Jack Parsons: The Troubled Rocket Scientist

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Happy new year! We're starting 2025 with an EXPLOSIVE episode! Arpita tells the story of Jack Parsons, the founder of JPL, who had some dark and unexpected interests. 

For more information and sources for this episode, visit https://www.smartteapodcast.com.

Episode Transcript

Aarati (00:11):
Hi everyone, and welcome back to the Smart Tea Podcast,
where we talk about the lives ofscientists and innovators who
shape the world.
Happy New Year, Arpita!

Arpita (00:21):
Happy New Year.
I'm so happy to be back.

Aarati (00:23):
Yes, it's really exciting after a little bit of a
break, um, which was definitelyneeded, I think, on both of our
ends.
Yes.

Arpita (00:34):
Just like a little time to do other things, just like
reset, rest.

Aarati (00:40):
and spend some time with family without, you know,
getting too stressed overthings.
So,

Arpita (00:46):
totally.
I feel the same way.
But, um, happy to be back.
Uh, how was your break?
What'd you do?

Aarati (00:53):
um, we did a couple of things.
We, uh, went to Shelter Cove,

Arpita (00:59):
Oh, love Shelter Cove.

Aarati (01:00):
yeah.
Northern California.
Um, we went there with mycousins and my grandma, and we
just got like this really bigAirbnb, um, and stayed there for
a few days.
And that was really lovely.
It was raining.
Like half the time we werethere.
So a lot of the times we werejust kind of inside putting

(01:21):
together puzzles and watchingBrooklyn Nine Nine, which was.

Arpita (01:25):
I love Brooklyn Nine Nine.
It's so funny.

Aarati (01:28):
Yeah.
So we, we spent a lot of timedoing that.
And then when it wasn't raining,we tried to go out to like the
beaches just to walk around, butit was really cold.
So, you know, it wasn't like wecould do a lot of stuff, but I
got these really huge, gorgeousshells from the beach, which I'm
still trying to figure out whatto do with, but they're so shiny

(01:51):
and they're so colorful andbeautiful.
And I feel like they would justmake, I don't know, really great
decorations or something.

Arpita (02:00):
That's super cool.
You could try to make them intomaybe, like, sun catchers, if
you can, like, you could try to,like, make a hole in them, and

Aarati (02:07):
They already have holes actually

Arpita (02:08):
they do!

Aarati (02:09):
for some reason like all of them have four holes along
the side

Arpita (02:14):
Oh, interesting.

Aarati (02:15):
I feel like it must be some sort of like when the
creature was alive, some sort oflike ventilation or like.
Waste expulsion system orsomething like, because it's,
it's very clearly like...

Arpita (02:28):
yeah, yeah, yeah.

Aarati (02:29):
four very, deliberate holes.

Arpita (02:32):
yeah, that could be cool, and then if they're shiny,
they could catch the light, Idon't know.

Aarati (02:36):
Yeah, they're very like, boring looking on one side, like
they just kind of look like arock and then the other side
like, Yeah.
On the inside is just so likeiridescent and kind of all these
colors.
So

Arpita (02:49):
that'd be pretty in the light.

Aarati (02:51):
Yeah.
So I'm trying to figure out whatto do with them.
If anyone has some suggestions,let me know.
And then after that, I went downto LA or that area with, my
brother and Kyro and we helpedmy friend move out of her house,
and this was before the fires.
So this is like completelyunrelated.
But like I was just down thereand hearing about all the fires

(03:15):
and the news.
It just breaks my heart becauseI'm like seeing places that I
was like, I was just there and Ican't believe that's gone.
You know, I can't believe thatit's such a tragedy that this is
happening.
Luckily, my friend does live farenough away from all of that
that, um, she's not affected byit.

(03:35):
I'm just heartbroken for allthose people that live there.

Arpita (03:40):
Definitely.

Aarati (03:41):
Yeah.
How are you though?
How was your break?

Arpita (03:44):
It was good.
I spent part of it in Michiganwith Logan's family and then New
Year's.
We have a tradition with somefriends to get an Airbnb
somewhere and then do like a bigsleepover.

Aarati (03:59):
Oh, cool.

Arpita (04:00):
And so we did that in Pacifica, this year, so that was
really fun.
And a few years past, it's beensuper rainy, like you said, like
we had like those really bigrains.
Um, and so then it was more justlike games and puzzles.
And this year we actually got tolike go out and do stuff.
Like the weather was reallynice.
Um, so it was good to get like alittle mix of family time,

(04:22):
friend time.
Um, And then I was just here forpart of it with lots of kitty
cuddles and just like doing allthe house things that you put
off while like work and lifegets really busy.
Um, we watched a lot of movies.
The one movie that Logan and mysister really wanted to watch

(04:43):
was The Martian.
Have you seen it?

Aarati (04:46):
I have not.
No, is that who's the actorwho's in that?

Arpita (04:50):
um, Matt Damon?

Aarati (04:52):
Yes.
Yes.
That's right.
Yeah.
Yeah

Arpita (04:55):
Matt Damon is the main character.
Um, this movie came out a whileago and it's based on a book.
But, um,

Aarati (05:01):
I think I read the book a long time ago.
Yeah

Arpita (05:04):
it's really old.
And it's admittedly quite good.
Um, I'm not really a sci fiperson and this is like a
ongoing problem in my householdbecause the only movies that
Logan wants to watch are spacemovies.
And I'm just like, okay, like wegotta, we gotta mix it

Aarati (05:21):
We gotta

Arpita (05:22):
movie he picks is like, space, And I'm like, there are
in fact other genres out there.

Aarati (05:27):
It's not just sci fi.
It's it's space specifically

Arpita (05:30):
Space specifically.
Space specifically, yes.
I think sci fi in general islike probably a preferred
bucket, but then like the subinterest is space.

Aarati (05:40):
space.
specifically?

Arpita (05:42):
space specifically?
yes.
And so this is like an ongoingdebate in this household.
But The Martian is admittedlyquite good.
And I think one of the thingsthat makes it really interesting
is the person who wrote the bookoriginally, like I want to say
he's a scientist himself, likehe's not a author or novelist.
And so a lot of the stuff thathe's writing about is, I mean,

(06:03):
like it's fiction, but it's likerooted within like scientific
principles.
Um, and so this is what inspiredmy story today.
It's about the founder of JPL.

Aarati (06:15):
Oh my goodness.
That's gonna be amazing.

Arpita (06:17):
I'm really excited about this story, but also it is a
cuckoo banana story.
I started writing it cause I waslike, Oh, like, I wonder if I
could pick someone who's likespace, like NASA, something like
that.
Cause I was like top of mind.

Aarati (06:30):
And we haven't had one

Arpita (06:31):
many.
Yeah.
We haven't really done that manyyet.
and then as I was doing myresearch, I was like, Oh, like
this guy is weird.
And then it takes such a, ittakes so many left turns and.
I was just, like, struggling tokeep up with the story because
every time I was like, oh, thisis the crazy part of the story,
there was another crazy

Aarati (06:50):
just

Arpita (06:50):
story.
It just got crazier and crazier.

Aarati (06:53):
my goodness.
Okay.

Arpita (06:55):
I also have to say this one is long.
I tried so hard to pare thisdown.
I think this is the opposite ofthe winter episode we did.

Aarati (07:05):
Yeah, we're making up for it now.

