: left dead bodies in his wake. And he had powerful friends,
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: like mayoral candidate Rudolph Halle, who once to promised to
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: make White commissioner of the New York Police Departments. For white,
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: Albertine represented a step up society's ladder. She was a
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: clothing buyer, She knew fashion. She always looked spectacular. White
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: enjoyed taking her out and showing her off, watching men
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: as they admired her, and sometimes he didn't mind if
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: they did more than that. George and Albertin were swingers,
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: a couple who didn't mind if one or both got
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: into bed with a third or even fourth party. But
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: this wasn't swinging in the Internet age, where partners swapping
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: on an app would hardly be newsworthy. This was the
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: early nineteen fifties, when sex in America was still a
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: taboo subject. Alfred Kinsey had just caused a stir publishing
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: his research into American sex lives. The first issue of
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: Playboy was just around the corner, and while nudity was tolerated,
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: anything beyond that would have been a problem. Porn movies
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: were still known as stag films. If you wanted to
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: watch people having sex, you'd have to know someone who
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: could hang up a bedsheet and set up a thirty
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: five millimeter projector. White was in the right place at
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: the right time. If he'd been in Middle America, he'd
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: be run out of town, But in Greenwich Village he
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: could be more open. It was the sort of scene
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: you could casually say you and your wife enjoyed the
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: company of others without fear. So White developed a third
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: identity want Apart from White the narcotics cop and Morgan Hall,
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: the CIA operative, he didn't give this one a name.
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: In a sense, it was White's real self, the one
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: who didn't have to hide anything, his occupation, his badge,
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: his stash of LSD. In White's Greenwich Village, he could
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: be anyone he it, and what he wanted was to
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: be more than a swinger. He wanted to be kinky.
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: One of White's first friends in the city was John
• 7:09
  Speaker 1: Alexander Kutz. His fans knew him as John Willie, an
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: artist and fetish photographer. Willie specialized in depictions of women
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: trust up in corsets and heels, imprisoned for some imagined
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: fantasy scenario. Willie even published a magazine devoted to such
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: content called Bizarre. Like a lot of fringe adult publications
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: of the era, there wasn't actually any sex depicted. In
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: bizarre there wasn't even nudity. The authorities considered the material
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: depraved and morally corrosive. Willie took pains to avoid anything
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: that might raise the ire of people who could block
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: his magazine, but it was still dangerous business. Publishers of
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: similar material were routinely rated by authorities, their books and
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: magazines ceased and brought before congressional hearings. Reading these magazines,
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: let alone publishing them, wasn't anything you wanted to brag about.
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: But like minds tend to congregate. If you're John Willie,
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: maybe you value having a friend who might be able
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: to steer some vice cops clear of your business. If
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: you're George White, you like the fact that John Willie
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: is connected to a scene you want to be a
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: part of. It wasn't long before John Willie introduced George
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: White to a man he'd get along with. He lived
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: just a few blocks away. His name was Gil Fox.
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: Like White, he had an alter ego to several of them.
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: Dallas Mayo was one, Paul V. Russo was another. Kimberly
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: Kemp under pseudonyms. Fox wrote erotic novels with titles like
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: a Touch of Depravity and The Trouble with Redheads. Often
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: there were lesbian storylines. This was, for a time incredibly taboo,
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: so much so that Fox didn't have a lot of
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: source material to call from. I would watch old movies
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: and imagine the man and woman as two women and
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: reimagine it as a lesbian scene. I'd pull a whole
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: scene from the Late Show and write it down and
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: then put it in a box. The night pool ideas
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: from the box. But that wasn't the only place Fox
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: got ideas. Fox and his wife Pat had what would
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: today be called an ethically non monogamous marriage. Sometimes they
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: hopped in someone else's bed, either together or apart. Pat
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: could provide details of her encounters with other women. Fox
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: also got inspiration from friends like George White. You know,
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: I like high heels a lot high old woman as well.
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: There's just something about it. Do you think you could
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: right a scene with two women wearing high heels. Books
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: of this type were often sold by bookstores run by
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: the mafia, another reason law enforcement was so interested in them.
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: But Gil's books and John Willie's magazines weren't the only
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: way White could indulge his fetishes. Albertein knew about his
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: fascination with high heels. She watched his White filled up
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: an entire closet with them for her use and his pleasure.
