reply to post by Tuning Spork
Tuning Spork, you are an exemplary internetinvestigator!!!
Conklin is EXACTLY the guy who founded and ran the 'Theological Seminary'. We talked by phone this morning.
Here's a note I've just posted on Bara's blog:
submitted 2:30 pm CST, Friday, Nov 30
Well, now that I have located and talked with the man identified on the 'deploma' as "Dean of the Seminary", I have a much better understanding of
what the piece of paper represents. To begin with, he insisted that a 'Doctor of Metaphysics' degree is NOT a 'PhD' and nobody has any right to
term it as such. We also discussed what the requirements had been for obtaining this piece of paper from the corporation he had set up and operated
for about a decade, in the 1980s.
Time to take a deep breath and step back. Cool off. Ken Johnston, despite (as Mike has stated) not agreeing with most of the fundamental claims in
Dark_Mission, has been sucked into this conflict with his specific Apollo-era allegations. Maybe deeper than he had originally intended.
It's time to ask Ken to clarify, in the light of highly inflated claims made by others about him, three things:
1. What was his real degree of responsibility and authority over Apollo mission imagery while he was doing his duties at the Lunar Receiving Lab? How
many people (if any) worked for him? Did he have any responsibility for 16-mm motion films? I have already talked with Dr. Mike Duke and Dr. Jeffrey
Warner, mentioned in the certificates, and with the chief of the LRL, Dr. Bryan Erb.
2. Dark_Mission portrays Ken as a "Marine fighter jock" and "test pilot". Realizing that graduation records from military flight school are on the
public records, Ken should specify the level of flight training he actually achieved, including what (if any) aircraft he ever actually flew (as
pilot). Flying simulators and ground trainers, alas, does not count as 'flight time' in most official books.
3. Dark_Mission and this blog refer to him as "Dr. Johnston". Ken should specify what it actually took for him to obtain the certificate posted
here, and on what basis that certificate as written justifies use of the academic title (especially as the school involved doesn't seem to ever have
been accredited -- according to the guy who founded it!).
I urge him to be forthcoming on these details, rather than wait for somebody else to publish the public record information (albeit often difficult to
obtain) that differs in so many substantial ways from the widely-circulated claims (many of them NOT Ken's fault).
Then we can properly assess the testimonial evidence that Ken has offered about this controversy.
Please forward this note to Ken for his own consideration of a response. Stop exploiting his enthusiasm and generosity (and genuine contributions to
the space program in many ways) for promoting a cause that he actually may have little in common with. And less and less, as his reputation is
exploited for book promotional purposes.
. See also 
