Free at Last

Monday, January 17, 2022, is Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, the third Monday in January of each year. In 1955, at age 26, Martin Luther King, Jr. was thrust into civil-rights leadership in Montgomery, Alabama, after Rosa Parks had made her courageous stand not to move to the back of the bus. A group of blacks, formed by the community to lead a bus boycott, chose King as a compromise candidate to lead their moral crusade. • Immediately, King was besieged with threats. The Ku Klux Klan gave him three days to leave town. • He spent a night in jail for driving 30 mph in a 25-mph zone. • A bomb exploded on his front porch. But it only made him stronger. In April of 1966, I was drafted into the U.S. Army (Vietnam Era) and stationed at Ft. McPherson, Headquarters of the Third Army, in Atlanta, Georgia, whereupon I was one of a half dozen data processing analysts, working night shift, supervised by a civilian employee, coding documents to be processed by computer. On April 3, 1968, Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. (MLK) was in Memphis, Tennessee, speaking to a capacity crowd of striking garbage workers and others at Mason Temple about the climate of racial hatred. King’s final words in his last speech were… “I've seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the Promised Land. And I'm happy, tonight. I'm not worried about anything. I’m not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.” At 6:01 the following evening, King was struck in the face by a rifle bullet as he stood on the balcony outside of room 306 of the Lorraine Motel. He was rushed to St. Joseph’s Hospital and pronounced dead at 7:05. Martin Luther King, Jr. believed in non-violent protest of racial injustice -- it cost him his life. He was 39 years old. Racial riots broke out that night in over 100 cities, including Detroit, Chicago, Boston, New York, Newark, Baltimore, Minneapolis, Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Nashville, Kansas City, Oakland, Memphis, etc. On April 5, 1968, President Lyndon Johnson called out 4,000 federal troops to quell the rioting in Washington DC -- plus, 20,000 Army and 34,000 National Guardsmen had been ordered to anti-riot duty elsewhere. April 11, 1968, was my scheduled discharge date from the U.S. Army. However, King’s funeral was to be conducted on April 9 in Atlanta, just a few miles from Ft. McPherson. My expectations of becoming a civilian once again were temporarily put on hold. The entire world, including the Army, expected massive outbreaks of chaos during or shortly after the ceremony. Instead of packing to go home, I was in combat gear, practicing bayonet thrusts, wondering how much live ammo would be distributed for riot control. Lester Maddox, an outspoken racist who once chased blacks out of his restaurant by passing out axe handles to his white patrons, was the Governor at the time. He was furious that flags at state buildings in the capitol of Atlanta, and elsewhere, were at half-mast the day of the funeral. Surrounded by 200 armed state agents, Maddox proceeded to personally hoist the two flags back up, but backed off when the major TV networks showed up to record the action. This added mayhem gave those of us standing by with bayonets an extra sense of anticipation. The funeral service was held in Ebenezer Baptist Church. King’s casket was placed on an old farm wagon, with steel-rim, wooden-spoke wheels. 30,000 marchers were sent ahead to start the procession. An estimated 200,000 mourners took part in the procession that eventually passed directly in front of the Capitol. Governor Maddox, along with 160 helmeted troopers and 40 enforcement officers from other state agencies, remained inside the statehouse. There were eight armed men at each entrance. Maddox had given them the following orders: “If they should go so far as to break through the locked doors, then start shooting and don’t stop until they are stacked so high above the threshold the followers would be unable to climb over them.” The procession passed by solemnly and the funeral occurred without incident. Two days later, I was discharged from the Army and returned home to Minneapolis, where I kissed the ground and embarked on a new life once again. The human conscience is eternal and will never die. ___________ Quote for the Day – “A man who won’t die for something is not fit to live.” Martin Luther King, Jr. ___________ Bret Burquest is the author of 12 books. He lives in the Ozark Mountains with a few dogs and has many memories of Atlanta, Georgia, in the mid 1960s. ___________ - -

