Does anyone recognize where [on Hollywood Blvd] this photograph of Bobbie Gentry and Glen Campbell was taken? [c. 1968]
imgur
When I happened upon this photo I knew next to nothing about Bobbie Gentry. The more I learned...the more intrigued I became.
Here's some info:
Bobbie Gentry moved to Arcadia, California, at age 13 to live with her mother. Gentry graduated from Palm Valley School in 1960.
She chose her stage name from the 1952 film Ruby Gentry, about a heroine born into poverty but determined to make a success of her life.
She began performing at local country clubs, and encouraged by Bob Hope, she performed in a revue at Les Folies Bergeres nightclub of Las Vegas.
Gentry then moved to Los Angeles to enter UCLA as a philosophy major. She supported herself with clerical jobs, occasionally performing at nightclubs.
She later transferred to the Los Angeles Conservatory of Music to develop her composition and performing skills. She also worked as a fashion model,
and on June 29, 1962, United Press International circulated a wire photo of Gentry posing in a swimsuit alongside a second model..Cheryl Crane, daughter of Lana Turner.
wiki
She later transferred to the Los Angeles Conservatory of Music to develop her composition and performing skills.
In 1967 (the turning point in Bobbie Gentry's life) her #1 hit
'Ode to Billie Joe" was released.
Here's Bobbie in a 1967 appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show. (filmed at a Vietnam era military hospital)
• Video Link
A MYSTERY
To everyone's surprise Bobbie Gentry pretty much diasppeared in 1981.
"Bobbie Gentry's last known performance was on Christmas night 1978 on “The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson” and on a Bob Hope special in 1981.
Gentry made no public announcement of her retirement; instead, she simply disappeared, and the circumstances surrounding her disappearance
have grown into mythological proportions in the decades since."
Numerous websites, like the
clarionledger, say she is living in Los Angeles.
(others say she is living somewhere in the south)
If you're intrigued..here are two excellent articles.
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Rolling Stone
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Irish Times
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