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The cult came to national attention after two dozen people from the small town of Waldport, Oregon, dropped everything to follow Bo and Peep. A 1975 TIME article described Applewhite as having a "rare ability to impress audiences with the urgency and truth of his message." (Such was Bo and Peep's appeal that NBC aired a series pilot called The Mysterious Two--originally titled Follow Me If You Dare--about an extraterrestrial couple.) But Bo and Peep's disciples were not all sheep. One group of discontented followers rejected the cult when a promised space visit never materialized. To stem the drop in membership, Bo and Peep instituted the boot-camp phase of their movement to prepare followers for the rigors of space. Family contacts were frowned upon--except for one time, Mother's Day, 1983.
Perhaps there was a reason for the sentiment. In 1982 Nettles had written to her daughter, informing her that she had had her eye removed because of a melanoma. The cancer, however, did not go into remission. Terrie Nettles said her mother contacted her again in 1984, saying she was so deep into the movement she didn't know how to get out, that "there wasn't a graceful way to leave." In 1985 her mother said she was sending Terrie a "couple of hundred bucks" because "the time was coming close and coming to a point where they were leaving...that she would be transported by a UFO. Maybe she knew she was dying." Nettles died that year. It would be months before her daughter found out.
Applewhite always left an empty chair for his deceased partner, referring to Ti as if she were hovering nearby. Androgyny became even more apparent among the believers--from baggy uniforms and jumpsuits to close-cropped haircuts. At some point, Applewhite had himself castrated, as did at least five of his followers.
In the early 1990s the group renewed its recruitment campaign. (Some members even tried turning the cult's manifesto into a prime-time series.) A 1993 ad in USA Today carried this message: "Caution: If the above information is assimilated, you may experience such side effects as loss of marriage, family, friends, career, respectability, and credibility. Continued use could even result in the loss of your membership in the human kingdom." No one can say they weren't warned.
Reported by Patrick E. Cole/Rancho Santa Margarita, Deborah Fowler/Houston, Jeanne McDowell/Los Angeles and Richard Woodbury/Denver