CISSY

by Paul F. Healy ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 13, 1966

Eleanor Patterson, of the McCormick-Patterson newspaper family, was the sort of woman who had a personality for every place and occasion to match her high fashion get-ups. Now, she's got two biographies in print at tar same time. Alice Albright Hoge did Cissy: A Biography of Eleanor Patterson reported on page 88 and, if you must choose, hers is the better book at catching and communicating the audacity, pugnacity and breathtaking bezazz of the poor little rich girl who was self described as, ""a rich, slightly nasty child,"" who feared dying alone--and did. The Hoge book was said to benefit by the use of family documents, while Doubleday says Healy, a career man on Cissy's brother Joe's Daily News had the wholehearted cooperation of Patterson's widow and Cissy's daughter Felicia. He's got a greater number of anecdotes and has expanded some of the stories only touched on in Hoge's book but he's much more sentimental in his approach to the astringent and eccentric Cissy who traded invective with her old friend and past mistress of the art, Alice Roosevelt while fussing and cussing her Washington newspaper into the red. The choice is between Hoge's style, selectivity, and willingness to pass judgment on figures and feuds, and Healy's fatter, fact-filled, more nostalgic affection.

Pub Date: May 13, 1966

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Doubleday

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1966

Categories: NONFICTION