Marjorie Cameron was a mysterious 20th-century artist, Thelemite, muse, goddess, “witch,” and occult group leader. Her life intertwined art and occultism in fascinating—and frightening—ways.
1. She Was An Occult Muse
Artist Marjorie Cameron learned about the occult from her husband, Jack Parsons, who also happened to be a devout Thelemite. But, after a fiery tragedy ripped their marriage apart, she fully embraced the underworld of carnal rituals, blood magic, psychedelics, and apocalyptic prophecies all on her own.
2. She Had A Quiet Suburban Childhood
Marjorie Cameron was born into a perfectly normal family in Belle Plaine, Iowa in April of 1922. Her father, far from being an occultist, was a blue-collar railway worker named Hill Leslie Cameron, and her mother was named Carrie Cameron. She was the eldest of four children. But, lurking beneath her suburban veneer was a flair for the arts—and the occult.
3. She Had A Flair For The Dramatic
While Cameron’s family lived in the more affluent part of town, her childhood was no less of a struggle thanks to the Great Depression. As a student at Whittier Elementary School and later Belle Plaine High School, Cameron excelled in the arts, hinting at the dark and mysterious turn her life would take in a few short years.
4. She Was Different From The Beginning
Cameron was always the “black sheep” in her family. She was the only one of her relatives with red hair, crystal blue eyes, and a love for the arts. But she thought it made her special. “When I was in kindergarten,” she later recalled, “I was taken out of the regular schools and put into a special school because they recognized that I had above average abilities”.
However, this wasn't the only reason she stood out from the crowd.
5. She Was A Rebel And An Outcast
From an early age, Cameron suffered from mental health issues. While still in school, one of her childhood friends had taken their own life—and, sadly, the same dark thoughts had crossed Cameron's mind as well. She acknowledged that she had a penchant for rebelling, confessing, "I became the town pariah ... Nobody would let their kid near me".
Turns out, fate had even crueler twists in store for her.
6. She Found Herself In A Family Way
With her flame-red hair and piercing blue eyes, Cameron had no trouble attracting men—even before she was old enough to get her driver’s license. In her teenage years, she had relations with several men, becoming pregnant before her 18th birthday. Cameron’s mother felt that she had no choice but to perform a dangerous home abortion.
It wouldn’t be the last time that Cameron’s carnal desires landed her in hot water.
7. She Joined The Navy
Cameron managed to bounce back from her wayward teen years. She graduated from high school with a scholarship but decided to forge her own path. At the outbreak of WWII, she enlisted in the Navy, serving with the “Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service”. In her role, she brushed shoulders with the likes of Winston Churchill and Hollywood stars to promote the efforts on the frontlines.
But she never lost sight of what mattered most.
8. She Abandoned Her Post
In the middle of the fighting, Cameron’s younger brother, James, returned home with an injury from the battlefield. Frantic, she traveled to Iowa to see her brother, going AWOL from her post in Washington, DC. She eventually received a court-martial for her disappearance but, for reasons that she never discovered, still received an honorable discharge.
Maybe it had something to do with the magical powers of a certain someone in her future.
9. She Found Her Fate Waiting In A Line
After the end of WWII, Cameron went to live with her family in California. But, it was at an unemployment office that a chance encounter would forever change her life. She bumped into a former colleague who invited her to visit the auspicious 1003 Orange Grove Avenue (AKA “The Parsonage”). Little did she know that her destiny awaited her.
10. She Was Part Of Parson’s Plan
1003 Orange Grove Avenue had earned the moniker “The Parsonage” because it was under lease to Jack Parsons. He was a rocket scientist and founding member of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. He also happened to be a devout follower of Thelema, Aleister Crowley’s rapidly expanding religious movement. And he had plans for Cameron.
11. She Was An “Elemental” Woman
As Cameron walked up to The Parsonage that day, she couldn’t have known what strange and otherworldly fate she was walking into. You see, Parsons had just returned from the Mojave Desert where he had performed a series of rituals using medieval, esoteric Enochian magic with his friend L Ron Hubbard (yes, that L Ron Hubbard—the founder of Scientology).
