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Yetta Dorothea Geffen

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Yetta Dorothea Geffen
A young woman with fair skin and dark hair gathered to the nape, photographed in profile, in an oval frame
Yetta Geffen, from a 1919 publication
BornDecember 10, 1891
Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.
DiedMay 21, 1986 (age 94)
Longmeadow, Massachusetts, U.S.
Other namesJetta Geffen, Jetta Mirkil
Occupation(s)Musician, publicist, journalist, editor

Yetta Dorothea Geffen (December 10, 1891 – May 21, 1986), also known as Jetta Geffen Mirkil, was an American musician, journalist, and publicist. She went to Europe after World War I to entertain the troops, playing violin in an all-female quintet sponsored by the YMCA.

Early life[edit]

Geffen was born in Boston and raised in New York City, the daughter of Charles Geffen and Vera Schneirova Geffen.[1][2] Her parents were Russian Jewish immigrants.[3] Her father was a painter and a musician. She attended Wadleigh High School for Girls,[4] and trained as a musician at the Institute of Musical Art under Frank Damrosch.[5]

Career[edit]

Geffen was a member of the editorial staffs at the New York Press and the Washington Times.[6] She also contributed to the New York Tribune, Musical Courier,[7] The Theatre,[8] and The Musical Observer.[9] She often interviewed musicians and actors, but she also covered the women's suffrage movement,[10] and public health reforms.[11]

In 1916 she appeared in period costume for the Civil War segment of the Great Pageant at Yale.[12][13] In March 1918 she was a judge at a costume ball in Greenwich Village.[14] In 1919 she was traveling with D. W. Griffith as his press representative.[5][15] She toured post-war Europe in 1919, playing violin as part of a YMCA-sponsored musical quintet called "Just Girls".[15][16] She wrote from Europe, "Paris may face a coalless winter and New York begins to look very good to me."[17]

Geffen was also an actress,[18] and did publicity for the Greenwich Village Theatre.[19] In 1925, Geffen was managing director of the Richard Mansfield Players in New London, Connecticut.[20][21] She managed the Fifth Avenue Playhouse in Greenwich Village in 1926.[22]

Publications[edit]

  • "The Cabaret Booking Agency" (1913)[8]
  • "Clinging Vines No More; Gently Nurtured Women Who Now Incite to Riot" (1914)[10]
  • "Gossip Anent Our Spring Coiffure? Is it to be High, Low, False or Real?" (1914)[23]
  • "Lou-Tellegen, Newest of Matinee Idols, Makes Love in Six Tongues and Calls American Girl Cultured and 'Tres Chic'" (1914)[24]
  • "A Queen of Stage Adventuresses" (1914)[25]
  • "Some Recent Hits" (1915)[26]
  • "Community Action Remedy for Cruel Waste of Babies' Lives" (1915)[11]
  • "Mme. Calve Great Even to her Own Secretary" (1915)[6]
  • "Outdoor Music on a Huge Scale" (1916)[27]
  • "The Russian Ballet Rehearses" (1916)[7]
  • "The Yale Pageant" (1916)[13]
  • "Wisdom and Wit from the Lips of Teresa Carreño" (1917)[28]
  • "Leopold Godowsky Discusses the Piano and the Universal Brotherhood of Art" (1918)[9]
  • "The Romantic Courtship of Gilda Varesi" (1922)[29]

Personal life[edit]

Geffen married Hazelton Mirkil, a Philadelphia attorney and World War I veteran, in 1935.[2] He died by suicide a few months later.[30] Her inheritance from his estate was a matter for the courts.[31][32] She died in 1986, at the age of 94, in Longmeadow, Massachusetts.[33]

References[edit]

