Kerry Wendell Thornley facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Kerry Thornley
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| Born | April 17, 1938 Los Angeles, California |
| Died | November 28, 1998 (aged 60) Atlanta, Georgia, U.S. |
| Pen name | Lord Omar Khayyam Ravenhurst Ho Chi Zen |
| Alma mater | University of Southern California (no degree) |
| Period | 1950s–1990s |
| Genre | Counterculture |
| Subject | Religion, politics, satire |
| Spouse | Cara Leach (1965–?) |
| Children | 1 |
Kerry Wendell Thornley (April 17, 1938 – November 28, 1998) was an American author. He is known for co-founding Discordianism with his childhood friend Greg Hill. In this group, he was often called Omar Khayyam Ravenhurst or Lord Omar. He and Hill wrote the main book for their religion, Principia Discordia, Or, How I Found Goddess, and What I Did to Her When I Found Her. Thornley also wrote a book called The Idle Warriors in 1962. This book was inspired by his acquaintance Lee Harvey Oswald before the 1963 assassination of John F. Kennedy.
Thornley was very active in the counterculture publishing world. He wrote for many underground magazines and newspapers. He also published many of his own one-page newsletters. One of these newsletters was called Zenarchy, published in the 1960s under the pen name Ho Chi Zen. Zenarchy is described as "the social order which springs from meditation." It is also called "A noncombative, nonparticipatory, no-politics approach to anarchy intended to get the serious student thinking."
Kerry was raised Mormon. As an adult, he often changed his beliefs and interests. He explored many ideas throughout his life. These included atheism, anarchism, Objectivism, autarchism, neo-paganism, Kerista, Buddhism, and the Church of the SubGenius.
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Kerry Thornley's Early Life and Family
Kerry Wendell Thornley was born on April 17, 1938, in Los Angeles, California. His parents were Kenneth and Helen Thornley. He had two younger brothers, Dick and Tom.
Thornley went to California High School in Whittier, California.
On December 11, 1965, Kerry married Cara Leach at Wayfarers Chapel in Palos Verdes, California. They had one son, Kreg Thornley, who was born in 1969. Kerry and Cara later divorced. Kreg became a photographer, painter, musician, and filmmaker.
Military Service and Oswald Connection
Thornley had been a reservist in the U.S. Marine Corps for about two years. In 1958, at age 20, he was called to active duty. This was soon after he finished his first year at the University of Southern California.
According to Principia Discordia, it was around this time that he and Greg Hill had their first Eristic vision. This happened in a bowling alley in their hometown of Whittier, California.
In early 1959, Thornley served in the same radar operator unit as Lee Harvey Oswald. This was at MCAS El Toro in Santa Ana, California. Both men were interested in society, culture, books, and politics. When they were on duty together, they talked about topics like George Orwell's novel Nineteen Eighty-Four. They also discussed the philosophy of Marxism, which Oswald was very interested in.
Later, while on a ship returning to the United States from Japan, Thornley read about Oswald. He learned that Oswald had moved to the Soviet Union in the U.S. military newspaper Stars and Stripes.
Writing and Public Attention
In February 1962, Thornley finished his book The Idle Warriors. This book is special because it was the only book written about Lee Harvey Oswald before President Kennedy was assassinated in 1963. Because of this unusual timing, Thornley was asked to speak to the Warren Commission. This group investigated Kennedy's assassination. He testified in Washington, D.C., on May 18, 1964. The Commission asked for a copy of his book and kept it in the National Archives. The book was not published until 1991.
In 1965, Thornley published another book called Oswald. This book generally supported the idea that Oswald acted alone in the assassination. This was the conclusion of the Warren Commission.
Later Life and Passing
For the next 30 years, Thornley lived in many different places across the United States. He was involved in various activities. These included editing underground newspapers and attending graduate school. He spent most of his later life in the Little Five Points neighborhood of Atlanta. During this time, he created a free series of flyers called "Out of Order." These single-page, double-sided copies were given out in the Little Five Points area. In 1994, he and Malaclypse the Younger were welcomed into the Order of the Pineapple.
Kerry Thornley struggled with illness in his final days. He passed away from cardiac arrest in Atlanta on November 28, 1998, at the age of 60. The next morning, 23 people attended a Buddhist memorial service for him. His body was cremated, and his ashes were scattered over the Pacific Ocean.
Shortly before he died, Thornley reportedly said he felt "like a tired child home from a very wild circus." This was a reference to a passage by Greg Hill from Principia Discordia:
And so it is that we, as men, do not exist until we do; and then it is that we play with our world of existent things, and order and disorder them, and so it shall be that Non-existence shall take us back from Existence, and that nameless Spirituality shall return to Void, like a tired child home from a very wild circus.
Kerry Thornley's Pen Names and Titles
Kerry Thornley used many different pen names and titles. He provided a list of these himself. Here are some of them:
- co-founder of the Discordian Society and the Legion of Dynamic Discord
- co-author of Principia Discordia
- Grand Ballyhoo of Egypt of the Orthodox Discordian Society
- Kerry Wendell Thornley, JFK Assassin
- Omar Khayyam Ravenhurst
- President of the Fair-Play-for-Switzerland Committee
- Reverend Doctor Jesse Sump
- Ancient Abbreviated Calif. of California
- Sinister Minister of the First Evangelical and Unrepentant Church of No Faith
- Ho Chi Zen (the Fifth Dealy Lama)
- Purple Sage
- Pope
- "I further declare that there is no truth whatsoever to the charge that Kerry Wendell Thornley is a fictitious identity created by the Warren Commission for its own mysterious purposes (Vol. XI, pp. 80+, Commission Exhibits and Testimony)"
Images for kids
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Kerry Thornley around 1970
See also