Arpita (07:06):
we're making up for it now.
I cut this down multiple times.
I considered making it twoparts.

Aarati (07:12):
Oh my

Arpita (07:13):
think it realistically could be two parts because this
is, it's a dense story.

Aarati (07:18):
Oh my gosh.
Okay.
I'm, I'm ready.
I'm so excited.
Let's do it.

Arpita (07:24):
Okay, so the founder of JPL, his name is Jack Parsons.
His full name is actually MarvelWhiteside Parsons.

Aarati (07:33):
What?
I'm already like, wow.

Arpita (07:36):
No, that's his real name.
So he was actually named afterhis dad, his dad's name is
Marvel.
But then, because he's a junior,he got nicknamed Jack really
young.
Um, And so he was called Jackpretty much always after that.
He was born in Pasadena,California in 1914.
And the drama starts likeliterally right away.

(07:56):
So right after he was born, hisdad got caught sleeping with
another woman and he was alsoinvolved in a sex ring with
prostitutes.

Aarati (08:06):
What?

Arpita (08:07):
So his mom filed for divorce and then,

Aarati (08:11):
Oh my God.

Arpita (08:12):
and then she moved.
herself and Jack in with herparents, so Jack's grandparents,
and they lived on a, this likereally big mansion, this estate
on Millionaire's Row inPasadena, which like still
exists.
It's just like a neighborhoodwith like a ton of fancy
mansions.

Aarati (08:29):
That's already insane.
Oh my gosh.
And I'm so glad her mom waslike, peace.
I'm going to go live onMillionaire's row.
Like I have somewhere to go.
I have somewhere to be.
I'm taking my son and we're,we're fine without you and your
weirdness.
Goodbye.
That's amazing.

Arpita (08:45):
Um, Yeah, so the grandparents are really wealthy,
and so Jack had, he like reallyliked growing up here, he got to
like run around, he was an onlychild, there's like really big
grounds.
He didn't have that manyfriends, and he was a pretty
serious kid, so he spent a lotof his time reading, which then
began his interest in sciencefiction, which then, probably

(09:06):
similar to Logan, inspired hisearly interest in rockets and
space.
And when he was in junior high,he made a friend named Edward
Foreman, and the two of themwere like, always up to like,
some shenanigans, they, probablylike most young boys, They loved
blowing things up and makingamateur rockets.

(09:27):
So they'd take the explosivepowder from cherry bombs and
fireworks for fuel And theymostly ended up just making like
big holes and like burningthings in the backyard.
But they also did make someinteresting discoveries and
interesting learnings.
So if you have a bunch ofexplosive powder and you ignite
it, it's going to explode, butin every single direction, um,

(09:51):
it's not going to come out inone direction, right?
It's like not something that youcan control.
The explosion is going to happenin every single direction, but
what they were interested indoing was like, like blowing up
these rockets.
They wanted the rockets to goup.
And so for in order for that tohappen, you need thrust and you
need steady thrust.
So, for a lot of the fuel theywere using, which was like

(10:13):
whatever they could get theirhands on, they're probably like
11 at this point, they burnreally, really quickly instead
of steadily.
You want something that's goingto like burn at kind of a slow
rate over time.
But what they're using rightnow, because it's made up of all
these different substances, it'slike kind of hard to control.
They're basically just likeigniting it with a spark.
It's hard to control.
So you can't get that upwardthrust.

(10:34):
Everything is like moving indifferent directions.

Aarati (10:37):
You want something that kind of just constantly pushes
you up rather than just explodeseverywhere immediately, all at
once.
Makes

Arpita (10:45):
Right, right.
Um, and if you're trying to getit to go up high, you need it to
have a certain amount of thrustover time versus an explosion is
going to have a big spike ofenergy, and then it's going to
go down really quickly becauseall of the fuel gets burned at
once.
So they're trying to solve thisproblem.
And so Jack comes up with thisidea of taking all of the

(11:06):
explosive powder and mixing itwith glue.
So then the glue hardened.
And so when They lit it on firethat's now like hardened to a
mass so it has to burn throughthe glue in order to get to the
next explosive molecules.
So it takes longer for it toburn, which means that it's a
little bit more controllable.
And then they, like, were ableto sort of get rockets to move

(11:30):
up a little bit more and havesome more upward direction and
thrust.
It's still, like, very bad.
Like, 11 year olds should not bedoing this, but

Aarati (11:38):
Oh my God, they're 11?!

Arpita (11:40):
Yeah, they're in junior high.
They're like maybe 12.
Like, yeah,

Aarati (11:44):
yeah.

Arpita (11:45):
little kids.
They should definitely not bedoing this, but the glue did
work quite well.
And this was like a veryexciting discovery for Jack.

Aarati (11:54):
Okay.

Arpita (11:54):
This seems like overall, like kind of like par for the
course.
I mean, it was like.
1920 maybe like they hadprobably limited supervision,
but Jack also had some kind oflike darker sinister interests.
So when he was 12, he triedsummoning a demon in his
bedroom.

Aarati (12:14):
Wait, what?

Arpita (12:15):
I know.
I don't know how he did this,but he tried summoning a demon
in the bedroom, and for somereason he convinced himself that
it worked.
He did summon this demon.
It scared absolute crap out ofhim.
And then he swore off, like,ever messing with, like, the
spirit world, or, like, demons,or, like, magic ever again.
So he was like, I'm never gonnado that again.

Aarati (12:34):
That's so random.

Arpita (12:36):
This is important to the story.

Aarati (12:37):
Okay Yeah, I'm like, it came out of left field, but I'm
figuring there's more to this.

Arpita (12:41):
No, this is important to the story is like when he was
really young, he like startsmessing with the spirit world
and he decides that he's notgoing to do it again.
But.
And as you may imagine, he doesdo it again.

Aarati (12:50):
Oh, my goodness.
Oh, my goodness.
Okay.
Rockets and demons.
Great.

Arpita (12:54):
Rockets and Demons.
Yeah, that's actually a goodsummary.
So based on all of this, it'snot like a huge stretch to
imagine that Jack had a littlebit of a discipline problem.
He got in trouble a lot.
And at school.
And so in 1920, his mom sent himto a military academy and within
days of arriving at thismilitary academy, he blew up a

(13:16):
toilet and he got expelled.
So

Aarati (13:18):
Oh my God.
Oh, my God.

Arpita (13:23):
Man's loves blowing things up.
Um, and so, like, his familydidn't even really have time to
recover from this.
They, like, you know, put himback in public school.
He continued having disciplineproblems.

Aarati (13:35):
I'm just gonna say that that says something when even
the military can't straightenyou out.
Like even the military is like.
No, you're, you're too crazy.
we can't We can't deal withthis.

Arpita (13:45):
He, yeah, he definitely just, like, on one as a kid.
And so then in 1929, the stockmarket crashed and his
grandfather lost all of hismoney in the stock market crash.
So this family now had likeserious money problems to deal
with.
So, by this point, he hadenrolled in Pasadena Junior
College, and he was only therefor a very short time before he

(14:10):
had to drop out and get a job tosupport the family.
Still on his interests, uh,explosives and chemistry.
So he started out as like aphysics and chemistry major at
Pasadena Junior College.
And when he had to leave to geta job, he decides to apply to
the Hercules Powder Company,where he could still work with

(14:30):
and be exposed to and also stealexplosives.

Aarati (14:35):
So the powder company like basically makes explosive
powders, like gun powders andwhatever?

