You already know that Scientology has an ersatz navy it calls the Sea Organization, and it operates a floating cathedral in the Caribbean, the cruise ship the Freewinds.
And if you’re up on your Scientology history, you know that this naval flavor is part of Scientology’s DNA because its founder, L. Ron Hubbard, was a rather hapless Navy Lieutenant in WW2 who was such an inept commander he fought a 35-hour battle with a magnetic sea floor deposit off the coast of Oregon and later used a Mexican island for target practice and nearly caused a serious international incident.
(And real afficionados know, thanks to historian Chris Owen, that Hubbard’s ineptitude actually cost lives in the war.)
Anyway, to cover up that he was a disastrous World War 2 ship’s captain, Hubbard steeped Scientology in naval folderol and even ran the organization from a small armada that plied the Mediterranean, Atlantic, and Caribbean between 1967 to 1975.
Less well known is that the Sea Org also operated a couple of ships in the Pacific during those years, including a former sub-chaser named the Grinnel that was changed to Bolivar.
You rarely hear about the Bolivar, but our helper who digs around in old newspaper archives recently located not one but two breezy pieces about the ship in the Press Telegram, published in 1970 and 1971.
We found these pieces really remarkable for a reason we’ll discuss a little later. For now, enjoy these two looks at the fun ship Bolivar, and especially the second one, which features our old friend Neil Sarfati, who had a habit of getting himself good press back in the day, and who always looked damn good too. You’re the best, Neil!
Girls in This Man’s Navy
Press-Telegram, Sep 10, 1970
By Ed Goldman
The caller to the newspaper identified himself as a Long Beach resident who visits the harbor frequently.
“There’s a ship out here at Berth 10 with a bunch of kids on it,” he burst out. “Cute girls on it, too…and they claim to be the members of the crew.”
Catching his breath, the caller went on. “I’m not knocking any of it, but when I asked what kind of ship it was, the crew members said ‘a training ship.’
“All I’ve got to say is that’s one hell of a navy. Where do I sign up?”
What he had under surveillance was the converted submarine chaser Bolivar, now a floating school for 44 young followers of Scientology — the somewhat controversial religion described as “the first fully precision science of the mind.”
Members of the Bolivar crew work together during a lengthy excursion and learn to be executives within the Sea Org (organization), the major branch of the Church of Scientology. The Sea Org bought the Bolivar a month ago.
The church, founded by former science fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard, has attracted a large following throughout the United States and portions of other countries.
Last July 3, approximately 3,000 Scientologists gathered at the Long Beach Arena for a three-day annual convention which marked the religion’s 20th national celebration of the theories of dianetics and “total freedom.”
Gregory Schiller, 22, the Hubbard representative on the Bolivar, had turned down a full-paid scholarship to Reed College in Portland, Ore., to follow the religion that attempts to deal with a human being as an intricate mechanism.
The recently named minister of Scientology said, “We believe in self-determinism as being the common denominator of all life impulses.”
The Bolivar, said Schiller, “is a sort of intro-organization management training service. It was set up to forward the research of L. Ron Hubbard and it offers courses in dianetics — laws of the mind.”
Schiller, polite and soft-spoken in a way that supports his claim of “inner peace,” displayed some of the textbooks for the sea-faring school.
Reproduced diagrams and explanations of boating, using the practice of dianetics, comprise the written lessons for the course. The rest of the curriculum consists of discussion, “asking why about anything whenever you need to know,” and introspection.
Schiller and his crew, who will be here one more week, are hard-working youths, 18 to 25, who live together “with love and understanding of the world around us.”
The Bolivar’s “one hell of a navy” is putting its religion into practical Use — survival at sea — in what Schiller calls “a simple matter of putting your philosophy where your mouth is.”
Scientology Group Has Party Aboard Bolivar
Press-Telegram, Feb 7, 1971
By Noel Swann
The little-old-lady-from-Pasadena type might have been forgiven for thinking it was just another of those swinging dockside cocktail parties being held in broad daylight yet.
There was this sleek sea-going yacht at Long Beach’s Pier “A” with bunting strung from bow to stern. That “freaky” rock ‘n roll music blaring from loudspeakers.
And on deck, in plain view of passersby, were all these young couples, sipping champagne, eating cake, laughing, joking, occasionally hugging each other and generally having a “wild” time.
Even the crew, whom you could tell from their blue uniforms, seemed to be joining in. Including the man with the fancy braid who must have been the captain.
And what was worse, one of the men aiding and abetting all the funmaking appeared to be a reverend. With a collar and a kind of crucifix hanging on his chest.
In fact, our fictitious little old lady would have been right in what she saw Saturday afternoon. But her interpretation of the festivities are another matter.
