Eleanor and Hick: The Love Affair That Shaped a First Lady: A Review

Quinn, S. (2016) Eleanor and Hick: The Love Affair That Shaped a First Lady. Penguin Press, New York.

In the years since the death of Eleanor Roosevelt, all the skeletons appear to have come out of her and her husband President Franklin D. Roosevelt's closet.  Eleanor herself appears to have been forced out of the closet, her sexual persuasion now a subject of debate.  The BIG question surrounding the former First Lady is 'Was Miss Ellie gay?  Was she maybe bisexual?'  Eleanor and Hick cannot answer the question of whether she and her friend/associate Lorena Hickok had a sexual relationship.  There is simply no solid proof of such a thing.

Eleanor and Hick does show that there was a deep, profound, even romantic relationship between Roosevelt and Hickok, but romantic attachments does not always mean sexual relations or even physical desire. One can feel passionate, even romantic about someone without it becoming physical. Eleanor and Hick makes a strong case that without Hickok, Eleanor would not have become the iconic, activist First Lady she became.  

There could not be two women as vastly different as the patrician Eleanor and the hard-scrabble Lorena.  The former was born into wealth and privilege, daughter of one of the oldest New York families and niece of the President of the United States, Theodore Roosevelt.  The latter was born into squalor, abused by her father and forced out into the world.  Despite their radically different social circumstances, the two were kindred souls.

Eleanor, nicknamed 'Granny' by her own mother for her dour demeanor, was brought up in a pretty chaotic world.  The glamorous Alice Roosevelt looked askance at her daughter and openly called her unattractive.  Eleanor's father Elliott had a very serious drinking problem and while he was devoted to his 'Little Nell', it wasn't enough to save him.  Eleanor's childhood was filled with fine homes but ones full of emptiness and even danger.

Hickok's early years were equally chaotic.  With essentially no parents, she dropped out of school and worked in other people's homes until a distant relative, Aunt Ella, rescued Hick, helping her get an education and eventually a career as a journalist.  It was as a journalist that Hickok and Roosevelt got reacquainted (Hickok having previously interviewed Eleanor when the latter was the spouse of an up-and-coming politician named Franklin); Hickok got a chance to board a train carrying the Roosevelts on a campaign tour and she got an interview.  Despite their differing backgrounds, they immediately bonded.

Hickok was as openly lesbian as one could be in the 1930s, and she fell in love with Eleanor as well as the New Deal the Roosevelts personified.  Knowing that it would be impossible to be impartial, Hick gave up her career as a journalist to be with Roosevelt in both official and unofficial capacities. Eleanor's own private life was not as clear: in her posh French school, Allenswood, many girls were attracted to her in various degrees, from mere infatuation to perhaps sexual desire.  Whether she actually returned the affections is unknown.

For a time, the two were very close companions, bosom buddies if you will.  Again, whether it ever turned sexual, even once, is something Eleanor and Hick does not give a firm affirmative or negative.  Roosevelt did associate with a large group of lesbians, who were a major part of Democratic Party outreach, especially to women.  One of her enterprises, Val-Kill, was a cooperative between Eleanor and a lesbian couple with whom she eventually had a bitter falling out.

Hick encouraged Eleanor to be more assertive, working with her to break out of her shell more and take risks.  It was Hick who suggested that Eleanor use her diaries and letters to her to create what would become Eleanor's daily My Day newspaper column, making Eleanor's voice and views known around the world, for good or ill to FDR (who was too busy with both the business of government and his own wandering eye to be hovering over 'the missus').

Quinn's argument is that Eleanor would not have become the First Lady of the World if not for the help of this squat little woman next to the almost six-foot-tall Eleanor.  Eventually though, whatever passion they felt for each other, be it romantic, sexual, or something in between, faded.  There was still respect, admiration, and affection, but the thrill was gone.  Eleanor had found other people (men, interestingly enough), while Hick found love with another woman.

Eventually, old age caught up with Eleanor Roosevelt, and she died in 1962, revered and admired.  Lorena Hickok died five years later, pretty much forgotten by history, yet in those five years, on Eleanor Roosevelt's birthday, Hick would go to her old companion's grave and leave a tribute: a yellow rose.

The Third Doctor on Doctor Who, Jon Pertwee, observed that there wasn't during his time on the show any hint or suggestion of romance between the Doctor and his Companion.  He was fond of the Companions, Pertwee said, but fondness is different from desire.  I find this to be the case when it comes to a love affair between Eleanor Roosevelt and Lorena Hickok.  There may have been a love affair between them.  I think there was one.  Yet, does this mean there was a sexual one between them?

There is a difference between affection and attraction.  They are not one and the same.  I believe one can be fond of someone, even feel great emotion for them, without it ever entering the world of physical intimacy.  It may be possible that Eleanor Roosevelt had great passion for Lorena Hickok, finding in her someone to confide in, to free up emotions.  Their letters do indicate something very strong: Eleanor treasuring a ring Hick had given her, reminiscing about their trips together.

One letter even speaks about how Eleanor wanted "to put my arms around you and hold you close".  Read today, they strongly suggest a physical relationship.

So, was Eleanor into a gay life?  Again, no proof has yet confirmed or wholly denied a physical relationship, and my memory of Eleanor and Hick doesn't ever say "Yes, they had sex".  I imagine that for many people, particularly the LGBT community, having someone as prominent as a First Lady be in 'the sewing circle' would be of great symbolic use.

As a side note, these are probably the same people who stretch to find that either President James Buchanan or his successor, Abraham Lincoln, might have been gay based on circumstantial evidence that can be interpreted in certain ways to fit the supposition.

However, on a personal level, I'm disinclined to think that Mrs. Roosevelt did indeed carry on a sexual relationship with Lorena Hickok or with anyone outside Franklin.

