I Wonder What They Talked About...

What did they talk about, this white man who stole black music and this black man who crooned white man's music... It wasn't chicks.

"It's Men Who Make Women Whatever They Are."

A quote from Nana (1934), a movie Sam Goldwyn used as a vehicle for Anna Sten, a Russian actress he was determined to make the next Garbo or Dietrich. Sten sounds much like Dietrich in her singing stage performance.

However, Sten didn't learn English very well and so did not endear herself to American film fans; she was dubbed Goldwyn's Folly.

The movie has consequently been rather ignored, but really isn't as bad as folks might have you think; I rather enjoyed it on TCM tonight. The only irksome thing for me was The Code ending.

And the fact that TCM doesn't allow you to embed the videos; so you'll have to click the links above to see them.

Fanny Brice's Baby Snooks

It should be noted that I believe the song that Fanny Brice is said to have sang in the 1939 article by James Street was actually Three Little Fishes (Itty Bitty Poo), a "Southern children's song" written in 1939 by Josephine Judson Carringer.

According to this article, Josephine Judson Carringer was musically gifted, highly intelligent, ad entered college when she was 16 yrs old. She wrote Three Little Fishes with Betty Lynn Kirk, her sorority sister at the University of Tennessee in the late 1930s. They then sold the song for $200 and Saxie Dowell adapted the lyrics and music into the piece that became a number one hit in 1939 as performed by the Kay Kyser orchestra with Ish KaBibble singing.

According to Time, June 19, 1939, "Saxie Dowell recently heard, in the South, an old nursery tune called Down in de Meddy. He thought it mighty cute." We can't blame Saxie for the giant PR machine which would deny buying music (especially for a mighty cute old nursery rhyme song), and so we can likely believe the rest:

The result was published last April by Santly-Joy-Select, Inc., which got out The Music Goes 'Round and 'Round and admits to liking "crazy things." Under its title Three Little Fishies, Saxie Dowell's song last week had set something of a current record by leading the field in sheet music sales for a month.

Three Little Fishies has verses which can be sung either in English (Down in the meadow in a little bitty pool) or in "fish talk" (Down in de meddy in a ITTY BITTY POO). The chorus can be sung only one way: Boop boop dittem dattem whattem Chu! The song, likely to cause reverse peristalsis in fastidious stomachs, is all about some "itty fitties" who "fam and dey fam" until they "taw a TARK!" (shark). Den dey fam back to deir poo. The publishers, wary of overplugging Three Little Fishies, withheld it from all but a few big orchestral names—Hal Kemp, Guy Lombardo, Kay Kyser, Paul Whiteman, each of whom recorded it. The song was plugged on the radio by Mildred Bailey, Fannie Brice, Judy Starr. Along with the itty fitties, fat Saxie Dowell fam into such fame that he is now thinking of leaving Hal Kemp and starting a band of his own.

The song is a relative childhood classic -- that is to say, if you had a corny family like mine, you heard your relatives sing it. Often. You may have even heard Madonna and Rosie O'Donell perform a cover of the tune.

Now, you might be wondering why I'd be taking so much time to discuss a cute old kids' song here at SPS. Well, the idea of Baby Snooks, the bratty character played by Fanny Brice fascinates me.


It plays well-enough on the Baby Snook radio shows but, as Brice was fond of dressing & behaving 'in character', once you can see as well as hear it takes on other elements.

Putting a grown woman in little-girl-garb may have it's humorous elements, but it also says something about power & dominance -- and you don't have to be a perv to see it. Little girls are innocence, but they are also property; they belong to daddy. Short baby-doll dresses, oh-so fashionable these days, communicate these things -- innocence and access -- which is why I don't own a single one of those monstrosities.

Having a bratty girl-child mouth-off to her master may be cute, but underneath it all lies -- as sure as those ruffled panties -- the idea that she will eventually heel and heed her master. Or, if she does not, then he is less-than-a-man and plays cuckhold to her charms. Sure, all this can only make it funnier; but did they get it?

Without Brice & Snooks, we likely wouldn't have had Lily Tomlin's Edith Ann on Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In -- but there's a huge difference between the two.


Tomlin's Edith Ann appeared alone in her giant rocking chair where she told stories about her family & dog. Having her be alone could have been a choice to deal with scale; but even so, simply being alone meant Edith Ann was not (as) eroticized.


Baby Snooks, by comparison, not only acted with others but interacted physically with them, drawing in all those adult contexts. There is a large difference between discussing a punishment, a la Edith Ann, and showing a grown woman dressed as a child over the knee of her daddy figure like Baby Snooks; the image has erotically charged elements.


At the base of this humor is prettified misogyny &/or glorified cuckholding. It's all good & fine for adult role-play sex-scenarios, really; but as entertainment one really ought to be aware that's what they are enjoying.

Baby Snooks (with Hanley Stafford as "Daddy") was performed on television only once (and this was Brice's only TV appearance too), on CBS-TV's Popsicle Parade of Stars in 1950 (one year prior to Brice's death). Entertainment folks document Brice's height &/or age as the reason for its failure, and Brice herself is said to have admitted that the character of Baby Snooks just didn't work properly when seen... But come on!

This wasn't the first time Baby Snooks had appeared before people. Baby Snooks was even in Judy Garland's Everybody Sing (1938) prior to radio success.



While Brice & Garland are wonderfully funny in that scene, this was not the usual Baby Snooks routine. Baby Snooks was built on the annoying relationship with her father and, sometimes, other men. The Baby Snooks character had been preformed live on stage for years and, height of male actors aside, there clearly were other issues at work here.


In his book Fanny Brice, Herbert G. Goldman writes of a Baby Snooks performance with Bob Hope (links again added by SPS):

Fanny, who rejoined the Follies at the Winter Garden, was still not in the best of health, and had to clear her throat in her Snooks scene Hope. "That's my cold clearing up," she ad-libbed at one point.

"I thought you were just oversexed," was Bob Hope's quick reply. The line stayed in.

Yeah. No wonder it just didn't work properly on television.

I wonder just what it is that people were thinking about Baby Snooks at the time.

You can download 10 Baby Snooks shows from me for just $3.

Note: Gone Fishing (06/01/1939) & Baby Fish Story (04/11/1940) have quite a bit of similar content for a woman who eschewed rehearsals, saying she wanted to give performances a spontaneity and unpredictability that would be lost with an over-familiarity with the lines and other players. That could just be the writers milking their own jokes. What do you notice about the shows?

What Does A Talent-Scout (In 1939) Look For?

A center-fold presentation of what radio and movie talent-scouts looked for... I guess a gal really had to measure-up for radio too.

(Click to read the huge scan.)

Posed by Lillian Cornell, NBC singer, who typifies those qualities sought by the alert talent-scout. Photographs by Maurice Seymour.

From Radio Guide, week ending Sept 22, 1939 -- thanks to Pop Tart (who also put up a quiz from this issue, along with answers at CQ) for sending it to me!

Good Girls Don't -- Whore Their Own Posts?

If you want to know why this video of The Knack is here, the story goes a little something like this...

Girl remembers, girl writes, but girl thinks it's too personal for this here blog so she publishes it elsewhere.

Then girl links to it anyway. Not just because she wrote it, but because now she thinks it may just make sense here anyway.

Adamant Eve, 1949

Sheet music for the 1949 varsity show performance of Adamant Eve. Songs: I Didn't Know it Was That Good and Kissing Me; lyrics by Moe Jaffe and music by Clay Boland. Cover illustration by Lou Day. Via University of Pennsylvania Archives.

Dance Of The Hoo-Hoo

Vintage ragtime sheet music which reminds me of what some folks teach their kids to call their -- looks around to see who is listening, then whispers -- private parts. No, not the pussy.



Found at A Tad Too Much tan For Taupe, Rob Crausaz's Ragtime MIDI Files (yes, a sound file is there!) says this of the Emma Y. Suckert song:

Dance of the Hoo-Hoo (1898)
This delightful folk rag, which is available on the "Lester Levy" website, was written in honor of "The Concatenated Order of Hoo-Hoo" (the cover has a replica of their official symbol). According to its website TCOHH is, "the oldest industrial Fraternal Organization in existence in the USA" (being founded in Jan. 1892 as a "public relations department of the lumber industry").

Intrigued, I Googled-on...