Arpita (14:41):
Correct.
Yeah, like gunpowder and stuff.
Um, and so that was the job thathe picked because he was like,
want still continue doing this.

Aarati (14:48):
Naturally.
Naturally.

Arpita (14:50):
And so he did save up some money and he enrolled at
Stanford to try to finish hisdegree in chemistry, but then he
ended up not able to afford histuition and he went back home to
Pasadena.
And that's pretty much the endof his formal education, as he
doesn't really have a collegedegree at all, like everything
else that he learns from thispoint onwards is self taught,

(15:12):
which is crazy, given all thethings that happen next.

Aarati (15:16):
So he started his BS, but he didn't actually finish
it?

Arpita (15:19):
Exactly.
Yeah, so he started at thejunior college really briefly,
and then he enrolled at Stanfordreally briefly, but then
couldn't afford it, so hedropped out.

Aarati (15:28):
Okay.

Arpita (15:29):
So now it's 1935, and he meets this young woman named
Helen Northrup at a local churchdance, and he proposed marriage
almost immediately.
Um, they got married a fewmonths later and went on a
honeymoon in San Diego.
There's not really a toninteresting about this.
It seemed like it was like the30s and this is kind of normal

(15:50):
for them to have short sort ofdating engagement.

Aarati (15:55):
Yeah.
Like we hear a lot of storiesfrom that time where it's like,
less than a year and they'remarried.

Arpita (16:00):
Right.
Helen comes up again later, sodon't you fret.
Uh, but at least for now,they're just happy and in love.
That same year in 1935, he,attends a lecture on rocket
engines at Caltech, which, sohe's in Pasadena, Caltech is
really nearby, um, and he goeswith his childhood buddy, Edward
Foreman, a.k.a.

(16:21):
The guy that he used to blowthings up with in the backyard.

Aarati (16:23):
Mm-hmm

Arpita (16:24):
So Edward and Jack are hanging out after the lecture,
and they meet some people whoeventually introduce them to
this man named Frank Malina, whois a Caltech graduate student
who's working on his PhD inrocketry.
So these two nerdy boys, Jackand Edward, are stoked.

(16:45):
They're like, hell yeah.
Like this guy knows all thethings.
They're like super

Aarati (16:49):
You're doing your PhD in Rockets.
That's amazing! Yes.

Arpita (16:52):
They love, they're so excited about.
And they asked Frank about likeall of Caltech's like resources.
They're like, Oh, like, tell usabout this.
Like, 200 mile an hour windtunnel, tell us about like all
the lab space, like tell usabout all this stuff.
And they start just likebabbling and they start talking
about rockets and how much theylike rockets and like visiting
outer space, exploring otherplanets.

(17:15):
Um, And this is interesting.
So Jack and Edward are notacademics.
And Frank is like a PhDscientist and he understands
like some of the nuances of likeacademia and like things that
are going to get you canceled.
At this time.
Space travel and rockets areconsidered science fiction, and

(17:35):
if that's something that you'reactually interested in, it's
like Looney Tunes.
Like, that's not somethingthat's ever going to be
respected or get funding.
But, Frank is also reallyinterested in rockets and space,
but he knows it's career suicideto, you know, like, try to get a
grant on rockets.
They kind of form this unlikelyfriendship because he kind of

(17:58):
has a little bit more clout froman academic community, but
Edward and Jack have, like, thisenthusiasm.

Aarati (18:04):
Yeah.
He knows how to like reign themin when they're being a little
too crazy around the wrongpeople.

Arpita (18:09):
Exactly, exactly.
So they're just like startingthis like relationship, this
friendship.
And Frank agrees to help Jackand Edward sort of learn more
about this.
Try to like, maybe get somehands on experience.
And he tells them that he'llhelp them.
But he says, you have to besneaky, because we can't tell
people that we're interested inrockets otherwise, like, we're

(18:30):
all done.
And so they started working onengines for planes because it
was like the closest kind ofanalog and they were secretly
working on adapting the enginesto be different and try to like
solve some of these problemslike fuel and thrust and blah,
blah, blah.

Aarati (18:47):
Yeah.

Arpita (18:48):
Okay so now this duo Jack and Edward officially
becomes a trio and like Imentioned, rockets are not
respected, so they had a reallyhard time trying to get funding
for their crazy idea, or likeanybody who would fund anything
adjacent.
No one's interested.
And so they were super desperatefor cash in order to fund all of

(19:09):
their research.
So Frank and Jack pivoted, andthey tried to write a screenplay
about two heroic rocketscientists.
And it was like a very thinlyveiled story about themselves.
And they tried to sell thescript to a movie studio to then
use the cash to support theirresearch.
And this plan did not work.

Aarati (19:31):
Really?

Arpita (19:32):
It did not.
And Jack became obsessed withthis idea.
He was like, I have to know moreabout rockets.
And he put every single dollarthat he earned toward getting
equipment and material forrocket research.
He made nitroglycerin at home,which is Illegal, and was
bootleg, and he, like, sold thatfor extra cash.

(19:54):
He pawned Helen's wedding ringfor extra cash, um, which she
was less than thrilled about.
they're just, like, trying to doeverything they can in order to
get some cash.

Aarati (20:06):
This is like really reminding me of that movie.
I think I mentioned it before,October Sky.

Arpita (20:11):
Oh yeah!

Aarati (20:11):
Which is literally about the Rocket Boys.
But this is a little bit later.
I think it's like the 1950s and60s.
Um, so I think Rocketry is alittle bit more accepted then
there's like the whole SpaceRace with Russia and everything.
So this just seems like earlydays, like it sounds almost like
October Sky, but like psychotic,just what it's reminding me of.

Arpita (20:36):
So it looks like October Sky is a little bit more about
the space race, like you said.
I just googled

Aarati (20:41):
It's more about the space race, but like the movie
itself is about four boys whoget together.
They're really interested inrocketry.
They're trying to make homemaderockets.
They like go into the sciencebehind it.
They're entering thesecompetitions.
So it is a lot more likestructured but it is about like,
kind of the same thing aboutlike these guys that are these
young adolescent boys that arejust really interested in

(21:04):
rocketry and space.
But your story seems to have alittle sprinkling of like chaos.

Arpita (21:10):
Crazy.
Yeah.
It's, crazy.
We haven't even gotten to thecrazy part yet.

Aarati (21:15):
Oh, oh, dear.
Okay.
I'm holding I'm holding on to mychair.

Arpita (21:19):
So we are skipping ahead a little bit.
Let's just, they have the cashnow.
Like they did all this likescrappy stuff.
They have money, and so they're,the trio do their first tests in
the middle of the Mojave Desert,and as the group's chemist, Jack
was focused on making the rocketfuel, and he tried both solid
and liquid fuels.

(21:40):
So for solid fuel, he usedgunpowder mostly.
And kind of like what Imentioned before, so gunpowder
is the mixture of severalsubstances like charcoal,
sulfur, and some other things,and on a molecular level, all of
these are very different sizes,and when they're jostled, for
example, like right before anexplosion, if things are like

(22:00):
being shaken up, The substancesseperate out based on size, and
then the separation causesgunpowder to explode instead of
burn steadily.
And this is like what we justtalked about.
Um, so then he pivots and hetries liquid fuel.
And so he has two hoses, onethat feeds in liquid oxygen, and

(22:21):
the other that feeds in methylalcohol.
And these liquids like getpoured in, they mix inside of a
chamber, and then there's aspark through an ignition
system, which starts the burn.
And so they were like, okay,this like gunpowder solid fuel
situation isn't really working.
Let's do liquid fuel.
So they tested this, and itdidn't work.

