Rocket PoweR, InteRstellaR tRavel and eteRnal lIfe

instructor with whom Dan was ‘keeping company’”
introduced the two men. 63 George Mapes related that
after his father died Hungerford visited George’s
mother, Gertrude W. Mapes, a few times. These “platonic
visits” ended the relationship, he adds, since she
had no serious interest in Hungerford. Still he was a
good looking man. 64
Shirley Hyde maintained an interest in aviation. For a
number of years she worked as an associate editor for
Flight Control, a publication of the Bendix Aviation
Corporation, and wrote about aviation history. In particular,
she recalled an article of Blanche Stuart Scott, a
pioneer pilot, which Scott said was the “only accurate
reporting ever done about her.” Ironically, Shirley Hyde
never flew. She recalled that as a small girl “I was placed
in the cockpit of a two-place plane while my father and
someone spun the prop to get it started. I was VERY
frightened.” Later she was preparing to fly with her
husband “at Majors Field in Greenville, when a student
crashed and went up in flames . . . .I did not go up. I did
have a brief ride in a DC-3 once when it taxied to refuel.
That is the extent of my flight experience. Never left
the ground.” 65
Jon Elan Steen, the grandson of the third Hungerford
brother, William, related in 1992 his memories of
his great uncles on West Second Street. “I went there
quite often as a child. Great uncle Floyd had the personality
of a dumpling and said just about as much as
one, but I guess he was almost as brilliant as great
uncle Dan. Uncle Dan, now him I remember better, at
least he seemed to have some personality, although he
said little to me personally. I was only 8 or 9 years old
at the time.” 66
In 1979 Marvin stated that Hungerford “was an
amazing man in many ways and was the first really
solid clairvoyant I ever met. Mr. [Ralph L.] Hodge and I
both visited him at his home . . . in 1964. 67 A few weeks
later, Marvin added, “ . . . they [Daniel and Floyd] were
regarded as eccentrics and rightfully so, but in Dan I
believe there was true genius. Properly channeled and
with the proper leadership, he might have gone far in
his field.” 68
Marvin also wrote
Dan Hungerford was a wizard in the true sense of
the word. He had a fully-developed sixth sense
which, had I not witnessed this, I could not believe.
There were many in Elmira with whom I talked
who feared him because of this. His mathematical
formulae was [sic] absolutely on target although
when I showed this to mathematicians in colleges
here, they asserted that they had never seen anything
as perfect or highly developed. And this for a
third grader! 69
In the spring of 1964, Hungerford wrote to Marvin
about “automatic writing”, a means of extrasensory
communication with entities both living and deceased.
So Hungerford noted that:
I . . . have had a copy of Basil King’s – the abolishing
of Death – 1919 for a long time but couldn’t
read it until my brother Floyd passed away – so
suddenly at last Xmas time.
In the book a young lady – is furnishing material
thru a process of automatic writing.
I’m hoping you’ve had some experience along this
line, and I’m enclosing a copy of article from local
paper – and for the first time in my life – am trying
several nights in a row. I sleep sitting up in a chair
– girls picture in one had Pencil in the other – Paper
on a board in front of me. It was scarry [sic] the first
two or three nights. So far is only – chicken tracks –
yet some what intelligible. I’m hoping I can get a
picture of the murder – maybe you can help...
You will notice I’m living Floyd’s life Too. 70
Ritchard E. Lyon, minister at the First Baptist Church
in Elmira, officiated at the funerals for both Daniel and
Floyd Hungerford. Yet their later adult lives appear to
have been mostly non-religious. To be sure, churchgoing
would have been expected in rural Pennsylvania
in the late nineteenth century. Hungerford later referred
to Jesus in his writings, since Christian thoughts were
part if his life. For example, in a September 1966 letter to
Henry G. Budd, a minister whose protest against legalized
gambling was published in the Star-Gazette,
Hungerford displayed a comprehensive knowledge of
Biblical stories. 71 But in a statement titled “Our
Philosophy of Life” dated August 23, 1962 he wrote “. .
. we are here for no reason of our own -? – why not
make the best of it? And recognizing the destiny of man
– as – involving the conquest of space – occupation of
the stars – and the attainment of eternal life – on this
side of the grave . . .” 72
Hungerford professed to possess extrasensory perception.
In a letter to Marvin, he told of attending a
funeral in Syracuse in January 1929. After witnessing a
“dispute between a man and his sister” there he
returned to Elmira by car. Rain and an icy road made
his return trip a terrible experience. “That night at home
I dreamed I saw an army plane crash over Pennsylvania
– 8 men died, the next day the paper carried the story
just as I had seen it.” 73
Late in his life Hungerford wrote of a conversation
with his friend Russell Barr, who had driven him to a
hospital in Montour Falls, returning in a rainstorm.
Chapter Three: Family 17