Flower in the River: A Family Tale Finally Told

Louella Parsons: Ink, Influence, and the Eastland

• Natalie Zett • Season 4 • Episode 164

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Celebrity culture was born not in Hollywood, but in the inky columns of newspapers, each inch building a new kind of fame. Society pages gave way to syndicated gossip that could rewrite a person’s fate before noon. I trace the rise of gossip columnists as they transformed into entertainment kingmakers, focusing on the trailblazer who set the standard: Louella Parsons. At her height, her name was as powerful as a studio head’s, and her blessing could make or break a career.

We journey with Parsons from small-town Illinois to the bustling streets of Chicago and New York, where she is swept into William Randolph Hearst’s world, a place where publicity, privilege, and allegiance quickly intertwine. I unravel the infamous “yacht incident” and explore why its ripples endure—not just for the drama, but for what it reveals about which stories see daylight, which are hidden, and who ultimately bears the cost. For anyone fascinated by film history, old Hollywood, media ethics, or the origins of celebrity journalism, this is where the threads come together.

Louella and the Eastland Disaster.

Then the thread returns to the 1915 Eastland disaster in Chicago and the way its stories keep slipping out of view. A 1926 trade journal reveals Parsons once covered Eastland families directly, visiting small homes and collecting grief-filled personal histories, a side of her that complicates the “queen of gossip” persona. I added Louella’s connection to the Eastland Disaster to her bio on Wikipedia—a platform that also reminds us that citing sources is essential to preserving history.

If this sparked something for you, subscribe or follow, share the episode with a friend who loves old Hollywood or Chicago history, and leave a review so more listeners can find the show.

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Title Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Welcome And Series Context