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: According to Gil, who had intimate knowledge of White's life
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: behind closed doors, one of White's favorite scenarios would be
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: to take a pair of knee high boots and carefully
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: lace them up for Albertein. Gil's wife, Pat also instructed
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: Alberteen on other fetishes, like spanking. When White wanted or
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: needed something more extreme, he might solicit the company of
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: a professional. Once White invited Gil and Pat to his
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: hotel room. When they walked in, they saw White stripped
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: down to his underwear. Tied to the bed. Near him
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: was a dominatrix, a whip being cracked across White's ample backside,
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: and yes, she was wearing high heels. If White had
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: been in two loveless, relatively sexless marriages, he was making
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: up for lost time. Greenwich Village was a path to
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: indulging in anything he wanted. It was a playground. As
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: sexual escapades go. It was all relatively harmless. Gill and
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: Pat Fox regarded George and Albertine as like minds. All
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: of them were into kink. The two couples trusted one another.
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: Though Gill and Pat didn't know George was working for
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: the CIA, his extracurricular work wasn't disclosed to them, so
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: he thought nothing of it when White invited them over
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: for drinks. Gil had been around White long enough to
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: know he was an alcoholic. White favored gin, but wasn't picky.
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: He regularly started his drinking in the morning and continued
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: through the day. That detail matters. If there's one thing
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: you want out of someone conducting an illicit CIA experiment
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: with powerful haucinogenic drugs, it's probably sobriety, and that wasn't
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: something White could offer. But just how bad was White's problem?
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: Bad enough that when he was on assignment with the
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: Narcotics Bureau to chase a trail of heroin to Turkey,
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: he passed out drunk in front of a suspect while undercover.
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: The criminal went through his pockets and found his badge.
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: White barely escaped with his life years later, with LSD
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: in his possession, he was, in all likelihood drunk on
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: the night of November two when he welcomed the Foxes
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: to his apartment. We know the date because it's an
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: entry in White's diary. For him, it was a very
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: special occasion. He was about to take his LSD experimentation
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: into uncharted waters. Part two Dinner Parties. Gill and Pat
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: Fox arrived at White's apartment his real apartment, not as
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: Morgan Hall residents, and said hello to Kai Jerkinson. Kai
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: was a drama professor from Chapel Hill and another interesting
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: wrinkle in White's personality. His circle of friends included murderers, informants,
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: mayoral candidate, swingers, and apparently professors. All of them found
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: something alluring about White. For the criminals, fraternizing with a
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: cop felt empowering, like they were getting a peek at
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: the other side. For more respectable members of society it
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: was the opposite. White felt dangerous, unpredictable. They just didn't
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: quite understand the danger until it was too late. Welcome everyone, Pat,
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: you look like a million yil. How's the magnum opus coming? Well,
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: come on in and meet the Jerkinson's Tenas getting dinner ready,
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: The Foxes chatted with Kai and Joe Jurgensen while White
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: busied himself at the bar. One thing Gil had noticed
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: about White was that he liked mixing two pictures of
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: martinis at his parties. One was for himself, because again
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: he had some kind of vendetta against his liver. The
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: other was for guests. The two pictures served a different purpose,
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: though White wanted to keep the pictures separate so he
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: could add a little something extra to one of them
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: to liven up the proceedings. Drinks for everyone, come on
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: my own recipe. The Whites, Foxes, and Jorgenson's began to party, drinking, dancing,
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: talking about their Thanksgiving celebrations, talking about the holiday season
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: and about New York and their plans. Then the couples
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: piled into a car and began driving in the lower village.
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: Gil noticed it had started snowing, and he admired the
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: white flakes falling. After a few minutes, Gil stopped smiling.
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: The snow was beautiful, it was maybe the most beautiful
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: snow he'd ever seen, But there was something different about him.
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: It began to change colors. The snow was lit up,
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: switching from blue to green to yellow. Gil looked or
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: at his wife, Pat, who held an expression of pleasant disbelief.
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: Then he looked at Joe Jerkinson, who was holding her
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: arms out in front of herself like a ballet dancer.
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: Joe would later say she was admiring an ornate pair
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: of opera gloves that had materialized out of thin air. White,
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: having imbibed Martini after Martini, was looking at all of
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: it like the mad Hatter having a party. There was
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: Gil enjoying a winter snowstorm on a clear night, and
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: Pat quiet, Kay and Joe look nervous. They all decided
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: it would be a good idea to pile into a
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: lesbian bar, but Pat and Joe began freaking out and
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: wanted to go home. The night had come to an
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: ignoble conclusion. What could the c i A learn from this?
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: How to average couples responded to being dosed with LSD?
