Scientology Went From $1 Billion In Debt To

[hifiguy]

5. I've told this story before but it's worth repeating.

In the early/mid 1990s I was the retail manager of a large science-fiction/comics shop in Minneapolis. Well known writers occasionally used to stop in to browse and chat. One day Gordon R. Dickson stopped by and got to telling tales of The Old Days of SF.

Gordy was a very good friend of Robert Heinlein, and repeated a story that Heinlein had personally told him. Back in the 1940s Heinlein, Hubbard and, IIRC, Clark Ashton Smith were sitting around having a few drinks at an early SF gathering/convention. After a few belts, Hubbard bet Heinlein and Smith that he could make up a phony religion of his own and make a fortune in the process. Heinlein and Smith thought Hubbard, a hack writer at best, was full of crap and bet Hubbard he couldn't do it. They lost big time, though I don't recall what the stakes of the wager were.