West & Wallace

Myrtle Lorraine Sands, a young woman who used to work in Los Angeles, where she had fun spotting film folk in public places, is now in charge of re-indexing the records of births, marriages & deaths in the office of the County Register of Deeds, Milwaukee.

One day last fortnight, when she happened upon Marriage Certificate No. 40553, Myrtle Sands's eyes bulged, her heart jumped. The certificate proclaimed the union of Frank Wallace and Mae West, of Brooklyn, N. Y., April 11, 1911. To Myrtle Sands of Los Angeles and local cinemansions there could be only one Mae West--the big-bosomed, broad-beamed blonde of the films (She Done Him Wrong, I'm No Angel, Belle of the Nineties). Essential to the West tradition of cozy hospitality is the point that she has never married. Moreover, no biographer has been astute or energetic enough to prove that Mae West was born before 1900. If, as the certificate stated, she was 18 in 1911, she must be 42 today Excitedly Myrtle Sands laid her discovery before her chief. Newshawks entered. The great fact-finding machinery of the U. S. Press began to hum.

P:Local reporters found that on April 11 1911, a Mae West and a Frank Wallace appeared in Milwaukee in a vaudeville turn called "A Florida Enchantment." Said Mae West in Hollywood, with surprised amusement: "I never heard of the guy. And I never was in Milwaukee until four years ago."

P:The Associated Press's $1,000,000-a-year Wirephoto system flashed a copy of the certificate to Mae West. Said she: "It has no signatures. The names were written in by the clerk. I'm sorry about that. The bride's handwriting would bear me out."

P:In Manhattan, Broadway reporters picked up the trail of a Frank Wallace who played the part of a Bowery singing waiter in Mae West's Diamond Lil in 1928, learned he had died two years ago. Actor Wallace's picture zipped over 3,000-mi. of telephone wire to Hollywood. Mae West: "Yes, I remember that face. But I was never married to anybody." P:Manhattan newshawks rooted up an-other Frank Wallace in a theatrical hotel with his dancing partner, Trixie La Mae. Readily Hoofer Wallace admitted it was he who had married Mae West in Milwaukee. Hearst's New York American said that he said: "We got along swell for a year. Then Mae was offered $350 a week and I said 'Go on up,' and I went back to my single act. We were divorced later." Mae West: "The nerve of a brass monkey! . . . Nerts! ... Let him show a marriage license or divorce papers!"

P:In Houston, Tex., the Press found a 1924 marriage license obtained but never used by Actress Mae West and a local theatre pressagent named Burmeister. Mae West, infuriated: "This thing is going too far. That makes nine guys this year that I've been married to. It's a lousy publicity gag, and I'm not getting anything out of it."

P:Gleefully the Press printed each bit of circumstantial evidence, each fiery retort. But one important bit of Myrtle Sands's discovery, Mae West could not deny: the names of the bride's parents in the Milwaukee certificate--John West and Matilda Dilker--were indeed the names of the parents of America's Sweethot.

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