Gary Allen, 50, Conservative Author, Dies : Spread Messages by Mail-Order Books, Cassettes, Film Strips

Gary Allen, whose books “None Dare Call It Conspiracy” and “Tax Target: Washington” articulated conservative goals for the last two decades, died Saturday of a liver ailment. He was 50.

Allen died at Memorial Medical Center in Long Beach, hospital spokesman Don Brackenbury said.

“He was the great popularizer of the conservative cause,” said W. Scott Stanley, editor in chief of the Washington-based Conservative Digest. Stanley, who said Allen started and mastered the technique of spreading the conservative message through mail-order books, cassettes and film strips, called him “a pioneer in putting the right message together with the right tool.”

Allen’s most popular book was “None Dare Call It Conspiracy,” a 1971 publication that used mail orders to parlay sales of 6 million copies in eight languages, according to his son, Mike. The book expounded the theory that international banking and politics control domestic decisions, taking them out of the hands of elected officials.

Besides many books, Allen was a contributing editor to the Conservative Digest and to the John Birch Society’s American Opinion magazine. In that publication, he wrote a 1974 article claiming that Sen. Alan Cranston (D-Calif.) “closely associated himself with Communists and Communist purposes”--a piece described by a senatorial spokesman at the time as “pure gibberish.”

Mike Allen said he did not know if his father was a member of the ultraconservative organization. He was a speech writer for former Alabama Gov. George Wallace during his presidential campaigns and an adviser to conservative Texas millionaire Nelson Bunker Hunt, his son said.

Born in Glendale and raised in Long Beach, Allen had a Bachelor of Arts in history from Stanford University.

He leaves a wife, Barbara Jean, and four children. Funeral services were set for Friday at Good Shepherd Presbyterian Church in Los Alamitos.