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Speaker 1: Is it today? Is it today?

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Speaker 2: Happy birthday?

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Speaker 3: It is really humbling for me to have to call

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Speaker 3: you up on my own birthday.

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Speaker 2: First of all, shut your mouth.

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Speaker 4: Do you want to wish me a belated happy birthday?

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Speaker 4: Because my birthday came and went no.

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Speaker 1: No.

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Speaker 3: But do you remember I left you. I left you

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Speaker 3: a really heartfelt belated birthday wish? Oh, it was really

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Speaker 3: something I want you.

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Speaker 2: To know about, something about me and my birthday. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: my birthday is my birthday. It's not my birth week,

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Speaker 2: it's not my birth month.

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Speaker 5: It's my birthday.

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Speaker 6: If you don't get me on the day, don't bother.

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Speaker 2: I don't bother.

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Speaker 4: Not interested?

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Speaker 3: Hey, can I ask you?

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Speaker 7: So?

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Speaker 3: Since it's my birthday, can I ask you a question?

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Speaker 3: Do you do any celebrity impressions?

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Speaker 2: I already regret calling you to wish you a happy birthday?

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Speaker 3: Not to nitpick, but I'm the one who called you

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Speaker 3: From Gimblet Media. I'm Jonathan Goldstein and this is Heavyweight.

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Speaker 3: Today's episode, Beverly and Van Ashley comes to me with

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Speaker 3: a love story. It begins like something straight out of

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Speaker 3: the movies. A young woman meets a young man. They

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Speaker 3: share a first kiss, They pledge their love, but then

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Speaker 3: they marry other people and live out their days apart.

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Speaker 3: Then they die and the credits roll. Ashley has never

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Speaker 3: stopped wondering about this couple and why they never receive

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Speaker 3: their happily ever after ending. And this is because the

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Speaker 3: young woman in the story was Beverly Colom and she

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Speaker 3: was Ashley's grandmother. Ashley and her grandmother were close. Ashley

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Speaker 3: called her by an affectionate nickname.

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Speaker 8: So she was a mamma.

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Speaker 3: Mamma's her name, mamma. You called her your mammon, Mammon.

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Speaker 8: We called her our mamma, like with a W at

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Speaker 8: the end.

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Speaker 3: In the evenings, Mammon and Ashley watched Jeopardy together, shouting

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Speaker 3: their guesses at the TV. During commercials, they pressed mute

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Speaker 3: and quietly read. For Ashley, everything her grandmother did was

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Speaker 3: imbued with a certain glamor.

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Speaker 8: She would roll her hair every evening, and I woke

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Speaker 8: up really early as a kid, and I would help

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Speaker 8: her take her pins out of her hair.

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Speaker 3: She was so cool.

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Speaker 8: I just wanted to know everything about.

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Speaker 3: Her, So they'd spend a lot of time talking about movies,

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Speaker 3: the family, and boys. For Ashley, this meant sharing stories

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Speaker 3: about her different crushes, but for Beverly it only ever

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Speaker 3: meant talking about one person.

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Speaker 8: This man named Van. She would call him Van or

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Speaker 8: my Van.

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Speaker 3: Beverly life had been a hard one. Ashley knew her

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Speaker 3: as a widow, but before then she'd been trapped in

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Speaker 3: an unhappy marriage, raising five kids essentially on her own.

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Speaker 3: She was a serious woman, not given to sentimentality, but

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Speaker 3: when she spoke Van's name, her face would light up.

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Speaker 3: She met Van in New Orleans in the late nineteen thirties.

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Speaker 3: The two worked at the local newspaper. Van was a salesman,

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Speaker 3: Beverly and entertainment reporter. But when she talked about those days,

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Speaker 3: no matter how big the stars and the stories she told,

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Speaker 3: it was always Van who took center stage.

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Speaker 8: And it was clear that she had kind of set

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Speaker 8: up the stories so that we would ask about him.

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Speaker 8: Because you know when someone tells you a story and

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Speaker 8: you know that they're really into it and they wanted

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Speaker 8: to tell it more.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, she wanted to talk about him.

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Speaker 8: Yeah.

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Speaker 3: Sometimes the stories were nothing more than a choice. Dale

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Speaker 3: barely an anecdote. Van had blue eyes. Van favored vests,

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Speaker 3: the kind of non stories one tells when one is

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Speaker 3: in love. But Beverly always insisted that she and Van

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Speaker 3: wererent in love. She said they were just friends.

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Speaker 8: I mean, so, I like, I think when there's just

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Speaker 8: such a there's such a disconnect, right, there's a disconnect

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Speaker 8: with like how much she mentions him and then how

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Speaker 8: much she protests that like they're just friends.

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Speaker 3: Ashley never bought the whole just friend's thing, and she's

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Speaker 3: always wanted to prove that it was more that Beverly

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Speaker 3: and Van's relationship was a great, untold romance. Ashley says

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Speaker 3: that in Beverly's old age, her musings about the past

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Speaker 3: became increasingly frequent. The family began to record these recollections

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Speaker 3: so they'd have a record of Beverly's life, and in

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Speaker 3: these recordings, the name Van pops up over and over again.

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Speaker 3: I asked Ashley to play me the recordings so I

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Speaker 3: can hear what she heard, the southern accent, to delight

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Speaker 3: in Beverly's voice, the romantic tenderness as she speaks of

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Speaker 3: her Van. As the tape begins, I'm amazed by the

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Speaker 3: voice reaching out from the past.

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Speaker 2: It just did.

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Speaker 9: A book time.

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Speaker 3: Amazed, that is, and offended as an audio producer by

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Speaker 3: how crappy, the sound quality is. Ashley tells me the

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Speaker 3: family employed the questionable interview Watergate bugging technique of hiding

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Speaker 3: a dictaphone under a couch cushion. They believe that in

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Speaker 3: this way, Beverly wouldn't know she was being recorded and

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Speaker 3: grow self conscious. Ashley then had the tape transcribed, and

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Speaker 3: then you told your grandmother. You're like, hey, surprise, Yeah,

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Speaker 3: we were recording you, and we transcribed this and she

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Speaker 3: wasn't upset. She was touched.

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Speaker 8: No, she hated it. Oh that we hadn't spell checked it.

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Speaker 8: There were like a lot of typos.

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Speaker 3: Oh, that's what she took exception to with the fact

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Speaker 3: that there was bad spelling. It wasn't that you had

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Speaker 3: actually like wiretapped her personal history or anything.

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Speaker 8: Yeah. I remember her even fixing them, like circling them

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Speaker 8: in like red pen.

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Speaker 3: Because the recording sounds like David Sedaris stuck in a

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Speaker 3: gym locker. I asked Ashley to read the role of

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Speaker 3: Beverly from her poorly spellcheck transcriptions.

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Speaker 8: So when she first introduces him, she says, Van was

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Speaker 8: a salesman at the time in the display advertising department

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Speaker 8: of the paper, and we've gradually became friends through encounters

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Speaker 8: in the elevator halls and his frequent visits to the newsroom.

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Speaker 3: So that's how she talked. This was not written language.

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Speaker 8: No, that's how she talked.

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Speaker 3: People talked like that back then. A little copy editor

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Speaker 3: in the mouth, red pan circling jibber, crossing out the jabber.

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Speaker 3: Van and Beverly developed an office flirtation, and eventually Van

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Speaker 3: declared his true feelings about Charlie Wicker, a sportswriter in

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Speaker 3: the newsroom.

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Speaker 8: Van stopped by my desk and abruptly asked, do you

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Speaker 8: date Charlie Wicker? No, why, I replied, to which he explained,

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Speaker 8: I've been wanting to ask you for a date for

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Speaker 8: a long time, and I couldn't bring myself to date

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Speaker 8: anyone who would go out with Wicker.

