If you are a fan of the Stranger Things series, you know that much of the plot revolves around an obscure program conducted by US Government scientists. But did you know that this aspect of the plot was inspired by an initiative - supposedly real - called Project Montauk?

According to the conspirators on duty, rumors surrounding the Montauk Project began to circulate in the mid-1980s, and the program would be focused on the development of psychological warfare techniques and would involve research related to the expansion of the human mind, teleportation, invisibility, time travel and other dimensions.

Montauk Project

According to Dave Gonzales of the Thrillist portal, according to a guy named Preston B. Nichols, an alleged Montauk participant who wrote a series of books about his experiences, the research was conducted at a pair of military bases called Montauk Air Force Station. and Camp Hero, both located on Long Island.

Camp Hero Location

Apparently, after leaving the program, Nichols was able to recover some memories that had been suppressed and gave several interviews revealing what was happening in the base laboratories. More precisely, Nichols said he remembered participating in a series of experiments called the Montauk Chair .

Eleven undergoing experiments similar to those described by Nichols

As I said, one of the tests performed was The Seeing Eye, during which a medium - a boy identified as Duncan - was holding a lock of hair or any other object belonging to someone else. and, after concentrating for a few minutes, seeing through that individual's eyes, hearing everything he heard, and even having the same sensations. Sound familiar?

Believe if you want...

Nichols also revealed that on one occasion the medium would have unleashed in the physical world a monster in his subconscious. The transmitters connected to Duncan pointed out that it was an animal-looking creature, huge, mean, and hungry, and this being would have caused some destruction at the base until it was captured. The monster would have even been seen by several people, but interestingly, each one described a different beast.

Origins

According to Dave, the rumors point out that the Montauk Project would be an offshoot of another top-secret program - and also considered by skeptics to be nothing less than an elaborate conspiracy theory - that we already talked about in the Mega Curious: The Philadelphia Experiment.

Nichols gossip or reality?

You can check the full details of this intriguing experiment through this link, but basically it consisted of a series of tests conducted by the US Navy in the 1940s. The purpose of the project was to apply Albert Einstein and Unified Field theory. it would have resulted in the teleportation of a warship - called the USS Eldridge - from Philadelphia to Virginia with all the crew on board.

The elements of the story told by Nichols are too crazy, but ... is it?

For Duncan, the so-called Nichols-mentioned child medium, would be one of the crew aboard the USS Eldridge and would have traveled back in time from the 1940s to the 80s during the warship dematerialization experiment - and was incorporated into the Project. Montauk in the body of a boy.

Still according to Nichols, several children would have participated in the experiments, and some were even sent to unknown points of space-time through a portal. After several years of experimentation, those involved in the project have developed the ability to travel in relative safety in time and to other places in space, such as Mars.

You decide whether or not to believe Nichols's accounts

In addition, eventually scientists working on the Montauk Project would even have built a kind of time machine. However, after the incident involving the monster released by Duncan, the researchers concluded that they were dealing with something extremely complex and dangerous and decided that it was best to end the experiments.

***

Now, curiously, back to the show before it went into production, his name was not Stranger Things, but Montauk - in reference to the supposedly top-secret US military-led project. In addition, instead of the story unfolding in the (fictional) Hawkins, Indiana, town, the plot also took place on Long Island, where the experiments were conducted.