From Stichting Argus:

The Concatenated Order of Hoo-Hoo was founded on January 21, 1892, in Gurdon, Arkansas, to which its headquarters had returned at the time of this writing. In the intervening years, it has moved a long way from its intention, which was to fight superstition and conventionalism, and became a parody of established secret societies. It started out with the intention of having nothing that other orders possess. Originally, there were no lodge rooms. Meetings, or “concatenations,” were held in hotels, the first being at the St. Charles Hotel in New Orleans on February 18, 1892. Even the name is unique. “Hoo-hoo” is not some arcane lumberman’s distress call, but a word coined by one of the founders, Bolling Arthur Johnson, about a month before the order was founded. He used it to describe a lonesome tuft of hair on the head of one Charles H. McCarer. “Concatenated” referred both to the cat, which was chosen as the symbol, and to “concatenation,” or “linking together in a chain.”

The founding members were not just lumbermen. They also included railroad men (who transport lumber) and newspaper men (who cover it with print). The organization chose as its emblem a black cat, to show its disdain for superstition, and based much of its ritual on the cat’s nine lives. Their officers were the Supreme Nine, made up of the Snark, the Senior Hoo-Hoo, the Junior Hoo-Hoo, the Bojum or Boojum, the Scrivenotor, the Jabberwock, the Cuctocacian, the Arcanoper, and the Gurdon. The overall leader was the Snark of the Universe. One of the high points of the ritual was the Embalming of the Snark, by which process he passed into the House of Ancients.

The organization is still around, Hoo-Hoo.org, but it doesn't seem as fun and irreverent as before.

Does Anyone Say "Head-Banging" Anymore?

Hot for SIXX:A.M.'s video, Pray for Me?

Catch the band on XXBN's Cult of Gracie tonight. (I'm public phone-o-phobic, so I sent my questions in via email lol)

More info on the band, and another video, here.

Pray For Me Video

The explicit version of SIXX:A.M.'s newest music video, Pray for Me:

Something Old, Something New: Barbi Benton For You

Tonight, relaxing from a day of hunting, we are listening to records.

Yes, good old vinyl.

Last week, when out and about, I bought a Barbi Benton album, Something New (Playboy Records). I bought it not for the musicality (and having listened to it, there's nothing really to comment on), but for the giggle factor; I just wanted to call my sister and tell her I had a Boobie Benton LP.

Yes, my sister and I called her Boobie Benton.

I'm not proud of it, or anything.

But let's face it, back then our knowledge of Ms. Benton came from her appearances on Hee Haw, and while we knew nothing of her link to Hugh Hefner, Playboy After Dark, or even that Hef and Playboy existed (yet), we weren't blind. At first, Barbi's corny sexualized costumes may have not meant much to we wee girls, but as we grew (and feared further growth) into puberty, we became more than a bit self-conscious...

What do immature humans do in uncomfortable situations or with uncomfortable feelings? Mock the thing that brings them to mind, duh. (Note: This is normal & find for kids, but adults really should mature their minds along with their bodies.)

So, Barbi Benton became Boobie Benton. And Adrienne Barbeau was -- you guessed it -- Adrienne Barboob. (You don't want to know what we called Connecticut Avenue when we played Monopoly without our parents around.)

Ironically, while sis and I were often too naive to appropiately deal with our feelings about boobs, or know that Hee Haw was inspired by Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In, we both were sophisticated enough to realize that Laugh-In was the far more biting & better show.

Back to Boobi...


Barbi Benton was published in Playboy, including covers, but she was never a centerfold... Do you think that has to do with the relationship with Hef? Like he either felt territorial or feared accusations of cronyism? Of course, it could just have been her choice.

But I am struck by how fresh, cute and innocent Barbi's look is compared to Hef's current type (and by that I mean the same plastic blonde bimbo look his girls have had for decades). Barbi Benton more exemplifies the original Playboy magazine ideals of sex not being dirty, that it's something everyone does, including the girl next door.

How far Playboy has drifted in that regard... Much to my personal disappointment.

Today Benton is still beautiful, if blonde, apparently a pottery loving interior decorator, and while her bangs live on, some think she hasn't aged well on the inside, saying, "Some women can age gracefully, trading physical beauty for inner strength. I wanted Barbi to be one of those. Instead, she is a black hole of bitterness, disconnected from reality, obsessed with the few short years she felt alive."

Yikes. (I couldn't get the video to play, so I can't comment.)

But the real burning question on my mind is: Where's the Internet Homage to Sugar Time!

Sugar Time! was the short-lived television series which starred Benton (Maxx), Marianne Black (Maggie) and Didi Carr (Diane -- shown at left on Match Game, via), as a girl band ready to make it big.

Where are the 70's TV fans who should be making pages and posts, if not an entire site, to the show? I vaguely remember it... It's sort of fuzzy -- and bouncy in my recollection. But then I must be on the right track, as it was the show which caused the term "jiggle TV" to be coined. Certainly that merits some actual archival interest, right?

Collecting: Creepy or Sexy?

Via Boing Boing, quotes from Robert Crumb on Collecting (from Vinyl Junkies: Adventures in Record Collecting, by Brett Milano):

“Collecting is creepy. Record collectors put each other down for their various fixations. Everybody is convinced that his way of collecting is superior. They look down on casual collectors, who are just accumulators -- the kind who’ll just pick up anything and let it pile up. A true collector is more of a connoisseur, and that’s the good thing about collecting. It creates a connoisseurship to sort out what’s worthwhile in the culture and what isn’t. Wealthy art collectors in this country have sorted out who the great artists are. If you’re collecting a lot of objects of one particular kind, you develop a very acute sense of discrimination.”

“Any of the younger guys who get into collecting are quirky and oddball types, pretty maladjusted people. They’re not into hanging around in bars and picking up chicks or nothing. If they have a girlfriend at all it’s amazing. And the older collectors I know, a lot of them just have their little room down in the basement where they go and listen. They don’t share it with anyone, and their wives don’t know anything about it. So when they die, the vultures start descending.”

“Picking up chicks? Forget it! It never gets them hot, they don’t give a shit about collectors. I wouldn’t say that collectors are antisocial - that would imply that they want to do something harmful to society - but it’s not very sociable either. Very self-obsessed, kind of asocial. That’s why the world looks down on collectors, it takes a certain kind of personality. There is nothing sexy or glamorous about it. Women aren’t attracted to people because they collect. You can go up to them and say, ‘I’m an outlaw bandit’ and they’ll like that. But if you say, ‘I’m a collector’ - no chance.”

With all due respect, Mr. Crumb, I promise not to start drawing comic books -- if you'll stop telling me what kind of guys I dig.

I'll take (and I have) a collector over an outlaw bandit (or any bad boy) any day.

Related: Marybeth Hamilton celebrates the passion of a record collector, from where the image comes.

Of Bottoms Up, Getting Your Kicks, And Kicks In The Pants

The above illustration is by Bradshaw Crandell & from Ted Saucier's Bottoms Up, Greystone Press, NY, 1951.



Saucier was the publicist for the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel for nearly four decades, and this was likely all the authority needed to author a book of cocktail recipes for the elite -- and which appear to be, at least in part, credited to the elite.

For example, Bottoms Up is the first known reference of a vodka martini in the United States, a recipe credited to celebrity photographer Jerome Zerbe. (Zerbe was a long-time companion of the society columnist and writer Lucius Beebe. Beebe reportedly made so many flattering references to Zerbe in his newspaper column, "This New York," that rival columnist Walter Winchell suggested that the column name should be changed to "Jerome Never Looked Lovelier." Together, Zerbe and Beebe created El Morocco's Family Album.)

As a side-trip, some info on the Waldorf-Astoria -- and certainly such a grand old hotel deserves it's due at a sex history blog. (If only to see that our fascination with celeb watching isn't all that new.; perhaps at a later date we'll dish on the more sordid happenings of bedrooms.)

From a 1931 article titled, At Home To Society:

The hyphenated name caught the public's fancy: a great hotel—a name big enough to apply. The comedians and humorous writers of the day took it up and played upon it—a sure sign of popularity.

"Meet me at the hyphen," said one wag.

"Where is that?"

