TEXAS GUINAN—NOT JUST ANOTHER INDICTED B.S. ARTIST PART 2

MAMIE, A YOUNG LADY FROM WACO, (sounds like the start of a salacious limerick, eh?) gained fame with a name change to “Texas” (out the window goes the rhyme). Today in Part 2, we continue sharing Texas Guinan’s sometimes apocryphal tales, concluding with her being, quite rightly, Queen of the Night Clubs during Prohibition. 

Don’t try this at home, kids. Ms. Guinan was a professional. 

A Kaiser Here, A French Marshal There. Guinan was a conservatory-trained soprano and, Wikipedia notes, she “appeared as Zaza in the variety show Hop-o’-My-Thumb, based on a French fairytale of the same name. The show opened at the Manhattan Opera House November 26, 1913, and closed January 1, 1914.  She toured the United States with the Whirl of the World musical comedy in 1915.”

What’s more, the tour supposedly involved more than just the United States: It coincided “with her unverified account of being casually approached in Berlin by Kaiser Wilhelm II, who engaged her in conversation as she sat alone reading a book.”

An astounding claim, possibly in two aspects.

Another pesky bit of fact checking: “Her later claims of being in France in 1917 entertaining the troops, and being decorated with a bronze medal by French field marshal Joseph Joffre, have been proven false by the timeline and California location of her prolific film-making.”

Indeed, Wikipedia observes that Guinan’s film career had her “at the vanguard of women filmmakers in the United States…. During her years with Bull’s Eye Productions/Reelcraft, she began to expand towards the production end of film-making, as a unit department head on the films Outwitted, The Lady of the Law, The Girl of the Rancho, The Desert Vulture, and at least five other productions. She created Texas Guinan Productions in 1921 to produce Code of the West, Spitfire and Texas of the Mounted. After I Am the Woman and The Stampede for Victor Kremer Film Features, she returned to New York.”

Midtown Celebrates. Prohibition arriving in 1920 made sales or transport of alcohol illegal, but it sure didn’t keep people from drinking. Or earning a living while others drank: In 1923, the Beau Arts speakeasy hired Guinan as a songstress, for which she was paid $50,000. Figure around $910,000 in today’s dollar.

The kid from Waco was doing just fine, thank you.

Hello, Sucker! Wikipedia recounts, “Guinan’s give-and-take dialogue with the customers inspired producer Nils Granlund to put together a full floor show with Guinan presiding as emcee for Ziegfeld Follies chorus girls. Bootleg huckster Larry Fay struck a deal with them to feature the show at his El Fey Club on West 47th Street in Manhattan. There, she became known for her catchphrase, “’Hello, Sucker! Come on in and leave your wallet on the bar.’ ”

In a real balancing act, Guinan published an article “How to Keep Your Husband Out of My Night Club” in Liberty magazine, April 1932. (April Fool’s? No, it was the April 30, 1932, issue).  

People hanging out with Guinan at the 300 Club, 151 W. 54th Street, included Al Jolson, Jack Dempsey, soprano Geraldine Ferrar, and the Prince of Wales. Ruby Keeler, Barbara Stanwyck, and George Raft were discovered by talent scouts while working as dancers there.

Agg! It’s a Raid! “The last week of June 1928,” Wikipedia recounts, “Assistant U.S. Attorney General Mabel Walker Willebrandt ordered a raid of speakeasy clubs in New York. Guinan, Helen Morgan (hostess of Chez Helen Morgan), Nils Granlund, and 104 others were arrested, and indicted by a federal grand jury. Guinan, Morgan and Granlund faced two years in prison, with a $10,000 maximum fine, if convicted. The others indicted were employees and patrons, who faced lesser penalties. At her April 1929 trial, Guinan was acquitted.”

Scotland Yard and French Objections. “During the Great Depression,” Wikipedia notes, “she took her show on the road. She attempted to move to Europe, but Scotland Yard threatened to board her ship if she tried to land in England, where she was on their list of ‘barred aliens….’ Guinan had a contract with a Paris club, but French employment laws dissuaded non-citizens from working in France. She turned this to her advantage by launching the satirical revue Too Hot for Paris upon her return to the States.”

You gotta admire her initiative. 

In 1933, Guinan portrayed herself in Broadway Thru a Keyhole, a pre-Code musical written by Walter Winchell. The film had early (uncredited) appearances of Lucille Ball, Susan Fleming, and Ann Sothern.

Tainted Water, Not Bad Hootch. On tour with Too Hot for Paris, Texas contracted amoebic dysentery during an epidemic at Chicago’s Congress Hotel during the 1933 World’s Fair. The epidemic was traced to tainted water.

Wikipedia recounts, “She fell ill in Vancouver, B.C., and died there on November 5, 1933, age 49, exactly one month before Prohibition was repealed.” Some 7500 people attended her funeral; two of her pallbearers were bandleader Paul Whiteman and writer Heywood Broun.

Even with fabrications here and there, the kid from Waco lived a life of high style. ds 

© Dennis Simanaitis, SimanaitisSays.com, 2023