Comments About Elizabeth Short From People Who Knew Her

"In the first place, she didn't drink, she didn't smoke, because after all, living with her, I knew, and she always came in at a decent hour, 11 o'clock, or around there. She never came in later than that, and naturally if she was supposed to be sexy and do other stuff, there is a lot more that goes to it, rather than if a decent girl -- there is drinking, smoking, wining and dining, and a few other things that go with it. I don't think she was trying to be sexy -- in a very innocent way [trying to put on glamour]. In a plain way. Nothing malicious about her.


"This Bill Robinson tried to take advantage of her once and he slapped her in the face and threw her out of the car. She came home crying about that. I don't think anyone else tried anything.

"She was the type that didn't want anybody to touch her clothes and she didn't want to touch theirs. She washed everything and was a very meticulous person."

"Tender. Young and tender."

---

"I think she was prettier without her makeup on. I remember one day going up to her apartment on the top floor, and she answered the door, standing there in a light blue chenille bathrobe, with a towel wrapped around her hair. She had just washed her hair. And she looked so pretty. Her high cheek bones, creamy skin.

"I don't think she dyed her hair, it was naturally black. Had always been dark. I always remember her having dark hair and blue eyes. I used to pal around with Muriel sometimes. We were the same age, in classes together. Bette and Muriel were the two Shorts I knew. I remember Muriel being very popular and having a lot of friends. Mrs. Short was a hardworking woman, just trying to bring up her girls, and she kept the apartment very neat and clean.

"The last time I saw Bette was in 1945. The war was still on and I was working at the soda fountain in Liggett's on Tremont Street in Boston -- wore a beige and green uniform with an apron and a little thing on my head. Bette would come in and sit at the counter. Have a cold drink. She didn't try to pick up anyone, but just would be friendly to people around her. I can't remember what we talked about, just remember it was always interesting to talk to her.

"She had a walk like none I've ever seen. Standing very straight, smaller steps than other people, and very fast. You couldn't help but notice her. Sometimes when I'd see her walk down Salem Street I'd see her sort of casually look around, but I'm sure she was looking to see if anyone was watching her. She liked to be noticed. And her hips moved, but it wasn't just a wiggle. Different. You could never forget that walk.

"Sometimes she'd meet me and we'd go shopping together in Boston. The day I bought my pea coat was very embarrassing. The sales lady asked me if I wanted to wear it home, and I said, "Yes." She put the sales slip inside with my coat and wrapped them in a box. On the way out we were stopped by the store detective, and brought to a small room. I unwrapped the box, showed him the sales slip and everything was o.k. He apologized. I had been a little nervous, but Bette wasn't flustered. Just took it in stride.

"One night on the stoops we talked a little about her trips, and her plans. She could hardly wait to turn 21 -- a few more months. She hated the work permits that women under 21 had to carry.

"Bette's boyfriends treated her with respect, like a lady. If I had a date with a guy who had a car, he'd honk the horn and I'd come running out. But not Bette. I remember watching as her date went all the way up the three flights of stairs, and when they came out, he opened the car door for her, helped her in and out. She was treated like a lady."

---

"In 1946 I was going to high school and working part-time at Brittingham's on Sunset Boulevard near Columbia Studios. Elizabeth Short was a frequent customer. We knew she wasn't a hooker. Not the type. She was a woman of mystery. People always noticed her and wondered about her. Soft, feminine, and fragile. She never laughed loudly. Pale face, always wore black, about 5'5" tall. I spoke to her a few times in the powder room. There was a rumor that she was going with someone connected to Columbia Studios, someone named Mac or Max. Exact dates are hard to remember but it was around the time Orson Welles was shooting The Lady from Shanghai. He was one of the regulars."

---

"I knew Bette Short, saw her in 1944, 45, 46, whenever she came back for a visit. I was shocked, and felt so sorry for Bette. She was condemned for things she never should have been. She was sexy and people condemned her for the way she flaunted herself.

