February 2009 Update
From
The Wilhelm Reich Infant Trust
& The Wilhelm Reich Museum
We thank you for your continual interest and support. For newcomers to our e-mail Update list, none of the names on this list--nor the names of any Museum visitors, conference attendees or bookstore customers--are shared with any other individuals or organizations. If at any time you wish to be removed from this list, please let us know.
All previous Updates, dating from March 2004, available online.
You can access them through the Updates option at the top of this page or via the Quick Links along the left side of the page. These Updates provide the best contemporaneous accounts of the Trust's ongoing activities over the past six years.
2009 Summer Conference
The Financial Crisis and the Trust
Reich's Journals and Bulletins
Become a Friend of the Trust
2009 SUMMER CONFERENCE AT ORGONON: JULY 13 - 17
FROM THE ARCHIVES OF THE ORGONE INSTITUTE:
Archival Materials – Current Projects & Research – Publishing
We are now putting together our 2009 Summer Conference which will comprise formal
presentations by scholars and researchers who are currently working with archival materials for their projects, plus audio and visual presentations of resources from the Archives: audio recordings, documents, and films.
On October 29th, 2007 we posted the Index of the Archives of the Orgone Institute on our website, plus a History of the Archives and the Access Policies & Procedures. With the posting of this information, The Wilhelm Reich Infant Trust began accepting applications from scholars and researchers wishing to study archival materials at the Countway Library of Medicine at Harvard University.
Since then, numerous applications have been processed and people have visited the Countway Library to study archival materials of interest. And in July 2008--instead of our regular annual summer conference--we held a first-time Archive Workshop devoted to what we consider the most sensitive and proprietary unpublished resources in the Archives: Reich's orgone motor research, the Y factor, and orgonometric equations.
To this Archive Workshop we invited scholars and researchers who had specifically requested these materials or had informed us that they planned to do so in the near future. We also invited several individuals who were working with the Trust on specific projects involving unpublished archival documents.
This summer many of these same archival resources will be presented publicly for the first time, in addition to other materials that researchers are discovering in their work
at the Countway Library. Audio and visual presentations will include:
- Listening to audiotapes of:
- Reich's laboratory work
- Reich speaking
- Screenings of a cross-section of unpublished archival papers, including:
- Laboratory notebooks
- Diaries & journals
- Miscellaneous documents
- Watching films, including:
- Bion and cancer films
- Historic films of Orgonon
Among the conference speakers will be:
- Philip Bennett, Ph.D.
A long-time student of Reich's work, who currently teaches in the
Graduate School of Education at Fairfield University in Connecticut.
- Mary Higgins and Kevin Hinchey
The Wilhelm Reich Infant Trust & Museum
- Tina Lindemann, M.D.
Physician & medical orgone therapist – Vienna, Austria
- James Strick, Ph.D.
Academic historian of science who specializes in the history of ideas and
experiments on the origin of life; author of Sparks of Life (Harvard, 2000)
and The Living Universe (Rutgers, 2004).
We'll have more detailed information in our March 2009 Update. We hope that you'll join us this summer for an exciting program guaranteed to deepen your knowledge and your appreciation of these much anticipated materials and their significance for the future
of Reich's legacy.
PREVIOUS INFORMATION ABOUT THE ARCHIVES
For other information about The Archives of the Orgone Institute, please see:
THE IMPACT OF THE FINANCIAL CRISIS ON THE WILHELM REICH INFANT TRUST
Like many non-profits--and like many of you--the Trust's financial status has been dramatically affected by the frightening downturn in the economy, despite what were conservative, credible and responsible investments by those managing our Endowment Fund.
Back in April 2004, in the second of our newly created e-mail Updates to our friends and supporters, we wrote:
Our funding needs cover a broad range from individual project support to general support to capital support. With the Museum's annual operating budget now exceeding $130,000 (to maintain seven buildings on our 175 acre property, plus salaries and office expenses), capital support is more crucial than ever. Like most non-profits, we need to secure a solid financial base as we plan for the future. Which means we cannot survive without a healthy Endowment Fund.
In 1991 The Wilhelm Reich Infant Trust began its Endowment Fund which is managed by a senior officer at UBS Financial Services. The Fund now consists of $218,000. This sum represents individual contributions, proceeds from our annual programs at the Williams Club in New York City, and bequests from two individuals who were profoundly committed to Reich's work and the mission of the Trust. Considering the Fund's thirteen-year existence, it's a small sum, insufficient to the task. But in view of the donations that our friends and supporters continually make for many of our immediate needs and projects, it is understandable why the Fund isn't larger.