There are a few things to consider.  First, Mrs. Roosevelt came from an era where women could be more openly affectionate without there being any suggestion of 'untoward or unnatural' activities.  Second, Eleanor and Franklin had five children together, hardly a suggestion that Eleanor didn't, at least on some level, enjoy heterosexual sex.  There might have been more intimacy between them if not for Franklin's devastating affair with Eleanor's social secretary, Lucy Mercer (later Mrs. Rutherford), which totally broke that part of their life together.  Third, would Eleanor, as old-fashioned in some ways as she was, and who had endured the horror of an unfaithful spouse, herself opt to be unfaithful?

There had been rumors of an affair between herself and a bodyguard,  Earl Miller.  He had a smaller but still influential role in the First Lady's life, showing her how to shoot and making her laugh.  When asked about the possibility of an actual sexual relationship, he answered, "You don't go to bed with someone you call 'Mrs. Roosevelt'".  In her latter years, the Widow Eleanor was also extremely fond of her doctor, David Gurewitsch, with the suggestion she was in love with him.

Whether Eleanor Roosevelt was gay or bisexual is known to only one person, and she isn't giving interviews outside a seance.

If the idea that Eleanor Roosevelt was schtupping a rather frumpy middle-aged woman is the reason one picks up Eleanor and Hick, it would be a sad turn, because the book is not some sordid tabloid gossipy tome.  It is instead, a very interesting read about the relationship between two women, whatever form it took, helping and shaping each other, as well as shaping world history.  One learns quite a bit, such as how influential lesbians were in the Democratic Party of the Roosevelt years.

One also learns about these two very interesting women, who rose from very punishing circumstances to become strong, capable, and historic figures.  That, I would argue, is more interesting than any sexual tidbits about long-dead people.

Crisis of Character: A Review

Byrne, G. (2016) Crisis of Character: A White House Secret Service Officer Discloses His Firsthand Experience With Hillary, Bill, and How the Operate. Center Street, New York.

*Editor's Note: this review is for the audiobook, reading by Brian Troxell.

Bill and Hillary Clinton can be seen two ways, depending on your political persuasion.  They can be seen as a loving couple who have devoted their lives to public service, working towards making the world a better place (that would be the liberal point of view).  They can be seen as a cold, calculating pair interested only in holding on to the power they think is their divine right, enriching themselves in the process (that would be the conservative point of view).  Crisis of Character comes from former Secret Service Agent Gary J. Byrne, who was part of then-President Bill Clinton's protection detail and was ensnared in the tumultuous Starr investigation that nearly brought down his Presidency. 

Those on the Right or Left who might expect a no-holds-barred takedown/monstrous slur of the Clintons may be in for a surprise.  While we do get some disturbing new information about President Clinton's liaison with former intern Monica Lewinsky, Crisis of Character reads more like the unpublished memoirs of MITCH RAPP than a tell-all on the machinations, real or imagined, of the 42th and almost 45th President.

Most of Crisis of Character is really about Byrne himself and his experiences working at the Secret Service and later, the Air Marshall Program.  He talks often about how inept the Secret Service was when kowtowing to political correctness (such as putting physically unfit people in guard positions to fill quotas) or in how their hands were tied due to civilians who thought they knew better (such as when staff to then-candidate Bill Clinton would push the Service to wave in people instead of inspecting them, or when a gay activist visiting the White House became incensed when told he couldn't put gay-themed stickers around the Mansion or the artifacts within them, insisting that 'they had won').

It should be noted that whenever the Service would screw up, or indeed whenever anyone would screw up, Byrne himself was not the person who did the actual screwing up.  When it came to President Bill Clinton's extramarital assignations, Byrne didn't do the screwing either.

Instead, we see that to a point, Crisis of Character actually backs up the former President and First Lady's story: White House intern Monica Lewinsky, not the brightest bulb who if Byrne had had his way wouldn't have ever set foot on the grounds, was a stalker of sorts.  She would go into restricted areas, constantly coming up with weak excuses to be where she knew she shouldn't be (she got lost, she was looking for the restroom, she was visiting a friend, she was dropping things off).  It was an irritant to Byrne and the other agents, but eventually she managed to snare herself a President (and was unaware that she wasn't the only mistress gallivanting about, former Second Daughter Eleanor Mondale getting in on the action too).

The grotesque nature of the liaison (I'm not sure it would qualify as an actual affair) involves having the President's semen not just on that infamous blue dress, but on White House hand-towels that a Navy officer was forced to wash as part of his duties.  This whole thing disgusted our agent, especially given the difference between our Baby Boomer President and the last President from The Greatest Generation, dear Poppa Bush, who was dignity and kindness itself.

We then get the long, sordid saga of the Clinton impeachment, and how it wrecked his life when he got dragged into it.

Apart from this and the assertion that then First Lady Hillary Clinton knew of the liaisons (down to throwing things at the President), Crisis of Character really has little to nothing to do with the Clintons, in particular with how Hillary Clinton plotted for sixteen years to return to power in her own right as the first female President.

Instead, Crisis of Character tells us of the various exploits (both exciting and mundane) that Byrne went through.  I couldn't help think of the late Vince Flynn's most famous character: superspy and super-Patriot MITCH RAPP, a man who is the embodiment of the American Assassin.

Let me digress slightly to say that as much as I liked Flynn personally and found him to be highly talented, I never liked MITCH RAPP (the caps are always because he struck me as a staccato, monotone, monosyllabic person).  MITCH RAPP, in the two novels I read/heard about him, has no personality.  He has no family, no friends, no outside hobbies, no quirks, no sense of humor, no personal foibles, no life apart from kicking ass and killing people, especially if it means going against those in power.

Sure, he might have been motivated by his girlfriend being killed in the Pan Am bombing, but MITCH RAPP, at least the one I encountered, doesn't even appear capable of any human emotion, let alone love.  He doesn't appear to enjoy sports, doesn't read books, binge-watch shows, have any guilty pleasures, laugh at anything...in short, he to me is so cold and unlikable I really have a hard time getting through a MITCH RAPP book.

