Timothy Leary's Reading Glasses

Timothy Leary's Reading Glasses
Type	Reading glasses
Effects	Real: Induce vivid psychedelic hallucinations Replica: Psychedelic vision, perception of advertisements and hidden messages and objects
Source	Timothy Leary (real) James MacPherson (replica)
Danger	Low
Activation	Wearing
First Appearance	"MacPherson" (replica debut; real mentioned) "For The Team" (real debut)
Last Appearance	"For The Team"

Dr. Leary experimented with a lot of different ways of seeing beyond what our brains are capable of seeing.

History

These psychedelic sight enhancers first appear, after a fashion, in "MacPherson", although Artie states that James has duplicated the original Dr. Leary item. 

In "For the Team", Pete is ordered by Mrs. Frederic to not go on anymore missions for a while until they're sure the effects of the Telegraph from Oman have worn off on him. Bored, Pete tries to make doing paper work more fun by wearing the glasses. 

Effects

Real

Wearing the glasses causes the wearer to have vivid hallucinations and you never want to take them off after you put them on according to Artie. 

The glasses definitely make the world a less boring place, superimposing, multiplying and often garishly coloring images, as well as, at least in the case of the MacPherson variant, frequently adding a soundtrack to the moment.

Replica

An improvement on the original (made by Timothy Leary), as these glasses do not impede free will. MacPherson used them to hide objects on a higher spectrum so that only those who had copies of the glasses could see what he wanted hidden. MacPherson also used them as a form of catalog for the artifacts he was selling on the black market. When the glasses are worn, the wearer can see the date, time, and location of the place where MacPherson is selling his stolen artifacts printed on the glasses case.

Artie, Pete and Myka found them and discovered the information about the auction in MacPherson.

Real World Connection

Timothy Leary was an American psychologist and writer, known for his advocacy of psychedelic drugs. Leary believed LSD showed therapeutic potential for use in psychiatry patients. In his infamous Good Friday experiment, he

October 22, 1920-May 31, 1996

took two groups of people and gave one group a psychedelic mushroom compound while giving the other group a placebo, them believeing that it was a psychedelic drug. Almost all of the members of the experimental group reported experiencing profound religious experiences, providing empirical support for the notion that psychedelic drugs can cause religious experiences. One of the participants in the experiment was a religious scholar, Huston Smith, who would become an author of several textbooks on comparative religion. He later described his experience as "the most powerful cosmic homecoming I have ever experienced". During the 1960s and 1970s, Leary was arrested often enough to see the inside of 29 different prisons worldwide. President Richard Nixon once described Leary as "the most dangerous man in America".

Trivia

• The prop used for both the real and replica glasses are the personal glasses of executive producer Jack Kenny.
• The real glasses were collected in 1969, presumably in August. The 55th annual Agents' Retreat, held August 15-18 and themed around them to celebrate their collection, was dubbed the "Summer of Leary", and coincided with Woodstock.

Gallery

Appearances

• "MacPherson" (replica)
• "For The Team" (real)