In this episode, we uncover the strange and fascinating life of Wilhelm Reich, a once-promising Vienna-trained psychoanalyst whose career took a sharp turn into uncharted territory. From a scandalous youth and mentorship under Freud to his unorthodox theories on "orgastic potency," Reich's ideas often teetered between groundbreaking and eyebrow-raising. We follow him across the Atlantic, where he invented the Orgone Accumulator (a.k.a. the cosmic orgasm box), clashed with the FDA, tried to win over Einstein, and even claimed to battle UFOs in the Arizona desert. Visionary, eccentric, or both? Either way, his story is a wild ride through sex, pseudoscience, and space energy.

For more, check us out on social media at viennapastandpresent or at viennapastandpresent.com. Reach out to us at [email protected]. We love hearing feedback and ideas. Danke!

LINKS https://www.nytimes.com/1971/01/04/archives/back-into-the-old-orgone-box.html

https://projectmailer.net/pm/The_Mailer_Review/Volume_10,_2016/Mailer%E2%80%99s_Use_of_Wilhelm_Reich

https://www.meduniwien.ac.at/web/en/about-us/history/

https://www.wilhelmreich.at/wp-content/uploads/Hebenstreit_Diplomarbeitsauszug-2.pdf

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orgone

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilhelm_Reich

https://www.scribd.com/document/409496302/brady-the-strange-case-of-wilhelm-reich-pdf

https://oe1.orf.at/artikel/328444/Film-Der-Fall-Wilhelm-Reich

https://www.lennygibson.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Reich-review.pdf

Movie about Reich (Apple+): https://tv.apple.com/at/movie/the-strange-case-of-wilhelm-reich/umc.cmc.4d5kpivmlampf1bsyguxnu6my?l=en

NYTimes article : https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/12/07/87342935.html?pageNumber=20