Reich later developed a similar kind of relationship, combining the roles of employ-
er, friend, and colleague, with another Rangeley man, Tom Ross. Forty at the time, Ross
became caretaker of the Orgonon property in 1948. But the word “caretaker” does scant
justice to Ross’s role there. Not only did he keep up the property; he also helped Reich in a
variety of ways from constructing different kinds of equipment to participating in experi-
ments, and he became a trusted friend. Unlike so many of Reich’s students, who brought to
their relationship with him all kinds of therapeutic expectations, a thirst for knowledge or
love from the marvelous leader, Tom made no such demands. He was doing a job, he liked
Reich, he was prepared to learn from him; but if things did not work out, he could go else-
where without too much sadness, guilt, or anger. Tom was able to perceive many orgonom-
ic phenomena, such as the tingling heat of the accumulator when he put his hand close to
it. However, when he did not feel or understand something, “I told the doctor that—I did-
n’t have much education, I only finished the eighth grade.”
Just as in the late 1920s and early 1930s Reich had found that his industrial worker
friends were more in touch with basic social truths than his sophisticated psychoanalytic col-
leagues, so in the 19405 he felt that many of his Maine country friends were in touch with
natural-scientific truths that eluded the Einsteins and Oppenheimers. Reich spoke often of
the need for a response from the environment.He had his own talent for finding it.
Such was Rangeley’s charm: the climate, dry and clear; the geography of mountains
and lakes; friends like Templeton and Ross who could to some extent follow Reich’s work;
the relatively simple human work relationships that existed in a small rural town and that
closely fitted Reich’s model of a work democracy; the opportunity for sustained research,
uninterrupted by patients and other involvements of his New York existence—all these
made the Maine summers vastly appealing to Reich. He did everything he could to extend
the length of the Rangeley phase of his yearly schedule, starting with a month in 1940 and
building up to about four months by 1949. In May 1950, he began to live at Orgonon on a
year-round basis.
Reich had elaborate plans as to how Orgonon would become a center for
orgonomic research and education. Few of his hopes came to pass. Over the years, several
courses and conferences were held at Orgonon for physicians and other students. A hand-
ful of serious researchers spent considerable time there. But as with so many of Reich’s
plans for group development of his work, his dreams for Orgonon were barely fulfilled.
The end ofWorld War II marked the end of Reich’s relative isolation from the psy-
chiatric world. Prior to 1946, he had only two therapists working with him, Wolfe and
William Thorburn.The latter was an osteopath. Reich had a good opinion of this quiet, gen-
tle man’s therapeutic skill, but Thorburn was never close or particularly active in the organi-
zational development of orgonomy. Some of the physicians associated with Reich after the
war were to be important.
The first was James A.Willie. Willie owned a private psychiatric hospital in
Oklahoma at the time he read The Function of the Orgasm.^13 He was suffering a depression in
24 : Personal Life and Relations with Colleagues: 1941-1950 319