Beth Lydy (c. 1896 – February 6, 1979), who also used the name Lyda Betti, was an American actress, operetta singer, writer, educator, and theatrical producer; she was the wife of violinist and broadcaster Eddy Brown.
Early life
editLydy was born in Indiana and raised in Pine Ridge, South Dakota, where her father John W. Lydy worked as a government teacher on a Sioux reservation. She and her sister Ruth Lydy attended school in Frankfort, Indiana, and in Chicago.[1]
Career
editLydy's musical stage roles included Hilma in The Girl from Brazil (1916);[2] Marlene in Her Soldier Boy (1916-1917), a wartime romance;[3] and the title role in The Rainbow Girl (1918).[4][5] During World War I Lydy performed in a vaudeville show in Greenwich, Connecticut put on by Stage Women's War Relief.[6] She also contributed a recipe for "Deviled Crabs" to a 1916 celebrity cookbook that raised funds for the Red Cross.[7]
In the 1930s, Lydy wrote radio scripts for WOR, the New York radio station where her husband was musical director. The pair also produced summer musical programming in Connecticut between the World Wars.[8] After World War II, she and Eddy Brown established the Accademia Internazionale di Bel Canto in Bordighera, Italy.[9]
In 1956, they accepted a joint position at the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music, as artistic coordinators and master teachers.[8][10]
Personal life
editLydy married violinist Eddy Brown as his second wife in 1926, in Riverside, California.[11] She was widowed when Eddy Brown died in 1974.[12] Lydy Brown died in 1979, in Peru, Indiana. She was about 83 years old.[9]
References
edit- ^ Burns Mantle, "What's What in the Theatre" Green Book Magazine (December 1916): 994-995.
- ^ "44nd Street: The Girl from Brazil" Theatre Magazine (October 1916): 204b.
- ^ William A. Everett, Sigmund Romberg (Yale University Press 2008): 87-89. ISBN 9780300138351
- ^ "New Amsterdam: The Rainbow Girl" Theatre Magazine (May 1918): 316.
- ^ Louis Achilles Hirsch, The Rainbow Girl (M. Witmark & Sons 1917).
- ^ "For Stage Women's War Relief" New York Times (August 7, 1917): 7.
- ^ Beth Lydy, "Deviled Crabs" in Mabel Rowland, Celebrated Actor Folks' Cookeries (Mabel Rowland 1916): 194.
- ^ a b John Anthony Maltese. "Eddy Brown" American National Biography Online (January 2002 update).
- ^ a b Obituary, Jewish Post (February 16, 1979): 16.
- ^ Susan Lennis, "Eddy and Lyda Betti Brown: Keeping Alive Musical Tradition" Indianapolis Star Magazine (February 27, 1972): 24-31.
- ^ "Eddy Brown Weds Miss Beth Lydy" New York Times (September 23, 1926): 22.
- ^ "Eddy Brown, Violinist, 78, Dies; Prodigy Made Disks in 1920s" New York Times (June 18, 1974): 42.