Evangeline Adams and the Wynn Key Cycle

In 1926 Sidney K. Bennett (aka Wynn) had a serious accident which prompted him to develop his “Wynn Key Cycle” which he popularized in the 1930s. He does not credit Evangeline Adams with one of the fundamental ideas that makes up his Key Cycle, but there is a striking resemblance to the method of horary astrology which Evangeline Adams was practicing in the 1920s in New York City, long before Wynn’s accident. Adams was the most famous astrologer in the USA at the time, and Wynn was a studious astrologer, so it is highly likely that he was aware of Adams’ methodology.

Here is a passage from Astrology Your Place in the Sun (1927) by Evangeline Adams:

“... take the exact time the question is asked and work out for this time the Ascendant, or first house, as well as the cusps of the other eleven houses; just as you would if drawing a natal chart.  Instead, however, of placing in this chart the planets as they appear in the heavens at the moment the question is asked, the querent’s radical planets should be placed in this chart.  The Astrologer should now proceed to read the chart in the same manner as if it were the radix, for the chart as it now stands might be considered the horoscope for the birth of the idea,  just as the natal chart is the horoscope for the birth of the individual.”  (page 261)

The crux of Adams’ horary method is the astrological houses calculated for the time and place of the question. The crux of Wynn’s Key Chart is also the astrological houses, which in this case are calculated by progressing the Angles of the Solar Return for the time and place of the date in question. Having read widely in both Adams’ and Wynn’s publications, it seems obvious to me that Adams’ methods prompted Wynn, perhaps subliminally, to focus of the houses particular to a date and time of an incident (as in a horary question) as the crux of the technique.

Just how did Wynn progress the Angles of the Solar Return chart? His idea was simplicity itself. He began with the current Solar Return at the birthplace and also calculated the upcoming solar return of a year later. These two Returns are typically 365 days and about 5 hours 48 minute and 46 seconds apart (the mean duration of a tropical year). He realized that he could progress the MC of the Solar return at a mean rate of 5 hours 48 minute and 46 seconds PER tropical year, or about 29 minutes per month. Such a rate would advance the MC of the current Return so that it arrived at the exact position of the MC in the next return exactly a year later.

Wynn also realized that the real duration of a tropical year can vary by several minutes from year to year, so he individualized the rate of progression according the the year in question. Then having progressed the Angles and cusps of the Solar Return by this rate for the birthplace, he could easily re-located the progressed Solar Return to any location the native happened to occupy on a given date during the year.

In one of his articles about the Wynn Key Cycle he gives the following example of how he progressed the Solar Return MC, from which he then calculated the remaining cusps of the chart:

Suppose someone is born in Chicago on 24 August 1936 at 2:54:40 PM CDT with the Sun at 01 Virgo 26′. This birth time corresponds to a Sidereal Time of 18:06:17. Wynn preferred to work with sidereal time in doing these calculations.

A year later the Sun will return to its natal position on 24 August 1937 at 8:42:51 PM CDT, which corresponds to a Sidereal Time of 23:54:28.

Subtracting the sidereal time of the next solar return from the current one (and disregarding the whole 365 days between the date), we arrive at 23:54:28 minus 18:06:17, which equals 05:48:11, that is 5 hours, 48 minutes and 11 seconds. Then the rate at which the MC will progress is 05:48:11 divided by the 365.242 days in a tropical year:

05:48:11 = 5 hours x 60 min/hour + 48 minutes + 11 seconds / 60 seconds per minute = 348.183 minutes.

348.183 minutes / 365.242 days = 0.953294893 minutes per day by which the birth time must be advanced to progress the MC.

Each “month” or one-twelfth of the year, the MC can be progressed by advancing the birth time at a rate of 348.183 minutes / 12 = 29.01525 minutes per “month”. Note that these rates are specific to the first year of life of this native and will need to be calculated for other years which may vary somewhat in length because Wynn uses the actual length of the year rather than the mean length.

Left-hand chart: Native born in 1936.
Right-hand chart: Solar Return cusps progressed to 25 Dec 1936 with transiting planets for that date at the birthplace.

Wynn found in his research that the progressed Solar Return cusps combined with the transiting planets on a given date, and then compared with the natal chart, offered an extremely useful predictive tool.

If the native were not at the birthplace on 25 December 1936 in this example, Wynn would simply re-locate the progressed Wynn Key chart to the native’s actual location.