"Between the Waldorf and the Astoria," was the reply, That joke immediately traveled to Kalamazoo, jumped to Des Moines, leaped to San Francisco, and was soon told in the Hong-Kong Club. Going the other way, within a few weeks it was served as a relish at the Sphinx bar in Cairo with the newest American cocktail. By the spring of 1899 somebody was singing on the stage a song called "The Waldorf-Hyphen-Astoria," whose words various New York papers printed.

Here's a scan of Waldorf "Hyphen" Astoria, words and music by E.C. Center and Jackson Gouraud (via NYPL Digital Gallery).



Here are the lyrics:

We have all met those guys who affect to patronize
The hotel with the hyphenated name
But if it should befall that on them we'd try to call,
It would be hard to find them just the same.
After hunting long and well through each separate hotel,
Without result, a fellow must decide,
They may be on the square, but if they are living there,
It must be on the "hyphen" they reside.

Chrous: At the Waldorf "Hyphen" Astoria,
No matter who or what you are,
Be sure you not to Oscar as you enter.
Just speak to him by name,
And for "ten" he'll do the same--
That's the proper thing at the Waldorf "Hyphen" Astoria.

The 'Oscar' mentioned, according to Nancy Groce in New York: Songs of the City, is "Oscar Tschirky, the Waldorf-Astoria's powerful and punctilious headwaiter". And the song may have mocked the name, but was more about the who's who which stayed there -- and resulting gawkers:

Of course, like today, not everybody seen there was actually a guest or a patron of the hotel's extremely expensive restaurant, the Palm Garden. Many, like the poseur in the 1897 song "Waldorf 'Hyphen' Astoria," simply hung around for a glimpse of the rich and famous.

The song was sung by John Parr in A Reign of Error, a musical farce featuring The Rogers Brothers.



It seems the production had been around earlier, and the song added later (March 19, 1899, The New York Times)



The same allure & authority Saucier & the Waldorf-Astoria held for publishers captured the attention of Hefner and Bottoms Up received a dandy review in the second issue of Playboy -- sure the nude illustrations helped *wink*


(Images via A Dash of Bitters.)

This collector cannot be restrained from wanting such a book. (Give me the $200 for the signed copy at eBay, will ya? I'd settle for any decent copy of Ted Saucier's Bottoms Up, actually; but why should I settle for anything?)

Nor can she help (nor be stopped) from noting this little piece of irony discovered during her research...

In 1931 some clever person (known only by the initials M.C.) 'respectfully' suggested that "the militant suffrage movement, now on the rampage in England, be referred to as 'The Reign of Error'."


It would seem that M.C. was unaware of both theatre & popular music to feel they had coined such a phrase. (Unless they were just 13 years of age at the time the letter to the editor was penned.)

So we begin with an illustration of a naked lady using ice tongs to select men she'll consume and end with a person wishing women would remain less than equals in the eyes of the law.

I leave it for you to discuss.

Monica Lewis: Blonde Bombshell... Banana?

Monica Lewis was born in 1925 in Chicago, Il, and went from hosting, at 17, her own radio show in New York to become an accomplished pop singer and jazz stylist, television personality, and film star.

The blonde beauty who graced many a magazine and advertisement naturally rubbed elbows with giants and would-be giants. From her official bio:

she paused for (and sometimes steered clear of) romantic entanglements with Ronald Reagan, Frank Sinatra, Ed Sullivan, Herman Wouk, Sidney Sheldon, Kirk Douglas, Richard Rodgers and Milton Berle.

(Shown at right with a young Ronald Reagan.)

My disc-overy of Lewis began with her cheeky backside of her 1945-1949 Song Book Collection, Monica Lewis Sings.




She was discovered by Benny Goodman and quickly was recording at Signature, Decca and Capitol where she worked with such musical greats as Billy Butterfield, Yank Lawson, Bob Haggart and Teddy Wilson. Her early recordings ranged from Gershwin, Kern and Coward, to more risque songs such as I'm Gonna Be a Bad Girl (which she co wrote) and was the first to record Put The Blame on Mame.



A quick search and I discovered Lewis was the singing voice of the animated Chiquita Banana for 14 years (1953 and 1967). This fascinated me, as you'll see, because Chiquita was one hot fruit -- and I don't just mean the banana's exotic tropical local either. Lots of folks find the Chiquita Banana a-peeling.



Seldom does a fruit inspire such lusty thoughts. Wile no doubt part of the sexual confusion is due to the whorish glamorous garb and makeup, I suspect it's really the arched back which sends the libido a message.

When Chiquita became a woman rather than a banana, I lost interest too. A woman's a woman, and as far as illustrated babes go, she's not as exciting as the pre '87 forbidden fruit was.

Back to Monica Lewis.

Her musical success brought MGM a-courtin' and the studio signed her in 1950 as their response to to Lana Turner. She was in a number of films, including, as this still shows, in The Strip.




In 1956, at what many would call the height of her popularity, Lewis would marry Jennings Lang and busy herself with running an 'executive household' and mothering their children. She made the occasional television appearance, but it's for her supporting roles in Lang's blockbuster disaster movies, such as playing the heroic stunt secretary Barbara in Earthquake, that she is often most remembered.

My favorite was when she played a retired jazz singer in The Concorde: Airport '79 (1979), the third sequel to Airport (1970), that she was really 'noticed' again.

Cool Cinema Trash notes that in the film Lewis is joined by her "jive-talkin', pot smokin', saxophone playin' friend Jimmie Walker."

After an impromptu jam session, she worries, "Maybe I don't have it anymore."

"You're like fine wine, you get better with age." He assures her, "And you're gonna get those Russians drunk."

For more, read about the recently (September, 2007) announced rights for her biography, Be Bop, Borscht and Banana Pie, here. (I hope it's published soon; I've got room in my 'to be read' pile.)

Meanwhile, you can content yourself with reissued CDs and films, as well as collectibles. While her official website teases that memorabilia is available, I've yet to find any there. Until that changes, check eBay.

Because things like this amuse me...

The cover of Monica Lewis But Beautiful:



The cover of a 1953 issue of Novela Film, a Yugoslavian movie magazine:



Guess they couldn't afford the better prints for publication.

Covers of Marlene

I'll be honest and tell you that my love affair with Marlene Dietrich began with hearing Lili Marlene. It still haunts in the most pleasing of ways.


But some prefer their Marlene more glamorous...


Others love their Marlene in combat boots.


However you prefer your Marlene, one thing is certain: You can put Marlene on your cover, but you cannot do a 'cover' of Marlene. She's the one and only.

Love Me Or Leave Me

I was up late, into the wee hours, reading pulp novels for you dear readers (ah, the things I do for you -- watch for the reviews) and decided to flip on the TV. It won't surprise you that I'm a huge fan of Turner Classic Movies, so being the last channel I watched, that's the channel that came on. The movie had already started, so I missed the opening monologue by Robert Osborne, but quickly fell in love with Love Me or Leave Me.



The film stars Doris Day in a role -- a film -- which I had not expected. She's much more like Monroe than I had ever imagined in this film, but being so cozy from all the reading, I felt myself drifting off... Until, that is, I heard Day singing Ten Cents A Dance (YouTube). Wasn't that a Ziegfeld Follies song?

Suddenly I found myself leaping off the couch to check the Internet to verify my dim recollection of the song. Sure enough, that song is a classic -- with a classic performance by Ruth Etting (YouTube).



And that's when I discovered that Love Me or Leave Me was the film adaptation of Etting's life.

Well, Ruth Etting's life along with her manager-come-husband, Chicago gangster Martin "Moe the Gimp" Snyder, and her pianist, Myrl Alderman, the 'love interest' -- all of whom were still living and paid well for consulting during the creation of the film (which still took Hollywood liberties here and there). The film portrays the real life story of Etting's discovery, rise to stardom as America's Sweetheart of Song, and the jealously or love triangle, complete with shooting.



While Etting divorced "Moe the Gimp" in 1937, Moe wasn't the kind of gangster to let it go...

According to Laura Damuth and Anita Breckbill, who wrote a paper on The Ruth Etting Archives/Collection at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln:

Moe returned to California and in a jealous rage shot and wounded Ruth's pianist and boyfriend Myrl Alderman. The subsequent sensationalized trial brought her career to a halt. Snyder was tried for kidnapping and attempted murder. The trial was a sordid scandal and an ordeal for Ruth, lasting from October through December of 1938. Snyder was found guilty and sentanced to prison. When he appealed the decision, Ruth and Myrl Alderman declined to appear in court, and he was released after a year in prison.

