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As written by a student for his College Journalism Class, from interviews in February, 1995. Copyright � 1995 all rights reserved NOT FOR REPRINT OR DISTRIBUTION |
"Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in
Heaven."
From the Lord's Prayer.
"All Christians pray `Thy will be done.' The question is, do they
mean it?"
Glenn McClary, author of "THE LITTLE BOOK -- A Study of the
Visions and Prophecies of
the Coming of the Lord and End of the World."
Long curls of black and gray beard dangle above the
keyboard and
handwritten notes in front of him as Glenn McClary toils at his
vintage Royal
typewriter. Sturdy fingers with traces of dirt beneath the nails
wrest from it
words, then paragraphs and then pages of the book which has
consumed the writer's
life for 13 years.
It's a book he never planed to write, any more than he
planned much of
anything else in his life.
Armageddon, he knows, is a hard sell.
His legs, weary of being crossed and folded against the
floor under his
trim frame, protest after a couple of hours, and his fingers
stiffen from the
cold. He carefully sets the typewriter aside, stows away the
board and plastic
milk crates of his makeshift desk and stretches his limbs, then
rises. Parting
the front flap of his tent, he steps into a fragrant bed of
spring grass and
cherry blossoms carpeting the woods outside.
As usual, he is alone.
His gaze sweeps upward past the canopy of a triangle of
firs surrounding
his home as he studies the weather. Glenn decides the single
layer of longjohns
he wears beneath his weathered blue jeans, flannel shirt and
jacket will
suffice. Muffled by the trees, the relentless traffic noise on
Highway 99 West,
a short walk away, rises to a noxious crescendo as he sets off on
his rounds,
which typically take him 8 to 10 miles on foot.
Through winters and summers, darkness and light, he has
followed this
path since 1982, when he left his livelihood and Tigard apartment
behind.
Born in a tent on a snowy January midnight at the
portal of Yosemite
National Park in 1941, he is at home in the woods. His father
returned to the
laborers' camp each night after building roads in the Sierra
Nevada Mountains
for the Civilian Conservation Corps. The extended family of
"Okies" migrated
west the year before to pick produce. Poor but resourceful, they
gleaned the
fields after the harvest, caught shad by the tub full and brought
home wild
game from frequent hunting trips.
As central to Glenn's life as the outdoors were the
classes he attended
three times a week at the Church of Christ--a sect begun by John
and Alexander
Campbell--which took the Bible at its literal word. Learning the
Scripture well,
he discovered in himself an innate, unshakable belief in God and
His Word.
It was his duty, he was taught, to spread the good news of
God's
everlasting salvation for those who accept Him. The Lord would
return one
day--no one knew just when--to destroy Satan and welcome the
righteous to His
Kingdom of Heaven. Longing to serve his maker, the 10-year-old
sometimes
imagined himself shoveling ashes among the ruins scorched by the
brimstone he
was taught would lay in the wake of the final battle.
His appetite for knowledge wasn't confined to Bible
studies; disturbed
by the falsehoods he perceived in science texts and other books,
he spent hours
on end at the library, devouring the abbreviated information in
encyclopedias and
dictionaries.
His intensity took its toll. From the sheer exultation
which accompanied
such learning episodes the boy plunged into periods of deep,
inexplicable despair
for which he had nether name nor help from his parents.
His father, hardened by the white lightning and lean times
of his own
youth, restricted family contacts to those who sympathized with
his narrow
religious beliefs and need for control. He disciplined his four
boys--of which
Glenn was the first--often and severely, threatening to beat them
until the
blood ran down their legs. To Glenn's perplexity, his father
blamed him for
having driven a wedge between him and his wife.
Oppressed to the breaking point, the boy questioned his
own sanity at
times, occasionally fantasizing about suicide. Learning he could
enlist in the
Navy at 17, he quit high school and fled home in 1958, a year
after the Soviet
Union launched Sputnik, the first satellite to orbit earth.
