We would like to thank Susannah Mayor, National Trust Warden at Smallhythe Place, and the National Trust for permitting us access to their archives throughout the research for this book. 1 We would also like to acknowledge Susannah in pointing us to Winchelsea through Pamela’s sketch of Tower Cottage. This led to the trip that revealed some of the more astonishing examples of real-world models for what has become the world’s most popular tarot deck.
We would also like to thank the staff at the V & A Theatre archives for their assistance and considerable patience whilst we made our way through hundreds of folders and thousands of images to discover just two important photographs. The staff at the Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library (Yale University) and others have assisted the research and production of this book.
The staff at the Library and Museum of Freemasonry, London, have provided kind assistance and access to their archives for much of the Golden Dawn material in this present book.
In particular we would like to personally thank two Japanese collectors who have provided materials from their personal collections, and Kenji Ishimatsu in particular for also organising a collection of scans of the original and earliest editions of the Waite-Smith deck from various collectors around the world. The card images used throughout this book are from that collection, with permission and our thanks. Koretaka Eguchi provided us high-resolution scans from his substantial collection of related Colman Smith materials that include the Green Sheaf magazines.
Giordano Berti provided images of the Sola Busca deck from the Wolfgang Mayer edition (1988) and permission. This limited edition deck is a beautiful reproduction of the Sola Busca.2
Stuart Kaplan, Bobbie Bensaid, and Lynn Araujo of U.S. Games Systems kindly provided a scan of a newly acquired portrait of Pamela and gave us permission for usage, which we acknowledge and for which we give our thanks.
The RSA (Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce) confirmed Pamela’s membership, based on the provision by Corrine Kenner of a signed bookplate from Pamela’s own hand which bore the letters “FRSA.”
The work of Robert Gilbert on A. E. Waite and Mary K. Greer on Pamela Colman Smith has been the bedrock upon which this present book was built, along with enthusiast sites online. We hope to have extended this research in new and exciting directions, particularly with regard to Pamela’s contribution to the deck.
Finally, we would like to acknowledge and thank Barbara Moore for her support and friendship and for creating the opportunity to make these new discoveries available to a wide audience through Llewellyn Worldwide.