DCS: joyce bryant

Posted by on

Joyce Bryant had aspirations of becoming a teacher. But, at 19, she was dared to participate in an impromptu singalong at a local Oakland club. She noticed that she was the only one singing. The club owner offered her $25 to continue. She accepted, as she need the money to get home.

And that was the beginning of Joyce’s career.

By the late 1940s, Joyce was performing in New York nightclubs. Those gigs led to a 118-date tour of the resorts in the Catskill Mountains. She soon found herself on the same bill as the famed Josephine Baker. In an attempt to stand out, Joyce painted he hair silver. She put on a tight silver dress and draped herself in a silver fox coat. In Joyce’s own recollection: “I stopped the show.”

Tight, cleavage-revealing silver dresses became Joyce’s trademark, along with her silver hair and four-octave vocal range. Joyce was turning heads and becoming a top headliner. She earned the nicknames “The Bronze Blond Bombshell” and “The Black Marilyn Monroe.” Singer Etta James later admitted that she tried her best to copy Joyce’s style.

Joyce recorded a number of popular and successful songs, some of which were banned from radio play for their suggestive lyrics. Her 1954 recording of “Running Wild” was given the “okay” by CBS and NBC censors, who deemed her previous efforts “too sexy for airplay.”

A fierce opponent to Jim Crow laws, Joyce became the first black entertainer to perform at a Miami Beach hotel, despite threats from the Ku Klux Klan. She also broke racial barriers at nightclubs in the Washington, DC area.

In spite of her provocative act, Joyce was a deeply religious person. She hated the drug and gangster culture so prevalent in the nightclub business. In 1955, she left show business to focus on civil rights issues and church interests. Joyce regularly organized fundraisers for food, medicine and clothing for underprivileged communities. She appeared sans makeup and without her trademarked silver hair.

She made a return to the stage in the 1960s, touring with French and Italian opera companies. Coming back her jazz roots, Joyce worked as a vocal coach for Phyllis Hyman and Raquel Welch in the 80s.

Joyce died from complications of Alzheimer’s Disease in 2022 at the age of 95.

Comments

comments

inktober52: crunch

Posted by on

Pamela Low graduated from the University of New Hampshire in 1951 with a degree in microbiology. She went to work as a flavorist for Arthur D. Little, an international consulting firm based in Boston.

In the early 1960s, Pamela was tasked with devising a flavor for a new cereal to be introduced by Quaker Oats, a client of Arthur D. Little. Pamela thought… and remembered a dish that her grandmother would prepare and serve to her family. The dish was rice in a butter and brown sugar sauce. The flavor stuck with Pamela and she began to work towards recreating the taste. Her efforts resulted in the flavor of Cap’n Crunch… a taste that she described as “want more-ishness.”

Cap’n Crunch — as a concept — was developed long before Pamela was involved. It was conceived by Allan Burns, who would later co-create The Munsters and The Mary Tyler Moore Show.  The character of blustery Cap’n Horatio Crunch and his intrepid crew was developed in the Marketing Department of Quaker Oats. They just needed a cereal to go with their idea. When Pamela’s concoction was delivered to approving Quaker executives, little did they suspect that Cap’n Crunch would one day lock in as the second most popular cereal after Kellogg’s Frosted Flakes. Needless to say, Quaker was very pleased.

Pamela worked on various other projects during her 34 years with Arthur D. Little, including Mounds, Almond Joy and Heath Bars. Pamela collected various pieces of Cap’n Crunch memorabilia, but, as she admitted in a 2002 interview, she never cared too much for cereal.

Pamela passed away in 2007 at the age of 79.

Comments

comments

DCS: kandi barbour

Posted by on

Pretty Kandi Barbour was discovered by photographer Diana Hardy in the 1970s. As a teenager and under Hardy’s direction, Kandi began posing for various men’s magazines. At 19, she ventured into the world of hardcore pornography, appearing in over 30 films. She eventually left the adult film business to focus on mainstream modeling. She became a familiar figure in a series of television commercials for various K-Tel Records releases in the 80s.

Kandi split her time between Los Angeles and Honolulu, Hawaii, where she worked as an exotic dancer at Club Hubba Hubba.