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Speaker 3: With Wicker out of the picker, Beverly and Van began

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Speaker 3: to date, which led to their first kiss. For Beverly

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Speaker 3: all of nineteen, it was her first kiss ever. When

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Speaker 3: Beverly shared the story of the kiss with Ashley, her granddaughter,

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Speaker 3: took it as proof positive of their romance, but Beverly

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Speaker 3: corrected her, claiming that it wasn't a romantic kiss. She

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Speaker 3: only kissed Van because she was so comfortable with him,

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Speaker 3: and she wanted to see what kissing was like. According

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Speaker 3: to Ashley, Van was something between a dance partner and

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Speaker 3: a partner in crime. The fred to Beverly's ginger, he

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Speaker 3: escorted her all over town. He nicknamed her Duck. When

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Speaker 3: the US entered World War Two, Van enlisted in the

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Speaker 3: Air Force and was stationed in North Africa. While overseas,

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Speaker 3: he wrote to Beverly back home in New Orleans, and

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Speaker 3: after her death, Ashley discovered the correspondence. Beverly had kept

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Speaker 3: the letters her whole life.

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Speaker 8: So June eighteenth, nineteen forty four, Dearest Duck, It's about

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Speaker 8: five pm here now, and I was thinking how nice

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Speaker 8: it would be if I were inn for the weekend.

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Speaker 8: I would be just getting up in order to get

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Speaker 8: dressed and pick you up for eleven thirty Mass. We

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Speaker 8: would have a whole wonderful day in front of us.

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Speaker 8: Of course, the highlight of the whole affair would be

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Speaker 8: just being with you. You are so close to my thoughts

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Speaker 8: that it's sometimes difficult for me to realize that there

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Speaker 8: are so many thousands of miles separating us. I would

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Speaker 8: gladly spend one thousand dollars just to see you for

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Speaker 8: ten minutes, or even just to talk to you on

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Speaker 8: the telephone. I'm thinking of you every minute of the

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Speaker 8: day and night. Love you with all my heart.

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Speaker 3: Vam Well, that really, I mean, that really sounds like

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Speaker 3: a love letter.

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Speaker 8: That's a love letter.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, it's a love letter. Ashley pulls out more letters.

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Speaker 8: I might add, too, Duck that now, almost three years later,

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Speaker 8: you look even prettier and I thrill as much or

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Speaker 8: more every time I see. If I were there now,

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Speaker 8: i'd know that soon from around the corner it would

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Speaker 8: come a terribly welcome sight you and a brown or pink.

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Speaker 8: It'd be too long that I'll be home again and

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Speaker 8: have a toast for us forever, because I love you

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Speaker 8: with all my heart as always Van.

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Speaker 3: Evidently Ashley's not the only one who didn't buy the

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Speaker 3: whole platonic routine. Here she is reading from the transcripts again.

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Speaker 8: None of my friends or family could understand how two

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Speaker 8: people could see so much of each other and not

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Speaker 8: be a hot romance.

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Speaker 3: Everyone in the newsroom teased them constantly. Van's own mother

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Speaker 3: was so eager for her son to propose to Beverly

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Speaker 3: that she gave him an heirloom diamond ring to present

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Speaker 3: to her, but Van never did present the ring to Beverly.

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Speaker 3: He proposed to someone else. After the engagement was announced.

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Speaker 3: One of Van's close friends, Dick, approached Beverly conspiratorially.

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Speaker 8: When Van became engaged to his first wife, Frances, Dick

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Speaker 8: cornered me one night and told me that all I

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Speaker 8: had to do was quote say the word, and the

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Speaker 8: engagement would be off.

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Speaker 3: But Beverly never did say the word. Poor Dick, Beverly said,

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Speaker 3: he never could understand Mayan Van's relationship. Not long afterwards,

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Speaker 3: Beverly also became engaged, so.

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Speaker 8: She got a proposal from from.

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Speaker 3: Ashley struggles to remember the name, and I'm taking aback

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Speaker 3: because the name is in fact that of her own grandfather, a.

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Speaker 8: Man named Llewellyn Brickin. It's funny that that's hard for

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Speaker 8: me to remember. But he was from like a fancy

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Speaker 8: family in Alabama. And she said, yes, growing up, I

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Speaker 8: never heard stories of this guy, of my grandfather, like

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Speaker 8: from my grandmother. Nothing nothing good, nothing bad, just like

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Speaker 8: he was a ghost.

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Speaker 3: The grandkids grew up knowing nothing about their grandfather. But

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Speaker 3: everything about Van, a man who had no role in

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Speaker 3: the family. Ashley's older brother, Lloyd, remembers finding it all

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Speaker 3: very confusing as a kid.

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Speaker 7: I remember her talking about Van and being like confused

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Speaker 7: about whether Van was Gams my grandfather, like as if

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Speaker 7: Van was Gams at a younger age, his name had

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Speaker 7: been Van earlier.

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Speaker 3: It wasn't until age five that Lloyd discovered he even

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Speaker 3: had a grandfather. The family never saw Llewellyn, he was

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Speaker 3: always in his room. On a visit to Beverly's house,

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Speaker 3: Lloyd and his younger brother spotted a figure shuffling through

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Speaker 3: a dimly lid hallway, so the like, who is that man? Terrified,

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Speaker 3: Lloyd tried to tell his mother what he'd seen.

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Speaker 4: My mother sat down like somberly, and she was like,

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Speaker 4: that's your grandfather, Huh. Would you like to go and

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Speaker 4: meet him?

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Speaker 3: Lloyd did not want to go meet him. Still, their

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Speaker 3: mother ushered him and his baby brother into the bedroom

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Speaker 3: where the man sat dozing in a chair. Lloyd's mother

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Speaker 3: nudged Lloyd forward until he was almost up against his

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Speaker 3: grandfather's knees, and she.

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Speaker 4: Touches him on the shoulder and she says, Daddy and

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Speaker 4: his eyes open up, and she says, Daddy, I want

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Speaker 4: you to meet your grandsons. And he he seems alone, disoriented,

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Speaker 4: and he looks at us for like for some seconds,

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Speaker 4: and he says, when you get older, you need to

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Speaker 4: go to Argentina. The most beautiful women in the world

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Speaker 4: are in Argentina. And I swear to you you like

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Speaker 4: like just kind of goes back to sleep in the chair,

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Speaker 4: and that was that.

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Speaker 3: Ashley has always wondered why her grandmother chose Llewellyn, a

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Speaker 3: ghost who gave unsolicited travel advice, over Van, the man

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Speaker 3: she was meant to be with. So I try to find.

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Speaker 5: Out, Hello, Jonathan, you're quite prompt.

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Speaker 3: This is Lloyd, and Ashley's mom knocks, and being called

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Speaker 3: prompt in that Southern accent of hers makes me happier

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Speaker 3: than a dead possum laying in the sunshine. While I

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Speaker 3: can't say I've spent much time in the American South,

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Speaker 3: I have seen a lot of foghorn leghorn cartoons, and

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Speaker 3: so I try my best to respond in kind. Just

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Speaker 3: try to be on time, ma'am.

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Speaker 2: Just try to be on.

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Speaker 5: Time, ma'am. I'll say, whatever this is, Marian.

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Speaker 3: I also phone up Ashley's aunt, Marian, Why do you

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Speaker 3: think that in the end your mom chose your dad.

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Speaker 10: Well, you know, when she would tell us, she said

247
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Speaker 10: he is the smartest, had the cutest personality, the most fond,

248
00:14:29,680 --> 00:14:33,280
Speaker 10: just could wide up a room. You know, who knows

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Speaker 10: what makes people really fall in love?

250
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Speaker 3: As a kid? I mean, did it seem as though

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Speaker 3: it was a loving marriage.

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Speaker 2: At first?

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Speaker 3: At first? Llewellyn doated on Beverly hiring a staff of

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Speaker 3: people to look after their home. At first, Llewellyn was charming,

255
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Speaker 3: the kind of guy who never drink at parties so

256
00:14:57,680 --> 00:15:01,160
Speaker 3: that he could drive everyone home. At first, it must

257
00:15:01,200 --> 00:15:03,960
Speaker 3: have felt like Beverly was embarking on a wonderful life,

258
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Speaker 3: and it must have felt terrible when it didn't last.

