The couple were undoubtedly sincere believers. The sincerely credulous are also perfect suckers, and in the late 1960s a convicted thief and embezzler named Erich von Däniken decided to take advantage of as many Americans as possible. Chariots of the Gods? posited that extraterrestrials had come to Earth thousands of years ago to help build the Egyptian pyramids, Stonehenge, and the giant stone heads on Easter Island.
