Bare-Faced Messiah (PDF) - Apologetics Index

Chapter 2
Whither did he Wander?
Fundamental to the image of L. Ron Hubbard as prophet are the tales of his teenage travels. At the
age of fourteen, it seems, the inquisitive lad could be found wandering the Orient alone,
investigating primitive cultures and learning the secrets of life at the feet of wise men and Lama
priests. 'He was up and down the China coast several times in his teens from Ching Wong Tow to
Hong Kong and inland to Peking and Manchuria.'[1] In China he met an old magician whose
ancestors had served in the court of Kublai Khan and a Hindu who could hypnotize cats. In the high
hills of Tibet he lived with bandits who accepted him because of his 'honest interest in them and
their way of life'.[2] In the remote reaches of western Manchuria he made friends with the ruling
warlords by demonstrating his horsemanship. On an unnamed island in the South Pacific, the
fearless boy calmed the natives by exploring a cave that was supposed to be haunted and showing
them that the rumbling sound from within was nothing more sinister than an underground river.
'Deep in the jungles' of Polynesia he discovered an ancient burial ground 'steeped in the tradition of
heroic warriors and kings . . . Though his native friends were fearful for him, he explored the sacred
area - his initiative based on doing all he could to know more'.[3]
There appeared to be no limit to the young man's abilities: 'I remember one time learning Igoroti,
an Eastern primitive language, in a single night. I sat up by kerosene lantern and took a list of
words that had been made by an old missionary in the hills of Luzon [Philippines]. The Igorot had a
very simple language. This missionary phoneticized their language and made a list of their main
words and their usage and grammar. And I remember sitting up under a mosquito net with the
mosquitoes hungrily chomping their beaks just outside the net, and learning this language - three
hundred words - just memorizing these words and what they meant. And the next day I started to
get them in line and align them with people, and was speaking Igoroti in a very short time.'[4]
Throughout this period, Ron was said to have been supported by his wealthy, not to say indulgent,
grandfather and it was during his travels in the East that he became interested in the 'spiritual
destiny' of mankind. 'L. Ron Hubbard learned that there was more to life than science had dreamed
of, that Man did not know everything there was to know about life, and that neither East nor West,
the spiritual and the material, had any full answer. To L. Ron Hubbard there was a whole field here
that was begging for research.'[5]
It would, to be sure, have been an impressive start to any young man's career, if only it had been
true.
• • • • •
At the end of March 1924, the Hubbards left Washington DC and moved, once again, from one side
of the continent to the other. Having finished his training at the Bureau of Supply and Accounts
School, Harry Hubbard was promoted to full Lieutenant and posted back to the Puget Sound Navy
Shipyard at Bremerton, in Washington State, as Disbursing Officer.
Bremerton was a nice little town mushroomed around the great naval shipyard, the northern base
of the Pacific Fleet, which sprawled along the shore of Puget Sound. Seagulls wheeled and cawed
over the quiet high street and the fishing fleet in the harbour and a tangy aroma of salt, tar and oil
scented the breeze off the Sound, where bustling white-painted ferries provided the town's main
link to Seattle on the opposite shore. The Hubbards found a house two blocks from the shipyard