One of the more interesting items in our collection is a scrapbook of newspaper clippings dedicated solely to newspaper coverage of the trial. The Los Angeles Examiner had an especially talented writer, James Lee, whose writings on this trial gave an interesting snapshot into journalistic ethics adn trial coverage of the mid-30s. Lee makes a drama of the proceedings, complete with characters: Ruth Etting is "The Little Lady", her ex-husband, Moe Snyder is "The Gimp", Myrl Alderman is "The Piano Player," and that all important scene prop, the gun, is called "The Equalizer." Here, for example, is a description of "The Little Lady" on the stand.

She was dressed sedately, but expensively. She wore a knee-length gray jacket of very wooly lamb, a severe, dark blue tailored dress, and a blue felt hat that looked like the campaign headgear worn by the Union officers in the War Between the States, only with a good deal more chic, of course. (Los Angeles Examiner, 12/13/38)

This kind of writing, plus word-for-word transcription of some of the courtroom scenes, make for entertaining and sometimes painful reading on this portion of Ruth's life.

After the trail and Ruth's marriage to Myrl Alderman, the two lived in seclusion on a small ranch in Colorado Springs.

The reason this film strikes one as so much different than most Doris Day flicks likely lies in the fact that Love Me or Leave Me, made in 1955 with MGM, was the first film made by Doris Day after her 'liberation' from Warner Brothers. It's rather obvious MGM wasn't viewing Doris Day as just another funny, fluffy, cute, good girl who could sing -- because in this role Day wears sexy costumes, drinks, and has the ambitions as well as the actions of a woman who was less girl-next-door and more on the make.


Maybe saying Ruth Etting was "more on the make" seems a bit too much, but we all know Doris Day's image -- and Ruth, the torch singer, was far more sex pot.

It's said that when Mae West first saw Etting (in the Ziegfeld Follies), she said, "The curtains opened, and here was this girl. Not what you'd call a classic beauty--but unusual. She had a sex quality that seemed to mesmerize the audience. And when she finished singing, they just kind of went crazy."

The Ruth Etting we see portrayed by Doris Day is far more aggressive than most of Day's characters (before or since -- however, I'm not a Doris Day aficionado). Day's abilities as an actress and MGM's faith in Day aside, one shouldn't underestimate Day's understanding of Etting. TCM says:

A final irony about Love Me or Leave Me is the fact that the relationship between Ruth Etting and Marty Snyder had some disturbing parallels to the relationship between Doris Day and her husband Marty Melcher. Like Snyder, Melcher also controlled Day's business affairs, made creative decisions for her even though he had no musical experience, and lived through her work. When Melcher died in 1968, Day discovered that he had mismanaged her entire life savings of $20 million dollars, leaving her completely broke.

Clearly Day wouldn't know how well she understood her character until years later, but it's worth noting.

Derald Hendry at DorisDay.Net writes:

And, she knew as the filming progressed that there was something special about the movie. Most film critics consider it her very best role. She certainly should have at least been nominated for an Academy Award. But there is something strange about Academy voters. A person in a singing role is rarely taken seriously. Few musical stars have ever been been nominated for an Oscar. She worked very hard on her role. During the first seven weeks of shooting, she had only one half day off!

Cagney said of Doris: “As an actress, she perfectly illustrates my definition of good acting; just plant yourself, look the other actor in the eye, and tell him the truth. That’s what she does, all right.” He considered this film one of his top five pictures.

And the picture turned out to be a “smash.” It was nominated for six Academy Awards. Best Actor, Best Screenplay, Best Song, Best Original Story. It makes you wonder what Doris’s film career would have been like if she had been at MGM from the very beginning of her career.

Related:

For more info on Ruth Etting, America's Sweetheart of Song, see www.ruthetting.com, the official and family run website. (Where it seems both JLo and Angelina Jolie want to be in a remake of Love Me or Leave Me.)

Also, this page is run by a "palruth" who is researching Ruth Etting for a book.

Both sites welcome input/information.

See More Of Debra Paget

Found at Infomercantile (becoming an addiction, even though it's rarely smutty), is this slide of Debra Paget:


My guess is that it's an amateur shot taken at a performance sometime in the late 50's or early 60's -- which was around the time of her two marriages and matching divorces, and perhaps explains the confidence-building skirt slit, sans panties.

Strange Are The Ways Of Love (MP3 hosted again by the fine folks at Sex-Kitten.Net), but we all understand the need to bolster one's self-image post divorce -- even if it involves showing a bit more below the belt than the fashions and times warrant. (No wonder some love Paget more than Monroe.)

Strange Are The Ways Of Love was nominated for an Academy Award® for Best Song, for The Young Land (1959).

There is more to see and hear from Debra at this fan site -- but be warned, the colors may harm your retinas.

Paget's still alive, but I don't suppose this post will help me garner an interview.

Dario Moreno & Brigitte Bardot

Via Schadenfreudian Therapy we find this delightful video of Turkish singer Dario Moreno dancing with Brigitte Bardot, from the film Come Dance With Me:

Xavier Cugat: Creative Cool-Cat With All The Kittens

Xavier Cugat, the Rhumba King, is as known for his love life as he is his Latin rhythms.



A notorious womanizer, he married five times:

#1 Rita Montaner
#2 Carmen Castillo
#3 Lorraine Allen
#4 Abbe Lane (In his bands for many years, until their divorce.)
#5 Charo (She & Cugat were the first couple to marry at Caesars Palace when it opened in Las Vegas in 1966.)

Cugat also has many film credits, mainly for playing himself.

From Stage Door Canteen (1943) here's Lina Romay (not this Lina Romay) with Cugat & orchestra, performing She's a Bombshell from Brooklyn:



Lina Romay sings Antonio in the motion picture The Heat's On (1944)with the Xavier Cugat Orchestra.



Cugat supposedly gave Rita Hayworth one of her first jobs, and so later appeared with her in You Were Never Lovelier, but I remember him from so many of Esther Williams films, including the remake of Annette Kellerman's Neptune's Daughter.

Via A Damn Find Product's post we learn that Xavier Cugat was also a talented illustrator. Exhibit A, cover of Game & Gossip, 1932:



Exhibit B, Fandango - Dance Rhythms - IV (from Game & Gossip, 1932):


Perhaps the most fascinating is this fold-out with 74 caricatures of the most popular Hollywood celebrities such as Fanny Brice, Mary Pickford, Joan Crawford, Norma Shearer, Clara Bow, Gloria Swanson, Constance Bennett, Billie Dove, Greta Garbo and Charlie Chaplin.


For more names, see the list of names and the key; but note the following: Dietrich could not even pose in Cugat's imagination with Garbo, and note how powerful women were -- their names & personalities still awe.

That Cugat would was an illustrator shouldn't be shocking. Golden Age of illustration notwithstanding, Cugat was a bit of a money-grubbing sell-out jack-of-all-trades who's been quoted as saying, "I would rather play Chiquita Banana and have my swimming pool than play Bach and starve." According to Solid!:

Cugat was often depicted in publicity photos holding a chihuahua and a pipe, even though he didn't smoke. He was never the one to miss out on a good business opportunity, however. He cashed in on this image and began selling his own line of pipes. He also started a chihuahua breeding business which featured documentation certifying that the dogs were Cugat dogs. Cugat never met a marketing deal he didn't like. Over the years he hawked a diverse line of products, including cigarette lighters and shirts, and also owned several Los Angeles-area restaurants. In addition Cugat was a talented caricaturist. His work appeared in newspapers, magazines and galleries around the world. During the 1920s he worked as a cartoonist for the Los Angeles Times newspaper while playing music at night.

Perhaps this is why Cugat was never without beautiful women.

Nice Spindles, Babe

From Ben Pearce's Flickr set (which is most excellent, but lacks any info for collectors), found via Fabulon.

Horny Old Asses

From Penny Postcards, found via Baikinage's StumbleUpon page.

Double The Fanny Brice Is Twice As Nice (Part One)

Recently at a sale I spotted this 78 with one side titled Second Hand Rose and eager to show it off to my pal Secondhand Rose, I didn't even notice it was by the Fanny Brice -- nor did I note the other side with My Man -- until I had it home.