(22:43):
Did not go well.
The first three times they triedit, the motor just failed, like
nothing happened.
And the fourth time they did it,the oxygen hose caught on fire,
and the whole thing burst intoflames in their faces.

Aarati (22:55):
Oh my god.
Oh my god.

Arpita (22:57):
All bad.

Aarati (22:58):
Yeah.

Arpita (22:59):
To be honest, this is probably like way farther than I
would have ever gotten.
I'm like, this is crazy.
You're like the middle of thedesert, like blowing shit up.
Nevertheless, these threepersisted and in 1937, they
worked out a lot of the issuesthat they had with their liquid
engines and they were able toproduce a decent amount of
thrust.
So, Frank is still affiliatedwith Caltech, and so he showed

(23:22):
these results to a facultymember there, who was really
impressed by them, and offeredthem this, like, teeny tiny bit
of lab space and money, and thewere, like, thrilled.
They were like, the best thingever.

Aarati (23:34):
That's a huge achievement.

Arpita (23:36):
Huge achievement.
So now that they're like,official, quote unquote, the
trio decides to call themselvesthe Jet Propulsion Laboratory,
aka JPL, that we know today, um,what they really wanted to do
was call themselves the RocketPropulsion Laboratory, but they
knew that aligning themselveswith rockets was crazy and would
make respect them less so theywent with Jet.

Aarati (23:57):
I see.
I see.
An interesting, interestinghistory behind that etymology
there.
Hi everyone, Aarati here.
I hope you're enjoying thepodcast.
If so, and you wish someonewould tell your science story, I
founded a science communicationscompany called Sykom, that's S Y

(24:18):
K O M, that can help.
Sykom blends creativity withscientific accuracy to create
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including explainer videos,slide presentations, science
writing, and more.
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(24:39):
Check us out at sykommer.
com.
That's S Y K O M M E R dot com.
Okay, back to the story.

Arpita (24:48):
Okay.
So weird side story here, but Ipromise it's relevant.
Um, around the same time, Jackbegan making a name for himself
in the local papers.
So in 1938, an LA police captainwas arrested for trying to
murder a private detective.
So the detective had dug up somedirt on police corruption, and

(25:09):
the, the captain planted a pipebomb in this detective's car.
It exploded, but it didn't killthe detective.
And this captain was put ontrial for attempted murder.
And Jack, because he's an expertin explosives, got asked to be
an expert witness.
And part of the trial, he evenbuilt a replica pipe bomb and

(25:31):
blew up a Chrysler, like justprove that it was possible.
And the press.
loved it.
They were like, this is the beststory ever.
It's so juicy.
There's police corruption.
There's so many layers.
so interesting this.
And then the other layer herethat I should mention is Jack
was like hot.

Aarati (25:50):
Oh, really?

Arpita (25:50):
He was.
Yeah.

Aarati (25:51):
Hang on.
I have to find a picture of him.

Arpita (25:54):
He's like 6'2 he has like dark hair, he's really
handsome, he's a very likesmooth talker.
So then on top of that there'sthis hot guy who's like
interested in like chemistry andhe's like really great at
talking about this stuff.
So like the press is like allover this.
So like now Jack is like minorcelebrity.
So this, little bit of famereally helps them out because

(26:17):
this little crew is, like,trying so hard to get funding,
and they finally get this,little baby grant developing
rocket plane engines for thearmy.
This group is really just likeone step forward, three steps
back.
So even though now they hadfunding, the people at Caltech
hated them because they werejust like there like day and

(26:38):
night, like revving engines,being super noisy.
And Jack had like a very laxattitude about safety, which you
can imagine people at Caltechwere obsessed with.
They, like, loved it, of course.

Aarati (26:51):
They're probably responsible for, like, why we
have to take all those safetytrainings now.
It's their fault.

Arpita (26:57):
Like, the people at Caltech, as you can imagine,
are, like, methodical.
Like, they're very serious aboutstuff.
like,

Aarati (27:03):
Very deep thinkers.

Arpita (27:05):
He didn't give a shit about any of that.
And so, they had tons of, like,chemical leaks, like, things
were always going rogue, like,they were always, like, doing
something crazy, and then thecrux of this is, they so they
always had, like, a bunch ofrogue explosions, and this was,
like, again, no one really likedthis at Caltech.
But then they had a really badone that almost decapitated

(27:27):
someone and they blew up anentire wall in the university.
And so, JPL was like, you guysare done.
And banned them.

Aarati (27:38):
Wait, I thought JPL was what they...

Arpita (27:40):
Sorry.
Caltech banned JPL.
sorry.
I misspoke.
Caltech was like, you guys aredone.
And so banned JPL and they werelike, you guys got to get out of
here.
And their little production,which they called JPL still
moved to this like small canyonoutside of Pasadena where JPL
actually still is today.

Aarati (27:58):
That's insane.
That's, that's a lot like theAlfred Nobel story where he was
like blowing up stuff and, um,where was that?
Stockholm.
He was blowing up stuff in,yeah, he's blowing up stuff in
Stockholm, and Stockholm islike, you can't do this here,
get out of Stockholm, he likemoved to like a little lake on

(28:18):
the outskirts

Arpita (28:19):
Exactly.
of like That's exactly whathappened here.
Um, It's also like not asdensely populated as we think of
this area now, um, so nowthey're in this like warehouse
that they've set up on theirown, it's like out in the middle
of nowhere, and Jack isdefinitely like the self
proclaimed ringleader of thetrio, and people started to joke
that JPL really stood for JackParsons Lab, which you can

(28:42):
imagine

Aarati (28:42):
Hah.

Arpita (28:43):
and Fred, sorry, Edward and Frank really loved, yeah,
you can imagine.

Aarati (28:48):
Yeah.

Arpita (28:49):
Okay, we're gonna switch gears again.
So remember how Jack tried tosummon those demons as a kid?

Aarati (28:55):
Yes I do!

Arpita (28:56):
Um, he really, he still really likes demons.
Um, he loved reading sciencefiction and horror and he was
really open about theseinterests at JPL.
So the staff at JPL just thoughthe was just like a weird dude.
They were like, that's justJack.
He's a weird guy.
But Jack was like actuallyreally, really interested.

(29:17):
So he saw rockets and theoccult, uh, occult meaning just
like supernatural beliefs, astwo sides of the same coin.

Aarati (29:25):
Okay.
You're going to have connectthat for me, because I do not, I
don't get it.

Arpita (29:30):
Yeah, I don't get it either, but he basically saw it
as two sides of the same coin.
So like both of them offered thechance to slip off the bonds of
the earth and roam free.
So rocketry freed your body intospace and the occult freed your
mind and soul.
I don't know, man.

Aarati (29:46):
Okay.
Interesting.
Yeah.
I'm not sure about that, but oh,oh, okay, sure...

