A vision of an earthquake in California From the journal “Prophecies of the Future” – published in 1938 Internet: https://www.psygrenz,com E-Mail: technik@psychowissenschaften.de Translator’s email : evak30@optusnet.com.au A vision of an earthquake in California, published in 1938, experienced by a 17 year old young man. This vison caused quite a stir amongst the Pentecostals at that time, actually throughout America, because it was published in the journal “Prophecies of the Future’ in 1938. This young man had an accident with his horse and he was in hospital. He had terribly strong headaches and he dreamt this dream on four consecutives nights, whereby further details were revealed to him every night. ”I was in hospital suffering terrible headaches and it felt as if the whole world rotated in my brain. I remembered my fall from my horse “Blackie” and as I lay there, images formed in my mind, images that moved like lightning and images that stood still – I seemed to be in another world that moved slowly like silent black and white movies, but in colour and with sound, I cannot say whether this was in the future or in an ancient land. I seemed to be in Los Angeles, but it wasn’t at the present time (1937), because it was larger, much larger. Busses and strange-looking cars filled the streets of the city. I thought of the Hollywood Boulevard and I found myself there on Hollywood Boulevard, I don’t know whether this is true or not. There were a lot of men of my age there, but they wore beards and some of them sported earrings. All the girls wore short skirts and they sauntered along with dance-like movements. I asked myself whether I should talk to them. I said ‘Good day’, but they didn’t hear me or saw me. I began to realise that I would look just as strange to them as they looked to me. I tried to imitate their crazy walking for a while. I assume that one has to learn it. I couldn’t do it. I noticed things were quiet, a kind of stillness as if one could hear stillness. Something was missing that should have been there. I didn’t realise it to begin with, but then realised that there were no birds around. I listened and walked along the Boulevard for two blocks towards the North, past all these houses, but no birds anywhere. I asked myself, what could have happened to them, did they all leave? Where to? It was so quiet that I could hear this quietness – I knew then that something was about to happen. I asked myself what year this could be, it was undoubtedly not 1937. I saw a newspaper at a corner store with a picture of the president. It wasn’t Roosevelt, he was larger, weightier and he had large ears. If it wasn’t 1937, what year could it be I asked myself? I looked at the headline, but I couldn’t make it out, it looked a little like 1969. I wasn’t too sure about it, because my eyes couldn’t clearly focus on it. Someone approached, it was the nurse, she woke me up to take my temperature. I woke up thinking that this had been a crazy dream.” * * *
- 2 - “My headaches were worse the next night, the fact that I wasn’t killed falling off the horse is a miracle. I had another crazy dream; it was once again in Hollywood. I again saw these people and I wondered why they would dress like this. I was again on Hollywood Boulevard and this time around, I waited for something to happen. Something momentous was going to happen and I would be right there. I looked at the large clock down at the big theatre and it was ten minutes to four in the afternoon. At the location where all the film stars left their handprints and names, I saw names that I recognised, but some that I didn’t recognise at all, names I had never heard of. These crazy children, why are all of them dressed like this? Maybe it’s a carnival event or something similar, but it didn’t feel like a carnival. It was rather towards the beginning of spring. There was this noise again, or rather the lack of noise, quietness, quietness, quietness. I asked myself: ‘Do these girls not know that the birds have gone somewhere else?’ The stillness grew and grew. I knew it was going to happen, something was going to happen, it is happening now and once again the nurse woke me up.” * * * “I dreamt again the next night, about places I had been, or rather about places I had not been. I went to the end of the world and back. I went to the end of the world and there was nowhere left to go, not even this hospital. If only my eyes were a little clearer so that I could write all of this down. Nobody will believe me anyway. I went back to my last moments at the Boulevard. A sweet child walked past, a girl. She had small boys in tow, one on each hand. Her skirt was rather short and she looked tired. For a moment I thought that I could ask her about the birds and about what had happened, but then I remembered that she couldn’t see me. Her hair was completely frizzed and it stood on end all over her head. A lot of