The ship is the 174-foot TSMY Bolivar, an erstwhile submarine chaser which has been in and out of mothballs more than once before being whipped into its present shape as a research and training vessel for the Church of Scientology.
The man in black with the white collar is Rev. Neil Sarfati, port captain and counselor. The man in the braiding is seaside skipper, Bob Young, a Londoner with a past in the merchant marine and a future in the church he now espouses.
(Scientology is defined by its adherents as an applied religious philosophy possessing a technology for spiritual recovery and the increase of individual ability. it can be translated from its Latin and Greek roots as “knowing how to know” or “the study of wisdom.”)
The Bolivar crew is… well, unlike any other crew you’re likely to find. Boys, girls, women, men, whole families, all Scientology followers on a trip to a greater understanding of what they’re about and what they can find in their religion.
Anyone can do any job aboard the ship with the right training, and no one is fazed when you have to call the chief engineer “M’am.” Women work the engine room, take turns at the wheel on the bridge and do other jobs usually reserved for hardy mate-lots.
Sarfati explains that the crew — all volunteers — gets a course in basic sea training as well as specially training in the administration arm of Scientology.
Each person spends an average of two to three months aboard the vessel and usually qualifies as an able-bodied seaman by the end of it.
(A large part of the Scientology movement is based at sea. Its founder and leader, L. Ron Hubbard, actually has his headquarters aboard a yacht in the Mediterranean.)
The Bolivar was bought about May last year after it had been lying idle and decrepit at a dockside in Long Beach. The Church of Scientology took it over and rebuilt it all with volunteer labor and ingenuity.
Three months ago it made its maiden voyage under the new colors to Vancouver, British Columbia; Seattle, and San Francisco with the crew visiting various Scientology churches in those cities.
Saturday the ship returned to Long Beach from its first successful trip which was the occasion for the champagne and partying. And since the vessel was open to tours there was the normal amount of greetings and huggings going on.
So, if you happened to see on Pier “A” a little old lady from Pasadena shaking her head, you’d have been able to tell her in true nautical fashion that the whole thing was “above board.”
They’re both fun pieces, to be sure, but for us the most interesting thing about the Bolivar is that it was where everything began to go wrong with maybe the most well-known Scientologist who ever ended up suing L. Ron Hubbard’s outfit.
Lawrence Wollersheim.
If you look at Wollersheim’s Wikipedia entry today, it tells you that after joining Scientology in 1969 in San Francisco, things started to go bad for him when he was stuck working long days on a ship.
Wollersheim first got into Scientology in 1969. In 1973, he joined Scientology’s Sea Org and worked at the Celebrity Centre, and later was sent to Scientology’s ship, the Apollo. There, he was put on a strenuous work regime of 19-hour days and forced to sleep nine deep in the ship’s hold. He tried to escape the ship because he felt he was losing his mind, but he was captured and returned. He was convinced to disconnect from his wife, parents, and other family members, and was threatened with a freeloader bill if he left. At times he was locked in the ship’s hold for 18 hours a day, deprived of sleep, and fed only once a day.
That reference to Hubbard’s flagship the Apollo is an error. The court document that Wikipedia cites only refers to “a ship” that Wollersheim was assigned to, but the ship he actually served on, and where he suffered so much abuse, was actually the Bolivar.
Wollersheim’s legal saga is such an important part of Scientology lore, from his escape, to filing his lawsuit in 1980, to the wild 1986 trial in Los Angeles, and the release of documents about Xenu in the court file, to Scientology vowing never to pay “one thin dime to Wollersheim.”
Scientology did pay a lot of dimes, nearly $9 million altogether in 2002, and we were on the scene reporting on the case at the time. In 2008, we wrote a lengthy overview of Wollersheim’s entire legal journey for The Village Voice.
And it’s fun to be reminded that a case which still has reverberations for Scientology today all started on Scientology’s sub-chaser the Bolivar, which was not, it turned out, as much of a party boat as it wanted local reporters to believe.
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Source Code: Actual things founder L. Ron Hubbard said on this date in history
Avast, Ye Mateys: Snapshots from Scientology’s years at sea
Overheard in the Freezone: Indie Hubbardism, one thought at a time
Past is Prologue: From this week in history at alt.religion.scientology
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that's a great article tony👌
I trained on the Bolivar and BlueFin in 1969 under captains Bob Young and Jerry McDonald.. My band PEOPLE! went as a group because we had joined the Sea Org as a group. And when we sailed over to Catalina we did have a party with the band performing on the deck at night. Lots of crew got drunk and rocked out. I remember it being very cold and my guitar was getting clammy from the moisture.
The conditions for the crew were pretty dreadful. We didn’t care because we’re only there for 10 days to get our Able Bodied Seaman checksheet completed.