259
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Speaker 5: My father wasn't happy about being wealthy. He wanted to

260
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Speaker 5: be super wealthy, so he did a lot of investing

261
00:15:18,440 --> 00:15:23,000
Speaker 5: in a lot of not very safe companies, and his

262
00:15:23,200 --> 00:15:27,440
Speaker 5: you know, his wealth disappeared very rapidly, and he wasn't

263
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Speaker 5: able to handle that, and so he became an alcoholic

264
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Speaker 5: and stated an alcoholic his whole life.

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Speaker 3: Llewellyn went from charming to mean.

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Speaker 5: He was exceedingly violent, toward our mother. Never was violent

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Speaker 5: toward us, but he would wreck rooms.

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Speaker 3: Okay, Llewellyn lost everything, and thus so did Beverly. She

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Speaker 3: went tumbling from a life of luxury to one of struggle,

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Speaker 3: forced to work two jobs in order to provide for

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Speaker 3: five kids and a husband who said in a room

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Speaker 3: and drank all day.

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Speaker 5: Mother never threw him out. She did not believe in divorce.

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Speaker 2: You know.

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Speaker 5: She was a very strong, believing Catholic.

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Speaker 3: And she never looked back.

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Speaker 10: Oh, I don't know. She never would have told us that.

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Speaker 10: She just said, you make your bed, you lie in it,

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Speaker 10: and just made the best of everything.

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Speaker 3: But to quote my podcast brother Alex Baldwin, here's the thing.

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Speaker 3: Through it all, Beverly still had Van. Even though they

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Speaker 3: married other people and lived hundreds of miles apart. Van

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00:16:39,520 --> 00:16:43,920
Speaker 3: and Beverly remained close. Though neither Knox nor Marian ever

284
00:16:44,000 --> 00:16:47,520
Speaker 3: met Van, they felt his presence all throughout their childhoods.

285
00:16:48,200 --> 00:16:51,960
Speaker 3: Van's phone calls were frequent. Marian remembers how the spiral

286
00:16:52,040 --> 00:16:55,040
Speaker 3: cord of the hallway phone would snake into Beverly's bedroom

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Speaker 3: when he called.

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Speaker 10: We knew when Van called not to interrupt her. It

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00:16:59,680 --> 00:17:03,120
Speaker 10: was so light she was back in the good old days,

290
00:17:03,280 --> 00:17:05,560
Speaker 10: like she was on a I'm not saying on a

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00:17:05,640 --> 00:17:07,159
Speaker 10: date with him, but maybe like that.

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Speaker 5: She normally talked to him at least once a month.

293
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Speaker 2: They would joke.

294
00:17:11,680 --> 00:17:14,600
Speaker 5: They would have conversations for hours if they wanted.

295
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Speaker 3: To, over a course of How long was this was

296
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Speaker 3: this the case?

297
00:17:19,440 --> 00:17:21,520
Speaker 5: Probably forty fifty years?

298
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Speaker 4: Oh my goodness, many many years.

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Speaker 3: Yeah.

300
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Speaker 5: Mother had gone through Francis's cancer and her death and

301
00:17:33,520 --> 00:17:34,320
Speaker 5: supported him.

302
00:17:34,720 --> 00:17:40,160
Speaker 3: That was his first wife. Yeah, and after when Van's

303
00:17:40,280 --> 00:17:44,320
Speaker 3: wife died and your dad died, Why do you think

304
00:17:44,960 --> 00:17:47,439
Speaker 3: Van and your mother didn't marry at that point?

305
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Speaker 5: Oh well, okay, these things did not happen at the

306
00:17:50,600 --> 00:17:51,160
Speaker 5: same time.

307
00:17:51,400 --> 00:17:53,159
Speaker 2: Okay, my father didn't die.

308
00:17:53,040 --> 00:17:57,119
Speaker 5: Till mother was in her sixties. Fan had already remarried.

309
00:17:58,320 --> 00:18:03,360
Speaker 3: By the time Llewellyn died. Van had been remarried six years. Beverly,

310
00:18:03,440 --> 00:18:08,680
Speaker 3: for her part, never remarried, remaining stubbornly alone. To Ashley,

311
00:18:09,040 --> 00:18:11,240
Speaker 3: it seemed the couple that was meant to be had

312
00:18:11,240 --> 00:18:23,600
Speaker 3: missed their moment, and after that the timing was never right.

313
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Speaker 3: Ashley visited Beverly a few months before she died because

314
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Speaker 3: she knew it always lifted her grandmother's spirits. She asked

315
00:18:31,760 --> 00:18:32,280
Speaker 3: after Van.

316
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Speaker 8: She said that she hadn't heard from him in a while,

317
00:18:36,240 --> 00:18:40,159
Speaker 8: and I told her that she should call him, and

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Speaker 8: she refused. And her explaination to me at the time

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Speaker 8: was that women don't call men.

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Speaker 3: Hmmm.

321
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Speaker 8: And I thought it was a joke, but she was serious. Yeah,

322
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Speaker 8: And she never called him.

323
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Speaker 3: Beverly and Van never spoke again, and later that year

324
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Speaker 3: Beverly died. So Ashley is left with the burden of

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00:19:01,000 --> 00:19:05,119
Speaker 3: her grandmother's tale of what never was, and now she

326
00:19:05,200 --> 00:19:07,720
Speaker 3: wants to know if somewhere out there there were people

327
00:19:07,760 --> 00:19:10,280
Speaker 3: who share that sense of loss over a thing that

328
00:19:10,359 --> 00:19:13,520
Speaker 3: never existed. She wants to find out if the same

329
00:19:13,520 --> 00:19:17,760
Speaker 3: way Beverly's family had a Van, Van's family had a Beverly.

330
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Speaker 8: I just think, like, did they hear about us? Do

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Speaker 8: you know what I mean? Like, were we as important

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00:19:21,840 --> 00:19:26,480
Speaker 8: it was? Was my grandmother as important in like Van's

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00:19:26,520 --> 00:19:31,159
Speaker 8: stories or not?

334
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Speaker 3: What would that? What would that bring?

335
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Speaker 8: I think I think it would mean that that that

336
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Speaker 8: that she meant something, you know, that her life wasn't

337
00:19:47,160 --> 00:19:52,440
Speaker 8: this kind of sad struggle, but that she had had

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Speaker 8: like a bigger life than the life that I saw

339
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Speaker 8: that she was, like, really loved.

340
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Speaker 3: I get to work researching Van's family tree. Maybe, like Beverly,

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00:20:28,640 --> 00:20:31,560
Speaker 3: Van had a special relationship with one of his grandkids,

342
00:20:31,800 --> 00:20:34,280
Speaker 3: someone he might have shared his heart with. So I

343
00:20:34,320 --> 00:20:37,000
Speaker 3: phone up his grandson, but in the way of romantic

344
00:20:37,040 --> 00:20:41,359
Speaker 3: Beverly stories, he doesn't have much to offer. Next, I

345
00:20:41,440 --> 00:20:45,359
Speaker 3: email his granddaughter, who writes back, my interactions with my

346
00:20:45,440 --> 00:20:49,399
Speaker 3: grandfather were sparse and perfunctory. I love and respect him dearly,

347
00:20:49,840 --> 00:20:52,760
Speaker 3: but that's just how it was. I actually have some

348
00:20:52,840 --> 00:20:55,320
Speaker 3: regret about this now that he is gone and I

349
00:20:55,359 --> 00:20:55,879
Speaker 3: am older.

350
00:21:02,480 --> 00:21:02,760
Speaker 2: Hello.

351
00:21:03,440 --> 00:21:04,399
Speaker 3: Hi, is this Webby?

352
00:21:04,840 --> 00:21:05,720
Speaker 2: Yes?

353
00:21:05,359 --> 00:21:06,280
Speaker 7: Hello?

354
00:21:06,440 --> 00:21:07,120
Speaker 3: Is this Debbie?

355
00:21:07,400 --> 00:21:07,720
Speaker 9: Yes?

356
00:21:08,359 --> 00:21:11,800
Speaker 3: I decided to move up the family tree to Van's daughters,

357
00:21:11,800 --> 00:21:14,919
Speaker 3: Debbie and Webby. Debbie owns her own store.

358
00:21:15,400 --> 00:21:16,960
Speaker 2: I'm in the middle of whale and then d.

