--- aliases: - Andrija Puharich - Henry Karel Puharich - Henry Puharich born: 1918-02-19 category: Key Figures created: 2026-05-15 died: 1995-01-03 location: Chicago, Illinois summary: Physician and parapsychologist who lectured the Pentagon on ESP in psychological warfare in 1952, founded the Round Table Foundation, and brought Uri Geller to Stanford Research Institute in 1972. tags: - Person - Parapsychology - CIA - MKULTRA - PSI - UriGeller - SRI - RoundTableFoundation - 1950s - 1960s - 1970s title: Andrija Puharich updated: 2026-10-03 --- Henry Karel "Andrija" Puharich (1918-1995) was a prominent American physician, research scientist, and parapsychologist who became a central figure in the [U.S. government](/organizations/us-government/)'s investigations into [ESP](/concepts/extrasensory-perception/) and [PK](/concepts/psychokinesis/) during the [Cold War](/concepts/cold-war/). His lifelong quest to understand the nature of consciousness and anomalous mental phenomena led him to explore the intersection of science, mysticism, and the supernatural[^1]. Born in [Chicago](/places/chicago/) on February 19, 1918, to poor Yugoslavian immigrants, Puharich had an early experience that shaped his future. As a milk delivery boy, he claimed to have calmed a vicious dog by sending "feelings of calmness and peace," leading him to believe in [mind-to-mind telepathy](/concepts/telepathy/) and inspiring him to pursue medicine to understand the biological basis of such phenomena[^1]. He excelled academically, attending Northwestern University for philosophy and premedical studies before entering medical school. During his studies, he deeply contemplated the nature of the mind and consciousness, stating, "Understanding the nature of man’s consciousness... is my lifelong quest"[^1]. After completing his medical degree in 1947, Puharich worked with leading physicians, including his mentor, Dr. Andrew C. Ivy. During his residency at the Permanente Research Foundation, he formulated the Puharich Theory, which posited an unknown energy force linking the brain and nervous system to cells, with instructions flowing between them as "dynamics." He believed this energy radiated on the electromagnetic spectrum but was beyond current measurement technology. His theory gained traction when Lloyd H. Beck and Walter S. Miles of Yale University reported that the olfactory nerve of a bee radiated energy in the infrared spectrum[^1]. Inspired by microbiologist Paul De Kruif, who warned him to "Beware the Establishment!"[^1], Puharich began lecturing on his ideas, merging philosophy, mysticism, and science. This attracted wealthy benefactors, notably Joyce Borden Balokovic and Zlatko Balokovic, and later [Alice Astor Bouverie](/people/alice-astor-bouverie/) and [Marcella Miller du Pont](/people/marcella-miller-du-pont/). With their financial backing, Puharich established the [Round Table Foundation](/organizations/round-table-foundation/) in Glen Cove, Maine, in 1949. The foundation, named in homage to King Arthur, aimed to conduct experiments on ESP and related phenomena[^1]. The Warrenton Estate, Puharich's home and laboratory, became the center of his research. Here, he conducted experiments on audio waves and human hearing, collaborating with ear surgeon Samuel Rosen, whose accidental discovery of the "Rosen stapes" operation brought prestige and grants to the foundation[^1]. Puharich's mystical beliefs deepened through his mentorship with John Hays Hammond Jr., a wealthy inventor and ESP advocate. Hammond, influenced by Nikola Tesla, believed scientific inspiration could come from an unknown energy force in dreams. Together, they built a [Faraday Cage](/concepts/faraday-cage/) to test ESP on [ELF waves](/concepts/extremely-low-frequency-elf-waves/). Their "Project I" involved psychics like [Eileen Garrett](/people/eileen-garrett/), whose ESP abilities reportedly increased inside the cage[^1]. Puharich also investigated audio aberrations, collaborating with Warren S. McCulloch, a cybernetics founder and [Central Intelligence Agency](/organizations/central-intelligence-agency/) asset. They discovered that a machinist hearing voices was actually picking up radio signals due to carborundum dust on his dental fillings, a finding that garnered attention from *[The New York Times](/organizations/new-york-times/)* and the [U.S. Navy](/organizations/us-navy/)[^1]. Puharich's work caught the attention of the [Pentagon](/organizations/pentagon/). In 1952, Lieutenant