Nan McLean, 1923-2019: One of the bravest women who ever exposed Scientology's abuses - 2019-11-19

Nan McLean, 1923-2019: One of the bravest women who ever exposed Scientology's abuses November 19, 2019, Tony Ortega, Underground Bunker

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Last night, we learned from Nan McLean's granddaughter Phaedra Fairwell that Nan, a veteran of vicious Fair Game attacks after leaving Scientology and going public in the 1970s, died yesterday at Southlake Regional Hospital in Newmarket, Ontario. She was 96 years old.

We are fortunate that we got to meet Nan in Toronto at the "Getting Clear" conference in 2015. We had included her in our book about Paulette Cooper — they were tight friends in the 1970s and were among only a small handful of people speaking out about Scientology at that time.

Nan joined Scientology in 1969 and brought her husband and some of her children into the organization — her son John joined the Sea Org and served on the ship Apollo with Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard. But by 1972 Nan had become unhappy with the answers she was getting from Scientology staffers, pulled her family out, demanded refunds, and then went public with their criticisms of the church. Then, Scientology went after her and her family, as described in a 1978 press report…

Wikipedia cite:

{{cite news | author = Tony Ortega | title = Nan McLean, 1923-2019: One of the bravest women who ever exposed Scientology's abuses | url = https://tonyortega.org/2019/11/19/nan-mclean-1923-2019-one-of-the-bravest-women-who-ever-exposed-scientologys-abuses/ | work = Underground Bunker | date = November 19, 2019 | accessdate = November 19, 2019 }}