April 22, 2007, is Bettie Page's 84th birthday, so HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BETTIE!In the early 1960s a friend of mine handed me a stack of girly magazines and pointed out one of the models. "That's Bettie Page," I remember him saying.
I'd like to claim that I knew even then that Bettie would become the cult figure she is today, but I didn't. I thought she was pretty and sexy. She even stood apart from the other models, but I didn't imagine then that four decades later people would devote websites, magazines, books, and movie biographies to her.
I think the pictures that we all thought were perverted back in the 1950s look innocent today. Would you be scared if you saw this smiling woman with a whip? Bettie did a lot of bondage photos but frankly, she just wasn't the dominatrix type.
Many people have done their own versions of Bettie though artwork…
…and some by mimicking her look.
Here's Bettie a couple of years ago with Anna Nicole Smith and Pamela Anderson. There is a spark in the smile that shows the young Bettie.
Click on pictures for full-size images.The Bettie Page that is the object of the Bettie cultists is an invention, not a real person. There are thousands of pictures of her available everywhere and they are the object of worshipful fans. The real Bettie Page had a life and did all of the everyday things the rest of us did. In later life she even got religion, becoming a born again Christian. As with Marilyn Monroe the image took over the reality. But in her youth she had a look that the camera loved and it is these pictures that we know as Bettie.
Ciao for now.
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