"I couldn't figure Bette out. We never met at her house in Medford, usually somewhere else, on a predetermined corner or an out-of-the-way restaurant. It wasn't that I was married, she just seemed to prefer it that way. There was no sex involved, but sometimes I'd sneak Bette into my rooming house. We'd try to be quiet because guests, especially female guests were not allowed in the rooms. We'd whisper and give each other massages, not sexual, more innocent. She had a kind of purity that made it so I could not, would not go further. She seemed so trusting.

"Sometimes I'd get this feeling about her. I told her I wanted to wash the make up off her face, wanted her to be her natural self, but I never firmly told her 'Be yourself!'

"We would drive around in my car, maybe go to a drive-in for cheeseburgers or park near the reservoir and talk, maybe a few kisses—but never passionate. Bette didn't talk about other men in her life.

"She was smart enough, but she seemed content to float. She seemed to want companionship. Just live for today… forget her problems… just enjoy the time together. 'Let's enjoy today, right now. Enjoy what we have,' is what she'd say. Somewhere she was looking for something. She was smart enough, but I always felt she was not utilizing her full capabilities. I tried to tell her.

"We might be laughing and joking and then she would grow very quiet and a sadness would come over her, but she wouldn't tell me what was bothering her. I figured Bette's life had been tough, and I felt I wanted to help her in some way.

"The last time I saw Bette in '46 she told me she was going back to California. This time she felt sure she could make it, but first she had a job lead, she said, a modeling job in Indiana that someone had lined up for her."

---

"1947. Can never forget reading the newspaper. 'Mama, Bette Short has been killed.' 1938 - 46 Knew Bette from school, never friends just to say hello. Bette a porcelain China doll with beautiful eyes -- think of them as blue, but sometimes would change depending on color she wore, and became greenish. She'd be here for a few months and then disappear. Porky O'Neil from Washington Square took Betty to a prom. Later he went in the service.

"The family was haunted by reporters. A lovely, lovely family. Just terrible. In those days children were your whole world. Can remember Muriel saying, 'My sister's dead, my sister's dead.' Saying it over and over again -- for weeks after, trying to convince herself."

---

"Can't remember too much. Bette loved children. I remember her taking you [Mary Pacios] to Ben Shuman's Drug Store, on the corner of Cross Street, one door down from my store. She'd buy you an ice cream cone. I've seen all the neighborhood kids grow up, families move away.

"We didn't lose anyone during the war. All the kids came back -- some wounded, like your brother, Bob. Her murder was the worst thing that ever happened to us. Just shocking. Her family traded at the A & P, across the street. Maybe once or twice they'd come in. But she'd always talk to me when I was standing out front, kibitz a little. A pretty girl. A real shame."

---

"I never dated Bette. My father used to gang up with her and they'd tease me. He sure liked Bette. The apple of his eye. Bette would make his day

"She was different in some ways, and not quiet. I never remember her roughhousing. But she was always friendly, never at a loss for words. And it wasn't just that she was so pretty. There are lots of pretty girls. There was something different. She was someone you liked to watch, the kind of girl boys might sneak looks at but would get tongue-tied if she spoke to you. And that walk of hers. It wasn't put on. She always walked that way, even in junior high. I always thought that if she had a glass of water on her head she wouldn't spill a drop.

"And Kenny, Kenny Schmidt—he had a wicked crush on her. Guess we were fourteen or fifteen then. I was like Kenny, shy around girls. And I guess in a way we were afraid of her. We were all the same age but she seemed so sophisticated. She'd watch the band practice, the drills over at the City Hall parking lot. I'd see her sitting with her sister Muriel on the Common and then they'd come over to the house for refreshments afterwards. Kenny took a lot of ribbing. He'd stammer around her and his face would turn beet red."

"I can't remember the first time I saw her. Always seemed to know her from the first grade at Washington School on.

"It's funny, but I remember the day she signed my yearbook. She came by the house and we couldn't find a pen, so she signed her name with a pencil. Everyone else signed with a pen, but Bette signed with a pencil."

