Little Me The Intimate Memoirs of That Great Star of Stage, Screen, and Television, Belle Poitrine

chapter one -- A STAR IS BORN 1900-1914 Early days in Venezuela, Illinois * The father I never knew * Momma's genealogy * Momma's business career * School days * Momma's friend, the Professor, introduces me to music * My flair for the arts * The nickelodeon * My patron * Lessons in dramatical attitudes The sun was just smiling its first shy gleam over the Illinois River when I made my debut into the world--a red, wrinkled, writhing baby girl. "What day is it?" Momma murmured. "Why, it's May Day, Miss Schlumpfert," the midwife said. "The first of May." "Then we'll call her Maybelle," Momma said and drifted off to sleep. I was a rosy, happy, healthy little thing with bobbing curls and an insatiable curiosity. Everyone who saw me toddling along the dusty streets of Venezuela, Illinois (population--then--9,000) stopped to admire me and it was evident to even the most obtuse that I was going to be a great beauty. But beauty wasn't enough in a hidebound little provincial backwash like Venezuela. "Family" mattered a great deal in the town and, alas, of family I had only dear Momma. I never knew my father. When I was old enough to ask about him, Momma would become very vague and, looking off in the distance, she would answer simply, "He was a traveling man, Belle." Perhaps it was from him that I inherited my lifelong wanderlust. And, oh! how I longed to wander away from narrow-minded little Venezuela, never to return again. Or--even better--to return as a rich and famous woman, to buy the biggest, finest house on "The Bluff," overlooking the river, and to snub the haute bourgeoisie of Venezuela just as they had once snubbed little Belle Schlumpfert. For tiny Venezuela was divided into three classes. First there were the rich old families who lived in big, beautiful houses with stained-glass windows, portes cochtres, turrets and towers and ornamental iron statues up on "The Bluff." They were the rulers of the town--the Hobans, the Kerrs, the Hollisters, the Williamses with their seven talented daughters. They were the families with "hired girls" and their own buggies, the cream of Venezuela who thought nothing of going to Peoria, or even to Chicago, to do their shopping! Mary Elizabeth Hoban had even visited New York and travelled to Staten Island! Little Belle Schlumpfert was beneath their haughty gaze! In the lower town were the businessmen and shopkeepers--the clannish middle classes of the community who formed the second stratum of society. They noticed me, all right, but always with contempt. For I lived beyond the Rock Island tracks in Drifters' Row and, even worse, Momma was a career woman--something unheard of in those days. Drifters' Row was the "shanty town" of Venezuela, peopled by railway men, by the foreign element, by the poor, by those whom life had treated more harshly than the denizens of "The Bluff." Those who lived there had not been in Venezuela for long and presumably did not intend to stay. Hence the name. All of us were looked down upon by the older families of Venezuela. We were the "dregs." I resented this. I wanted to say "My family is as good as yours--even better. Come and see how we live! Although our house is humble from without, the interior is a thing of beauty." And it was. Momma had exquisite taste and a natural knack for making any place homey, attractive and inviting. In fact, it is from her side of the family that I inherit my own taste--often remarked upon--and my artistic flair. Although our tiny little house had but two small rooms, Momma had made the most of them. She had turned the sitting room into a veritable conversation piece by bringing together her large collection of seashells, the gay Kewpie dolls and souvenirs from her many travels. Almost every inch of wall space was hung with artiDennis, Patrick is the author of 'Little Me The Intimate Memoirs of That Great Star of Stage, Screen, and Television, Belle Poitrine', published 2002 under ISBN 9780767913478 and ISBN 0767913477.