How did Ken Kesey and his psychedelic community the Merry Pranksters re-imagine reality through their use of the phrase “the current fantasy”? How does one determine one’s fantasy? Surely it’s by performing these fantasies collectively — in groups, with others. In today’s performance, let us imagine ourselves as psychedelic detectives, researching Michael Bowen and Gary Goldhill, figures Tom Wolfe references as members of the League for Spiritual Discovery in his book The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test. Goldhill was an English head who worked for the BBC, Wolfe says, until he took some magic mushrooms in San Miguel de Allende, and in so doing discovered “the Management and gave up all, all the TV BBC game and dedicated himself to The Life” (Wolfe 361). Time to dive back into this thing, no? Symbols trigger recollection of forgotten knowledge. They cure us of our amnesia. We realize reality is a hologram — Philip K. Dick’s “Black Iron Prison.” A military coup d’état occurred on 11/22/63. Our duty now is to unravel belief in the frame.
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Trance-Scripts 
I knew, and, for several months, lived with, Gary Goldhill in his household on Masonic Street. I was his dumb blonde girlfriend.
I have the impression Goldhill might have had some kind of military intelligence background though given my limited knowledge of the situation (and blond hair) I could easily be totally wrong. I know I am still scared of him even today in my otherwise confident and peaceful old age. He was, to me at least, a scary guy. Is he still alive? I am glad to say I am!
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Wow — thanks, Laurie! What a wild scene that must have been. Interesting to hear that Goldhill might have had ties to an intelligence agency. Scary, indeed! I wonder what happened to him. Pull on the narrative threads in the history of the 60s psychedelic counterculture and things turn weird pretty quickly!
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another gumshoe here on the Goldhill trail…. we know he left a life in London and the BBC to go west with an opened mind.. sleuths here believe that mind was opened here in London by probably none other than William Burroughs. Goldhill had a radio programme in production in early 1963. It was an arrangement of recordings made by Burroughs in response to Goldhill’s questions. This work had to be taken over by someone else. There is no record as to why. Around 1963 Burroughs was still tinkering with psychedelics. Even though everyone was it would be hard not to put 2 and 2 together. But what kind of answer do we get? And was his middle name Berger? Laurie …. anyone who works for the BBC ends up thinking they worked for a military intelligence. And anyone who has worked with William Burroughs knows we all under Control.
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Fascinating! Thanks for this lead regarding Goldhill’s connection to Burroughs, Jim.
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I’ve come across a listing in the LA FreePress August 11 1967 that asks:
URGENT: – anyone having the address of Gary Goldhill, abstract artist, whose kother is dangerously ill, kindly write immediately to M Salmon, 24 Beulah Pl., Bergenfield, New Jersey 07621
Interestng that people were looking for him way back then even….
i have as it a jpeg clipping from an archive if you want me to send it you..
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Thanks, Jim! If you could send me the jpeg, that would be great. Given his evasive nature, I suspect Goldhill must have been rather miffed by Wolfe’s mention of him two years later in The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test.
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what address can i use to for a jpeg?
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trance-scripts@protonmail.com
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No probs.. do keep me posted. And do feel free to give my email address to laurie jane Boxer.
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