Arpita (29:53):
So in 1939, Jack and Helen attended a Mass in this
religion called Thelema.
Thelema was invented in theearly 1900s and drew on a number
of different occult practicesand the two central core aspects
of Thelema are magic and sexrituals.
In Thelema magic doesn't meanlike the way you would think

(30:16):
about like a magician on stageit's more like paranormal stuff,
like interacting with spirits,like talking to the dead.
And then sex rituals are exactlywhat they sound like.
In Thelema, sex was considered asacrament, and so during Mass,
this is horrible, but duringMass, worshippers ate these
things that they called cakes oflight, and it's like the

(30:40):
Eucharist that you would get ata Catholic church, but instead
it was made out of flour, honey,oil, Ash, and then some sort of
like bodily fluid.
So either like semen ormenstrual blood.
It's so gross.

Aarati (30:54):
no, no, no, no, no, no, I was like on board until you
kind of hit ash.
And then after that I'm out.
Nope.
No, not good.

Arpita (31:04):
So they attend this mass and Jack and Helen are like
"Sick.
More.
Let's do it.
This is great." They becomefascinated with the religion and
Jack
began
trying magic rituals himself.
So he interpreted all of theseexperiences through this, like,
new science of quantummechanics.
So he's kind of like blendingscience with this, like, weird

(31:27):
magic ritual.

Aarati (31:29):
Yeah I can see why Caltech kicked him out.

Arpita (31:32):
Caltech kicked him out for a lot of reasons.
So he started like recruitingpeople to try his new religion
and his colleagues at JPL werelike, uh, no, thank you.
But Jack and Helen did manage torecruit Helen's half sister,
Betty.
So eventually, Jack and Helenmove into a commune with other
Thelemic worshippers, and theircommune happened to be on

(31:54):
Millionaire's Row, where he grewup.
So, as you can imagine, thepeople who live on Millionaire's
Row are not part of weirdcommunes like that.
They're not.
They're not happy about and thepolice were often called on the
commune, but whenever they came,Jack would answer the door.

(32:14):
He's like tall, dark, andhandsome.
Like once they started talkingto him, he's like, I'm a
scientist.
I worked with Caltech andthey're like, wait, are we
talking about?
This guy is like an upstandingcitizen.
He's smart.
He's a scientist.

Aarati (32:26):
And he was associated with that big case a while ago.
they like recognized him alittle bit.
Yeah.

Arpita (32:33):
So they were like, what are we doing here?
This is like, not a problem atall.
And so nothing ever happensevery time the police are
called, even though like weirdshit's happening at the commune.
So speaking of weird things thathappen at the commune, in 1941,
Helen goes on this vacation overthe summer.
And while she's gone, Jackstarts sleeping with her half
sister, Betty, and he did sowith, like, the full support of

(32:57):
all the other people in hiscommune.
However, was only 17.

Aarati (33:02):
Oh dear.
Oh no.

Arpita (33:03):
So when Helen returned Jack confessed everything.
He's like, I'm sleeping withBetty, but he didn't apologize.
In fact, he basically pointblank told Helen that he found
Betty more attractive and he wasdetermined to be with her.
And then Betty was like, I'm inlove with Jack.
And obviously this is crazy.
And Helen thought so too, butHelen was also really deep in

(33:26):
this cult.
So she's like, okay.
And then she starts an affairwith the spiritual leader of the
commune.
And then eventually married him.
So

Aarati (33:34):
Oh my gosh.
This

Arpita (33:36):
I guess all's well that ends well, but like,

Aarati (33:38):
That's crazy.
Yeah.
And like everybody in thecommune is just supporting this.
They're like, yeah, is whatshould be happening for some
reason.

Arpita (33:49):
So Jack is at JPL, but is kind of having a hard time.
So he'd made some breakthroughs,but what he really wanted to do
was send people to space.
And this was still just like acrazy idea, not respected.
So he was settling for makingairplanes faster for the
military, but he was unsatisfiedfrom a career perspective.

(34:11):
So he started working to buildrocket motors again, and so
going back to that experiment hedid as a kid where he added glue
to gunpowder with pretty goodresults, he decided to try this
again.
So this time he mixed gunpowder,glue, cornstarch, and
fertilizer.
And his team at JPL decided totest this mix in what they
called Jet Assisted TakeoffMotors, J A T O's.

(34:40):
And his team bolted severalJATOs under the wing of a small,
lightweight aluminum plane, andlike all planes, then this one
had a propeller to help it fly.
So the JPL crew ripped thepropeller off and decided that
if this plane was going to fly,it was going to be on jet rocket

(35:03):
power alone.
So it wasn't going to fly likebased on normal plane mechanics.
It was going to use this likejet rocket power.

Aarati (35:09):
Oh my God.
Wait, who is the pilot of this?
Who's the brave soul that ispiloting this plane?
Because no amount of money couldmake me do that.
Oh my god.

Arpita (35:19):
Yeah, we're getting there.
So, this attempt, like, did notgo well.
So, one motor exploded, which,like, tore part of the wing off,
and then shrapnel, like, blastedthe plane's body, and then tear
tore a big hole in it, and thispilot who was in the plane,
like, barely survived.
However, a week later, the pilotwillingly got back in the

(35:40):
cockpit again to try again.

Aarati (35:41):
What?
Oh my god.
Why?
Why?

Arpita (35:46):
I don't know.
I don't know what to tell you,but he did get back in the
cockpit again, and

Aarati (35:51):
Oh my goodness.

Arpita (35:52):
This pilot blasted down the runway and took off, but was
able to take off way sooneralong the runway than a normal
plane would have taken.
So rather than, for example,like going 100 meters in order
to like ramp up and then takeoff, it was 30 percent sooner.
So it was like a shorter runwaytime in order for the plane to
take off, which was a really bigdeal.

Aarati (36:13):
Oh, my gosh.
I feel like he must have knownthat somehow, like, from his
first attempt, he must haverealized, like, hey, wait a
minute, if I take off sooner, itmight go better.
I'm gonna try this again,because I know.
what I did wrong that almostkilled me the first time.
But,

Arpita (36:28):
I don't know.

Aarati (36:30):
I don't know.
No, this is, no, this is stillnot good.

Arpita (36:34):
It's not good.
But what it did mean is thatthey launched the first ever
vehicle, in this case it waslike a plane, with jet rocket
motors and the takeoff time wasreally helpful because later
what ended up happening is thatthey realized for military
purposes that they could land onand off of, like, military

(36:54):
destroyers, like ships in thesea, because it didn't need as
big of a runway, and then likereally remote locations it was
able to take off sooner.
So it didn't need quite as bigof a runway before.
Um, so it had like reallyinteresting military
implications, AKA they couldstill be funded, aKA they could
still mess around.

Aarati (37:13):
Oh my gosh, this is just crazy.
I don't, I don't know if thiswould like would this even be
allowed today?
Because they've had so many, no,like they've, they've almost
decapitated someone.
They've put a pilot in thehospital and they're like, sure,
you can have more funding tokeep doing this without any,
additional safety standards orregulations.

Arpita (37:36):
Remember now they are their own independent entity.
So they can theoretically dowhatever they want.
They sure, like within reason,like they're no longer
affiliated with Caltech, so theydon't have as many, I guess, as
much oversight.

Aarati (37:50):
But someone is still funding them devices like this
is a good idea.

Arpita (37:53):
Well, someone is funding them to try to, like, make the
military better, basically.
So they just need to demonstratethat whatever output they're
creating is helping militarypilots or planes or whatever.
Like, as long as they'redelivering on that, that's fine.
I guess the method of how theydo it, they don't really care
about because they're their ownfunded, or their own entity,

(38:17):
basically.