The purpose of the rituals had been to summon an “elemental” woman to be his lover. And he believed that Cameron was just that woman.
12. She Felt The Magic
Parsons walked into The Parsonage to find Cameron there. With her unusually red hair and captivating blue eyes, Parsons knew that his magic rituals in the desert had worked—she was the “elemental” woman whom he had summoned. And the attraction was mutual. Cameron, though not an occultist herself (yet), couldn’t deny the chemistry between them.
He inspired her to perform some rituals of her own.
13. She Had A Two-Week-Long Coitus Ritual
Whether she shared Parsons’ strange occult beliefs or affinity for dark magic was irrelevant. Their attraction was immediate. Cameron spent the next two weeks with Parsons—in his bedroom. According to those who witnessed their mid-January 1946 introduction, neither Cameron nor Parsons emerged from the bedroom for the whole two-week affair.
Parsons, as it turns out, had even bigger occult plans for Cameron.
14. She Was Going To Be The Mother Of A Goddess
As far as Cameron was concerned, their two-week confinement to Parsons’ bedroom was just a lovers’ romp. However, to Parsons, it was something far more supernatural. Parsons considered their two-week bedroom honeymoon to be a part of a carnal ritual that he called “Babalon Working”.
He believed that their lovemaking would bring forth Babalon—a Thelemite goddess—who would take the shape of a human. He might actually have been right.
15. Her Magic Ritual Worked
After their two-week affair, Cameron left. She planned to return to California—and, possibly, “The Parsonage”—but she first planned a visit to New York to see a friend. While there, however, she learned something exciting and terrifying all at once. Parsons’ “Babalon Working," well, worked.
16. She Was Pregnant With Anticipation
Turns out, two weeks of lovemaking has some predictable outcomes—whether there’s black magic or not. In New York, Cameron learned that she had become pregnant as a result of her time with Parsons. However, still unaware that her pregnancy was part of Parsons’ “Babalon Working," she performed an abortion.
By the time she returned to California, things had not gotten any better for Parsons either.
17. Her Lover Lost Everything
Back in California, Parsons had invested his life savings in a startup with Hubbard and his girlfriend Sara Northrup. However, it quickly became obvious to Parsons that Hubbard had made off with his money. For their friendship, this was the nail in the coffin. When Cameron returned to California and learned the news, she had a strange way of comforting her lover.
18. She Had A Dark Sense Of Humor
It’s unclear whether or not Cameron disclosed the news of her pregnancy and abortion to Parsons once she was back in Pasadena. But, what she did next proved to Parsons that she was the “elemental” woman he had conjured up. To console Parsons for Hubbard’s betrayal, Cameron painted a horrifying picture of Northrup with her legs cut off below the knee.
Certainly, it was love.
19. She Had A Magical Marriage
Less than a year after meeting, getting pregnant, having an abortion, and sharing dark arts, Cameron and Parsons did the only logical thing. On October 19, 1946, the couple said their “I dos” at the San Juan Capistrano courthouse in Orange County. Unsurprisingly, however, their marriage was filled with diabolism—and doomed from the beginning.
20. She Was Sweet As “Candy:
Despite being a little odd herself, Cameron didn’t fully embrace Parsons’ Thelemite beliefs. In fact, she was somewhat disinterested in the details of his devilry. Nevertheless, Parsons believed that Cameron still had a special destiny in the world of the occult and gave her the magical name of “Candida," or “Candy” for short.
Parsons, however, was determined to convert Cameron—by any means necessary.
21. She Was Going To Meet Crowley Himself
In early 1947, Cameron boarded the SS America bound for Paris. Parsons had insisted that she meet Aleister Crowley, the founder of Thelema, and speak to him about “Babalon Working”. However, Cameron had intentions of her own. She hoped to study art at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière. Her voyage, however, was ill-fated.
