Question

[james_davis_nicoll]

Can anyone tell me anything about the Ocean Living Institute, which I believe was active in the 1970s and whether or not there were two companies or more by that name at that time?

Comments

[ethelmay.livejournal.com]

If Bailey Smith was Cornell class of 1954, he's still around (or was quite recently) and helping organize alumni activities.

Dyer Grossman was class of 1963, though, so that may be the wrong Bailey Smith (though the disparity of dates doesn't rule out their meeting via old boys' network).

[carloshasanax.livejournal.com]

Ah! Thank you for the dates. And also for the information that Smith didn't flee to the Netherlands, because I was getting a little sick looking through all this stuff.

I think I have a Cornell Club connection...

[carloshasanax.livejournal.com]

The late Marilyn Wright, the reporter for the Traverse City Record-Eagle who covered the investigation into the pedophile ring, talked with the '54 Bailey Smith in 1977, and he confirmed knowing Grossman then, last seeing him in January 1976.

[ethelmay.livejournal.com]

It seems entirely possible that some people were involved (to the extent of having their names dropped and so forth) who didn't know at all what was actually going on, so I wouldn't expect that they'd all need to "fly at once, all is discovered." But you never know which.

[carloshasanax.livejournal.com]

After the fact, however, with the FBI manhunt, and Starchild's fraud conviction (he was named trustee of Shelden's "fly at once" stash, several million dollars, and looted it, but Shelden figured out a way to charge him from abroad), and the Senate hearing, and the Pulitzer-nominated investigative newspaper reports, I think it's a little unlikely that anyone involved in OLI would not have known what it actually was, even if they were complete dupes beforehand.

[ethelmay.livejournal.com]

Sure. I'm just saying I expect some of those "Oh, shit, pedophilia? I so did not sign up for this shit" reactions were real.

[carloshasanax.livejournal.com]

I sincerely hope that's the case.

I don't know what the hell to make of the person who decided to brazen it out.