---

"I was a Lieutenant in the '40s. Made Captain in 1955, became Medford Chief of Police 1961 -1970. Remember seeing Bette in Medford Cafe, around 1945, 1946. Bette worked in Cambridge, would come in the Cafe late around 1:10 AM; leave around 1:30 AM. She'd always walk home alone. If she liked you, she was not shy about throwing herself at you. We'd kibbitz. She was stunning, like a model. I used to wonder why she picked me to talk to. I was married at the time. Then I figured maybe I was protection against some of the guys that were ogling her."

---

"Bette was always nice to me, friendly, and talked to everyone. She liked to tease Hector [Dorothy's husband]. Called him Horace. He'd say, 'My name ain't Horace.' But she'd just laugh. Sometimes Hector's chickens would get out the coop and Bette would run all the way down from her porch and chase the chickens back in. There was nothing like watching Bette chase the chickens. Then when Hector came home she'd yell down, "Horace, I put your chickens back in again." She always called Hector, Horace.

"Your [Mary Pacios'] father would sit on the wall and Bette would talk to him. I don't know what they would talk about, but sometimes they would talk for a long time. Your father and Hector really liked Bette. Hector won't talk about her, and he doesn't like me talking to you about her.

"Bette was very good to Muriel. Bette was good, sweet, funny, not stuck up, always stopped and chatted, made you feel at ease. And what a walk. The truck drivers and men would stare when she walked down the street. It was a wonder there weren't more truck accidents when she walked down Salem Street. She always dressed well, and I remember her black suit. She'd wear a small pink hat with pink ostrich feathers and when she walked the feathers would float. She just looked so graceful, but eye-catching, something to look at.

"Maybe Bette was different in California, but I can't believe she changed that much. I can't say anything bad about Bette. I can't say anything bad about Bette. Newspapers said so many different and conflicting things. They said her father went to a carnival and never came back, went to the store for a loaf of bread and never came back. He sent Bette money. Bette saved her money.

"The reporters were all over my back yard. They'd try to talk to me but I'd just run in the house, and kept the kids away from them. Afterwards, right after Bette died, Muriel would come over and talk about Bette, all the things she did for her, bought her little presents, was nice to her. But a few months later she seemed to want to forget.”

---

"I was a pal of Dot Short's. We were two years older than Bette, and graduated from Medford High in 1940. Mrs. Short was very strict with her girls. They moved in to the triple-decker next to the Visiting Nurse's Association about 1937, but Bette wasn't with them when they moved in. She was at a summer camp for kids who had TB.

"Mrs. Short worked and wasn't home during the day. Girls couldn't have friends in the house when she wasn't there. Or we couldn't come over around meal time. House very neat and clean. Girls all had chores, helped out. Bette and Dottie in demand as babysitters -- rates: .25 before midnight, an extra .10 if you stayed after midnight.

"Dottie, Bette and I were going to be movie stars. We were all entranced with movie stars, star struck. Spent hours talking about movie stars, about going to Hollywood. We performed using the Short's front porch as a stage. Every Friday as soon as the song sheets came out, we'd pool our money, get the latest sheets, and spend hours singing. Bette imitated Deanna Durbin. Walked like her, talked like her, and in my eyes sang like her. Dottie was a cut up, a character -- used to get me in trouble in school, call my name and then when I'd turn around the teacher would catch me.

"I married in 1942 and moved away. A few months before the war broke out I was visiting in Medford and saw Bette in the restaurant directly across from our house on Salem Street. The proprietor, Mr. Griffin, owned both our big house and the restaurant. There weren't any tables, just stools and a counter to the right when you walked in.

"I was surprised to see Bette sitting at the counter. At first I didn't recognize her. Bette was dressed to the nines. She had on a leopard skin coat and hat. Bette looked so sophisticated and striking—like a model. I sat down next to her and thought to myself, Dottie's kid sister sure has grown up! Bette was sitting on the stool with her legs crossed, wearing dark stockings and suede pumps, and a lot of makeup by Medford standards—pancake and lipstick with a touch of mascara—making her look much older than her seventeen years. Bette was very up. She told me she had been to Florida.

