L. Ron Hubbard

Lafayette Ronald Hubbard (March 13, 1911 - January 24, 1986), better known as L. Ron Hubbard, was a prolific American writer of fiction in all genres, science fiction, religious works, technical, educational and management texts, and miscellaneous reports, essays and poetry.

Hubbard was born in Tilden, Nebraska. Scientology has produced a large number of biographical publications which make extraordinary claims about Hubbard's life, most of which are disputed. One of the few facts about his life that are generally agreed upon is that he was an author of pulp magazine stories during the 1930s, and that he produced a large number of short stories and novellas that were reasonably popular. He wrote primarily in the science fiction and fantasy fiction genres, though he also authored several Westerns. Literary critics outside Scientology consider Hubbard's best books of his pulp writing period to be Final Blackout[?] and Fear[?].

In 1950, Hubbard published a book describing the self-improvement technique of Dianetics, which he eventually expanded to a religious philosophy called Scientology. In 1954, he founded the Church of Scientology, a controversial religious movement over which he presided to his death.

Hubbard's notable literary works unrelated to Dianetics or Scientology include Battlefield Earth and Mission Earth[?], a science fiction satire of 20th century events and culture in ten volumes.

Hubbard was associated for a time with Jack Parsons -- a rocket propulsion researcher at Caltech and associate of Aleister Crowley. It is alleged that during this period Hubbard and Parsons were engaged in the practice of ritual magick. The Church of Scientology insists that Hubbard was sent to put an end to Parsons' magickal activities, and to "rescue" a girl he was "using" for magickal purposes; most of Scientology's critics consider the Church's statements to be after-the-fact rationalizations. Crowley considered Hubbard a "lout" who made off with Parsons' money and girlfriend in an "ordinary confidence trick". See [1] (http://www-2.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Library/Shelf/atack/bs2-6.htm) for a discussion of these events, from an anti-Scientology viewpoint.

Hubbard died in Hemet, California. The time of Hubbard's death is a matter of some controversy: While the Church of Scientology announced his death in 1986, he did not appear in public after 1981. Critics of Scientology claim that books published under Hubbard's name in the 1980s, including the later books of the Mission Earth series, were actually ghostwritten[?] and not written by Hubbard at all. These claims have been supported by high-ranking members of Scientology who left the organization.

Following Hubbard's death, leadership of organization of Scientology was taken over by David Miscavige[?].

External links

• L. Ron Hubbard site from the Church of Scientology (http://www.lronhubbard.org/lrhhome)
• L. Ron Hubbard site not from the Church of Scientology (http://www.xs4all.nl/~kspaink/cos/rmiller/)