359
00:21:17,800 --> 00:21:20,760
Speaker 3: And Webby works in design. Is it web design?

360
00:21:22,680 --> 00:21:23,680
Speaker 2: Interior design?

361
00:21:24,040 --> 00:21:26,040
Speaker 3: Oh? Because I thought it would be fun if you're

362
00:21:27,280 --> 00:21:29,360
Speaker 3: because you do web design and your name is well, yeah.

363
00:21:31,040 --> 00:21:33,600
Speaker 3: I want to know if Beverly Colomb was a presence

364
00:21:33,600 --> 00:21:36,080
Speaker 3: in their lives, and so I put the question to

365
00:21:36,119 --> 00:21:37,879
Speaker 3: them with an elegant economy.

366
00:21:39,840 --> 00:21:44,440
Speaker 9: Beverly, Oh, Beverly that he used to date way back then.

367
00:21:44,760 --> 00:21:49,359
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, well, I mean, I mean he referred to her. Also,

368
00:21:49,720 --> 00:21:52,159
Speaker 2: he was crazy about Beverly, and I just know that

369
00:21:52,240 --> 00:21:54,760
Speaker 2: it really really liked her. As soon as you hear

370
00:21:54,800 --> 00:21:57,000
Speaker 2: the name, it just brings back, you know, a warmth.

371
00:22:01,840 --> 00:22:04,760
Speaker 3: I'm hoping to find some proof of an abiding romance

372
00:22:04,840 --> 00:22:09,080
Speaker 3: that I can share with Ashley. But Webby and Debbie

373
00:22:09,080 --> 00:22:12,520
Speaker 3: don't have many Beverly anecdotes. So I asked who else

374
00:22:12,600 --> 00:22:15,200
Speaker 3: might be able to illuminate what Van and Beverly meant

375
00:22:15,240 --> 00:22:15,760
Speaker 3: to each other?

376
00:22:16,960 --> 00:22:22,000
Speaker 2: Who is alive that would still remember that they're all gone?

377
00:22:23,280 --> 00:22:26,040
Speaker 3: Webby tells me that if Van were still alive, he'd

378
00:22:26,040 --> 00:22:29,000
Speaker 3: be more than one hundred years old. His brothers, his

379
00:22:29,119 --> 00:22:32,880
Speaker 3: war buddies are all gone. His youngest daughter, who he

380
00:22:32,920 --> 00:22:36,640
Speaker 3: was closest with, died young. I talked to a couple

381
00:22:36,640 --> 00:22:41,080
Speaker 3: of Van's sons in law, no dice, but it occurs

382
00:22:41,119 --> 00:22:43,879
Speaker 3: to me that Van has one last family relation who

383
00:22:44,000 --> 00:22:47,440
Speaker 3: might remember Beverly, someone in fact, who might have been

384
00:22:47,440 --> 00:22:50,720
Speaker 3: in the house huttering around in the background during those

385
00:22:50,760 --> 00:22:54,359
Speaker 3: marathon telephone calls. What about your stepmother?

386
00:22:56,760 --> 00:22:59,199
Speaker 2: Oh, I haven't talked to her since I split up.

387
00:22:59,240 --> 00:23:02,800
Speaker 2: That ended best we don't even talk about the stepmother.

388
00:23:03,440 --> 00:23:05,280
Speaker 2: Oh God, I wish it had been Beverly.

389
00:23:08,560 --> 00:23:11,080
Speaker 3: Van was married to his second wife, Barbara, for twenty

390
00:23:11,119 --> 00:23:14,960
Speaker 3: five years. Towards the end of Van's life, Debbie remembers

391
00:23:15,000 --> 00:23:17,480
Speaker 3: showing up one day to their home in New Orleans.

392
00:23:18,040 --> 00:23:20,240
Speaker 2: I walked in the house and she had him walking

393
00:23:20,280 --> 00:23:25,359
Speaker 2: around with a diaper on with a robe open, while

394
00:23:25,400 --> 00:23:30,000
Speaker 2: she had three other people playing cards, playing bridge. And

395
00:23:30,040 --> 00:23:32,600
Speaker 2: that's it. That's the end, you know, I just started

396
00:23:32,600 --> 00:23:33,120
Speaker 2: taking over.

397
00:23:34,840 --> 00:23:35,840
Speaker 9: I was horrified.

398
00:23:35,880 --> 00:23:38,200
Speaker 2: I mean, I quit my job, everything, I mean, because

399
00:23:38,240 --> 00:23:41,160
Speaker 2: I was one of Anyway.

400
00:23:44,000 --> 00:23:46,760
Speaker 3: Van was showing signs of dementia and his health was

401
00:23:46,800 --> 00:23:51,600
Speaker 3: deteriorating rapidly. After that visit, Debbie decided to move in.

402
00:23:52,760 --> 00:23:55,040
Speaker 3: He was around this time, a time when Van might

403
00:23:55,080 --> 00:23:58,480
Speaker 3: have most wanted to hear Beverly's voice. That he'd stopped phoning,

404
00:23:59,560 --> 00:24:02,680
Speaker 3: and so for the first time in fifty years, Beverly

405
00:24:02,720 --> 00:24:06,080
Speaker 3: and Van were going at life without each other, all

406
00:24:06,240 --> 00:24:17,800
Speaker 3: possibly because Van had forgotten her phone number. And then

407
00:24:18,240 --> 00:24:19,560
Speaker 3: came Hurricane Katrina.

408
00:24:20,760 --> 00:24:25,359
Speaker 2: Those the last months of his life worked really very tough, yeah,

409
00:24:25,640 --> 00:24:29,440
Speaker 2: very very tough from Katrina. Because he died in October.

410
00:24:29,920 --> 00:24:33,359
Speaker 2: The storm, of course, was in August. His wife, she

411
00:24:33,520 --> 00:24:34,800
Speaker 2: moved out when he was dying.

412
00:24:36,800 --> 00:24:40,000
Speaker 3: That had to be very hard for your dad.

413
00:24:41,359 --> 00:24:44,080
Speaker 2: Very hard. She left him malone at his worst time

414
00:24:44,119 --> 00:24:47,600
Speaker 2: of need. So we all gathered around him and we

415
00:24:47,680 --> 00:24:50,879
Speaker 2: had three had his three girls, and he was happy enough.

416
00:24:51,560 --> 00:25:00,960
Speaker 2: But you know, yeah, I say, where's my wife?

417
00:25:04,880 --> 00:25:05,160
Speaker 9: Hello?

418
00:25:06,119 --> 00:25:09,040
Speaker 3: Hi, this is Jonathan Goldstein speaking.

419
00:25:09,160 --> 00:25:12,120
Speaker 2: Oh yes, Jonathan, hold on, I'm gonna hand the fund

420
00:25:12,119 --> 00:25:12,640
Speaker 2: to my mother.

421
00:25:13,880 --> 00:25:15,600
Speaker 9: It's joh Okay.

422
00:25:15,280 --> 00:25:17,120
Speaker 3: Hello, Hi, missus Bailey.

423
00:25:18,000 --> 00:25:20,560
Speaker 9: Fine, fine. I hope I can be some help, but

424
00:25:20,640 --> 00:25:21,840
Speaker 9: I don't know if I can.

425
00:25:23,359 --> 00:25:26,320
Speaker 3: Van's second wife, Barbara, is now ninety three, and she

426
00:25:26,400 --> 00:25:29,360
Speaker 3: experienced the end of Van's life differently than his daughter's.

427
00:25:30,240 --> 00:25:33,879
Speaker 3: Around the time of Katrina, Barbara was almost eighty. She

428
00:25:34,000 --> 00:25:37,240
Speaker 3: was scared and wanted to leave New Orleans, but couldn't

429
00:25:37,240 --> 00:25:38,360
Speaker 3: get Van to leave with her.

430
00:25:39,000 --> 00:25:45,439
Speaker 9: Katrina was just terrible. I couldn't handle Van. He was

431
00:25:45,560 --> 00:25:47,280
Speaker 9: ill and had to be helped in and out of

432
00:25:47,359 --> 00:25:50,120
Speaker 9: bed and everything, and Debbie was they of doing that,

433
00:25:50,760 --> 00:25:53,640
Speaker 9: and so I couldn't take him. I wanted to leave.