"I told her Florida certainly agreed with her! And asked her what she was doing in Florida. Bette said she was working as a waitress in a nice hotel. Since she'd been back, the only work she'd been able to get was ushering at the Square Theater. She planned to go back to Florida in a month or so, but what Bette said she really hoped to do was break into modeling.

"Well, I told Bette, I was sure she could do it. I told her she looked like she just stepped out of a magazine. I asked her to say hello to Dottie for me and joked that I never got to see anyone now that I was an old married lady living in Stoneham."

---

"Medford was a sleepy college town, with band concerts, parades, and movies as the main entertainment.

"Bette started traveling in 1940 for her health -- worked in Florida as waitress during the winter. She was so alive. Had such a personality. In the Court we got to know her. She had a soft voice.

"1939 -- You [Mary Pacios] were about 5 or 6 when she befriended you and started taking you to the movies. Sometimes to the matinees -- ten cents, and you'd come back with a piece of the Depression glass. The TV movie about her wasn't Bette. Bette would be kind to a little child. I couldn't picture that Lucy Arnaz character being good to a child. Bette was very open. Nobody really knew her family. But Bette really enjoyed talking to us. Muriel too. Bette would open her window and talk to the people in Dot's yard -- even the children.

"Bette liked you, could talk to you. You were so pretty with blue eyes, and her being so pretty with blue eyes. You had a personality like hers. She used to like to watch you in parades. It wasn't like taking a kid to the shows. I would see you two talking. And walking together down the street.

"Bette liked to tease people -- give them pet names -- Jules was Julius, and she always called Hector, 'Horace'.

"1945-1946 Bette was traveling back and forth. Come home to Medford stay a few months and be off again. Friends and neighbors used to sit on the wall -- the famous wall of our front yard on Salem Street -- they'd be waiting for the trolley or just sitting there warm nights, talking. Bette would always stop and talk -- especially to your father. She always called him Mr. Pacios. They used to tease back and forth. She was the apple of your father's eye. Mr. Barrett would always kid your father. 'Here comes your girlfriend,' he'd say.

"I was working in Belmont and Bette was working in Belmont as a hostess in a tea room. We'd ride back on the same trolley. I never saw her with a man. Only once, on the trolley, an older man, and they were talking.

"She didn't wear black all the time. It was stylish black when she did. I remember her in a black fitted suit -- no collar, and a camel's hair coat that had a little pink in it, and a pink hat with feathers. She told me she got it at cost after modeling it. She didn't have many clothes, but they were all good. She showed me the watch the major gave her, and a letter from his mother. She was shook up when she got the news. [Major Matt Gordon's death.] They were engaged. The watch was expensive, oval with diamonds.

"Movie stars don't have anything on Bette. She told me she had been picked as 'Camp Cutie' when she worked at the PX. Real proud of it.

"Her hair was very dark, black. She liked to be admired. But I always felt it was 'look but don't touch.' And that walk! That's what used to cause all the attention! You can take Marilyn Monroe and try to compare them with their walks! It never looked exaggerated to me. Wasn't put on.

"Before she died, nobody talked about her. No one had bad thoughts about her. I just liked her. I can't help it. Once you saw Bette Short, you couldn't forget her."

---

"1937 - 1940 Bette babysat me and my two brothers. Loved her as a babysitter. Bette liked children. She entertained us. Told stories, acting out different parts -- hand motions, different voices for the characters. Never raised her voiced -- would say, 'Don't do that. Your mother would not approve.'

"Bette was pretty, very neat and stylish -- not a hair out of place. Well brought up, acted like a lady. Proud of her looks and very polite. You'd think she was upper middle class. Her father wanted her to get into the movies, sent her money to go to California. She was gone 3- 6 months and came back changed -- went Hollywood. Looked, dressed, and acted like a movie star, as if she had already made it. We thought that someday when we went to the movies, it would be Bette's face that we'd see up there on the screen. People in cars would look at her when she walked down the street. She had a sultry walk. It was like Bette was saying, 'I am here. I am a star.' Medford was too quiet for her. She wanted the action.

"Around 1945 or 46 she was going with Mr. Griffin. She'd be in the restaurant [across from 101 Salem Street] all the time. She had a father complex. She'd also hang around the Medford Cafe and went to the Square Theater.

