Flemming Funch about Capitan Bill Roberson
timecops Max
From International Viewpoints (IVy) Issue 3 - November 1991 Captain Bill Robertson By Flemming Funch , USA
Captain Bill died the 12th of May 1991.
There
are few people who have been involved with
auditing or with Scientology who never heard of Captain Bill. He was
one of
those real big names who always appeared
at the forefront of what was going on. Over the years he has been
intimately
involved with many different parts
of the subject in many different ways. He leaves behind a lot of
friends, and
probably also a few opponents here and there.I am happy to have been a
friend
of his for the last few years,
I wouldn't want
to have missed that. Bill was a very colourful character and there was
always
something going on where he was. Always thinking and acting in a big
manner, he
wasn't the person to let details get in his way.Bill entered
Scientology in the
beginning of the `60s. He did the Briefing Course on Saint
Hill in 1965 and became a staff member there. He
went on to the Sea Organization when it was formed
in `67 and was
intimately involved with many of its operations until `81. He became
very
successful as a missionaire in many
different areas. In Europe he was
probably
best known for the year he was the Commanding
Officer on FOLO in Copenhagen .
He was in very good favour with Hubbard because of his continued
ability to get
things done against impossible odds. Over a number of years he was
captain on
the flagship Apollo. LRH awarded him the rank of Captain, the only
person
besides Mary Sue at the time who got
that title.
He had the exclusive honor of being known widely from then on as simply
"Captain Bill".
The
first time I personally saw Bill was in 1980 when
I was the Qual Sec in the Denmark Day org. Everybody
in the org was very honored that a
VIP like Captain Bill was going to visit, so the whole place had to be
shiney
and ready for a "white glove" inspection. We worked all day to clean
up, and my colleague from the evening shift and I had
decided to overhaul
the whole office. We had everything turned upside down when Bill
arrived early
for the tour and I was in the middle of carrying out the trash. He just
grinned
and shook our hands, but we were rather embarrassed.The next year, in
`81, his
SP declare arrived in my in-basket.
It
said that he and a bunch of other Sea Org notables were claiming to be
representatives from the Galactic Patrol professing to be on a mission
to save
this planet. The issue was supposed to ridicule the idea, of course.
But, I
thought: "Gee! Wow! The Galactic Patrol!?! Of course, where do I join
up"? It didn't say anything in the ethics order about where to join, so
I
didn't think much about it before a couple of years
later.I had in
the meantime been declared myself and had sort of realized that
something was
fishy with the old organization. Various materials had started
circulating, and
some of the first materials we ran into were some many-times copied
"Sector Operations Bulletins" written
by
Captain Bill. They put the big perspective into a lot of things, and
also
provided the kind of revitalized game
that many of us had been looking for. Here was obviously a guy who was
willing
to do whatever it took to straighten
things out.In late `83 I got an invitation to an "International OT
Committee Conference" with Bill and others in southern Spain .
Without
much hesitation I went there with my family and several other friends
from Copenhagen .
We were very
impressed with Bill and with the game plan that he
presented at the meeting. And in good style the
meeting wasn't without adventure either. The church had sent in a guy
under
false pretense to go crazy and disturb the meeting. The poor guy had
hardly
started attacking and abusing one
of the other speakers before Bill shouted "HCO, bring order!" Most
ex-staff members recognize this as
a signal to remove a disturbing person from the area. During the course
of
about half a minute a bunch of the
participants carried a kicking and screaming RTC operative out and
dumped him
on the parking lot.
After which the meeting continued as before with hardly a comma skipped.Bill moved from Spain to Germany in 1985 and started concentrating more on tech. He felt it was needed for the independent field to have a better quality of tech delivery. What started as a corrective action gradually developed into a large scale research project to develop and teach further advanced levels.Bill developed a series of new advanced levels numbered from OT8 to OT16 and beyond. he wrote an impressive amount of technical issues, taped numerous technical briefings, and gave lectures of various kinds. He also trained about 50 upper level C/Ses and was instrumental in getting many new centers and delivery terminals started mostly across Europe . In all this he was unswerving in his dedication to the basics of Standard Tech and he continously gave LRH credit for making it all possible.I myself have had the pleasure on several occasions to spend a few weeks with Bill doing advanced levels and C/S training courses. Bill had a certain unique style of running the show. He would zip around on his motorcycle between centers and students and would spend hours personally with each student going over technical issues and C/Sing matters.I miss the many hours I've spent with Bill over a cup of coffee and a cigarette going over technical points or matters of the world. Talking with him was always a very rewarding experience and he would happily go on until everything had been put in place. I have seen him on at least one occasion when he was with his closest friends spend two straight days talking non-stop.I have seen people get the impression from Bill's writings that he would be hardnosed and inflexible to deal with. No so at all.
I have several times arrived with a long list of challenges and disagreements for him. To my surprise I found every time that he was willing to talk about everything and that he already had given it a lot of thought and had an answer ready. I must admit there are still important technical points I differ with him on. However, I have never had any reason to doubt his technical competence and dedication to the truth.The last few yearsBill was living quietly in his secluded mountain home with his communicator and companion Maria Maloney.
He occasionally travelled around to deliver seminars, but otherwise concentrated on training of C/Ses and on his music.
Bill was an accomplished musical composer. He had an impressive studio in his home where he created music with his computer.
He produced a total of 19 albums. My favorite is the one with an original tune for each of the star systems in the old galactic confederation.Maria will still be working as his communicator and will continue to distribute his works, including the Sector 9 and Teegeeack books and the many taped lectures.Captain Bill will be sorely missed by the many people who knew him well or who benefitted from his work. I hope he will continue pursuing his ideals vigorously wherever he is.
--
Sincerely yours, Maxim Lebedev, Moscow,
http://www.galac-patra.org
http://www.lrh.narod.ru
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