  1. ^ Father's name, birthdate, and birthplace from Geffen's 1919 application for a United States passport, via Ancestry. She gave her father's name as "Sergei Geffen" on her 1935 marriage license forms, and her birthdate as December 10, 1896.
  2. ^ a b "Actress Weds Lawyer". The Philadelphia Inquirer. 1935-02-16. p. 2. Retrieved 2024-06-13 – via Newspapers.com.
  3. ^ Alice Fahs, Out on Assignment: Newspaper Women and the Making of Modern Public Space (University of North Carolina Press 2011): 88-89. ISBN 9780807834961
  4. ^ Wadleigh High School, The Wadleigh Yearbook (1908 yearbook): images 90, 91. via Wadleigh History Project.
  5. ^ a b "Publicity Woman has Wide and Varied Career" The Fourth Estate (January 25, 1919): 28.
  6. ^ a b Geffen, Yetta Dorothea (1915-03-31). "Mme. Calve Great Even to her Own Secretary". Times Herald. p. 12. Retrieved 2024-06-13 – via Newspapers.com.
  7. ^ a b Geffen, Yetta Dorothea (May 4, 1916). "The Russian Ballet Rehearses". Musical Courier. 72 (18): 11.
  8. ^ a b Geffen, Yetta Dorothea (October 1913). "The Cabaret Booking Agency". The Theatre. 18 (152): 126.
  9. ^ a b Geffen, Yetta Dorothea (January 1918). "Leopold Godowsky Discusses the Piano and the Universal Brotherhood of Art". The Musical Observer. 17 (1): 14.
  10. ^ a b Geffen, Yetta Dorothea (1914-06-03). "Clinging Vines No More; Gently Nurtured Women who Now Incite to Riot". The Kansas City Star. p. 18. Retrieved 2024-06-13 – via Newspapers.com.
  11. ^ a b Geffen, Yetta Dorothea (1915-05-19). "Community Action Remedy for Cruel Waste of Babies' Lives". New Britain Herald. p. 4. Retrieved 2024-06-13 – via Newspapers.com.
  12. ^ "40,000 Applaud Music of Yale's Great Pageant" Musical America (October 28, 1916): 4.
  13. ^ a b Geffen, Yetta Dorothea (July 27, 1916). "The Yale Pageant". Musical Courier. 73 (4): 24–26 – via Internet Archive.
  14. ^ "The Society of Salamanders presents the Passing Show of Greenwich Village (advertisement)". The Quill. 2 (4): 29. March 1918.
  15. ^ a b "Publicity Woman Now in France with Y.M.C.A." Fourth Estate (1316): 19. May 17, 1919.
  16. ^ "Yetta Dorothea Geffen Coming Home" Musical Courier (August 28, 1919): 24.
  17. ^ "Yetta Dorothea Geffen Writes of her Concert Trip Abroad". Musical America. 30 (18): 39. August 30, 1919 – via Internet Archive.
  18. ^ "Bainbridge Players". Billboard: 27. March 8, 1924 – via Internet Archive.
  19. ^ "Jetta Geffen Gifted". Billboard: 43. November 7, 1925 – via Internet Archive.
  20. ^ "Richard Mansfield Players to Give Barry's 'You and I' in New Haven Tonight". Hartford Courant. 1925-10-19. p. 17. Retrieved 2024-06-13 – via Newspapers.com.
  21. ^ "Mansfield Players to be Reorganized". Hartford Courant. 1925-12-17. p. 21. Retrieved 2024-06-13 – via Newspapers.com.
  22. ^ "Fifth Avenue Playhouse Opens Oct. 15 with Films". Billboard: 36. October 9, 1926 – via Internet Archive.
  23. ^ Geffen, Yetta D. (1914-01-05). "Gossip Anent Our Spring Coiffure? Is it to be High, Low, False or Real?/Yetta D. Geffen". The Washington Times. p. 8. Retrieved 2024-06-13 – via Newspapers.com.
  24. ^ Geffen, Yetta Dorothea (1914-02-15). "Lou-Tellegen, Newest of Matinee Idols, Makes Love in Six Tongues". The Washington Times. p. 6. Retrieved 2024-06-13 – via Newspapers.com.
  25. ^ Geffen, Yetta Dorothea (December 1914). "A Queen of Stage Adventuresses". The Theatre. 20 (155): 291–294.
  26. ^ Geffen, Yetta D. (February 1915). "Some Recent Hits". The Theatre Magazine. 21 (168): 87–88.
  27. ^ Geffen, Yetta Dorothea (May 25, 1916). "Outdoor Music on a Huge Scale". Musical Courier. 72 (21): 9–11.
  28. ^ Geffen, Yetta Dorothea (April 11, 1917). "Wisdom and Wit from the Lips of Teresa Carreño". Musical Courier.
  29. ^ Geffen, Yetta (1922-06-25). "The Romantic Courtship of Gilda Varesi". Detroit Free Press. p. 96. Retrieved 2024-06-13 – via Newspapers.com.
  30. ^ "Attorney Ends Life". Times Union. 1935-07-19. p. 15. Retrieved 2024-06-13 – via Newspapers.com.
  31. ^ "First Wife Gets Mirkil Estate". Delaware County Daily Times. 1935-10-23. p. 8. Retrieved 2024-06-13 – via Newspapers.com.
  32. ^ "Widow or Divorcee to Get War Insurance". Berwick Enterprise. 1936-12-12. p. 1. Retrieved 2024-06-13 – via Newspapers.com.
  33. ^ Jetta Mirkil in the Massachusetts, U.S. Death Index, via Ancestry
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