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The Belousoffs: The Luckiest or Unluckiest Couple? Just ask Howard Hughes and...
Yesterday, while reading letters and other paperwork my grandmother Mitzi Cummings Fielding set aside in one large envelope in the 1970s, I followed a trail that led me to a wealthy couple from Los...
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Documentary about Restoring the Hollywood Moguls’ Temple Picked up for...
Circa 1960: Ida (older sister of Louis B. Mayer) with Rabbi Magnin, who served the Wilshire Boulevard Temple for 69 years from 1915. I am so proud of my friend Aaron Wolf’s documentary, Restoring...
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Ida and the Sinner, Mae West
My great-grandmother Ida Mayer Cummings with the unstoppable Mae West. Date unknown, however might be early 1930s. Mae West was most likely a VIP guest of a Jewish Home for the Aged event in Los...
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Sid Grauman: the hair, the theaters, the chutzpah.
Louis B Mayer with Grauman Chinese Theater, Sid Grauman, and a young Marion Davies, actress. Date circa 1925. Location unknown. Anyone who comments about a rare early morning start to play himself in...
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RIP Louis B Mayer – 55th anniversary of his death
Rare photo of a young Louis B Mayer with his wife Margaret Shenberg picking apples. Place unknown, date unknown, however probably before 1920. RIP ~ Louis B Mayer ~ July 12, 1884 – October 29, 1957 On...
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The Humanitarian Hat – Ida greets First Lady, Eleanor Roosevelt
My great-grandmother, Ida Mayer Cummings, greeting First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, wife of liberal and democratic President, Franklin D. Roosevelt, most likely at the LA Jewish Home for the Aged. I love...
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Rabbi Magnin and the Moguls
My great-grandmother Ida Mayer Cummings with Rabbi Edgar Magnin, 1960. “He was the right rabbi in the right temple in the right city at the right moment in time. If he had not presided over our B’nai...
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What Ben Urwand has taught us: the package is not the product
Mary Pickford (right) with my great-grandmother, Ida Mayer Cummings, Louis B. Mayer’s sister. The two women were dear friends, and it was through Ida that Mary become a devoted benefactor of Jewish...
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UPDATED: The Perfect Pickford Family
Mary Pickford and Buddy Rogers with adopted children Roxanne and Ron. “Things didn’t work out that much, you know. But I’ll never forget her. I think that she was a good woman.” Ron Pickford Rogers....
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Judy Garland – the tragic arc of the child star.
My grandmother, Mitzi Cummings, interviews a very young Judy Garland, who in this photo looks like she may be promoting her first movie, musical short Every Sunday, which included fellow child actor,...
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Me, the ghost of the future past
An amazing family photo: (standing from left to right) Ida Mayer Cummings with sister Yetta Mayer Rieder, her oldest son Jack Cummings next to youngest son, Leonard Cummings and youngest daughter, my...
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Sid Grauman: the hair, the theaters, the chutzpah.
Louis B Mayer with Grauman Chinese Theater, Sid Grauman, and a young Marion Davies, actress. Date circa 1925. Location unknown. Anyone who comments about a rare early morning start to play himself in...
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RIP Louis B Mayer – 55th anniversary of his death
Rare photo of a young Louis B Mayer with his wife Margaret Shenberg picking apples. Place unknown, date unknown, however probably before 1920. RIP ~ Louis B Mayer ~ July 12, 1884 – October 29, 1957 On...
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Ida and the Sinner, Mae West
My great-grandmother Ida Mayer Cummings with the unstoppable Mae West. Date unknown, however might be early 1930s. Mae West was most likely a VIP guest of a Jewish Home for the Aged event in Los...
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The tailor’s son takes a wife…
My grandfather Solomon (Sol) Baer Fingerman (right) with his younger sister, Esther, and older brother, Samuel in their father’s tailoring workshop in Denver, Colorado. He later changed his name from...
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The Humanitarian Hat – Ida greets First Lady, Eleanor Roosevelt
My great-grandmother, Ida Mayer Cummings, greeting First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, wife of liberal and democratic President, Franklin D. Roosevelt, most likely at the LA Jewish Home for the Aged. I love...
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To bury a son…
Leonard M. Cummings. Date unknown. “Instead, Leonard took his last breath with no more to give and no more to get.” In this photo, joy meets agony… This is a portrait of my great-uncle Leonard M....
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The boring places where obsessions are born
“At some point, while I was still on the article’s first page, the young man hopped into the doctor’s office. I kept reading. He would need stitches for sure. The receptionist kept typing. It occurred...
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