Monday 30 September 2019

1201) Beulah Annan

Beulah May Annan (née Sheriff; 1899 – 1928). American suspected murderer. Her story inspired Maurine Dallas Watkins's play Chicago in 1926. The play was adapted into a 1927 silent film (with Francine Larrimore as Roxie Hart), a 1975 stage musical, and a 2002 movie musical (which won the Academy Award for Best Picture), all with that title, and a 1942 romantic comedy film, Roxie Hart (with Ginger Rogers as Roxie Hart), named for the character who Annan inspired.

- "They say she’s the prettiest woman ever accused of murder in Chicago—young, slender, with bobbed auburn hair; wide set, appealing blue eyes; up-tilted nose..."  https://chicagology.com/notorious-chicago/beaulahandbelva/

- "Beulah Annan was known as the “prettiest murderess” for her red hair and fair looks."  https://chicagogsu.wordpress.com/source-material/

- "The image proved irresistible: the thin straight nose, the high cheekbones . . . the gorgeous red hair that rolled off her head like a prairie fire,”  https://nypost.com/2010/08/08/the-girls-of-murder-city/

- "Beulah Annan wore her red hair in a bob."  https://books.google.it/books…

- "With her flaming red hair showing at its best with a fresh trim and marcel, she made a picture which would rival paintings of the famous Titian.https://books.google.it/books…


1200) Steven Runciman

Sir James Cochran Stevenson Runciman (1903 – 2000), known as Steven Runciman. English historian best known for his three-volume A History of the Crusades (1951–54).
His three-volume history has had a profound impact on common conceptions of the Crusades, primarily portraying the Crusaders negatively and the Muslims favourably. Runciman was a strong admirer of the Byzantine Empire, and consequently held a bias against the Crusaders for the Fourth Crusade evident in his work. While praised by older crusade historians as a storyteller and prose stylist, he is viewed as biased by some contemporary historians.

- "Tall and large-boned, with auburn hair glinting, he would glide into a party and soon be surrounded."  https://jmarin.jimdo.com/homenajes/sir-steven-runciman/

- "Steven cut his auburn hair in a fringe, befriended Cecil Beaton and wore rouge..."  https://www.spectator.co.uk/…/steven-runciman-historian-te…/



Sunday 29 September 2019

1199) Noah Webster

Noah Webster Jr. (1758 – 1843). American lexicographer, textbook pioneer, English-language spelling reformer, political writer, editor, and prolific author. He has been called the "Father of American Scholarship and Education". His "Blue-backed Speller" books taught five generations of American children how to spell and read. Webster's name has become synonymous with "dictionary" in the United States, especially the modern Merriam-Webster dictionary that was first published in 1828 as An American Dictionary of the English Language.
In 1806 he published his first dictionary, A Compendious Dictionary of the English Language. The following year, he started working on an expanded and comprehensive dictionary, finally publishing it in 1828. He was very influential in popularizing certain spellings in the United States. He was also influential in establishing the Copyright Act of 1831, the first major statutory revision of U.S. copyright law. While working on a second volume of his dictionary, Webster died in 1843, and the rights to the dictionary were acquired by George and Charles Merriam.


- "Webster’s flaming red hair and remarkably erect bearing made him a striking figure."  https://www.latimes.com/la-oe-kendall15-2008oct15-story.html

- "But then, everything changed when I found, inside, a lock of Noah Webster’s hair, red and wispy."  http://www.hemisphericinstitute.org/…/en/e-misferica…/lepore

- "Webster was tall with flaming red hair.https://www.hbook.com/…

- "His gray eyes were flecked with brown and his red hair never would behave."  https://books.google.it/books…



Saturday 28 September 2019

1198) Helen Thomas Flexner

Helen Thomas Flexner (1871 - 1956). Professor of English at Bryn Mawr College (where her sister Martha Carey Thomas was the president) and author of the book A Quaker Childhood.
Her husband was Simon Flexner, director of the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research. One of their children was historian James Thomas Flexner.

