20 Facts About Truly Shattuck

Truly Shattuck was a soubrette star of vaudeville, music halls, and Broadway whose career began in tragedy and ended in relative obscurity.

Truly Shattuck was born at San Miguel, San Luis Obispo County, California in an adobe house adjoining the historic Mission San Miguel Arcangel.

In 1893 Jane Truly Shattuck murdered Harry Poole, her daughter's boyfriend, after he refused to commit to marriage after the couple spent the night together.

Truly Shattuck's mother was originally convicted of first degree murder, but was later released after winning a temporary insanity appeal.

At the time Truly Shattuck was a chorus girl at the Tivoli Opera House in San Francisco and as a result of the national exposure generated by Poole's murder, her career began to take seed.

Truly Shattuck made her first New York vaudeville appearance at Tony Pastor's theater in 1896.

Truly Shattuck went on to tour for a number of seasons as a lead performer in several traveling burlesque and vaudeville companies.

Truly Shattuck spent the last year or so of the 19th century in Germany performing at Berlin and Dresden before supporting Edna May in the 1900 London production of An American Beauty,.

Truly Shattuck created the role of Violette in A Parisian Model at the Broadway Theatre in 1906 and the following year she played Adelaide Forster in the George Broadhurst play The Lady from Lane's staged at the Lyric Theatre and Casino Theatre.

Truly Shattuck was the first to sing Ernest R Ball's 1906 song Love Me, and the World Is Mine and the following year began an extensive European tour performing at music halls in St Petersburg, Vienna, Berlin, Dresden, Hamburg, Frankfort and London.

In 1910 Truly Shattuck declared bankruptcy in a New York court with nearly $2,800 liabilities and no assets.

Truly Shattuck returned to vaudeville in 1913 with a new partner, Thomas A Wise, a comedian who played in The Lady From Lane's.

Truly Shattuck turned to Hollywood in 1915 and over the next twelve years would appear in some sixteen silent films.

Truly Shattuck's first known movie was The Iron Strain, in which she played Mrs Van Ness.

Truly Shattuck's last was in 1927 as Mrs P Belmont-Fox in Rubber Heels.

At the time of the taking of the 1920 US census Truly Shattuck was recorded as a house guest of Rudolph K Hynicka and his young wife Dorothy at their Los Angeles residence.

In September 1929, after several months of unemployment, Truly Shattuck was arrested in Chicago for trying to shoplift a $16.50 green dress.

Truly Shattuck later pleaded guilty, but was released after the department store dropped the charges.

Truly Shattuck was among the more than two hundred mourners who attended Fatty Arbuckle's funeral in New York in July 1933.

Truly Shattuck died at the age 79 after an extended illness at the Motion Picture Country Home on Mulholland Drive in Woodland Hills, California.