The Three Christs of Ypsilanti Read Free

felt, and whose yearning for self-improvement in the experiments is palpable, even when mixed up with a lot of mumbo jumbo about espionage and life in merry old England. Here’s the envoi he wrote to Rokeach after the men’s meetings had come to an end:
    We, the workers for the world, will keep on going, and, one beautiful day, there will not be an
enemy
left.
    This beautiful day will never come soon enough.
    I’ll see you in the next report.
    So long, I feel much better, thank you.
    â€”R ICK M OODY
    [ 1 ]Pseudonyms all.
    [ 2 ]See, for example, page 62.
    [ 3 ]There are more devastating missed connections with this fictitious wife, but I’ll leave them to the reader to discover.

Preface
    T HE ACCOUNT presented herein concerns three men, all of whom claimed the same identity, and tells what happened in the two years they lived together. The report describes a scientific research project, but it is also a story worth telling in its own right. In many of its readers it may well provoke anxiety and tension; to most of us it seems a terrible thing for a person not to know who he really is. This is the only study on which I have ever worked that has aroused the interest of children. I shall never forget my neighbor’s children running after me to inquire whether the three men who had lost their identities and believed themselves to be Christ had made any progress in finding out who they really were.
    I have tried to tell this story in sufficient detail so that other behavioral scientists will find it useful for purposes other than those discussed in Chapters I, XI, and XIX. At the same time, it must be pointed out that the present account is necessarily a highly selective condensation of a far greater body of material consisting of hundreds of tape recordings, personal notes, case records, reports by research assistants, nurses, and aides, and reports and letters written by the subjects themselves.
    This project could never have been carried to a completion without the support, active co-operation, and encouragement of many individuals and institutions. I am happy to acknowledge my deep gratitude to the Social Science Research Council for its supportthrough a Faculty Research Fellowship in 1960. This was supplemented by Michigan State University through a special grant from its Development Fund and also through additional annual grants from its All-University Research Fund.
    I am happy also to acknowledge the unstinting co-operation and encouragement of Vernon A. Stehman, M.D., Deputy Director of the Department of Mental Health in the state of Michigan, and of the psychiatric staff at Ypsilanti State Hospital. I am especially grateful to three psychiatrists under whose direction this work was carried out: O. R. Yoder, M.D., Medical Superintendent; Kenneth B. Moore, M.D., Clinical Director; and his successor, Alexander P. Dukay, M.D. Thanks are also due to Drs. John Olariu and Walter A. Brovins, resident psychiatrists, and to many nurses and aides, especially Caroline Gervais and Henry Westbrook.
    This work engaged the services of a number of research assistants for various periods of time. I would like to acknowledge my indebtedness to them. Dr. Richard Bonier, Dr. Ronald A. Hoppe, Doris Raisenen, and Cheryl Normington worked on the study during the summer of 1959. Dr. Mark Spivak worked with me from September 1959 to October 1960. His extensive experience in the application of social-psychological theory and research in the mental-hospital setting was invaluable to me. Mary Lou Anderson worked with me from October 1960 until the termination of the project. The crucial role she played is recorded more fully in several chapters of this book.
    I wish to acknowledge further my deep indebtedness to Dinny Kell, who listened to all the tape recordings and prepared sensitive summaries of each. I have benefited greatly from many discussions I have had with her about the material, although we sometimes disagreed about