- "Bertrand Russell once described her as "gentle, deaf and rather timid with very lovely red hair.https://www.washingtonpost.com/…/41b5db3d-f8d4-4076-9946-a…/

- "Well, my mother was was redheaded, at a time when when red hair was just beginning to come into fashion."  http://www.booknotes.org/Watch/72573-1/James-Thomas-Flexner

- "In their correspondence, her red hair stood as the symbol of her physical attractiveness. If only she did not have red hair!https://books.google.it/books…


Friday 27 September 2019

1197) James Thomas Flexner

James Thomas Flexner (1908 – 2003). American historian and biographer best known for the four-volume biography of George Washington that earned him a National Book Award in Biography and a special Pulitzer Prize. His one-volume abridgment, Washington: the Indispensable Man (1974) was the basis of two television miniseries broadcast in the mid-1980s starring Barry Bostwick as Washington.
He wrote other historical biographies, including The Young Hamilton (on Alexander Hamilton), Mohawk Baronet (on Sir William Johnson, 1st Baronet), and The Traitor and the Spy: Benedict Arnold and John André. He wrote many books on the history of American art, including a highly regarded life of the American painter John Singleton Copley.
His father was Simon Flexner, a sixth-grade dropout who became a self-taught microbiologist, pathologist, director of the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research in New York City and discoverer of a cure for spinal meningitis. 
His mother was Helen Thomas [Flexner], a professor of English at Bryn Mawr whose sister, Martha Carey Thomas, was president of the college.

- "His hair rises from his scalp in the same strong, tight curls that were to make my own red hair almost impossible to comb." https://books.google.it/books…


- "Until it faded when I was in my forties, my red hair made an instantaneous favorable impression wherever I went." https://books.google.it/books…



1196) Harriet Hubbard Ayer

Harriet Hubbard Ayer (1849 – 1903). American cosmetics entrepreneur and journalist.
In 1886, she launched Recamier Toilet Preparations, Inc., which she managed and marketed by incorporating her own name on the label and writing strategic, innovative advertising copy. Her products included creams, balms, scents, brushes, soaps and more which brought in over one million dollars a year. She used much of her earnings for interesting advertisements, paid endorsements by famous entertainers, and for advertorials.
Between 1887 and 1893, at the height of her career as the head of her cosmetics company, Blanche Howard, a finishing school mistress in Stuttgart, Germany, turned Ayer's daughters, who were enrolled there, against her. Ayer was publicly accused of scandalous behavior in five lawsuits in 1889, which were broadcast weekly in the newspapers. In her attempt to regain control over her children, she was drugged and isolated and eventually institutionalized in 1893 by her former husband, Herbert Copeland Ayer.
It took fourteen months for her to escape from the Bronxville Insane Asylum. While recovering from her ordeal and to regain the respect of her daughters and the community, Ayer gave dramatic lectures in 1895 documenting the intolerable conditions in asylums. Her career as a journalist commenced a year later, when in 1896 she was hired by the New York World to write and edit their new weekly woman’s section.
When she died, she was the highest paid female journalist in the United States and was receiving 20,000 letters a year.


- "Ayer emerged from the asylum in the same dress and underclothes she had been wearing when she had entered, all now in tatters. Her red hair was now gray.http://www.perfumeprojects.com/…/marketers/Harriet_Hubbard_…

- "When she was eventually released her flame red hair was completely grey..."  https://books.google.it/books…





1195) Percy Grainger

Percy Aldridge Grainger (born George Percy Grainger; 1882 – 1961). Australian-born composer, arranger and pianist who lived in the United States from 1914 on and became a citizen in 1918. In the course of a long and innovative career, he played a prominent role in the revival of interest in British folk music in the early years of the 20th century. Although much of his work was experimental and unusual, the piece with which he is most generally associated is his piano arrangement of the folk-dance tune "Country Gardens".