Edgar Cayce and Atlantis

There is a fine line between real and unreal. But if you look hard enough, the unreal becomes more real every day. Anthropologists once believed North and South America had initially been populated by Asians crossing a land bridge connecting Asia and Alaska during the last Ice Age, some 20,000 years ago. However, recent genetic DNA analysis of Native Americans now places the initial wave of migration between 38,000 to 50,000 years ago. Genetic DNA analysis can trace the ethnic tribal lineage, and thereby land of the origin, of a human being. Native American tribes contain four distinct DNA groupings, designated A, B, C and D. These groupings are found in Asia but not in Europe or Africa. While 96 percent of all indigenous natives in North and South America fall within A, B, C and D, there was a mysterious four percent, dubbed Group X, which could not be explained. Type X subjects were not found in the vast majority of tribes, including none in South America. It was also determined Type X subjects arrived in North America 10,000 to 38,000 years ago, later than the other groups. By far, the highest concentration of Type X in Europe was found in the Basques, a race of Caucasians who live in the Pyrenees Mountains between Spain and France. The highest frequency of Type X in the entire world was found in the Berbers, a race of Caucasians who live in the Atlas Mountains of Morocco in North Africa. The Basques and Berbers have long puzzled anthropologists, linguists and historians because they don't seem to fit into their continental surroundings. However, independent researchers of the Association of Research and Enlightenment (A.R.E.), followers of Edgar Cayce, have come forward and made a few observations of their own. Known as the Sleeping Prophet, Edgar Cayce (1877-1945) is considered by many to have been America's foremost psychic. Throughout his lifetime he performed over 14,000 readings while in a self-induced trance. Although delving into many subjects, 8,976 of his readings, transcribed onto 900,000 pages of notes, were devoted to medical problems, a majority of which were resolved, often advancing current medical technology. Cayce’s readings were always recorded by a stenographer. To do a medical reading on a subject, all Cayce needed was the subject’s pre-arranged location at the time of the reading. On one occasion, Cayce went into a trance and declared that the subject was not at the location where he was supposed to be at the time. It was later determined that the subject had forgotten about the meeting and was indeed not at the pre-arranged location at the prescribed time. On another occasion, Cayce was to do a reading for a ship’s captain who was at sea. When Cayce went into his trance, he realized the fellow could not speak English, so he did the entire reading in fluent German, a language he had no knowledge of when awake. Clearly, Edgar Cayce had a unique talent, although he claimed that everyone had the capability to do the same. In addition to medical inquiries, people would often slip in questions about the past or the future. An extremely high percentage of Cayce’s “predictions” of the future have come true. And now the genetic DNA analysis findings of Type X may actually lend additional credence to his psychic readings as well. Many of Edgar Cayce's readings concerned the island continent of Atlantis, the fabled empire located beyond the Pillars of Hercules (presumably the Rocks of Gibraltar in the western Mediterranean), as thoroughly detailed in Plato's TIMAEUS, that fell into the sea. Cayce’s readings described three separate disasters that befell Atlantis. The first catastrophe happened in 50,700 BC, caused by an explosion of gas pockets within the earth that triggered volcanoes and earthquakes, generated a magnet pole shift on the planet and produced a great Ice Age. The second catastrophe occurred in 28.000 BC, coinciding with the Biblical account of Noah and the Great Flood. After the deluge, the continent had been broken into three main islands: Aryaz in the east (present day Azores Island group), Poseidia in the north (West Indies area), and Og in the south (near South America). The final catastrophe took place in 10,600 BC. There were gigantic land upheavals upon the earth and the remaining land mass of Posedia and Aryaz (except for the mountain peaks) disappeared into the seas. The Cayce readings indicated the Atlanteans had been forced to relocate to various distant lands during the catastrophes, specifically to the Pyrenees Mountains (between Spain and France), Morocco (Atlas Mountains), Egypt (where they built the pyramids) and North America (where they formed the Iroquois nation). All Type X locations. In North America, the highest concentration of Type X lineage was found within the Iroquois nation (Ojibway, Oneota and Nuu-Chah-Nulth tribes). Cayce also reported some Atlanteans went on to the American Southwest and Midwest. The Navajo (Southwest) and mound builder region (Midwest) also contain some Type X subjects. The bottom line -- everywhere Edgar Cayce (psychic readings) claimed the Atlanteans settled after their land disappeared has a high unaccountable occurrence of a specific DNA type (type X) found nowhere else on this planet. This isn't exactly scientific proof of the prior existence of Atlantis, but we live in a very strange universe where everything is a sign that holds a mystery. Many of Cayce's readings are mysteries yet to be unraveled. Edgar Cayce claimed to have had the ability to link to the Universal Consciousness, which he referred to as the Akashic Records. Akasha is a Sanskrit word meaning "sky" -- a term used to describe mystical knowledge from another plane of existence. These records contain the entire history of human experience, and knowledge of the universe and beyond. "He who knows himself is enlightened... To the mind that is still the whole universe surrenders." Lao Tzu At the center of all humans is the source of all knowledge -- the first step to believe it, the second step is to seek it. ___________ Quote for the Day – “Man is a being in search of meaning." Plato ___________ Bret Burquest is the author of 12 books. He lives in the Ozark Mountains with a few dogs and often searches for meaning. ___________ - -