The Men Who Stare at Goats
(2009). A surprising amount of factual detail was gleaned from these and numerous low-budget movies from the 1950s to 1970s. In particular, script names were usually modified and not created whole. We compiled a list of screen names from over 300 movies.
A simple computer analysis compared the list against the faculty of elite science and medical programs of the same period. This produced six probable and fifteen likely candidates from Princeton's faculty. Expanding the search to include Princeton staff, graduate assistants and local professionals produced another three probable and seventeen likely names. Preeminent among all the names were Wilbert J. Muska, PhD and Tomas
Moure-Eraso, MD. Most public information about the two was redacted sometime in the 1970s.
Their academic records were still available. Dr. Muska earned his PhD from Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule (ETH) Zürich. Dr. Moure-Falcao received his MD from UCLA. With such impressive credentials, it is not surprising that the two were recruited to work in Princeton (the city, not the university). No record was found of them ever working directly for the school. Given the nature of the work, this is not surprising. Instead, they formed a consulting firm, which worked for people who do not give names.
Redaction of records is rarely complete. For example, we could construct a rough timeline of their professional involvement through property taxes on an office complex. The taxes were paid jointly from 1958 to 1971, thereafter by Dr. Muska alone until 1977. This date is significant because of the 1976 election of President Jimmy Carter. Shortly after he took office a number of black operations ceased, apparently including this one.
Constructing the nature of the practice requires more conjecture, though the
Master PC
stories give the very broad strokes. Dr. Muska was an engineer and Dr. Moure-Falcao was a surgeon. Records of supply purchases were difficult to find and no records of medication were ever located. However, it is clear that there were medications. A number of orders were found for local antiseptics, injection syringes, and needles.
Less common were orders for electrical contacts and adhesive patches. These would be used for monitoring the effects of a drug or treatment. Other orders were found for electronic supplies, suitable for modifying and maintaining electronic lab equipment, though we could not determine exactly which equipment. If this were the extent of our discoveries, the work would have remained functionally secret.
The first key break was the discovery of a sheaf of 1970-1971 memoranda. The notes comprised correspondence between Dr. Muska and Dr. Moure-Falcao, primarily related to the reasons Dr. Moure-Falcao was leaving the partnership. He was distressed at the direction the work had taken and dismayed by the implications of their progress. These notes provided our first references to devices such as "the cap", "an implant" and "the control module." Also, there were many references to Cindy and Candy. One breakthrough came when time-line analysis showed a transition from one name to the other. We determined that both names referred to a single woman, a locally prominent exotic dancer using the stage name Candy Kane.
Following the breakup, there was also a relative breakdown in security. Dr. Muska needed to find another surgeon, which turned out to be difficult. There are also orders for a considerable quantity of electronic equipment and supplies. We infer that Dr. Muska focused more of his time on design and construction than had been the case previously. We have references to such items as "the body chamber", "a halo", "a comfort suit" and several iterations of "the new remote". We also noted a large cluster of names cropping up in B movies, some without any modification, usually as a test-subject/victim or a mad-scientist's henchman.
This increased availability of information stopped abruptly in late summer 1973. Presumably, a new person arrived who tightened security significantly. We came to call him Mike, after Mycroft Holmes, though it is possibly a woman or multiple individuals. Until the shutdown in 1977, very little leaked out. Afterward is another story, so we believe that Mike had left Princeton quickly.
In June 1977, the office was sold to an accounting firm. In July, there was an auction, from which a catalog survived. The catalog listed a large amount of equipment, primarily medical monitoring equipment, such as EEG and EKG, even polygraphs or equipment for electronic calibration. Much of the equipment was described as 10 years old or older. There were also some unusual pieces, such as a traction frame and a hyperbaric chamber, with pumps.
Concurrent with this, Dr. Muska announced his retirement and purchased a home in Colorado ski country. That winter he had a serious fall while skiing and died of intracranial bleeding. Less than a month later, Dr. Moure-Falcao was killed in his Los Angeles home. The case was never solved. Fortunately, for our investigation, a money trail developed.
