Pinned Down

Bettie Page, the sweet, angelic face of leather-clad, ball-gagged spanking, has died following a heart attack at the age of 85. The most famous pin-up girl after WWII had her spreads in Wink, Eyeful and Titter plastered on lockers, garage walls and pool halls, while her leather-and-lace 8- and 16-mm films were bachelor party staples. She approached respectability as Playboy’s January 1955 centerfold, but that helped earn her a spot in front of Sen. Estes Kefauver’s commission on juvenile delinquency, and by 1957 she had left the business for a descent into insanity, and then hit bottom by joining a Billy Graham crusade.