From the meaning of the symbols on the one-dollar bill to the origins of the Ouija board,"Occult America" briskly sweeps from the nation's earliest days of mystical and esoteric movements to the birth of the New Age era, tracing the many people and episodes that continue to exert such a powerful pull on the public today.

Tells the story of engineering student Frank Malina and his friend, explosives enthusiast Jack Parsons. Together, they embarked on a journey that took them from junk yards and desert lots to the heights of the military-industrial complex. Malina designed the first American rocket to reach space and established the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. But trouble found him when the FBI suspected him of being a communist. And when some classified documents went...