Nevertheless our goal is to build the Fund to $1,000,000 by the year 2008. Please help us provide a solid financial base for the Trust through contributions of assets during your lifetime or bequests in your will. Helping us reach our goal is a unique and practical way to express your commitment to Reich's legacy.
By January 2008, less than four years later, we were nearing our goal of $1,000,000.
From 2004 to the end of 2007, the Trust was quietly but consistently reaching out to friends and supporters for small, medium, and larger, substantial contributions. By January 2008,
we had grown the Fund to well over $800,000, the result of significant cash donations supplemented by steady, conservative interest on the Fund's principal through responsible, low-risk investments by UBS Financial Services. At that point our plan was:
- to develop a major fund-raising effort to reach $1,000,000 as soon as possible
- to draw interest annually from this $1,000,000 to pay some operating expenses (which now exceed $170,000 a year), while leaving the principal untouched
- to develop fundraising strategies to pay the remaining annual operating expenses
That was the plan, anyway, which we originally intended to include in our presentation
"The Next 25 Years of The Wilhelm Reich Infant Trust and The Wilhelm Reich Museum" at our annual benefit for the Endowment Fund held last November in New York City.
Everything changed when the 2008 markets began their steady decline, culminating with the alarming financial crisis in September and October. While our financial manager at UBS never invested the Trust's assets in the high-risk subprime market, UBS itself was deeply involved in these and other high-risk transactions. When the subprime market unraveled, the ripple effect throughout UBS was devastating.
The result: The Wilhelm Reich Infant Trust Endowment Fund lost 20–25% of its value.
As if this were not bad enough, dwindling revenues in some areas (publishing royalties, book sales, Museum attendance, etc.) and rising expenses in other areas (winter heating bills, archival work, maintenance) have forced us to start tapping into the remaining Endowment Fund principal, something we were desperately trying to avoid.
We realize, of course, that we are not the only ones suffering financially…that many
of you have been equally impacted by the current crisis. We only ask that whenever
possible and whenever comfortable, you will continue to support our efforts.
REICH'S JOURNALS AND BULLETINS
In November 2008, we reached our goal of making all of Reich's published research
journals and bulletins available in bound-Xerox copies in The Wilhelm Reich Museum Bookstore. These include all issues of:
There are also original editions of the Orgone Energy Bulletin in the following libraries:
- Library of Congress (Washington D.C.)
- Kinsey Institute Library (Indiana)
- Northwestern University (Illinois)
- University of Maine at Orono (Maine)
- Hamilton College (New York)
- New School University (New York)
- New York Academy of Medicine (New York)
- SUNY Health Science Center at Brooklyn (New York)
- University of Rochester Medical Center (New York)
- National College of Natural Medicine (Oregon)
- College of Physicians of Philadelphia (Pennsylvania)
- University of Rhode Island (Rhode Island)
- University of Puget Sound (Washington)
- Kings College in London (United Kingdom)
NEW ON OUR WEBSITE: USE PAYPAL TO BECOME
A FRIEND OF THE WILHELM REICH INFANT TRUST
Now it's easier than ever to become a Friend of The Wilhelm Reich Infant Trust by making whatever donation you're comfortable with through PayPal.
In addition to our regular Membership Categories--
- Individual - $25
- Family - $35
- Business - $40
- Contributing - $50
- Sustaining - $125
- Donor - $250
- Patron - $500
- Life - $1000
--you can set up a recurring monthly donation of $5, $10, $25, $50, $100, or $250
by clicking the appropriate PayPal button. And if you don't already have a PayPal account, we can handle that for you. For further information, e-mail us at wreich@rangeley.org or call us at (207) 864-3443.
Please become a Friend of the Wilhelm Reich Infant Trust and help sustain the legacy
of Wilhelm Reich by making a tax- deductible donation to the Trust. Join Friends
from all over the world who contribute significantly and benefit from the privileges
of membership:
- Free admission to the Wilhelm Reich Museum during visiting hours.
- Patron and Life members receive guest passes for persons accompanying them.
- Ten percent discount on purchases from the museum bookstore.
- The annual newsletter with original material by Reich and reports on Trust activities.
- Advance notice of new publications by Reich.
UNTIL NEXT MONTH
Please share this Update with colleagues, friends, and family who may be interested in the life and legacy of Wilhelm Reich and the good works of The Wilhelm Reich Infant Trust and The Wilhelm Reich Museum. Thank you again for your friendship and support.
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