"Bette was a friend of my cousin Dorothy -- school chums for years, best friends. Bette used to be over my Aunt's house all the time."

---

"Knew Bette Short in 1944, maybe autumn, mild weather. Remember her wearing a light blue two-piece dress or suit that reflected the color of her eyes. And a black or dark colored raincoat, which in those days was an all-purpose coat. She'd come into the Medford Cafe. It would be late at night after midnight. I was a student at Leland Powers School of Radio, my last year. I was 4F. Sometimes I'd be alone, sometimes I'd be with some friends.

"Bette liked the booths, out of the spotlight. She seemed like a private person, embarrassed by remarks. Bette would join us, and we'd move to a booth, but sometimes she'd leave if the conversation got rough or vulgar. Usually she could handle things, had a way of freezing you with a look. Mostly Bette would talk to me. Best were the times when we were alone.

"I think Bette was a victim of our time. She wanted to be somebody famous. She had stars in her eyes, dreams rather than plans. She'd talk about her trips. I never equated her with the Black Dahlia. Nature gave her a great endowment. She didn't wear seductive clothes, didn't need to. She was meticulous, neat. I think of her as pretty, private, with a sadness about her. A void, something missing. She seemed older than her years, more mature. Somehow I felt she didn't know how to cope. She didn't smile a lot. She had a soft voice, low, refined, not tough, a shadow figure. White, white alabaster skin and black, black hair. She had lipstick shaped full lips, no rouge. She wasn't brazen, not a hussy."

---

"I was a student at Harvard. She worked at a restaurant, Saint something. It was in the mid-40s. She was nice, very good-looking. I'd go in with a couple of classmates. We kept trying to date her. Finally she relented and made a date to meet us after work one night. She never showed up. I think she knew our intentions were less than honorable."

---

"Bette would come in, buy cosmetics, and 'feminine' supplies. She was unabashed, open about such purchases, not like other women customers. Sometimes I noticed you [Mary Pacios] would be with her. You'd sit at the soda fountain, Bette treating you to a lime rickey or an ice cream cone.

"Bette would talk to people, always friendly. Around 6:30 or 7:00 pm the next day's edition of the Daily Record would come out and it would be a little busy with people coming in to pick up the paper. Sometimes I'd see Bette around then talking to various people, and to Ben Shuman the owner. This would have been in 1945, 1946."

---

"Bette went to school with my brother. She was very nice to me when I was a child. Took me for walks and to the movies. Over the years, I've often thought about my last time with Bette, visualizing it in my mind, sort of a way of keeping her alive.

"I am looking out the window, through the lace curtains, watching Bette walk up our front stairs. She knocks on the door. My mother answers, and I run past her, onto the porch. Bette takes my hand and we walk down the steps, across the street, stopping at the gas station. I remember her talking to someone and me shifting from foot to foot. Then we continue on our way. It's spring and the light is dancing off the buildings.

“We stop at Ruth's Dress Shoppe, where Bette tries on different dresses. I remember a black dress with pink roses. I sit and watch Bette's reflections in the three-way mirror. I feel a little embarrassed when the sales girl remarks how lucky Bette is that she doesn't have to wear falsies. We leave the dress shop and go into the ice cream parlor. It is dark and cool inside. Bette is laughing and raising a spoon to her lips. She is talking, but I never remember the words."

---

"Bette wasn't the only one in our family with health problems. Nonie and I also had asthma. When all three of us were having trouble breathing, we'd take turns in the rocking chair. Sometimes, Mama would send for Doctor Beck and he'd come and give each of us a shot of adrenaline. In those days it wasn't known about allergies to cats and dogs. That's probably why Bette always felt better in Florida and California—no pets.

" Mama never forgave my father for leaving the way he did—business bad, owing creditors, not able to meet the payroll. She closed the business and went to work to put food on the table.

"Mama had a Saturday night routine—ironing, fixing hair ribbons, polishing shoes—making everything neat and pretty.