434
00:25:53,760 --> 00:25:58,240
Speaker 9: I wanted to evacuate, and they didn't want to evacuate,

435
00:26:00,200 --> 00:26:02,639
Speaker 9: and I couldn't. I couldn't take they They wouldn't go

436
00:26:02,720 --> 00:26:05,080
Speaker 9: with me to my brothers, and they were just going

437
00:26:05,160 --> 00:26:09,280
Speaker 9: to stay there. And of course then they got caught.

438
00:26:13,680 --> 00:26:17,040
Speaker 3: In the end, Van couldn't even be buried. All the

439
00:26:17,080 --> 00:26:19,240
Speaker 3: cemeteries in New Orleans were flooded.

440
00:26:21,119 --> 00:26:25,120
Speaker 9: It was a myth, you know. There was a lot

441
00:26:25,160 --> 00:26:28,159
Speaker 9: of Katrina that we wished didn't happen.

442
00:26:32,960 --> 00:26:36,040
Speaker 3: Most of Van's keepsakes were destroyed in the hurricane. So

443
00:26:36,119 --> 00:26:40,280
Speaker 3: while Beverly's family has letters and photographs, Van's family has nothing.

444
00:26:40,960 --> 00:26:45,000
Speaker 3: The record of his inner life is rapidly disappearing. I

445
00:26:45,040 --> 00:26:48,240
Speaker 3: asked Barbara if the name Beverly means anything to her.

446
00:26:48,960 --> 00:26:52,520
Speaker 9: I remember the name, the name was very familiar, but

447
00:26:52,640 --> 00:26:58,159
Speaker 9: I don't remember anything else really, And in fact, i'm

448
00:26:58,160 --> 00:27:02,000
Speaker 9: thinking about it, I don't remember hearing a lot about

449
00:27:02,640 --> 00:27:04,680
Speaker 9: Van's life with the paper.

450
00:27:06,160 --> 00:27:09,920
Speaker 3: Barbara married Van in nineteen eighty. Van was sixty years old.

451
00:27:10,240 --> 00:27:12,040
Speaker 3: His newspaper day is far behind him.

452
00:27:12,720 --> 00:27:16,639
Speaker 9: Being a second wife, you don't talk about the old

453
00:27:16,640 --> 00:27:18,720
Speaker 9: time with the other wife, you know what I'm trying

454
00:27:18,760 --> 00:27:19,240
Speaker 9: to say.

455
00:27:19,680 --> 00:27:23,440
Speaker 3: Yeah, I can imagine that that would make sense. Was

456
00:27:24,080 --> 00:27:28,440
Speaker 3: this a second marriage for you as well? Yes, yes,

457
00:27:28,960 --> 00:27:30,040
Speaker 3: how did you guys meet?

458
00:27:30,600 --> 00:27:37,160
Speaker 9: Well, we met. My daughter Becca and his daughter Debbie

459
00:27:37,280 --> 00:27:38,120
Speaker 9: were friends.

460
00:27:38,480 --> 00:27:38,960
Speaker 3: Okay.

461
00:27:39,560 --> 00:27:43,560
Speaker 9: Now I was having a party and Debbie said, would

462
00:27:43,600 --> 00:27:47,800
Speaker 9: I invite her daddy? And so I did. This is

463
00:27:47,840 --> 00:27:52,320
Speaker 9: my favorite story. And then at the end of the

464
00:27:52,359 --> 00:27:57,119
Speaker 9: evening she said, why don't you ask miss Rutledge to dinner?

465
00:27:58,280 --> 00:28:02,959
Speaker 9: And he said, which one is she? And I had

466
00:28:03,000 --> 00:28:07,200
Speaker 9: been his hostess he was he was at my house

467
00:28:07,720 --> 00:28:09,200
Speaker 9: and he says, which one is she?

468
00:28:11,560 --> 00:28:13,200
Speaker 3: How would you describe the courtship?

469
00:28:14,200 --> 00:28:27,439
Speaker 9: I guess you'd say low key, you know. Yeah, I

470
00:28:27,440 --> 00:28:30,360
Speaker 9: don't know if your second husband is ever the great love.

471
00:28:30,560 --> 00:28:30,760
Speaker 2: You know.

472
00:28:30,800 --> 00:28:33,040
Speaker 3: What I'm trying to say, is there is there someone

473
00:28:33,080 --> 00:28:35,040
Speaker 3: when when I do say like the you know, great

474
00:28:35,080 --> 00:28:37,439
Speaker 3: love of your life, is there someone that comes to mind?

475
00:28:38,840 --> 00:28:43,160
Speaker 9: Well? I was in love with my first husband. Yeah,

476
00:28:43,240 --> 00:28:46,040
Speaker 9: and I won't say that I didn't love Vane, but

477
00:28:46,160 --> 00:28:48,320
Speaker 9: it wasn't you know, it wasn't like young love.

478
00:28:49,040 --> 00:28:56,400
Speaker 2: Yeah, he liked her a lot, but he didn't love

479
00:28:56,400 --> 00:28:57,720
Speaker 2: her in the way he loved my mother.

480
00:28:58,600 --> 00:29:02,120
Speaker 3: This is Webby again. She says that like Barbara, Van's

481
00:29:02,120 --> 00:29:04,920
Speaker 3: feelings for a second spouse couldn't compare with the kind

482
00:29:04,960 --> 00:29:06,560
Speaker 3: of love you can feel when you're young.

483
00:29:07,000 --> 00:29:10,000
Speaker 2: It wasn't the romance of a lifetime, but he was

484
00:29:10,040 --> 00:29:11,720
Speaker 2: a man and he loved her and he didn't want

485
00:29:11,720 --> 00:29:13,280
Speaker 2: to be alone.

486
00:29:13,520 --> 00:29:16,320
Speaker 3: On the subject of young love and romance of a lifetime,

487
00:29:16,600 --> 00:29:20,120
Speaker 3: I bring up Beverly again, presenting a theory that Van

488
00:29:20,160 --> 00:29:22,760
Speaker 3: and Beverly were in love and meant to be, but

489
00:29:22,800 --> 00:29:26,120
Speaker 3: that Beverly had chosen the wrong suitor. She'd refused Van

490
00:29:26,280 --> 00:29:27,280
Speaker 3: until it was too late.

491
00:29:28,040 --> 00:29:32,520
Speaker 2: He was not shot down by Beverly that I know, Uh.

492
00:29:32,440 --> 00:29:36,360
Speaker 3: Huh, I mean the sense that I get from He.

493
00:29:36,520 --> 00:29:39,080
Speaker 2: Never imitated that he was in love with Beverly Cola.

494
00:29:47,720 --> 00:29:51,880
Speaker 2: There was something deep between them, but it wasn't love

495
00:29:51,920 --> 00:29:53,320
Speaker 2: and marriage and baby carriage.

496
00:29:54,480 --> 00:29:56,560
Speaker 3: Do you have any sense of why that was? Why

497
00:29:56,600 --> 00:29:58,320
Speaker 3: they didn't end up going in that direction?

498
00:29:59,160 --> 00:29:59,360
Speaker 10: Wow?

499
00:30:00,040 --> 00:30:01,600
Speaker 2: I meant you had a friend that you're a door,

500
00:30:01,640 --> 00:30:02,560
Speaker 2: but you're not in love with.

501
00:30:04,040 --> 00:30:04,400
Speaker 3: Sure.

502
00:30:05,960 --> 00:30:09,960
Speaker 2: There you have it, because if if it was not

503
00:30:10,120 --> 00:30:11,680
Speaker 2: that way, they would have been married.

504
00:30:13,200 --> 00:30:15,960
Speaker 3: Even the letters Van wrote Beverly during the war are

505
00:30:16,000 --> 00:30:18,040
Speaker 3: taken differently than Ashley had taken them.

506
00:30:18,480 --> 00:30:21,840
Speaker 2: I think this was all pre My mother was Beverly

507
00:30:21,920 --> 00:30:25,200
Speaker 2: and Van, you know they were. That was before he

508
00:30:25,240 --> 00:30:25,880
Speaker 2: met my mother.