Colonel John B. Stanley of the [U.S. Army](/organizations/us-army/)'s Office of the Chief of Psychological Warfare, who also served as an Army liaison to the CIA, met with Puharich. This led to Puharich delivering classified briefings and being recalled to military service in March 1953, where he worked at the U.S. Army Chemical Center in Edgewood, Maryland[^1]. His task was to find a drug that could enhance ESP, mirroring the Central Intelligence Agency's quest for a truth serum[^1]. During this period, Puharich became obsessed with the hallucinogenic mushroom *teonanáctl* (God's flesh), after Alice Astor Bouverie informed him of [Harry Stump](/people/harry-stump/)'s channeling of an "Egyptian persona" that spoke of such a drug. Puharich learned of [R. Gordon Wasson](/people/r-gordon-wasson/)'s expeditions to [Mexico](/places/mexico/) in search of the mushroom and briefed his Army superiors on it[^1]. However, the CIA, through [James Moore](/people/james-moore/), bypassed Puharich and approached Wasson directly, leading to Puharich being sidelined from the [MKULTRA Subproject 58](/programs/project-mkultra/)[^1]. Puharich's personal life suffered during his Army service. His wife, Jinny, battled severe depression and underwent insulin shock therapy. After their divorce, Jinny died by suicide in 1959[^1]. Puharich later married [Bep Hermans](/people/bep-hermans/). Upon his return to civilian life in 1955, Puharich continued his research at the Round Table Foundation. He experimented with *teonanáctl* on himself and others, including Harry Stump, with [Aldous Huxley](/people/aldous-huxley/) as a witness. While the experiments did not yield the divinatory powers Puharich hoped for in Stump, they highlighted the ethical complexities of his research[^1]. After the death of Alice Astor Bouverie, a key financial supporter, and growing paranoia about CIA interest in his research, Puharich and [Peter Hurkos](/people/peter-hurkos/) traveled to Mexico in search of more mushrooms. The Round Table Foundation eventually closed in 1957[^1]. Puharich continued to work on secret government contracts, including for [NASA](/organizations/nasa/) and the Air Force Systems Command, exploring concepts like "skin reading" - the idea that the skin could function as an organ of sensory communication beyond touch. He demonstrated this with deaf individuals, convincing Paul S. Henshaw of the [Atomic Energy Commission](/organizations/atomic-energy-commission/) of its legitimacy[^1]. His interests also extended to psychic healing, leading him to [Brazil](/places/brazil/) to study [Arigo](/people/arigo/), a healer who reportedly performed surgeries with a pocketknife. Puharich documented Arigo's work, hoping to secure military interest in "psychic healing on the battlefield," though without success[^1]. In 1970, Puharich met [Itzhak Bentov](/people/itzhak-bentov/), who introduced him to [Uri Geller](/people/uri-geller/), an [Israeli](/places/israel/) with extraordinary psychokinetic and telepathic abilities. Puharich became obsessed with Geller, believing he could secure a government research contract if he could test him under laboratory conditions. His efforts led to Geller being tested by the Central Intelligence Agency at [Stanford Research Institute](/organizations/stanford-research-institute/) (SRI), though the CIA viewed Puharich as a "potential liability"[^1]. Puharich acted as Geller's official manager, often involving the press, which complicated the CIA's desire for secrecy[^1]. Throughout his life, Puharich maintained a theory that extraterrestrials were trying to send messages to humans through psychic people, and that ELF waves were responsible for the sicknesses of the age[^1]. Andrija Puharich died tragically in 1995, alone and impoverished, under threat of eviction from the estate of his last benefactor, R. J. Reynolds. He was 76 and suffering from dementia, kidney failure, and gangrene[^1]. The CIA's own history of its interest in parapsychology, written in 1977, began with Puharich: "in 1952 the [Department of Defense](/organizations/department-of-defense/) was lectured on the possible usefulness of extrasensory perception in psychological warfare," citing his paper "On the Possible Usefulness of Extrasensory Perception in Psychological Warfare" to a Pentagon conference of that year, which "induced one of the earliest U.S. Government parapsychology investigations" when the chief of the [Technical Services Division](/organizations/office-of-technical-service/) commissioned a review from Stephen Abrams of the parapsychology laboratory at Oxford. In January 1973 an officer of the [Office of Research and Development](/organizations/office-of-research-and-development-cia/), reviewing the SRI film of Uri Geller, wrote that "Geller's connections with Dr. A. Puharich, with whom many unsavory reports have been linked, also is disturbing."