The following is a letter I wrote to Brian Harner's ex-wife on October 15 2020. A small amount of information has been removed.
October 15 2020
I have recently had the privilege of meeting your ex-husband Brian Harner. I initially found his book on June 15 2020, and I have been in correspondence with him since August 14 2020. I have made many of our conversations public on my website kimwrate.com. All information relevant to Brian can be found at the page “Brian Harner Archive,” which is at the URL https://www.kimwrate.com/Brian-Harner-Archive.html.
I am the first person to speak publicly about Brian with my identity attached. I met him on August 14 by asking him a question in an anonymous forum. He responded by telling me that he was just several weeks away from being potentially kicked out of his apartment and subsequently shutting off his cellphone service due to lack of money. On August 17 I wrote an article titled “Brian Clark Harner” in an attempt to get in contact with him under my real identity. We ended up writing a total of over 100,000 words to each other via e-mail. Most of the e-mail messages were sent between August 24 and September 22. In late September we switched to conducting most of our conversations over the phone, partially since sitting at the computer and typing is painful for Brian.
Brian ended up receiving over $700 before the end of August via a PayPal account, and his landlord ended up not kicking him out anyway. He renewed his cellphone service in the middle of the month, and that is how we were able to conduct our phone conversations later in the month. At the time, Brian was living in an apartment in Mangum, OK above his restaurant, The Holy Grill. His business partner in running the restaurant since Spring 2019 was Robert Bishop. Brian's restaurant was quite popular with the people of this small town, and he became well-loved. Brian cooked grass-fed steaks provided by Weldon Warren's Holy Cow Beef Company, and he brewed beer. People proclaimed these steaks to be the best they had ever eaten. However, as Brian deferred more control of the business to Robert at the end of 2019, Robert made poor business decisions which included buying low-quality beef. Patrons were not as fond of Robert as they were of Brian. In March the restaurant closed due to COVID-19, and Robert never reopened it. Brian's intention in running the restaurant was to teach people about raising healthy beef and alcohol production (to be used as ethanol), provide a place where people could speak with him, and financially provide for himself in the process. To these ends, Brian invested $60,000 in equipment for the restaurant. In spite of all their conversations that suggested otherwise, Robert apparently did not care about Brian's reasons for running the restaurant. Note that Robert and his mother are technically the owners of the building which contains the restaurant on the first floor and the apartments on the second. The conflict between Brian and Robert became dire in August, and that is why Brian expected to be kicked out in September. In both September and October Brian did not pay rent to Robert due to the large amount of money Robert owed him. While Robert and his mother, Judy, did not kick Brian out, they began to spread rumors about Brian. Brian was upset over the betrayal by his close friend, and he made the hard decision of permanently turning his back on Robert and Judy.
The restaurant was just one of the projects Brian worked on during his 16 months in Mangum. His most important endeavor was the construction of his invention, the Holy Grail. Brian managed to produce a blank as well as the plate which attaches to the end of grail (called the base). There are pictures on my website as well as on the videos. The grail really does look like a large, skinny goblet. Brian received help with the grail from a restaurant patron named Shane. Shane works in the management of a machining company. Shane is also a cattleman, and he taught Brian about raising grass-fed beef cattle. Brian considers Shane to be his best friend. Robert helped Brian to build the foundry used in the project, but he took no further interest in the project. Anyway, Brian completed the base of the grail in late July. When I began talking to him, he was hoping to complete the grail as early as August 31. Instead, he and Shane finished the tools needed for the project on August 31, and the new plan was to cast the grail in Bell Metal Bronze sometime in September. Shane is very busy since he works full-time, runs a farm, and has a family at home. On top of that, the two deliveries of petrobond sand took several weeks: the second delivery did not arrive until September 22. Brian and Shane managed to agree on performing the pour on September 26. However, Shane's father was admitted to the ICU at the end of the day on September 22, and he died on September 24. After that, Shane was busy until at least October 1 transferring possessions from his father's farm to his own. On that day, Brian found out that his friend Nathan and his wife had completed very little work on editing the videos Brian filmed. These videos provide instructions on how to build a Holy Grail using the same technique that Brian did. This news came after two months of them having the videos. As such, Brian informed me in an e-mail that he planned to not renew his cellphone service on October 9, and leave Mangum for an undisclosed location shortly thereafter. He observed his consistent failure to get through to people- even those closest to him- and considered that his presence amongst society might be more harmful than helpful. When he sent me this message I was on the waitlist for a 100-mile race on October 10th. I figured that I should not go to the race so that I could spend Brian's last week talking to him. When I told him of this he became upset that he was just getting in someone's way again. After many hours of conversation, I decided to go to the race after all, and we decided that Brian would meet me there. Before he left Mangum, his friends who live there convinced him to keep his cellphone on for one more month. He left many of his possessions, including the Holy Grail blank, with Shane. On October 9th he left Mangum, and at 12:30PM on October 11th he met me in the town of Rocky Point on Long Island. He was impressed that I got him to visit New York City, which he nicknamed, “The Asshole of the World.”
I spent just under 47 hours with Brian. We had six conversations which you can listen to, and we had many other conversations which were not recorded. He gave me one of his perfect-score bowling rings as a keepsake. Inscribed on the inside of the ring is, “B. Harner 11/21/07”. After Brian and I parted ways around 11:20AM on October 13, he headed to Michigan to help Nathan and his wife work on the Holy Grail instructional videos. I last heard from him in the evening on October 13.
Brian told me that once he finally decides to not renew his cellphone service, he will send a text to all people he knows- including his family members- 24 hours before he is scheduled to lose service. The text will include a link to his book, and inform everyone that this is their last chance to speak with him. Currently he plans for this to happen on November 7, since he is set to lose service on November 8. However, I do not know for sure, since I do not know when he will leave Michigan nor whether his next location will provide him the ability to charge his phone. Nothing is set in stone, though. Brian will consider sticking around if people take him more seriously, and especially if he gets enough money to build a holy grail manufacturing facility and subsequently use a number of grails to construct a pyramid. Otherwise, he is burnt out.
I am writing this letter to inform you about the life Brian has led since your separation from him and where things currently stand. At this point it appears that Brian's end will come not from disease as originally expected, nor even from murder, but instead from attrition due to the indifference of others. Brian did not instruct me to write this, nor did I inform him that I am doing so. ...
I intend on eventually posting this letter to my website. I plan on writing to two other people and posting those letters as well. Last month I sent Facebook messages to Robert Bishop and to another person who betrayed Brian on his journey, Kassidi Jones. I did all of this on my own initiative. There is very little that Brian has actually asked me to do.
I cannot convince
you of the reality of Brian's message. He understands that you had a
lot to lose financially and socially by listening to him. If no one
listens to him, there will be a lot more for our entire species to
lose than money and social status. If I had to ask you to do
anything, I would request that you listen to Brian's message (both in
his book and in our conversations), and consider contacting him. His
cellphone number has remained the same. If you want to talk to me,
you can e-mail me at the “Contact” page on my website (the link
is on the Home page), call me, or send a letter to the return address
listed on the envelope. I was born on June 29 1996, so I am 24 years
old.
Thanks for your attention and I look forward to your response.
Sincerely,
Kimberly Wrate