Fanjo Moosh

The early years

Fanjo Moosh was a remarkable man. Very little is known about him other than he travelled the world extensively and met some of the most influential minds of the last century. Born April 1st 1923 in Belfast, his mother was a Spanish Catholic and his Father a WWI veteran and sweet shop owner. In 1937 he left Belfast High School and without his parent’s consent and took a job with the Aberdeen and Commonwealth Line. He joined the Jervis Bay in Southampton as apprentice to the ship's carpenter. He sailed to Sydney via Port Said, Colombo, Fremantle, Adelaide and Melbourne. From Sydney he joined a cargo ship owned by the Burns Philp and Co. shipping company and spent the rest of the year traveling the South Pacific during which time he was aboard a ship that ran aground off the Solomon Islands. He stayed on board after the crew had abandoned ship in lifeboats so that he could help the captain attempt to maneuver the vessel off of the rocks. They failed and he some how made it to a reef where he was rescued by the Anuta tribe who live by the principle of Aropa, a form of communism. He lived with them for a number of months before being picked up by a boat heading for the West coast of the U.S. The documentary maker Margaret Mead was on board and Fanjo spent the journey talking to her about her films. When they reached San Francisco she presented him with two cameras. One was a stills camera and the other was an early 8mm movie camera. After heading south through California Fanjo arrived in Hollywood in April and took a job as a gardener in the employment of Aldous Huxley. For nearly two months Fanjo Moosh spent his days in Huxley’s garden watching the meetings between him and Jiddu Krishnamurti listening to them talk about meditation. He then headed for home and set off for the east coast of America by train. After running out of money he began traveling in box cars with hobos through the dust belt and then north into Chicago where he heard the blues for the first time. He worked for a while cleaning glasses and floors in a club where Sonny Boy Williamson was a regular performer. After a brief friendship, Sonny Boy presented Moosh with his first harmonica.

Europe and WWII

After passing through New York City at the end of 1937 he boarded a ship heading for Portugal. Once in Lisbon he was recruited by the Spanish Nationalists to fight in the Spanish Civil War. However as soon as he arrived in Madrid he realised he'd made a mistake and deserted to the Republican cause. During his time in the city he met Ernest Hemmingway who convinced him to leave immediately for home as, in his opinion, the war could go on indefinitely. So he returned to Belfast where, on the outbreak of WWII he joined the R.A.F. by lying about his age. He was trained as a Bomber Crew Gunner and served in North Africa and the Middle East during 1940. At the end of the year Fanjo was sent to Australia and then on to Burma where he was shot down and captured by Japanese forces. He spent the remainder of the war in a Japanese prisoner of war camp.

After WWII

He returned to the U.K. after a year convalescing in Sydney and studied Music under Benjamin Frankel at London’s Guildhall School of Music and Drama. In 1949 he took a job at the newly formed British Transport Films organisation. After four years of living in London he returned to the U.S.A. where he met Jack Kerouac. He then travelled to Mexico City with Kerouac where they parted company. Moosh continued south through Central America and into Brazil where he began to explore the Amazon region. It is thought that Kerouac put him in touch with William S. Burroughs who was also in South America searching for Yage. In 1955 Moosh returned to New York City after a brief stay in Havana where he is reported to have stayed with his old friend Hemingway. On his return to New York he wrote to Jack Kerouac who invited him to San Francisco where he attended the Six Gallery Reading. Kerouac introduced him to Allen Ginsberg and Neal Cassady amongst others. He remained in the U.S.A for the next five years travelling back and forth across the country. It wasn't until 1960 that Fanjo Moosh returned to London where he rejoined the British Transport Films organisation. He found it hard to stay focused in his old job after his experiences in America and left after only a few months. He remained in London until 1971 when he moved to West Berlin where he remained for over a decade.

The Final Trip

Fanjo Moosh left the U.K. again in 1982 for the last time. He was unwilling to remain in the country whilst it was governed by Margaret Thatcher's conservative Government and he was a vocal critic of the Falklands war. He headed for New York once again and retraced his 1953 trip through North America and into the Amazon. After spending a year in Sao Paulo in 1985 whilst recovering from injuries sustained in a plane crash in the rain forest, he planned another expedition into the Amazon. It was during this trip that he was separated from his party. They reported him as missing presumed dead. In 1990 an anthropologist heard reports from traders about a western male living with a fierce tribe deep in the Amazon. The traders had with them a bundle of undeveloped film stock which they handed over to the anthropologist. However the content of the film was never discovered as it subsequently went missing. The film, what was on it and Fanjo Moosh’s whereabouts remain the subject of constant speculation.