But once I did, I knew I had sheet music about here... Somewhere...

Weeks (and boxes) later, I found it. (And of course, more than a dozen others to scan and post here later too.)

Anyway, here's the belated post.

To understand the context of both songs, here's a bit of Brice's bio:

Brice starred in the Ziegfield Follies in the 1920s and 1930s and became known for her beautiful voice and limber grace, which she always used in the service of humor. When she tried dramatic Broadway roles, her plays were unsuccessful.

As Brice's fame increased, so did her notoriety. In 1918, she married Jules "Nicky Arnstein, a handsome, urbane but somewhat inept con man and thief she had lived with for six years. Despite Arnstein's infidelity and a stretch in Sing Sing Prison for illegal wiretapping, the devoted Brice stayed with him, had two children and supported him by working on-stage almost constantly. Brice's tumultuous relationship with the ne'er-do-well Arnstein gave her material for a rare non-ethnic success: appearing in the Ziegfield Follies of 1921, the usually manic comedienne stood nearly motionless on the stage and, singing in a beautiful, unaccented voice, moved audiences to tears with her rendition of "My Man" with its now-classic lyrics, "But whatever my man is, I am his - forever."

In 1924, Arnstein was charged in a Wall Street bond theft. Brice insisted on his innocence and funded his legal defense, at great expense. Arnstein was convicted and sentenced to the Federal penitentiary at Leavenworth. Released in 1927, the ungrateful and unfaithful Arnstein disappeared from Brice's life and that of his two children. Reluctantly, Brice divorced him.

Brice had some of her greatest success during her years as Mrs. Arnstein, including her famous song "Second Hand Rose." Yet, in 1923, as biographer Grossman puts it, Brice "tired of being a sight gag" and had her nose surgically straightened. Still, acceptance eluded her when she tried her hand at "American" drama.

After a failed marriage to Broadway impresario Billy Rose and starring roles in Hollywood film, Brice found a niche -broadcast radio - that made her comfortable. In 1938, she launched her own weekly radio show. A wonderful mimic and impersonator with a great ear for dialect, Brice chose instead to limit herself to one character, Baby Snooks, a precocious, bratty toddler - who had no accent. Her enormously successful run on radio lasted until her death in 1951, just as television was beginning to capture the radio audience.

Barbra Streisand paid tribute to Brice in her loosely biographical film Funny Girl.

Now to the song lyrics.

Second Hand Rose
By James Hanley and Grant Clarke -- listen along here. (Many thanks to Sex-Kitten.Net for hosting the file!)

Father has a business,
Strictly second-hand,
Everything from tooth-picks to a baby grand.
Stuff in our apartment,
Came from Father's store,
Even things I'm wearing, someone wore before.
It's no wonder that I feel abused;
I never get a thing that ain't been used!

I'm wearing second-hand hats,
Second-hand clothes,
That's why the call me Second Hand Rose.
Even our piano in the parlor,
Father bought for ten cents on the dollar.
Second-hand pearls,
I'm wearing second-hand curls,
I never get a single thing that's new!
Even Jakie Cohen, he's the man I adore,
Had the nerve to tell me he'd been married before!
Everyone knows that I'm just Second Hand Rose,
From Second Avenue.

I'm wearing second-hand shoes,
Second-hand hose,
All the girls hand me their second-hand beaus!
Even my pajamas, when I don them,
Have somebody else's 'nitials on them.
Second-hand rings, I'm sick of second-hand things,
I never get what other goilies do.
Once while strolling through the Ritz, a woman got my goat,
She nudged her friend and said, "Oh, look, there goes my last year's coat!"
Everyone knows that I'm just Second Hand Rose,
From Second Avenue.

My Man

Sung by Miss Fanny Brice in Zeigfield Follies of 1921 as Mon Homme (My Man).
Written by Maurice Yvain, lyrics by Channing Pollack.

It's cost me alot,
But there's one thing that I've got
It's my man.
Cold and wet, tired, you bet
But all that I soon forget
With my man.

He's not much for looks
And no hero out of books
Is my man...
Two or three girls has he
That he likes as well as me
But I love him!

I don't know why I should
He isn't any good
He isn't true
But I'll stick to him like glue
What else can I do?

Oh my man, I love him so!
He'll never know.
All my life is just despair
But I don't care!
When he takes me in his arms
The world is bright,
All right!

What's the difference if I say
I'll go away?
When I know I'll come back
On my knees some day;
For whatever my man is
I am his
Forever more!

Sometimes I say
If I just could get away
With my man
He'd go straight, sure as fate,
For it never is too late
For a man.

I just like to dream of a cottage by a stream
With my man
Where a few flowers grew and perhaps a kid or two
Like my man.

And then my eyes get wet
I 'most forget
'Til he gets hot
And tells me not to talk
such rot...

Oh my man, I love him so!
He'll never know.
All my life is just despair
But I don't care!
When he takes me in his arms
The world is bright
All right!

What's the difference if I say
I'll go away
When I know I'll come back
On my knees some day
For whatever my man is
I am his
Forever more!

For more on Fanny Brice, see the Fanny Brice Collection -- and wait for my part two!

Teresa Brewer Sings Pickle-Up-A-Doodle

I don't know if Teresa Brewer knew it, but this song sure sounds full of euphemisms to me...



Via Fabulon.

Marlene Dietrich in "The Blue Angel"

Der Blaue Engel (1930) was the first sound film ever made in Germany. It's also the movie that rocketed Dietrich, as the cabaret singer Lola Lola who headlines at "The Blue Angel," to international stardom.

It's also the first film in which she sings Falling in Love Again, which became a Dietrich trademark over the years.

Related:

A review of Josef von Sternberg's The Blue Angel, which includes this tantalizing tidbit:

Greta Garbo possessed some of the same qualities as Marlene Dietrich, but Garbo brought a more introspective quality to her performances. Dietrich's innate bitchiness was always part of the characters she played. Like Dietrich, Garbo had a seemingly cool exterior, but this coolness was balanced by a faint-but-discernible smoldering sense of warmth. Dietrich was rarely warm but her magnetism has become legendary.

Listen to Dietrich music clips here.

Now Will You Be Good!

It's not posed as a question, so I'm guessing they knew that any straight guy would love to be forced into a dip with three women. Even in 1910.

But he couldn't leave his hat on.



I'm guessing the pomade kept him from ruining his 'do'.

Postcard copyright (and postmarked) 1910 by the Colonial Art Pub. Co, B'klyn, N.Y. Published by F. G Henry & Co.

Collecting News & Views

Norman Mailer passed away, and DeeDee (and others) share their thoughts on the ambitious writer whose giant ego oft overshadowed his written works.

Heidi Fleiss fluffs & folds to pass the time as she awaits the ability to open her Stud Farm (meanwhile, you gents can apply for a position with Heidi).

And lastly, from whence the image comes, Derek talks about the context of collecting music compilations. I note it because A) it furthers what I wrote about here, and B) it has the Promfumo scandal. (So I may just have to add that record to my collection.)

Oh, Mother! I'm Wild!

Oh, Mother! I'm Wild! by Johnson, Howard, Harry Pease, and Eddie Nelson, 1920.



Use these lyrics to sing along with the MP3 of a more modern uke version sung by Brian Hefferan.

Oh, Mother! I'm Wild!

[Verse 1]

Percival Jones was a sweet little boy
All dressed up like a bundle of joy
Early to bed and early to rise
never made Percival very wise
'Cause after a month on Broadway
Here's what he wrote home today

[Chorus 1]

Oh, Mother! you wouldn't know your child
Oh, Mother! I'm getting awfully wild
I am drinking Coca-Cola now
On the level, I'm a little devil
Oh, Mother! you wouldn't want me home
cannibals compared to me are mild
I'm no more your peaceful little lamb
I shave most every day just like a man
I've thrown away my nighty and I wear a big pjam
Oh, Mother I'm Wild!

[Verse 2]

Percy went out to see a musical show
Got him a seat in the very first row
The girls on the stage started to shimmy and shake
Percy stood up and shouted "Goodness sake!"
Oh mother if you could just see
This is the life dear, for me!

[Chorus 2]

Oh, Mother! you wouldn't know your child
Oh, Mother! I'm getting awfully wild
I am reading dimestore novels now
Every minute, I just go the limit
Oh, Mother! you wouldn't want me home
cannibals compared to me are mild
Once I dined, stayed out 'till after ten
I bought some Cuban cigarettes and then
I stood out at the corner and I smoked with all the men
Oh, Mother I'm Wild!