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: Did White even report the incident to Sydney Gottlieb or
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: did he keep it to himself knowing these people weren't
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: part of the profile gott Leap wanted. He was supposed
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: to be dosing criminals and outcasts, so he could have
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: plausible deniability if they ever reported him. Was he doing
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: it to win the Cold War? Or was George White
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: doing it just for fun. There were two important lessons
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: White learned that night about consequences for Kai and Joe
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: Jurgensen to educated, upper class professionals. They were livid they
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: knew why had dosed them, and Joe refused to forgive
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: White for what he deemed a harmless stunt. She felt
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: violated Her marriage toc I didn't last either. The two
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: divorced a few years later. The Foxes were another story.
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: They too were angry with White, who had betrayed their trust.
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: But the fox has also fancied themselves liberal thinkers on
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: the outskirts of society, Gil challenging conventions this erotic work,
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: and Pat an enthusiastic partner in their swinging lifestyle. In
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: another city, in another life, they might have gone to
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: the police. In Greenwich Village of the nineteen fifties, LSD
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: was around. It was part of the lifestyle. Unlike the Jurgenson's,
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: the Foxes decided to stay in White's orbit. In fact,
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: they did more than that. The Foxes actually helped White
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: grow as pool of subjects, and this time the consequences
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: would be far more serious than technicolor snow Elliott and
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: Barbara Smythe were married in September nineteen, Elliott was an
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: employee at the F. L. Smythe Machine Company, his family's business.
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: After Barbara gave birth to their daughter, Valerie, Elliott persuaded
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: his beautiful new bride to relocate to Greenwich Village. He
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: had heard the siren call of the neighborhood's contemporary are
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: attitudes about socializing and sex. Elliott wanted to swing. Elliott
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: had actually swung with the Foxes before. He and his
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: previous girlfriend once had a foursome with Gil and Pad,
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: and he wanted to continue the dynamic with his new wife.
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: But with Valerie their daughter, swinging didn't seem to be
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: in the cards. Free time was harder to come by.
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: Gil introduced Elliott to White and the two struck up
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: their own friendship. Well, they were friendly, but what really
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: made an impression on Elliott was Albertine, a vivacious woman
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: with poise and style. White noticed he always noticed when
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: men admired his wife, and he made it clear that
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: they were open to just about anything. The first time
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: Elliott and Barbara went over to White's apartment, White showed
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: him the shoe closet, heels of every color, size and
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: variety from basic pumps to the elaborate lacea boots that
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: Albertine and strutted around in for White's enjoyment. This was
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: White's toy chest. He only showed it to a select few,
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: but he liked Elliott and he really liked Barbara Swinger.
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: Math is always a little hard to define. There's what
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: a couple may want, and there's what each individual wants.
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: Elliott wanted Albertine in or out of high heels. Albertine
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: was attracted to Elliott. White was attracted to Barbara. But
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: and here's where the Brakes get pumped, Barbara wasn't into White.
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: It was always a dice roll how people perceived him.
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: Some found his bad boy menace appealing, others didn't, and
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: Barbara didn't. Ordinarily that would have been fine, with the
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: couple still socializing, still trading stories, maybe Elliott and Albertine
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: stealing some time together. But reject Shin was something White
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: didn't like. His first wife had rejected him, his second
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: wife had rejected him. The FBI George White's personality, approach
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: and appearance is not up to FBI standards. Right, there
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: was a pattern before, he hadn't been able to respond
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: to it. But now things were different. On January eleven, NFTE,
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: just a few weeks after the Smythes visited, George and
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: Albertine invited Barbara over, just Barbara. Elliott was away on
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: a business trip, but that was okay. Barbara could come
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: by herself, but she brought a sidekick, her baby, Valerie,
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: who was just twenty months old. There was someone else
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: in the apartment too, a friend named Clarice Stein, who
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: worked with Albertine. While she liked Albertine, she had apprehensions
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: about why gil Fox had never told Elliott or Barbara
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: about White's hobby, the one that had put him in
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: an LSD snowstorm. He should have in the apartment. Barbara
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: put Valerie down and started talking with Clarice and Albertine
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: about the apparel business. White tended bar mixing his standard
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: two pictures of Martinis, one for him, one for the guests.
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: They started drinking, Barbara keeping herself to one because of
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: the baby. It took about fifteen minutes before the laughing started.
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: Something was funny. Barbara, Clarice, and Albertine began laughing hysterically, uncontrollably,
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: like nitrous oxide was being pumped into the room, their
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: drinks slashed over the rim of the glass from her bassinet.
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: Valerie watches her mother seemed to be in good spirits.