people that I saw looked like this, but she looked ever so tired and as if she was sad about something. I assume that she was sad before it happened, because it must have surely happened. There was a strange odour in the air. I didn’t know where it came from. I didn’t like this odour, because it smelled like sulphur or sulfuric acid, it smelled of death. For a moment I thought that I was back in a chemistry lesson. When I looked around I found that the girl had disappeared. For some reason or another I wanted to find her again. It was as if I knew that something would happen and I wanted to be with her and help her, but she had gone away. I walked for half a block and I saw the clock once again. My eyes seemed to be glued to the clock. It was fife to four on a sunny afternoon. I thought that I would stand here forever and just look at the clock, waiting for something to happen. Then, when it happened, it was nothing much. It certainly wasn’t as powerful as the earthquake we had two years ago. The earth only shook for a moment. People looked at each other in surprise and then they laughed. I also laughed, so this is what I had been waiting for, this little tremor, it meant nothing. I was relieved, but also disappointed. What had I been waiting for? I went back to the Boulevard and tried to move my legs the way these children did. I didn’t find out how they did it. I felt as if the ground beneath my feet was not solid. I knew that I was dreaming, but I wasn’t dreaming. And then there was this odour again, it came like an ocean. I saw the expressions on the children’s faces, two of them came towards me, both with beards and both with earrings. One of
- 3 - them said: ‘ Let’s get out of here and go back East.’ He seemed surprised. It was as if the sidewalks trembled, but one could not see it, at least not with one’s eyes. An old lady had a small white dog with her, she scooped it up in her arms and said: ‘Let’s go home, Mama will take you home.’ This poor old lady doted on her dog. I now became afraid, genuinely afraid. I remembered the girl, but she was way down the block. I began to run and the ground began to shake. I couldn’t feel it, but I knew that it did. Everybody looked afraid, they all looked terrible. One young lady simply sat on the sidewalk doubled up in a laughing fit and said over again: ‘It is the earthquake, it is the earthquake’, but I couldn’t recognise that anything had changed. And then it came, and how it came, like nothing in God’s world, like nothing. It was like the wailing of a siren, long and deep, or like the scream of a woman giving birth that I had heard as a child. It was terrible, it was as if a monster lifted up the sidewalk. One could feel it long before one could see it. The sidewalks were no longer solid. I looked at the cars, they blew their horns, they kept moving as if they were still not aware that something was happening. A small white car appeared, it was half the size of a baby and it rocketed from the centreline directly at the curb. The girl driving it simply sat there, she sat there and stared with open eyes, she couldn’t move. She whimpered like a little girl and she made strange noises. I observed her and I thought about the other girl. I told myself that it was just a dream and that I would wake up from it, but I didn’t wake up. The shaking had started again, but differently this time. A nice shaking, like the movement of a cradle, and then I saw it – it seemed as if the middle of the Boulevard was breaking in two. The concrete looked as if a huge shovel had lifted it upwards. It broke in two and this is why the car of the girl went out of control. This was followed by a loud noise, something I had never heard before, then hundreds of noises all at once. Children and women and these mad men with their earrings all seemed to move across the sidewalk. They were lifted up and water started to seep out of the ground, the screams, it was terrible. I woke up. I don’t want to have this dream ever again.” * * * “The dream returned the following night. It was like the first time and it was a preview, everything that I remember about it was that it was the end of the world. I was there again, directly amidst all this carnage. My eardrums felt as if they were about to burst. People fell down, some of them severely hurt. Pieces of building splintered off and flew through the air, one of them hit me hard at the side of my face, but I didn’t seem to feel it. I wanted to wake up in order to get away from this place. It had been fun at the beginning, in my first dream. I had some idea that I would dream about the end of the world or something similar, but this was terrible. Older people were in their cars, most of the children were in the street, but those old men screamed and bellowed as if somebody could help them. Nobody could help them. This is when I felt lifted up. I was now over the city. It tilted in the direction of the ocean like the folding of a picknick table. The buildings remained better intact as one would have imagined, they remained standing. The people near these building tried to hold onto them or to enter them. Everything around them broke to pieces, but they remained intact, they remained standing. I was now above them and I looked down. I started to encourage them by saying: “Hold on, hold on”. I wanted to spur them on, call out and scream at them. These particular buildings, the building along the Boulevard stayed intact, the girl with the two children might have been able to go inside one of
