There is no doubt, however, that Bernard became fluent in the Tibetan language, travelled in Tibet, met senior figures, and gathered an extensive collection of photographs, field notes, manuscripts, and ritual objects.

[6] As a student of liberal arts at the new University of Arizona from 1926, Bernard became seriously ill with rheumatic pneumonia after being thrown into a fountain during a hazing ritual on a cold day early in 1927, and was taken home to recuperate.

[8][9] During the summer holiday he worked as a court clerk in Los Angeles and by luck met his father, who introduced him to Indian philosophy and a variety of yogic practices.

"[11] Running into debt, he discovered through a chance reading of Fortune magazine that he had a rich uncle in New York, Pierre Arnold Bernard, who had also trained under Hamati.

In the view of Namiko Kunimoto, Bernard's photographs taken in the East served to authenticate the travel narrative and to construct Tibet "as a site of personal transformation.

[18] On his return to the United States in 1937, he claimed to be a lama,[6] "the first white man ever to live in the lamaseries and cities of Tibet",[19] and "initiated into the age-old religious rites of Tibetan Buddhism".

[21] The book was released in Britain as Land of a Thousand Buddhas, attracting "sensationalistic reports" from the tabloid press about the "white lama", and the status of "a fraud and imposter" from British intelligence, who had been tracking him in Tibet.

[2] Bernard was featured in popular magazines, including five cover stories in Family Circle in 1938 and 1939, followed shortly by his second book, Heaven Lies Within Us, which explored Hatha Yoga under the guise of an autobiography.

His Tibetan collection included 22 bronze statues of Buddhist gods, 40 thangka paintings, 23 rugs, 25 mandalas, over 100 cloth wood-block prints, 79 books, and many textiles, robes, hats, ritual implements, and household objects.

[26] From a different point of view, Bernard certainly pioneered the spiritual approach of a generation of Westerners interested in Buddhism, Yoga, and other religious traditions of India.

They purchased the historic 37-acre (15 ha) "Cuesta Linda" estate in Montecito, California, naming it Tibetland as they hoped to invite Tibetan monks to come and stay.

[2] In 1947, Bernard, with his third wife, Helen,[2] again visited northern India, on an expedition to the Ki monastery in Himachal Pradesh in an attempt to discover special manuscripts.