When Women Were Dragons

An article printed in The Washington Post on January 23, 1956, details a group of protestors appearing at a meeting of the House Subcommittee on Compensation and Resolution. According to the article, the content of this meeting remains entirely hidden from the public—both the agenda and the day-to-day operations of the committee. The article only reports that the activists stayed in the meeting for well over nine hours, and no representatives from either side were available for comment. The footnote reads that the article was not published on the front page of the newspaper but instead was printed on the last page of the Style and Fashion section.

Alex reflects on her experience of the Mass Dragoning. She is in school when she first hears the sirens. When she returns home, her mother leaves and promises that she will return—a critical promise considering how many mothers leave their families that day, including Marla. When Bertha does return, she has Beatrice with her. Without explaining what has really happened, Bertha simply tells Alex to take her “sister” into the living room to play. Looking back on this incident as an adult, Alex recalls that, for the remainder of her mother’s life, Bertha never explained or talked about Marla’s disappearance or her adoption of Beatrice as her own.

After the Mass Dragoning, both the world and Alex’s family move forward as if nothing ever happened. Bertha never discusses Marla, neither her existence nor her disappearance. In the family’s “new normal,” Beatrice is now (and has always been) Alex’s sister, but Alex harbors her own secret knowledge about Marla.

Alex’s memoir recounts an incident that occurs three days before the Mass Dragoning, in which Marla comes to her sister’s house for dinner. Marla gets Alex ready for bed, and while they are alone, Marla gives her a collection of documents including letters, photographs, and a booklet called Some Basic Facts About Dragons: A Physician’s Explanation. The photographs are of Marla and two other women in uniform. Alex also notes that the booklet was authored by Dr. Henry Gantz. The cover art depicts a diagram of the female reproductive system transposed with the face of a dragon. Marla tells Alex that she isn’t obligated to do anything with the document except hide it. Alex never tells anyone about this exchange, nor about the booklet, which she hides behind the wall paneling in her bedroom closet.

Even though efforts to ignore the Mass Dragoning are tireless, it is impossible to conceal such a widespread event. In her memoir, Alex remembers the confusion that follows the event. For example, the official curriculum taught about the event morphs before her eyes as attitudes shift. First, the nuns who run Alex’s Catholic school suggest that dragons come from Hell, before suggesting that maybe dragons have eaten the missing mothers. But despite such heavy-handed attempts to hide the truth, some dragons remain in mainstream society and try to be wives and mothers despite their new physical form. Additionally, many prominent figures in society—obstetricians and rabbis, for example—are eaten and therefore are missing in droves. The news reports surrounding these are confusing and always in flux, as are the details of the Mass Dragoning itself, but none of this information made it into the young Alex’s house, and she is kept in the dark as to the full extent of the realities that surround her.

Alex describes her Aunt Marla’s dragoning and disappearance, feeling as if she were there and could picture it clearly. Through reports from her coworkers gathered years later, Alex develops a story about what happened to her aunt before she changed. In this patchwork version of the event, Alex states that Marla leaves work at the auto shop around one o’clock that afternoon, clutching a picture of Bertha, Alex, and Beatrice and leaving her tools to her coworkers. Recounting this, Alex also feels that she has a memory that is not her own—a memory of Marla leaving, saying goodbye to Beatrice, and burning George alive before her final departure. Alex “recalls” all of these events in her mind’s eye. Alex also notes that in her waking moments, it’s easy to lie, but she finds that she cannot keep the truth from entering her dreams.

A police report from Bethesda, Maryland, details the results of a search warrant executed by two officers. The officers approach a residence guarded by two people: Dr. Henry Gantz and Mrs. Helen Gyzinska, who are both placed under arrest for refusing to exit the premises. While there is no direct reference to the Wyvern Research Collective, the presence of Dr. Gantz and various scholars—as well as an effort by the police department to interrupt their activities—suggests that the Collective used this residence to study and archive data on dragoning.