These tiny slayers of man
I have ended up as a pauper, but I achieved the impossible and would do it again
The June 1931 issue of Popular Science features page after page of blurbs about breakthrough technologies. There are massive x-ray tubes designed to radiate cancer and a car covered in balloons that fords rivers. A large light mounted to the back of a truck projects advertisements into the clouds, and another on a cane helps its vision impaired owner find a keyhole in the dark.
Two pages near the end are devoted to another scientific discovery, flanked on either side by ads for Wrigley’s spearmint gum, gold leaf and “men wanted” listings. Its author describes a visit to a San Diego laboratory, seated in darkness among doctors and lab workers. A spherical object appears on the projector screen in front, described as a “gray indoor baseball.” Inside, small objects drift back and forth.
“The spore of the bacterium that causes lockjaw,” a man calls out over the PA. “Watch it!” The voice of god belongs to Roman Rife, a “pioneer in making motion pictures of the microscopically small.” The author of the piece describes the man with great wonder, the head of a one-man movie studio churning out his own pre-code films exclusively set in an unfamiliar world populated by dangerous monsters.
His mini movies feature hookworms, typhus and other bodily invaders, each narrated by Rife in a kind of news reel format. He offers up incredible factoids throughout. “If a man could move proportionately fast,” he says of some on-screen germs, “he could travel on his own feet more than five hundred miles an hour.”
The motive for his work, in part, is an attempt to determine the impact of forces like x-rays and ultraviolet light on the harmful microbes. A green light shows promise with lockjaw, which he’s quick to document in a reel. The article, however, ends with a warning. It’s a word of caution not to get ahead of oneself with regard to these microscopic wonders.
“Rife has devised a magnetic compass so delicate that it can be used to study the electricity and magnetism in living germs,” the writer notes. “He suggests that if the electrical make-up of certain dangerous germs is learned, it may someday be possible to destroy them in the human body by applying small doses of electricity. In no way, however, Rife makes clear, does this idea uphold the claims of medical fakers that they can cure disease by applying electrical ‘vibrations’ to the body of a patient.”
The Smithsonian Institute offered another glowing evaluation of Rife, this time focused on his work with the microscopes themselves. “Dr. Royal Raymond Rife of San Diego, Calif., who, for many years, has built and worked with light microscopes which far surpass the theoretical limitations of the ordinary variety of instrument,” the report explains, “all the Rife scopes possessing superior ability to attain high magnification with accompanying high resolution.”
His humble backstory likely contributed to the growing fascination around his work. Prior to this life, Rife was employed as a chauffeur. He was tasking with watching a half-dozen luxury vehicles owned by a “widely known” physician. It was this employer who would eventually convince him to pursue the world of microscopy that soon became his life’s focus.
By the end of the 30s, the attention paid to Rife’s work began to shift. The San Diego Evening Tribune described another aspect of the microscopic world that had become his focus,
Just what this Ray does to the organisms to devitalize them is not yet known. Because each organism requires a different wave length, it may be that whatever befalls these tiny slayers of man is something similar to the phenomenon occurring when the musical tuning fork is set in vibration by sound waves emanating from another fork struck nearby […] When the ray is directed upon them, they are seen to behave very curiously; some kinds do literally disintegrate, and others writhe as if in agony.
Such coverage piqued the interest of Southern California MD Milbank Johnson, who sought to test “Rife’s Ray” on real patients. The Frequency Instrument was built around a "Mortal Oscillatory Rate," which vibrated the microbes to the point of destruction. “A tube lights up and three minutes later the treatment is completed,” Rife said of the light socket-powered invention. “The virus or bacteria is destroyed and the body then recovers itself naturally from the toxic effect of the virus or bacteria. Several diseases may be treated simultaneously.”
Johnson’s work with the system was laser focused on cancer. He pursued grants for Rife’s work, responding with angry frustration when they failed to materialize.
"You and we are seeking to conquer this horrible human curse,” he wrote to one unresponsive party. “I realize that the general acceptance of our views will completely revolutionize present concepts concerning the causes of many diseases besides cancer. Therefore, the greatest care must be taken in each step if we are to avoid at least some of the tremendous antagonisms which always greet new ideas.”
Both men would ultimately stop short of claiming to have discovered a cure for cancer. Johnson noted that results were “not conclusive,” and in at least one case, sent a patient to a separate clinic in order to have the effected body part removed to stop its spread. Further research found no evidence that the systems were an effective treatment for cancer. The American Medical Association condemned the use of the Frequency Instrument, and the once celebrated inventor became a pariah.
Rife lived the final decades of his life on the fringes of the medical world. "Having spent every dime I earned in my research for the benefit of mankind,” he noted in a court document in his final years, “I have ended up as a pauper, but I achieved the impossible and would do it again.”
A decade after his death, Rife’s work became the subject of medical conspiracy, claiming that the American Medical Association had suppressed breakthrough work for nefarious purposes. After the 1987 publication of the book The Cancer Cure That Worked, machines bearing Rife’s name surged in popularity in alternative medical communities, adding diseases like AIDS to the laundry list of conditions the Mortal Oscillatory Rate could eradicate. Facilities cropped up making bold health claims for the technology, and some where ultimately prosecuted for health fraud.
“You are a menace and a threat to society," a judge noted in one such case. "Your sales strategy targeted the most vulnerable people, including those suffering from terminal disease […] It is especially cruel because, in many instances, it proved false hope to people who had no hope."
The American Cancer Society offered a similar assessment in its own study. “The theories and speculations of the proponents of electronic medicine may be interesting and imaginative,” the organization wrote, “but responsible health care providers and government regulators demand that the diagnosis and treatment of cancer be based on more than fanciful ideas.”
Sources:
Annual report of the Board of Regents of the Smithsonian Institution 1944 https://library.si.edu/digital-library/book/annualreportofbo1944smit
Popular Science June 1931
Scientific Genius Dies; Saw Work Discredited https://rifevideos.com/scientific_genius_dies_saw_work_discredited.html
Questionable methods of cancer management: Electronic devices https://acsjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.3322/canjclin.44.2.115
Dr Rife's oscillating beam ray https://www.theguardian.com/science/2003/apr/03/research.science1
The Cancer Cure That Worked by Barry Lynes