[^2] ### Round Table Foundation in CIA Records A questionnaire submitted in 1952 by the Select Committee of the House of Representatives created by House Resolution 561, Eighty-second Congress, Second Session, to investigate tax-exempt foundations and comparable organizations (the Cox Committee) is held in CIA records as a 78-page copy approved for release on December 5, 2001. The foundation address list in the questionnaire includes "Round Table Foundation," Glen Cove, Maine, between the Religious Education Foundation and the Rubicon Foundation.[^3] ### Round Table Foundation in the Maine Press, 1949 The Portland Press Herald (Sunday Telegram section) of January 9, 1949 carried a staff-written story by Jim Moore, datelined Camden, headed "Secrets Of Life." It reported that Dr. Henry K. Puharich, a Chicago physician then about thirty, with his wife Virginia (born Jackson) and their daughter Svetlana, aged eighteen months, had settled at Camden, near Zlatko Balokovic and his wife, and had set up the "Round Table Foundation Laboratory of experimental electrobiology" in a converted barn on the Bald Mountain retreat. The story gave his schooling as a bachelor's degree in philosophy and a medical degree from Northwestern University, followed by a rotating internship at Permanente Hospital in Oakland, California, and described Mrs. Puharich as a former Office of War Information editor and Northwestern laboratory assistant. It stated his theory, which it said he had presented in 1946 to a zoology seminar at the [University of California](/organizations/university-of-california/) and to the Society of Junior Fellows at [Harvard](/organizations/harvard-university/), that nerve units radiate and receive energy waves, with the "plasma membrane" acting as a piezo-electric crystal that behaves as a radio receiver and transmitter. The story added that the theory might explain the microphonics of the ear and might account for mental telepathy by electronic equipment "which may not yet be developed," and that his crystal work was done with Dr. Raymond C. Tibbetts of Camden.[^4] ### Reference in the Scott Jones papers The finding aid of the C. B. "Scott" Jones papers at the University of Colorado Boulder lists, in Series 6 ("Special Assistant to [Senator Claiborne Pell](/people/claiborne-pell/)"), under Reports and organizations, a file titled "National Science Foundation: Andrija Puharich reports and correspondence." The saved container tree gives the title only, without dates or box number.[^5] [^1]: Jacobsen, Annie. *Phenomena: The Secret History of the U.S. Government's Investigations into Extrasensory Perception and Psychokinesis*. Little, Brown and Company, 2017. [^2]: Kress, Kenneth A. "Parapsychology in Intelligence: A Personal Review and Conclusions," *Studies in Intelligence,* vol. 21, no. 4, winter 1977, declassified. Central Intelligence Agency, Office of Research and Development, memorandum ORD-413-73, "Briefing by Stanford Research Institute," January 24, 1973, CIA-RDP96-00787R000400070029-2. Read in the archive.org mirror of the CIA FOIA Reading Room STARGATE collection. [^3]: "Questionnaire submitted by the Select Committee of the House of Representatives of the Congress of the United States, created by House Resolution 561, Eighty-second Congress, Second Session, to investigate tax-exempt foundations and comparable organizations," CIA-RDP91-00682R000300080029-3, CIA Reading Room, https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/document/cia-rdp91-00682r000300080029-3. The document page carries OCR text only; the PDF has no text layer, and the foundation name is read from that OCR. [^4]: Jim Moore, "Secrets Of Life," *Portland Press Herald* (Portland, Me.), January 9, 1949, p. 61, https://www.newspapers.com/image/848421406/. [^5]: University of Colorado Boulder Libraries, Rare and Distinctive Collections, collection COU:4004 (the C. B. 'Scott' Jones papers), ArchivesSpace resource 346, https://archives.colorado.edu/repositories/2/resources/346, container tree for Series 6, fetched October 3, 2026 from the vault owner's browser.