Olivebelle Hamon
Olivebelle Hamon, also known professionally as Loma Worth (September 2, 1909 – August 20, 1987), was a child musical prodigy, heiress, vaudeville performer, and licensed pilot, with a headline-making personal life in adulthood.
Early life
[edit]Olivebelle (or Olive Belle) Hamon was born in Lawton, Oklahoma, the daughter of Jacob Louis "Jake" Hamon and Georgia W. Perkins Hamon. Her mother was a cousin to Warren G. Harding.[1] Her father, an oil millionaire charged with bribing Senator Thomas P. Gore,[2] was killed in 1920 by his nephew's wife Clara Smith Hamon, who was acquitted in the ensuing high-profile trial.[3] Her only sibling was Jake L. Hamon, Jr., who followed his father into the oil business.
Career and personal life
[edit]Olivebelle Hamon was famous from a very early age as a violinist in Chicago,[4] a standout student of Rudolph Reiners.[5] In 1922 she gave a stunt recital, playing her violin while walking up and down 33 floors of external stairs at the Wrigley Building,[6] as a benefit for Camp Algonquin, a YMCA "fresh-air" camp on the Fox River.[7]
She also began flying very young, with lessons well underway by age 10.[8] In 1930, she was denied permission to make a stunt flight from London to Cape Town.[9] In 1930 she participated in the National Women's Air Derby, flying from Long Beach, California to Chicago.[10] She earned her federal flying license in 1932, after the death of pilot Robert Short, a man she planned to marry.[11][12]
As an adult, she used the names "Freddy Worth"[13] and "Loma Worth" for a show business career as an actress and "one-woman band". Any inheritance from Jake Hamon had been long since lost to extravagance and mismanagement,[14] but not before she acquired a personal airplane[15] to fly between performing engagements.[16]
Much of her fame was derived from her eventful personal life rather than her stage work.[17] Olivebelle Hamon was reported to have a busy roster of suitors, including Pete Llanuza, a newspaper cartoonist in his fifties.[18] She was engaged in 1930,[19] but insisted it was only a lark, because "the stage and aviation have got me."[20] She sought at least three more marriage licenses in 1932,[21] before marrying J. Lawrence Waters of Valdosta, Georgia that year.[22] Her marriage to Waters did not last. In 1938 she married Chicago musician Leo Cooper; they divorced in 1946. She soon married a third time, to Chicago businessman William Augsburger, in 1947;[17] they divorced within a year.[23][24]
Olivebelle Hamon died in 1987, aged 78 years in Portland, Oregon. Her remains were buried in the same plot as her father, mother, and brother, in Ardmore, Oklahoma.
References
[edit]- ^ "Olive Belle Proudly Shows 'Apology' by Leonard Wood Jr." Boston Daily Globe (March 16, 1924): 48.
- ^ Ron J. Jackson Jr., "Deadly Affair" NewsOK (December 2013).
- ^ Laton McCartney, The Teapot Dome Scandal: How Big Oil Bought the Harding White House and Tried to Steal the Country (Random House 2009): 57-59. ISBN 9780812973372
- ^ Mary Carver Williams, "Important Event at the Blackstone" Music News (March 19, 1920): 35.
- ^ Agnes Beldon, "Chicago Musical College" Music News (April 7, 1922): 25.
- ^ "Olivebelle Hamon, stunt violinist--outtakes" Filmed on October 13, 1922, Moving Image Research Collections, Digital Video Repository).
- ^ "Will Play Violin All Way Up Wrigley Stairs and Back" Chicago Tribune (August 29, 1922): 17.
- ^ "Young Girl Flies High" Maywood Herald (August 27, 1920).
- ^ "British Ban Hop by Woman" The New York Times (November 25, 1930): 18.
- ^ "In Air Race" Chillicothe Constitution-Tribune (August 20, 1930): 16. via Newspapers.com
- ^ "Short Death Ends Romance" Los Angeles Times (February 27, 1932): A1.
- ^ "Short's Pupil Wins Wings" Los Angeles Times (March 9, 1932): A2.
- ^ "Why Jake Hamon's 'Baby Gal' Shunned Notoriety and Millions to 'Go it Alone'" The Times (February 28, 1926): 54. via Newspapers.com
- ^ Terrel de Lapp, "Jake Hamon's Women" Los Angeles Times (April 17, 1932): J16.
- ^ "Flies to her Work" Record-Argus (March 24, 1933): 7. via Newspapers.com
- ^ "Tale of Oil King's Daughter Who Saw his 13 Millions Dwindle to Pittance" The Philadelphia Inquirer (November 2, 1930): 108. via Newspapers.com
- ^ a b Warren Hall, "Olivebelle's Evil Star" Atlanta Constitution (June 29, 1947): SM10.
- ^ "New Faces Complicate Race to the Altar with Olive Hamon" Seattle Daily Times (September 18, 1932).
- ^ "Daughter of Hamon to Marry" Los Angeles Times (September 17, 1930): 4.
- ^ "Daughter of 'Jake' Hamon Prefers Acting to Wedding" Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (September 25, 1930): 2. via Newspapers.com
- ^ "Olive Hamon Gets Marriage License--3rd" Star Tribune (December 3, 1932): 1. via Newspapers.com
- ^ "Native Valdostan Latest Aspirant for Husband of Olive Belle Hamon" Atlanta Constitution (December 3, 1932): 4.
- ^ Alma Lind, "The Hamon Harvest of Unhappiness" Atlanta Constitution (August 8, 1948): SM4.
- ^ "Wealthy Woman Asks Divorce in Chicago" Lubbock Evening Journal (May 12, 1948): 2. via Newspapers.com
