A View on the Life and Work of Royal Raymond Rife

(October 2007 - by John Herschel)

The following conclusions are my opinions only and are made with flimsy evidence to back them up. However, I believe that some attempt should be made to try and get the events that occured during Rife's lifetime into some sort of believable perspective.

It was 1931 and America was battling to recover from a severe economic depression. Millions of unemployed people walked the streets and charities and other social systems were overwhelmed. Certainly not the best time to find support for new and offbeat inventions, especially in the medical and scientific field, where ambitious men were manoeuvring to establish their power and influence. The fledgling pharmaceutical industry was expanding and people were looking for any way to make money. Americans were tired of poverty and they were all looking forward to a brighter future.

However Royal Rife was fortunate. He had financial support from a wealthy industrialist. He had no concerns about whether what he invented had any commercial merit. Then a wealthy doctor, Milbank Johnson and a medical scientist, Arthur Kendall, showed interest in his work and Rife found further encouragement to achieve what many thought was impossible, “a cure for all diseases”. Rife was happiest, it seems, when he was alone with his inventions in his laboratory. He left most of the routine matters to other people to deal with. Rife and Kendall engrossed themselves in their laboratory work and Johnson was the doctor who wanted to use their discoveries to help suffering people. Johnson “managed” the development of the Rife therapy and Hoyland and his assistants built the instruments. Rife did not participate very actively in the clinics that provided Rife treatments to patients. He had invented the Rife Ray instrument, but it seems he was happy to leave it up to others to use it. If not for Johnson’s enthusiasm and continual encouragement, the instrument may have remained just a novel lab invention. Johnson was the driving force that got Rife noticed, appreciated and respected. For at least 9 years Johnson championed the Rife cause and tried everything possible to change general opinion and gain acceptance from the medical fraternity.

In their characters and personality, Rife and Johnson were on opposite sides of the spectrum. In a strange way this is what possibly drew them together in the beginning. Each found in the other talents that they themselves did not possess. But as time went by and the difficulties they faced increased, the differences between the two men became too much to reconcile and a major disagreement caused them to go their separate ways. It is very likely that Johnson was opposed to the way that Rife had handed over the development of the Rife Ray instruments to Hoyland before full and proper trials had been completed. Perhaps Rife also disagreed with the decision made earlier in 1937 by the Special Medical Research Committee “to let the Rife Ray rest” until the cancer research work had been completed.

Johnson had tried hard for many years to get Rife's work accepted. He had endured ridicule from fellow doctors and he had personally funded all of the clinical trials that he had arranged. But eventually enough was enough. Perhaps he was tired of the intrigue and drama and wished just to spend the last remaining years of his retirement in peace and quiet. So Dr Milbank Johnson faded from the scene although not from anyone’s memory.

In agreeing to start the commercial manufacture of the Rife device, Rife was obviously persuaded that the time had come to go public with the instrument. Hoyland and his colleagues wanted to make money and Rife wanted his device to be in common use to cure diseases and help humanity. Rife was totally inexperienced in business affairs and he put his trust in others to handle financial and commercial matters. Rife’s naivety in business dealings allowed the situation to get out of control since everyone wanted a slice of the action. The formation of the Beam Ray corporation was a disaster and it had a serious consequence. When it seemed that, at long last, Rife's work had a chance to be taken seriously by the medical establishment, the greed and ineptness of Rife's colleagues put an end to everything.

Beam Ray Incorporated was a company that was set up in 1938 to manufacture and sell Rife Ray devices. During the existence of Beam Ray Inc. an important series of events occurred concerning three English doctors. In early 1938, Dr. Couche went for a vacation to England. While he was there, Couche met some influential doctors who were interested to hear of the amazing results that Couche had achieved with his Rife Ray device. The English doctors were Dr. Bertram Winter Gonin, the head of the London School of Tropical Medicine and who was also the personal physician to the Royal Family, physician Dr. William Blewitt and a specialist in electro-medicine, Dr. Howard Parsons. Couche told these doctors the stories about how Rife had developed advanced microscopes, the discovery of the cancer virus and the ray machine that could kill microbes and cure diseases. Gonin and his associates decided to come to the USA as soon as possible to meet Rife and to hopefully negotiate the purchase of some of Rife’s equipment.