509
00:30:30,040 --> 00:30:31,960
Speaker 3: The reason Webby and Debbie don't have much in the

510
00:30:32,000 --> 00:30:34,920
Speaker 3: way of Van and Beverly anecdotes might be because they just

511
00:30:34,960 --> 00:30:38,680
Speaker 3: never needed them. They're not invested in unearthing some great

512
00:30:38,720 --> 00:30:41,520
Speaker 3: love story for Van because they believe he already had

513
00:30:41,560 --> 00:30:45,760
Speaker 3: one with their mother, Whereas Beverly and Llewellyn had a

514
00:30:45,800 --> 00:30:55,360
Speaker 3: bad marriage, Van and Francis had a good one. You've

515
00:30:55,360 --> 00:30:56,960
Speaker 3: had some water, I've had some.

516
00:30:57,160 --> 00:30:59,080
Speaker 8: I've had a lot of I have a lot of coffee,

517
00:30:59,080 --> 00:31:01,440
Speaker 8: and I have had a lot of coffee.

518
00:31:01,000 --> 00:31:04,480
Speaker 3: And you will have coffee should you choose to have them.

519
00:31:04,960 --> 00:31:07,480
Speaker 3: Having talked to everyone, I could I get back in

520
00:31:07,560 --> 00:31:10,600
Speaker 3: touch with Ashley. So we talked with Webby and Debbie,

521
00:31:10,640 --> 00:31:12,680
Speaker 3: and then I spoke with I tell her that while

522
00:31:12,720 --> 00:31:15,680
Speaker 3: I couldn't find anything to support a romance, that didn't

523
00:31:15,680 --> 00:31:19,160
Speaker 3: mean Beverly wasn't important to Van's family. I explain how

524
00:31:19,160 --> 00:31:23,560
Speaker 3: instantly everyone recognized Beverly's name, knew your grandmother's name that

525
00:31:23,960 --> 00:31:26,520
Speaker 3: had resonance for them. Yeah, and there are two other

526
00:31:26,600 --> 00:31:29,800
Speaker 3: things I'd come to learn during my conversations with Van's family.

527
00:31:30,520 --> 00:31:33,000
Speaker 3: The first comes from Webby, Well, she.

528
00:31:33,160 --> 00:31:36,840
Speaker 2: Was my godmother who was Beverly.

529
00:31:38,200 --> 00:31:41,120
Speaker 3: Over the years, Van's wife, Francis, became close friends with

530
00:31:41,160 --> 00:31:44,560
Speaker 3: Beverly too, and Van and Francis wanted Beverly to remain

531
00:31:44,600 --> 00:31:46,320
Speaker 3: connected to their family forever.

532
00:31:47,320 --> 00:31:50,920
Speaker 2: They made her my godmother. You know, that's quite an

533
00:31:50,960 --> 00:31:54,040
Speaker 2: honor to bestow upon a friend, to ask them to

534
00:31:54,080 --> 00:31:54,600
Speaker 2: do that for you.

535
00:31:54,960 --> 00:32:00,320
Speaker 3: So you're first born, Oh my gosh, you didn't to

536
00:32:00,400 --> 00:32:02,640
Speaker 3: know about this, right, this is news.

537
00:32:02,840 --> 00:32:08,840
Speaker 8: Yeah, I didn't know anything. I didn't know no no idea, yeah,

538
00:32:08,880 --> 00:32:13,720
Speaker 8: no idea. And my grandmother was pretty Her faith was

539
00:32:13,760 --> 00:32:16,240
Speaker 8: really important to her. And I am sure that that

540
00:32:16,400 --> 00:32:19,760
Speaker 8: meant the world to her. I'm sure she took that

541
00:32:19,920 --> 00:32:20,880
Speaker 8: really seriously.

542
00:32:25,200 --> 00:32:27,959
Speaker 3: And then there's the second thing. I learned, a small,

543
00:32:28,080 --> 00:32:30,800
Speaker 3: strange thing that I'm not even sure is a thing.

544
00:32:31,720 --> 00:32:35,400
Speaker 3: Throughout my conversations with Van's family, there was one oddly

545
00:32:35,480 --> 00:32:38,680
Speaker 3: specific Beverly and Van's story that everyone seemed to know.

546
00:32:39,400 --> 00:32:41,960
Speaker 3: In fact, it was the only story they all seemed

547
00:32:41,960 --> 00:32:45,880
Speaker 3: to know. No matter who I spoke to, kids, grandkids,

548
00:32:46,080 --> 00:32:49,480
Speaker 3: sons in law, it kept popping up again and again.

549
00:32:50,400 --> 00:32:53,360
Speaker 3: Back in their newspaper days, Van escorted Beverly to the

550
00:32:53,360 --> 00:32:56,360
Speaker 3: showbiz party she reported on, and they met the biggest

551
00:32:56,360 --> 00:33:04,720
Speaker 3: stars of the day, among them Dicky Mickey Rooney, who

552
00:33:04,760 --> 00:33:07,720
Speaker 3: appeared in more than three hundred films over the course

553
00:33:07,800 --> 00:33:11,080
Speaker 3: of an eighty eight year career. Mickey Rooney began as

554
00:33:11,120 --> 00:33:14,360
Speaker 3: a child star, appearing in a half dozen movies opposite

555
00:33:14,400 --> 00:33:18,600
Speaker 3: his friend Judy Garland, but according to Vanity Fair, he

556
00:33:18,720 --> 00:33:23,360
Speaker 3: was also quote the original Hollywood train wreck one who,

557
00:33:23,400 --> 00:33:26,800
Speaker 3: by the accounts of Van's family, train wrecked his way

558
00:33:27,000 --> 00:33:28,520
Speaker 3: into Van and Beverly.

559
00:33:28,880 --> 00:33:31,120
Speaker 2: I just heard one story about Mickey Rooney at one

560
00:33:31,160 --> 00:33:34,720
Speaker 2: of the parties. I know he was disappointed in Mickey Roone.

561
00:33:34,800 --> 00:33:37,520
Speaker 4: You remember him saying something along the line, I hate

562
00:33:37,680 --> 00:33:39,160
Speaker 4: that Mickey Roney.

563
00:33:40,120 --> 00:33:43,240
Speaker 3: Every telling is slightly different, but all of the stories

564
00:33:43,360 --> 00:33:44,640
Speaker 3: have one thing in common.

565
00:33:45,040 --> 00:33:48,600
Speaker 4: Currently, Mickey was a little bit on the crass side

566
00:33:48,600 --> 00:33:48,960
Speaker 4: the thing.

567
00:33:49,160 --> 00:33:53,320
Speaker 2: He said something crude and lude sexually led to a

568
00:33:53,400 --> 00:33:56,600
Speaker 2: woman at the park. He was making crass.

569
00:33:56,520 --> 00:34:00,520
Speaker 3: Remarks, crass remarks in the presence of Van Date for

570
00:34:00,560 --> 00:34:03,280
Speaker 3: the evening one, Beverly Colom.

571
00:34:03,280 --> 00:34:05,240
Speaker 2: And my father went over there. I'm kind of pulled

572
00:34:05,280 --> 00:34:07,480
Speaker 2: Hi by the collar and said, you say that again,

573
00:34:07,520 --> 00:34:08,960
Speaker 2: and I'm gonna knock you out.

574
00:34:09,120 --> 00:34:11,759
Speaker 8: I do recall him saying something like I punched that

575
00:34:11,840 --> 00:34:13,439
Speaker 8: guy right in the nose one time.

576
00:34:13,640 --> 00:34:16,000
Speaker 2: You know Cowarde, and my father was six feet so

577
00:34:16,040 --> 00:34:18,120
Speaker 2: he was much bigger. He said he had to be

578
00:34:18,200 --> 00:34:20,640
Speaker 2: restrained not to want to throw him out the window.

579
00:34:25,280 --> 00:34:26,680
Speaker 3: Do you know who Mickey Rooney is?

580
00:34:27,560 --> 00:34:32,440
Speaker 8: Oh? Yeah, my grandmother hated him.

