Associate Warden's Record Card for Wilhelm Reich, Lewisburg Federal Penitentiary, March 1957
photograph · 1957
LINK
SUMMARY
A U.S. federal prison intake/record card for Wilhelm Reich at the Lewisburg, Pennsylvania federal penitentiary, dated March 1957 (the month of his transfer there following his criminal contempt conviction). Metadata read directly from the Commons imageinfo API: Artist 'Prison employee,' license 'Public domain,' categorized 'PD US Government.' The Commons credit line cites Antonin Svoboda's 2009 documentary 'Wer Hat Angst vor Wilhelm Reich?' ('Who's Afraid of Wilhelm Reich?') as the source through which the card became publicly available. Used as a disconfirmation-stage artifact documenting the imprisonment itself.
NOTES
A federal prison record card for Wilhelm Reich from Lewisburg Federal Penitentiary, dated March 1957, the month he was transferred there after his criminal contempt conviction for defying the 1954 FDA injunction. Rights (public domain, U.S. government record) read directly from the Commons imageinfo API. Used as an artifact documenting the disconfirmation stage: the case ended not in a retraction of the orgone theory but in Reich’s imprisonment and, within the year, his death in custody.