Listening to Crisis of Character, one feels that Byrne seems himself as a MITCH RAPP-type: tough, take-no-prisoners, at permanent guard, a master at weaponry and hunting down evil beings.  It borders on the comic, and to be honest, I skipped some parts because he went on and on about his various trainings, which might have been interesting if I went into the book wanting to learn that.

I went into the book wanting a reason to not have Madam Clinton be Madam President, why Hillary Clinton was unfit to follow Poppa Bush or even her own husband a la Evita Peron.  What I got was how great Gary Byrne was at his job.

If you want to learn about the machinations of the Clintons (real or imagined) or why she was not fit to have been Commander-in-Chief, skip Crisis of Character. 

Hope: Entertainer of the Century: A Review

Zoglin, R. (2015) Hope: Entertainer of the Century. Simon & Schuster, New York.

In the nearly fifteen years since his death at age 100, I venture to say that the name Bob Hope is slowly being forgotten.  I'm old enough to remember Bob Hope specials, even his last USO tour during the First Persian War.  If he is remembered, it is with a certain disdain, a relic who was both politically incorrect and politically repulsive to the current leading lights of laughter.  With left-wing comics Bill Maher, Samantha Bee, John Oliver, Sarah Silverman, Trevor Noah, Stephen Colbert, Will Ferrell, and Jon Stewart ruling comedy, Hope's brazen conservatism is essentially the final nail of the coffin of his reputation as a comedy master. 

Richard Zoglin would have a long argument with you on Hope's legacy and importance.  Hope: Entertainer of the Century is an impeccable biography of the all-around star who found success in every field of entertainment he entered: vaudeville, Broadway, film, radio, and television.  Hope's fortunes (financial) were assured, but his fortunes (career and reputation-wise) faded thanks to a mix of time and Hope's own inability to stay with them.  Hope: Entertainer of the Century covers both Hope's public and private life, one that was filled with sex, ego, and pettiness, but also one that had kindness, generosity, and shrewd management.

Leslie Towns Hope (Zoglin insists that the more traditional "Townes" spelling is wrong, even when Hope did it) was an immigrant, born in England but who was brought along with the rest of his family to join his father in Ohio.  He was a bit of a scrapper, not one for school (Zoglin uncovered that Les, as he preferred to be called, had even done a stint in juvenile correction school), but one who loved his family.

Encouraged by his mother, who loved playing her piano, Les started entering dance competitions and soon built up an act with other partners, who for various reasons, didn't stay long.  Still, Les Hope kept plugging away at showbiz, and soon he was working his way up the various vaudeville circuits, from regional to national.  He also started honing his comedy skills, where it was his quips, not his dancing, that got the attention. 

Already at this point, Zoglin would argue, Hope was creating a new style for comedy, one that didn't depend on what had gone on before in vaudeville (comedy duos, ethnic stereotypes, or standard jokes).  Instead, Hope started doing more topical humor, tailoring quips for the regional audiences.  As a side note, Hope was among the first to not try any ethnic humor, his Midwestern manner being an odd fit to try anything ethnic, though he tried once with such awful results he never ventured into it again.

As his career kept building, Hope indulged his other great passion: women.  He had a secret first marriage, and his marriage to Dolores Reade (born Dolores De Fina) is shrouded in mystery.  Despite a wide-ranging search, no marriage license or wedding photo has ever been found or produced.  Zoglin argues that as a devout Catholic, Dolores would not have 'lived in sin' for long, so the likelihood of a Church-sanctioned wedding must have happened, but when, how, and under what circumstances no one outside Bob and/or Dolores knows.

Hope, for his part, continued his rise in showbiz, and after a failed first attempt finally got into the movies at a relatively old age of 34.  Not a splash at the beginning, it was The Big Broadcast of 1938 that bolted Hope's career: not the movie itself, but its theme, Thanks For the Memory (a title which most people erroneously refer to as Thanks For the Memories), which he lucked into to be his signature song.

Out of his movie success came radio, where Hope became a pioneer: having to create a whole radio show out of whole cloth versus other radio comics like Jack Benny and Burns & Allen, who already had definitive personas.  Hope's humor was also unique in that it was more down-to-earth, more the 'everyman' than a particular type like the cheapskate Benny or cerebral Steve Allen.

Hope managed his career smoothly, open about using writers (whom he wasn't the most generous with and whom he expected to be on call 24/7).  His radio and film career built up, and eventually a "Bob Hope" type emerged: the brave coward, one who appears courageous but turns chicken at first sign of danger, who pursues women but crumbles when he manages to get a response.

This of course was different from Bob Hope in real life, who had no problem getting almost any woman into bed (if it is believed, among his conquests were Ethel Merman and Doris Day, the latter never commenting on this curious liaison).  What Dolores knew, or wanted to know, is also unknown.

The Second World War was Hope's finest hour.  A man who didn't have any great angst, he thrived on the live crowds and threw himself into entertaining the troops (having done a wide variety of charity events for years prior).  Hope was undeterred, crisscrossing Europe and Asia to find an audience (even if sometimes troops would rather get home than get Hope).

After the war, things slowly changed, but Hope didn't.  He didn't become an ideologue until the Nixon years, and his support of both Nixon and the Vietnam War, along with his mocking of the youth movement in his various USO and television specials, began to sour larger groups of audiences.  His film career began to fade, and his specials became the like man himself: more rigid, more scripted, more cautious, and finally a sad parody.

Bob Hope ruled NBC, with only Johnny Carson being anywhere near his equal.  However, whenever Hope wanted to promote something, Carson had to give him time on The Tonight Show.  Carson, more withdrawn and moody, didn't gel with the generally bon vivant Hope, and Carson hated how scripted their 'spontaneous encounters were', to where if Carson skipped a question Hope would answer it anyway.

