Inside Scientology Part 16

[>] No evidence has been found: The Scientology researcher Chris Owens has written extensively on Hubbard's war record, using Hubbard's navy records and other data acquired through the Freedom of Information Act. Most of his findings are contained in the e-book Ron the War Hero: L. Ron Hubbard and the U.S. Navy, 194150, www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Cowen/warhero/contents.htm.

[>] "Have served at sea": Telegram from Hubbard to Chief of U.S. Naval Personnel, October 12, 1945, www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Cowen/war hero/1945/451012.gif.

[>] "flood of copy": Letter from Hubbard to agent Lurton Bla.s.singame, December 29, 1945, as cited in Ron: Journals and Letters.

[>] "capabilities and crafts": Parsons v. Hubbard and Northrup, Dade County, Florida, July 11, 1946, as cited in George Pendle, Strange Angel, p. 267.

[>] "writing material": Letter from Hubbard to Chief of Naval Personnel, file number 113392, April 1, 1946, as cited in Pendle, Strange Angel, p. 268.

[>] "near mental and financial collapse": Letter from Parsons to Aleister Crowley, 1947, as cited in Kenneth Grant, The Magical Revival, p. 168.

"broke, working the poor-wounded": Letter from De Camp to Isaac Asimov, August 27, 1946, as cited in Pendle, Strange Angel, p. 271.

[>] quietly writing a series: Hubbard's affirmations have been a point of controversy since they were revealed during the 1984 Armstrong case. During his trial, Armstrong read portions of them into the record, and the Church of Scientology authenticated them. More than fifteen years later, in 2000, Armstrong received an e-mailed copy of the affirmations, which he posted on his website, www.gerryarmstrong.org, vouching for the authenticity of the doc.u.ment. "I don't have any desire to profit monetarily by posting Hubbard's unpublished affirmations," he noted. "My desire is that these writings help everyone, Scientologist and wog [non-Scientologist], to make informed and better choices about L. Ron Hubbard and Scientology." Hubbard's affirmations have been a point of controversy since they were revealed during the 1984 Armstrong case. During his trial, Armstrong read portions of them into the record, and the Church of Scientology authenticated them. More than fifteen years later, in 2000, Armstrong received an e-mailed copy of the affirmations, which he posted on his website, www.gerryarmstrong.org, vouching for the authenticity of the doc.u.ment. "I don't have any desire to profit monetarily by posting Hubbard's unpublished affirmations," he noted. "My desire is that these writings help everyone, Scientologist and wog [non-Scientologist], to make informed and better choices about L. Ron Hubbard and Scientology."

2. Dianetics For the story of the rise and fall of the Dianetics movement, I relied primarily on Helen O'Brien's insider account, Dianetics in Limbo, as well as Dr. Joseph A. Winter's A Doctor's Report on Dianetics and Martin Gardner's Fads and Fallacies in the Name of Science, all cited in the bibliography. Of these three, O'Brien's offers the best personal account of Hubbard's movement, Winter's book provides a more critical a.n.a.lysis, and Gardner's book takes the position of a skeptic. Unless otherwise cited, all references to Winter, including quotations, come from A Doctor's Report; all references to Helen O'Brien come from Dianetics in Limbo, as do quotations. The account of the Shrine Auditorium event draws from Gardner's Fads and Fallacies and from Russell Miller's Barefaced Messiah.

For general historical and biographical information on Hubbard, I relied upon Atak's A Piece of Blue Sky and Miller's Barefaced Messiah, as well as Sara Northrup's account of her marriage as told to the Los Angeles Superior Court during her 1951 divorce proceedings and to the writer and former Scientologist Bent Corydon for his book L. Ron Hubbard: Messiah or Madman?, written with Brian Ambry.

For correspondence from Hubbard, I relied on scans of original letters published by the Church of Scientology International at several websites, notably "Ron the Philosopher: The Birth of Dianetics," which is published at www.ronthephilosopher.org. I also received a.s.sistance from Gerry Armstrong and Caroline Letkeman, who have published many of Hubbard's letters, speeches, and other communiques on their website Refund and Reparation (www.carolineletkeman.org).

This chapter also contains numerous statistics and notes on psychiatry and psychotherapy during the 1950s and its role in American society. Unless noted, these come from The Collected Works of C. G. Jung; Morton Hunt's The Story of Psychology; Lauren Slater's Opening Skinner's Box; Jack El-Hai's The Lobotomist: A Maverick Medical Genius and His Tragic Quest to Rid the World of Mental Illness; Stephen Whitfield's The Culture of the Cold War; and Hugh Urban's article "Fair Game: Secrecy, Security, and the Church of Scientology in Cold War America."