Aarati (38:18):
Gotcha.

Arpita (38:20):
Um, so even though this worked with the pilot, Jack knew
that it was lucky and it's notsustainable.
So he began tinkering again withliquid fuel.
So one hot afternoon he saw someroofers working and they were
pouring asphalt, which is aliquid that then solidifies into
a solid.

(38:40):
And then he was like, Oh, thisis a great idea.
So he realized that asphaltburns really well and is a
liquid.
So you can mix in otherpropellants, but then it hardens
into a solid.
So then nothing separates andthen because it's a solid, you
don't need like the hosesituation with like liquid
oxygen that he tried before andcollect complicated machinery in

(39:03):
the engine.
So asphalt really combines thebest of both setups.
It's both fuel and glue.

Aarati (39:08):
Interesting.
Okay.

Arpita (39:09):
And so he found that asphalt mixed with potassium
perchlorate burns really well.
So now he had the rocket fuel ofhis dreams.
That being said, his mainfunder, the military was not
super thrilled at the idea.
So if you ignite asphalt, itjust burns and burns and burns
and burns until it runs out,which is not ideal for a plane.

(39:30):
Ideally, what you need to beable to do is turn it on and off
as opposed to just like burningforever.

Aarati (39:35):
Oh, I see.

Arpita (39:36):
And the army then grudgingly allowed him to
continue his experiments if hefocused only on liquid fuel,
which is easier to control.
So imagine just like pouringgasoline or like diesel fuel
into a plane.
It's easier to control.
So Jack then experiments withchemicals that ignite
spontaneously upon mixing.
So, after he tried variousdifferent combinations, he

(40:00):
successfully built aspontaneously burning liquid
fuel motor using aniline andnitric acid.
So in the span of one year, heactually did invent two
different, two completelydifferent types of motors, the
solid fuel and liquid fuel,which is actually the basis for
a lot of rocket engines that weuse today.

Aarati (40:21):
Oh really?

Arpita (40:23):
So then during World War II, uh, this is what I mentioned
earlier, Jack's engines wereused in thousands of planes.
So the boost in speed that theyprovided allowed planes to take
off on aircraft carriers.
They could land in remote areaswith short runways and rescue
troops, which then saved around4, 500 lives during the war.

Aarati (40:42):
Oh my gosh, amazing.
So he's not all chaos.
Like there's some good comingout this He did make good on his
promise to the army or themilitary to, like, actually help
them, like, their funding paidoff.

Arpita (40:54):
Their funding did pay off.

Aarati (40:55):
That makes me feel a little bit better.

Arpita (40:56):
Yeah, it's like, not all bad.
Um, we are going to take anotherleft turn soon, so just prepare
yourself.
Um, but, so given this, like,demand for, aircraft engines,
Jack's JPL colleagues, founded acompany specifically to
manufacture motors.
So they called this companyAerojet, which is still around
today.
And he, Jack has no businessskills or any business sense,

(41:20):
but somehow becomes vicepresident.
But let's not forgetconcurrently with the story.
Jack is still involved in hisThelema cult and summoning
spirits, and this becomes aliability for Aerojet.
So he's not quiet about hislifestyle.
He talks about this a lot.

(41:42):
And for the most part, it was.
Fairly harmless if not just likesuper weird.
So he would answer the doorholding like a snake.
He would conduct seances toEgyptian gods.
Like he'd do just like weirdshit that people were like,
Jack's weird, but that's justJack.
But other stuff is not soharmless.

(42:02):
So for one, as we talked aboutbefore, he abandoned his wife to
sleep with a 17 year old.
Um, other commune members wereaccused of sleeping with a 16
year old neighborhood boy.
Um, and neighbors In nearby thecommune saw like, naked women
jumping through bonfires in theyard.

(42:24):
Jack was also making absintheillegally in his bathtub, and he
was taking all sorts of drugslike cocaine, morphine, peyote,
and he would show up veryregularly, hungover or still on
drugs to Aerojet meetings,which, like, you can imagine,
really pissed them off.
They were like, we're trying torun a business.

Aarati (42:45):
Yeah.
It's such a different, like,it's so weird to reconcile those
two sides of one person.
It's like what did you say itwas like president or VP of,
yeah.
VP of like Aerojet.
Any vice president though, likea vice president of a company
that's rooted in science andlike literal rocket science.

(43:05):
And like this crazy cult personwho's on drugs and believes in
like sex rituals and stuff.
And that's like the same person.

Arpita (43:14):
That's the same person.

Aarati (43:15):
It's so different than what we think about.
We think about like VPs ofrocket space companies being
very, very smart, kind of allbusiness, like

Arpita (43:24):
Honestly, it kind of reminds me of Elon Musk a little
bit.
Like he's also cuckoo bananasand is smart, like founded
SpaceX, you know, has done allthis like interesting stuff with
like batteries and all thistechnology but also is a nut
job, like...

Aarati (43:40):
Like completely insane.

Arpita (43:41):
Completely insane.
So, I mean, not...

Aarati (43:43):
Good parallel.

Arpita (43:44):
unheard of.
Okay, so, as you can imagine,uh, Aerojet finally had enough,
and they're like, you're fired,you're out of here.
So, at this point, Aerojetdidn't actually need a lot of
his tinkerings and crazybehavior.
What they really needed wassomeone to like, just work 9 to
5 because they're trying to growa business.
And that is not Jack's forte.
So Aerojet gave Jack$11, 000 inseverance, which allowed him to

(44:08):
purchase the mansion that thecommune was in.
And then people started callingit"Parsonage" in his honor.
Okay, so now World War II endedand enter L.
Ron Hubbard, who is the futurefounder of Scientology, who
joins the commune.
And Jack was in love.

(44:29):
He was like, this guy isawesome.
Jack loves like magic andcommuning with gods and demons.
And then Ron to him was the mostnatural magician that he'd ever
met.
And so Ron had this, like,amazing gift.
I don't even know what thatmeans, honestly, but it had this
amazing gift for contacting,like, the other worlds, and Jack

(44:50):
welcomes Ron into the commune'sinner circle, and Ron, in
return, showed his appreciationby sleeping with Betty.

Aarati (44:59):
Oh my gosh, this Betty girl also, like, oh my god.
What, is happening in this...

Arpita (45:07):
I don't know.

Aarati (45:09):
What?

Arpita (45:10):
So then Betty leaves Jack for Ron, and Jack wasn't
even that mad because he was soobsessed with Ron that he was
like willing to accept anything,honestly.

Aarati (45:20):
Like yeah, you, deserve her more than I do.
You're amazing.

Arpita (45:23):
Exactly.
Exactly.
That's exactly right.
So Jack has an idea for Ron.
He goes back to that experience.
He has a kid where he summoned ademon and he's like, wouldn't it
be cool if we did that again?
And he had a specific spirit inmind.
It's this goddess named Babylon,AKA the Scarlet Woman.

(45:43):
And take a wild guess.
Babylon is a sex goddess.

Aarati (45:47):
kidding.

Arpita (45:48):
And because the world was like, World War II, like
it's like war torn, all of thisstuff.
He thought that the world wascurrently being ruled by a
violent God.
And he summoned Babylon, itwould teach people to
love.That's his hypothesis..

Aarati (46:03):
Okay.
Sure.
Just gets crazier and crazier.

