Six weeks after the 1929 stock market crash, Frank Bruce Robinson created a self-help religion he called Psychiana. An ingenious mass-marketing pioneer, he sold a correspondence course promising health, wealth, and happiness to those who believed in the “God Power.” In the midst of the Great Depression, his mail-order religion with a money-back guarantee swept the United States and spread to some sixty-seven countries–or so its founder claimed–to become one of the most successful twentieth century New Thought religions.
Facing charges of passport fraud in May 1936, an immaculately dressed Robinson arrived at the federal building in rural Moscow, Idaho. A person of considerable local and regional significance, he was Latah County’s largest private employer. Throngs lined the streets and sidewalks waiting for him. He exited his sleek green Duesenberg, waved to the crowd, and smiled for pictures. His son later wrote that the charismatic leader possessed “an insatiable appetite for publicity.” Central to the investigation was Robinson’s true identity. He was not all he claimed to be, and his small-town trial captivated the country and made national headlines.
A full-length biography of Robinson combined with an in-depth historical examination of Psychiana, this book traces the improbable rise and fall of a master charlatan while also giving voice to his unwavering followers–from a dust bowl farmer to a former heavyweight boxing champion–who clung to their beliefs despite ongoing financial and emotional costs. Their stories reveal how adversity can galvanize faith in a false prophet, and paint an intriguing, intimate portrait of a nation challenged by a brutal depression and war.
Table of Content
I. OUTLIER: 1886-1928
1. No Man Knew His History
2. Vagabond
II. “DEAR FRIEND & STUDENT”: 1928-1934
3. From the Ashes
4. Ad Man
5. “Keyed Up to a High Pitch”
6. Occult Appeal
7. “The Shackles Are Off ”
8. Toil
9. “Does the LAW Work?”
10. “At the Hour You Took Command”
11. Faith Factory
12. “The Magic Wand”
13. Under the Banner of Advertising
14. No Narrow Creed
15. Passport to Trouble
16. “There Will Be No Peace in Our Household”
III. MESSIAH ON TRIAL: 1934-193
17. American Spectacle
18. “That We Should Enter Again into Our Partnership”
19. “The Suffering of Humanity”
20. Prosecution
21. On Trial
22. “Psychiana is With Me”
23. The Marksmen
24. “A Pack of Bloody Hounds”
25. “Out in these By-Ways and Hedges”
26. “Redeemed from the Jaws of Doubts and Agnosticism”
27. “Criminal Action”
28. “The Child is the Father of Man”
29. The Lion of Idaho
30. Letter from Bledington
31. Loyalty
32. Havana
33. “It is Terrible Discouraging Here”
34. Return
35. “Through the Bright Spot, Out Into Somewhere”
36. “My Road is Pretty Rocky”
37. Be Quiet
38. Fallout
IV. THROUGH WAR TO GOD: 1937-1945
39. Radio Psychiana
40. “You Are God’s Moses to Me”
41. “On the Ether Waves & the Cosmic Rays”
42. “I Used to Go to the Hills and Pray to that God in the Sky”
43. Convention
44. “The Meanest Swindler in the World”
45. Looking the Part
46. Winter War
47. “It Seems Terrible Hard at the Present Time”
48. “The Cobbler Mustn’t Go Beyond His Last”
49. “This Imperishable Yardstick”
50. Psychiana Blitzkrieg
51. “The Day I Answered Your Advertisement”
52. Drive
53. The Poet
54. “What Do You Want?”
55. Vision Quest
56. “Frankly Speaking”
57. The Pilot
58. Prophet and Mystic
59. A Mad World
V. REQUIEM FOR A PROPHET: 1945-1952
60. Psychiana in the Nuclear Age
61. The Gathering Storm
About the author
Brandon R. Schrand is the award-winning author of The Enders Hotel: A Memoir, and Works Cited: An Alphabetical Odyssey of Mayhem and Misbehavior. His nonfiction has appeared in Sports Illustrated, The Utne Reader, North American Review, and numerous other publications. He holds an MFA in creative writing, nonfiction, and an MS in American studies.
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