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Not Your "Plain Jane"

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Contributed by: jim robinson on 5/13/2008

I grew up in the Hop-along Cassidy, Gene Autry and Roy Rogers era.
Kids today will surely make a quizzical face and say, "Who?" Anyway, there are a few of us left that remember those "heroes" of the '40s and '50s. Whether you were a guy or a gal back then, we all had thoughts that included; "I wonder what it would be like to meet someone famous like our heroes on the "silver screen." Then, reality would creep in and we would fall back into our mundane existence, knowing that the actual chance of meeting a famous icon, much less even seeing one, was not going to happen.

The group of guys from my block and surrounding streets were the best friends a person could have. I feel it's important to name them as a group. There was Maury, my Jewish friend, Bobby, better known by his nickname "wild man," Grier, the oldest and our mentor. Then there was me, the youngest and struggling to cope with my 12th year. Our group played "touch" football at the park as often as we could all get together. On one fortunate occasion, I found out that one should never be surprised whom they meet.

One day we had been playing for about half an hour when Grier told me to get clear and catch a sideline pass for a touchdown. We were tied 21-21 and my team needed a win. Bobby, the center, got the ball back to Grier as I struck off down the sideline, got around Tommy and PJ, and looked over my shoulder to "snag" the pass.

It was perfectly thrown and nothing in the world could have prevented me from making the "catch of the day." Did I say nothing could prevent me? Well, something did! Just as I reached up for the catch, I noticed a "stunning" blonde sitting a few feet away on a park bench. My concentration went awry and the ball hit me on top of my head!

I didn't care. Suddenly, catching a touchdown pass didn't weigh as heavy as my interest in watching that blond. All the guys had seen her too and we shuffled around and pretended we were still trying to huddle. The funny thing about it was that now all eight of us were in the same huddle. So much for football. We sat down in a circle and our main topic of conversation was, "Who is she?" "God, look at those bazookas!" wild man Bobby blurted out.

We just kept on talking about this "Athena" who had suddenly appeared in our midst. Then we noticed she was walking toward us. As she approached the group, she asked in a sultry voice, "Would you guys let me play?" Well, I sure didn't see anyone objecting or telling her it was just a "man's" game. She was "knocking our socks off." That's a polite way of saying our hormones were doing "handstands," and clearly she was five or six years older than any of us.

We unanimously decided that the "new girl" could play on our teams. Bobby officially named her "Blondie," which she seemed to like. So, we put her on one team for four downs, and then switched her over to the other team for the next four downs.

The game that had almost come to an end, went on for another hour or so and the final score was up in the 40s. Blondie turned out pretty good and even caught two touchdown passes. I had to keep reminding Bobby that even though we were playing "touch" football, not to let his roving hands get "out-of-hand."

When we decided to quit for the day, we said our goodbyes and the other guys headed home. Bobby and Grier were talking about who should go over and talk to Blondie. At the very least, find out who she was. "I'm not going," Grier announced, and Wild Man is liable to do something disgraceful. "That leaves you Jimmy."

Blondie was back at the bench repairing her makeup and brushing the leaves out of her hair. I was a little nervous, but agreed to go and talk to her. She was ready to leave, when I mustered the courage to strike up a conversation. "Hey, you're pretty good. Where did you learn to play so well?" "My cousins taught me; we used to play in our backyard." I ventured further, "Hope you don't mind us calling you Blondie; didn't mean you were like the cartoon character".

She smiled and said, "Oh, I know. I've been called Blondie before; no big deal. Actually, I'm a brunette and my real name is Jayne. That's spelled with a "y". I was trying to put the letters in order in my mind, when she continued. "I live over on Amherst." My mind went to mush! "I live on Amherst too". "Oh yeah, what block? she inquired. I told her my address" "Wow, I'll be, we only live two blocks apart!"

I thought I knew all the people on my street, since I had thrown their newspapers for the last year or so. When I inquired about which house she lived in, she said they didn't take the Dallas Morning News, but her house was the gray one with the light tan trim and the blue mailbox in front with their name, Palmer.

That didn't mean a thing to me at the time, but as improbable as it may seem and difficult to fathom, my newest acquaintance, "Blondie" was the very same, one and only Jayne Palmer, who would in a few short years become the famous and voluptuous Jayne Mansfield. And...she lived only two blocks from me.

Maury was hanging around and waiting for me, so I pitched him my keys and yelled for him to ride my scooter home. This was strategy that I was working on because I knew if Jayne and I walked home, we could talk longer than if I just offered her a ride that would only last five minutes.

Maury was trying to get my attention by telling me something about his reluctance to ride my "moped." I told him in my most annoying tone to just "put it in first" and he'd figure it out. In retrospect, that wasn't the smartest thing to tell him. He started it up, put it in gear, and we waved as he rode off down the street.

Jayne and I talked as we walked to her house and I learned she had aspirations of being an actress someday and had plans to enroll in drama courses at SMU. Have I mentioned that she was only five years older than me? She had gone to my grade school, junior high, and high school, and I had never noticed her before!

She introduced me to her mother and step-dad, who probably wondered what I was doing with their older teenage daughter. They apologized for not taking "my" newspaper and offered me lemonade, and then I walked the two blocks back to my house.

Maury was puttering up my drive just as I got there. He jumped off, handed me the keys, wiped his forehead, and said, "Man, what causes that grinding sound?" I asked him what he was referring to and he said, "Well, I think I got it into first ok, but couldn't find that second gear and then this grinding started, so I went up to Northwest Highway and over to Preston and back down our street to give it a chance to straighten out."

What he had described to me was about a 6-mile trip on my '53 Moped (my baby) never shifting out of first gear!" I came unglued, "You never shifted out of first? You, jerk! You probably burned up my transmission!" He really took it hard when I yelled at him. "You asked me as a favor to take your scooter home. I told you I didn't like riding one, but you were so "looped" over Blondie, you didn't listen to me!"

Maury could be very defensive at times, but we had been friends too long to let a transmission ruin that relationship. The next day I really lucked out. The transmission had miraculously survived and was alright after I refilled it with oil.

Jayne played a few more Saturday games with us before she married Paul Mansfield later that year. She had two other marriages and five children, but always kept the name Mansfield. She attained her goal to be a Hollywood starlet and made several movies.

In 1967; as she was returning from a night club act in Biloxi, Mississippi, on a dark night in Louisiana, Jayne died instantly in a rear-end collision with a truck that was spraying insecticide. Her attorney and chauffeur were also killed in the Jaguar convertible. Three of her children survived the crash. Jayne was thirty-four years old. One daughter, Mariska Hargitay, stars today in the Law and Order: SVU television series.

I was glad I had known her, even for a short time. Today, I think about those times when "Blondie" brought a fresh perspective to our neighborhood football games.

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