- " I played with Percy Grainger - he conducted, with his flaming red hair, a strange, strange man, fascinating and very powerful.http://www.timreynish.com/repertoire/composers/schuller.php

- "A striking individual with blue eyes and brilliant orange hair, Percy gave his first public performance at the age of 12, and critics hailed him as a new prodigy.https://www.classiccat.net/grainger_p/biography.php

- "Startlingly good-looking, with red hair and finely-chiselled features, Grainger must have cut quite a figure on the concert platform."  https://www.bklynlibrary.org/…/…/15/annals-brooklyns-musical

- "Percy Grainger, an Australian-born composer prodigy with a handsome English face and wavelets of longish ginger hair..."  https://books.google.it/books…

- "To this day, I remember Grainger with his mop of red hair..."  https://books.google.it/books…



1194) Doris Humphrey

Doris Batcheller Humphrey (1895 – 1958). American dancer and choreographer of the early twentieth century. Along with her contemporaries Martha Graham and Katherine Dunham, Humphrey was one of the second generation modern dance pioneers who followed their forerunners in exploring the use of breath and developing techniques still taught today. As many of her works were annotated, Humphrey continues to be taught, studied and performed.

- "A slender, attractive woman with red hair..."  https://books.google.it/books…

- "Onstage during those years, with her red hair and green eyes..."  https://books.google.it/books…

- "With her cloud of curly, red-gold hair..."  https://books.google.it/



1193) Joan "Rusty" McNeil

Rusty McNeil (born Joan Betty Wilmsmeier, 1929 - 2010). American music historian and folk singer. In 1950 she married Keith McNeil and in 1966 the two decided to become full-time musicians, touring across the US and Canada.

- "With her shock of red hair, Joan McNeil earned the nickname Rusty, a title she kept when she started performing traditional American folk music..."  https://www.scpr.org/…/celebrated-folk-singer-rusty-mcneil…/

- "Only her father used her given name, her son said. Everyone else called her Rusty, a nickname that sprang from her shock of red hair."  https://www.latimes.com/…/la-xpm-2010-dec-28-la-me-rusty-mc…

- "Rusty McNeil, the red-headed member of the popular husband and wife folk-singing duo Keith and Rusty McNeil..."  https://www.pe.com/…/riverside-member-of-famed-folk-singin…/



1192) Susan Reed

Susan Catherine Reed (1926 – 2010). American singer, harpist, zitherist and actress. A regular on the New York folk scene, Life magazine dubbed her "the pet of Manhattan nightclubbers" in 1945.

- "In 1944 a 16‐year‐old girl with red hair streaming down her shoulders skipped out onto the floor of Cafe Society Down town, held up a stringed instrument and said ingenuously, “This is a zither.https://www.nytimes.com/…/susan-reed-makes-folk-comeback-at…

- "The daughter of Daniel Reed, a successful entertainer, actor, director, and playwright, red-haired folk singer Susan Reed spent much of her childhood surrounded by entertainers."  http://awe.mudcat.org/thread.cfm?threadid=129175



1191) Leo Sowerby

Leo Salkeld Sowerby (1895 – 1968). American composer and church musician, was the winner of the Pulitzer Prize for music in 1946, and was often called the “Dean of American church music” in the early to mid 20th century.

- "And Leo loved it, because Patrick was red-headed - as Leo was."  http://www.wytonarchive.org/…/Wyton,%20Burdick%20Interview.…

- "... and appointed red-headed and spunky, but neverthless shy, Leo Sowerby..."  https://books.google.it/books…






1190) Patrick O'Higgins

Patrick O'Higgins (1922 - 1980). Photographer and publicist for Helena Rubinstein. He also wrote Madame, a biography about her. He was of French and Irish origins and during World War II served with the Irish Guards.

- "Another beauty from the past, red-haired Patrick O'Higgins, reemerged.https://books.google.it/books…

- "... a classically beautiful young man with close-cropped ginger hair and blue eyes who wore impeccably cut riding clothes."  https://books.google.it/books…

- "Another interesting character was Patrick O'Higgins, a red-haired, handsome veteran of the Irish Guards..."  https://books.google.it/books…



Thursday 26 September 2019

1189) Ed Kleban

Edward “Ed” Kleban (1939 – 1987). American musical theatre composer and lyricist.
He is best known as lyricist of the Broadway hit A Chorus Line. He and composer Marvin Hamlisch won the 1976 Tony Award for Best Original Score, and he shared the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1976 with Hamlisch and three other contributors to the musical. For several years he worked at Columbia Records, where he produced albums by performers as diverse as Igor Stravinsky and Percy Faith and the album for the Off-Broadway musical Now Is The Time For All Good Men. He was a teacher for many years at the BMI (Broadcast Music Incorporated) Musical Theater Workshop.