22. Her Paris Trip Was A Disaster
Sadly, Cameron’s Paris trip turned out to be a total flop. When she arrived in Paris, she learned that Parsons’ beloved Crowley had passed. To add insult to injury, she also learned that the Académie de la Grande Chaumière had rejected her application. With so much bad news, she found post-WWII Paris to be “extreme and bleak” and spent the next three weeks in Switzerland.
Things at home, however, weren’t much better.
23. She Developed A Strange Affliction
After her unsuccessful trip to Europe, Cameron returned home to California. However, her string of bad news only continued. She developed a case of catalepsy, a neurological condition that causes “muscular rigidity," "fixity of posture," and "decreased sensitivity to pain”. Parsons suggested astral projection as a treatment but Cameron had a better idea.
24. She Left For Sunny Mexico
Perhaps because of their differences over Thelema and occultism, Cameron’s and Parsons’ marriage teetered on the brink and they debated getting a divorce. Instead, however, the couple decided to take a break from each other. Cameron traveled to Mexico to the artistic commune at San Miguel de Allende. Parsons, however, stayed behind and caused all kinds of trouble.
25. Her Husband Cheated On Her
While Cameron was in Mexico, Parsons stayed in California and moved into a house in Redondo Beach. It wasn’t long before he started seeing other women behind Cameron’s back, briefly becoming involved with an Irishwoman named Gladis Gohan. After two years apart, however, Cameron returned, ready to repair their marriage.
But dark forces of destiny had already descended on their home.
26. She Started Over With Parsons
By March 1951, Cameron and Parsons had settled into a quieter life in a coach house on South Orange Grove. Parsons, no longer working in rocketry, had taken up a job at the Bermite Powder Company, where he produced explosives for the film industry. Cameron, on the other hand, embraced the artistic atmosphere of their new home.
Their fresh start, however, was about to come to a shocking and explosive end.
27. She Faced a Tragic Turn
Cameron and Parsons made plans to travel to Mexico. However, a fateful (and fatal) event altered their course. On June 17, 1952, the day before their planned departure, Parsons received an order that he needed to complete quickly. Frantically, he began working on the volatile materials at their house, unaware that this seemingly routine task would soon lead to a devastating disaster.
28. Her Left Went Up In Smoke
Parsons, who had been making explosives and rocket fuel his whole life, did the unthinkable. While preparing the rush order, he made a mistake, causing the explosives to go off. Grievously wounded, ambulances rushed him to hospital but he didn't survive. This explosive development was too much for Cameron to bear.
29. She Turned To Magic
Overwhelmed, Cameron couldn’t bear to cast her eyes on Parsons’ remains—or what was left of them. Drowning in grief, she fled to San Miguel, Mexico, relying on a friend to take charge of Parsons’ cremation instead. With her life in shambles, she sought solace in the mystical rituals that had defined their relationship. But it took her to a dark place.
30. She Performed Dark Rituals
In her grief, Cameron found communion with her dearly departed husband by taking up his occult practices. She desperately wanted to speak with her late husband's spirit and came up with a demented solution: blood rites. During these intense ceremonies, she would slash her own wrists. Bizarrely, she also claimed to have a completely different identity by the name of “Hilarion”.
But there was nothing hilarious about her descent into madness.
31. She Saw Signs From Above
Shortly after performing one of her blood rituals, Cameron heard about an unidentified flying object that observers claimed flew over Washington DC's Capitol Building. In her grief and fragile mental state, she interpreted it as a sign of Parsons’ spirit. Feeling uplifted, she mustered up the courage to return to California.
But yet another dark episode awaited her there.
32. She Tried To End It All
After two months of licking her wounds—and exorcising her demons—Cameron returned to California. However, the pain of not having Parsons around was still more than she could bear. In a dramatic turn of events, overcome with despair and darkness, Cameron attempted to end her own life. Her brush with the Grim Reaper gave her renewed insights.