In May 1938, the three doctors arrived in San Diego from England and spent time in Rife’s laboratory investigating Rife’s inventions. They wanted to see for themselves what Rife had discovered, what equipment he was using, his methods and the effects of the Rife Ray device on viruses and bacteria. Unlike some other doctors and scientists who had visited Rife's laboratory and, for various reasons of their own, "refused to see what was right in front of their eyes," Gonin saw. What Gonin saw was that everything in this wonderland-of-analytical-science known as "The Rife Research Laboratory" was integral to the whole. If you wanted to duplicate the work from one lab to another, you could not do it simply by erecting the equipment in another place. There is an implicit and exact methodology by which the technology must be employed. The "work" or "the hard part" of any "Rife research" resides in the "levels of exactitude" one must employ in the application of the technology to obtain the desired results. This is true for every element of the "Rife paradigm" - the optical light path in a Rife microscope must be precisely aligned to within mere microns, or it won't work; the Mortal Oscillatory Rate of a micro-organism is of an exact frequency and the generation thereof must be from a properly designed and constructed device, or it won't work; The pH level of a culture media must be adjusted to a defined parts-per-million-ratio, or it won't work; to see a cancer virus the illuminator of the Rife microscope must be aligned to 12 and 3/10 degrees, or it won't work... and so on and so on. Gonin saw all of this and he was impressed and, more importantly, he knew what had to be done. In fact he was so impressed with what he saw in Rife's lab that he paid a deposit of $15000 to Beam Ray Inc. before even one piece of equipment was ever delivered.

After his return to England, Gonin started preparations to build a laboratory that was designed according to Rife's recommended specifications. Rife would be commissioned to build a microscope for Gonin; personally transport it to England; and stay at the new laboratory for as long as it would take to teach the British Team the "ins and outs" of Rife's cancer research and bacteriology studies - a spare-no-expense effort to red-carpet Rife into the heady (and highly influential) spectrum of Gonin's ilk: the British high-science Glitterati. And that was the plan for the microscopes, the cancer work, the bacteriology studies and for Rife himself and the Beam Ray devices. And that is where the whole deal fell apart.

By the end of August 1938, it was clear that all was not well in the Beam Ray corporation. Hoyland began to give everyone the run-around regarding the Rife frequencies and the Beam Ray devices that were delivered did not work properly. Hoyland was also not in agreement with the terms of the contract that had been concluded between Beam Ray and Gonin that granted the English doctors a licence to manufacture and sell Beam Ray devices.

Couche was already in London, England to oversee the receipt & installation of the first of the Beam Ray devices. Shortly after Parsons had collected the first two instruments, Blewett wrote a letter to Rife to complain that the “the two lab machines with graduated dials do not agree – which was right?...the wave form...is bad – full of harmonics...the machine we saw in San Diego was free from harmonics...the machines are faulty in other ways, faulty connections, etc.”. Rife wrote back to Gonin and offered to do everything possible to rectify the situation, although by this time, he was unaware of the problems developing in Beam Ray Inc.

Gonin decided to give Beam Ray a second chance. He arranged a second trip across to New York to try to sort out the mess and confusion that had now arisen with Beam Ray and took with him a new contract addressing all the concerns that Hoyland had raised previously as a reason why Beam Ray had not honoured their side of the original contract.

Alas, even that was not enough to get the deal back on track. Eventually after much pleading and then threatening and then dispair and then just disgust at how they were being treated while the Beam Ray gang stabbed each other in the back over their greed for money, the “English Doctors” walked away and were never heard from again.

To make matters worse, news of the miraculous cures being obtained with the Rife Ray devices reached the ears of Dr Morris Fishbein, who controlled the American Medical Association (AMA). After attempts to gain control of Rife’s invention had failed, Fishbein commenced on a campaign to discredit Rife and his work and to stop the use of the devices. Rife was then subjected to what we would call today, industrial sabotage. In the first related incident, the J.C. Burnett Laboratory in New Jersey, which was starting to validate Rife's work, was destroyed by a fire that was believed to be arson. This was followed by the gradual pilfering of components, photographs, film and written records from Rife's laboratory. Then a Dr Nemes, who was also trying to duplicate some of Rife’s work, died under mysterious circumstances when his laboratory and all of his documents were destroyed in a fire. Eventually Rife's laboratory was vandalised and all his documents were destroyed.

By mid 1939, Rife found himself embroiled in a messy lawsuit involving Beam Ray Inc. Beam Ray won the lawsuit, but the legal assault had the desired effect - the company was bankrupt and in disarray. Then the medical authorities finally clamped down and the few doctors providing Rife treatment were “persuaded” by the AMA to stop using the Rife devices. Rife had finally run out of rich and brave friends to support him.

The following information has come to light that gives us a clearer understanding of Rife's personality.

