Linda Goodman

American astrologer Linda Goodman was born this day, 9 April, in 1925. She's the astrologer who lit the fuse under Sun sign astrology with her book
Sun Signs, first published in 1968. Sparks of inspiration from her book still fly far and wide, long after the author's demise in 1995. Back in England, I bought that book in the mid-'70s, enjoyed it a lot, due to her writing style and sense of humour. I passed it around work friends to spread "the word"; it was never seen by me again!

Most Sun sign astrologers, in spite of their continued popularity, and position as "gatekepers" to astrology proper, still receive a bad press. There are bad ones, some very bad ones, but those with a flair for writing in a style accessible to interested but low-information readers, who can show a modicum of humour and insight into the human condition, while tempting readers to find out more about their subject, continue to survive unfair ridicule and denigration. Linda Goodman was one such astrologer. In preparing this post I discovered more about her. Whether what has been published is 100% accurate only those closest to her will know, but it makes interesting reading, and paints a (possibly exaggerated) picture of a rather eccentric, driven, intense but very generous character.
Ms Goodman chose never to reveal full detail of her birth data, what she did reveal turned out to be inexact, once detail from her birth certificate became available.

I'll quote excerpts from each of the links below as samples, then take a peek at her natal chart.

Astro.com:Linda Goodman

Conscious Evolution - piece by Maria Barron about Linda Goodman (2000)

People.com - piece by By Sarah Moore Hall, Richard K. Rein originally published 1979.

From astro.com - notes regarding time of birth:

LMR quotes Kathleen Johnson for the date, from Goodman; confirmed by Frank C. Clifford by phone from the records bureau. Time deduced by LMR from her statement that she had Neptune right on the ASC. For the most part she concealed her own data, only dropping hints and clues to her colleagues.
According to Wikipedia, the magazine 'Today's Astrologer' writes on February 6, 2008, p. 11:
According to her birth certificate, on file at the American Federation of Astrologers in Tempe, Arizona, she was born on April 9, 1925 at 6:05 a.m. EST in Morgantown, West Virginia

From the Conscious Evolution link above:

...............Although Linda never revealed the full contents of her own birth chart publicly, a chart cast for around 8:23 a.m. on April 9, 1925, in Morgantown, West Virginia, matches all the aspects she did reveal about her natal chart and the circumstances she believed about her birth.

(NOTE: This time of birth is some 2 and a half hours later than the time on her birth certificate)

In Gooberz, Linda says she was born in the morning and that she always had a hard time really reconciling who she was because of her "somewhat afflicted planet in Libra." That kind of identity conflict fits the astrological description of a person with the Sun and Moon in opposite signs. In the chart as cast, it is the Moon, representing the emotional nature, which shows up as Linda's "somewhat afflicted planet" in gentle, beauty-loving Libra. It opposes her natal Sun in the fiery, independent and combative sign of Aries. The "graceful conjoining" of the stars Spica and Arcturus, which Linda mentions in the same description as a blessing in her chart, is there as well. The two stars are conjoined with her natal moon.

Linda also says her chart was blessed by trines from Gemini, Neptune and Mars. In the chart as cast, Linda's ascendant shows up at about 9 degrees Gemini, and indeed there are trines emanating from the point of her Gemini ascendant as well as from Neptune and Mars. Neptune, the planet of dreams, trines her Sun and Venus. The ascendant and Mars, both located in quick-thinking, communicative Gemini, trine the mid-heaven point in the chart. Suggestive of how one might be remembered in the world, Linda's mid-heaven point is in the New Age sign of Aquarius.
Also, in the chart as cast, Linda's ruling planet, Mars, sovereign of Aries, is conjoined with her ascendant, providing an explanation for why Linda would refer to herself, in newspaper articles and with friends, as a triple Aries. Only two planets -- the Sun and Venus -- are in Aries at any time that morning. But with Mars located at the point of the ascendant, the third dose of Aries Ram energy is added, conspicuously, to the personality...............................