33. She Delved Deeper Into Occultism
Perhaps in an attempt to feel closer to Parsons, Cameron increasingly immersed herself in the occult, poring over the material her late husband had left behind. With a change of heart, she fully accepted his Thelemic beliefs, finally making sense of Parsons' intentions with the “Babalon Working'' ritual. But that wasn't the wildest part.
34. Her Mental Stability Wavered
In time, Cameron eventually came around to the idea that she was, in fact, the real incarnation of Babalon. Despite (or because of) her newfound beliefs in Thelema, Cameron’s mental health spiraled out of control. She wholeheartedly believed that a nuclear test on Eniwetok Atoll would trigger the devastation of California's coast.
Paranoid and anxious, her behavior grew ever more erratic. There was only one safe place for her to go.
35. She Went To The Loony Bin
It’s unclear exactly what happened next in Cameron’s life but there is some evidence to suggest that she may have spent some time in a psychiatric institution. Despite this, she still managed to upkeep her love life, indulging in a short-lived tryst with Leroy Booth—a Black jazz musician. It was a bold relationship as, at the time, interracial couples were not permitted by law.
But what she did next was even more provocative.
36. She Was Too Odd For The Occult
During her unstable phase, Cameron put her strange behavior on full display for the people she lived with—Thelemite Wilfred Talbot Smith and his wife. However, Smith was skeptical of her mental state, feeling that she was too mad even for him. He described her as having “bats in the belfry” and dismissed her thoughts as “Mad Mental Meanderings”.
But Cameron wasn’t deterred—she would find her own people.
37. She Started An Occult Group
Cameron began a brand new chapter at the end of 1952. She moved to Beaumont, California, settling down at a dilapidated ranch. With the help of some of her friends, she brought together a group of folks who practiced magic, dubbing them “The Children”. This new community allowed her to delve deeper into her mystical pursuits and continue her quest for spiritual enlightenment—and physical pleasure.
38. She Carried Out Radical Rituals
Cameron’s group purposely included members of various races, and she led a series of carnal magic rituals, centered on coitus. Her goal was to create a new breed of multiracial "moonchildren" faithful to the ancient Egyptian god Horus. Needless to say, once again, her dabbling in these rituals had only the most predictable outcome.
39. She Lost Her Star
As a result of the coital rituals, Cameron (predictably) became pregnant. However, this was all part of her plan. She began referring to her future child in mystical terms, calling them “the Wormwood Star”. However, her plan didn’t exactly, well, go according to plan. The pregnancy tragically ended in a miscarriage.
And Cameron’s mental state fell right off a cliff.
40. She Drove Her Believers Away
Cameron's behavior took an even more worrisome turn when she began prophesizing an apocalypse. For her cohorts, she had taken things one step too far—and many of "The Children" proceeded to turn their backs on her. After all, some of her claims were utterly unhinged.
41. She Made Apocalyptic Prophecies
Amongst her wild delusions was Cameron's belief that America would be overtaken by Mexico and that there would also be a race war. But perhaps her strangest claim of all was about the comet. You see, in the event that a comet destroyed the Earth, Cameron asserted that her circle of believers would find refuge on a flying saucer—and travel to Mars.
Turns out, there was a perfectly rational explanation for her tenuous hold on reality.
42. She Delved Into Psychedelics
During her rituals, Cameron turned to the use of psychedelics. Taking these hallucinogens, however, wasn’t without consequences. She suffered from intense mood swings and auditory hallucinations, as well as depression. Her mental state was too much for even the most radical occultists.
43. She Was Crazy By Crazy Standards
Despite how unstable she was, Cameron stayed in touch with Jane Wolfe, a fellow Thelemite. However, other Thelemites, including Karl Germer and Gerald Yorke, thought she had fallen victim to total insanity. Fortunately, once again, she managed to find people who shared her particular brand of madness—not that that was a good thing.
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44. She Became A Movie Muse
Through her Los Angeles friends, Cameron met Thelemite filmmaker Kenneth Anger at a party called “Come As Your Madness”. Anger was immediately taken with Cameron—and her madness—and decided to cast her in his film Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome. The film made her an instant star in the avant-garde film and art worlds.