- 4 - them. It looked like this for a long time, three minutes, but three minutes seemed like an eternity. All of them tried to get inside. They would remain standing, one knew that they would remain standing even if the water would continue to rise – but they didn’t! I had never imagined before what it would be like to see a building die. A building is like a person, it will give in. Some of the larger ones did just that. They started to crumble, like an old man with the shakes who can no longer stand up. They disintegrated into nothing. The smaller buildings screamed like mad, louder and higher that the creaming of the people. They were mad with mortal fear, but the buildings did die. I could no longer look at the people. My desire to go higher and higher continued and I was lifted up to a point where I could see better. I seemed to be on top of the Big Bear Mountain near San Bernadino, but the strange thing about it was that I could see everywhere at once. I was aware of what was happening. The earth seemed to shake again. Even though I was high above it, I could feel it. It lasted maybe 12 seconds this time and it was gentle. One finds it hard to believe that something so gentle could cause such a lot of damage, but I saw the streets of Los Angeles and everything between Los Angeles and the San Bernadino Mountains tilt towards the ocean, houses and everything that was left. I could see the major highways, dozens of lanes that were still overwhelmed with cars, some sections had five lanes and all the cars went in the same direction. And then the ocean came and it moved like a giant snake across the land. I asked myself what time it was and even though I wasn’t on the Boulevard, I could see the clock, it was 4:29pm, half an hour had passed. I was glad that I could no longer hear the creaming, but that I was able to see everything. Then, like looking at a giant map of the world, I could see what was happening to the land and to the people. San Francisco felt it, but it was in no way like Hollywood and Los Angeles. I seemed to see that not only the Garlet-Fault, but also the San-Andreas Fault shook San Francisco. I could see how all the mountains came together, the Sierra Nevada, San Andreas and Garlet. I knew what was going to happen in San Francisco. It would tilt because of the Garlet Fault. It would be turned upside down. Because of the twisting, it happened very quickly. It seemed to happen a lot quicker than in Hollywood, but I was suddenly no longer there, I was far away from it. I closed my eyes for a long time. I guess it was for about ten minutes, and when I opened them again, I saw the Grand Canyon, as I looked at the Grand Canyon, the large gap closed. The Boulder Dam was lifted from underneath, it seemed as if a volcano with all its associated events was erupting from Nevada to Reno and all the way south to Baha California and Mexico, I saw the map of South America, Columbia was particularly effected by another severe volcanic eruption. Venezuela also seemed to have a few volcanic activities. I could see Japan in the far distance and it was lying on a fault line. It was so far away that I couldn’t see it clearly, because I was on top of the Big Bear Mountain, but Japan began to sink into the sea. I didn’t know how late it was at this point. The people looked like puppets, so far away that I couldn’t see them. It was all over in one or two minutes; it had passed and there was nobody left behind. I didn’t know how late it was, I didn’t have a watch. I tried to see the Hawaiian Islands; I could see huge tidal waves crash into the islands. The people in the streets got wet and they were startled, but I didn’t see anybody fall into the ocean. I saw further inundations around the globe. Is the world being drowned? Constantinople, the Black Sea rose, the Suez Canal seemed to dry up for some reason. Sicily couldn’t hold on. I could see the map, Mount Etna quivered, a large section of it seemed to slide away, but it seemed to be earlier or later. I didn’t know how late it was. England endured floods, but not due to a tidal wave. Water everywhere, but I did not see anyone disappear in the sea. The people there were absolutely
