Beatrice Kay

 Beatrice Kay (April 21, 1907– November 8, 1986)

Her career began at the age of six as "Little Lord Fauntleroy" in stock theater in Louisville, Kentucky. Kay went on to become a headliner at Billy Rose's Diamond Horseshoe Nightclub in New York. She was on The Mercury Theatre on the Air (directed by Orson Welles), and eventually hosted a radio show, The Beatrice Kay Show, in 1946. Also on radio, she sang regularly on Gaslight Gaieties and Gay Nineties Revue. On Broadway, Kay appeared in Tell Me Pretty Maiden (1937), Provincetown Follies (1935), and Jarnegan (1928). She also recorded several phonograph albums, and appeared in a 1945 motion picture about the club where she had performed in her earlier years—Billy Rose's Diamond Horseshoe. In addition, Kay appeared with Cliff Robertson in 1961's Underworld U.S.A. and in 1969's A Time for Dying, with Victor Jory and Audie Murphy. Songs which she helped popularize include "A Bird in a Gilded Cage", "No! No! A Thousand Times No!!", "The Band Played On", "Mention My Name In Sheboygan", and "Ta-ra-ra Boom-de-ay". She died in North Hollywood, California, in 1986, aged 79, having been in poor health after suffering a series of strokes. Kay was cremated, and the ashes scattered.