Pamela Green

In 1949 Pamela Green joined Spielplatz Naturist Club in Bricket Wood, near St. Albans. Another famed member was Ross Nichols (1902-1975), founder of the Order of Bards, Ovates and Druids. Ross was a committed naturist and joined the utopian Spielplatz community in Hertfordshire in the 1930s. A neighbouring naturist club, The Fiveacres Country Club, was also home to a coven of witches.

Gerald Garner (1884 – 1964), who in the first half of the 20th century popularised the pagan religion of Wicca, had brought some land in Fiveacres in 1946. For Garner, a keen nudist, the naturist club was the ideal venue to be skyclad. He purchased and transplanted the Elizabethan witch’s cottage from the renowned Abbey Folk Park at New Barnet, which had been forced to close due to wartime bombing. The cottage became the centre of The Bricket Wood Coven’s rites and rituals. Many important and influential figures in Wicca were members of the coven, including the High Priestess Doreen Valiente, Jack Bracelin, and Eleanor Bone.

Gerald Garner  would often visit Ross Nichols at Spielplatz. Long evenings when they would talk late into the night was the norm. Ross Nichols ended up helping Gerald Garner with his first work of non-fiction, Witchcraft Today (1954). Witchcraft Today is one of the foundational texts for the religion of Wicca, along with Gardner’s second book on the subject, The Meaning of Witchcraft (1959) of which Pam had a first edition on her shelf, along with other books on the subject.

Continuing the witches theme, Pam named her cat Pyewacket. Pyewacket was one of the familiars detected by the witchfinder general Matthew Hopkins in Manningtree, Essex, in 1644. He is believed to have been responsible for the deaths of 300 so-called witches, all women, between the years 1644 and 1646. In 1959 Pam and George Harrison Marks purchased a boat at the Earl’s Court Boat Show. They named her Pyewacket as well. She was kept in a boatyard in Maidenhead.

Below is a publicity shot of Pamela Green from the 8mm striptease film Witches’ Brew (1960).

I wondered what happened to the witch’s cottage? Does anyone know? If you do drop me a line.

The recently published book, The Story of Soho: The Windmill Years, by Mike Hutton author of the The Vice Captain, is well worth a look. The Windmill Theatre provides the backdrop against which Hutton explores Soho, during the years 1932-1964. Jack Spot, Paul Raymond, Mrs Henderson, George Harrison Marks and Pamela are all featured.

See larger image The Story of Soho: The Windmill Years 1932-1964 (Hardcover) By (author) Mike Hutton List Price: £20.00 GBP New From: £10.09 In Stock Used from: £9.45 In Stock

Here’s a fab a picture that most of you won’t have expected to see — George Harrison Marks with Brucie.

Parody of Botticelli’s The Birth of Venus by Angus McBean, featuring Pamela as Venus and David Ball, Angus’s boyfriend as Zephyrus, the Greek god of the west wind. I think it appeared in Lilliput  in 1952.

While going through a box of archive material I came across this stereoscopic card. I don’t know anything about it. To me it looks it is from the 1920/30s. Not sure what they are up to but it seems fairly amusing, so I thought I would share it with you.

Caption contest anyone? The best answers are always sharp, short, and funny!

A wondeful image of Pamela taken by the Hungarian photographer Zoltán Glass. Part of series of photos taken by Zoltán of Pamela for Lilliput magazine in January, 1952. Courtesy of Joseph Vasta.

This ad comes from the magazine Gerry published by Gaffinia. According to the blurb in the front of the magazine it features American photography “designed especially for the British photographer studying the techniques of other countries”. No date but my guess it from around December 1959 / January 1960. No idea who Gerry is or why George Harrison Marks and Pam felt she  warranted her own magazine.

Not much to say about this except that Pam was partial to dressing up. When George Harrison Marks and Pam first started their publishing empire they didn’t have that many models on their books. Pam, therefore developed a couple of alter egos, this one being Princess Sonmar H’Arriks from Morocco. The long black wig that Pam is wearing had originally been made for the French ballerina Ludmilla Tcherina for the film The Tales of Hoffman (1951). The film, incidentally, was made by The Archers (Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger).

A dark haired Pamela Green on the cover of Pose and Poise from the mid ’50s. The booklet is apparently for art students.