QUEENSLINE
This Astoria native’s powerful voice was featured
in several Broadway musicals and hollywood fi lms
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TIMESLEDGER | QNS.COM | JAN. 29-FEB. 4, 2021 13
In conjunction with the
Greater Astoria Historical
Society, TimesLedger Newspapers
presents noteworthy
events in the borough’s
history.
Born on Jan. 16, 1908, as
Ethel Agnes Zimmermann,
Astoria native Ethel Merman
is perhaps best remembered
for her powerful
mezzo-soprano voice in numerous
Broadway musicals
and Hollywood films.
Her much beloved musical
numbers include “Everything’s
Coming up Roses,”
and “There’s no Business
like Show Business.” Merman
was married four
times, including a 32-day
union with Ernest Borgnine
in 1964.
Ethel Merman was born
in her maternal grandmother’s
house on 26-5 4th St.
in Astoria. She grew up in
Dutch Kills near 37th Avenue
and 30th Street and was
baptized in the local Church
of the Redeemer. The future
star attended P.S. 4 and graduated
from William Cullen
Bryant High School, where
the auditorium was later
named in her honor.
.After being discovered
by a theatre producer during
one of her singing performances,
in 1930 the rising
star landed her first musical
role in George and Ira Gershwin’s
“Girl Crazy.” Merman
performed to rave reviews
at the Alvin Theatre, with
the New York Times noting
that she sang “with dash, authority,
good voice and just
the right …. style.” Perhaps
more remarkable, The New
Yorker called her “imitative
of no one.”
Merman went west to Hollywood
in the early 1930s, but
really made a splash when
she returned to Broadway
for Cole Porter’s “Anything
Goes” in 1934. Returning to
the Alvin Theatre, her voice
graced the stage in the unforgettable
scores “I Get a Kick
out of You” and “You’re the
Top.” The accomplished actress
later won a Tony Award
in 1950 for her role in the musical
“Call Me Madam” and
garnered a Golden Globe for
the screen adaptation.
She saved perhaps her
greatest effort, however, for
her portrayal of the domineering
mother Rose Hovick
in The Broadway Theatre
show “Gypsy.” Running for
702 performances starting
in 1959, she was lauded by
critics, with the New York
Post calling her “a brilliant
actress.”
In her later years, the
girl from Astoria continued
to appear on stage, film and
television. Merman met with
great success in the 1963 Hollywood
comedy It’s a Mad,
Mad, Mad, Mad World, and
later guest starred on The
Ed Sullivan Show, The Lucy
Show, Batman and The Love
Boat. In 1970, she joined the
cast of Hello Dolly in New
York, her return to Broadway
earning her one standing
ovation after another.
Ethel Merman passed
away in her sleep in New York
on February 15, 1984, leaving
behind a legacy just as
rich and varied as her career
spanning seven decades.
“I don’t want to sound
pretentious, but in a funny
way I feel I’m the last of a
kind. Where will they find
the shows like Girl Crazy,
Anything Goes, Annie Get
Your Gun, Call Me Madam
and Gypsy? They just don’t
produce those vehicles anymore.”
For further info, call the
Greater Astoria Historical
Society at 718-
278-0700 or www.
astorialic.org.
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LAST WEEK’S TOP STORY:
Mega Millions ticket worth $1 million sold at Astoria
convenience store
SUMMARY: The New York Lottery announced Saturday morning
that a second prize Mega Millions lottery ticket worth $1 million
was sold at an Astoria convenience store.
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