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Surnames: Sears, Pullen
Classification: Query
Message Board URL:
http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/rw/WNH.2ACIB/549
Message Board Post:
Her married name was "Starlight" Cady, though she had had two children and was
divorced from Mr. Cady by 1946 or so. But oh, what a talent the lady had.
She was an organist and pianist beyond compare but always local, not national nor
international.
I do not now know of her maiden name nor where she was from. A search for her in the
late 1970's revealed a letter (now lost) from someone in southern California who
claimed to be a relative of the family. Further correspondence led to a dead end.
Mrs. Cady (as she was known to us kids) graduated in the 1930's from The Chicago
Musical College and played in several national Radio show orchestras before marriage. She
and her husband had two children. After her divorce and having to assume the support of
the children, Ms. Cady went to work as a teacher and church organist/pianist while the
children were cared for by her own mother in a town fairly close to Fort Worth. I do know
that Mrs. Cady never drove a vehicle and relied soley on local Public Transportation and
the caring and support of close friends.
The older of her two children was a girl. I believe her name was Mary. She was probably 17
in 1955. The younger child was a boy, probably 16 in that same year.
Mrs. Cady was a studio teacher, a demonstrator, and a salesperson for the various
keyboard instrument companies in our area including the then-new "Electronic"
Hammond and Connsonata organs, the Steinway and host of other pianos.... and products of
the Reuters and Allen Organ Companies.
She played in public most of her long life and was the "convention pianist"
for most of the public gatherings in Fort Worth in the 1940's and into the
1960's.
Age finally cought up with her and sometime before 1968, she had retired in ill
health to California to live with family members there.
Oh, that "Chicago College of Music" later became the College of Music of
the University of Illinois at Evanston.
Her performances of Bach, of Mozart, of Chopin, of Gershwin, of the great hymns of
the church, and the "Pop" standards of the day, remain unsurpassed in my mind
at this great length in time.
The late Jack Gordon, once a leading columnist for "The Fort Worth Press"
newspaper, once wrote of the performance of an international star in Dallas at the fabled
"Fair Park Auditorium", site of so many wonderful and legendary performances .
Gordon thought the artist was very good but, in closing, is reported to have written,
"but I can drive twenty minutes from my office, and while relaxing with friends, hear
the greatest artist ever to play in our area, and almost every night: "Star"
Cady."
Someone help me track down her relatives. Thanks/Rich Pullen/Fort Worth