Hope Emerson

Hope Emerson (October 29, 1897 – April 24, 1960) was an American actress, vaudevillian, nightclub performer, and strongwoman. Emerson started acting when she was three years old during a production with her mother. Her career started when she advertised sheet music by playing the piano at a 10-cent store. Emerson made her Broadway debut in Lysistrata in 1930. She starred in other plays, radio programs, films, television shows, and commercials. She often played the role of a villain in comedies and dramas. Emerson's performance in Caged "became the standard model for women's prison films." Her roles included being a circus strongwoman, a nefarious masseuse-conspirator, a mail-order bride, and a prison warden.

Emerson died from a liver ailment on April 24, 1960, at the Hollywood Presbyterian Hospital.

Personal life Hope Emerson was born in Hawarden, Iowa, on October 29, 1897, to John Alvin Emerson and Josephine "Josie" Washburn Emerson. Her father sold boots and shoes, and then became town marshal and city assessor. Emerson's mother not only attended church and was involved in social work, but she was also a vaudeville performer. Emerson had a brother and a sister, but both died soon after birth. While Emerson was a high school senior, she moved with her family to Des Moines, Iowa, where she finished her education at West High School in 1916. She never married.

When asked in a New York World-Telegram interview in 1936 about her size, Emerson said, "I've heard a lot of blather about the tragedy of being a big woman but I've never known any of it. I suppose I've missed a lot of good cries but I've had so many laughs, I'd be a sap to kick. Life at 6 foot 3 has been so swell that I'd bat my fairy godmother over her old gray head if came around trying to make me 5 foot 3. How do I know what life would look like for me if I was so petite? It might be different. And living the kind of life that makes you glad just to be alive seems a bit more important than the size of my shoe."

She appeared in a couple of shorts, but her feature film debut was an uncredited role in Rascals (1938). Some of Emerson's more memorable roles were as a circus strongwoman in the film Adam's Rib (1949), as a nefarious masseuse-conspirator in the noirish Cry of the City (1948), and as a mail-order bride in Westward the Women (1952). The book Female Masculinity says that Emerson's performance in Caged "became the standard model for women's prison films." Her other film roles included Thieves' Highway, Rosanna McCoy, House of Strangers, and Dancing in the Dark. In the 1951 film Double Crossbones, Emerson played the pirate Anne Bonny. During filming, she accidentally pinned actor Donald O'Connor to the ship's rail with her body. The accident resulted in O'Connor having a cracked rib.

Emerson was a panelist on the ABC game show Quizzing the News (1948–1949) and played hillbilly host Maw Shufflebottom on the CBS variety show Kobb's Corner (1948).

She was featured on an episode of This Is Your Life, a television show that presented one individual's achievements and life per show, with family, friends and co-workers providing anecdotes. After the host Ralph Edwards appeared, the rest of the episode focused on Emerson's life as told by people who knew her. It all happened in front of a live studio audience, and it was "considered quite an honor to be chosen." KWIT writer James C. Schaap said, "And that's why, should you stop by Hawarden sometime, you should drive up to the cemetery, take the first little road north, cross a gravel lane, keep watching the graves on the edge and you'll find the pink Emerson stone—father, mother, and daughter. Pull over. Pay your respects. There they are, together, like always. They’d enjoy your applause."

Filmography

Rascals (1938) (uncredited) Cry of the City (1948) That Wonderful Urge (1948) (uncredited) House of Strangers (1949) Thieves' Highway (1949) Roseanna McCoy (1949) Adam's Rib (1949) Dancing in the Dark (1949) Caged (1950) Belle Le Grand (1951) Double Crossbones (1951) Westward the Women (1951) The Lady Wants Mink (1953) A Perilous Journey (1953) Champ for a Day (1953) Casanova's Big Night (1954) Untamed (1955) The Guns of Fort Petticoat (1957) All Mine to Give (1957) Rock-A-Bye Baby (1958)