Celebrate or protest, it depends on who you are what you believe about him.

Today, Scientologists (yes, like Tom Cruise) are celebrating L. Ron Hubbard’s birthday. Born on March 13, 1911, in Nebraska, Hubbard grew up as an adopted child in Iowa and Montana. During his stay there, he met and befriended the Blackfoot Indians and eventually wrote a book about them. Hubbard’s adoptive father was in the Navy, so the family moved around a lot: California, D.C., and even some visits to Asia. His college years found him at The George Washington University, but he was put on academic probation and eventually left. But it is said that during his time at the university, he researched physics and civil engineering, attempting to find answers to his questions about life.

After that time, Hubbard joined the Navy and became a science fiction enthusiast, publishing several science fiction articles like Final Blackout and The Carnival of Death in the 1940s. It is at this point in the story that critics often bring up controversial claims about Hubbard’s life: Russell Miller’s biography Bare-Faced Messiah claims that Hubbard was living with a man named John Parsons at the time, who apparently was in cahoots with Aleister Crowley, the satanist. Miller claims Hubbard attempted to help Parsons create the antichrist child. He’s also been accused of abusing his first two wives and of marrying the second wife while still being legally married to the first wife. Scientologists generally don’t accept these stories and remember him, instead, as a great novelist and short story writer of the science fiction genre and as a charming, charismatic leader. He is also remembered for his work in developing educational methods to help children learn to read.

Hubbard went on to bring attention to his book about Dianetics, a self-improvement technique proposing that people could be cured of any ailment if they were first purged of their traumatic memories of the past. A bestseller, the book was clearly a success, and Hubbard developed a following. His expanded version of Dianetics became what we know today as Scientology.

Scientologists paid money for books and auditing sessions (sessions where they were purged of their past memories), and the IRS in the 1960s claimed Hubbard was filtering some of that money (ok, millions) for his own personal use. The church lost its tax-exempt status, and Hubbard fled to a fleet of Scientologist-owned ships, where he spent the next eight years sailing about. He returned to the States in the mid-70s, and allegedly set up a scheme to destroy government documents about Scientology. Eleven church members were sent to prison for the scheme, and Hubbard, though not indicted, was named a co-conspirator. As a result of the case, he hid out at a ranch in California for several years, where he returned to his writing. He died of a stroke there at the ranch in 1986.

Hubbard’s name most recently made the news when Andrew Morton’s biography of Tom Cruise claimed Cruise used Hubbard’s frozen sperm to father his baby, Suri Cruise.

Corrupt or genius? Misleading or the answer? While some groups are celebrating today, others (like the anti-Scientology group Anonymous) are protesting Scientology. Take a deeper look at Scientology to see what you believe about L. Ron Hubbard and the religion he founded.

Beliefnet’s overview and interviews

Transcripts from a great 20/20 newscast about the religion

Relate Mag’s summary, scroll down to the Scientology part

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