US UCLA Charles E. Young Research Library Department of Special Collections, A1713 Young Research Library, Box 951575, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1575. E-mail: spec-coll@library.ucla.edu. Phone: (310)825-4988
Description
May Otis Blackburn and her daughter Ruth Angelina Wieland Rizzio founded a cult called the Divine Order of the Royal Arms of the Great Eleven in the 1920s. The two women believed they were high priestesses who were charged by Angel Gabriel to write two books that would "reveal all the mysteries of life and death and heaven and earth." The cult was investigated in 1929 for the death of Willa Rhoads, a child, and the disappearance of some of the cult's members. All of these investigations were started by a complaint made by Clifford R. Dabney, who charged that he gave Blackburn $40,000 to finish writing the books but the books never materialized. Reported in "Pair Describe Death in Oven...," Los Angeles Times, 10 Oct. 1929: A2, and "Cult "Queen" Tells of Being Chained Two Months to Bed Post...," Los Angeles Times, 11 Oct. 1929: A2. Handwritten on negative: Mrs. May Otis Blackburn, Ruth Wieland Text from negative sleeve: Blackburn, May Otis. Cults. 1929
Type
image
Format
b&w glass negative
Identifier
uclamss_1429_b3694_G468 ark:/21198/zz0002nfrb
Language
No linguistic content
Subject
Cults--California--Los Angeles Blackburn, May Otis, 1881-1951 Rizzio, Ruth Angelina Wieland
Source
Los Angeles Times Photographic Collection OpenUCLA Collections
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