Natalie Zett

Hello, I'm Natalie Zett, and welcome to Flower in the River. This podcast, inspired by my book of the same name, explores the 1915 Eastland disaster in Chicago and its enduring impact, particularly on my family's history. We'll explore the intertwining narratives of others impacted by this tragedy as well. And we'll dive into writing and genealogy and uncover the surprising supernatural elements that surface in family history research. Come along with me on this journey of discovery. Hey, this is Natalie, and welcome to episode 164 of Flower in the River. I hope you're doing well. Today we are talking about gossip columnists. You heard that right. A little background here. Gossip columns emerged in the 17th and 18th centuries. I didn't know that. Right alongside the rise of mass printing as a way to report on the private lives of the elite, whoever the elite happened to be in any given era. What we consider gossip columns and such are rooted in the 19th century society pages. The history of society pages is very long and contradictory and convoluted, but let me try to simplify it a little bit. This is from Wikipedia. In journalism, the society page of a newspaper is largely or entirely devoted to the social and cultural events and gossip of the location covered. Other features that frequently appear on the society page are a calendar of charity events, pictures of locally, nationally, and internationally famous people. Society pages later expanded to become women's page sections. According to this article, the first true society page in the United States was the invention of a newspaper owner called James Gordon Bennett, who created it for the New York Herald in 1840. His reportage centered upon the lives and social gatherings of the rich and famous, with names partially deleted by dashes and reports mildly satirical. Society was at first aghast, then amused, then complacent, and finally hungry for the penny press stories of its own doings. Bennett had in fact been reporting such news since 1827 with articles in the period after the Civil War, there were many newly rich people in the country, and reportage of their antics, sometimes tasteless and gauche, was of considerable entertainment value. But despite the growth in popularity in the 1880s, many serious newspapers were initially cautious about society reporting. For example, the Ottawa Journal didn't permit Florence Randall, its first society reporter, to do anything but recite simple chronicles of the dowagers and debutantes of the city. The staff at the Globe, whose society column began in 1893, considered society news to be, quote, horrid, vulgar stuff. It was not well received by its subjects. These subjects were largely the high society quote-unquote matrons who were used to having their private lives as private, not public. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, society reporting was largely seen as the provenance of female journalists. In the 19th century, in many newspapers, particularly the small ones, the only women on the paper's staff at all were those who covered society news. So that is a high-level intro to our topic today. Gossip columnists. Gossip columns. If you're a fan of early Hollywood, old films, film history in general, or like me, your Instagram algorithm seems to think you're about 125 years old, the names Hedda Hopper and Louella Parsons will ring a bell. And if they don't, don't worry, we'll get there. For this episode, we are going to focus mainly on Louella Parsons, but I will mention her rival, Hedda Hopper, in passing as well. What happened in the 1920s through the 1940s was genuinely remarkable. These syndicated columnists transformed what had been genteel society reporting into powerful, sometimes scandalous, influential entertainment publicity machines. Long before tabloids, long before celebrity culture as we know it online, these writers were shaping public perception in ways that could make or break careers. It's a fascinating history, and I'll paint with a fairly broad brush today because there's way too much to cover. But if you want to go deeper on the full arc of gossip column history, I recommend an excellent piece on Shonda Land, that's Shonda Rhymes' website. And I'll put a link to that in the show notes. But for this episode, we are going to focus on the woman who was arguably the first well-known female gossip columnist in America, Louella Parsons. Is that familiar to you? It will be by the time we're done. And of course, there's an Eastland disaster connection. Who was Louella Parsons? At her peak, her column was read by 20 million people across 700 newspapers worldwide, and she was the first writer of a dedicated motion picture column in the United States. She began writing her first column in 1914 for the Chicago Record Herald. She later moved to the New York Morning Telegraph before being lured away by none other than William Randolph Hearst's New York American in 1924. Why? Well, Louella had been championing Marion Davis, Hearst's, shall we say, special friend. And soon William Randolph Hearst became a fan of Louella Parsons. In turn, Louella Parsons eventually made her way to California, where she became one of the most influential and feared figures in Hollywood. And she remained the unchallenged queen