In the mid-1970's, Professor John Hubbard and a journalist named Christopher Bird had met with John Crane and obtained from him a list of about a dozen names with some contact information of people who were still alive that knew or worked with Rife. They then embarked on an interview process that lasted years, predominantly conducted by Professor Hubbard, and one which, thankfully, he recorded. One of the people that Hubbard interviewed was Robert Page. Page had lived near the Rife laboratory as a teenager and became very friendly with Rife during the late 1930's and early 1940's. Shortly after the interview, Page wrote a long letter to Hubbard. Towards the end of the letter, which was dated 14th August 1976, he wrote the following:

"John, Royal Raymond Rife was expert in several fields - and ahead of the pack in some of them; and this can never be taken away from him. He deserves to go down in the pages of history as one of the great, or at least one of the near great minds our century. But he will not get this reward because of a personality fault - or several of those. 1) I've often had the feeling that he divided all humanity in two groups: those he could trust implicitly, and those never to be trusted. 2) He had nearly complete contempt for the mental abilities of 99.9% of the members of the medical profession and particularly if they were - as you are - involved in the teaching of medical students. He often expressed complete and utter contempt for research faculty types. They would visit his laboratory but could repeat his work only if he stood behind them telling them how and when to take each new step. His contempt for some highly renowned scientists was, I had thought, so widely known that men of small stature would be out to shoot him down. 3) He never checked up on people he should and shouldn't trust. 4) He was never emotionally prepared for any reversals, because he never expected any - and couldn't really accept them when they came. 5) His basic philosophy in life was to help people (through his giant intellect given him for this reason), and when "people" were ready to jail him for his acts (good or bad, legal or illegal), he fell apart."

"Roy enjoyed adulation - and don't we all! One way to get it is to do things no one else can do - or do things better. I always felt that Roy needed this more than most people do. He got this in varying degrees and from various people for various accomplishments, AND THIS WAS 90% OF HIS LIFE. And when this was changed to condemnation, it was more than he could take. You spoke of alcohol as Roy's escape. I heard of stronger materials, but I have no real knowledge of this. Certainly he had access to whatever he wanted, through his in-laws, and otherwise. With all of his good points he was only a man and not perfect. He liked drama! He lived to be a little bit mysterious. If he knew that he could create (design, build, write - whatever) some one thing better than anyone else could, he was in seventh heaven. He would turn this into a drama. And if he could show up the medical profession (the research part of it), he was happy."

"John, I've mentioned the medical profession several times in re Rife. I shall hasten to tell you that several M.D.s thought a great deal of Roy - of Roy the scientist and of Roy the humanitarian. My parents were in a bridge club that included 5 or 6 MD's as well as quite a few members of other professions. Some of those MD's thought the world of Roy. They saw his "Ray" completely "Cure" nearly hopeless cases of TB and syphilis. By "cure," they meant only destruction of pathogens, not regeneration of tissue."

So we have some idea of what motivated Rife. Rife wanted to be recognised and respected by his peers, but he did not seek fame or fortune and this was evidenced many times during his lifetime. He willingly gave over control of his inventions to men like Hoyland, Cullen, Crane and others who wished to turn them into commercial ventures. Perhaps that was Rife’s downfall – he was easily manipulated and exploited by greedy and unscrupulous men, and lost control of the situation. Although he was involved with science and scientific work and gifted with incredible talent for designing and building precision mechanical and electrical devices, it is probable that Rife was more of an inventor than a scientist. He obviously had incredible knowledge about a wide range of subjects and other people, including fellow scientists, probably felt intimidated in his presence. Rife kept detailed notes about all of his work, and we know that these were either lost or destroyed sometime during the late 1930's. During his interview with Professor Hubbard, Robert Page alluded to the possibility that Rife's notes may have been "seized" by US Military Intelligence. On the other hand, Rife may have even destroyed his notes himself, if he thought that they were going to fall into the wrong hands. As a staunch humanitarian, Rife was very much opposed to having any of his work used to create weapons against mankind.

My conclusion is that Rife was a honourable man who was a brilliant and gifted inventor and scientist. However, he was a weak character, easily persuaded and taken advantage of by less honourable men than himself, and he was too trusting and careless in his dealings with everyone and everything outside of his laboratory. The details of Rife's dealings with Hoyland, Beam Ray Inc. and Rife's subsequent slide into alcoholism seem to confirm this to be the case.

In 1939 the menace of Hitler and Nazi Germany was looming. Britain declared war on Germany after the invasion of Poland. World War 2 had begun. Americans looked on, many sure that something so far away would not affect them or their country. But as the world stumbled into the 1940’s, America was slowly dragged into the chaos. So it is not surprising that from 1940 until at least 1945, Americans had more on their minds than worrying about Rife therapy. In California, the public kept one eye towards the East and Japan, as the war in the Pacific intensified. By the time the war had ended, penicillin and the new development of anti-biotics were being promoted as the cure-all for all diseases and illnesses and no one was interested in electronic medical gadgets.

