The following is the bulk of a posting I made on Dawn Jacksons "Traditional Witchcraft" yahoo list. It was in response to some discussion regarding the co-option and "Dumbing down" of the concept of  Traditional Witchcraft.

 In the early 1970's, at least here in America, there were three women
who publicly identified the Craft Current they followed as Traditional
in the Pagan Press/Zines of that era.

Those three were:
Gwen Thompson in Connecticut
Bonnie Sherlock In Wyoming
Kitty Lessing in Florida

Victor Andersons people, wisely chose to eschew that particular "Name
Game" and have homegrown their own Feri/Faerie brand which is to their
credit.

This can be verified by even a casual investigation of the "Green Egg"
which was the paramount journal in circulation here in the States
during that decade.

Mikes "The Cauldron" was known about but from my experience was not
commonly subscribed to.
Mike: I'd really be interested if you had any figures you could share
on how many American subscriptions you had in a typical year circa
1970 to 1990.


Anyway, in the 1970's the Craft groups who followed the paths as set
out By Gardner and Sanders never EVER used the term Traditional or
Traditionalist. They strictly adhered to the monikers of Gardnerian,
Alexandrian, or the sometimes confusing Al-Gard for those who followed
a mixed lineage.

The self identified Traditionalists made it clear that they were a
different breed of Witch from those groups which derived from Gardners
Wica and Sanders Neo-Classical Paganism and I do not recall a single
objection to the contrary. In fact the American Traditionalists were
happily singled out as "Not Like Us" by the American Gardnerians
Alexandrians and Al-Gards.

The Traditionalists were (and still are) decidedly Old Craft and
Luciferian in both Style and Lore, something that the typical 1970's
era Witches were desperately trying to deny and live down.


Gwen Thompson and Bonnie Sherlock bonded in a vivid and prolific
correspondence relationship, which led to them both sharing their
holdings fairly freely.

Kitty Lessing tended to march to the beat of her own drum, and she
disappeared from the scene well before the onset of the 1980's decade.
(If anyone out there holds a kinship to her, feel free to contact me
off list, I have a few personal letters from her which might be
valuable assets to your archives)


Bonnie Sherlock suffered from type one diabetes and while I do not
recall the exact year of her passing, I'm quite sure it was very early
in the 1980's or in the late 1970's.
I know that there were people she trained, but if they have retained a
continuing presence I am not aware of it. (I can make the same offer
in regard to personal correspondence from Bonnie, along with my
recollections of a single visit to meet her circa 1973)

Somewhere around the mid to late 1980's, after all three of these
Ladys had exited the scene or passed on, the terms "British
Tradtional" started being usurped by The Gardnerian and Alexandrian
groups that had previously shunned it as unclean due to its perceived
diabolical connections. And thus we have the current disparity in
which American Gardnerian and Alexandrian lineage Witches call
themselves "British Traditional" while their kin in the UK do no such
thing.

In recent years I have noticed, much to my dismay, that the term
"Traditional Craft" is becoming similarly co-opted

It has been suggested to me that those who have identified as
Traditionalist since the aegis of publicly acknowledged Witchcraft in
modern America ought to now abandon that term and "move on" to
"Traditional Initiatory Witchcraft" (TIW) to which I boldly reply

BULLSHIT!

My suggestion is that they really ought to roll back to their (one C)
Wica and be happy with it. I recommend abandoning their quest to
hijack every term that seems to be du jour and thus a suitable target
for adoption.

These terms are NOT orphans, they are NOT seeking a new home!


Now all this said, I am well aware that I will probably have bruised
the feelings of many Neo Pagan Wic(c)ans whom I've befriended over the
years and for that I can only say "Deal With It"

Feels free to come yell at me or otherwise discuss this issue in the FORUM

Many years ago I had a fascinating experience at the exploratorium in San Francisco. I found myself standing in front of a small cloud chamber watching a most incredible miniature light show. The Cloud Chamber is a sealed environment containing a supercooled, supersaturated water or alcohol vapour and which detects and makes visible electrically charged particles moving through it.

 Larger Image here:

Looking inside I could see the swirling real time tracks forming and trailing away in full three dimensional goodness. I was struck that if these invisible particles were penetrating the space in front of me then they were also penetrating the space inside of me. Inside my gut, inside my heart, inside my brain. There it was for the eye to see. Cosmic interplay that is older than life, older than consciousness, older than everything we can conceive of. Straight lines and Spirals combining in an orgasmic sigilic frenzy. Are their paths fated ? Is this the order in chaos? Is it an illusion, a clever trick of some power unknown to our comprehension? I don't know but I think it is some kind of clue to things we as Witches pursue. This blog entry came about via the catalyst of a posting in our forum in the "Musings on our Arte - 2008" thread.