Mae West

As can be expected, there is a dispute between sources over Mae West's birth year. Nobody disputes the place of her birth or the even the time, but, of course, no one could hope to know her Age. What can we say anyway? Someone like that; she's Ageless.

The following birth data is from Astrotheme. A couple of other sources on the Internet agree with it, but the Wikipedia entry gives her birth year as 1893 instead of 1892.

Mae West
b. Aug. 17, 1892 10:30 pm Brooklyn Heights, NY

Sun 26 Leo; ASC 26 Taurus; Moon Cancer; MC4 Aquarius; NN 12 Taurus

The 1893 date gives a Scorpio Moon conjunct Uranus and an Aries North Node. Seems more appropriate to me, especially when adding the Virgo Venus and Mars. She taught the entire flapper generation how to be emancipated, how to flirt shamelessly and openly. And she made money off of this and off of the controversy it provided (Aquarius MC and Uranus conjunct Moon). This seems very earthy Virgo and very sexy Scorpio.

What the charts do agree on is the Leo Sun, firey and bright with a strong, confident ego. Add to that a conjunction of Neptune to Pluto in Gemini in the 1st house of personality. Rex Bills gives shared rulership for "Temptation" to Neptune and Pluto and it's not by chance that one of the great Femme Fatales of Hollywood, especially the one with the wildest one liners, would have these two planets in conjunction in Gemini in her first house. "Why don't you come on up and take a look at my etchings." Etchings, I imagine are ruled by Gemini as they belong to printmaking. As channeled through 1st house Neptune-Pluto I gather that this pickup line served for the beginnings of many bootlegged romances. But, it always struck me as being really strange.

The 1893 date also loads Jupiter into West's First House. Jupiter rules the hips and West's were especially curvaceous, not to mention her style which was of larger than life and her wit which was "Straight From the Hip."

And then there's the Leo Sun, the natural sign of the Actress and Star. Leos like to take a Risk, Mae West simply liked to make it Risque. (I'm really overdoing it here).

I also wonder if there is a correlation between Leo and Controversy and being Censored. (Rex Bills gives rulership of Censors and Censure to Jupiter and Saturn / Controversy ruled by Mars and H7 (Uranus, Mercury which doesn't really support my ideas on this). Of the public personalities who have made loud mouthed Leonian social guffaws in the last year, two were Sun in Leos (Michael Richards & Don Imus).

Mae West was censored her whole life. She seemed to revel in it and said that she had been that way since she was five. Controversy followed her throughout her career or rather she brought it on. On April 19, 1927, when t.Neptune hit her Sun and t.Saturn hit her Neptune-Pluto conjunction, Mae West was sent to Jail. 10 days in the pokey for some sort of Morals Charge. Rex Bills gives rulership of "One's Moral Qualities" to H10 and H1 so one can see the impact of Saturn (ruled of H10) hitting her "Temptress" conjunction in the first House. And, well, talk about making Lemons out of Lemonade. She simply had a good time in jail as well. She insisted on wearing her own silk underwear and every night she dined with the Warden. The Wardens obviously had a lot more class in those days...