Bob Hope, once nicknamed 'Rapid Robert' for his quick-fire monologues, would not give up the limelight.  As he entered his 90s, he stubbornly insisted on doing his TV specials, where it was getting harder and harder to hide his advancing age, poor eyesight, and hearing difficulties.  Hope, to the end, wanted to be the center of attention, even if it was accidental.  When Dolores, who had given up her singing career to be Mrs. Bob Hope (and where despite the ability to Bob would not put her in his specials until very late in his career), made a 'comeback', Hope's hearing caused him to virtually shout when she sang.  Even worse, he would loudly order Dolores to stop being romantic with him after her set.

Given that at least until his 60s or 80s (I can't remember which), he had no problem being romantic with other women, it seems all so unfair.

In the end, after meeting his goal of living to 100, he died a couple of months later in 2003.  By that time, Bob Hope might have been an institution, but one that fewer and fewer remembered (his death merited one page in Time Magazine, but that of 'third-best Beatle' George Harrison got the cover).  Zoglin argues that Bob Hope had simply lingered too long: the prepared obituary for The New York Times had been sitting there so long that the author of the obituary himself had been dead three years).

I figure that many people nowadays do not know who Bob Hope is, or why he matters.  Zoglin's brilliant biography brings Hope back to life, showing us both his comedic brilliance and the hard, sometimes unfeeling man he was.

I say sometimes because Hope was more complex than 'selfish comic'.  Hope could be unpleasant (such as an early stunt where he would make paper planes out of his writer's paychecks and send them floating down, a practice he quickly dropped once it made the rounds).  He had no qualms about not just seeing other women on the side but forcing others to be party to such antics (in one incident Zoglin compared to a real-life The Apartment, he cajoled a young writer to let him have the key to his apartment for an assignation, leaving at the arranged time). 

However, Zoglin tells a story that reveals another side of Bob Hope.  Hope, unlike other stars then and now,  would reply to almost all his fan mail, adding personal touches, particularly whenever a soldier or his/her family were involved.  In 1967, as the Vietnam War escalated (and Hope's popularity diminished), he got a letter from a friend of a seven-year-old girl he had posed with for a cystic fibrosis campaign.  The letter detailed that she was dying and that if he could write to her it would mean so much. 

Bob Hope replied, and not just with a form letter, but with a brief note that even threw in some humor at his expense (opening with, "Remember me?").

Hope was complex and complicated, at times self-centered, even vain.  He was also, Zoglin would insist, a true genius: not just in comedy, but in the art of career management.  He set up Hope Enterprises to further his career, always venturing into new media when given the chance (he didn't run away from television when others were terrified of it).  He invested wisely in real estate (though bristling at reports of exactly how wealthy he was).  He brought an intimacy between himself and his audiences that made him appear approachable, even if he wasn't.

For all the disdain Colbert, Maher, Silverman et al may have towards Hope's politics, there would be none of them if not for Hope.  He set the standard of the modern late-night talk show: the monologue, the skits, those were all from Hope.

Bob Hope should not be forgotten or relegated to a small place in comic history.  Apart from Woody Allen, no major comedian/comedienne mentions Bob Hope.  With Hope: Entertainer of the Century, Richard Zoglin gives us the whole Hope: brilliant, petty, easy-going and difficult.  Bob Hope was a true comedic genius.

With luck, Hope: Entertainer of the Century will spark a revival to restore him to his rightful place in comedy.

Bob, Thanks For the Memory...

1903-2003

Sally Ride: America's First Woman in Space: A Review

Sherr, L. (2014). Sally Ride: America's First Woman in Space. Simon & Schuster, New York.


Sally Ride is an icon, an American heroine, yet also a figure cloaked in mystery.  Her friend, journalist Lynn Sherr, has taken it upon herself to reveal the public, private, and secret world of the first American female astronaut in the biography about Dr. Ride.  The title I believe is appropriate to how Dr. Ride saw life: direct, with no excessive details.  Sally Ride: America's First Woman in Space reveals as much as it can about the woman who broke barriers but still kept the world far more distant in her life than she was when she floated among the stars. 

Sally Kristen Ride, the oldest of two sisters, came from a family that encouraged intellectual pursuits and did not hold the idea that a person's gender held one back from anything.  In fact, the only time Sally was told she couldn't do something because she was a 'girl' was when she was told that she couldn't play for her beloved Los Angeles Dodgers.

No matter, as she found a true passion in tennis, playing fiercely and well enough to seriously consider a future as a professional (even going up against legendary tennis player Billie Jean King, who would become a friend and a sort of mentor in business years later).  Ride, however, also had an analytical mind, and had a tremendous passion for science.  If asked to find the term that best described her, she would answer "physicist", loving the logic of the natural sciences.

Ride would not think that being an astronaut would be within possibility until 1978, when while studying at Stanford, she saw a notice in the school newspaper announcing that NASA was looking for female astronauts.  Ride sent her application, and was accepted as part of a new class that dubbed itself TFNG (Thirty-Five New Guys, though Sherr states it really came from another, less flattering term).  The TFNG had six women and four minorities: three African-Americans and one Asian-American.

The class went through a battery of tests, drills, and training, and ultimately, Ride's mastery of the Remote Manipulator System (RMS), the robotic arm that would dispatch material from the shuttle, that got her into history.

After her successful trips, she retired, slightly disillusioned with NASA's bungling that led to the Challenger disaster, but still enthusiastic as she enters a new phase: academia.  She launches a new venture (no pun intended): to bring more interest to children in studying science and making it a career, in particular girls.  Ultimately she uses her name and cache to create Sally Ride Science, which sets out to bring girls and boys into an interest in the sciences.

Sadly, Sally Ride was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and died in 2012 shortly after her sixty-first birthday.

