Talk:Rosamond Marshall

Latest comment: 13 years ago by Nihola in topic Edited for encyclopedic style

Untitled edit

Peace and blessings to whom it may concern, Since there was littleinformation on the internet about author Rosamond Marshall, I went to the public library and the library of one of the local colleges to see what I could find. I found articles, which I listed in the references, in Biography and Twentieth Century Authors as well as her obituary (of sorts) in the New York Times. I used the information to submit this article. How does an article about a dead person not read as an obituary? The articles were written while she was alive and put the information in the past tense because I am writing in 2008 and she died in 1957. Please let me know how to correct this, because two of her novels Kitty and The Bixby Girls were made into motion pictures. The former by the same name and the latter as The Fine Young Cannibals

Rosamond Marshall was my father's sister. She employed publicists to manufacture her biography. This Wikipedia one is gravely in error on a number of points.

Rosamond was born in 1893 (see Botsford family genealogy, Joseph Line).

Her father, Charles Hull was not a newspaperman, though he did publish one book of poems. He was an engineer and inventor. Her mother, Florence Tappan was the editor of 'The Botsford Collection of Folk Songs from Around the World' published by G. Schirmer, and prominent in the WPA music program as head (unverified) of the YWCA music program in New York. They were a Staten Island NY family and the articles cited are almost certanly fabrications as to her education.

She was, during the period after the Great War (1914-1918) based in Brussels, Belgium, during which period she wrote for the Christian Science Monitor. She and her mother were both Christian Scientists.

She had written a long biography of the painter Thomas Gaisborough which she hawked around New York publishers. The last to be approached was Sidney Satenstein. As she told me personally in 1948, Satenstein read no farther than the first chapter, in which a young woman on the streets was invited to model for the painter. She mistook his intentions. Satenstein focused on this scene and told her, 'start with that scene and write a novel about her rise in society and I'll make you a million bucks.' He did. I can verify this because I met Satenstein with her in New York. That was the beginning of her career in Roimances. 'Kitty' was made into a popular film.

She did marry a rather second-rate painter called Gareazzo (I have one drawing of his) and an adopted daughter, Sandrine Ballard. Marshall, with whom I toured Radio City Music Hall in 1939, was her second husband. I have the impression he worked on the mechanics of the famous Wurlitzer organ there.

It is possible she knew French and German, but though French was my first language I never heard her speak it. Her marriage in Italy was brief. Rangoni (talk) 16:07, 18 September 2008 (UTC)Reply

Her farm on Victoria Island, B.C. was her joy.



Edited for encyclopedic style edit

I spent some time this morning working on the article. I removed quite a lot from her personal life, as it didn't have inline citations and you feel the information is not correct anyway. Wikipedia is pretty strict with this regarding biographies. I've added a few other references regarding the books that were made into movies. I added inline citations for the solid information, and put 'citation required' for the areas that really should be verified. If you have additional detail with solid sources, then more can of course be added in. Because I didn't know what information came from the obituary, I could only use the info that was accessible via the internet for the inline citations.

I added an info box with some details, but a non-copyrighted photo would be great. I can help with that if you have one, just let me know.

I linked to the movies that were based on her books, and added some other relevent internal links. I formatted the page so that it's in line with Wikipedia style (lead paragraph).

The page is pretty solid, and her name is already credited on the movie pages, so I've removed all the tags. Of course, more verifiable detail is always good.

One question: Why is her maiden name different from the surname of her parents? If I made an error here, I apologize, but it's unclear.

 :)  Nihola (talk) 19:44, 27 August 2010 (UTC)Reply