There are only two
tests of a life
well lived L.
Ron Hubbard once
remarked: Did one do as one intended? And were people glad one lived?
In
testament to the first stands the
full body of L.
Ron Hubbard life’s
work, including more than 5,000 writings and 3,000
tape-recorded lectures on Dianetics and Scientology.
In
evidence of the second are the
tens of millions of individuals whose lives have been demonstrably
bettered becauseL. Ron
Hubbard
lived.
Son
of naval commander Harry Ross Hubbard and Ledora May Hubbard, L. Ron
Hubbard was born on March 13, 1911 in Tilden Nebraska. At the
age of two, he and his brother took up residence on a ranch outside
Kalispell, Montana, and from there they moved to the state's capital,
Helena.
L.
Ron Hubbard's mother was a thoroughly educated woman and attended
teacher's college prior to her marriage. Ron was reading and writing at
an early age.
Due to his father's naval career the family moved from Montana for a
series of cross-country journeys.
It was through these early years that Ron first encountered another
culture, that of the Blackfoot Indians, then still living in isolated
settlements on the outskirts of Helena. His particular friend was known
as "Old Tom." Ron was initiated into the various secrets of
the tribe and soon a blood brother.
In
1923 at the age of twelve Ron's family moved to Seattle, Washington.
There he joined the Boy Scouts, whereupon he became an Eagle Scout. At
the end of that year he traveled to Washington DC, via the Panama
Canal, and met Commander Joseph C. Thompson, who was the first officer
sent by the US Navy to study under Sigmund Freud. Thompson passed onto
Ron essentials of Freudian theory.
In 1927, at the age of sixteen, Ron took the first of his several
voyages across the pacific. There he studied Far Eastern culture. There
he met a Beijing magician who represented the last of the line of
Chinese magicians from the court of Kublai Khan. Although renowned
mostly as an entertainer, Old Mayo was well versed in China's ancient
wisdom. Ron passed many evenings in the company of such wise men,
absorbing their words.
During these travels Ron also gained access to the much talked-about
lamaseries in the Western Hills of China - temples usually off-limits
to both local peasants and visiting foreigners.
Beyond the lamasery walls he closely examined the surrounding culture.
In addition to the local Tarter tribes he also spent time with nomadic
bandits originally from Mongolia. He further traveled up and down the
Chinese coast exploring villages and cities.
Everywhere he went there was one question on his mind: "Why?" Why was
there so much suffering and misery? Why was man, with all his ancient
wisdom and knowledge accumulated in learned texts and temples, unable
to solve such basic problems as war, insanity and unhappiness.
By the age of nineteen Ron had traveled a quarter million miles, to
China, India, Philippines, Japan, Guam and other points in the Orient.
In the Pacific islands, Ron continued his search by venturing deep in
the jungles of Guam where he located an ancient Polynesian burial
ground.
Returning to the United States in 1929, Ron resumed his formal
education, enroling at George Washington University. Upon the
insistence of his father he studied mathematics and engineering, which
later served to give him a scientific approach to solving the
riddles of the mind and spirit.
"To be very blunt," he put it, "it was very obvious that I was dealing
with and living in a culture which knew less about the mind than the
lowest primitive tribe I had ever come into contact with. Knowing also
that people in the east were not able to reach as deeply and
predictably into the riddles of the mind as I had been led to expect, I
knew I would have to do a lot of research."
Ron directed two expeditions: the Caribbean Motion Picture Expedition,
and the West Indies Mineralogical Expedition.
Soon
Ron had turned to fiction writing to run his research. He became
extraordinarily popular, and one of the most prolific writers during
the pulp era. Additionally he wrote screenplays for Hollywood.
But
while all the above was going on, L. Ron Hubbard was researching man.
Organizing the tremendous body of data he had acquired - from his
travels, research and experiments - he embarked upon a new experimental
path, to determine how cells functioned. In early 1938 Mr. Hubbard made
a breakthrough. he found that the common denominator of existence was
SURVIVE.
"I suddenly realized that survival was the pin on which you could hang
the rest of this with adequate and ample proof. It's a very simple
problem. Idiotically simple! That's why it never got solved. Nobody has
ever looked at anything being so simple to do so much. So what do we
find as the simplicities of solution? The simplicities of solution lie
in this: that life, all life, is trying to survive. And life is
composed of two things: the material universe and an X-factor. And this
X-factor is something that can evidently mobilize the material
universe."
His findings were compiled into a philosophic manuscript, Excalibur,
written during the first weeks of 1938.
At the outbreak of World War II, Mr. Hubbard was commissioned as a
lieutenant (junior grade) of the US Navy and served as commander of
corvettes. He saw action in the Atlantic and Pacific.
Mr. Hubbard concluded the war in Oak Knoll Naval Hospital through war
injuries. Here he continued his experiments of returned prisoners of
war, and began to administer his theories of the mind, helping patients
remedying the mind.
In 1948 Mr. Hubbard wrote a paper on the mind called The Original
Thesis. The first published article on Dianetics was entitled Terra Incognita: The Mind, appearing
in the Winter/Spring 1949-50 issue of the Explorers club Journal.
"There
is something new coming up in April called Dianetics." wrote national
columnist Walter Winchell on January 31, 1950. "A new science which
works with the invariability of physical science in the field of the
mind. From all indications, it will prove to be as revolutionary for
humanity as the first caveman's discovery and utilization of fire."
Winchell's prediction proved correct.
Dianetics:
The Modern Science of Mental Health was
published May 9, 1950. The response was instantaneous and overwhelming.
Almost overnight the book became an international bestseller, with
25,000 letters and telegrams of congratulation. The book hit the New York Times best
seller list where it stayed week after week and month after month,
forever changing L. Ron Hubbard's life and, the life of millions.
oOo
