My Library

But the building had been a gift of Chester B. Carlson, the inventor of Xerox and that organization's CEO, who had also endowed the Society with a principal fund of $2 million. The Carlson gifts had been bestowed largely by the efforts of Dr. Karlis Osis, the Director of Research -- who, nevertheless, was never to be a Board member, but only a paid employee. I had earlier met Dr. Osis back in 1962 when the Society was yet in an apartment on upper Fifth Avenue, before the Carlson gifts. At that time, Osis was interested in artists and if they also possessed some kind of psychic aptitudes. Somehow he had found out about me as an artist and had invited me in with a group of about fifteen other artists. Artists, however, tend to articulate themselves through their works -- not through their words. And so the whole thing was something of a scramble to comprehend what anyone was saying. Including the words of Osis -- who, born in Latvia in 1917, spoke a form of English which needed a translator standing by. None of the artists could understand most of what he said, including me. And few of the artists could understand each other -- and probably didn't want to, if you intimately know what artists are regarding each other. I didn't go back to the next meeting, and heard that few did. Now, nine years later in October of 1971, I stepped into the ASPR not merely and anonymously to use its library, but as an INVITED test subject, and, moreover, one with something of a track record.