Things were finally starting to look up.
45. She Found Love Again
Again through mutual friends, Cameron met Sheridan "Sherry" Kimmel, a WWII veteran from Florida who suffered from PTSD. Their relationship, though passionate, was nevertheless tumultuous. Kimmel grew unbelievably jealous of Parsons' lingering effect on Cameron. But what he did to erase Parsons’ memory was downright cruel.
46. Her Lover Burned Her Ex-Lover’s Memory
Though he had been gone for years, Parsons’ Thelemic beliefs still dominated Cameron’s mind. In a fit of jealous rage, Kimmel destroyed the only thing that Cameron still had of Parsons’; his notes on the “Babalon Working”. However, he should have focused his jealousies elsewhere given what Cameron revealed next.
47. She Became A Mother
For the fourth time (that we know of) in her life, Cameron became pregnant. However, she confessed that she had absolutely no idea who the father could possibly be. Despite the controversy, for once, she decided to carry the child to term. Then on Christmas Eve in 1955, she welcomed a baby girl into her life—Crystal Eve Kimmel.
But this would be no ordinary family.
48. She Explored Her Options
Perhaps triggered by the stress of the new baby, Kimmel’s PTSD landed him in a psychiatric hospital. Not one to wait for a man, Cameron dove into a romantic fling with the artist Burt Shonberg of Cafe Frankenstein. Together, they stayed at a ranch outside Joshua Tree and delved into the study of Ufology. But even that couldn’t keep her attention for long.
47. She Returned To Kimmel
Once Kimmel made it out of the hospital, Cameron tried to rekindle their dysfunctional relationship. In 1959, they tied the knot in a civil ceremony at Santa Monica City Hall. However, they could never properly patch up the gaping wounds in their relationship—and they eventually broke up for good.
But, Cameron figured, if Kimmel couldn’t appreciate her uniqueness, then she had an audience that would.
49. She Starred In A Cult Classic
In 1960, Cameron tried her hand at a new art form—film. Acting with , she starred in the Curtis Harrington film, Night Tide. Although the film had a limited release, it became a cult classic and cemented Cameron’s position as an arthouse and avant-garde icon. But the Thelemite community wouldn’t ever let her forget how she got her start.
50. She Supported Kenneth Anger
Kenneth Anger, the Thelemite filmmaker who had given Cameron her first acting job, moved in with her after returning from Europe. Anger’s biographer Bill Landis commented on that period in his life, saying that Cameron was “a rather formidable maternal figure” for the filmmaker. But, while they were close as family, they fought like enemies.
51. She Was “Transcendental”
In October 1964, the arthouse community wanted to show its appreciation to Cameron for her life’s work. A theater in Los Angeles held an event in her honor called “The Transcendental Art of Cameron”. It mainly showcased her poetry and artwork, as well as a few of her films, including Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome. There was just one problem.
Anger, the film’s director, hadn’t agreed to the screening.
52. She Was Basically Walking Typhoid
When Anger arrived at the event, he was irate. He disrupted the proceedings that evening and went on to betray his former friend in the worst way possible. A chilling poster campaign was his brainchild—one that dubbed Cameron the “Typhoid Mary of the Occult World”.
Years later, however, the old friends reconciled as if nothing had ever happened. The truth was that, after a life of occultism and explosive changes, Cameron simply wanted some peace.
53. She Settled Into A Quiet Life
In her later life, Cameron focused most of her attention on her family—especially her grandchildren. Her neighbors frequently spotted her out in her garden, plucking a Celtic harp. She was also known to light up a joint and take her dog on leisurely walks in the neighborhood. Finally, at the age of 73, she passed from cancer.
54. She Was A Witch—But A Sweet One
Cameron led an eclectic life—every bit as outré as the occult rituals that she performed. Friends variously described her as “a very, very intense personality, but very fascinating” and “a sweet person with a great personality”. But, maybe it was her one-time co-star and lifelong friend, Dennis Hopper, who summarized her best as “an out and out witch”.