And so Rife stumbled on, in his alcoholic haze, perhaps wondering how something so brilliant as his Rife Ray instrument and his unique microscopes could have failed to make the impact that they should have. But there was no Johnson to keep him on track and no Timken to give him money. The stress of all the past years had taken its toll and Rife had lost his enthusiasm for work as he continued to drown out his bitter memories with a whisky bottle. Rife had by then become dismissive and disdainful regarding the research scientists and medical profession of his day. In Rife's opinion, those that he had come into contact with were sloppy and imprecise with their work and would therefore never be able to replicate his work. Eventually Rife ended up in a rehabilitation home for alcoholics. In the meantime, Rife devices in the hands of a few doctors, who knew better than to make a fuss about the machine’s capabilities, continued to achieve remarkable results and patients got relief from many illnesses.

After meeting Rife, John Crane saw an opportunity to turn Rife’s invention into profit and persuaded Rife to co-operate with him. Seeing one last chance to make a difference for humanity, of course Rife agreed. He had little choice. Even an inventor had to eat. And so the brilliant inventor, Royal Rife, found himself working for a man many times his inferior in knowledge and intellect. By this time most of Rife’s lab records and notes had been lost or destroyed and therefore Crane persuaded Rife to write down everything he could remember about his work on cancer and the Rife instruments. This, I suspect, was intended more for Crane’s own use than be a legacy of Rife’s work. Rife was 64 at that time and his memory was not as good as it used to be. He was not able to accurately remember every single detail of events that occurred many years previously and sometimes got his facts muddled. But he did his best and in 1953, a publication was produced, the first and only formal document that Rife ever wrote. Crane obviously used the information to his advantage and carried on to produce Rife instruments and to revive and develop Rife therapy with Rife’s assistance.

But near the end of 1960, the authorities had had enough. Eventually the partners of Life Labs Inc., the company owned by Crane, were served with a summons regarding “the manufacture and sale of illegal medical devices” and "practicing medicine without a licence". Rife was almost 73 and could not face the abuse of another trial. So he escaped to Mexico while Crane and John Marsh faced the judge. No amount of evidence in their favour could persuade the court and Crane and Marsh were found guilty and they spent 3 years in prison. Eventually Rife returned to California, but he was a broken man and he signed over to Crane ownership of all the Rife instruments and technology. To their credit, Crane and Marsh kept Rife’s work going and preserved whatever knowledge was available that has enabled us to expand it to where we are today, and they suffered for it. However the way that Crane conducted the development of Rife therapy was possibly the reason why the therapy was not taken seriously until sometime in the mid 1990’s.

In August 1971, at the age of 83, Rife died after suffering a heart attack. So ended the life of a most remarkable man. But his legacy lives on today, growing stronger every year and may it prosper well. For Rife may have been correct when he stated that he had invented the “cure for all diseases”. Time will tell. The debate regarding the effectiveness of the different cancer therapies offered today rages on. David Karnofsky, who worked as a chemotherapist with Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York is reported to have said: “The relevant matter in examining any form of treatment is not the reputation of its proponent, the persuavesiveness of his theory, the eminence of its lay supporters, the testimony of patients, or the existence of public controversy, but simply – does the treatment work?”

Many people over the years have tried to discredit Rife and his work. Rife would indeed have been the best con-man this world has ever seen to have pulled off so many “deceptions” and over such a long period of time. Dr Milbank Johnson, Dr Arthur Kendall and many other doctors and scientists did see and believed what they saw was happening in the Rife Research Laboratory. Dr Gonin and his associates were impressed sufficiently enough by what they experienced in Rife’s laboratory that they were prepared to spend so much time, effort and money to try to get the technology across to their own country.

However, it seems to me that, other than for historical accuracy and interest, Rife's life story is of little consequence. So are the historical stories of whether Rife and his colleagues managed to cure anyone of any illness or disease. Today the only thing that really matters is the question “does the Rife device that you use on yourself, to cure whatever illness you have, work?” If it does then forget about all the history and the intrigue – it is of minor consequence. Aubrey Scoon, author of a special supplement titled “The End to all Disease” published in the Everyday Practical Electronics magazine in April 2001, made the following pertinent observation: “facts are the facts, the theory needs to be modified to fit the facts, not the other way around!”

Just honour the memory of all the people who made your cure possible.