Alarmed at Russia's head start into space and its own
vulnerability to
the nightmarish possibility of orbiting nuclear weapons, the U.S.
government
rushed to overtake its powerful foe. As space research
intensified, the young
sailor found himself an unwitting participant in experiments
stemming from the
Cold War.
Night faded to pale blue off the coast of American
Samoa in the South
Pacific
as some 300 sailors labored on the decks of the USS Point
Defiance. Stretching
to the horizon in all directions, the tranquil aquamarine sea lay
as smooth as
glass, except for ripples caused by a group of frogmen
inspecting an unfolding experiment.
Just below the surface three large missiles removed
earlier from deep in
the hold waited in special launchers.
Day was breaking as the water around the first rocket
churned into huge
plumes of steam. Hundreds of heads snapped upward as the missile
hurtled from
the surface into the brightening heavens trailing fire, thunder
and smoke.
The other two rockets followed.
Even from a respectful mile away, the spectacular power of
the event
awed the Point Defiance's crew. Uncertain of exactly what he'd
seen, it was
nonetheless clear it was a weapon, one designed to be concealed
beneath the waves and deliver destruction long-distance.
He later learned the rockets were prototypes for Polaris
missiles which,
armed with nuclear warheads, were installed on American
submarines patrolling
the world's oceans.
One thought haunted him that morning off Samoa: Mankind
had never developed
a weapon it hadn't used.
The prospect chilled him.
Discharged in Long Beach in 1962, Glenn settled in
Fresno, where he
dabbled in College typing and physics classes and began learning
the upholstery
trade. Returning to his hometown of Stockton, he met a woman at a
skating rink
and married her within a month. She soon gave birth to a son.
He spent the next few years perfecting his craft, buying a
home in
Manteca and adding twin daughters to his family. Yet, the nuclear
specter he'd
witnessed off Samoa and the darkness which plagued him as a boy
stalked him
still, deepening a growing emotional gulf between Glenn and his
wife.
Increasingly tormented by the prospect of nuclear war, he
studied the
predictions of noted clairvoyants Jean Dixon and Edgar Cayce.
Dismissing their
work as bankrupt, he turned once more to the Scripture.
There his worst fears were realized.
He saw the prophets' warnings echoed in events in the
Middle East and
Cold War. He grieved for his country, for the natural wonders and
millions upon
millions of people who, unaware, would be annihilated in the
coming holocaust.
But when, he implored God as the darkness swept over him
once more, when
will it come?
When?
Determined to protect his family from the inevitable
holocaust, Glenn
found new purpose. Abandoning his family to his studies each
night, he scoured
U.S. maps, plotting what he believed were the most likely targets
for Soviet
missile strikes. Pinpointing military installations, ports,
airports, highway
and rail junctions, state capitals and industrial centers, with a
red pen he
drew circles around them to distinguish the destruction from the
safe areas.
The resulting scrawl of red ink repelled him.
He decided to move his family out of the path of
devastation. The lush
greenery of the Northwest had impressed him when the USS Point
Defiance paid a
call to the Seattle area, and, noting the absence of nuclear
targets in western
Oregon, he began making preparations to move.
His wife, however, refused to go.
By the early 1970's his life had careened into a maelstrom
of emotional
highs and lows, from the outer fringes of which his wife and
children bore mute
witness. Weary of her husband's neglect and the incessant
turmoil, his wife asked
him to move out in 1972. Perplexed and devastated by his failure
as a husband
and father, he turned his back on God, whom he held responsible, and
descended into
the darkness once more.
He discovered in the group counseling he entered after his
divorce that
it at least had a name--manic depression--as well as countless
other victims.
More importantly, he learned to deal with it by keeping busy,
rather than
anesthetizing himself with drugs, television and sleep. He
realized as well, the
seriousness of his emotional problems precluded any possibility
of salvaging his
family.
