How the West was Found
Afterword to the Principia Discordia
(First Edition)
Wow.
I stumbled upon knowledge of the Dead SeePresident Scrolls purely
by chance - a reference number on a scan of a copy of something I
did not believe I was looking at: so much so that I passed over
the title page of the first edition of the Principia Discordia
(How The West Was Lost) many times before it dawned on me what it
was before my eyes.
On that sheet was an Accession Number. And that number pointed to
a secret which has lain hidden for over 30 years, trapped unseen
in a musty, dusty vault in Maryland.
As luck would have it, the Rev. Karl Musser happened to be in the
neighbourhood of that very vault, and willing to do me a favour,
All Blessings Unto Him.
But how did these papers end up in the Assassination Archive in
the first place?
In the late sixties, founding Discordian Kerry Thornley, who had
been in the Marines with Oswald, found himself under the
microscope of those investigating the Assassination of John F.
Kennedy. Such Official Investigations generate a Paper Trail -
evidence proffered is indexed and stored... preserved against the
erosion of time. (Well, mostly...)
I do not know who sent the documents to them. It may have been
Kerry, a friend of his, or even a "Concerned Citizen" (stool
pigeon), or "Undercover Internal Security" Agent (secret police).
But they were sent, they were filed.
They were forgotten.
These documents open a window on the formative era of
Discordianism. Just as notable for what is here (eg, the long-lost
Myth of Starbuck - so that's why we couldn't find it!!!) as for
what is not (eg Kopyleft), they reveal a conceptual process still
trying to orient itself in the world, still struggling to decide
what it even is.
However, speaking of Kopyleft... It grieves me to say it, but I am
certain that these documents are not. They predate the concept,
and are almost certainly controlled by either/both of Greg Hill
and Kerry Thornley's estates. I have put them online (because how
could I not???) but I note that they are here under a Creative
Commons licence instead of Kopyleft - which means you may not use
these works for commercial purposes. At least, unless we hear
different from the aforementioned.
Apologies. Normally, I would not have wasted my time preparing a
site like this to present non-Kopyleft material, but, even more
than the Semi-Official Quasi-Clandestine Bavarian Illuminati/
Discordian Archives, this was far too seminal to pass on.
There are places in the text where the words have not stood the
test of time. Mostly, it has been possible to reconstruct the
original. In a few places, though, there is a certain amount of
uncertainty. My apologies for errors in the transcription.
My personal reference library is currently 2,000 kms away, with
all of my Discordian notes (bar my personal copies of the
Principia and Apocrypha Discordii, of course) - yet again Eris
exerts her chaos on my world, but I have squeezed a little time
out, and have set this site up, to share this material with those
whom it will enlighten.
Sady, there are also two pages definitely missing. Perhaps they
will resurface, perhaps not... but regardless, we should cherish
what we do have, while we're waiting. (And as you mention it, no,
I've no idea why there's a potted bio of Thomas Malthus in the
appendices. Must there be a reason for such a thing, in such a
work as this?)
I would like to spend some time annotating this material, but my
reference works... I need them, and memory fails me. I will come
to this again in future, but for now, they are simply here.
Enjoy. We will speak again soon of other matters - I'm not finished
yet.