581
00:34:33,280 --> 00:34:40,640
Speaker 3: Hi, what do you know? Why?

582
00:34:40,800 --> 00:34:41,760
Speaker 8: No?

583
00:34:41,760 --> 00:34:46,280
Speaker 3: No, every person that I spoke to, practically from Van's family,

584
00:34:46,680 --> 00:34:52,560
Speaker 3: had a story that involved Van, your grandmother and Mickey Rooney.

585
00:34:52,600 --> 00:34:53,080
Speaker 8: Stop it.

586
00:34:53,920 --> 00:34:57,080
Speaker 3: No, I'm not kidding. Some some variation on it, because

587
00:34:57,080 --> 00:35:00,040
Speaker 3: you know so he he was her escort and and

588
00:35:00,120 --> 00:35:04,040
Speaker 3: there was a Hollywood party. I searched for newspaper coverage

589
00:35:04,040 --> 00:35:07,080
Speaker 3: of this fight between Van and Mickey Rooney, and while

590
00:35:07,120 --> 00:35:09,880
Speaker 3: I didn't find that exactly, I did find an article

591
00:35:09,960 --> 00:35:13,400
Speaker 3: Beverly wrote about a big celebrity party in New Orleans

592
00:35:13,520 --> 00:35:16,960
Speaker 3: in the fall of nineteen forty three, the exact party

593
00:35:17,040 --> 00:35:19,920
Speaker 3: where she and Van would have met Mickey Rooney and

594
00:35:19,960 --> 00:35:23,479
Speaker 3: where Mickey Rooney would have met Van's fist. Found some

595
00:35:23,800 --> 00:35:28,080
Speaker 3: of your grandmother's articles. Oh you did, have you ever

596
00:35:28,120 --> 00:35:28,759
Speaker 3: read any of them?

597
00:35:28,960 --> 00:35:29,200
Speaker 8: Never?

598
00:35:29,800 --> 00:35:30,080
Speaker 2: Here?

599
00:35:30,120 --> 00:35:35,279
Speaker 3: Take a look. Yeah, oh my god. Ashley gazes down

600
00:35:35,320 --> 00:35:37,920
Speaker 3: at the article cool, a big smile on her face.

601
00:35:38,480 --> 00:35:40,759
Speaker 8: Movie stars are all a twinkle as they go out

602
00:35:40,800 --> 00:35:41,480
Speaker 8: to do the town.

603
00:35:41,920 --> 00:35:43,080
Speaker 2: Ooh.

604
00:35:43,120 --> 00:35:45,760
Speaker 8: If you didn't already know the mass of film fans

605
00:35:45,840 --> 00:35:49,480
Speaker 8: jamming the Roosevelts soon made it plain Mickey Rooney and

606
00:35:49,560 --> 00:35:53,120
Speaker 8: Judy Garland were on the scene. I mean, look, at

607
00:35:53,200 --> 00:35:57,319
Speaker 8: least she reserved her personal feelings about Mickey Rooney from

608
00:35:57,360 --> 00:35:57,880
Speaker 8: the paper.

609
00:35:58,440 --> 00:36:03,480
Speaker 3: Right, she was a journalist, and so am I a journalist?

610
00:36:03,560 --> 00:36:07,839
Speaker 3: That is, I am too a journalist, which is why

611
00:36:07,880 --> 00:36:13,080
Speaker 3: I read in its near entirety Mickey Rooney's autobiography Life

612
00:36:13,200 --> 00:36:16,360
Speaker 3: is Too Short, a fun bit of wordplay. As Mickey

613
00:36:16,480 --> 00:36:19,040
Speaker 3: was a scant five foot two in his stockinged feet,

614
00:36:19,880 --> 00:36:22,520
Speaker 3: I search for confirmation of his having scuffled with the

615
00:36:22,560 --> 00:36:25,560
Speaker 3: six foot tall van. And while I learned that Mickey

616
00:36:25,640 --> 00:36:27,880
Speaker 3: was born on a dining room table and that he

617
00:36:28,000 --> 00:36:30,799
Speaker 3: was once visited by an angel while eating breakfast at

618
00:36:30,840 --> 00:36:33,960
Speaker 3: Harris Casino, there's no mention of a party in New

619
00:36:34,040 --> 00:36:44,480
Speaker 3: Orleans in nineteen forty three. Hello Kelly, Kelly Rooney, Hight

620
00:36:44,600 --> 00:36:49,040
Speaker 3: Jonathan and so I phone up Kelly, Mickey Rooney's daughter.

621
00:36:49,760 --> 00:36:52,160
Speaker 3: I explained how her father might be the leading man

622
00:36:52,400 --> 00:36:56,440
Speaker 3: in the most prevalent story anyone has about Van and Beverly,

623
00:36:56,680 --> 00:37:01,759
Speaker 3: and Van got into an, I guess, an altercation with

624
00:37:01,880 --> 00:37:05,080
Speaker 3: your father. Oh oh, and so I guess. I was

625
00:37:05,120 --> 00:37:08,919
Speaker 3: just wondering, like, how likely does that seem to you?

626
00:37:09,800 --> 00:37:13,799
Speaker 6: I hadn't heard of that situation, but I had heard

627
00:37:13,800 --> 00:37:20,920
Speaker 6: of situations where my dad had been in heated discussions.

628
00:37:19,440 --> 00:37:22,719
Speaker 3: Like it wouldn't be so out of the ordinary that

629
00:37:23,160 --> 00:37:24,400
Speaker 3: perhaps your father.

630
00:37:24,360 --> 00:37:27,920
Speaker 6: Exactly exactly, you know, my dad was a force to

631
00:37:27,920 --> 00:37:31,120
Speaker 6: be reckoned with, so I don't doubt that maybe he

632
00:37:31,120 --> 00:37:34,879
Speaker 6: could have gotten into a ruckus with somebody.

633
00:37:37,239 --> 00:37:40,319
Speaker 3: Kelly was born well after the Van incident. Her mother

634
00:37:40,440 --> 00:37:43,720
Speaker 3: was Mickey Rooney's fifth wife. He was married eight times

635
00:37:43,760 --> 00:37:47,080
Speaker 3: in total. He spent his whole life hoping that the

636
00:37:47,120 --> 00:37:49,720
Speaker 3: next marriage would be the one where the love would stick,

637
00:37:50,400 --> 00:37:53,920
Speaker 3: but Mickey ended up spending his final years alone. By

638
00:37:53,920 --> 00:37:56,000
Speaker 3: the end of his life, he'd arrived at a simple

639
00:37:56,040 --> 00:37:58,920
Speaker 3: conclusion about why to be with someone that he passed

640
00:37:58,920 --> 00:38:01,279
Speaker 3: on to his children. My sister said to.

641
00:38:01,320 --> 00:38:04,719
Speaker 6: Him one time, Dad, you know I'm getting divorced, And

642
00:38:04,760 --> 00:38:06,360
Speaker 6: he says, well, let me ask you something.

643
00:38:06,880 --> 00:38:10,560
Speaker 3: Did you love him? And she said, yes, Daddy, I did.

644
00:38:10,600 --> 00:38:14,000
Speaker 6: I loved him, and he says, well, did you like him?

645
00:38:14,400 --> 00:38:16,360
Speaker 8: Did you like the way he treated you? Did you

646
00:38:16,520 --> 00:38:17,840
Speaker 8: like the way he treated others?

647
00:38:18,400 --> 00:38:20,839
Speaker 6: And he really taught us that it's not about all

648
00:38:20,880 --> 00:38:23,200
Speaker 6: the I love you babies and the sex and this

649
00:38:23,239 --> 00:38:25,560
Speaker 6: and that. He said, you really have to be in.

650
00:38:25,719 --> 00:38:32,080
Speaker 3: Like his relationship with Judy Garland, that was never romantic.

651
00:38:33,680 --> 00:38:37,320
Speaker 6: No, I don't believe so. I mean, they met so young,

652
00:38:38,160 --> 00:38:39,879
Speaker 6: you know. We used to ask him that, well, why

653
00:38:40,320 --> 00:38:42,879
Speaker 6: didn't marry Judy? He said, well, it would have been

654
00:38:42,880 --> 00:38:44,040
Speaker 6: like marrying my sister.