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: But remember what the chemist Albert Hoffman said about his
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: discovery about LSD and about the dangers it posed when
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: it was outside of a highly controlled environment. The danger
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: of a psychotic reaction is especially great if l s
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: D is given to someone without his or her knowledge.
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: The conditions for the positive outcome of an l s
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: D experiment reside in the milieu of the experiment, the
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: person's present, their appearance, their traits. Barbara, you don't look
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: so good, you're feeling okay. The acoustic milieu is equally significant.
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: Even harmless noises can turn to torment. LSD tends to
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: intensify the actual psychic state. A feeling of happiness can
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: be heightened to bliss, a depression can deepen to despair.
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: It's danger to take LSD in a disturbed, unhappy frame
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: of mind or in a state of fear. The probability
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: that the experiment will end in a psychic breakdown is
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: then quite high. Before Barbara Smith could say more, there
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: was a knock at the door. It was Francine Kramer,
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: one of Albertin's coworkers. She seemed to be an intrusion
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: of reality. Francine watched as both Barbara and Clarice gathered
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: their things, Barbara scooping up Valerie and went out into
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: the night, Out into an uncontrolled environment, out to explore
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: a world bursting with their fears, the fear of being
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: a new mother, the amplified feelings of despair that can
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: accompany the arrival of a living being. You're now responsible
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: for all of it. Naked Present, m Part three, Untouchable.
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: Clarice and Barbara went their separate ways. Clarisse arrived home and,
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: still in a state of terror, picked up her telephone
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: and called White, demanding to know what he had done
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: to her. Yeah, George, George, I'm so scared. What's happening, Clarice?
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: You know what time it is? George? Should I see
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: a doctor? You should stop calling? Go to sleep, George, George.
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: Clarisse called again and again she begged him to tell
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: her what he had given her so she could get
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: something to counteract it. Each time White hung up, he
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: had gotten whatever information he wanted out of his experiment.
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: He had no interest in consoling her. In his diary,
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: he wrote just a four chilling words. Clarice got the
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: horrors Barbara had made at home with Valerie safely. She
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: didn't call White. She didn't even tell Elliot what had happened.
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: He had no idea that night would change the course
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: of both of their lives. Barbara grew distant. She was
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: prone to increasing bouts of depression. If it had started
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: as something expected, the kind of bleak moods knew mothers
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: sometimes experience, it had blossomed into something far more serious. Elliott,
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: I need to tell you something, and I need you
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: to promise to believe me. I think the mafia is
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: after me. The encroaching paranoia put a strain on their marriage.
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: Barbara withdrew more and more, fearing her phones were tapped
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: by She agreed it was best to be admitted to
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: Stony Lodge Hospital, where she was diagnosed as a chronic
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: paranoid with depression. She expressed fears Elliott was trying to
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: kill her. Her marriage didn't survive this day. She and
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: Elliott soon divorced, with Valerie being placed with Elliott's parents.
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: A woman with a new child with a happy home
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: life was by nineteen sixty two receiving a lecture shock therapy.
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: Over time, LSD researchers reputable ones would reinforce the idea
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: that people receiving doses unknowingly were at the greatest risk
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: for adverse reactions. They couldn't ease their minds by reassuring
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: themselves it was a drug induced episode and only temporary
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: traumatic flashbacks could persist for years, well beyond the initial
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: window of hallucinations. It would be a long long time
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: before Elliott found out what happened at George White's apartment
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: that night in nine By that time, Barbara would be dead,
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: having spent the remaining two decades of her life and
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: institutions we know George White had little compassion for his subjects,
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: like so many others. He left Barbara then for herself.
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: But what about Albertine? She had driven Linda King to
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: the hospital. Did she share white sampathy? Did you really
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: not care that her friends were being irreparably damaged by
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: his actions? In two thousand two, journalist Douglas Valentine interviewed Albertine.
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: It was Valentine who first revealed the connection between gil
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: Fox and George White in his two thousand two series
• 28:55
  Speaker 1: for CounterPunch dot Org. Albertine was Valentine wrote, a sweet woman,
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: measured in her responses, professing to have little knowledge of
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: White CIA activities. But when Valentine mentioned Barbara Smythe, she turned.
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: She began swearing and yelling. Valentine wrote that Albertine quote
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: descended into a string of expletives that would have embarrassed
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: a sailor. Her tirade left his writer with the firm
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: impression that she was thoroughly capable of having been White's
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: accomplice in his dirty work. Albertin refused to discuss it further.
