32 : Prison and Death: 1957Reich stayed at Danbury Federal Prison for ten days. On March 22, he was moved
to the federal penitentiary in Lewisburg, Pennsylvania, while Silvert remained at Danbury.
At Danbury, Reich had had his first psychiatric examination, carried out by Richard
C. Hubbard, M.D., a psychiatrist who was a consultant to the prison staff^1. According to
Greenfield, “the examination consisted of an interview lasting about an hour.” A young psy-
chiatrist at the time, Hubbard was an admirer of Reich’s. It must have been a strange expe-
rience for him to “evaluate” so renowned a psychiatric teacher.
They spoke about orgonomy and about the conspiracy against it. At one point in
the conversation, Reich heard the sound of an airplane. He rose and went to the window.
Then,turning to Hubbard, he “informed him that the plane was flying overhead because of
his presence in the prison, as a sign that he was being protected. Hubbard did not know what
to make of this. He had had prisoners deliberately say outlandish things to be thought unbal-
anced so as to invalidate a sentence, but he did not believe Reich would try such a trick.” At
the same time Hubbard felt that Reich must surely have realized that any psychiatrist, any-
body in fact, would interpret what he had just said as a delusion. Hubbard finally conclud-
ed that Reich really believed what he had said about the Air Force plane.
Toward the end of Hubbard’ s interview, Reich asked him what the diagnosis was
going to be. Hubbard apologetically explained that, “given Hubbard’s background, he could
only conclude that there was a definite disturbance.” Reich’s response was a thoughtful nod,
as if in agreement with Hubbard that within traditional realms (psychoanalysis, classical
physics),many of his concepts and findings would have to be considered insane. Reich still
could not grasp that some of his ideas could not be construed as rational at all Hubbard’s
briefreport on Reich went as follows:
Diagnosis:
Paranoia manifested by delusions of grandiosity and persecution and ideas
of reference.
The patient feels that he has made outstanding discoveries. Gradually over
a period of many years he has explained the failure of his ideas in becoming uni-
versally accepted by the elaboration of psychotic thinking. “The Rockerfellows (sic)
are against me.” (Delusion of grandiosity.) “The airplanes flying over prison are
sent by Air Force to encourage me.” (Ideas of reference and grandiosity.)
The patient is relatively intact in the greater part of his personality though434 Myron SharafFury On Earth