Erma Bombeck
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Erma Louise Bombeck (February 21, 1927 – April 22, 1996), born Erma Fiste, was an American humorist who achieved great popularity for a newspaper column that depicted suburban home life humorously, in the second half of the 20th century. Bombeck also published 15 books, most of which became best-sellers.
From 1965 to 1996, Erma Bombeck published over 4,000 newspaper humor articles. By the 1970s, her witty columns were read, twice weekly, by thirty million readers of 900 newspapers of the U.S. and Canada.
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[edit] Early Life
Erma Bombeck was born in Dayton, Ohio. She grew up in a working-class family. Her father was the city crane operator Cassius Fiste, and her mother's name was also Erma. Bombeck lived with her elder paternal half-sister, Thelma.
Erma began elementary school one year earlier than usual for her age, in 1932, and became an excellent student and an avid reader. She particularly enjoyed the popular humor writers of the time. After Erma's father passed away in 1936, she moved, with her mother, into her grandmother's home. In 1938 her mother remarried, to Albert Harris (a moving van owner). Erma practiced tap dance and singing, and was hired by a local radio for a children's revue for eight years.
[edit] Formative Years
In 1940, Erma Bombeck entered Emerson Junior High School, and began writing a humorous column for its newspaper, The Owl. In 1942, Bombeck entered Patterson Vocational High School, where she wrote a serious column, mixing in bits of humor.
In 1942, Bombeck began to work at the Dayton Herald as a copygirl, sharing her full-time assignment with a girlfriend. In 1943, for her first journalistic work, Bombeck interviewed Shirley Temple, who visited Dayton, and the interview became a newspaper feature.
Bombeck completed high school in 1944. Then, to earn a college scholarship fund, she worked for a year as a typewriter and shorthand typist, for the Dayton Herald and several other companies, and did minor journalistic assignments (obituaries, etc.) for the Dayton Herald as well.
Using her college fund, Bombeck enrolled in Ohio University at Athens in 1946. However, she failed most of her literary assignments and was rejected for the university newspaper; plus she ended up with no more money after the first semester.
Bombeck enrolled, nevertheless, into the Roman Catholic University of Dayton. She lived in her own family home and was hired by Rike's Store, a department store, where she wrote humorous material for the company newsletter. In the college, the English professor and priest Tom Price commented to Bombeck about her great prospects as a writer, and she began to write for the university publication, The Exponent. Bombeck graduated in 1949, with a degree in English. She became a life-long active contact for the University — helping financially and participating personally — and became a lifetime trustee of the institution in 1987.
In 1949, Bombeck also converted to the Roman Catholic church, from the United Brethren church, and married Bill Bombeck, a former fellow student of Dayton University, who was a veteran of the World War II Korean front. His subsequent profession would be that of school supervisor.
[edit] Housewife Column
[edit] Early Journalism
Erma Bombeck stayed on as a Dayton Journal Herald reporter, in the women's section, writing both its feature stories and a humorous housekeeping column, "Operation Dustrag." Bombeck also interviewed Eleanor Roosevelt and Mamie Eisenhower.
[edit] Housewife (1954-1964)
The Bombecks were told by doctors that having a child was improbable, so they adopted a girl, Betsy, in 1953. Erma decided to become a full-time housewife, and relinquished her career as a journalist. During 1954, Erma nevertheless wrote a series of humorous columns in the Dayton Shopping News.
In 1955, despite the former difficult diagnoses, Erma Bombeck had her first natural son, Andrew. The Bombeck family moved to Centerville, Ohio, into a tract housing development, and were neighbors to the young Phil Donahue. Away from her previous journalistic career, Bombeck initiated an intense period of homemaking, which lasted 10 years, and had her second natural son, Matthew, in 1958.
[edit] "At Wit's End" (1965)
In 1964, Erma Bombeck resumed her writing career for the local Kettering-Oakwood Times, with weekly columns which yielded $3 each. She wrote in her small bedroom, over a rustic table of a plank top with two supports of cinder wood.
In 1965, the Dayton Journal Herald requested new humorous columns as well, and Bombeck agreed to write two weekly 450-word columns for $50. After three weeks, the articles went into national syndication through the Newsday Newspaper Syndicate, into 36 major U.S. newspapers, with three weekly columns under the "At Wit's End" title.
Bombeck became a popular humorist nationwide. Beginning in 1966, she was requested to perform periodic $15,000 lectures, in the various cities where her columns appeared. In 1967, her newspaper articles were compiled and published by Doubleday, under the title of At Wit's End. And after a humorous Arthur Godfrey's radio commentary, she became a regular radio guest on his show.
[edit] Diversified Production
[edit] Success (1970s)
Aaron Priest, a Doubleday representative, became Bombeck's loyal agent. By 1969, 500 U.S. newspapers featured her "At Wit's End" columns, and she was also writing articles for Good Housekeeping Magazine, Reader's Digest, Family Circle, Redbook, McCall's, and even Teen magazine. Bombeck and her family moved to Phoenix, Arizona, into a lavish hacienda on a hilltop in Paradise Valley.