• 29:35
  Speaker 1: Like George White had done with Clarice Stein, she simply
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: hung up. She didn't want to hear anymore. In all
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: of these cases, each person who trusted George White had
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: a vastly different reaction to his dosing them. Barbara Smythe withdrew,
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: succumbing to the paranoia. Clarice Stein phoned White and essently
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: until she realized his approach was careless and calculating. She
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: eventually drifted back into the White social circle. She was,
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: after all, coworkers with Albertine. Perhaps it was easier to
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: let the whole experience go than to create problems at
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: her job. The Jurgensen's avoided him entirely, the appeal of
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: his dangerous side having grown too frightening. The Foxes accepted
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: it as a condition of their friendship with White. For
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: a man who enforced morality, it's puzzling to consider White's
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: own version of it and how callous he could be
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: even to friends, though we do know something about his
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: ethics thanks to this passage from his unpublished autobiography Morality.
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: As far as I'm concerned, that's just a word that
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: describes a current fashion of conduct. The Navajo Indians regarded
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: it as a moral for old people to be permitted
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: to live longer than they were able to take care
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: of themselves. We are moral, so we let our old
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: stars rust brought away in dreary poorhouses or pensioners hubble
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: type hotels. Our immorality sees nothing really wrong with evictions,
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: civil murder, capital punishment, anti birth control, laws that spawned poverty,
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: loan sharks and hidden charge operators, police brutality, millionaire politicians,
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: and the nuclear pomb. So why should I get bugged
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: about the possibility that I might be immoral in someone's
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: daffy book merely because once upon a time I permitted
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: a generation of Adams to terry in my Eden? Where
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: was Sidney Gottlieb? And all of this for an operation
• 31:52
  Speaker 1: that CIA director Alan Dulles considered to be paramount and
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: securing the future of the United States. Was anyone aware
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: of white statistic street, that he was extending his psychedelic
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: outreach to include young mothers, that he was consumed by
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: sex and alcohol. Sydney Gottlieb knew all about it, as
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: White continued to give him reports. The two grew closer
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: when White took up leather working as a hobby. He
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: made Gotleib a belt for his birthday, and he had
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: another gift for Gotlieb the next time. He was in
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: New York. On at least one occasion, with White passed
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: out drunk, got leave and Albertine went into the next room,
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: shut the door and enjoyed the freedom Greenwich Village could bring.
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: In Eden, there was Linda King, the actress who visited
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: White and wound up on the rooftop of an apartment
• 32:50
  Speaker 1: complex contemplating a step forward. Albertein drove her to the hospital,
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: where she insisted to everyone that George White had done
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: this to her. She wasn't scared of White. She wanted
• 33:01
  Speaker 1: people to know what happened. A police officer from the
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: New York Police Department took her statement, so did a
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: representative from the department's mental health unit. You can imagine.
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: They raced over to George White's apartment, knocked on his door,
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: demanded answers. Toxicology reports would demonstrate Linda King had been
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: administered LSD if they dug deeper, Barbara Smythe, Clarice Stein Kai,
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: and Joe Jorgensen, and countless others could corroborate King's story
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: that George White was on a psychedelic rampage. That's what
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: could have and should have happened. But Lynda King didn't
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: take into account one thing that the authorities had already
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: been contacted by the CIA, and the message was simple,
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: if anyone should come in with a complaint about George White,
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: it should be torn up and forgotten. He was on
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: a state sanctioned mission. Whatever happened to Linda King wasn't
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: the business of the New York Police Department. Decades later,
• 34:10
  Speaker 1: a CIA official would try to find Linda King's records
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: at Lenox Hill Hospital, they didn't exist. George White was
• 34:19
  Speaker 1: something worse than dangerous. He was untouchable. The only thing
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: that could come between White and the CIA's mission to
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: master mind Control was from the game finally went too far.
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: It would take a fall from a tenth story window
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: for George White's fantasy life to finally shatter and for
• 34:41
  Speaker 1: the Snake to no longer be in charge about it. Yeah.
• 35:11
  Speaker 1: Operation Midnight Climax is hosted by Noel Brown. This show
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: is written by Jake Rosin, editing, sound design and mixing
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: by Ernie Indradad and Natasha Jacobs. Original music by Aaron Kaufman.
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: Research and fact checking by Austin Thompson and Marissa Brown.
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: Show logo by Lucy Quintanilla. Special thanks to Spencer Gibson,
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: David Crumholtz, Vanessa Crumholtz, Ted Raymie, and Jason Thompson. Julian
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: Weller is our supervising producer. Our executive producers are Jason
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: English and Mangesh a Ticketter. See you next week.