Humorous Biographies

R-U (credits below)

RECAMIER, Madame, of Paris. Supplied the society column to the newspapers. To be invited to her salon meant that you would get plenty to eat, that you were somebody, that you would see somebody, and that you would have to wear your Sunday clothes. Her R. S. V. P.'s were always accepted. R. finally lost her money, and with it her friends. Ambition: The man of the hour. Epitaph: When She Had It She Spent It.

RUSSE, Charlotte, a pleasant creature, but one who sometimes caused pain after a visit.

SALOME, a celebrated dancer who could fill the largest opera houses in the world with bald heads, opera glasses, and jealous women. She is still in Who's Who, and probably will remain there until arrested.

SCOTS, Mary Queen of, a Scotch lady who is said to have been beautiful, who fell in love, and was one of the few women whose less attractive sister got the better of her.

SHEBA, Queen of, an ancient mere woman who matched her brains against the brainiest man who ever lived. She lost.

SHOE, Old Woman of the, one of those anti-race-suicide mothers whose family caused considerable worry. Ambition: A better job for her husband. Address: Shoe. Clubs: She did not have time for any, and thus could not be a suffragette.

SISTERS, Seven Sutherland, a noted family who held out salvation for the bald and envy to women.

SUFFRAGETTE, T. H. E., a woman who lived years ago in Great Britain and the United States, who believed that noble man was incompetent, incomplete, incompatible, incongruent, inconsistent, and an incubus in his incurious incumbency. She was the daughter of Too Much Time and Too Much Money. Early days spent at home. She married and began her career. S.'s first weakness was a club. Then she fell to the level of a speech maker and a flag carrier. The fanatical desire to see her name in print led to the adoption of strenuous press-agent tactics. She died fighting. Ambition: To offset her husband's vote on election day. Recreation: Parading, windows, bombs, letter boxes, English ministries, and a string of etcs. Epitaph: Requiescat In Pace. (Also see Mrs. Pankhurst and Hope.)

SUFFRAGETTE, T. H. E. Anti-, still lives, but is dying fast. Belongs to the moss-back half of femininity. Has serious objection to use of her head, except for decorative purposes. Was not averse to press notices and looked with envy on the achievements of the suffragettes in this direction. Being denied high office in their ranks because of lack of adequate cerebration, she set up a rival organization where brains were not requisite. Entertains the utterly absurd idea that all women, except herself, belong at home with their husbands and children. Where they belong in the absence of these, deponent sayeth not. Ambition: Continued parasitic existence. Recreation: Manufacturing evidence and tagging on behind. Address: Wherever there are suffrage meetings. Epitaph: Alas! The World Does Move And She Was "Agin It."

TANGUWAY, Eva, an actress who did not care even if those on the front row did.

TERRY, Ellen, a dear old lady whom the world wishes the footlights might always shine upon and upon whom the curtain would never descend.

TOURISTS, T. H. E., a man and woman who carried a camera, bought post-cards, read Baedekers, visited Cook's office, rode in carriages, and then told their friends all about the trip. Ambition: Just one look at everything. Address: Principally Europe. Epitaph: They Came, They Saw, They Vanished.

TROY, Helen of, a peach of a girl who eloped with a man and caused the longest siege in history to make her elope back again.

UNKNOWN, the man who painted thousands of pictures in art galleries.

Credits: The biographies in this section were extracted from Who Was Who: 5000 B. C. to Date: Biographical Dictionary of the Famous and Those Who Wanted to Be, edited by Irwin Leslie Gordon, about 1910.

Part of a collection of etexts on women's history produced by Jone Johnson Lewis. Editing and formatting © 1999-2003 Jone Johnson Lewis.