Ready Boots? Start Walking...

This is another Gemini Story.

Nancy Sinatra
b. June 8, 1940 Jersey City, NJ

No, it's not about Nancy Sinatra. It's about Helga Estby whom you've never heard of. It's about boots, and it's about walking, and it's about another wild Gemini.

Helga Estby
b. May 30, 1860 Christiana (Oslo), Norway

Sun 10 Gemini; Moon probably in Libra; NN 4 Aquarius

I've been reading a feminist biography about a Victorian Norwegian American Immigrant named Helga Estby. It's called Bold Spirit, written by Linda Lawrence Hunt.

Frought with financial problems and the threat that her family would soon lose their home because they couldn't pay the mortgage, Helga took up a wager from an Unknown Sponsor in New York who offered to pay $10,000 to any woman who would dare to walk across the country alone. This is still not considered a safe practice for a woman with a Visa card, a cell phone, and a car to drive, but Helga did this back in 1896 on foot while carrying almost nothing.

Helga's husband's carpentry business had suffered since a financial bust in 1893 and his back had given out on him. Their Son had just died. The family was about to lose its farm which they had worked so hard to get. This offer of $10,000 seemed to be the answer to Helga. She brought along her teenage daughter, Clara. They carried almost nothing: $5 each, a gun, a knife, some writing supplies and no change of clothes. They had to make money and to find lodging by any means possible. This is Reality TV in the Wild Wild West, only without the script and the camera crew and, well, without everything else. She couldn't even phone home. The Newspapers did cover them. The women did visit some big wig politicians, like President McKinley and his wife. Part of the wager was to wear special shorter skirts and to gather signatures from famous people. And they did this. They did it all back in the day when women were considered completely helpless. And they were wearing corsets! And they made it across the entire country from Washington State to New York City, through rain and sleet and snow and snakes and railway bums.

Helga and Clara started their walk on May 5, 1896 and ended up in Manhattan on December 23, 1896 and once they landed in New York City the "Mysterious Sponsor" reneged on the deal. They were left stranded penniless in New York with no way to get back home. And back home, Helga's husband was taking care of her other 8 kids. Two of them died. When she finally gained passage to get back home, her family and her Norwegian community was completely chagrined. She was never allowed to discuss the trip with them. And although she wrote about her travels, two of her daughters burned her papers after her death. And she actually lost her travel diary immediately after landing in New York. And her family lost their farm. Whew-wee, that's Extreme Makeover Gone Wild.

Helga was a Norwegian Immigrant. Her father died when she was 2 (Mars return c. NN) and her mother remarried, her step-father moved to America in pursuit of a better life and she and her Mother arrived at their new home in Michigan on August 12, 1871. Helga became pregnant by an unknown Father when she 15 and gave birth to her daughter Clara the next year (b.Nov. 26, 1877, Manistee, Michigan). Right before the birth she married Ole Estby (b.July 8, 1848, Oslo, Norway), a recent immigrant to America. They moved out to the prairie in Minnesota and tried to set up a homestead and start a family. But the life out there was total hell, due to Blizzards, Fires, & Pestilence. Ms. Hunt, writer of the book, calls prairie life a Crucible. When you look at Helga Estby's chart you realize it was the transiting conjunction of Neptune to her natal Pluto in Taurus. This can be an isolating transit when applied to practical everyday life. It turns out the Neptune-Pluto combinations seem to be significant in creating havoc in Helga's life, but are probably the reason why she was so creative. Apparently she spent hours up in her special room writing and painting during her latter years.

Pluto is in its opposite sign of Taurus and is unaspected in Taurus so it is not comfortably placed and is a prominent influence in Helga's life. Natally she has Neptune well placed in its own sign of Pisces sextiling and trining an opposition of Mars in Capricorn to Venus-Jupiter in Cancer. But, Neptune is conjunct the Fixed Star Scheat which is known for giving misfortune through bad judgment & vanity. In Horary Charts it's thought to cause Shipwrecks.

Around the time that this Neptune-Pluto conjunction happens (1880-81), Helga and Ole are just settling in to Prairie Life and the Midwest suffers its worst Blizzard season ever. Families were already dropping off from the Diptheria epidemic and the family, both parents raised in an urban environmnet, was living in a mud hut out in the middle of nowhere. Now they were stranded and their crops were wrecked and faced a winter of starvation. Soon after that uncontrollable fires started torching the prairies. This whole time Helga managed to keep her family safe and healthy but she was completely drained. Her progressed Sun moved into Cancer (1881-82) and then she had her Saturn Return. She and Ole decided to move out to Washington State and start over, May1887. He was a carpenter by trade and they were assured of an easier life. But, man, life was hard back then. Towns kept burning down, sewers kept backing up. Helga had some health problems from a fall which required surgeries. But, eventually the family ended up on a nice farm out in the country where the 9 kids could cram themselves into 2 bedrooms, described as an awesome amount of space. But, the Market plunged and Ole hurt his back and couldn't work and the family fell behind in taxes and mortgage. In January, 1896 a son died and Helga was desperate. Transiting Pluto and Neptune were passing over her Sun so sort of repeating the chaotic stress of the prairie.

But, Helga it turns out had suffragette tendencies. Her Sun is conjunct Uranus in Gemini promising an Intellectual and Individualistic personality and her Venus is conjunct Jupiter and opposite Mars which all show a positive independent forward thinking person. This last opposition is loosely conjunct her Nodal axis. Plus, she was going through her Jupiter Return in Cancer so long distance travel seemed to be in order.

