The Helen Morgan Page

… 1931, “Ode to a Porcelain Cat” became Helen Morgan’s first poem to be published. Apropos of nothing, November 21, 1931 also marked the closing day of Ziegfeld Follies of 1931 (Morgan left the production two weeks prior to closing night). Anyway, here’s the poem:

The New York American praised the more ambitious “Mother and Child,” although it escaped publication, as did her subsequent work, “Ode to a Duck” and “Conversation Between Two Cats.”[i]

She sold two poems to College Humor.[ii]A year passed before the magazine published her, a bit of whimsy called “Lover Camels.”

The magazine ultimately passed on the other, a piece of stray verse “about a China doll on the mantelpiece and a snooping bronze cat on the hearthstone.”[iii]

While “Ode to a Porcelain Cat” was Morgan’s first poem to be published, it was not her first time in print. The previous August, she subbed for Julia Shawell’s Evening Graphic column. While it’s nice to get a bit of backstage babble during the run of Ziegfeld Follies of 1931, it’s clear that Morgan, with her overgenerous heart, did not have the makings of a gossip columnist.

[i]       New York American, November 7, 1931 and Schurrer, Juanita, “Helen Morgan Enthusiastic about ‘Show Boat’; Began Singing at Six,” unidentified Highland Park, Michigan newspaper, May 1936

[ii]       McIntyre, O. O., “New York Day By Day.” Reno Evening Gazette, October 1, 1931

[iii]      “… cat on the hearthstone.” – Sobel, Bernard. Broadway Heartbeat: Memoirs of a Press Agent, p. 127