FATE and Heaven's Gate

Bonnie Nettles and Marshall Applewhite, better known by one of their monikers, “Do & Ti” “Bo & Peep,” or “The Two,” were just getting their feet underneath them in 1974. Decades before establishing the Heaven’s Gate clique, they had already ditched their families, adopted new names, and were recruiting harder than Nick Saban at a grad party. (We know our reference is dated, but we stand by it.)

That summer, the duo made an unlikely tour stop: Oklahoma City and the home of The International UFO Bureau (which, thankfully, is still operating today!). There they met with investigators Heyden Hewes and Dan Garcia for a few taped interviews regarding their divinely inspired mission.

By late1975, the Two were making waves in Oregon, hosting public meetings in hopes of convincing others to join. One particularly spicy event in Waldport, OR allegedly netted them 20 new followers and started a media frenzy.

FATE publisher Curtis Fuller made note of the kerfuffle in his March, 1976 I See by the Papers column. A copy is reproduced below. You gotta love his final sentence. Maybe that crystal ball of his needed some polish:

Prior to the publication of Fuller’s March 1976 piece, FATE’s MVP, Betty Lou White (who also served in the Women’s Army Corps from 1942-1946, but that’s a whole other story…), contacted Hayden Hewes to ask if he would be willing to give feedback on the Bo and Peep situation. Since he had interacted with the pair on multiple occasions, he was the closest thing to an “expert” as anyone.

This tactic is what a former boss of mine called “management theater,” where you prearrange a few questions and/or plant a shill in the crowd to ensure the right topics are “organically” raised in front of your audience. Below is Betty’s initial letter to Heyden:

The IUFOB was technically a subsidiary of the wordy but prestigious-sounding “International Association For The Investigation of the Unexplained,” hence the header on his stationary. In his reply, Hewes agrees to provide his perspective and requests the princely sum of $15-$20 for his troubles (and phone bill, back when long-distance was a thing):

We promise, we won’t divert this whole thing and start rating their letterhead, even though it’s a juicy one. I’ll simply point out the eye-catching logo and let you decide whether they should have capitalized the first “The” and not the second one, or whether the spacing between the word “Investigation” and “of” is off from the others. Check out that accompanying custom envelope though:

The day after New Year’s Day, Betty Lou was back at it, sending this postcard to Heyden letting him know that they’d pay $15.00 for his time. (Did she ever take a day off?):

FATE’s May 1976 issue printed Hewes’ reaction to Fuller’s column in its Report from the Readers section. It’s mildly interesting to see what portions were tweaked or edited from the original version (original is reproduced in the pages below the column):

Hayden later sent a follow-up correspondence on May 3rd to ask about his promised money and to remind Betty Lou of his Bo and Peep book coming in June:

Always one to save the receipt, the document below shows that Betty did indeed cut that $15.00 check:

Hewes conducted multiple interview sessions with the Two, eventually resulting in a 1976 book co-authored with Brad Steiger, UFO Missionaries Extraordinary:

That’s all for now. We’ll blow the dust off of more interesting FATE Files next week! Thank you for reading and supporting!