My Astro-X-Ray interview is out in the latest issue of the Astrological Journal! 
Editor Victor Olliver’s provocative questions had me considering both “soft” and “hard” astrology (Sun-signs and forecasting) and looking back at a full Saturn cycle of my career.
The comprehensive astrological textbook Mundane Astrology: an Introduction to the Astrology of Nations and Groups (1984) benefits from the contributions of three accomplished astrological authors – Michael Biagent, Nicholas Campion and Charles Harvey – who raised the level of astrological discourse with their contributions. While readers need a familiarity with basic astrology to understand this book, those interested in the subject, whatever their level of knowledge, will find much valuable information. 
This is one of the excellent astrology books published by the U.K. based Aquarian Press in the 1980s. It begins with a concise history of western mundane astrology dating back to the Babylonians. Basic meanings of planets, houses and signs in mundane astrology are provided, along with information on various planetary cycles. Other topics include ingress charts, lunations, eclipses, Astrocartography, the astrology of cities and countries and much more. This book predates Biagent’s Astrology in Ancient Mesopotamia and Campion’s Book of World Horoscopes and The Great Year, and provides an introduction to those works. I had never read Charles Harvey before, and his discussion of planetary cycles is phenomenal, including many references to Andre Barbault’s work. He also addresses midpoints, giving us a better understanding of this topic, too. The work of Charles Carter and John Addey is also covered, and with numerous references to the works of others, the book serves as a resource for more.
A long section pulls the techniques together to analyze World War II, as many European astrologers failed to accurately forecast it (ironically, Americans Elizabeth Aldrich, Louise McWhirter and Evangeline Adams had all predicted U.S. involvement in a conflict years earlier).
While this is a long book, many chapters are inclusive in themselves. The Table of Contents and Index make it easy to find topics of interest.
And it’s time for a reprint! While the book is available second-hand, copies tend to be rather expensive. The charts are small and hand-written, and can be challenging to read. Planetary abbreviations at times also make for a less than fluent read (it took me a while to find the key and realize that SO stood for the Sun!). Notes and sources sometimes follow one chapter and other times are placed further along in the text. The use of a 90-degree dial around the outside of many of Harvey’s charts is not explained until the very end, and it would’ve been more helpful at the beginning. A tiny font detracts from the Index. (Perhaps the 1995 Thorson’s edition may have resolved some of these issues.)
But these are quibbles. Mundane Astrology is a classic of astrological writing, superbly researched and clearly written. The authors generously share their abundant knowledge, and anyone interested in this complex subject will profit from reading it.
Check out Mundane Astrology on Amazon.com
I was thrilled to see Armand Diaz’ review of my book, Foreseeing the Future: Evangeline Adams and Astrology in America on Astrology News Service. He says,
“Adams was not only a good astrologer, as Karen Christino’s book clearly shows. She was a real maverick in many ways, including her fight to establish herself in business at a time when women rarely held positions of authority. She was also a master of self-promotion, and one gets the impression that Adams possessed the abilities of a great mystic in liberal combination with the spirit of P.T. Barnum.”
For more on the book and links to order, click here.
How can we forecast long-term trends with astrology? I wondered what took my grandmother away from her home in the U.S. for nine years during World War II. She had lengthy transits of Pluto and Neptune through houses, but their aspects changed and didn’t seem the most descriptive of her situation. Her progressed Sun in Sagittarius in her 4th house would show the developments in her home situation, including foreign travel, but that’s a longer trend. She also had Saturn chasing her Moon.
Since the progressed Moon’s cycle through the signs and Saturn’s transit cycle are similar (around 28 or 29 years), some of us will experience extended periods of time with Saturn repeating the same aspect to the progressed Moon. This, too, is such a long-term influence that it may be tough to categorize.
Saturn opposed my progressed Moon for over 20 years. For me, the period coincided with career development, important decisions, a lot of hard work and important housing issues. I also researched my family genealogy, broke an ankle and had minor surgery. I lost my father and became a caretaker for my mom. The symbolism is clear, but these are also typical life events that many of us will experience in a 20-year period.