- 5 - frightened. At some places they fell on their knees and began to pray for the world. I didn’t know that the English were an emotional people, but all kinds of Churches in England, Ireland and Scotland were crowded with people day and night. People carried candles, everybody cried for California, Nevada, Colorado and Utah. All cried for California and many of them didn’t even know anybody in California. They cried as if the people there were their blood relatives, as if they were all part of one family, as if this had happened to themselves. The city of New York entered the picture. It was still there; nothing had happened there. The water levels were very high. Things were different here. People ran through the streets shouting: “The end of the world is here!” People entered restaurants and ate up everything they could get their hands on. I saw a shoe shop; all the shoes were stolen within 5 minutes. Everybody on 5th Avenue ran. A newsflash came through a loudspeaker informing them that the electricity might fail in a few minutes. They would have to look after themselves. Five girls ran to the CVJM, that place at Lexington or anywhere else, they ran as if they were frightened to death. Nothing happened in New York. An old lady filled trashcans with water, everyone was frightened to death and they all looked benumbed. The streets seemed to be full of loudspeakers, there was no daylight, it was night. I had another look the next day and found everything topsy turvy, loudspeakers once again sounded. Fuel tanks were broken in some area, oil was horded and people seemed to plunder the markets. I saw many places that looked as before and the people there were not frightened, particularly in the rural areas. Everything here seemed nearly as before, as if nothing had happened. People seemed to strive for these places, some on foot, some in cars, but some of them had run out of petrol. I heard or somehow knew, that land had appeared in the Atlantic Ocean, a lot of land. I became terribly tired and I wanted to wake up. I wanted to go back and look for that girl with the two children. I found myself once again in Hollywood. It was still 4:29pm. I was no longer on Big Bear Mountain. I found myself over Hollywood. I was simply here and this seemed completely natural in my dream. I could now hear a radio station and it blared out telling people not to panic. They died in the streets, there were films. There was a little man who should have been afraid, but he wasn’t. He said something about an aeroplane that was to fly over, but I knew that this wasn’t going to happen, because things also happened within the atmosphere. The ocean began to race towards the land, such waves, they were nightmarish waves. I once again saw the Bolder Dam, it rose up, folded inwards and broke to pieces. The Grand Canyon no longer existed; it had been pushed together. The Bolder Dam broke to pieces and all these radio stations announced it at the same time: The Bolder Dam has collapsed. I asked myself how the people in the East would get to hear about it when I saw hand radio operators (cellular phones). I spotted them in the most peculiar places and it was as if I was directly next to them. A little man with glasses said: ‘California speaking, we are sinking into the ocean, California speaking, we are sinking into the ocean. Run to the hills, run to the hills. All states in the West, this is California, we are moving towards the ocean.’ I could see him, he was towards the land, but the water had moved in, his hand grasped the table, he stood up so that he could say one more time: ‘California speaking, we are sinking into the ocean.’ I seemed to hear these words over again, the same words hour after hour. They continued with this until the end, all of them screamed: ‘Run for the mountains, California is sinking into the ocean.’ I woke up, but it didn’t feel that I had dreamt. I have never been so tired, for one or two minutes I thought that it had actually happened. I asked myself a couple of questions: I never found out what
- 6 - happened to the girl. I thought about it. I will go home tomorrow, it had only been a dream, nothing else, nobody will wear such earrings and beards on Hollywood Boulevard in the future. Nothing like this will ever happen. The girl with the two children was so real to me. It will not happen, but how could I tell her if it happens (she might not even have been born) move away from California if her twins were with her so that she is not on Hollywood Boulevard when it happens. She was so real. The other thing, the hand radio operators who held onto their sets and continuously repeated the same thing: ‘California speaking, we are sinking into the ocean, California speaking, we are sinking into the ocean, run for the mountains, run for the peaks, California, Colorado, Utah; California speaking, we are sinking into the ocean.’ I assume that I will hear these words for the rest of my life.” * * * * * * *
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