of Hollywood gossip until the arrival of the flamboyant over-the-top Hedda Hopper, with whom she feuded spectacularly for years. Louella's early life is interesting, precisely because she didn't talk about it very much, or when she did, she tended to embellish a bit. She was born Louella Rose Ottinger on October 6, 1881 in Freeport, Illinois. That's Stevenson County, by the way. It's about 111 miles west of Chicago. Her father was of German Jewish descent, as was her maternal grandfather, while her maternal grandmother was of Irish origin, and she had two brothers and a sister. During her childhood, her parents attended an episcopal church. In 1890, her widowed mother married a man named John H. Edwards, and the family relocated to Dixon, Illinois, about 103 miles west of Chicago, by high school. Louella already knew she wanted to be a writer. At her 1901 graduation ceremony, she gave a speech titled Great Men, and her principal, apparently taking the hint, announced to the crowd that she would be a great writer herself. After high school, she enrolled in the teacher's course at a local Dixon College. While still in college, she landed her first newspaper job as a part-time reporter for the Dixon Star. By 1902, she had become the first female journalist in Dixon, reporting on the social goings-on of the town. Already she was doing exactly what she'd become famous for. She married her first husband, John Parsons, and the couple moved to Burlington, Iowa. It was there that she had her only child, Harriet, who was born in 1906, and Harriet went on to become a film producer and lived until 1983. Also, while in Burlington, Louella saw her first motion picture. The Great Train Robbery, 1903. That film clearly lit something in her. After her marriage broke up, Parsons moved to Chicago in 1912. This is where things really started to accelerate. This is where she got her first taste of the film industry, working for George K. Spohr as a scenario writer at the SNA company. Yes, that SNA, E-S-S-A-N-A-Y. I did an episode that featured the early film industry in Chicago a few weeks ago, if you remember that one. And SNA figures prominently in that story. So here's another thread connecting to that constellation. Louella sold her first script for $25. Her daughter Harriet also got to be in some of these early movies, and she was billed as Baby Parsons in several SNA films, including The Magic Wind, written by Louella herself. Louella even wrote a book during this period called How to Write for the Movies. In 1914, Parsons began writing the first dedicated movie gossip column in the United States for the Chicago Record Herald. Then in 1918, William Randolph Hearst bought that newspaper and promptly let Parsons go, having not yet figured out that movies and movie stars were news. That was a miscalculation that he'd soon correct. Louella relocated to New York City and started a similar column for the New York Morning Telegraph. It was there that she wrote a piece championing Marion Davis, Hearst's mistress and protege, at a time when most critics were dismissing the woman. Parsons encouraged readers to give Marion Davis a chance, and Hearst noticed he offered Parsons $200 a week, the equivalent of nearly $3,800 today, to become the motion picture editor of his New York American. Smart woman, smart move. The phrase, Marion Never Look Lovelier, became a standard in Parsons' column and a tongue-in-cheek cultural catchphrase for those who knew what was really going on. Now it's time for the yacht scandal. Yes, there's a yacht scandal in this. Now here's where it gets really interesting. There was persistent speculation that Parsons was elevated to her powerful position in part because of a scandal she chose not to write about. In 1924, director Thomas Ince died after being carried off Hearst's yacht, allegedly to be hospitalized for indigestion. Many Hearst newspapers falsely reported that Ince had never even been on the boat, that he'd been taken ill at Hearst's home. But Charlie Chaplin's secretary reportedly saw a bullet hole in Ince's head when he was removed from the yacht. Rumors flew that Chaplin had been having an affair with Marion Davis and that Hearst, attempting to shoot Chaplin, had accidentally struck Ince. Parsons was allegedly also aboard the yacht that night, and she never wrote a word about it. The official cause of death was listed as heart failure. Make of that what you will. became something that Hollywood's biggest names genuinely feared. Parsons regarded herself as the social and moral arbiter of Hollywood, and many stars feared her disfavor more than they feared negative reviews. She cultivated a network of informants throughout studio corridors, hairdressing salons, law offices, and doctors' offices. She was very strategic, she was thorough, and she was formidable. She remained unchallenged as the queen of Hollywood gossip until the arrival of Hedda Hopper, the time period late 1930s, early 1940s. Before we go back in time to talk about Loella Parsons' connection to the Eastland disaster, I want you to get a feel for who she was. I want you to hear her voice. I was able to locate a recording from 1945 from a program called Hollywood Mystery Time. It begins with an advertisement and then some gossip from Loella herself. Have a listen.