My grandmother Ida’s cycle started in 1935 with Saturn in her 7th house opposite the progressed Moon in the 1st, and didn’t end until after 1948, with Saturn in the 1st and the Moon in her 7th (lasting about 13 years, nearly half a Saturn cycle). 
Ida’s natal Moon was in the 12th and Saturn in Pisces in her 8th house. Both might relate to events she couldn’t control. There’s no close connection between the two planets, but they’re widely inconjunct (over 3-1/2 degrees apart), not the most comfortable aspect.
Ida had been away from her native land and family members for about six years when her progressed Moon began to oppose transiting Saturn. She never gave us convincing reasons why she didn’t come back to New York before her visa expired. Though when back in Germany, her mother wasn’t well and she also had no great affection for her husband in the U.S. She worked on the family farm and later had jobs as a mail carrier, waitress and housekeeper. World War II brought major limitations: food shortages and life-threatening situations. Her mother and two brothers died during this time. Ida finally got back to New York in 1947, but a year later her husband had a stroke and died, leaving her with little money and an infant to raise. The final two exact passes of her progressed Moon to transiting Saturn came later that year.
Most people won’t experience dire events like these. And because of its length, the transit Saturn-progressed Moon cycle is somewhat unwieldy for astrologers to interpret. It nests within many other cycles and we need to do a lot more research to understand how best to describe it.
See my previous post for more information on Ida’s natal chart and her experiences as a refugee and displaced person.
What do immigrants and refugees have in their horoscopes? Issues with the 4th house (home) and 9th (foreign countries)? Notable outer planet transits at the time of their travels and travails? My grandmother’s chart offered some clues. 
Ida was born in Germany in 1907. She came to the U.S. at age 22 and was married the following year. The Moon in Leo in her 12th conjoins the Ascendant in Virgo (about 6 degrees away) and squares the Midheaven. The Moon is often connected with change, movement and travel as well as the home. The ruler of the Ascendant, Mercury in Scorpio, is placed in the 4th house and squares both the Ascendant and the Moon. So we see some potential issues with her home.
The Moon is also part of a T-square with Venus in Scorpio conjunct the IC and the Midheaven. Perhaps there was something of a toxic atmosphere at home with her six brothers and sisters, or maybe she was simply restless and craved some change. This pattern might also affect her status or standing (10th house). In addition, her North Node in Cancer also points toward important experiences surrounding the home and family, especially as it closely trines Venus conjunct the IC. (She later worked for many years as a housekeeper.)
Ida had another T-square made up of the Sun in Scorpio in the 3rd house, Mars, ruler of her 9th, and Jupiter. The blending of the 3rd house of local transit with expansive Jupiter and the ruler of the 9th of long distance travel also suggests life experiences involving travel, foreign cultures or languages. The Sun-Mars-Jupiter combination should give her initiative and courage, but placed in cadent houses (3rd, 6th and 12th), she didn’t always have the complete freedom of choice she may have wanted.
Ida’s Moon also closely sextiles Pluto in the 10th house, and her life did undergo a radical change, even after she had settled down in New York State. In 1938, missing her family, she returned to Germany for a long visit. But by the time she was set to return in 1939, Great Britain had declared war on Germany, her mother was ill and wanted her to stay, and she wasn’t eager to go back to her husband. She was soon unable to return, spending the duration of World War II in Europe. She was required to regularly check in with the local Nazi authorities: she’d been in the U.S. for so long that she was considered “stateless,” complicating her legal status. She experienced bombing raids, food shortages and other harsh realities of war. Many women in the area were raped by Russian soldiers.
Ida’s Moon, 4th and 9th houses weren’t the most difficult, and she did survive the long wartime ordeal. But with two T-squares involving planets in fixed signs, the challenges and losses persisted. She eventually became both a displaced person and a refugee. It took many harrowing years before she was able to return to the U.S. after the war – not until the middle of 1947. Her journey had lasted nearly nine years.
