SOME MORE RECENTLY UNEARTHED BITS & PIECES ABOUT CROTON NOTABLES: MARGARET MAYO, LILLIAN NORDICA, JACKIE GLEASON and GLORIA SWANSON

Welcome to Everything Croton, a collection of all things Croton -- our history, our homes, our issues, our businesses, our schools -- in short, EVERYTHING CROTON. 

SOME MORE RECENTLY UNEARTHED BITS & PIECES ABOUT CROTON NOTABLES: MARGARET MAYO, LILLIAN NORDICA, JACKIE GLEASON and GLORIA SWANSON. Click on the photos and links.

First up, from Croton notable and playwright Margaret Mayo (and Salisbury Field), a 1914 review of TWIN BEDS. 

The play debuted on August 14, 1914, at the Fulton Theatre, and ran on Broadway for 411 performances.  Read more about it here.

And from a year earlier, a brief blurb about Mayo in article about women playwrights and the very successful "POLLY OF THE CIRCUS".  It would soon be made into a 1917 film with Mae Marsh.  It would be re-made in 1932 with Marion Davies and Clark Gable.

Next up a beautiful cover from the May 1901 edition of Theatre Magazine featuring Croton's Lilian Nordica.  For those who don't know, Nordica was the first and most glamorous American opera singer to attain true international prominence. She became known as a “Yankee Diva”, having sung before presidents, crown heads and working men with equal aplomb. Her cherished dream was to build an opera house—an American Bayreuth—at Harmon-on-the-Hudson. Learn more about this ambitious project in Unbuilt Croton, on the Croton Friends of History website. 

Jackie Gleason has been in the news a lot these days--or rather his famous round Cortlandt home---now on the market for twelve million.  Gleason, a frequent Croton visitor, was also a talented musician in his own right.  

Read a brief blurb about his Music, Martinis & Memories album via a 1954 article from Steve Allen's Turntable, Radio TV Mirror magazine.

And finally, a brief bit of tabloid gossip, 1923, about Croton's own Gloria Swanson. 

Speaking of Swanson, your editor has discovered a treasure trove of Swanson photographs---a Flickr Album from Alice Japan, filled with stunning high resolution images. Check it out here.

SEE THE LAST EDITION OF MORE RECENTLY UNEARTHED ITEMS ABOUT CROTON NOTABLES---ALLEN FUNT, HOWARD DA SILVA, AND JACKIE GLEASON---HERE