Also interesting is that her Progressed Sun at this time was conjunct her Husband's natal Sun. And her Husband's natal Sun was just changing signs from Leo into Virgo, not always the easiest transition as the gregarious ego has to go on Virgo's diet of discerning through insecurities one detail after another. Right now I'm finding a theme that this is a difficult progression for a Cancer Sun to make (Hart Crane's chart mentioned a couple of days ago and, I have to admit, from my own personal experience). Ole's ego would have been completely deflated from being physically disabled (Virgo=Health) and not being able to provide for his family and from his wife who takes off on a wild goose chase across the country with their one illegitimate daughter. Humiliation from News reports quoting Helga as saying that she was frustrated that her husband couldn't provide for their family also wouldn't have helped. This guy single handedly built the house they were living in and now was going to lose it for reasons out of his control and his wife publically mocks him. Stellium with Mercury-Uranus-Sun in Gemini sometimes cuts to the quick verbally, especially when trining n. Mars as Helga's does. But, Mercury rules walking.

T.Jupiter also would have passed over Helga's South Node in Leo at this time. She had Saturn in Leo natally and was perhaps a bit overcome with a need for Drama and Excitement in her life and loss and, combined with South Node in Leo, suffered despair through her Children as a result. Only her daughter-in-law managed to save any of her photographs; her own children destroyed everything else. And these lessons of overdoing Ego which are now once again coming out in positive ways through the Aquarius North Node. The writer of the bio, Linda Hunt tells the story not only of Helga's walk across the country, but how as a woman her great feat was ignored and disdained and unsupported. And also how she was ahead of her time in claiming her rights as a woman. And how families should preserve their families legacies. Most of the book is written through information gained from Newspaper accounts. That is very sad considering Helga supposedly wrote hundreds of pages about the experience.

A quick look at the chart for the day that the women departed Spokane Washington: May 5, 1896 12:19pm Spokane, WA. Virgo ASC with Nodes overlaid and Moon c. the NN on the DESC. The Sun was in Taurus opposing Saturn and Uranus in Scorpio over the MC-IC line. Mercury rules the Chart, is in H10 squaring Moon-DESC-NN opposite ASC. Sun and Venus are both in H9. Pluto-Neptune squaring Mars in H7, Pisces. The t.Sun was still within conjunction with that natal Pluto at 15 Taurus and t.Saturn was opposing it to the degree. Sun-Saturn can bring endurance and ambition to see a project through but the project will require much hard work and labor and the fruits may be somewhat limiting.

The Day which they arrived in New York: Dec. 23, 1896 1:00pm Manhattan, NY. Stellium of Pluto 13 Gemini-Mars 16 Gemini-Neptune 19 Gemini trining Venus-NN in Aquarius. Saturn and Uranus both at 27 Scorpio (sextiling Helga's Mars, trining her Neptune). Chiron was opposing n. Pluto. Funny how I've avoided saying anything about Jupiter through all this.

Both women had North Node in Aquarius. The NN was at beginning degrees of Pisces when they began the trip but moved back into Aquarius soon after. Clara had her first Nodal Return during the trip (her Moon, i.e. Mother, was probably in Leo and maybe conjunct her SN). Helga would have her Nodal Return after returning to Washington.

Eclipse information isn't easy to get before 1900. After Helga was born there was a total lunar eclipse that was shortest for its Saros Cycle on June 19 16:58 1860. The 1st Photograph of a Solar Eclipse was taken on July 18, 1860.

In 1896, there was the Longest Annular Eclipse of Saros 26 on June 12, 1896 12:24:24. There was a Total Solar Eclipse on Aug. 9, 1896. At some point in Idaho the women got lost for 3 days out on the lava beds in the heat with nothing to eat. For most of the trip they followed the railroad but had drifted off looking for a short cut at this point. On the 3d day they saw the light from a train. I wonder if it coincided with any of these eclipses.

Just because she was a suffragette, repressed though she be, I did a quick check of Helga's female asteroids. She had a small triangle of Juno 17 Capricorn trine Ceres 15 Taurus sextiling an apex Lilith 14 Pisces. Juno is squaring Pallas at 12 Aries.

And by wonderful coincidence almost the entire Estby family's birth information is listed on the Internet through the markers on their graves: www.interment.net/data/us/wa/spokane/micacreek/index.htm.

Clara: Nov. 26, 1877 (Michigan)
Olaf: Mar. 19, 1879 (Minnesota?)
Ida: Sept. 18, 1880 (Minnesota)
Bertha: Mar. 12, 1882 (Minnesota)
Henry: Jan 15, 1884 (Minnesota)
Arthur: Nov. 12, 1885 (Minnesota)
John: Nov. 10, 1887 (Spokane, Wash)
William: Apr. 16, 1892 (Spokane, Wash)
Lilian: Mar. 12, 1894 (Spokane, Wash)

Helga, a Gemini, took her Sagittarius Daughter with her because she felt they would have the best time together. They both shared the same North Nodes. Her daughter Ida was the most resentful and along with Lillian was the one who burned her mother's papers (1942). It's interesting the squares between the Virgo and the Pisces Suns to the Gemini and the Sagittarius Suns. Ida was born (Sun) right before the big Blizzards of 1880-1881 when Neptune was conjunct her mother's Pluto and it's interesting that she was responsible for almost erasing (Neptune dissolves) her mother's place in history. Lillian was born when Neptune and Pluto were both conjunct her Mother's Sun. It would be interesting someday to compare in detail the charts. Of course, the Moon's placements would be extremely important and we don't have those without birth times.