Linda told interviewers that she began her career writing for newspapers in the eastern and southeastern United States. She also said she had written speeches for black American civil rights leader Whitney Young, who served for several years as president of the National Urban League. Her political activism re-emerged at various times throughout her life. In 1993, she whipped off political letters on both the national and local level. One, to President Clinton, advised him to study a particular experimental fuel additive as he formed his environmental policies. The other, a letter to the editor of Cripple Creek's little weekly newspaper, The Gold Rush, advised local voters to return incumbent city council members to office.

In her personal life, Linda endured the pain of loss time and time again. She had children who died in infancy and a daughter, Sarah, nicknamed Sally, who died or disappeared as a young adult.
........... during her final years, as she faced declining health caused by diabetes -- when her belief in the benefits of physical immortality would occasionally give way to a desire to move on from this earthly plain of experience -- she would call to the love of her middle years, her second husband, Sam Goodman, who had preceded her in death.

From the People link above:

As dawn breaks over her remote aerie high in the Colorado Rockies, Linda Goodman shakes off sleepiness, feeds wood into the stove against the chill and sets about a bizarre daily ritual. To the low recorded music of a Gregorian chant, she lights candles on a handmade altar and recites a mystical litany she created six years ago as a message to her departed loved ones. It begins with the prayer of St. Francis: "Lord, make me an instrument of Your peace..."

Goodman's life defies imagination. On the one hand, she is a very rich woman, made so by her wildly popular books on astrology. Her 1968 explanation of the zodiac titled Sun Signs sold four million copies, and paperback rights to her current best-seller, Love Signs, went last year for $2.25 million, equaling the record held by Mario Puzo's Fools Die. By any standard, Goodman at 54 is the most influential astrologer in the world. But she has also become a recluse, hidden away in Cripple Creek, Colo., haunted by the disappearance of the two most important people in her life within the space of 20 months. One was her lover, Robert Brewer, a marine biologist of 22 who fled to Mexico without explanation in the spring of 1972 and has not been seen since. The other was her daughter, Sally, officially listed by the New York medical examiner as a suicide just before Christmas 1973, a casualty of liquor and barbituates at 21.

Goodman believes Brewer will return soon of his own accord; she keeps a place set for him at the dining table. Her grief over Sally, a budding actress and drama school graduate, has taken a more obsessive turn. "I know Sally is not dead," says Goodman. "I've done her chart over and over again. An astrologist can't predict death, but I can foresee non-death. I don't know exactly why she was taken, but I feel the time is right for her to reappear. The only reason I'm talking now is hope that I'll find some lead to her." ........................................
.....................A well-known astrologer on the East Coast, provided (by PEOPLE) with the date and place of Linda's birth (West Parkersburg, Va., April 9, 1925) but not with her identity, describes "an Aries who has a tendency to spin dreams. She is not a liar—she just dramatizes things. She tries to make her fantasies come true." Indirectly, Goodman's explanation seems to agree. "I admit that to be an astrologer you live a great deal in the imagination," she says. "But about Sally I'm like any distraught mother. I just want my daughter back."

Natal chart using data from Astrodatabank (AA rating, confirmed by birth certificate)

Linda Goodman's birthname: Mary Alice Kemery. Born on 9 April 1925 at 06:05 AM in Morgantown, West Virginia.

The chart differs in detail from the time of birth Ms Goodman gave to interviewers, but doesn't differ a lot in spirit. (See the snips from the Conscious Evolution link above). The Sun-Moon opposition is here. Her rising sign isn't Gemini though, but Aries, resulting, as she had stated, but for different reason, that she was "a triple Aries".
Neptune isn't on the ascendant, but it forms a nice close trine to Sun on the ascendant. Her mid-heaven was Capricorn, not Aquarius - and Capricorn underlines the kind of business sense she must have had, in spite of her seeming eccentricities and quirks. Jupiter close to mid-heaven reflects her reported generosity.