655
00:38:44,640 --> 00:38:45,040
Speaker 1: He said.

656
00:38:45,080 --> 00:38:46,880
Speaker 8: I was in love with her. I was in like

657
00:38:46,960 --> 00:38:47,239
Speaker 8: with her.

658
00:38:47,320 --> 00:38:50,359
Speaker 6: She was my world, so I felt, I mean, he

659
00:38:50,440 --> 00:38:54,640
Speaker 6: really loved her, He really loved her, and he would

660
00:38:54,680 --> 00:38:57,160
Speaker 6: have done anything to have tried to save her, and

661
00:38:57,960 --> 00:38:58,640
Speaker 6: did try to.

662
00:39:00,120 --> 00:39:02,560
Speaker 3: Judy Garland died at the age of forty seven from

663
00:39:02,600 --> 00:39:06,120
Speaker 3: a drug overdose. And Life is Too Short, Mickey writes

664
00:39:06,160 --> 00:39:09,280
Speaker 3: of Judy, it seemed as if we'd known each other forever,

665
00:39:09,840 --> 00:39:13,399
Speaker 3: that we were destined to be best friends. Mickey would

666
00:39:13,440 --> 00:39:15,799
Speaker 3: take Judy out for chocolate malts to cheer her up.

667
00:39:16,239 --> 00:39:18,959
Speaker 3: He'd answer the phone when she called at three am.

668
00:39:19,480 --> 00:39:23,399
Speaker 3: Anytime Judy he said, you call and I'll be here

669
00:39:23,440 --> 00:39:28,440
Speaker 3: for you. It's always been that way. Like Judy and Mickey,

670
00:39:28,719 --> 00:39:32,360
Speaker 3: Van and Beverly had been just friends. Only it wasn't

671
00:39:32,480 --> 00:39:35,719
Speaker 3: just friends for a man and a woman, especially at

672
00:39:35,719 --> 00:39:38,719
Speaker 3: that time, to have a friendship that spanned decades and

673
00:39:38,840 --> 00:39:43,160
Speaker 3: great distance, war and marriages and children was a rarer

674
00:39:43,239 --> 00:39:46,400
Speaker 3: thing than a mere romance. And maybe that's why no

675
00:39:46,440 --> 00:39:49,920
Speaker 3: one believed Beverly when she said they were just friends.

676
00:39:50,560 --> 00:39:52,719
Speaker 3: So while the story of Beverly and Van might not

677
00:39:52,840 --> 00:39:56,280
Speaker 3: be the love story Ashley was hoping for, Beverly Colom

678
00:39:56,840 --> 00:39:57,560
Speaker 3: had been loved.

679
00:40:03,560 --> 00:40:05,600
Speaker 8: There's something really big about someone who knows you so

680
00:40:05,680 --> 00:40:08,359
Speaker 8: well and continues to want to know you.

681
00:40:09,120 --> 00:40:10,000
Speaker 3: Can you imagine that?

682
00:40:10,640 --> 00:40:14,480
Speaker 8: No? I think it's really hard to stick with people

683
00:40:14,560 --> 00:40:19,359
Speaker 8: through there are many iterations in life, right, It's really

684
00:40:19,400 --> 00:40:26,320
Speaker 8: hard to meet somebody at sixteen and be with them

685
00:40:26,400 --> 00:40:30,640
Speaker 8: as they change into a totally different person. By I mean,

686
00:40:30,680 --> 00:40:32,799
Speaker 8: I'm only I'm thirty three, right, So have.

687
00:40:32,840 --> 00:40:34,480
Speaker 3: You already seen this even at thirty three?

688
00:40:34,640 --> 00:40:36,600
Speaker 8: Yeah, of course, I mean there are people that like

689
00:40:36,680 --> 00:40:39,960
Speaker 8: I loved so much and we don't have much in

690
00:40:39,960 --> 00:40:44,960
Speaker 8: common anymore. I think it was the biggest relationship of

691
00:40:45,000 --> 00:40:47,160
Speaker 8: her life.

692
00:40:47,360 --> 00:40:51,880
Speaker 3: You know, you began this thing, imagining this great untold

693
00:40:51,880 --> 00:40:54,759
Speaker 3: love story and wanting to actually learn about it.

694
00:40:54,800 --> 00:40:57,319
Speaker 8: And I don't care about the love story anymore, I

695
00:40:57,400 --> 00:41:02,560
Speaker 8: really don't. I'm good good, I'm good with that multi

696
00:41:02,719 --> 00:41:08,399
Speaker 8: year friendship. I'm just so happy that they had each other.

697
00:41:09,920 --> 00:41:12,560
Speaker 8: How lucky these people were. Van and Bev.

698
00:41:14,480 --> 00:41:17,960
Speaker 3: Beverly's life was a struggle. She would come home exhausted

699
00:41:18,000 --> 00:41:20,279
Speaker 3: after a long day of work and there would be

700
00:41:20,320 --> 00:41:24,960
Speaker 3: five mouths to feed and Llewellyn drunk. But then the

701
00:41:25,000 --> 00:41:28,600
Speaker 3: phone would ring, and Beverly would smile and duck into

702
00:41:28,680 --> 00:41:32,520
Speaker 3: the other room, and there, reaching out from hundreds of

703
00:41:32,560 --> 00:42:00,120
Speaker 3: miles away, was her Van. It was always that way.

704
00:42:24,600 --> 00:42:30,360
Speaker 1: Now that the fernentures roof, turning to its goodwill home,

705
00:42:33,880 --> 00:42:38,239
Speaker 1: Now that the last month's rant is scheming, with the

706
00:42:38,480 --> 00:42:42,239
Speaker 1: damage to possible, take this moment to dissolve.

707
00:42:44,800 --> 00:42:49,680
Speaker 8: If we meant him, if we talked serious but felt

708
00:42:49,760 --> 00:42:51,320
Speaker 8: around for far too.

709
00:42:53,680 --> 00:43:02,120
Speaker 3: From things that accidentally talk. This episode of Heavyweight was

710
00:43:02,120 --> 00:43:04,960
Speaker 3: produced by Khalila Holt and me Jonathan Goldstein, along with

711
00:43:05,000 --> 00:43:08,080
Speaker 3: Stevie Lane and Ba Parker. The show is edited by

712
00:43:08,120 --> 00:43:12,160
Speaker 3: Jorge just Special Thanks to Emily Condon, Alex Bloomberg, Fia Bennin,

713
00:43:12,480 --> 00:43:16,000
Speaker 3: and Jackie Cohen. Bobby Lord mixed the episode with original

714
00:43:16,040 --> 00:43:19,440
Speaker 3: music by Christine Fellows, John K. Sampson, Blue Dot Sessions,

715
00:43:19,480 --> 00:43:22,640
Speaker 3: and Bobby Lord. Additional music credits can be found on

716
00:43:22,680 --> 00:43:26,960
Speaker 3: our website, Gimbletmedia dot com slash Heavyweight. Our theme song

717
00:43:27,000 --> 00:43:29,440
Speaker 3: is by the weaker Lands courtesy of Epitaph Records, and

718
00:43:29,480 --> 00:43:32,080
Speaker 3: our ad music is by Hailey Shaw. Follow us on

719
00:43:32,080 --> 00:43:35,880
Speaker 3: Twitter at Heavyweight or email us at Heavyweight at gimltmedia

720
00:43:35,880 --> 00:43:38,719
Speaker 3: dot com to see a picture of Beverly and fan

721
00:43:39,160 --> 00:43:42,120
Speaker 3: check out our show art on Spotify. Check out the

722
00:43:42,120 --> 00:43:45,640
Speaker 3: photos from our other episodes this season two, and if

723
00:43:45,680 --> 00:43:48,480
Speaker 3: you do listen to Heavyweight on Spotify, be sure to

724
00:43:48,520 --> 00:43:51,879
Speaker 3: click the follow button. If you listen anywhere else, please

725
00:43:51,920 --> 00:43:53,240
Speaker 3: don't tell my boss Alex

726
00:44:00,440 --> 00:44:01,920
Speaker 2: Dott