[Verse 3]

...Once I went out to a swell affair
a lady asked me to do the shimmy there
I said I beg your pardon but that's something I don't wear
Oh, Mother I'm Wild!

Copies of (at least) the sheet music can be found at eBay.

For more, see theBilly Jones recording for Aeolian-Vocalion in 1919.

Cuz I'm A Woman, W O M A N

Raquel Welch & Cher, from Cher's variety show:

Sweater Girl, 1942

You might not think that Sweater Girl sounds like a Halloween trick-or-treat post, but it is.

This 1942 Paramount Picture, starring Eddie Bracken, June Preisser and Betty Jane Rhodes, isn't all campus kitsch. Sure it starts all Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland with college kids trying to put on a show, but somewhere over this rainbow it twists into a murder mystery. Ah, make that a musical murder mystery.

At the time of its release, The New York Times didn't like it:

Its cast—all of very tender years and much too immature for shocks of this sort—starts off by preparing that inevitable musical show but become involved in murders, babbling idiots and homicidal insanity in a plot which is nearly as confused as a Times Square traffic jam at curtain time.

However, the song "I Don't Want To Walk Without You" (words by Frank Loesser, music by Jule Styne) went on to become a pop hit -- thanks due to a young and rising star by the name of Frank Sinatra.

According to Wiley Lee Umphlett in Movies Go to College: Hollywood and the World of the College-Life Film some appreciated the film:

"This film's mixture of comedy, mystery and music was handled so skillfully that one reviewer was moved to comment that Sweater Girl was exceptional in its avoidance of the "usual artificiality of college pictures' and therefore contained the "spark of reality."

(Quote via Google Books.)

And the film still has fans who hope for a DVD release.

Terri "Cup Cake" O'Mason: "She's back again, brighter, better, more daringly naughty than before."

Terri "Cup Cake" O'Mason was a burlesque performer who signed a contract in 1960 with Fax Records to record for their "Stag Party Special" series of LPs.

And where "Cupcakes" (from Stag Party Special Number 2) is a mere taste of her unique talents, here's a full on dessert; "Stag Party Special Number 4; 'Back for Seconds' ".

WFMU link found via PCL LinkDump.

Janis Joplin, Topless

This is purported to be a photo of Janis Joplin -- I had it saved on my hard drive, and have no further information on it.

The Only Way To Keep A Gal, Is To Keep Her In A Cage

Deanna was working on this piece on collecting vintage sheet music, and showed me this baby:


Since neither Deanna nor I have the sheet music, she's contacting the seller, Joel, of www.sheetmusiccenter.com, for a follow-up article on "coon" music. I'll post the follow-up when she's published it, but I couldn't wait to show off this old cover with a man with a key standing outside his caged girlfriend.

This is what I could find out.

It's by "The Originator of Ragtime" or "The Father of Ragtime" Ben Harney. The Rag-Time Ephemerist has an article on Harney, Ben Harney in Context, which doesn't illuminate the cover art or the song itself much, but the online article does quote from The New York Clipper (September 26, 1896) which covers Harney's time with the Boston Athenaeum Star Specialty Company (touring under the aegis of Andrew J. Hughes, proprietor of Boston's Howard Athenaeum Theater):

His coon songs gained enthusiastic response. He was assisted in the gallery and on the stage by 'Strap' Hill, a colored dancer and singer.

In the article (again, only part of which is available online) there's a tantalizing bit more on "the negro" in question:

Based on the recollections of Harney's wife Jessie, the authors of They All Played Ragtime identified his "stage assistant," "Strap" Hill as a "young Negro ragtime player and entertainer ... from Memphis" whom Harney first met either in or on his way to Chicago in 1893.3 Clipper citations make it clear that Harney and Hill worked together, on and off at least, from the fall of 1896 until the fall of 1898

Harney wasn't favored by commercial recording, but there's an MP3 of him singing The Wagon here.

Stay tuned, as they say...

The Tiny Tim Gold Digger Connection

If someone would have asked me while I was growing up what the connection between Tiny Tim and gold digging was, I would have felt the answer lie in anyone who dated him. (Later on I found Tiny Tim to be nearly as sexy as Emo Philips -- don't mock, he got Judy Tenuta. Which is yet more proof that smart sexy women dig men smart enough to be funny. OK, and it's proof of my age. Moving on.)

The true answer regarding Tiny Tim and gold diggers is the song Tip Toe Through The Tulips With Me.


Image of sheet music via We Have Your Collectibles.

Tipsey For Nipsey (Russell)

Now I knew Nipsey Russell must have made some comedy records, but I had no idea what I was really in for when I grabbed these two old Nipsey records...


(Yeah, and I left those 50 cent price tags on 'em for the photos -- so it eats at your souls!)

The covers are nearly identical, save for the colorized photos and the song titles. The front covers read:

Nipsey Russell Presents Borderline Records

HARLEMS "Son of Fun"

The spines, however, make a bit more sense with the "Borderline Records Presents Nipsey Russell Harlem's Son of Fun". They also make it clear that I have volumes two and three -- so I'm missing number one (hint-hint y'all!)

Reading the titles doesn't do the works justice -- I know, because I read them and still wasn't prepared -- but here they are. (And hit the links to download/listen.)

Vol II

Side One:

Little Peter My Boy
Drafted
Cherry For A Banana Split

Side Two:

Nudist Wedding
Well Do Hospital
Public Transportation
The Singer

Vol III

Side One:

A Day At The Races
Radio Roundup
My Friend Luigi

Side Two:

Tall In The Saddle
School Days
Honeymoon Hotel

Like many folks, I knew Nipsey from game shows (my favorite, too, is Match Game). But I had no idea that 1960's Nipsey Russell was raunchier than Match Game Nipsey! Who knew that you could get away with such things in the 60's -- let alone without a warning label or whatnot.

Back cover reads:

about "NIPSEY" RUSSELL
HARLEM'S 'SON OF FUN'

NIPSEY RUSSELL is, by all odds, the more perceptive, brilliant and flexible of the current crop of young comedians. His keen wit is so readily adaptable to all situations and types of "Material" that he has been able to vary his efforts to everything from: -- Injecting bright sage humor into RELIGIOUS CONCERTS to -- Touring as Comic M.C. with star-studded Jazz Variety Shows (BILLY ECKSTINE'S GREAT SHOW OF '54) to -- Guest performances on CBS-TV (the ROBERT Q. LEWIS Show) to -- Legitimate Drama (Summer Stock lead in "CABIN IN THE SKY" Seacliff Theater) to -- dispensing the accepted brand of Commercial Comedy in plush Supper Clubs (The ELEGANTE in B'klyn and the CORDILLION ROOM of the CONCORD HOTEL). He projects so easily in each medium and with such warmth and affability that he is completely captivating to most audiences.

NIPSEY was born in Atlanta, Georgia and danced professionally from the age of nine. He received his early training in showmanship and stagecraft from two entertainment "Greats", EDDY HEYWOOD Senior and ANDY FAIRCHILD. College trained in Liberal Arts and Business, Nipsey served overseas in World War II as Army Lieutenant in the Medical Administrative Corps.

NIPSEY RUSSELL wrote, directed and emceed his own Radio Variety Show (STATION WLIB-N.Y.) for more than 17 months; played a featured part in the Negro National Network's RUBY VALENTINE SHOW Starring Juanita Hall... and was top comic in the STUDIO FILM "Rhythm" SERIES. Nipsey is a great favorite at the Famous APOLLO theater and his 10 year record run at Harlem's CLUB BABY GRAND is still unsurpassed. IN THESE ALBUMS -- Nipsey demonstrates his mastery of the "Double Entendre" Quips & Quotes and his hilarious interpretations of the raucous and bawdy routines he laughingly calls --

"DIALOGUE THEY DARE YOU TO DO!"

Die-hard collectors, I found no real info on these recordings. The album cover text which says that Nipsey presents Borderline Records made me wonder if this was his own label. Even when I found a (very few) other vintage records by Borderline, also comedy recordings, I wasn't sure... Nipsey had a business degree you know.

