The religion of Wicca began in the 1920s with Gerald Gardner. According to Ethan White, “It was the ‘Father of Wicca,’ Gerald Gardner, who provided the earliest account of such a group, making the claim (during the 1950s) that in the year 1939 he had been initiated into the New Forest coven” (187). After buying the Naturist Fiveacres Country Club in the 1940s, Gerald Gardner and his wife founded the Bricket Wood coven. Gardner and his wife, Donna, were the high priest and priestess respectively. The coven would hold meetings at a place they called the “witches’ cottage” that was located on the grounds of the country club. After the death of Gardner in 1964, however, Jack Bracelin was the successor for high priest in the coven, but quit soon after. Although the Bricket Wood coven is still alive today, there is no accountable history after the 1970s because of the amount of secrecy they have. Gardnerianism, a term used for Gardner’s tradition of Wicca, is the most dominant form of Wicca in England today. With the repeal of the Witchcraft …show more content…
According to Gary Jensen and Ashely Thompson, “In the surveys between 1990 and 2000, the number of people identifying themselves as Wiccan or Pagan grew faster than any other religious category studied in the American Religious Identification Surveys” (753). One Wiccan tradition that was founded in the United States was the Feri Tradition by a man named Victor Anderson. This tradition of Wicca placed a strong accent on sexual mystism and had a deep respect for nature and the world. Another tradition of Wicca that was formed in the United States was Dianic Wicca. The difference between Dianic Wicca and other forms of Wicca is that its followers worship a goddess instead of honoring both a male and female god. Dianic Wicca was founded by Zsuzsanna Budapest and has strong feminist