Biographical Sketches

Silent film star known as "The Vamp."

1885-1955. Silent film star, known as "The Vamp" for her uninhibited sexy roles. Although her studio claimed that she had been born in Egypt to an Italian artist and a French actress, she was actually born in Avondale, a suburb of Cincinnati, Ohio, as Theodosia Goodman to Bernard Goodman, an immigrant Polish Jewish tailor, and Pauline de Coppett, a Swiss-German immigrant who became co-owner of a wig makers shop.

Film director and choreographer of lavish Hollywood dance numbers.

1895-1976. William Berkeley Enos, better known as Busby Berkeley, was one of the greatest choreographers of the movie musical. He was born in Los Angeles to actor parents. His father died when he was a small boy and he formed a lifelong close attachment to his mother. Berkeley served as a lieutenant in the U.S. Army in World War I, where he directed parades, and after the cease fire staged camp shows for soldiers. Back home he became a stage actor and assistant director in small acting troops. His first big success was as dance director for Florence Ziegfeld's production of "A Connecticut Yankee on King Arthur's Court." Eddie Cantor, who starred in the long running Ziegfeld show "Whoopee!", suggested Berkeley for the dance routines in its film version, and Ziegfeld agreed.

Prolific Los Angeles poet and novelist of the heavy-drinking, down-and-out life.

1920-1994. Charles Bukowski was born in Andernach, Germany. His mother, Katharina Fett, was a local seamstress. His father, Henry Charles Bukowski, was an American serviceman who stayed on after the end of World War I. Their son was christened Heinrich Karl Bukowski, a Germanization of his father's name. When the German economy collapsed in the postwar years the family moved to Los Angeles in the spring of 1923. For some time they lived in a house on Virginia Road in the Jefferson Park section of West Adams. The young Bukowski Americanized his name to Henry Charles, like his father. He attended Virginia Road Elementary School. Starting when he was in elementary school his father began to beat him and sometimes Katharina as well.

First American-born Chinese woman physician. "Adopted" 1500 American flyers and submariners during World War II.

1889-1959. The first-known American-born Chinese woman physician. Margaret Chung was born in Santa Barbara , California , the eldest of eleven children. Her parents emigrated separately from China in the 1870s. Her father worked as a merchant, then went bankrupt and became a fruit peddler, dairyman, and ranch foreman. Her mother was rescued from a brothel. Both became invalids when Margaret was very young, and Margaret took over supporting the family by the time she was ten, as well as caring for her younger siblings and nursing her mother who was slowly dying of tuberculosis. She drove a horse-drawn freight wagon alone when she was ten and later worked 12-hour days in a Chinese restaurant when she was in the seventh grade. The family moved first to Ventura , then to the East Adams section of Los Angeles near San Pedro Street .