After falling out of the public eye, Kandi was discovered dead from exposure on a San Francisco street in January 2012. Her body was unclaimed and was donated for medical research and later cremated.

Court records revealed that Hawaiian railroad and shipping mogul Laurence Dorcy had left a substantial sum of money to Kandi in his will when he passed away in 2011. At the time, no one knew how to locate or contact Kandi and the inheritance went unclaimed.

Comments

comments

DCS: jane dornacker

Posted by on

Jane Dornacker was born performing. As a precocious elementary school student, she wrote a six-act play. At 8, she performed all the parts of an opera she had written in a secret language that only she understood. In high school, Jane was featured in productions in her native Albuquerque’s theater scene, including The Bad Seed.

At 18, she headed to San Francisco, where she formed the group Leila and the Snakes, which was described as “part rock group, part performance art.” One of their shows was attended by Bill Spooner, founding member of the avant-garde band The Tubes. Spooner asked Jane to join his group, adding that she’d be perfect for their outrageous live show. Jane toured with The Tubes for two years. In that time, she co-wrote the song “Don’t Touch Me There” and later wrote “Cathy’s Clone” for the band’s third album.

Later, she tried her hand at stand-up comedy, forming an all-female troupe with Nora Dunn and Paula Poundstone. At the same time, she worked as a traffic reporter for KFRC, a San Francisco Top 40 radio station. While giving traffic reports live on the air, she would often remind her daughter to wake up for school.

Jane took her traffic reporting to New York City, where she was the popular “trafficologist” on WNBC. In April 1986, she survived a crash of the traffic helicopter. Six months later, while delivering an afternoon drive-time report, the helicopter Jane was aboard clipped the top of a chain link fence and plunged into the Hudson River, sinking 20 feet. Jane was retrieved from the river, but died on her way to the hospital. The pilot survived. A later investigation revealed that the craft had been fitted with a military-grade replacement part that was not suited for civilian aircraft. Jane’s family sued Spectrum Helicopters and Jane’s daughter received a settlement of $325,000.

Jane was 39 years old. Wayne, New Jersey — her place of residence at the time of her death — erected a memorial in her honor.

Comments

comments

DCS: bob weir

Posted by on

I am a Deadhead by marriage.

I met the future Mrs. Pincus — the Deadhead referenced in the first sentence — in February 1982. By April, I found myself attending my first (of many) Grateful Dead concerts. Although we made it a point not to discuss our musical leanings while we were dating… we knew. We both knew. She was a devoted and loyal Deadhead and I was not. Nevertheless, I accompanied my girlfriend, then fiancé, then wife (all Mrs. P) to many Grateful Dead shows. Most were in the Philadelphia area. One was at the Meadowlands (then called the Brendan Byrne Arena). We went to a couple of Jerry Garcia solo shows. And then we went to a rather unusual performance by Bob Weir.

In the early 90’s, my wife’s politically-affiliated cousin offered us tickets to a fundraiser for a US Representative from her jurisdiction. Cousin didn’t have a lot of details on the event, but it was our understanding that this was a serious, political, adult benefit. I was expected to dress accordingly and that — I presumed — meant a tie and jacket. The real reason Cousin offered admission to Mrs. P was the featured performer at the benefit was the Grateful Dead’s Bob Weir. The event was hosted by The Barn, a now-defunct venue known for cheap beer, rowdy patrons and a regular roster of cover bands.

The night of the show, Mrs. Pincus and I dressed in our conservative best. Upon our arrival at The Barn, we realized our miscalculation in attire, as we were greeted by a knot of spinning, patchouli-stinking, tie-dye draped Bohemians, some of whom I’m sure I recognized from previous Dead shows. Some of them, I think, I remembered passed out in the parking lot of the notorious Philadelphia Spectrum.

A local Grateful Dead “tribute band” — Swirled Whale — pacified the crowd prior to the arrival of the evening’s headliner (the main draw) Bob Weir. Bob, however, was running late. Very late. Very, very late.