As Sherr was a friend of Ride, she brings her own insight into Sally Ride: America's First Woman in Space.  She also benefits greatly from having the full cooperation of all the Ride family: Sally's mother Joyce, sister Karen (better known as 'Bear' due to the young Sally's inability to say 'Karen' and reducing it to first 'Pear' then 'Bear'), and most importantly, Ride's longtime partner, Tam O'Shaughnessy, with whom Ride spent the last twenty-seven years of her life.

Sally Ride: America's First Woman in Space touches on Rides' very private life: her early lesbian relationships, her marriage to fellow astronaut Steve Hawley, and her life with O'Shaughnessy.  What Sherr finds frustrating is that Ride herself never wrote down her own feelings on topics, what she felt about love and romance.  This must make getting a fuller picture of any subject frustrating, but Sherr confirms what she sensed in all her interactions with Dr. Ride: that ultimately Sally Ride was a very private person, not one to look back, or perhaps, look within.

Throughout the book, Ride's unwillingness or inability to express emotion publicly or even to others appears almost as a hindrance, forever keeping the subject just a little opaque, even after her death maintaining some semblance of the privacy she yearned for despite her history-making journey.  However, once Ride is diagnosed, the cracks in her guarded nature begin to show.  It is now, as she comes close to death, that Ride starts slowly making strides towards acknowledging her longtime partner.

This isn't to say that Ride was ever 'in the closet' to where her lesbian or bisexuality was a closely guarded secret.  She travelled with O'Shaughnessy, lived with her, and even shared matching rings.  However, through almost all their time together, Ride did not introduce O'Shaughnessy as her 'partner', her 'girlfriend', or her 'companion', or any euphemism that would have indicated a romantic relationship.  Sherr speculates that seeing their friend Billie Jean King so publicly outed, and the damage that the revelation had on her business ventures, may have influenced their decision.

It is speculation because to a point, even O'Shaughnessy was not able to penetrate the strong guard of privacy that Ride had with everyone.  My view is that Ride simply wanted a private life, a space all to her own, where she didn't have to explain herself.  She already had a corner of history due to her historic flight (though Ride was technically speaking, the third woman in space). 

As such, it is reading how Ride, as she battled her cancer, started chipping away at her own remoteness that moves one.  Ride decided to register with O'Shaughnessy as 'domestic partners', something that she didn't need to do as she had already granted her partner the right of inheritance.  For me though, the most poignant moment is when Ride told her longtime partner how she wished they could have another twenty-seven years together, a remarkable declaration given how Ride had in all their time together told Tam that she measured their relationship in terms of five or ten years, not a lifetime.  That admission of just how important her longtime partner was to her made Sally Ride, emotional recluse, touchingly human.

Sally Ride: America's First Woman in Space is, mercifully, not a total hagiography. It is certainly very sympathetic to the subject, but it also does not shrink from pointing out that Ride could at times be unpleasant.  She could cut people off whom she considered having betrayed some trust (though to be fair, this is about the only flaw I can remember Ride having). 

Sherr doesn't condemn or criticize her for that, nor does she condemn Ride for not revealing her sexuality until after her death or even the fact that her longtime companion endured a somewhat ambivalent relationship (or that they had no children because Sally wished it so, whatever O'Shaughnessy's wishes). 

Sympathetic is the best term for Sherr's biography.  It isn't fawning, it isn't critical.

The scientific terms are well-explained without being complicated, which is good for the laymen who don't follow NASA-speak. 

About the only real flaw in Sally Ride: America's First Woman in Space is the occasional snarky asides Sherr cannot resist adding.  When commenting on the issue of 'bodily waste differences between men and women in space', Sherr writes the following:

The bodily waste issue was more than timely.  Sally was following closely the campaign to pass the Equal Rights Amendment, which would go down to defeat two months later thanks, in part, to the fuss kicked up by Phyllis Schafly over the specter of unisex restrooms.  You know, like the ones in airplanes.  Or in your home. (Emphasis mine).

There is a mocking tone to Sherr's lines, clearly revealing the contempt she has for those who disagree with her (like the late Schafly).  I don't agree with Schafly, but I also think Sherr could have rephrased this part or cut it out completely, sticking to placing objections like toilets in space in context of the times and era.  She does this well when discussing such things as the 'good old boys' mentality within NASA from almost its inception or how the public at the beginning of the space race didn't conceive of the idea of an 'astronette'.  When Sherr interjects her own contempt for those who disagree with her, it takes away from the subject and puts attention on Lynn Sherr herself, and she doesn't come across as capable of being truly objective.

Minor flaw though it is, a flaw it remains.

Ultimately though, Sally Ride: America's First Woman in Space is as close to a definitive biography as we are likely to get on this true American heroine.  Sally Ride's place in history is not just assured, but preserved with as great an insight into this private woman as we will ever have outside a successful séance.  Sally Ride's life was devoted to exploration and breaking down barriers, to show that science was not just for 'men in white coats', but that it could be both a career for women and moreover, fun.

Sally Ride remains a heroine, an icon, and a woman any young girl (and yes, boy) should look up to and admire.  Sally Ride: America's First Woman in Space, does Dr. Ride tremendous credit in keeping her memory alive, letting us see as much as possible and giving us not just greater insight into Sally Ride the persona, but Sally Ride the person. 

1951-2012

 

P.S.  While I'm sure Dr. Ride and Ms. Sherr would not approve of this, being a cheeky American I'm going to do it anyway.  Should anyone criticize me, well, get over it.

 



I Am Scout: The Biography of Harper Lee: A Review

Childs, C.J. (2008). I Am Scout: The Biography of Harper Lee. Henry Holt & Co., New York.

