Scientology

So...how do you view Scientology from space? Good question, but not really the intent of this post. Recently I happened to read the Wikipedia page about L. Ron Hubbard, the founder of Scientology. Seems like Scientology has been in the news a bit more recently, and I was curious about whatever happened to him. I still remember all the TV commercials from my college and early adult years advertising his book Dianetics. Sounded interesting and benign...those advertising people are slick...but I digress. Anyway, the article states that the last two years of his life was spent living in a motorhome parked on a 160-acre ranch he owned (or perhaps..."controlled", since he was living in "deep hiding"). The ranch was near Creston, California and the article has an oblique aerial photo of it. Having never heard of Creston, I decided to find out where it's located and see if I could spot the ranch. And here it is...!

2011 view of the ranch [35 27 13N, 120 30 07W]

When looking at this image, I was curious as to what the double diamond construction in the oval might represent, but then I noticed the imagery date was 2011. Hubbard died in 1986, so the ranch may not have looked quite like this at the time. Google has historical imagery dating to 1994...and that imagery looks considerably different.

1994 view of the ranch [35 27 13N, 120 30 07W]