I take a look at Ida’s transits and progressions during her travels in another post.
Louise McWhirter’s 1938 book on stock market forecasting outlines the methods she used to predict long and shorter-term trends on the stock market. She had obviously studied both natal and mundane astrology and used the North Node’s cycle, her own rectified chart for the New York Stock Exchange, the horoscopes of corporations, and lunations and transits to form her judgments.
The North Node’s cycle outlined the bigger swings of the market. From Scorpio to Libra, expected business volume moves from normal to above normal, creating prosperity. In Leo, business is at a high point. In Cancer and Gemini, business is above normal trending toward normal. With the Node in Taurus through Aries, we transition to below normal. When the North Node passes into Aquarius, we are at the low point. From Capricorn to Sagittarius we move from below normal to normal again. 
McWhirter rectified the NY Stock Exchange chart, giving it a 14 Cancer Ascendant with 24-1/2 Pisces on the MC and felt that transits to the angles would change the trends in securities, bonds and the general condition of the market. These “secondary factors” could alter the expected nodal cycle movement by up to 20%. Lunations (New Moon charts) compared with the NYSE horoscope will show the trend of the coming month.
Other factors can also throw this business cycle out of its expected rhythm. Transiting Jupiter conjunct the Node or in favorable aspects to Saturn or Uranus may give the markets a boost. Saturn or Uranus in hard aspect to the Nodes should depress prices. The positive or negative aspects between transiting Saturn and Uranus can also be used to forecast major trends. Louise felt that both the signs of Gemini and Cancer related to the United States, so Jupiter in these signs was helpful, while Saturn, Uranus and Pluto here were not.
To forecast for individual stocks, McWhirter utilized incorporation dates and their solar charts. If their natal planets connect to the NYSE chart, we can expect them to follow the general market’s trend. Lunations and outer planet transits to these charts will indicate how the particular company will fare in the coming months and years.
In 1938, McWhirter reiterated Dr. Luke D. Broughton and Evangeline Adams’ cycle for U.S. war with Uranus in Gemini, and correctly forecast that when Saturn and Uranus were in this sign from 1942 to 1944, it suggested “war, depression, government change, social upheaval and a financial panic.”
Louise McWhirter’s methods might not be as effective today as they once were, but they’re based on sound, standard astrology. We can all begin to test them by following the charts for the market and individual companies and studying the transits and lunations to them. As Louise advised, “It takes time and practice to become adept in analyzing the charts of stocks, but it is interesting and very worthwhile because it helps you to obtain financial independence through investment of a sound and practical nature.”
My biographical sketch of Louise McWhirter is here.
McWhirter Theory of Stock Market Forecasting is on Amazon.
Search the web and you’ll find plenty of information on financial astrologer Louise McWhirter, though all of it relates to her 1938 book, McWhirter Theory of Stock Market Forecasting. Her low profile has even led some to speculate she was only a pseudonym for W.D. Gann (a rather sexist theory proposed by a man). But yes, she did exist. 
Wikipedia shares information from a family member’s posts on Ancestry.com. Martha Louise McWhirter was born in 1896 in New York City, and we can find additional family information in Census records. Her younger brother was born two years later. Her father, Robert, was from Texas and her mother was from France. By the time Louise was 14, she was living in Maryland, her father had remarried and he was now a gardener and shareholder in a cooperative farm, which must’ve been an unusual situation at that time.
Louise’s parents had divorced and her mother returned to New York, working as a department store clerk. She died when Louise was only 21 years old.
McWhirter married John Mitchell Henry soon after, and the couple settled in Bayonne, New Jersey. They eventually owned their home and had five children – making it obvious why Louise didn’t publish her book until her early 40s. John worked as an assistant engineer at an oil refinery and Louise was a stay-at-home mom. Apparently she used her middle and maiden names for her work for privacy. She had studied the astrology of financial markets for years and one would guess that she made some modest investments herself. Perhaps she did readings for clients.
