THE DETROIT FREE PRESS

Detroit, Michigan, U.S.A.

21 December 1922

(page 3)

YOUNG HINDOO ATTACKS O.T.O.

Ryerson’s Former Secretary Says

He Learned Much of “Love Cult.”

As secretary for three weeks to Albert W. Ryerson, alleged Detroit head of the O.T.O. love cult, and at present defendant in a divorce suit instituted by his 18-year-old wife, Mazie Mitchell Ryerson, Maneck Anklesaria, youthful native of Bombay, learned much of the “mysticism” and purports of the local “love” chapter.

A senior student in the University of Detroit, Anklesaria, Wednesday night, told a Free Press reporter of his impressions of the love cult, a chapter of which was alleged to have been organized in Detroit about four years ago. Filing of the Ryerson divorce bill 10 days ago is expected to result in sensational exposures of the inner working of the cult, should the girl-wife’s suit be contested by her middle-aged husband.

Sought Journalistic Education.

“I first met Ryerson in October, 1920, a few weeks after I arrived in Detroit from India,” said Anklesaria. “At that time I was 20 years old. I had come to America to seek a journalistic education.

“A month after meeting Ryerson, he and a Dr. Freeborn whom I later learned was a stockholder in the Universal Book Stores, Inc., which Ryerson had organized, induced me to lecture on various phases of Orientalism and Hindu philosophy. I lectured twice each week in the store in the Ryerson building. There were never fewer than 50 persons attending the lectures and more often more than a hundred, both men and women.

“In these lectures, which lasted several weeks in the latter part of 1920, I dealt only in the mythologies and religions of the Orient. No particular class of people attended them, as far as I could determine.

Soon Left Him.

“About this time, Ryerson asked me if I would make my home in his apartment and act as his secretary. At that time, Mrs. Bertha Bruce was his housekeeper and attended to minor business affairs for him. I assented to his request but left three weeks later because of personal reasons.

Asked if Ryerson had spoken of Aleister Crowley, alleged “high priest” of the O.T.O., while he was employed as secretary, Anklesaria declared he was told by his employer that Crowley had organized and was head of the love cult in Sicily and that he assisted in the organization in Detroit of a chapter of the order in the latter part of 1918.

“At the conclusion of my lectures, Ryerson often engaged various individuals attending them in subjects of an Oriental and historical nature. He spoke fluently of the different pagan and occult beliefs and seemed to be completely absorbed in discussions of such.

He Admits Warning.

“Meanwhile, I had been informed to some extent of certain alleged activities of the O.T.O. and had been warned by a friend not to seriously accept the messages of the cult. This advice I heeded.”

Anklesaria said he first met the present Mrs. Ryerson in July 1922, as a guest in Ryerson’s boulevard home while on vacation from the University of Michigan. He said that at that time Ryerson had taken out guardianship papers for the girl and that he always introduced her in public as his daughter.