Louise Brooks lived through some 78 July 4th celebrations of Independence Day, including the 150th anniversary in 1926 and the 200th in 1976. This rambling post looks at the July 4th holiday in the life of the actress.
In 1926, Brooks was back in New York City, after having completed work on It's the Old Army Game in Florida, where she met the film's director, Eddie Sutherland. The two became involved, and would marry a few weeks later on July 21. How exactly Brooks spent this particular July 4th we don't know, but I would guess it was with Eddie.
And here is newspaper bit for It's the Old Army Game, which was showing at the Strand in Minneapolis, Minnesota (as well as many other cities and towns across America) on July 4th 1926. Brooks stardom was just starting to take off.
In 1976, Brooks was living in Rochester, New York, having moved there some years earlier. At this time in her life, she spent most of her time in her apartment, reading, writing letters, and working on her various writing projects (namely her essays and articles). Brooks liked to watch television and listen to the radio, and thus it's likely she watched some TV coverage of the American bicentennial. I remember that holiday, and media coverage was hard to escape.
One other event we can place with certainty on a July 4th occurred in 1968, when Brooks visited composer David Diamond at his Rochester home. Perhaps she attended an independence day gathering. According to the local newspaper, the weather in Rochester was partly sunny with a high in the low to mid 70s. It might have been a nice day to have an outdoor gathering. (Fans may recall Diamond from his memorable appearance in the 1998 documentary Louise Brooks Looking for Lulu.)
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| David Diamond in 1987 |
Speaking of the weather, among the miscellaneous items found in Brooks' papers was this reply from The Answer Man. According to its Wikipedia page, The Answer Man was a 15-minute radio program that aired from 1937 to 1956 on the Mutual Broadcasting System as well as in syndication. Questions submitted by listeners were answered on the air by Albert Mitchell, and those who sent questions not used in the program were given answers by mail.
Brooks had written a few brief notes on the reverse of this reply, including a couple of phone numbers. Given the context, I'll assume Brooks wrote to The Answer Man sometime prior to the show leaving the air in 1956, to which she received a reply by someone on staff with the initials of "jp". (I will also assume Brooks listened to the show while living in New York City. The Answer Man aired on WNBC -- then operating on the 660 AM frequency -- in New York City from 1950 until the show's conclusion in 1956. The Answer Man aired twice a day from Monday through Friday: it ran as a 15-minute program, typically broadcast in the early afternoon at 1:30 PM and during the evening at 6:15 PM.)
As best I can figure, Brooks was in Peterboro, New Hampshire on July 4, 1923. That is where Denishawn had its summer camp. Seemingly, something of note happened in Peterboro on July 4, 1923 -- I say that because Brooks tried to recall what the weather was like that day. She even went so far as to send away for the information. (Time and again, Brooks tried to place her memories in the context of the weather. It was one way to help her set the scene in her earliest efforts at writing, especially when she was working on Naked on My Goat.)
I'll finish with this July 4, 1982 newspaper clipping from McComb, Mississippi. Just a few months earlier, Brooks' Lulu in Hollywood was published. And in its wake reviews, articles, and columns like this one devoted to the actress appeared in newspapers just about everywhere. I can imagine Brooks feeling a sense of accomplishment and excitement that her book, something she had worked on for years and which meant a great deal, had been published and was garnering good reviews. Louise Brooks had long wished to be a writer....
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