Evangeline Adams and her teacher Catherine Thompson had used some financial forecasting techniques beginning in the late 1900s. The stock market crash of 1929 brought more interest in predicting the highs and lows of the market. Sepharial and L. Krohn had written a few books on the subject in the ‘teens, W.D. Gann was also writing by that time, and James Mars Langham and L.J. Jensen had published financial astrology texts in the early ‘30s. McWhirter says she originated the New York Stock Exchange chart, and Graham Bates credits her with rectifying it.
We don’t know exactly who Louise’s astrology teachers were. Her home was within commuting distance from Manhattan, where she might have taken classes with one of Evangeline’s former employees like Iris Vorel, Myra Kingsley, Nella Webb or Lynn Wells. Other New York astrologers at the time included Elizabeth Aldrich and Katherine Taylor Craig. Astrologer Juliet Pontin had a home in New Jersey and an office in the city.
McWhirter used the North Nodal cycle, transits and lunations to the NYSE and incorporation charts for long and shorter-term forecasting. She was a Libra with Jupiter in Virgo and her book is a clear and workable instruction manual on how she used astrology to forecast the ups and downs of the markets. As she said, “It is no longer necessary to be wiped out on the Stock Market. That is a sign of ignorance.”
I’ll share more about her book and forecasting methods in a later post.
McWhirter Theory of Stock Market Forecasting is on Amazon.
We’ve come to know a lot of facts about the Moon, but its astrological – symbolic or metaphysical – meaning is completely at odds with science. It’s a good example of how differently astrologers and materialists see the world.
Scientists see the universe in terms of physical characteristics. The InfoPlease encyclopedia talks about the history of our knowledge of the Moon’s physical characteristics – from Galileo taking a closer look with his telescope in 1610 to the Moon walk in 1969 and beyond. The Moon has no atmosphere, though there may be “water ice” in its soil, according to space probes. Most of it is made up of powdered rock and rubble, with craters from meteorite impacts. It is “an essentially static, nonevolving world.” In other words, it’s dead.
Dr. Luke D. Broughton (1828-1899), a homeopathic physician and astrologer advised us that, “God appears to have made the world upside down, and things appear inverted to men as well as to babies, the first time they look at them; and men, like babies, have to learn to see things aright.” The symbolic meaning of the Moon isn’t apparent (and may even be considered “occult” – secret, concealed or not easily recognized).
Astrologically, the Moon’s meanings are the virtual opposite of its scientific, physical attributes. We know it symbolizes our emotions and feelings. We look to the Moon in the horoscope to answer questions about fertility, birth and growth. And it’s often associated with life-giving waters, cycles and women.
We might say that the scientific view of the Moon is totally left-brained (using logic, facts and numbers) while the astrological one adds right-brained thinking (focusing on the creative, intuitive and emotional meanings). Scientists derogatorily think of our use of symbols as “magical thinking,” since they see no connection between meaning and the world around us.
Everyone sees meaning in different things in life, but it’s a shame that science is often so dismissive of astrology – they cut themselves off from worlds of understanding. While we know that we live in a vibrant, animate universe.
Chris Brennan and Christopher Renstrom talk about my book, Foreseeing the Future: Evangeline Adams and Astrology in America on the Astrology Podcast.
They cover Adams’ New York City arrest and trial, her impact on astrology, Trash Astrology 
and the history of astrology in the U.S. It’s fascinating!
Transiting Jupiter was in Sagittarius in Adams’ 9th house as she returned to the airwaves. It trined her Moon and squared her Venus and Ascendant when the Astrology Podcast went live.
Amazon.com is pushing the old (2002) version of Foreseeing the Future: Evangeline Adams and Astrology in America and only brings up the new version in digital. (They must have some in stock that they’re discounting.)
If you’re interested in the 2019 update, please use this link, and be sure to order the cover featured here.