As part of the recent Youth Literature class, as well as the fact that after fifty-plus years, Harper Lee is coming out with a second book (Go Set a Watchman), I think it would be nice to look over the life of this intensely private but pugnacious person: Miss Nelle Harper Lee, author of one of the Greatest Books of the Twentieth Century: To Kill a Mockingbird.   I Am Scout: The Biography of Harper Lee, is the juvenile version of Charles J. Shields' adult biography, Mockingbird: A Portrait of Harper Lee, is an excellent read for the target audience.  It gives wonderful information and insight into the intensely private author but is written in such a way that it doesn't sensationalize or delve into generally unpleasant matters (the murder of the Clutter Family in Kansas which was the basis of her frenemy Truman Capote's In Cold Blood, which Lee was instrumental in creating but which Capote downplayed her assistance).

Nelle Harper Lee's life is covered, beginning with her early years in Monroeville, Alabama.  She's the daughter of the South, but no Southern belle by any stretch.  Much like her main character in TKAM, she was a tomboy: willing to stand up and fight any boy, as well as play football like one.  She forced her way to a game once, and she didn't go down but instead knocked others down.  When the captain yelled that they were playing touch, she yelled back, "Y'all can play that sissy game if you want to, but I'm playing tackle!"

In what might be a contradiction, while she was rough-and-ready, she also had a deeply intellectual side.  In one of those fortuitous turns of literature, her next-door neighbor was another future American literary legend, Truman Capote (then known by his birth name of Truman Streckfus Persons).  He had essentially been dumped by his parents: the vain status-seeking Lillie May and the ne'er-do-well Archie, in the care of relatives.  They were neighbors to the Lee family, which couldn't be further from Capote's chaotic life. 

Lee's father, A.C. Lee, was a successful lawyer, Alabama state representative, and newspaper publisher.  His oldest daughter Alice followed her father's footsteps, and at first Nelle tried to do likewise.  However, her non-traditional ways in forms of dress and disinterest in being the embodiment of the proper lady (she smoked, she swore, and didn't have many if any real friendships/relationships) put her at odds with almost everyone around her.  She also had a great passion: to write.  The two came into conflict, and eventually, despite the misgivings of her family, she went to New York, where her old friend Truman, now known as Truman Capote (adopting his stepfather's surname), had made a big noise. 

Capote, who referred to themselves as 'apart people', was one of the few in her early years to be a kindred soul.  As children, they wrote together and were engulfed with books.  They would carry around a new typewriter almost everywhere (except to the treehouse, as it was too heavy).  As an adult, Lee started out as the prototypical struggling writer, finding a job with BOAC (British Overseas Airways Corporation) ticket seller and trying to write.  A fortuitous friendship allowed her to quit her job thanks to a gift of money that would allow her to live while she devoted herself full-time to writing.

With revisions and editing, she cranked out To Kill a Mockingbird, which came at the same time that her old friend Capote came to her and asked her to be his "assistant researchist" (his term) on his 'nonfiction novel'.  Her quiet manner and Southern charm smoothed the way for her loud, flamboyant, egocentric friend, who frankly irritated and shocked the conservative Kansans, who were in shock over the Clutter killings.  She and Capote didn't record their interviews, relying on their memories which they shared in evenings.  Often, Capote would write "See NL's notes" for clarification.

While she helped Capote, she also turned her attention to her novel, To Kill A Mockingbird.  She expected it to 'die a merciful death at the hand of reviewers', but instead she appeared to hit the zeitgeist of the rising civil rights movement.   The book became an immediate success, eventually winning the Pulitzer, a rare honor for a first-time novelist who hadn't published before.  The book redeemed her in her eyes to not having pursued law, and the film version cemented the legend.

As time went on however, Harper Lee became irritated by all the attention she was getting because of TKAM.  She worked on a second novel, but with all the publicity for Mockingbird, time just slipped by.  Later on, she did declare she was working on a second book, to be titled The Reverend, in the style of Capote's In Cold Blood.  Perhaps this was a way to get back at her friend, who downplayed Lee's contribution to his work (and this genteel antagonism might have been mutual, as Capote never "went to any strenuous lengths to deny" having written part or all of To Kill a Mockingbird.  Lee's disillusionment with her friend, dislike to be connected with In Cold Blood, and general dislike of attention was such that she did not attend the legendary Black and White Ball Truman threw for Washington Post editor Katherine Graham.

As time went on though, the idea of publishing another book slipped.  She would not speak at presentations, and her relationship with Monroeville, which has capitalized on their 'golden goose', has been fraught with tension.  At one point, she threatened to sue the local historical society when it thought of publishing Calpurnia's Cookbook, basing it on own of the novel's characters.  The entire run of the book had to be destroyed.  Now in her 80s, she is at peace about her curious place in literature: one book (so far), yet a legend.  As Miss Lee wrote to a friend, "People who have made peace with themselves are the people I most admire in the world".

I Am Scout gives us really interesting information both about her and her legendary book; for example, her choice for Atticus Finch was Spencer Tracy, even writing to him to suggest he play the role.  The studio for its part, wanted Rock Hudson.  Even after Gregory Peck was cast, there were subtle problems.  Peck, who had a strong financial hand in the film, insisted on building up his part at the expense of the children's viewpoint (Peck insisted on removing a scene where Jem reads to a dying Mrs. DuBose because it again put the emphasis on the children and not on Atticus Finch, much to the director's sadness).  She also lived in New York for several years, but disliked the city itself (she wouldn't go to Manhattan), not living lavishly despite the wealth she probably accumulated through the book.   More curiously, though she lived close to friends she did not visit them or encourage visits.  It is as if she, like Greta Garbo, wants to be alone. 

Lee also has a curious hostility to Mary Badham, who played Scout in the film version.  "(Harper Lee) rebuffed attempts by (Badham)...to communicate with her. 'Mary acts like that book is the Bible', Nelle mentioned to Kathy McCoy, the former director of the Monroe County Heritage Museums.  According to a terse not in the museum's archives, '(Gregory Peck) told M.B. not to try to contact N.L.".  One gets the idea that Lee respects her work, but also thinks that it is simply too difficult to live up to the legend.  It is her Citizen Kane, but unlike Orson Welles, she quit while she was ahead.

