Maximus Neumayer

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Dr. Maximus Neumayer

Dr. Maximus Neumayer was a psychologist and Theosophist from Brazil.

According to a 1930 account of his Theosophical activities:

The Crescent City Lodge of New Orleans had the honor of having as their guest and lecturer, Dr. Maximus Neumayer of Rio de Janeiro. He is enroute to India. Dr. Neumayer is one of the original or charter members of the first Lodge of Adyar to be established by Mme. Blavatsky. He is ninety-eight years old and appears about sixty-five. He lectured at the Tulane University and was guest of honor of the Masonic Temple. It was through the influence of Wallace de Ortega-Maxey of Santa Barbara, who was the guest of the Doctor in Brazil last year, that the Lodge was able to obtain him. Mr. de Ortega-Maxey has been doing a great deal of work here for the Society. He is a noted psychologist from the Society Internationale de Phililogie, Sciences et Beaux Arts, founded by Jules Verne, whose headquarters are now in London.[1]

Following the visit to New Orleans, he addressed Co-Masons in El Paso, Texas, then traveled to New York where he embarked for India.[2]

These articles have some anomalies that cannot be reconciled unless the age reported - ninety-eight - is erroneous. All available official records show that Dr. Neumayer was a much younger man, born around 1874 rather than 1832. It is also unlikely that he was a charter member of the first lodge at Adyar. That one was formed in 1882 and was called the Madras Lodge. The Adyar Lodge was formed in 1897, so it is possible that he was a charter member and that the two lodges were conflated in the 1930 account.

Passenger lists and immigration records from 1928-1930 all consistently indicate that Dr. Neumayer was a professor and journalist [i.e. travel writer] who was born around 1874. His parents, Natalio Neumayer and Clara Goldschmith, had emigrated from Bukovina in the Carpathian Mountains, in Ukraine or Romania. That region was then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. They were probably German-speaking Jews based on the "race" given in passenger records.[3][4][5][6][7] After arriving in Brazil, the family lived in Rio Grande do Sul for a time. The professor was able to speak English, Portuguese, Spanish, and German. On July 10, 1915, 40-year-old Maximus Neumayer married Julia Oliveira Freitas in the state of Rio Grande do Norte.[8]

Dr. Neumayer was an archaeologist and psychologist who traveled extensively in Mexico and South America. He wrote travel books like Unexplored Brazil and gave popular lectures about the places he explored.

See "Rosa-Cruz de Oro" and "Biografia del Dr Maximus meumayer" for photographs and brief articles in Spanish, naming many institutions with which he was associated, including the Theosophical Society and a Rosicrucian order.

Notes

  1. "What Lodges Are Doing" The Theosophical Messenger 18.3 (March, 1930), 68.
  2. "To Address Co-Masons" El Paso Evening Post (May 5, 1930), 5.
  3. New York, Passenger and Crew Lists (including Castle Garden and Ellis Island), 1820-1957. 1928 arrival in New York from Cuba.
  4. New Orleans, Passenger Lists, 1813-1963. 1929 arrival in New Orleans from Brazil.
  5. Border Crossings_ From Mexico to U.S., 1895-1964. 1930 arrival in El Paso from Mexico.
  6. New Orleans, Passenger Lists, 1813-1963. 1930 Arrival in New Orleans from Brazil.
  7. New York, Passenger and Crew Lists (including Castle Garden and Ellis Island), 1820-1957. 1930 arrival in New York from Brazil.
  8. Certidão de Casamento. Estado do Rio Grande do Norte. Matricula 0941510155 1915 2 00003 002 0000003 45.