[joe-frank-list] what's real, what's not

[russellbell at gmail.com]

	Quoth LD <majestic_cheese at yahoo.com>:

	'It's interesting tracing Joe's shows down to real life.'
	I started when I was researching the 'Congressional Record'
for something unrelated and the name 'Meier Langermann' caught my eye.
I knew the name because I had read the 'LA Weekly''s profile of Joe 10
years earlier.  After a few tries, Congress finally passed a bill 'for
the relief of Meier Langermann, his wife Friederike, and his son
Joseph' ('relief' = permission to stay in the US), and FDR vetoed it!
There's a letter from FDR in the 'Congressional Record' rejecting
Joe's admission into the US.  Congress passed another bill, which he
approved.  It brought home Joe's plight, which I hadn't thought about;
he had just been a guy with a radio show I occasionally heard.

	'Some of the stuff seems very real. Other things obviously
concocted, then there's a lot in the middle.'
	I sure hope the guy with the dogs in DC didn't really sicc one
on the postman.  ('Always').  I also hope much of Zachary's behavior
was exaggerated, if not invented.  I notice Jolly and Zoe never spoke
on Joe's shows.  Jolly and Larry were married when Larry died in 2012.

	'I think the holy grail of this is Kate herself. Was she even
real? Based loosely on a woman a friend of Joe's was having a
relationship with? A total fabrication? I think Joe took the answer
with him.'
	Joe had a lot of friends; it was a public relationship if it
existed.  I figure Michal Story, Lester Nafzger, Harry Shearer,
Kristine McKenna, Debi Mae West, David Rapkin, Bob Carlson must know.
If none of them ever met her, she's probably an invention.
	I notice that Judith Owen, who sang on some of Joe's shows in
the '90s, is Welsh and beautiful.  I've imagined her as inspiration.
She's been married to Harry Shearer since about 1990 and Harry was a
friend, so unless it happened before then I rule her out.

russell bell