l shock. Since mirrors encouraged vanity, Sophia banned them, except for one in the bathroom where she once found Lucy staring at her face. Lucy was then assigned chores as punishment for her self-importance. Money was so scarce that she did not have a pencil in school, a shame so searing that in her forties she hoarded pencils that were meant for her employees to use. When she was confronted by an executive that asked her where the pencils were going she took him to a back closet and showed him the packages of unwrapped pencils. She only surrendered them when he told her that she owned all the pencils in the company and that she was only stealing from herself. The most important influence on Lucys early years was Celeron Park. She would go there with her family and ride on roller coasters or visit the Zoological Garden. In 1919, when Lucy was eight she was known as a hyperactive child. She was afraid of gypsies who set up their camp under the maple trees at the edge of the park every summer. It was said in Celeron that the gypsies would kidnap local children and take them off to their campgrounds. Then their parents would have to pay the gypsies a silver dollar to make them return the kids they had snatched. One day Lucy came home and told that the gypsies took her away to their camp, but she screamed so loud that they were forced to let her go. This caused paranoia in the family. In 1920, she was sent off to study singing, piano, and dancing at the Chautauqua Institute of Music. After Lucy came back from school her maternal grandmother, Florabelle, died of cancer of the uterus on July 1, 1922. Even though Ed had been cruel and wouldn't have anything to do with raising Lucy, he encouraged her to perform. Since Ed belonged to the Shriners, he arranged for her to act, dance, and sing at their conventions. In 1923, Ed and Desiree took her to see the celebrated monologist Julius Tannen who was performing in the area. After seeing his perfo...