Eventually he moved to San Francisco, where he became
involved with another
woman. Together they moved to Oregon in 1977. Soon after the
couple arrived in
Beaverton, the relationship ended, its end hastened by the same
darkness which
ended his marriage. He became convinced God was punishing him.
Beseeching his
maker, Glenn came to understand that when he had turned away from
God, so had
God, as a disciplining parent, turned away from him.
While working at one of a series of upholstering jobs
in the Beaverton
and Tigard area, Glenn resumed his Bible studies with new
purpose. He felt driven
to penetrate the veil of Biblical metaphors which he was
convinced would reveal
when the nuclear war would occur, heralding Judgment Day and the
end of the world.
The answer, he knew, wasn't available elsewhere; the
clairvoyants had
proven a dead end, and the Church of Christ, which taught the
major prophecies
had already been fulfilled, was tragically mistaken. He had
learned as a child
what others taught about Bible prophecy, and he was devastated
when his studies
revealed they all contradicted the Scripture -- and each other --
in
some way.
With a clarity equal to his renewed faith in God, he
understood finally,
it was up to him to unravel the mystery.
As usual, he was alone.
As his notes begat pages of notes, so his Bible
multiplied into two,
then five and six, with Concordances and Dictionaries.
Time after time he worked into the early morning at his
desk, reading and
rereading and cross-checking passages. Notes filled the margins
of his Bibles,
and pages upon pages were dashed red with underlined passages.
Prophets major
and minor, he found, wrote of similar events linked to the end
time and the
second coming, but the absence of a discernible sequence was
baffling.
As the answers he so desperately sought eluded him,
depression overwhelmed
him once more, draining him of all but the will to live.
Sometimes he escaped
by reading science fiction, playing chess or building model
rockets and airplanes.
Alone in the rear of the upholstery shop, he went about
his trade, measuring,
cutting, fitting and securing fabric to furniture; his restless
mind, however,
remained fixed on his real work.
One night, as cars whizzed by his Beaverton apartment near
the corner of
Hall and Allen, Glenn meditated at length on a line from the Book
of Daniel:
"I read in books the number of the years." The Books, he was
positive, referred
to the Prophets, the timing of whose events still mystified
him.
Exhausted, he knelt and acknowledged his sins to God, and
prayed for
understanding.
Daylight streamed through the windows when he returned to
his notes from
the previous night.
Reviewing his most recent work, it was as if he were
seeing through clear
eyes. Of course! he saw suddenly. Comprehension surged through
him like electricity.
The events the Apostle John described in Revelation weren't
necessarily sequential;
some paralleled each other in time. Many events happened
simultaneously.
It was right there in front of him.
"When ye see all these things, know that it is near, even
at the very
door . . . truly I say unto you, this generation shall not pass,
till all these
things be fulfilled." Matthew 24:32-34.
Given his new perspective, the answers he sought fell
into place like
so many dominoes. Twice he ran into roadblocks, and twice more he
knelt and
begged for understanding. Twice more he awoke to new
understanding.
However, as the joy of discovery faded, he realized his
real work had
just begun. Having determined a nuclear holocaust would, in fact,
occur within
this generation, he agonized over the fates of people suffocating
in the
superficial world he'd left behind.
He wasn't intent on saving souls; that was other's
business. However, if
he could prove to those willing to listen that the world would
end within their
lifetime, they might be able to make the most of whatever time
remained. It was
a message of hope, he believed, a wake-up call; although he
understood Armageddon
is a hard sell.
And so, fortified with certainty and purpose, Glenn began
dismantling the
wall he'd erected between himself and the society with which he's
so long been
out of step.
At bus stops, at the library, in the park or the store,
wherever he
happened on his daily rounds, he prospected for open minds. His
dignity and
intelligence belied the stereotype of a zealous Jesus freak and
disarmed people
with whom he struck up conversations; some listened, even
becoming friends.
