William Moulton Marston, creator of Wonder Woman, never revealed where Paradise Island was during his run as Wonder Woman writer. He simply said, “on the shores of an uncharted isle set in the midst of a vast expanse of ocean.”1
The Wonder Woman TV pilot movie in 1975 explicitly located Bermuda Triangle2 and the comic book Wonder Woman #224 (June-July 1976)3 repeated this.
Why name Wonder Woman’s home Paradise Island?
While Marston was already obsessing with mythology and tackling woman suffrage in high school in 1910,4 the appearance of Child of the Amazons and Other Poems by Max Eastman in 1913 nailed down Marston’s image of an Amazon as a fictional vehicle to advance how he saw women – since Marston already saw his non-fictional wife Elizabeth Holloway as an Amazon before then.5 From Elizabeth to Thyone (pronounced thigh o nee, looks like Taiwan to me) of Child of the Amazons to Gaia in the 1932 novel Venus with Us to Diana.
In Child of the Amazons, the Amazon Thyone falls in love with a man – this is Diana and Steve Trevor in Wonder Woman comics.
In 1914, Inez Haynes Gillmore (later Inez Haynes Irvin) published Angel Island. American men were shipwrecked on an island of women, not Amazons but winged women. This apparently inspired Paradise Island. The book mentions “South Pacific Islander,”6 so I expect this refers to the Pacific Islands (Polynesia, Melanesia, and Micronesia) and not the Philippines. We have islands and locations in the Philippines called “paradise” and “paraiso.”
Eastman and Gillmore were both suffragists. They worked together as shown by the editorial masthead of The Masses where their names appear as contributing editors.7 Marston was a member of Harvard Men’s League for Woman Suffrage.8
In 1915, Charlotte Perkins Gilman published a 12-part serial novel, Herland, in her self-published magazine called The Forerunner.
Herland is about a race of women, isolated from the world, who give birth without men – parthenogenesis. There is no island in Herland, but the women are thousands of years old. Marston’s Amazons remain immortal (thousands of years old and non-aging physically) on Paradise Island.
“The women of Herland have no fear of men. Why should they have? They are not timid in any sense. They are not weak; and they all have strong trained athletic bodies.”9 Strong trained athletic bodies – very Wonder Woman comics.
In 1912, Elizabeth Holloway appeared in a musical about a world without men.10 This predates Herland by 3 years. The primary Amazon in Marston’s life (Elizabeth aka Sadie) has a lot to do with Wonder Woman lore.
In 1913, Marston began his research11 on the lie detector and published his findings in 1917. The lie detector is known as the predecessor of Wonder Woman’s golden lasso.
Marston was born at a time when suffragists and early feminists were celebrated and caricatured as Amazons – and was raised by strong women – so he absorbed the image of the “new woman” archetype early in his life (see Lepore’s Secret History and/or surf the Net for late 1800s and early 1900s history and resources to get a better feel of the milieu in which Marston grew up).
Conceptually, Wonder Woman began in the 1900s, going through iterations like Gaia in 1932 before settling as Diana in 1937,12 and finally as Diana (Prince) in the 1940s Wonder Woman comics.
So, why Paradise Island? Because Marston wanted an allegorical safe haven for women to harness strength and independence away from man’s world, advancing his psychological framework of balancing physical strength with loving submission to authority. In short, because of the mythical Amazons and the suffragists who sparked their revival in public discourse and modern mythmaking.
Notes
1Charles Moulton (w), Harry G. Peter (a). “Introducing Wonder Woman.” All-Star Comics #8 (Dec. 1941-Jan.1942), All-American Comics, Inc. [DC Comics]. p. 1. <Panels that follow this revelation are numbered 2 and 3; the following page is numbered 2; pages 3 and 4 are not paginated, while the rest are paginated.>
2“The New Original Wonder Woman.” Pilot TV movie. Wonder Woman. Written by Stanley Ralph Ross. Dir. John Erman. ABC. 7 Nov. 1975. Television.
3Martin Pasko (w), Curt Swan and Vince Colletta (a). Wonder Woman #224 (June-July 1976), National Periodical Publications, Inc. [DC Comics]. N. pag. <Bermuda Triangle is revealed in the story and on the letters page called Wonder Words.>
4Jill Lepore. The Secret History of Wonder Woman. New York: Vintage Books, 2015. pp. 6 and 343.
5Lepore p. 17.
6Inez Haynes Gillmore. Angel Island. New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1914. p. 37.
7The Masses 4.3 (1912): 2.
8Lepore p. 326. <This page shows Harvard University Archives as Lepore’s source.>
9Charlotte Perkins Gilman. “Herland” The Forerunner 6 (1915): 293.
10Lepore p. 22.
11Melissa M. Littlefield. The Lying Brain: Lie Detection in Science and Science Fiction. Michigan: The University of Michigan Press, 2011. p.156.
12Trina Robbins. The Great Women Superheroes. Northampton, MA: Kitchen Sink Press, 1996. pp. 3-4.
References
Eastman, Max. Child of the Amazons and Other Poems. New York: Mitchell Kennerley, 1913.
Marston, William M. “Systolic Blood Pressure Symptoms of Deception.” Journal of Experimental Psychology 2.2 (1917): 117-163.
Marston, William. The Private Life of Julius Caesar (Venus with Us). New York: Universal Publishing, 1953. Rpt. of Venus with Us: A Tale of the Caesar. New York: Sears Publishing Co., 1932.
Postscripts to Paradise
In 1908, the first suffragist parade in the United States happened in New York on February 16. Maud Malone led other suffragists in the historic march. It was a huge success and gained coverage across the country. The Washington Times billed it as “Amazons Bluff New York Police.” At the time, Marston was in high school, with his classmate and lifelong inspiration Elizabeth. I can imagine the kind of world building the 1908 Amazon event inspired in the young, fertile mind of Marston.
And, the rest is history.
Well then, let’s condense that history:
New York 1908. High school 1910. Lie detector 1913. Independent women and Amazons in literature 1912 to 1915. DISC framework 1928. Julius Caesar novel 1932. Diana 1937. All-Star Comics #8 1941. Events and projects in-between.
“Amazons Bluff New York Police: Fair Suffragettes Take ‘Quiet Walk’ Up Broadway While Police Admire.” The Washington Times [Washington, D.C.] 17 Feb. 1908, Last ed.: 9.
Imagine with me.
Cue in any music of your choice that makes you feel honor and remembrance.
Now, imagine the Amazons rising from the waters of Paradise Island. Let the music continue playing in the background as each woman rises.
First, Annie Dalton Marston, then Elizabeth Holloway, then Olive Byrne; Florentia (beloved of the fictional Julius Caesar), Dorothea (daughter of Florentia and Caesar), Gaia (granddaughter of Caesar and the future Diana); Queen Hippolyte, Diana, Metala, Althea, Etta Candy; Margaret Sanger, Emmeline Pankhurst, Maud Malone, Gloria Steinem and other feminists; Trina Robbins, Jill Lepore, Valerie Estelle Frankel, Regina Luttrell and other herstorians; Joye Hummel, Dorothy Woolfolk, Gail Simone and other Wonder Woman comic-book writers; Jill Thompson, Nicola Scott and other artists; the women in your life who bound you with love.
Imagine all of them holding a golden lasso that stretches and glows to infinity. That little glow, that tiny spark, lingers in our mortal hearts.
We, rememberers, remain mortal, but the legacy of the women we remember is immortal.
Thank you for your indulgence.
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updated August 26, 2026