Arpita (46:08):
It really does.
and so, like I mentioned, toJack rocketry and the occult are
intertwined.
And so his rocket career is nowin shambles.
He's been fired from Aerojet andthe occult was like pretty much
all he had left.
And so convinced Ron to help himsummon Babylon and they started

(46:29):
this ritual in 1946.
Honestly, like weird shit.
They like had like a dagger.
They like played music.
They like had blood.
There was like spells.

Aarati (46:40):
Okay.
I'm envisioning.
yeah, like crazy ritual.
yeah,

Arpita (46:45):
Yeah, unclear what they did, but they did something.
And according to Jack, thisworked because very soon after a
scarlet woman entered his life.
So this woman was a former Navyofficer who was curious about
religious worship and magic.
She'd heard about this fromfriends.

(47:05):
Her name was Marjorie Cameronand she had red hair and she
basically just like knocked onthe door of the commune.

Aarati (47:13):
Okay.

Arpita (47:13):
So according to Jack, his spell worked.

Aarati (47:16):
And supposed to be like the incarnation of Babylon, or
something?

Arpita (47:20):
Correct, according to according to Jack.
So, Jack becomes obsessed withMarjorie, and he thinks that he
summoned her from a differentrealm.
And, they start this affair, andthey lock themselves into a room
for weeks, and they're justsweet, sweet loving, and he
sincerely thought that himsleeping with Marjorie was a way

(47:42):
to bring world peace becausethis is the incarnation of this
goddess.

Aarati (47:47):
That's mind boggling.
Okay.
Like how do- how do people makethese connections?
I don't get it.

Arpita (47:53):
No, he's crazy.
He's crazy.
and so the two get married.
And so Jack is like finallyfeeling like he's like putting
the pieces of his life backtogether.
Like he's fired, but now he hasthis like woman that he's in
love with, like blah, blah,blah.
However, Ron screws Jack again.
Ron approaches Jack with thisbusiness plan.

(48:14):
He's like, Hey, what if we buysome yachts on the East coast
and then we sail them toCalifornia and we sell them for
a markup?
And...
this doesn't even make anysense, but Jack, no, it does
not.
But Jack was like, Oh my God,amazing, great idea.
And he blindly gave Ron hisentire life savings and Ron...

Aarati (48:36):
No.

Arpita (48:36):
disappeared to Miami with the money and he took Betty
with him.

Aarati (48:40):
Wow that's a shock.

Arpita (48:41):
And Jack is so obsessed with Marjorie, like he doesn't
even realize for a while thathe's been scammed and then he's
Oh my God, wait..." and he goesto Miami and he can't find Jack
and Betty and he assumes thatthey're on this yacht that they
bought and they're out at sea.
So then Jack decides to summonup a weather demon to start a

(49:03):
storm to kill Ron and Betty.
And so

Aarati (49:06):
Oh my goodness.

Arpita (49:07):
Somehow a storm actually did pick up across the coast,
and Ron and Betty's yacht getstotaled, like, completely
clobbered.
The sail got torn off, and they,like, finally make it back to
port, And Jack is, like waitingfor them.

Aarati (49:25):
Like, ha, how do

Arpita (49:26):
Yeah.
Exactly.
No, exactly.
Somehow this happened.
And so Jack ends up getting someof the money back, but he and
Ron, like, eventually part waysas enemies.
Like, he's no longer enamoredwith Ron.
Um, and Ron then goes on to getreally famous and rich as the
father of Scientology.

(49:47):
That is a entirely separatestory that we

Aarati (49:50):
Entirely.
Yes.
Yes.

Arpita (49:53):
Okay.
Back to Jack and back toAerojet.
So after he got fired, he wasstill looking for ways to get
involved in rockets andresearch.
But the field by this point hadreally changed.
Like there was some substancebehind it.
Like this was really developing.
They were like, this is actuallysomething that is worth putting

(50:13):
some scientific, uh, effortinto.
It's no longer just like a bunchof dudes in the middle of the
desert, like trying randomstuff.

Aarati (50:22):
I think at this point, it would be the beginnings of
the Space Race, right?
like, it's 19, early 1950s, Late1940s, because World War II just
ended?

Arpita (50:30):
Late 1940s.
Yeah, exactly.
So we're not quite space race,but yeah, just the beginnings.

Aarati (50:37):
Yes.

Arpita (50:38):
And so now there's like legitimate businesses around
this.
The military was involved andthen people needed security
clearances from the FBI.
So Jack starts trying to get anFBI clearance and as you can
imagine, the FBI did a littlebit of background research and
were horrified by everythingthey found.

Aarati (50:57):
YeAh.
Yeah.
You just basically have to dojust the barest amount of
research and be like, whoa, no.
Okay.

Arpita (51:04):
Totally, exactly.
Um, because he was readingcommunist papers, he slept with
a 17 year old, he was summoningdemons, and they were like, no,
no, no, no, this is nothappening.

Aarati (51:15):
I have to say there was a tiny part of me that was a
little scared that you weregoing to say that.
Somehow he got clearance and I'mlike, how?
No.
I'm so glad that that did nothappen.

Arpita (51:24):
I'm so Aarati..
So the next sentence, is, hiscolleagues.
from JPL and Aerojack were like,okay, like, we know this guy's
crazy, but also he's really,really, really smart.
So you should really let himparticipate in research.
So his colleagues vouched forhim and FBI was like, okay,
fine.

(51:45):
And they allowed Jack to workthese like really small scale
jobs.
However, this will make you feelbetter.
Jack ruined this almostimmediately.

Aarati (51:53):
Of course! Because he's like a chaos demon himself.

Arpita (51:58):
So he got caught stealing documents from the
military that he was supposedlygoing to send to foreign
governments.

Aarati (52:05):
Why?
What?
Oh my god.

Arpita (52:08):
I don't know.

Aarati (52:09):
Oh

Arpita (52:09):
I don't know.
So he got fired again.

Aarati (52:13):
I feel like he does like, he always does like the,
the most obvious thing thatwould get you kicked out of any
institution.
Like you go to the military, youblow up a toilet, you're out of
the military.
You go to like Caltech, Youalmost decapitate someone,
you're out of caltech.
Like you go now to the FBI, youtry to sell a foreign agency

(52:33):
government documents and you'relike you always do the he's
always doing like the absoluteworst thing you could do.

Arpita (52:38):
He's doing the worst.
That's totally true.
But also, like, kind of, he'sbrilliant.
So, like, it's unclear, like,what the situation is here.
Okay, so now we're like, we'rejust like ping ponging back and
forth.
So now he's back to magicbecause he no longer has rockets
in his life.
So he's back to magic and hedecides to do magic full time.
So now he's declared himself tobe the Antichrist.

(52:59):
He begins visiting prostitutesfor more like sex magic rituals.
Like he's like, full eyeballsdeep into this thing,

Aarati (53:06):
Mm hmm.

Arpita (53:07):
But he's also broke.
So in order to make money, hesets up a lab in his garage
where he starts making specialeffects chemicals for Hollywood
stuff like pyrotechnics, fog,stuff like that.
And one afternoon in 1952, hegot a rush order for some
pyrotechnics for a movie.
And so he headed down to hislab, also known as his garage

(53:29):
and starts mixing chemicals.
And around 5 p.
m.
there was two quick explosionsthat the whole neighborhood
heard.
And so neighbors rushed over andthey found a huge hole in the
ceiling.
The lab's windows wereshattered, the heavy garage door
had been torn from his hinges,and Jack was laying in the

(53:49):
middle of the wreckage.
Missing his right arm and mostof his face and his last words
that he said were quote,"But I'mnot finished yet." End quote.
So no one knows what happenedwith the accident.
Like we said, like many timesbefore, he was super cavalier
about safety.
So there's one, like, veryobvious hypothesis that he

(54:11):
probably just, like, messed upwhile he was mixing explosives.