Then again, she really didn't quit.  She had full intention of writing many books, of telling many stories.  However, the publicity, the notoriety, the passion Mockingbird was held by the public, in a way pushed Lee to not write.  Shields comments that the two essays she wrote for magazines post-Mockingbird had "a strong whiff of self-righteousness", calling them too self-conscious, as if she were trying to already live up to a legend she didn't want and couldn't carry.  

Harper Lee has pretty much resigned herself to both the praise and curse of To Kill a Mockingbird, a book that is good, that she knows is good, but that has also pretty much condemned her to endless comparisons, which might have frightened her from going into publishing another one...until now.  At age 89, a second Harper Lee book, Go Set a Watchman, is set for publication this July (I already have it on order, though it won't arrive until a few days after initial publication.  I'm not in that much of a hurry). It is called a sequel to her first book, though it apparently was written prior to Mockingbird and only recently rediscovered (even Lee apparently forgot all about it).

I Am Scout is perfect for the target audience, providing an interesting portrait of the author who has earned a place in history with only one book to her name (at least until July 2015), written in a simple tone that children will find easy. Adults can also enjoy I Am Scout as a fascinating portrait of the mostly-reclusive writer, who gave the world a wonderful story, then watched it overtaken by others whose intensions were both good and bad.        

Nelle Harper Lee
Born 1926

Module 12--Bill the Boy Wonder: The Secret Co-Creator of Batman: A Review

MODULE 12:
BILL THE BOY WONDER:

THE SECRET CO-CREATOR OF BATMAN:

by Marc Tyler Nobleman, illustrated by Ty Templeton

I feel the need to start with full disclosure.  I'm not into comic books.  Basically, my whole knowledge of figures like Superman, Batman, and Spider-Man (among others) comes from the film and television adaptations.  Currently, the Batman television prequel Gotham is not just a hit, but is among one of my favorite television shows. Through the campy 1960s television show, the Tim Burton/Joel Schumacher films, the Christopher Nolan Dark Knight trilogy, up to Gotham, I took it as fact that Bob Kane had created Batman out of whole cloth on his own.  Bill the Boy Wonder: The Secret Co-Creator of Batman brings us some shocking news: Kane was not alone.  Bill Finger, whom Kane has admitted was integral to the creation of this iconic figure, remains virtually unknown, even to Batman fans.  Marc Tyler Nobleman and Ty Templeton's book not only sets the record straight, but gives this hidden figure his due in a book I think Finger would be proud of. 

Milton Finger wanted a job, but in the Depression, his Jewish background (and first name) would probably keep him out of work.  He turned Milton into the more American "Bill", but work was still hard to come by.  He dreamed of being an artist and writer, but could only find work as a shoe salesman.  A chance encounter with another cartoonist, Bob Kane, soon started them on collaborating.  Inspired by the success of Superman, they worked to create another equally successful character.  Their character was different than the popular ones of the day. He would be a vigilante, human, with no superpowers.  Kane took the idea to their publisher, who liked it.  Finger agreed to write Batman stories without credit (a typical arrangement at the time).  Kane also hired other artists to serve as illustrators and ghostwriters, including one named Jerry Robinson.

Bob Kane
1915-1998

Finger not only wrote many Batman stories, but came up with much of the Batman mythos: his origin story of young Bruce Wayne, whose wealthy parents were murdered, Wayne's hometown of Gotham, the Batcave and Batmobile.  Finger also created the young Dick Grayson, the first Robin, and villains such as The Penguin and The Riddler.  Finger would jot down tidbits in a journal, using them for ideas, but was happy to share these notebooks with other writers.  In time, he married a woman named Portia, had only one son named Fred, and kept working on Batman.    That changed in 1964, when comics editor Julius Schwartz started talking openly about Finger's contributions.  Jerry Bails, a Batman fan, began investigating and interviewing Finger, publishing an article giving Finger co-credit.  Kane did not take this kindly, but neither Kane or Finger pushed on the issue of credit. 

On Friday, January 18, 1974, Bill Finger died.  Fred Finger scattered his ashes in the sea, but not before placing them in a Bat-Sign he made on the beach.  After Finger's death, Kane gave Finger credit...with his words, but never asked that he be given credit in print.  "But Bob didn't amend the part of his contract requiring that he always be listed as the sole creator of Batman", the book notes.  However, Finger's old protégé Jerry Robinson kept Bill Finger's legacy alive with the creation of the Bill Finger Awards for Excellence in Comic Book Writing. 

Bill the Boy Wonder is a fascinating portrait of a hidden figure to most if not almost all Batman fans.  Finger comes across as a pretty affable guy, perhaps too affable.  His lack of insistence in not asking for co-credit for creating one of the most iconic comic-book figures is puzzling to say the least.  With the success of Batman in various serials and the 1960s camp Batman show, Finger had plenty of time and opportunities to lay down the law if he so wished.  He had a strong case, but Finger never pushed or insisted on credit.  This despite the fact that Finger's contributions to the Batman storyline was an open secret among their colleagues.  Kane himself talked about how Finger did much to shape Batman to the figure we know him today, but just as Kane never pushed for Finger to get recognition, neither did Finger.

From Kane's perspective, it is understandable.  Batman is a major franchise that is still popular today.  From Finger's perspective, it is still puzzling.  Did Finger simply not care?  Did he think it wasn't worth the trouble to get a byline?  Did he think the work was reward enough? Bill the Boy Wonder never answers that question, I think because there is no answer possible.  Finger has been dead for forty years, as is his son Fred.  Bill Finger is so mysterious a figure that the book notes that the author was able to find only one known note in Finger's handwriting, and that was from around 1942. 

