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Pat Peardon, about age 11, From Radio Stars, April 1936.
Image from the Media History Digital Library. |
Patricia Peardon
April 20, 1924* - April 22, 1993
Also Known As Pat Peardon, Patsy Peardon**
Known Juvenile Roles
King Arthur Land, NBC, 1935
Beatrice Fairfax, NBC, 1935
Forty Five Minutes in Hollywood, 1935
Let's Pretend, 193?
March of Times
Orphans of Divorce c.1939 - 1942
The Aldrich Family
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| The cast of NBC's "Adventures in King Arthur Land"(1935) from left to right, Charita Bauer, Jimmy McCallion, Ethel Blume, Lynn Mary Oldham, Patricia Peardon. From Radio Stars, November 1935. Image from the Media History Digital Library. |
Patricia "Pat" Peardon was an actress and sculptor best remembered and possibly most researched today for originating the title role in Junior Miss on Broadway. A substantial part of her acting career was also was in the Golden Age of Radio as a child and teen star.
Early Life
Born in Paterson, New Jersey in 1924* and raised in Allendale, Midland Park, and Ridgewood, she was the daughter of U.S. Navy Commander Roswell Cameron Peardon and a his wife abusiness executive. Encouraged by an early interest in performance, she began acting at age eight and attended Oakley Hall, a private girls’ school.
Childhood on Radio
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Snippet of Pat Peardon on March of Times. From The Central New Jersey Home News,
February 17, 1938. From Newspapers.com |
As a child actress, Peardon gained experience in radio, appearing on programs such as The March of Time, where she portrayed roles including Princess Elizabeth and Alice in Wonderland, and Cavalcade of America. Peardon was a cast member of Adventures in King Arthur Land a lost fantasy series by Madge Tucker that ran for several months in 1935 on NBC.
She also appeared as Shirley Temple on the program Forty Five Minutes In Hollywood a lost program that featured radio actors reenacting scenes from new and upcoming films. Peardon's impressions of Temple were widely noted in the press and she may have been the first actor to portray the world famous child star in a reenactment.
Little Pat was also promoted as the youngest member of "Roxy's Gang" or the popular Roxy Hour in 1935 led by the pioneering Samuel "Roxy" Rothafel.
Peardon was also a cast member on Let's Pretend and Beatrice Fairfax. Some press clippings place her in the 1930s Camel Caravan radio program. As a teenager she was one of a number of actresses heard as Mary, the sister of Henry Aldrich on The Aldrich Family.
In these many series, Peardon worked with many famed child actors of the 1930s like Jimmy McCallion, Cherita Bauer (decades before The Guiding Light), and Nancy Kelly.
With so many early Golden Age radio programs having very little surviving audio, scripts and logs, plus documentation of child actors roles, it it hard to say just how many programs Peardon acted in before the age of 17.
On Stage with the Stars
At age twelve, she toured with Katharine Hepburn in a Theatre Guild production of "Jane Eyre" in the role of 'Adele' a little French girl. The encouragement from Hepburn would strongly influenced her career ambitions. Peardon was already nationally known from press releases about her radio roles, but sharing the stage with Hepburn gained her even more national attention. She also starred in a production of "The Middleman" with Ernest Truex and Mildred Natwick based in Suffern, NY.
"Patricia Peardon is excellent as Judy, displaying a winning charm and performing with considerable skill" - Variety, November 5, 1941 review of Junior Miss
Peardon achieved national recognition at seventeen when she debuted on Broadway as 13 year old Judy Graves in "Junior Miss" (1941) a play based on humorous tales of adolescence written by Sally Benson. Her performance earned critical acclaim and led to a Life and Family Circle magazine cover features. She continued the role throughout the play’s Broadway run, national tour, and a USO-sponsored European tour.
"Junior Miss" was popular enough for a radio series in 1942, ironically starring Shirley Temple, who Peardon had impersonated when both were little girls. This program is not known to exist, but scripts from the series were sold as part of auctions from Temple's estate.
Her later stage work included "The Desperate Hours" (1955) and performances with Shakespearean and regional theater companies.
Early Television Roles.
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| Screenshot of Wright King and Pat Peardon from an episode of "Johnny Jupiter", c. 1953. Screenshot from YouTube.com, W/O/C Channel. |
While still acting on stage Pat Peardon also appeared on anthology TV programs like the TV versions of Lights Out, Escape and The Philco TV Playhouse.
From September 1953 to June 1954 Peardon had a supporting role on the 2nd version of the children's sci-fi puppet series Johnny Jupiter. On the series Wright King played Ernest P. Duckweather a young TV shop repairman who invented a TV that could communicate with aliens on the planet Jupiter, who were puppets. Peardon played Katherine Frisby the daughter of the television shop owner. While not the highlight of Peardon's career, three surviving episodes of Johnny Jupiter are widely available on YouTube and may be the most accessible recordings of any of her performances today. Also it was from watching this series, that this writer became curious to know more about her.
Her last recurring TV role was on the short lived soap opera Our Five Daughters (1962) starring Esther Ralston.
Expanding Creativity and Later Life
In addition to acting, Peardon created literary recital programs, including "The Amazing Miss Alcott", commissioned by the Library of Congress for the centennial of "Little Women". In the mid-1960s, she transitioned into sculpture, producing small bronze figures that were widely exhibited, including at Tiffany & Co., the Metropolitan Opera House, and other major cultural venues.
In the late 1970s, Peardon lent her voice to a couple of now scarce book recordings for The Library of Congress National Library Service For the Blind and Physically Handicapped.
Patrica Peardon married twice, had two daughters, and died of pneumonia in New York City at age 69.
Thoughts and Legacy
Patricia Peardon was a extremely talented child, teen and adult actress of radio's Golden Age whose life showed the potential and versatility of children trained in radio acting. Her body of work screams for preservation today and how unfortunate that many recordings were not preserved. There are so many performances that are recalled about her that would be excellent to hear today, like her impersonations of Shirley Temple, or her roles on daytime dramas, and work for the war effort. Also, it is unfortunate that more than likely (unless filmed for a newsreel) there may not have been a film or audio recording of her performances in "Junior Miss".
Sources & Additional Resources
"Child Star of 'Jane Erye' is Enjoying a Rest on Vineyard" Newspapers.com. The Standard-Times, June 27, 1937. https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-standard-times-patricia-peardon-ra/194177284/.
"Patricia Peardon - Roxy Saturday Night" Newspapers.com. Daily American-Democrat, January 30, 1935. https://www.newspapers.com/article/daily-american-democrat-patricia-peardon/194174115/.
Notes
* Most sources give her birth year as 1924, a few cite 1923.
** She was very scarcely called Patsy; this was only found in a few childhood clippings. Peardon was usually called "Patricia" or "Pat".