Swirled Whale played for a tedious hour and a half. The band’s lead singer, a sinewy fellow with a long, unkempt mane of dirty blond hair, was draped in the prerequisite tie-dye. The way he prowled the small stage and contorted himself around the microphone stand, made it very clear that he was convinced that the crowd was there to see him.

Finally, a harried Bob Weir cut through the crowd from the back of the room. He sprinted to the stage, acoustic guitar in hand. He greeted the crowd with a smile and a wave. He had a few brief words of introduction and stumbled over the benefitted candidate’s name. He quickly adjusted a few pegs on the neck of his guitar and began his first song. He raced through two more songs, thanked the audience and split. He may have even been checking a train schedule as he departed the stage. His entire presence took up less than twenty minutes… and that is being generous.

Bob Weir passed away this week. He had been ill on and off over the past few years, including a successful battle with cancer. In the end, an underlying lung ailment took the beloved singer-songwriter at the age of 78.

Although rarely discussed, Mrs. P and I were well aware of each other’s favorite bands. She knew I liked Queen and it was quite obvious that she liked the Grateful Dead. Those two bands could not be further from each other as far as musical visions. The Dead prided themselves on a freeform, unstructured presence, rarely playing the same songs on consecutive nights of their exhaustive touring schedule. Queen were a precisely intricate group of perfectionists. They were slaves to the studio and often had difficulty reproducing their signature sound live in concert. But, like the Dead, they boasted a rabidly devout fanbase that would love anything they did. Both bands, curiously, progressed into their twilight years with eerie similarities. Both bands lost their iconic leader at a relatively young age. Both bands carried on with some remaining original members, some replacement members and some members who wisely decided not to carry on with the band.

When Queen’s charismatic front man Freddie Mercury died, many of my friends who knew I was a Queen fan, offered me their heartfelt condolences. When The Grateful Dead’s Jerry Garcia died, Mrs. Pincus experienced similar sentiment from her friends.

Last night, after the news of Bob Weir’s passing broke, a wave of condolences flooded Mrs. P’s Facebook page, in addition to a slew of text messages.

It was sad. Even for an in-law.

Comments

comments

DCS: annisteen allen

Posted by on

Ernestine Allen’s early life is kind of sketchy. The sultry jazz vocalist offered different stories of her humble beginning throughout her life. She fudged on dates and locations. She claimed she sang at clubs that weren’t yet established during the times she gave for her performances. Nevertheless, there is no denying Ernestine’s talent and appeal.

She sang with and recorded for a number of swing and big bands including the charismatic Lucky Millinder. Millinder was an interesting character. As a band leader, he couldn’t read or write music,  didn’t play an instrument and rarely sang. He was, however, a compelling figure and an accomplished showman. He renamed young Ernestine as “Annisteen” as a tribute to his hometown of Anniston, Alabama. The newly-christened Annisteen had a half dozen hits with Lucky Millinder in the early 1950s.

Later, Annisteen signed a contract with Capitol Records and toured with the doo-wop group The Orioles. She scored a big hit with “Fujiyama Mama” a tune later made famous by rockabilly queen Wanda Jackson.

In the 1960s, Annisteen retired from singing to take a job in a hospital administrative office. It was a job she held for the next twenty years. In August 1992, at the age of 71, Annisteen suffered a fatal heart attack.

Comments

comments

DCS: merna kennedy

Posted by on

After her parents separated, Merna Kennedy’s mother packed up the family and moved to California. Mama Kennedy began to teach, prep and train seven-year old Merna and her brother Merle to perform as a song-and-dance duo. The siblings were a popular vaudeville act and were featured often at Los Angeles prominent vaudeville theaters. They caught the eye of Lita Grey, Charlie Chaplin‘s second wife. Sadly, Merle broke his leg, putting an end to the act.

Through her connection to Lita Grey, Merna landed a role in Chaplin’s film The Circus. Because of the leg strength she gained from dancing, Merna was given the role of a bareback rider.

Merna made more films, including two dozen talkies, but called it a career in 1934 when she married choreographer/director Busby Berkeley. The union only lasted two years.

In December 1944, Merna married Master Sergeant Forrest Brayton. Just four days after the marriage, Merna died from a heart attack. She was 36.

Comments

comments