By 1978, 900 U.S. newspapers were publishing Bombeck's column.
[edit] McGraw-Hill (1976)
In 1976, McGraw-Hill published Bombeck's The Grass Is Always Greener Over The Septic Tank, which became a best-seller. In 1978, Bombeck arranged both a million-dollar contract for her fifth book, If Life Is a Bowl of Cherries, What Am I Doing in the Pits? (1978) and a 700-thousand-copy advance for her subsequent book, Aunt Erma's Cope Book (1979).
[edit] Television
Through the invitation of television producer Bob Shanks, Bombeck participated in ABC's Good Morning America from 1975 until 1986. She began doing brief commentaries which were recorded at Phoenix, and eventually did both gag segments and important interviews.
For several years, Bombeck became a multimedia workhorse. Then in 1978, she failed with the The Grass is Always Greener television pilot on CBS, and the show never became a sitcom. In 1980, then Bombeck wrote and produced her own show, the also unsuccessful Maggie, for ABC. It aired for just four months (eight episodes) with poor reviews; nevertheless the show meant that Bombeck was overwhelmed with obligations, returning from Los Angeles to Phoenix only during weekends. Bombeck was offered a second sitcom attempt but she declined.
[edit] The Equal Rights Amendment (1978)
In 1978, Bombeck was involved in the Presidential Advisory Committee for Women, particularly for the final implementation of the Equal Rights Amendment, with the ERA America organization's support. Bombeck was heavily criticized for this by conservative figures, and some U.S. stores reacted, removing her books. In 1980, the proposed Amendment fell through without enough states supporting it, and Bombeck expressed much displeasure about this turn of events.
[edit] Great Popularity (1980s)
By 1985, Erma Bombeck's three weekly columns were being published by 900 newspapers in the U.S. and Canada, and were also being anthologized into many best-selling books. She was also in twice-weekly Good Morning America slots. Bombeck belonged to the American Academy of Humor Columnists, along with other famous personalities. During the 1980s, Bombeck's annual wages ranged from $500,000 to one million dollars.
[edit] Death
Erma Bombeck was diagnosed with polycystic kidney disease. In 1996, she was brought to a San Francisco hospital for a kidney transplant, which was performed on April 3. However, she suffered terminal complications from the procedure, passing away on April 22.
Her remains are interred in the Woodland Cemetery, Dayton, Ohio, under a big rock from the Phoenix desert.
[edit] Books
- At Wit's End, Doubleday, 1967.
- Just Wait Until You Have Children of Your Own, Doubleday, 1971. Written with Bil Keane.
- I Lost Everything in the Post-Natal Depression, Doubleday, 1974.
- The Grass is Always Greener Over the Septic Tank, McGraw-Hill, 1976.
- Aunt Erma's Cope Book, McGraw-Hill.
- If Life is a Bowl of Cherries, What Am I Doing in the Pits?, McGraw-Hill, 1978.
- Aunt Erma's Cope Book, McGraw-Hill, 1979.
- Motherhood: The Second Oldest Profession, 1983.
- Family — The Ties that Bind ... and Gag!, 1987.
- I Want to Grow Hair, I Want to Grow Up, I Want to Go to Boise: Children Surviving Cancer, 1989. American Cancer Society's Medal of Honor in 1990. Its earning was distributed for divers health organizations.
- When You Look Like Your Passport Photo, It's Time to Go Home, 1991.
- A Marriage Made in Heaven or Too Tired for an Affair, 1993.
- All I Know About Animal Behavior I Learned in Loehmann's Dressing Room, 1995.
- Forever, Erma: Best-Loved Writing From America's Favorite Humorist
[edit] Quotes
- "Insanity is hereditary. You can catch it from your kids."
- "My second favorite household chore is ironing. My first one being hitting my head on the top bunk bed until I faint."
- "There's nothing sadder in this world than to awake Christmas morning and not be a child."
- "If a man watches three football games in a row, he should be declared legally dead."
- "The only reason I would take up jogging is so I could hear heavy breathing again."
- "Laughter rises out of tragedy, when you need it the most, and rewards you for your courage."
- "Dreams have only one owner at a time. That's why dreamers are lonely."
- "When I stand before God at the end of my life, I would hope that I would not have a single bit of talent left, and could say, 'I used everything you gave me.'"
- "In general, my children refused to eat anything that hadn't danced on TV."
- "When humor goes, there goes civilization."
- "Seize the moment. Think of all those women on the 'Titanic' who waved off the dessert cart."
[edit] Sources
- Erma in Bomburbia. Time Magazine cover story. (1984)
- Full Biography of Dayton University
- Encarta Encyclopedia
[edit] External links
