<p>
<a href=“http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/12/arts/shirley-temple-black-screen-star-dies-at-85.html?hpw&rref=movies&_r=0”>http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/12/arts/shirley-temple-black-screen-star-dies-at-85.html?hpw&rref=movies&_r=0</a></p>
<p>As an aside, Mickey Rooney was in the audience at the last Lay Leno Tonight show. He is 93. </p>
<p>Awww…many loved her!!! My memories include watching her on Sundays before/after church along with the semi-animated “Davey and Goliath” when I was young.</p>
<p>I had no idea she was still alive. I also use to love watching her movies after coming home from Sunday school. Watched ‘Davey and Goliath’, too. </p>
<p>My mother loved Shirley Temple movies, so I grew up watching them on TV. I was a round-faced, curly-headed little girl so I really identified with her (the singing and dancing part, not so much) Another part of my childhood is gone.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Wow, ditto-memories of long ago Sunday afternoons. </p>
<p>She really was wonderful. Although the films haven’t aged well, she was irresistible. At such a young age, she was a marvelous dancer and a good little actress. Some film historians credit her with saving 20th Century Fox during the Depression. </p>
<p>She was such an amazing talent as a child. Unlike a lot of child stars today, she ended up living a normal and successful adult life.</p>
<p>May she rest in peace. I have fond memories of Shirley Temple–my parents were fans, and my daughters used to watch her movies when they were young. One D, when she was in 3rd grade, had to make a power-point presentation on “a person who inspires you”–and she chose Shirley Temple. ( I didn’t think this was a very good choice, but I decided to let an 8yo be an 8yo.) D’s younger sister was then a tiny kindergartner with very curly blonde hair. The teacher joked that D should bring her sister as a “visual aid” when she made her presentation. We taught the younger girl to sing “On the Good Ship Lollipop” which she sang for her sister’s class presentation–wearing a short dress and holding a big lollipop. It was such a hit that the teacher made her sing for the principal. Then she performed again when the class made their presentations to the parents. And then the music teacher asked her to join the school talent show (very rare that a kindergartner would get on stage.) The teacher entered D’s presentation (not including the “live visual aid”) in a state media competition, and she got 2nd place. (The winner was also from the same class–his presentation was on Leonardo da Vinci, of course.) D’s message was that Shirley used her talents and her smile to cheer people up during the depression. (Many people may not remember that she was also an ambassador, UN representative, and was one of the first prominent women to speak openly about breast cancer in 1972-73.)
Whatever happened to MY little “Shirley?”-- now in 6th grade, her hair is no longer so curly or blonde. She hates singing, and never performed again!</p>
<p>I have been “hearing” her “animal crackers in my soup” song in my head all morning… <a href=“Animal Crackers in my soup - YouTube”>Animal Crackers in my soup - YouTube;
<p>She was amazing. Her transition from child star to a wonderfully successful adult life as an ambassador was wonderful. State department folks we know said she was a very well regarded ambassador. </p>
<p>I, too, loved her movies. Loved those curls, her dancing, her singing. </p>
<p>My favorite tune…On the Good Ship Lollipop.</p>
<p>atomom, what a great story! </p>
<p>I never knew that Davey and Goliath was broadcast in so many towns. Hardly ever missed it or the essentially weekly Shirley Temple movies on TV back in the mid and late 1960s. Favorite Shirley Temple anecdote: she and Bill Bojangles Robinson were Hollywood’s first on-screen interracial couple," a film scholar once said. LOL.</p>
<p>The Good Ship Lollipop could have my mother racing out of the room, screaming and pulling her hair out. She thought Shirley Temple was an over-actor of the highest order, and her sweet, pouty little songs just drove her nuts.</p>
<p>I loved those movies, though, so there was no escaping it for her. :D</p>
<p>I heard her talk. Very intelligent and forgiving person. Her parents squandered nearly all her money but she loved them. Her autobiography is a marvel of observation. I found this bit in The New Yorker: </p>
<p>“Any film stage properly lit becomes a veritable crisscross of unseen light beams. These soon became my secret tools for correct positioning. Realizing that my facial skin was sensitive to subtle differences in emission of heat from various combinations of light beams, I came to correlate and memorize the patterns of heat and action established during rehearsal and used this knowledge to maintain correct changes of position during filming. What I recalled was a rehearsed pattern of heat. My knack involved sensing the difference between a patch of skin on my forehead and a cooler area on my cheek, [so] I could even sense if my head was held in the right position.”</p>
<p>I think her first full length movie was Little Miss Marker. She was perfect in it.</p>
<p>
One of the tragedies of Hollywood’s “Golden Age” is that performers like Bill Robinson were shut out of the film careers they’d certainly have had today. His movies with Shirley Temple were among the few films he made that were widely released. In this clip from “The Littlest Rebel,” made when she was just 7 years old, you see real affection between the two of them, as well as some great dancing. <a href=“http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=776oLm9GXxQ”>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=776oLm9GXxQ</a></p>
<p>A classy kid and even classier lady.</p>
<p>
In fact, Shirley was the only white female star with whom a black performer could perform as an equal in those days.</p>
<p>Oh no. So sad. We all loved her. </p>
<p>The directors called her “one take Shirley” because she knew her lines and didn’t flub. </p>
<p>May she rest in peace. </p>