Class of 1932

MEMORIAM        BIOGRAPHIES        MEMORABILIA

IN MEMORIAM 

Mildred ARNOLD
Martha Bogdonovich BOMBERGER
John M. CRAWFORD 31 Dec 1917-5 May 1993
Lenore Gnegy SPIGGLE
Mary Lawrence GOVERDICH 18 Jan 1914-8 Aug 1994
Mary Lee GROSS (1913-2001)
Mildred MAMISH
William MILLER
Paul MOSSER
Jack PACHOSA (1912-1990)
Irene PARSONS (1915-1989)
Dana RUCKLE
Adele SHREVE (1913-1990)
Lenore Gnegy SPIGGLE (1915-1940)
Mary Evelyn WALTERS
Boyd WISE (    -    )
Amelia Zalatoris PARKER  aka Sunee PARKER d. 2000
Joe ZWISLE

BIOGRAPHIES

Mary Lee GROSS: Married Wilson Hunter EFFLAND (DHS Class of 1931), was a homemaker, who worked several years for Kelly-Springfield Tire and Rubber Co. in Cumberland. She was member a member of Davis United Methodist Church. She is survived by several nieces, and one nephew. Burial Sunset Memorial Park, Cumberland, MD. ? (Obit: Cumberland Times 19 Sep 2001)
 
Amelia ZALATORIS aka Sunee PARKER: Sun, The (Baltimore, MD): Headline: Sunee Parker: Ronald  Reagan, Adlai Stevenson and Jack Benny Were Among Her Customers. December 16, 2000: Sunee Parker, 87, who gained celebrity in 1930s as city's only female barber Author: SUN STAFF Jacques Kelly; Sunee Parker, who as Baltimore's only female barber in the 1930s and early 1940s became a local celebrity, died Wednesday of respiratory failure at Burke Health Care Center in Burke, Va. She was 87 and had lived in Mount Vernon. For three decades, she had a leather-backed barber's chair in the Hotel Belvedere, where a future president and entertainment celebrities waited their turn for shaves and haircuts. When the hotel temporarily closed in the 1970s, she moved her business two blocks away, to the first floor of the Horizon House apartments at Calvert and Chase streets. She retired there in 1988. At the height of her renown, she appeared on "What's My Line," a popular Sunday night television show on which a celebrity panel tried to guess the occupations of guests. New York publishing executive Bennett Cerf correctly identified her profession before a national audience. Before the arrival of unisex hair-cutting operations in the 1960s, it was considered unusual for a woman to cut men's hair. It was not until World War II that women became barbers, and there were not many of them in Baltimore for another 25 years. She gave Ronald Reagan, then an actor, a trim in the 1940s. Presidential candidate Adlai E. Stevenson. comedian Jack Benny, boxer Jack Dempsey and singer Tennessee Ernie Ford all sat in her chair in what was once one of the city's busiest hotels. "After she was on `What's My Line,' she got a number of offers to work in other cities," said Sandra Zalatoris-Kivowitz, a niece who lives in Lake Ridge, Va. "They wanted her to be in the movies, too." Miss Parker got a mention in Walter Winchell's syndicated newspaper column: "Talent scouts are talking about Sunee Parker, the female barber at the Belvedere Hotel in Baltimore who refuses to leave her job for lucrative film opportunities." "Her clientele followed her everywhere," said Orem Wahl, a neighbor who lives on Calvert Street. "She was a real downtown figure. She went to the racetrack once a week." Miss Parker, who wore her hair in a Prince Valiant style, kept scrapbooks of her career, including an Evening Sun article of Oct. 30, 1935 headlined: "City's Only Girl Barber Has Many Close Shaves." She often told her interviewers that she did not date her customers. Asked about her intentions, she replied, "Sorry, I am married to a barber's chair." Her first assignment was cutting hair at the old Park Terminal Barbershop, a neighborhood barbershop near a streetcar barn at Pennsylvania and Fulton avenues in 1935. Born in Thomas, W.Va., she was a graduate of Davis High School in Davis, W.Va. She enrolled in a 12-week barbering course at the Tri-City Barber School on East Baltimore Street, receiving her state license in 1935. She often appeared at barbers conventions and occasionally wore exaggerated hats, such as one that supported a barber's pole. She also traveled to London and Paris to study styling there. A Mass of Christian burial will be offered at 10:30 a.m. today at St. Ignatius Roman Catholic Church, Calvert and Madison streets, where she was a member. Survived by nieces and nephews, Miss Parker left instructions in her will that her tombstone was to read: "The barber stylist is in."
 

MEMORABILIA

Class Sponsor: Jason WOLFORD

Main Menu     Class Menu     Announcements