And Fred Allen Stayed With Aunt Lizzie

Golden-era radio comedian Fred Allen was born May 31, 1894 in Cambridge, Massachusetts. His brother Bob was born two years later, and then, quite unfortunately, their mother died. Fred and Bob, along with their father, moved in with the sister of Fred's mother and lived there for a number of years. In his out-of-print autobiography Much Ado About Me Fred tells about the day that all changed:

We lived on Bayard Street for over ten years. One rainy spring night as we were all eating supper, my Aunt Lizzie announced she wanted everybody to come home early the following evening. She said that it was very important. I sensed something ominous. The next night my Aunt Jane, my Aunt Mary, my Uncle Mike, my Uncle Joe, my brother and I all assembled in the living room. Aunt Lizzie opened the session tersely. She said, "Henry has something to say." My father rarely had anything to say. Something told me that if my father really had something to say, we were facing a crisis.

Apparently too embarrassed to face the others, my father hung his head and said what he had to say tp the elk's tooth that lay dormant on his vest. He spoke slowly. Rigor mortis seemed to have set in on every sentence he uttered; each word seemed to lie in state on his lips before it tumbled out into space. When my father had finished, the little group sat staring at him, stunned. My father had informed us abruptly that he was going to remarry. He was also going to move out of the house and take his piano and his sewing machine with him. My Aunt Lizzie didn't mind losing the piano, but she did mention that she really needed the sewing machine. My father was adamant. Addressing my brother and me, he told us we could either come with him and his new bride, whom neither of us had ever seen, or we could stay with Aunt Lizzie. My brother Bob decided to go with my father. Young as I was, I felt I owed something to a wonderful woman who had been a mother to me for some twelve years. I said that I would stay with Aunt Lizzie. I never regretted it.

(from Stuart Hample's terrific All the Sincerity in Hollywood: Selections from the Writings of Fred Allen)