"Bette was very good to me. Every year just before school started, she'd take me shopping. Bette carefully planned the shopping trip: lunch at the Medford Cafe—I always wanted the baked macaroni. Then we'd go to a matinee at the Square Theatre, and after the movie, to W. T. Grant's on High Street. Concerned about money, I'd always choose the less expensive pencil box, which had only one drawer. But Bette would see me sneaking glances at the bigger pencil boxes with two or three drawers, and Bette would say, 'Maybe this one is better, the one with two drawers. It has more room. Why don't we buy this one?'

"Bette had a large bottle of Lydia Pinckham pills that she took for 'female complaints,' but I didn't dare ask Mama what was wrong. We were brought up old fashioned and never discussed sex with our mother. My sisters and I never walked around half-dressed in our underwear or slips, always covering ourselves with robes. When I no longer saw the bottle, I assumed Bette's problem had cleared up.

"Mama had a premonition. Mama came home from work very tired and went to bed right after supper, but around midnight she woke with a cold chill. Mama told me she felt as if the blanket had been yanked off the bed. She went over to the windows thinking maybe the wind had blown it off, but the windows were closed. Mama said she got a strange feeling. She knew something was wrong, that something had happened to Bette.

"I don't remember who ran the three blocks through the icy snow for the minister. But Reverend Henderson seemed to be there almost from the minute Mama told us. He stayed through most of the night. There were prayers and talk of having strength, and not understanding the why of God's will.

"It was at the airport with the photographers running backwards and the flashbulbs popping that it hit me, inside my head—my sister's dead, my sister's been MURDERED!"

---

"It would've been 1943—every morning, all during the month of August, I saw her. She was living in the old bunkhouse on the ranch, Rancho Santo Antonio, with another girl, just a few miles out of Casmalia, near Santa Barbara. She would wear almost the same outfit every day, a white blouse and black slacks, sometimes jodhpurs, and the spectator shoes. I remember her shoes, the white parts meticulously clean and white, and the black parts shining except where the dust had scuffed around the edges.

"I could almost tell the time just by seeing her appear in the distance, seven-thirty in the morning. She'd be carrying letters to mail. And even if it took me a little longer to finish chores, I arranged it so I would be working near the roadway when she passed by. I was fifteen at the time and could barely manage a 'Good morning,' before blushing. She'd laugh and say teasingly, 'See you tomorrow.' I'd watch as she walked towards town, and I'm ashamed to say, my eyes on her kiester until she disappeared from sight. I felt like a jerk. I'm sure she knew I was watching her."

---

"Bette was my first love when we both went to Roberts Junior High. I always thought it was funny that Bette wouldn't let me come to her house. We'd always meet somewhere and once in a while go to a movie, but mostly talk, and sometimes hold hands, and occasionally kiss—once or twice. I was an orphan, living with a foster family in Fulton Heights. Always felt like an outsider. I played the harmonica, and sometimes Bette would sing along. She liked to hear me play the latest songs.

"Bette was like a porcelain China doll, fragile. She was moody—sometimes shy, sometimes talkative. I'd take her to the Medford Theater to see the movies—always a musical. She liked to take a roundabout route down Ashland Street with its big oaks and elms. We'd go to the United Farmers Ice Cream Parlor after a movie and share a banana split. And as dainty and as ladylike as she seemed, she'd plunge right into the ice cream."

---

"Bette was very good looking with very pale skin and dark hair. And wore what I call a white Teddy Bear coat. When she walked down the street even the grown men would whistle at her. Stunning, beautiful.

"When I was a kid, maybe '40 or '41 used to take Mrs. Short's barrels out on Sunday night because trash pick up was on Monday. Took the three barrels out of the cellar. Paid ten cents. Used to walk up the three flights of stairs to the door on the back porch to collect the ten cents.

"Bette would talk to the kids playing out front. So many kids in Fifield Court and Salem Street didn't need to go to playground. Bette was aspiring to be in Hollywood. My father and Uncle Hector would run to watch her. 'There she goes! There she goes down the street!'

"At the band concerts Bette would dance with me -- a little kid. Some of the older guys would get jealous. We'd do the Lindy."

---