Bare-Faced Messiah (PDF) - Apologetics Index

In February 1953, Hubbard decided it was necessary to bolster his status with the phlegmatic
British by acquiring some academic qualifications. He knew precisely where they were available -
from Sequoia University in Los Angeles. The 'university' of Sequoia was owned by Dr Joseph
Hough, a chiropracteur and naturopath who ran a successful practice from a large house in
downtown Los Angeles and conferred 'degrees' on whoever he thought merited them. Richard de
Mille was awarded a Ph.D. from Sequoia, somewhat to his surprise, for a slim volume he had
written under the title An Introduction to Scientology.
On 27 February, de Mille, who was then living in Los Angeles, received an urgent telegram from
Hubbard in London: 'PLEASE INFORM DR HOUGH PHD VERY ACCEPTABLE. PRIVATELY TO YOU. FOR
GOSH SAKES EXPEDITE. WORK HERE UTTERLY DEPENDANT ON IT. CABLE REPLY. RON.' De Mille found
Hough thoroughly agreeable and replied the following day: 'PHD GRANTED. HOUGH'S AIRMAIL LETTER
OF CONFIRMATION FOLLOWS. GOOD LUCK.' It was in this way that Hubbard acquired the distinction of
appending letters to his name - a mysterious 'Doctorate of Divinity' would follow shortly, along with
a 'D. Scn'.
It was clear from correspondence around this time that Hubbard was beginning to ponder the
future of Scientology. Few of the franchises in the United States were generating much income and
the organization had grown haphazardly into a cumbersome conglomeration of corporations
spread around the country and increasingly difficult to control. He was also facing the relentless, if
covert, opposition of J. Edgar Hoover and the FBI. Hoover's agents rarely failed to mention, in
answer to inquiries about Hubbard, that his former wife claimed he was 'hopelessly insane'.[11]
At the beginning of March, Hubbard wrote to Helen O'Brien from London and asked her to go to
Phoenix, close down the publishing operation and move it to Philadelphia. On the day she arrived,
she learned that burglars had broken into Hubbard's house on East Tatem Boulevard, near Camel
Back Mountain. She drove out there and found the house had been ransacked. Although she had
no way of knowing what had been stolen, she assumed the thieves had been looking for the fabled