Jane Wolfe

A Pennsylvania Dutch girl who moved to New York in the late 19th century to pursue a theatrical career, she became one of early silent pictures' better known character actresses. Between 1910 and 1920 she appeared in over 90 films, but then her acting career all but ended, and she devoted the rest of her life to the study and teaching of an occult religion. In 1918 she had begun a correspondence with the English writer and occultist Aleister Crowley. In 1920 she left Hollywood to join Crowley at his "Abbey of Thelema" on the Italian island of Sicily where she lived for several years, becoming his student Soror Estai, and accepting his new religion of sex, drugs, and magick in the name of personal liberation. Later she returned to Southern California where she continued to represent Crowley, and taught his doctrines for many years until her death in 1958.