We use Optical Character Recognition (OCR) during our scanning and processing workflow to make the content of each page searchable. You can view the automatically generated text below as well as copy and paste individual pieces of text to quote in your own work.
Text recognition is never 100% accurate. Many parts of the scanned page may not be reflected in the OCR text output, including: images, page layout, certain fonts or handwriting.
WHEN Joan Blaine had finished telling me her story, at the luncheon table in Chicago's Merchandise Mart, I looked across at her and wondered at the hidden forces which mould the smiling masks we turn to the world. Poised, cultured, cool, smiling, the very essence of feminine grace and self-assurance — there was nothing in what I saw to serve as a clue to the story she'd kept so long locked in the depths of her heart. Yet — there it was. These things had happened to the girl who plays Mary Marlin
on the air. They had all gone to form her as I saw her
before me. Joan Blaine is the product of a destiny she could not
escape — a destiny which was written before she was old
enough to choose what her life would be. A destiny, in fact,
that even thwarted her one desperate attempt to turn it
from its appointed end.
Its first hint came in the words her grandfather spoke to
her, one night when she was a black-haired little girl on his
knee. "Joan," he said with a smile which didn't hide the seriousness in his voice, "you are going to be famous. You are a Blaine, and each generation of Blaines has produced one who has been famous. Tomorrow it will be you. But you must work for it. You must give your whole life to it. Nothing else can matter, no sacrifice can be too great."
Only half comprehending those words when she heard them, Joan has never forgotten them. She has never been able to forget.
In her childhood, the truth of her grandfather's statement that no sacrifice could be too great was apparent. Even as a little girl, she was denied the normal excitements of children's games and parties. She was .too delicate, for one thing; for another, there was so much for her to learn and so little time to learn it in. Few restrictions were made on the activities of her brothers and sisters, but Joan, under the
For Mary Martin's Kleenex programs, turn to page 50.
By JUD ASHLEY