In 1949 a man from Florida, then 75 years old, who told of several precognitive dreams in times past which served him as warnings against such dangers as drownings, fire or other accidents, wrote of his most recent one.

"In August of 1945, my wife and I drove to New Jersey where some of our children were then living.

"About daylight on the sixth, I was sitting up in bed spelling, 'Bay—Bayone—Bayonne,' aloud. My wife said, 'What are you trying to spell?'

"I said, 'There is going to be an explosion of two or three millions of gallons of oil or gasoline in Bayonne in three weeks or three months--I can't quite get it. Many lives will be in danger, but if precautions are taken the explosion will not take place.'

"I repeated the name to my wife, lest I might forget it. I asked my son if he had ever heard of a place called Bayonne. He said, 'It's on the Jersey side of the river and the Standard Oil Company has a refinery there. Why do you want to know?'

"I told him, and he, knowing of my many earlier premonitions, took it seriously and later... (he arranged) ...that the commander of the base had me tell him of my premonition.

"He thanked me and said he would have warnings posted.

"The accident happened, as you know. You might get copies of the papers in that vicinity for November eighth and seventh, and see what they say. As my daughter said when she wrote me about it, 'Well, Dad, you hit the nail on the head again, and right to the day.'

"So far as I can remember I had never heard of the name, Bayonne, before the morning of August 6, 1945. Did the commander warn the Standard Oil Company?"

EDITOR'S NOTES

"Fifteen persons were injured, two seriously, at the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey's plant here Tuesday when a huge oil tank with a 100,000 barrel capacity exploded and caught fire. The blaze menaced several other huge tanks in the area. Three of the injured were ...ists burned by flaming oil that covered their vehicles while they were passing the plant as the blast ocurred. The others were injured while fighting the stubborn blaze which sent flames shooting several hundred feet in the air and cast thick palls of black smoke visible for more than six miles..."

This dream is evidence how ESP focuses. Note the date: August 6, 1945. This man's dreams ignored a much greater human catastrophe in the present to focus on the much smaller Bayonne explosion in the future. But it's logical for his ESP to ignore Hiroshima; the dreamer couldn't do a thing about it if he wanted to. But Bayonne? He could act, and did.

Of course, it sounds like the commander politely took his warning, then forgot him. Not the dreamer's fault. E for Effort!

In fairness to skeptics, we must concede New Jersey explodes every few months. This fire, huge though it was by non-Jersey standards, barely rated a brief wire story. The Bayonne Historical Society ignores it on their city timeline; so does Wikipedia. Too many BIG spills, fires and explosions over the decades to worry about a mere 100,000 barrels.

--Chris Wayan

SOURCES: Account of dream: Hidden Channels of the Mind by Louisa E. Rhine, 1961, pp. 146-147. Account untitled, author's name witheld; title & byline added to aid searching & indexing. News story of Bayonne fire: Walla Walla Union Bulletin, Nov 7, 1945, with some gaps filled in by the same wire story in the Lubbock Landslide for that date (both scans poor; sorry about the "...ists". "Reservists"?)

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