Martha Raye
August 27, 1916 - October 19, 1994

 

 

Born Margaret Yvonne Teresa Reed on August 27, 1916 in Butte, Montana, Martha Raye, as the world came to know her, was raised in a Vaudeville family by her parents Pete and Maybelle, along with her brother Bud and sister Melodye.

Martha began performing at a young age with the family and sang with bands throughout high school. Her first film appearance came in a band short entitled A Nite in a Nite Club in 1934. In 1936, Paramount brought her on board and easily and immediately established her screen character in her feature debut, starring Bing Crosby, entitled Rhythm on the Range (1936). Martha burst onto the silver screen as a boisterous, outspoken physical comedianne eager to please her potential suitors. She attacked musical numbers with the same zeal and professional fervor with which she executed a pratt fall or a comically muddled, inaccurate dance step. It was this intelligent, tough, second-fiddle charm and her impeccable attunement to comedic timing which initially won her the hearts of America and would eventually aid in easing the homesick frustrations of thousands of U.S. soldiers.

Over the next 26 years, she would go on to make nearly two dozen movies, regularly cast alongside such comic greats as Joe E. Brown, Bob Hope, W.C. Fields and Abbott & Costello before being cast in her final great feature role in 1962, opposite Jimmy Durante as the second leads in the musical circus comedy, Billy Rose's Jumbo. Nearly indisputably, Martha's proudest role came alongside Charlie Chaplin in his dark comedy, Monsieur Verdoux, a story of a woman unwittingly escaping her husband's several attempts at her murder. Her final movie, Airport '79 - The Concorde, was a sequel to the original Airport movie. She was hilarious in her comedic cameo, an accompishment of which she was extremely proud.

From 1954 to 1956, Martha hosted her very own variety show, "The Martha Raye Show", performing skits, musical numbers and intricate, high-energy comedic dance routines with guests such as Eva, Magda and Zsa Zsa Gabor, Rocky Graziano, and Caesar Romero, to name only a few.

Comfortable with prime time television, over the years Martha would also make cameo appearances on some of the better known programs in the history of TV, including "The Love Boat", "The Andy Williams Show", "The Judy Garland Show", two Sid & Marty Krofft vehicles, "The Bugaloos" and "Pufnstuf", "McMillan and Wife", "Alice" and "Murder, She Wrote".

Martha was also an active supporter of the U.S. military, and in addition to starring in numerous feature films, hosting a television show and making dozens of prime time TV appearances, she selflessly volunteered a substantial portion of her time and talents to entertain U.S. troops overseas throughout World War II, The Korean War and the Viet Nam conflict. She has been cited with dozens of awards from the U.S. military and was the first female recipient of the Jean Hersholdt Humanitarian Award. Among countless prestigious commendations and several presentations of honorary military status, Martha received The Woman of the Year Award from the VFW, as well as from the USO, and the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest commendation of a civilian. She has also been recognized by Hollywood, including the Outstanding Acheivment Award from the Screen Actors Guild. She also has three stars along the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Martha married seven times between 1937 and 1991, most of her marriages lasting less than two years, and her first, to Bud Westmore, lasting only three months.

In 1991, Martha met Mark Harris and much to the joy of mud-slinging tabloids and entertainment magazines across the country,within a month they were married. Being over thirty years her junior proved in time to be only the initial reason her relationship with Mark Harris became her most high-profile marriage. Melodye Raye Condos, Martha's then 47-year-old daughter, had begun the legal process of obtaining executor of estate status over her mother's affairs, claiming that Martha, due to illness and age, was incapable of handling them herself.

Mark, a seasoned stage performer himself, fought against Melodye's proceedings and in the end won out as executor of estate due to marital status. As though this weren't enough celebrity slop in the feeding trough for tabloids and talk shows throughout the nation, Mark and Martha further kept the media attentive when they filed suit against Bette Middler for her 1991 film, For The Boys, insisting that it was a blatant and conscious theft of Martha's life story.

In November of 1993, after a long and drawn-out series of illnesses, Martha was presented with the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Clinton. The ceremony was witnessed by a small circle of close and personal friends of Mark and Martha, and took place in their modest Bel Air home. Although several people close to Martha had worked tirelessly since 1987 to see that this well-deserved recognition was bestowed upon Martha before her passing, by the time the White House got around to awarding the honor, Martha was already a double amputee, and accepted her medal from a wheelchair.

After an earthquake shook the foundation of her Bel Air home beyond repair, Mark moved them into the Bel Air Hotel on Bellagio, where Martha spent her last days. She expired from complications stemming from a battle with pneumonia on October 19th, 1994.

As tribute to her absolute and selfless dedication to the U.S. troops that she so generously cared for and entertained over the span of six decades and through three long wars, Martha Raye is at rest with her fellow sevicemen at Fort Bragg, North Carolina.

Mark had the structurally damaged house torn down shortly after Martha's passing, and has erected a new home in its place. Not a wall in the house comes without the face of Martha Raye glowing back from it, and not a view can be had without the display of an American flag. The front view of the house sports a mural of Martha and an American flag, along with the patriotic admonition "United We Stand, Divided We Fall" scripted in grandios red lettering, along with the politically hedonistic battlecry, "Victory for All Americans!" On the adjoining exterior wall is painted a near-story high Lady Liberty along with the commanding poetic quip, "Feel the Spirit of Martha Raye/Help protect the U.S.A.!" Mark Harris has clearly and feverishly designed what he considers a home gallantly crediting the memory and the spirit of a woman who was indisputably one of America's most talented and tiring patriots…

Martha Raye.

 

 

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