In addition, I relied on a tremendous number of newspaper and magazine stories from the 1950s, notably those that appeared in Time, Newsweek, and Look magazines, all of which have been cited below or in the bibliography.

[>] "rape women without": Letter from Hubbard to Forrest Ackerman, January 13, 1949, carolineletkeman.org/sp/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=387&Itemid=116.

[>] Hubbard offered the APA: Letter from Hubbard to the American Psychological a.s.sociation, April 13, 1949, www.ronthephilosopher.org/phlspher/page16.htm.

[>] The society turned him down: Hubbard also wrote to the American Medical a.s.sociation, the American Gerontological a.s.sociation, and the American Psychiatric a.s.sociation, with a similar offer to share his research. He later maintained that the AMA responded with a single word-"Why?"-and that the APA wrote him a curt response: "If it amounts to anything I am sure we will hear of it in a couple of years." From "Ron the Philosopher: The Birth of Dianetics," www.ronthephilosopher.org, by the Church of Scientology International.

[>] "My response to this information": Joseph Winter, A Doctor's Report on Dianetics Theory and Therapy, www.xenu.net/archive/fifties/e510000.htm.

[>] "Many traumata were so unimportant": C. G. Jung: Collected Works, volume 4: Freud and Psychoa.n.a.lysis (1961), "Some Crucial Points in Psychoa.n.a.lysis," from the Jung-Loy Correspondence, paragraph 582.

[>] "cures and cures without failure": Hubbard, Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health [DMSMH], p. 482.

[>] Hundreds of people: In his original article, "Dianetics," published in the May 1950 issue of Astounding Science Fiction, Hubbard wrote that "to date, over two hundred patients have been treated; of those two hundred, two hundred cures have been obtained."

[>] about six thousand psychiatrists: Albert Maisel, "Dianetics: Science or Hoax?" Look magazine, December 5, 1950.

[>] Only six hundred or so: Morton Hunt,The Story of Psychology, p. 660. This number accounts for "medical" a.n.a.lysts, meaning licensed physicians with psychoa.n.a.lytic training. In addition, Hunt notes there were "about 500 lay a.n.a.lysts in the country and perhaps a thousand in training in some twenty inst.i.tutes for physician a.n.a.lysts and a dozen for lay a.n.a.lysts."

[>] "The trail is blazed": Hubbard, DMSMH, p. 1.

[>] "You are beginning an adventure": Ibid., p. 4.

[>] "empirical evidence of the sort": Lucy Freeman, "Psychologists Act Against Dianetics," New York Times, September 9, 1950.

[>] twenty to thirty: Hubbard, DMSMH, p. 198.

[>] "poor man's psychoa.n.a.lysis": "Poor Man's Psychoa.n.a.lysis," Newsweek, October 16, 1950. The article, addressing the medical community's view of Dianetics, also makes the point that while most physicians "maintain their haughty silence, the dianetics vogue flourishes."

"lunatic revision of Freudian psychology": Williamson, Wonder's Child, p. 183.

[>] "I considered it gibberish": Isaac Asimov, In Memory Yet Green, p. 587.

[>] "any engram command": Hubbard, DMSMH, p. 494.

[>] A five-week course, priced: All information on prices is derived from "Dianetics: Science or Hoax?"Look magazine, December 5, 1950; see also Williamson, Wonder's Child, p. 84. The description of the five-week course at the Elizabeth Foundation is drawn from Look as well as from "After Hours," Harper's, June 1951.

[>] A one-on-one session: Look magazine, December 5, 1950, notes that Dianetics sessions started at $25 per hour; a typical psychiatrist's fee at the time, the article noted, started at $15 per hour.

[>] "fifteen minutes of Dianetics": Williamson, Wonder's Child, p. 84.

[>] "a personality, a national celebrity": Los Angeles Daily News, September 6, 1950, as cited in Russell Miller, Barefaced Messiah, p. 162.

[>] "full and perfect recall": Ibid., p. 165.

[>] "I thought he was a great man": Ibid., pp. 18283.

[>] "You could practically see the AMA": Helen O'Brien, Dianetics in Limbo, p. 8.

[>] "People had breakdowns": Miller, Barefaced Messiah, p. 169.

[>] "Looking back, it is hard": Ibid., p. 10.