The Heaven’s Gate Suicides

The first well-known American cult of the Internet era

The audio version of this story has much more content, including the audio files of Marshall Applewhite and his followers explaining Heaven’s Gate, their mission, and intentions. The blog version does not have that transcript.

In March of 1997, the San Diego Sheriff’s Department discovered the bodies of 39 members of Heaven’s Gate in a house in the San Diego suburb of Rancho Santa Fe. They had performed a mass suicide to reach what they believed was the next level of human existence through an extraterrestrial spacecraft trailing the Hale-Bopp comet.

Marshall Applewhite released this video titled “Last Chance To Evacuate Planet Earth (Before It Is Recycled)” right before Do (Marshall Applewhite, pronounced “Doe”) and 38 other members of Heaven’s Gate were found dead in their San Diego mansion. Do had cultivated this family, offering community to like minded spiritual individuals. It was their mission to utilize a series of ritual suicides in order to to reach what they believed was an extraterrestrial spacecraft following the Hale-Bopp comet. To leave their earthly bodies, or what they called their vehicles, and board this spacecraft would allow them access to an advanced evolutionary level. But, Do didn’t do this all on his own. Let’s start from the…