ural-scientific work we lack the broad-based research that could validate or disprove his
hypotheses and shed light on the theoretical constructs underlying those hypotheses.
During March 1952, while Reich was concerned with “DOR-clouds,” he noticed
changes taking place in the rocks at the fireplace of the Observatory. They appeared to be
blackening and undergoing a process of progressive crumbling and disintegration. “In many
rocks the surfaces have lost their smoothness; the rock surface looks ‘spongy’ as if the rock
has been drilled and innumerable holes of about^1 /16th or^1 /8th of an inch in diameter and
depth had been hewn into the surface.”^17
One particular rock developed small holes with a powder-like substance that could
be removed by wiping off the surface with a finger. Observing this rock carefully, Reich saw
the steady increase in the number of holes on its surface. He also noted that the white pow-
dery substance became streaked with blackish particles *.
Of this blackening, Reich wrote that he severely doubted himself when he first saw
the phenomenon. He went so far as to deny the observation. This was the kind of skepti-
cism Reich could permit himself but not his assistants^18.
The DOR process and the cloud-busting together led Reich to believe that he had
found important leads to the comprehension of desert development and desert fructifica-
tion. (Four years after the start of Oranur and two and a half years after observing the black-
ening rocks, Reich would test these hypotheses when he made an expedition to Arizona in
the late fall of 1954.)
Almost concurrently with the discovery of orgone energy in 1940, Reich had begun
to formulate armor blocks as consisting of immobilized orgone energy. Again around
March 1952, he started thinking of the frozen energy in the armor as DOR, which was a
new insight stimulated by his observation of atmospheric DOR. When the armor prevent-
ed the unimpeded flow of energy, a person’s healthy energy was blocked. Orgone energy,
trapped within the armor or muscular spasms, became transformed into DOR, quite apart
from any atmospheric influence. Here again Reich was establishing one of his sweeping con-
nections an identity between the black DOR-clouds and the “black” DOR in the human
organism^19.
Black was more than a metaphor for Reich, even though the color neatly fitted the
metaphysical concept ofevil or the Devil.His hypothesis of DORclouds and their removal
was tested through the use of the cloud-buster. So also was his notion or armor containing
DOR. About a year after the development of the cloud-buster, Reich had the idea of using
354 Myron SharafFury On Earth
*“The same kind of phenomena Reich noted in his fireplace was to become of intense concern in the art world
a few years later. Although the effects of pollution on stone art works had been noticed from the beginning of the
industrial age, this problem did not become a menace until the late 1950s, Then it was noted in Italy, for example,
that the fourteenth-century frescos of Giotto were being lost to posterity as the walls on which the murals were
painted crumbled away. A specialist on the restoration of American stone buildings declared in 1965 that century-
old structures had suffered more decay in the last twenty or so years than in the previous eighty.” Howard Lewis,
With Every Breath You Take(New York: Crown, 1965), 119.