But time was precious and the world teemed with the
unsuspecting; a more
efficient presentation was necessary. By 1982 he had diagrammed
his findings
into a timeline on a long rectangle of paper.
While it got the point across, the chart proved
cumbersome. So Glenn
continued tinkering with his approach. Finding a gold necklace by
the road one
day, he hocked it for $40, using the cash to have a 40-page
summary of his
findings typed into a handout with which to prospect.
His employers, meanwhile, were less and less forgiving of
his
eccentricity, and something had to give. If he were to continue
serving Him,
he told God one day in 1982, then God should be willing to
provide for him. The
next day, he collected his backpack, sleeping bag and tent, left
his Tigard
apartment and walked into the woods off Highway 99 West. There,
between King
City and Tigard's Summerfield retirement community, he pitched
his tent and
established the first of his camps in the area.
Free to devote himself full time to his real work,
Glenn spent the
next couple years refining his notes on his used Royal as he
continued his
search for open minds. As the notes expanded in volume and
clarity, he realized
that only by introducing the message in the form of a book, with
cover, table
of contents and index--the whole package--could he reach people
with an
acceptable presentation.
A longtime regular, Glenn literally was first in line
when, in 1990,
the Tigard Public Library made personal computers available to
its patrons.
Intelligent, quiet and gracious, he was a pleasant and respected
presence. Each
day he made the brisk 40-minute hike, stopping in the restroom to
peel off a
layer or two of long underwear in winter so he wouldn't roast in
the library's
warmth. He tugged them back on before leaving, ready once more to
face the cold.
The pace of his work accelerated as he placed the text on
floppy disks.
Sealing them meticulously in layers of plastic bags, he ferried
them back and
forth from his tent. When the computers were occupied, he
studied, teaching
himself different software programs and a programming
language.
To compensate for his lack of writing experience, he
attempted to emulate
the prose of British author C.S. Lewis, whose concise style he
reveres. He was
influenced as well by Henry David Thoreau, and Abraham Lincoln's
"Gettysburg
Address."
Lacking the money to pay professional editors or
proofreaders, he spent
several years trimming the manuscript from 600 pages to 300, and
ultimately to
two-thirds of that. By the fall of 1993, He had completed the
book.
Cutting a deal with a local printer, he had the text
printed as a
spiral-bound, softcover volume called "THE LITTLE BOOK -- A Study
of the
Visions and Prophecies of the Coming of the Lord and End of the
World."
Package in hand, he struck agreements with Books, Etc., a south
Tigard
Bookseller, and McCann's Pharmacy in King City, and his book was
on the
rack.
There was neither time nor reason to celebrate, however;
the writer
is a mere messenger. His name doesn't even appear on the book's
cover.
On an unseasonably warm February afternoon,
receptionist Robin Franz
greets Glenn as he pays a visit to King City City Hall. Tied to a
wooden railing
outside the plate glass front door, his German shepherd, Sonny,
barks loudly,
indignant at even this brief separation.
Scolding the dog in vain, Glenn's narrow, weathered face
stretches into
a sheepish grin as he turns back to Robin.
"He's spoiled," Glenn says apologetically, drawing a soft
laugh from her.
"You always say that," She replies.
Alerted by the sharp bark outside, dog lovers materialize
from elsewhere
in the building to fuss over Sonny and make friendly small talk
with his owner.
Glenn sheds his backpack and produces copies of his book,
one of which
he offers to Robin for $10, a sizable discount from the store
price. He accepts
her polite refusal graciously.
After some more friendly chatter, Glenn replaces the books
in his pack,
slings it back in place, says goodbye, and continues on his
rounds with Sonny.
He has a long day ahead of him.
Armageddon, he knows, is a hard sell.
Since this was written, Sonny has adopted a woman with two
children.
He does guard duty, and is attempting to raise the kids to be
upstanding members
of the pack.
Alone as usual, Glenn still lives in a tent in the woods
between King
City and Tigard, and continues to make his daily rounds searching
for open minds.