But Barnes and Noble states, "In 1960 Russell signed to the Borderline label and released a series of comedy LPs including Confucius Told Me, Things They Never Taught at School, The Birds and the Bees and All That Jazz, and Sing Along with Nipsey Russell."

Also, most if not all of the bits recorded on these two records (and the others) were also recorded on the (much easier to find) Humorsonic label -- which I also didn't find any real info about. (I'm still not satisfied with this; so more research is required.)



Here are my 'liner notes' and additional resources:

I think this may be what is referred to as "STUDIO FILM "Rhythm" SERIES".

This was the only reference I could find to Nipsey's radio show.

Listen to NPR's tribute to Nipsey Russell.

The cover states it was the Negro National Network, but it was (should you care to continue searching) in reality the National Negro Network, started in 1953 by Leonard Evans. W. Leonard Evans, Jr. died in June of this year (2007); he left a wonderful legacy of African-American media. Here's a wonderful 1963 interview with Evans titled "Why Do We Need a Negro Sunday Supplement?" Should that site remove the recording, or you'd prefer to download it for listening to later (it is quite long), I've uploaded a copy here.

For more on African-Americans and radio history, see this article by author Donna Halper (whose interesting media bio includes the discovery of Rush.

From Nipsey to Rush. This is why I dig collecting.

PS When sharing the Nipsey humor tracks with your friends, please credit me, Silent Porn Star, with a link. It's polite, proper and provides incentive for me to go through the bother of making such files to share. Thank you.

The Tattooed Lady (Vintage Nudes)

And, while I'm thinking of it, Lydia The Tatooed lady by Groucho Marx:

Rapunzel, As 60's Kitsch, Isn't a Let Down

Baby Jane Holzer recorded one song, Rapunzel (Atco 6482), in March of 1967, before finally abandoning New York for Palm Beach.


Download Rapunzel here, and then tell me: Is it just me, or is this track loaded with euphimisms?

Via 45blog, which looks defunct (hence my downloading all and preserving it here).

The (Beer) Classic

Q: Anheuser Bush?

A: Fine. How's yours?

Under the Anheuser Bush: lyrics, sheet music and MP3, circa early 1900's.

Billie Holiday

I never knew that Billie Holiday left the stage midway through the song and allegedly slashed the heckler with a knife -- then resumed singing. The song? Strange Fruit, a song about the lynching of a black man in the American South.

You can find more here, at PCL. (The link they direct us to, the Walter Gordon Collection, is not working now... I keep my fingers crossed for its return. Meanwhile, use the Google cache.)

You can also find a press release on the collection here.

Also via Google cache, I found this image:

The text reads: John Levy (left) and Walter Gordon stand in the court hallway before Billie Holiday’s criminal assault trial. Levy was Holiday's manager and boyfriend for much of her turbulent career.

Music For Chubby Chasers: Huggin' And Chalkin'

Huggin' & Chalkin' (words and music by Clarence Leonard Hayes and Kermit Goell) is a cute little song about a fellow's love for his BBW... With a bit of a twist.

Huggin' & Chalkin'

I got a gal who's mighty sweet
Big blue eyes and tiny feet
Her name is Rosabelle Magee
And she tips the scales at three-oh-three

Oh, gee, but ain't it grand to have a gal so big and fat
That when you go to hug her, you don't know where you're at
You have to take a piece of chalk in your hand
And hug a ways and chalk a mark to see where you began

One day I was a-huggin' and a-chalkin' and a-chalkin' and a-huggin' away
When I met another fella with some chalk in his hand
A-comin' around the other way over the mountain
A-comin' around the other way

Nobody ever said I'm weak
My bones don't ache, my joints don't creak
But I grow pale and I get limp
Every time I see my baby blimp

Oh, gee, but ain't it grand to have a gal so big and fat
That when you go to hug her
(You don't know where you're at)
(You have to take a piece of chalk in your hand)
(And hug a bit and chalk a mark to see where you began)

One day I was a-huggin' and a-chalkin' and a-beggin' her to be my bride
When I met another fella with some chalk in his hand
A-comin' around the other side (over the mountain)
A-comin' around the other side

She's a mile wide!
(Chalkin' up a markdown and yellin' "No More!")
When I met another fella with some chalk in his hand
A-comin' around the other side (over the mountain)
Over the Great Divide!!

Hoagy Carmicheal brought this song to #1 on the Billboard charts in 1947, so he's most famous for it. In 1946, Kay Kyser charted at #8, and after Hoagy, both Johnny Mercer (reached #8) and Herbie Fields (#14) also had chart success.

You can download Huggin' and Chalking' by Hoagy Carmicheal here.


I've only seen sheet music featuring Mercer, as shown above.

Gracie and I do a silly bit on how to have perky breasts (with vintage nudes, of course) over at Sex Kitten -- and while you're there, check out Panty Raid by Doug Clark & the Hot Nuts.

Whip Me, Beat Me, Make Me Buy Dumb Things

From Spank While you Sell: Corporal punishment imagery in print advertising:




Of particular note:

Schoolboys in Disgrace

This is a record sleeve, which I suppose is a kind of advertising. The album, by that most uncompromisingly British of veteran rock bands, The Kinks, dates from 1975. This cartoon image (credited to one Mickey Finn) was already the height of retro when it first appeared, and the era alluded to is probably really the late 1950s, when Kinks leader/songwriter Ray Davies and his brother Dave were at school in suburban north London. The lyrics of one song on the disc, Headmaster, clearly refer to getting the cane. From a cultural historian's point of view, it's extremely interesting that there is such a clear reference -- in the lyrics and in the drawing -- to bare-bottom canings, since even in the 1950s that was not at all the norm for ordinary local secondary schools:

Headmaster, this is my confession,
I've been such a little fool.
I've dishonoured one who trusted me,
I have broken all the rules.
I've been such a little fool.
Don't tell all my friends I bent over,
Don't tell them you made me cry.
Don't tell them I've been sacrificed,
Don't tell all my friends or I'll die.
Headmaster don't beat me I beg you,
I know that I've let you down.
Headmaster please spare me I beg you,
Don't make me take my trousers down.

Sexploitation in Music

Casetta dishes on Sexploitation in Music:

Sex has always been a part of the music. There are risqué R&B numbers, raunchy blues ditties; rock and roll took its name from slang for doing the horizontal mambo. Don't even get me started on opera... talk about some weird fetish freaks!

Kiss & Tell With The Bay City Rollers

I didn't even know this existed.





If I had, I'm certain I wouldn't have wanted it. (And Chris Jart assures me it wasn't worth it.)

I was too cool to be boy-crazy about the Bay City Rollers. (I'm not saying that I didn't have silly teen dreams or think of kissing the posters on my walls, I just didn't do this with the Bay City Rollers.)

Sure, I had the album, but who didn't love that ear worm S-A-T-U-R-D-A-Y NIGHT? (If you were a teen in '75 you had to love the "rockin' party anthem." I think it was a law or something.)



Some girls so love the boys in plaid that they swooned over I Only Want To Be With You.


In fact, I had one album (the Greatest Hits) and in the early 80's some guy I dated twice borrowed it.

Yeah, "dated" -- it's not like I let him pick me up in a bar and go home with him. Or called him one a few weeks later when bored just to have sex. A two-night stand is so terrible to admit to. Especially to a short, swarthy little man who you cringe when you think about -- the things I do in the name of honesty here.

He never gave the record back. And I, apparently over that self-loathing low point in my life, never called him to get it -- it wasn't worth it. If the price of leaving the little sweaty troll behind was one Bay City Roller's record, that was the (exceedingly low) price I'd have to pay. While that price was even lower than my standards to hook-up with the guy, the loss of the record doesn't remove the personal blot, the stain on my history (were that as easy to remove as those on my sheets!).

So why am I posting this Bay City Rollers Kissing Kit?

Well, for one, we all had silly celeb crushes and it's fun to mock those of others. :p

Second, it's also important to remember that even as you mock another for their tween-lust of a goofy band or other mistake -- you have bigger mistakes to cringe over.

It's important to recognize your own personal sex history -- including those moments that aren't warm and fuzzy.

That, my friends, is part of nostalgia.

So here's to you, guy whose name I can't remember. Enjoy the record if you still have it.

