L. Ron Hubbard
L. Ron Hubbard was a writer of fantasy stories and science fiction who used his skills at creating fiction to produce a history of his own life, which led to the creation of the religion Scientology. The Church he created and for which he wrote the majority of its doctrines recognizes Hubbard’s recitation of his life and experiences as fact, despite substantial portions of it which have been proven false. Hubbard claimed to be largely raised on a Montana cattle ranch owned by his grandfather, where he learned to ride horses before he could walk. Records instead show that he grew up in the center of Helena and an aunt reported that the family did not own a ranch. These discrepancies and hundreds more are blithely ignored by Scientology literature.
During the Second World War Hubbard served in the US Navy, a time in which he later claimed to have experienced extensive combat operations, severe wounds and blindness, and for which he received numerous awards and citations for his service. Navy records indicate that he was never wounded or injured, spent most of his war service in the continental United States, and was found after several questionable incidents to be, “…lacking in the essential qualities of judgment, leadership, and cooperation.”
Despite Hubbard’s claim of receiving crippling injuries to his back and hip, eye injuries, and twice being declared dead by medical personnel, Navy records list a duodenal ulcer as the cause of his only hospitalization in the service. According to Scientology documents, it was this hospitalization which led to Hubbard’s formulation of the practices described in Dianetics.
Hubbard’s status as the holder of a doctorate of philosophy was acquired from Sequoia University, an unaccredited degree mill which was shut down in 1984 after a legal action which found it did not comply with California education laws. Through the growth of Scientology Hubbard acquired a great deal of money by having himself paid a percentage of the Church’s gross income.
He later spent a great deal of time trying to avoid prosecution by French authorities for fraud and other violations. Eventually convicted by the French in absentia, he lived in hiding in various locations while fighting extradition. Forbes magazine later estimated that Hubbard had acquired more than $200 million by 1982, and the IRS began investigating whether to indict him for tax fraud. When he died in 1986, the Church of Scientology issued a statement that he had left his body which had by then become detrimental to his work, and relocated his spirit to another planet to continue his research.