Billings Christmas News--1913

Three days before Christmas 1913, Anna Held, one of the most famous actresses of her day, stepped out of her special train in Billings and began hawking The Billings Gazette.

“Paper mister,” the Polish-born star all but commanded as she strode through downtown businesses, accepting any amount dazzled customers wanted to pay. Chorus girls from her comic opera “Mademoiselle Baby” followed in her wake with great stacks of newspapers.

In the hour before the matinee at the Babcock Theater, the “vivacious, the queenly, the favorite of cosmopolitan audiences,” had sold $200 worth — a princely sum 100 years ago.

Proceeds went to the Big Brother Christmas Tree at the Elks Club. Every cent would benefit the community, especially hundreds of poor swept into the city in a spectacular period of growth.

After her evening performance, Held and her entourage waded into the crowded theater and sold another $100 worth of the evening edition.

The millionaire actress, famous for a vast and stylish wardrobe that included a $20,000 Russian sable coat, had recently split from her common-law relationship with legendary Broadway impresario Florenz Ziegfeld. Held has been credited with concocting the showgirl format that became the Ziegfeld Follies.

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