That's Bull Moose, Not Randy, Jackson

Bullmoose Jackson was born Benjamin Clarence Jackson in Cleveland in 1919. It was in 1943 that bandleader Lucky Millinder's band that gave him the unforgettable name "Bull Moose."

Here's more according to Schadenfreudian Therapy -- Featuring 1950-60s vintage Calypso music (the REAL stuff, not Harry Belafonte or the souvenir steel drum music sold to tourists) -- where I found Bull Moose:

His own band, the Buffalo Bearcats, earned more in the late 1940s than both Ella Fitzgerald and Sarah Vaughn. Bullmoose hired some great sidemen for his band, including drummer Panama Francis, bassist Red Callender, (longtime Monk tenor man) Charlie Rouse, and Sam "The Man" Taylor (best known for his work on the original Screamin Jay Hawkins classic "I Put a Spell on You"). But the song you probably know him for -- "Big Ten Inch Record" -- was recorded after his greatest fame, in 1952 with the Tiny Bradshaw Orchestra.

You can even download seven Bullmoose Jackson cuts here.

Songs in the download are:

Big Fat Mamas Are Back in Style
Keep Your Big Mouth Shut
Nosey Joe
Cherokee Boogie
We Can Talk Some Trash
Bowlegged Woman
Get Off the Table, Mabel

Amazingly, I've heard Get Off the Table, Mable. But you know I'm lovin' Big Fat Mamas Are Back in Style and Bowlegged Woman. Wonderful music and risque songs; how have I lived so long without these songs?

I also found the lyrics to Big Fat Mamas Are Back in Style:

Listen, sister
You should wear a smile
Jump for joy just like a child
'Cause big fat mamas are back in style

Listen, brother
It's all over that dial
Hear that crowd, they're going wild
'Cause big fat mamas are back in style

You need a big fat mama
And boys you can't go wrong
A big fat mama
To rule your home sweet home

Listen, mama
You gotta keep that double chin
'Cause the big fat mamas and the little fat mamas
Are back in style again

(More info on the lyrics here.)

Bull Moose died in 1989, but his mark on the history of rhythm & blues will remain forever.

Vintage Cat Ballou

I'm a fan of Jane Fonda, so when I found this vintage paperback I was thrilled. The Ballad of Cat Ballou struck me for its campy sex kitten cover and it wasn't until I was in line at the thrift store that I recognized that face.


The film Cat Ballou (1965) stars Jane Fonda, Lee Marvin, Michael Callan, Dwayne Hickman, Nat King Cole, and Stubby Kaye -- and was nominated for five Oscars, for which Lee Marvin did win Best Actor in a Leading Role. The film is a comedy-western, but the original novel (by Roy Chanslor) upon which the movie is based, is a serious western telling the story of a woman out to avenge her father's murder.

The Ballad Of Cat Ballou (lyrics)

Well now friends just lend an ear
For you're now about to hear
The ballad of Cat Ballou
It's a song that's newly made
And Professus and the Shade
And the Sunrise Kid are singin' it for you

Cat ballou, Cat ballou
It's a hangin' day in Wolf City Wyomin'
Wolf City Wyomin', eighteen ninety four
They're gonna drop Cat Ballou through the gallows floor

She killed a man in Wolf City Wyomin'
Wolf City Wyomin' killed a man it's true
And that is why they're a-hangin'
Hangin' Cat Ballou

She has the smile of an angel (fights like the devil)
The eyes of an angel (bites like the devil)
The face of an angel (I say she's the devil)
(She's mean and evil through and through)
Cat Ballou, Cat Ball-ou-ou-ou
She's mean and evil through and through

With her outlaw band they're now tellin' a story
Now tellin' a story how she rode the plain
The wildest gal in the we-est since Calamity Jane
And today's the day that she's goin' to glory
She's goin' to glory for the way she sinned
They'll be a-speedin' her soul on a wayward wind

She has the smile of an angel (fights like the devil)
The eyes of an angel (bites like the devil)
The face of an angel (I say she's the devil)
(She's mean and evil through and through)
Cat Ballou (Cat Ballou)
Cat Ball-ou-ou-ou (Cat Ballou)

She's mean and evil through and through Cat Ballou
Cat Ball-ou-ou-ou
She's mean and evil through and through

Lyrics by Mack David and Jerry Livingston.
Recorded by Nat King Cole and Stubby Kaye.

Part memoir, part review, this piece by Pam Malouf has me eager to see the film too:

Forty years later, I still find myself thinking about Cat Ballou. I lost my innocence right alongside Cat that day when the sheriff lied about her daddy's death. The bold courage and willingness to stand up to authority displayed by Cat showed me that all it takes is guts for anyone (including women) to stand up for her rights. If a young, innocent girl could ride fearlessly after a noseless killer, then nothing could stop me! Cat Ballou was an inspiration to throw caution to the wind and fight for what I believe in.

This New American Library copy (sixth printing) is clearly the movie tie-in, so I wonder if it will have the humor of the film? With Roy Chanslor listed as the author, and no mention of any screenplay, I doubt it... But I can't wait to find time to read it.

A terrific grab for 75 cents.

Photo credits: reproduction poster via Amazon.

XXX Record Albums

Somethings to delight, and somethings to offend... LP Cover Lover has Triple-X covers for you to see...




Link found via Red Blooded Thing.

June Wilkinson

If you collect vintage men's mags from the 50's and 60's you can't shake yer a stick without seeing blonde, busty June Wilkinson.




Also as a brunette.



Including Playboy magazines.


She was even featured in Frederick's of Hollywood catalogs.


She also had minor film and television roles, including Evilina on TV's Batman.

Because you've seen so much of June, you may think you know all about her. But I didn't.

I did not know that June Wilkinson toured as a singer with comedy legend Spike Jones, or that late in the '70s she started the June Wilkinson Aerobic Workout Studios in Canada, or that she dated Elvis, or that she was the columnist (at least in name & photo) behind "Girl Watching Problems" for Girl Watcher magazine.


For more on June, read her 2004 interview and see more photos there too.

Ziggy Stardust Comic

This comic book features David Bowie as Ziggy Stardust along with cameos & guest appearances by Elton John, Kate Bush, Mick Jagger, Batman, Freddie Mercury and Ozzy Osbourne.

See scans here.

Tom Jones in Speedos

I have a thing for Tom (someone else already took my "Jones-ing" line), so once I found this pic I had to post it here.

Hairy (Jazz) Onions Anyone?

"Silverstein, when not writing for children, often breached such exclusively adult topics as drug use and sex."

Read all about Hairy Jazz by Shel Silverstein and the Red Onion Band.

(More on the other kind of hairy onions is found here.)

Future of Collectibles

In pondering the collectibles of tomorrow...

What will folks say about Hip Hip? Perhaps they will say what Shemia Miller says in The Hip Hop Brand Is On The Auction Block.

Will there be such a thing as digital ephemera? I would have to imagine there will. There are certainly already many who collect digital images of risque postcards and vintage nude photographs -- some because the price of originals is quite high; others because digital allows for ease of storage.

The Not-So-Silent Rita Hayworth Post

Sexy Rita Hayworth and Merv Griffin sang a duet in 1971 on Merv's show. While she sang for herself on the show (and Carol Burnett's), her movie songs were sung by Anita Ellis, Nan Wynn & Martha Mears.

The song was titled I'm Old Fashioned, and Rita was 53 years old.

Thirty years prior, Rita's career was launched with this photo by Life photographer Bob Landry. The photo never made the cover of the magazine. Amazing when you consider this pinup sold more than 5 million copies -- only Betty Grable sold more.

The photo itself is so popular that it has legends of its own:

"One story has it that the photo was taken in Hayworth's own bedroom, but another suggests that she knelt on a bed on the movie set. The sexy lace nightie was either made by the press agent's mother or came from Columbia Pictures' prop department. A flashbulb may or may not have failed -- sculpting the shadow on Hayworth's chest. One rumor has it that someone told Hayworth to take a deep breath before the famous shot, making the image even more provocative."

Click here for more on the iconic Life photo.

Many thanks to Sex-Kitten.net for hosting the audio file!

70's Pleasure Activities

Activities: Erotic Coloring Book (print & color!)

Reading: Eros Magazine, 1980 ('Read' yeah, read... 1980 is 70's-ish)

Film: Behind The Green Door (watch clips!)

Music: Sex-O-Rama Soundtrack (listen to clips!)