Fleeing the Fates of the Little Rascals

View, through the eyes of a child and teenager, the scene of growing up in the glamorous Hollywood of the 1930s and 1940s! During childhood, the author visited or auditioned at almost every major movie studio in Tinseltown. What was it like to work on the set of Hal Roach's Little Rascals? To be given a screen test with one of Hollywood's greatest directors? To be told "never again to call" the office of Columbia Pictures studio boss, Harry Cohn? To receive from one of the Marx Brothers, the gift of a camera? Author Laura June Kenny experienced all this and more. Her memoir provides a unique look at a Hollywood and a Southern California that is no more, and cannot be replaced. Born disadvantaged in the worst year of the Great Depression, her fate was to be discovered and to be loved by a disparate group of people who inspired her to reach for the "real stars," and thereby find her stardom. Filled with rare photos from the author's own collection, this is the story of a Hollywood moppet turned teacher, writer, public speaker, emcee, wife, mother, grandmother, and what she learned along the way!

Born impoverished in the Great Depression's worst year, toddler Laura June Williams found care beyond her family. Foster parents showered her with love, but one show business couple embraced her in the lap of luxury in Hollywood's Golden Era. During childhood, she appeared in several episodes of the Little Rascals and other films. After attending Berkeley and U.C.L.A., Laura June chose to teach young children in both California and Canada.In recent years the author wrote extensively for the Kingston (Ontario) Whig-Standard, and was a weekly columnist for the Pahrump (Nevada) Gazette. She is currently editing the memoirs of two octogenarians, transcribing her own pioneer great-grandmother's 1874-1896 journal, and writing and speaking on end-of-life issues.