Theosophy Cultural Perspectives
Kenneth Small and Robert Ray -- USA
Revisiting Visionary Utopia - Katherine Tingley’s Lomaland
Kenneth Small and Robert Ray
Introduction - Kenneth Small
A series of serendipitous connections brought me to collaborate with Robert Ray, head of the Special Collections Library at San Diego State University (retired 2021), which resulted in ongoing exhibits centered on the Lomaland Theosophical Community beginning in 2016 through the spring of 2020. I was introduced to Robert Ray by Prof. Rebecca Moore, then chair of the religious studies department at SDSU in 2015. This opened a period of collaboration and great creative effort on the part of special collections centered on the Lomaland community. The scope of our Lomaland and theosophical archive focused on the historical period from 1897-1942. Our extensive archival resources on the post 1942 Lomaland history, later theosophical resource materials and correspondence, theosophical and perennialism studies etc were viewed as outside the scope of these initial projects and maintained separately. Robert Ray and I decided to keep as a primary focus the culture of the Lomaland community and its creativity, values and internal culture and community/global influence. The Lomaland community’s events and Katherine Tingley’s more detailed, rather complex specific history, we felt would come in future exhibits, studies and presentations and outside the scope of these initial cultural overview exhibits and presentations. During the time period of these two exhibits, we hosted lectures by a variety of scholars, including Massimo Introvigne on Lomaland symbolist/visionary artist Reginald Machell; Dwayne Little, PhD, professor emeritus Point Loma Nazarene College on Katherine Tingley and Lomaland; Riain Ross-Hager on Lomaland resident and Welsh poet, Kenneth Morris; Kenneth Small on Raja Yoga Education, Art, Drama and Literature at Lomaland etc. It is our view that this broader understanding of Lomaland’s daily life, cultural and theosophical core values and ideals, sets the necessary stage for future more detailed examinations and presentations.