Aarati (54:15):
Yeah.

Arpita (54:15):
And then that caused the first bang, and then because he
kept other explosives just lyingaround, those might have ignited
and then caused the second bang.
But there's also darkerexplanations that have been
proposed.
So, a neighbor, supposedly,there's not really any proof for
this, found a syringe ofmorphine in the lab trash can,

(54:36):
so then like, was he high whilehe was doing these?
We don't know.
Other people thought that he waslike being driven to suicide or
was like trying a differentmagic spell.
It's unclear.

Aarati (54:48):
Yeah.
I was gonna say I wonder if hewas trying something with his
occult, you know, especially ifmorphine was involved or
something if

Arpita (54:56):
Yeah,

Aarati (54:57):
trying some weird thing.
Yeah.

Arpita (54:59):
And so no one, no one really knows what happened.
Um, but then there was also someconspiracy theories about this.
So remember the police captainthat had that planted the bomb?
Um, Jack's testimony sent thepolice captain to prison.
And also, right before he died,the police captain had been
released from prison.

(55:19):
So, was that a coincidence?
Like, was the police captaininvolved?
Like, we don't know,

Aarati (55:23):
Some vengeance plot.

Arpita (55:24):
exactly.
So, regardless, he died superyoung.
He was only 37.

Aarati (55:30):
My gosh.
He's only three seven and

Arpita (55:32):
yeah.

Aarati (55:32):
this stuff has happened.

Arpita (55:34):
I know.
It's crazy.
Because he started when he waslike 11.
So, like, it moves, the storymoves quickly.
Um, He's only 37, but he left areally complicated legacy, as
you can imagine.
So, people who are involved inthe occult, still are obsessed
with him.
So, in like, conspiracy theorycircles, he's credited with
attracting the first alienvisitors to Earth.

Aarati (55:57):
Oh,

Arpita (55:58):
IDK.
Um, in rocket research, hislegacy is super mixed, as you
can imagine.
So both his solid fuel andliquid fuel motors were really
big breakthroughs.
And NASA's Titan rockets, aswell as space shuttle were both
based on his work.
Like it was really fundamentalto understanding both solid and

(56:20):
liquid fuel motors.

Aarati (56:22):
Mm-hmm

Arpita (56:22):
Groups like JPL and Aerojet, both that he founded,
don't really embrace him, whichyou could totally understand
why, like he was cuckoo bananas.
But also like it's kind ofmixed.
Like a lot of people who aregeniuses are also very troubled
and, you know, are reallyinvolved in like a lot of

(56:44):
different things that are maybenot super high brow or...

Aarati (56:48):
Yeah.

Arpita (56:48):
above ground.
So it's kind of complicated.

Aarati (56:51):
Yeah, because it's like you want to give credit where
it's due, but at the same timeyou don't want to lift this guy
onto a pedestal because he'sinsane.

Arpita (56:58):
Exactly.
insane.
Exactly.
And so there's a lot ofcontroversy in the rocket
science field about how muchcredit he deserves.
Um, and there's just like such afine line between insanity and
genius.
Um, that being said, the thingthat people are very conclusive
about is that if he was alive,you know, like if he continued
to live, there is no way hewould have ever worked at NASA.

(57:22):
So at NASA, as we all know it'slike very involved in the
rockets and the space race, butthe agency was like, way too
buttoned up and like, way toostraight

Aarati (57:32):
Yeah.

Arpita (57:32):
laced.
Like, it's just like, no chancehe would have ever been able to
work with.

Aarati (57:36):
Yeah,

Arpita (57:37):
Exactly.

Aarati (57:37):
have all the safety standards.

Arpita (57:39):
And so there's also another theory that the quote
unquote establishment to try toget rockets up and running just
used Jack.
Like they kind of just likemilked him for his ideas But
then just like didn't reallyprotect him when he really
needed it.
So that's the other kind ofPhilosophy here, but that being

(58:00):
said he didn't really do himselfthat many favors.
He led a really reckless life Hedid a lot of really questionable
things he summoned demons, like,I don't know, Like, there's a
mix, like, did they really needto protect him?
Like, he didn't really give thema lot of reasons to make them
empathetic towards him.
But also his ideas, like, wereso fundamental to a lot of what

(58:23):
we know about space and rockets,which is also crazy.
But yeah, that.
is a very, very abbreviatedstory about Jack Parsons.
There's so much that I had tocut out in order for this to
like even remotely fit into areasonable time frame.

Aarati (58:40):
I feel like now there should be a movie about it.
Like, I know he tried to sellhis story

Arpita (58:45):
I think there is a show actually.
Let me Google it.
There was one that, I foundwhile I was researching.
Um, Strange Angel.

Aarati (58:55):
Strange Angel.
Okay.

Arpita (58:57):
It's a TV show.
It ran from 2018 to 2019, andit's about him.
But I think it's mostly actuallyabout his, occult spiritual
stuff.
I don't think it's as much aboutJPL.

Aarati (59:10):
Okay.
But still, that's worth a look.
Because, yeah, that, that storyis absolutely crazy.
I feel like Hollywood.
Would make a story about It nowwho

Arpita (59:19):
Oh, yeah, it is.

Aarati (59:21):
pitch Amazing that story just ticked all the boxes
though.
It was like it had explosions.
It had demons.
It had space.

Arpita (59:30):
Oh my god.
It was so long.
For context, the original, justlike when I was like pulling
stuff in for from like a bunchof different sources, was 12
point font, single spaced, 17pages.
And usually my stories are likearound seven pages.

Aarati (59:51):
Wow

Arpita (59:52):
when I am reading them.
So I did end up getting it downto seven and a half.

Aarati (59:59):
that was worth That was worth everything.
Yeah, that that was amazing.
That was an amazing story.
Thank you so much for startingJanuary off that way

Arpita (01:00:10):
yeah, with a bang.

Aarati (01:00:12):
With the literal bang.
Yes.
Oh, my gosh.
Great story.
And I'd never heard of it beforeeither.
So.

Arpita (01:00:20):
Yeah me I either.
Which is crazy for how likeubiquitous you, JPL and NASA and
like all these space stories

Aarati (01:00:26):
Yeah,

Arpita (01:00:26):
are.
Maybe it's just ubiquitous in myhouse, but it seems to be like a
thing that everyone knows about.

Aarati (01:00:31):
No, but it's like, yeah, it is like everyone knows JPL
and NASA and like, no, I, I didnot know this history behind how
it got started.

Arpita (01:00:39):
Which is probably by design.
like

Aarati (01:00:40):
Yeah, probably like,

Arpita (01:00:41):
JPL does not want you to know about this.
So, yeah.

Aarati (01:00:44):
Or just like, yeah, we're just not going to talk
about it that much.
It's

Arpita (01:00:48):
Exactly.

Aarati (01:00:49):
know.
Oh, my gosh.
Great story, though.
Amazing.

Arpita (01:00:52):
Thank you,

Aarati (01:00:55):
Thanks for listening.
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(01:01:15):
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