- "As Mr. Hamlisch's lyricist, the choice was Edward Kleban, a red‐haired, stocky former executive of Columbia Records."  https://www.nytimes.com/…/chorus-line-is-the-product-of-fiv…



1188) Cy Feuer

Cy Feuer (1911 – 2006). American theatre producer, director, composer, musician, and half of the celebrated producing duo Feuer and Martin. He won three competitive Antoinette Perry Awards for Excellence in Theatre and a Lifetime Achievement Tony Award. He was also nominated for an Oscar for 1938's Storm Over Bengal.

- "Cy was an exuberant man with freckles and his red hair always in a brush cut.https://books.google.it/books…

- "He was a man with a barreling energy, a little guy with red hair and freckles..."  https://books.google.it/books…



1187) Betsy Blair

Betsy Blair (1923 – 2009). American actress of film and stage, long based in London.
Blair pursued a career in entertainment from the age of eight, and as a child worked as an amateur dancer, performed on radio, and worked as a model, before joining the chorus of Billy Rose's Diamond Horseshoe in 1940. There she met Gene Kelly; they were married the following year, when she was seventeen years old, and divorced sixteen years later in 1957.
After work in the theatre, Blair began her film career playing supporting roles in films such as A Double Life (1947) and Another Part of the Forest (1948). Her interest in Marxism led to an investigation by the House Un-American Activities Committee and Blair was blacklisted for some time, but resumed her career with a critically acclaimed performance in Marty (1955) for which she was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress.
She continued her career with regular theatre, film and television, mainly in Europe, until the mid-1990s.


- "The red-haired actress earned an Academy Award nomination as best actress in a supporting role as Clara Snyder in Marty...”  https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search…

- "She was a red-haired, eighteen-year-old dancer from New Jersey..."  https://books.google.it/books…

- "For a leading lady he hired red-haired Betsy Blair..."  https://books.google.it/books…



1186) Marie of Romania

Marie of Romania (Marie Alexandra Victoria; 1875 – 1938), also known as Marie of Edinburgh. Last Queen of Romania as the wife of King Ferdinand I.
Her parents were Prince Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh (later Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha) and Grand Duchess Maria Alexandrovna of Russia.
As queen, she was very popular, both in Romania and abroad. In 1926, Marie and two of her children undertook a diplomatic tour of the United States. They were received enthusiastically by the people and visited several cities before returning to Romania.
Sister of Victoria Melita




1185) Elizabeth Atkinson Green

Elizabeth Atkinson Green (née Lay, 1897 - 1989). Wife and collaborator of playwright Paul Green, who received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama for his 1927 play In Abraham's Bosom. They married in 1922 and had four children.
She attended the University of North Carolina from 1917-1920 and received both an undergraduate and a master’s degree. She was considered a gifted playwright by Frederick “Proff” Koch, a dramatic literature professor who founded the Carolina Playmakers, and was the author of the first play — When Witches Ride — performed by the theater troupe. Aside from playwriting, Elizabeth was also a writer for The Daily Tar Heel.

- "I was very proud of my abundant red hair."  https://archive.org/…/paulgre…/paulgreeniknow02gree_djvu.txt

- "Together with his charming red-haired wife and his own vigorous good looks, he took the town by storm."  https://amsaw.org/amsaw-ithappenedinhistory-031704-green.ht…

- "... as Lib, the tough-minded and beautiful red-haired Yankee, demanded that her new husband be Paul Eliot Green."  https://books.google.it/books…



Wednesday 25 September 2019

1184) Anna Held

Helene Anna Held (1872 – 1918), known professionally as Anna Held. Broadway stage performer and singer born in Warsaw, Poland. She started her career with stints in theatres in Paris and London, and is most often associated with theatre producer and impresario Florenz Ziegfeld, her common-law husband.

- "Her head was disproportionately large and looked larger because of the thick auburn hair piled loosely atop it."  https://books.google.it/books…

- "... her expressive large brown eyes, a glorious mass of auburn hair, a French accent..."  https://books.google.it/books…

- "The tiny, slightly plump, coquettish entertainer with reddish-brown hair and large, expressive brown eyes..."  https://books.google.it/books…