Speaker 2

Woodbury for the skin you love to touch. And now here she is, Louella Parsons. Hello to all of you from Hollywood. Here's my first news tonight. Brigadier General Elliot Roseville summoned to Washington to confer informally with President Truman is back in Hollywood to see his bride, Actress Faye Emerson. A good reason to believe that both Elliott and his sister Anna were asked if they knew anything about their father's plans at the Yallett Conference. Plans that had not already been told to President Truman. This time it's a complete nervous breakdown. Friends say that wedding bells will jingle merrily for Groucho Marks and Kay Gorsey just about this time next month when the lady is free. She's the youthful ex-wife, a dead-ender Leol Gorce. Dead-end kids are certainly hitting the Hollywood social columns lately.

Why Citations Protect History

Closing And How To Support

Natalie Zett

Okay, so now we are going to go back in time and discuss Louella's connection to the Eastland disaster. Before I read this article, here's some context. This article was published in 1926 in Editor and Publisher. This was a trade journal for the newspaper industry. Even though it was written by a woman, it was written in a time when women in journalism had to justify their own existence in the profession. And that shapes everything about the language you're about to hear. Louella Parsons, a successful and established journalist by this point, still frames her accomplishments in terms of what women had to overcome just to be taken seriously. You'll hear very dated and cringeworthy references to appearance, to dress, to proving mental fitness, things that no male journalist would have ever been asked to address. That's the world she was operating in. As you've already heard, Louella Parsons was no slouch when it came to being a strategist. So if you can listen to what she is saying beneath the framing of her time, we have to do a lot of that when we examine documents from previous eras, even 100 years ago, which doesn't seem that long ago, but you will hear some differences between now and then. And who knows, you might even hear some common threads between then and now. Editor and publisher for august fourteenth, nineteen twenty-six. Headline Women in Advertising and Journalism. Prejudice against newspaper women has vanished. Prejudice against newspaper women has entirely vanished, in the opinion of Louella O. Parsons, motion picture editor of Universal Service. Quote, the percentage of successful women in the field of journalism today has increased 75% since I began my career, she declared. The idea, too, of the dowdy-looking female with bedraggled hair and ill-fitting clothes as typifying every woman reporter went out with a bicycle. The modern newspaper woman is not only mentally alert, but is smartly dressed. Mrs. Parsons' particular work for the past twelve years has been along specialized lines such as moving picture editor of the Chicago Herald, and then as editor of the New York Morning Telegraph, later with the New York American, and now with Universal Service. Quote, there is no craft in the world as exciting as the newspaper profession, and no part of the work as interesting as reporting, because it offers a variety of subjects and a world of experiences, she said. Even now I forget the movies every so often to report a special story for the city editor. Only a few weeks ago, I met the train bringing Amy Semple McPherson to Los Angeles to write a feature article on mob psychology as represented by the crowd at the station. My first newspaper job dates back so many years that I refuse to give actual figures. I was home from school on a summer vacation with no thought but having a good time when I was offered the position of society editor on the Dixon, Illinois Star. One of my best friends was married to the publisher of the paper in Dixon, a town of 12,000. I was paid a large sum of $5 a week. As the first woman reporter in Dixon, I felt my responsibilities. I bought a huge notebook which accompanied me wherever I went. I was so delighted with the distinction that I gradually accepted the added responsibilities of dramatic editor, music critic, and assistance to the editor for all the same salary. Just when I was getting $6 a week, I left it all to get married. For the next four years, I was busy in my home with my small daughter. When I found myself alone with a three-year-old baby, I naturally turned to the one thing I knew: newspaper work. I wrote feature stories for the Chicago Tribune, which were sometimes accepted and sometimes put into the wastebasket. The uncertainty of definite remuneration made me accept with alchety an offer to join the SA Film Company as scenario writer at $20 a week. For the next five years, I turned out an average of two scenarios a week. I wrote a textbook on how to write for the movies, and I contributed a Sunday feature to the Chicago Herald. My heart, however, was always more in newspaper work than in writing the thrillers, demanded. And so when James Keeley, publisher of The Herald, asked me to inaugurate a daily column and write reviews in addition to the Sunday page, I resigned from SNA to affiliate myself with the Herald. I was told to cover the Ethland disaster, where more than 2,000 people were drowned on an excursion boat. I was instructed to visit the homes of the afflicted and get their personal stories. In the beginning, I approached these small houses with reticence, but the eagerness of the people who were of the poorer class to tell their stories made me forget myself. There is a curious, morbid desire to talk among people who have had trouble, and their willingness to tell me little intimate stories of their loved ones was one of the most touching things I have ever encountered. In some homes, three and four children were drowned, and it seemed to give the parents relief from their grief to talk to someone who understood. Any stranger, I suppose, would have sufficed, but a newspaper reporter stood for a certain amount of dignity, and they felt honored that the paper had sent someone to visit them. I worked unceasingly with about two hours sleep a night, learning more about human nature than I have ever learned before or since Loella Parsons' connection to the Eastland disaster was shared apparently just this one time in 1926, and then nothing afterward, no follow-through, no one picked up the thread, which means this story, like so many others of the Eastland disaster, was right there, pre-available, accessible, and yet it was slipping toward being lost altogether. That's probably because the research slowed down so much in the last few years. And that's what makes this such a significant discovery. If you know anything about Louella Parsons, what you know is the public persona, the gossip columnist, the feared gossip columnist. That's the image, that's the persona. What you don't think of is a young single mother trying to make a living for herself and her daughter, who was, by her own account, forever changed by sitting with the families of the Eastland disasters. How many she interviewed, who she interviewed, I don't know. None of these interviews appear to be online, but I have a feeling they probably exist somewhere. Maybe in a box, maybe in a museum somewhere in the basement, maybe in someone's attic. I'll keep looking because wouldn't that be something to find? What strikes me is that Louella was one of the very few women reporters of that era, and the fact that the paper thought enough to send a woman to these grieving families made all the sense in the world. A woman, a mother, that was a stroke of genius, whether intentional or not. For those families, it probably gave them a safe, listening ear. And for Louella herself, it made a deep impression, maybe not forever, but for a long time afterward. I was also struck by the way she described the victims as the quote-unquote poor class. Heck, she's talking about my family, by the way. We were of that poor class in Chicago when the Eastland disaster touched us. And you can feel the distance in her language as well, that sense of class distinction. The families she was talking to, these were immigrants or the children of immigrants. Working people. And Louella, whatever her circumstances, she saw herself as coming from a different echelon. That's worth sitting with too. Oh, and before we go, I almost forgot this. As I was doing this research, I added Louella Parsons' Eastland reporting experience to her Wikipedia entry. Of course, I cited my source for that. And the one thing about Wikipedia, even though it's crowdsourced, you do have to cite your sources. My understanding is that if you don't do that, the information gets flagged, challenged, or removed. I'm sure you've gone to different Wikipedia entries and have seen those warning labels. The thing about source citations, this is not a high bar. It's the same standard that's expected of high school students writing term papers. And of course, it's expected of scholars, of historians, and of genealogists. I mean, Elizabeth Schoen Mills has spent a career formalizing that approach for those of us who work in those areas. And you would think the same would be true of historical or heritage organizations. Mostly, fortunately, that is the case, but not always. When platforms present Eastland disaster history or biographies without citing sources, it's a departure from a very basic and widely accepted standard that shows respect for the subject but also allows others to continue the research. Well, I will keep looking to see what else I can find out about Louella Parsons' connection to the Eastland disaster. In the meantime, take care of yourselves and take care of each other. Stay safe, and I will talk to you next week. And I think I'll have Louella close us out.

Speaker 2

This is Louella Parsons saying that's all for tonight. But I'll see you next Sunday.

Natalie Zett

Please subscribe or follow so you can keep up with all the episodes. And for more information, please go to my website. That's www.flowerinthher.com. I hope you'll consider buying my book available as audiobook, ebook, paperback, and hardcover because I still owe people money, and that's my running joke. But the one thing I'm serious about is that this podcast and my book are dedicated to the memory of all who experienced the Eastland disaster of 1915. Goodbye for now.

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Natalie Zett

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