Maryland Area Naturist Association

Maryland Area Naturist Association (MARNA) formed in the 1994 when its founder Walter M Green III saw a need for a naturist group that accepted single male naturists (a.k.a. nudists). At first this groups was Internet-based and had no physical form such as a meeting group, location or events. This group was set up originally on the GeoCities servers which was new at that time, and was placed in one of its "neighborhoods". Green had been told he was one of the local clubs list, and that it was rare or difficult for a single to join unless another single of the opposite sex was also interested or another male left the club. The website at GeoCities eventually attracted other interested parties, who will remain anonymous, one of whom helped finance MARNA's first few events in the late 1990s or early 2000s. The financier of the first event later dropped out and MARNA needed to find funds to hold additional events. Around this time Yahoo had purchased GeoCities and the changes in GeoCities structure encouraged MARNA to acquire its own website. Not long thereafter Green began financing the group's events. The early events started with attendance of 5 to 8 persons and at a financial loss, which meant only a few dollars were recovered from attendees, while the overall cost for the events was paid for by its founder. Once the events started to actually grow to roughly 15 to 20 persons, the founder started using any and all profits to recover money lost on the earlier events.