However, the book itself makes for a fascinating read.  The Author's Note which details more information about Finger as well as Nobleman's search for information is in itself fascinating read.  We learn that few pictures of Bill Finger exist, and that the search was drawing blanks because he had changed his name from Milton.  We also learn a far stranger story about what happened after Finger's death. 

His son Fred was gay, so it was believed Finger had no heir.  Fred Finger's belongings were given to a Charles Shaheen.  Shaheen had been receiving small royalty checks from DC Comics and it was thought the checks ended after Shaheen's own death.  However, DC Comics had been sending those royalties to a Jesse Maloney, a drifter.  In the course of Nobleman's investigation he discovered Finger's niece and nephew, who asked him why he didn't talk to Finger's granddaughter.  The fact that Finger had a grandchild was stunning given Fred Finger's open homosexuality, but Nobleman learned that Fred had been married briefly to a woman and had a daughter named Athena.  Athena was tracked down through MySpace, where she shared that her dog's name was Bruce Wayne.

Athena filled in the missing pieces.  Charles Shaheen had been her father's long-time partner, but the family didn't like Shaheen.  Maloney had claimed to be Fred Finger's brother (though Maloney's relationship to Shaheen, whether it was romantic or not, is not known).  Once Maloney was unmasked (no pun intended), DC began sending all of Bill Finger's royalties to Athena, which helped in raising her own son, Bill Finger's great-grandson and final heir. 

I imagine even Commissioner James Gordon would find this tale extremely bizarre.

Ty Templeton's illustrations capture the look of comic books, with their panels and split images.  A few illustrations, like the Wayne murders and the various figures Finger either created or co-created (such as Robin, The Joker, Catwoman, The Penguin and The Riddler) are so evocative of Kane's illustrations (no one disputes Kane did artwork for Batman, though he himself did not write the stories).  They are beautifully rendered.  A particularly poignant moment is when Fred Finger places his late father's ashes on the beach, having shaped the sand into a Bat shape.  "The tide crept in and swept them out to sea," the box says.  It's a beautiful moment.

From the serials to Gotham, all Batman fans bow in salute.

BRIEF REVIEW DISCUSSION

In the Kirkus Review of Bill the Boy Wonder, Nobleman gets enormous credit for the amount of research that went into rescuing this figure from near-oblivion.  Certainly Athena Finger is grateful for Nobleman's research, and not just in financial terms.  The grandfather she never knew (Bill Finger having died two years before her birth) is now assured of the legacy that came too late for him.  We now have the story of Bill Finger, the man who made Batman the man he is today.

PROGRAMMING SUGGESTIONS

I think there are a few good programs that can come from this.  One is to put Bob Kane "on trial" and discuss the ethics of crediting someone for their work (remembering that Finger never pushed or insisted on credit).  A comic-con is also plausible, as is a comic-book creation contest...with winners getting full credit.  A Batman exhibition, where we see the evolution of the character, is also worth considering.

Bill Finger
1914-1974

REFERENCE:

Book Review: Bill the Boy Wonder: The Secret Co-Creator of Batman by Marc Tyler Nobleman (2012, April).  Kirkus Reviews.  Retrieved from https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/marc-tyler-nobleman/bill-boy-wonder/

Big Life For A Little Man

Well, it took far longer than I thought, but I finally ended the biography of Truman Capote. I guess I knew more about his life than I thought...little drunk (literally).

This isn't to say that I didn't end it with a certain sadness for the man. After writing In Cold Blood, he went off the rails in a big way. Bad romances, drink, drugs...the usual things that bring people down. One of the points of the two Capote films, Capote & Infamous, suggested that the stress of creating In Cold Blood (specifically his relationship with one of the murderers, Perry Smith) all but wrecked him emotionally. There is a certain truth to that: after In Cold Blood, the only things he produced were the short story collection Music for Chameleons and a few hints at his unfinished work Answered Prayers. Oddly, one of those parts, La Cote Basque, destroyed his associations with the very people he longed to be part of. It could have been a desire to destroy himself, I have no idea.

I got through his life story for two reasons: one, the two aforementioned films intrigued me about the real man, and two, his seminal work, In Cold Blood, was listed as one of the books of the Twentieth Century...and has also been challenged/banned. I plan to read In Cold Blood, but first on my list is How The Irish Saved Civilization. I've started on it and find it quite interesting, well-thought out. Somehow, seeing how Western Civilization is in danger of collapsing--what with college students not being able to write in cursive, having no appreciation or even fear/hatred for actual books or works of art (and a lot of modern art being, well, curious at best), and the glorification of non-entities (Jersey Shore, Rob Dyrdek) and second-rate performers (John Mayer), and a shocking lack of knowledge (believing either Glenn Beck or Keith Olbermann are actual news sources rather than propagandists for their respective causes), we need to look back on when we were in danger of having vast stores of knowledge erased by the barbarian horde.

I hope to finish How the Irish Saved Civilization in two weeks, but I also will indulge in more popular literature. I have never read a novel by Janet Evanovich, James Patterson, John Grisham, Nora Roberts, Nicholas Sparks, or Vince Flynn. I understand they are wildly popular, but they've never appealed to me. However, I think I should give them all a fair hearing. Oddly, that's what I'm going to do: hear them. I confess to enjoying books on audio more, and I am able to finish a story faster that way (I'm a slow reader--what, six to eight weeks for a biography, although And Then There Were None I was able to finish in one sitting, still the only book I was able to do that with). With that in mind, I have requested a title from Mr. Flynn and Brad Thor, who writes similar books--action/espionage thrillers. I can't say whether they're goo or bad. I'm not snobbish enough to dismiss their work as trash, but I can't elevate it to great literature either. It may be that Flynn, Thor, or any of the above want to be thought of that way. Of course, I don't think they want to write garbage either. Good books will always be good books.

Well, there it is. Next book: How The Irish Saved Civilization.