DuPont, makers of better things for better living through chemistry, presents the Cavalcade
of America, starring Dorothy McGuire.
Good evening.
This is Dorothy McGuire.
I don't know anyone, man or woman, who doesn't enjoy looking at a pretty dress.
Tonight, I think you'll enjoy listening to the story of a woman who's got a million of
them, Nellie Donley.
Nellie Don, who took a needle and a piece of gingham and built a great American enterprise,
thus proving, as the song says, that everything's up to date in Kansas City.
The Golden Needle, starring Dorothy McGuire as Nell Donley.
When I was very young, we lived in Parsons, Kansas.
That is, the rest of the family lived in Parsons, Kansas.
Most of the time, I was in Paris.
I dreamt I was on the left bank, scintillating with continental wit as famous artists fought
to paint my portrait.
No, I was really at Buckingham Palace, sweeping a graceful curtsy and murmuring, Your Majesty.
No, wait.
Actually, I was out in the African belt.
My beaters had taken to the bush, and there I was, face to face with a man-eating rhinoceros.
Nellie!
Better get to those dishes.
They're piling up, and we have company coming for supper.
Yes, Mother, in a minute.
Mercy on us.
You're not still turning that scene, child.
Well, you started two hours ago.
But the cloth's so old.
It keeps rambling, look.
Oh, I know, dear.
It's been a lot of the youngest since the beginning of time to have to make over all
the hand-me-downs.
By the time they get to me, they're nothing but patches on patches.
You sew very well for such a young girl.
But you shouldn't stop to daydream.
Now, now, come on.
I was only thinking, Mother, if someone had the right clothes to put on, there might be
some place someone could go and see.
Oh, is that it?
Well, one of these days, I'll take someone up to Kansas City.
No, I mean places like New York and Paris and Rome.
You'll see them in time.
They charge money to ride on trains.
You know, child, we used to have an old saying.
If you stitch with a golden needle, your garment will be magic.
Magic?
Like a magic carpet?
Oh, I could go wherever I wanted.
Mother, is it true?
In certain ways, I think it may be.
Oh, but where would I ever find a golden needle around here?
Well, that I can't say now.
I'm too old to be looking myself.
But, well, you have a way with a needle.
I think you might find one almost anywhere.
I looked and looked for that wonderful needle, but it never turned up.
And as I grew older and thought I was wise, the whole idea became something to laugh at.
Then one day in 1916, after we'd moved to Kansas City,
I invited some of my Lindenwood school friends over for lunch.
We were all very serious young ladies determined to improve our minds by being able to discuss important current events.
Well, you should have seen me last night, Elizabeth, dancing the new tango.
Honestly, Martha?
Uh-huh.
Where did you ever learn how?
From Irene Castle herself.
You didn't really meet Irene Castle?
Well, not exactly to speak to.
She was up on the stage and I was in the audience.
Oh, Martha.
Oh, but she's honestly the most stylish thing.
Oh, I wish I could look stylish like the actresses.
Well, you do, Liz.
Well, you certainly do today anyway in that darling dress.
Oh, do you really like it?
Mm-hmm.
Nell made it for me for Christmas.
Honestly?
Well, she made mine too.
And you must have made your own, Nell.
Why, we're a regular fashion show of your creation.
You know, Nell, instead of giving dresses away like you do, I think you ought to make them to sale.
Oh, that's a wonderful idea.
Oh, why, they're only cotton house dresses.
But you could make a fortune, honestly.
Nell, we're serious.
You can't find anything like them in the store.
And the way women go around the house looking like perfect frats.
Why, just think of the husbands you'd be doing a favor to.
Yes, I am thinking.
That night I thought and thought.
It was all right, I told myself, for a girl to be a wife.
But did she always have to look like one?
Why, I might become emancipator of American womanhood.
Next day I took two of my own cotton dresses to a store in downtown Kansas City.
And the manager said...
Sorry, miss, not interested.
At the second store...
Uh-uh.
Besides, we just got our yearly shipment of regulation house garments.
Our customers are used to them.
Now you're stirring them up, making them dissatisfied, right?
My good shoes were giving me blisters by the time I reached the sixth store.
Say, are you touched?
Why, it would cost you at least six bits to make up one like this sample.
But if a woman had something that was in style and really fit her,
she might be willing to pay, say, up to a dollar.
A dollar?
Listen, are you touched?
You asked me that before. I don't believe I am.
Look, Mr. Ballinger, what does your wife wear to cook and clean in?
Hmm? Oh, I don't know.
Every year I usually take her home a couple of mother Hubbard's, size large.
Never gave it much thought.
Well, how would you like to see her in something real pretty for a change?
Something she could, well, say, answer the doorbell in too.
Yes, I see what you mean.
No, no use trying to high pressure me. Our customers aren't millionaires, you know.
Oh, please, it wouldn't cost you anything to try and sell them.
Dollar for a house dress. No, I couldn't take the chance.
Look, I'm the one who's taking the chance.
What if I made up, let's see, uh, 18 dozen?
Well...
Oh, thank you. Oh, you won't regret it. I know you won't.
Miss, you've got plenty of gumption, I'll say that for you.
But gumption don't sell merchandise.
And if yours don't sell, you're going to be sorry you ever saw the inside of this store.
In spite of Mr. Ballinger's words, I think I've floated home.
I wasn't dreaming of London or Paris now.
I was in business with 18 dozen dresses due at the store in exactly a month.
Oh, golly.
Golly, how was I going to do it? I needed help.
I went to the phone and rang up my neighbors. First, Katie Schleicher.
Hello.
Hello, Katie. I'm going to manufacture dresses.
And I thought if you want to help me do some sewing and model,
we could fit the smaller sizes on you.
Oh, sure, sure, I'll help you. I'm a pretty good size 12.
When do you want me to start, Manny?
They're going to be made in all sizes, Mrs. Herbert.
Of course, dear, I'd love to help you.
I'm handy with a needle, and they tell me I'm a perfect 44.
Nails! Oh, Nail, wait a minute!
Oh, Liz, hello.
Oh, my, I'm glad I ran into you.
We girls haven't had a current events meeting since we were at your house,
and I thought maybe this afternoon...
Oh, I'm afraid I can't make it, Elizabeth.
I'm on my way downtown to the sewing machine dealers.
Oh, and you really are going into business?
Mm-hmm.
That's thrilling!
But you have a sewing machine.
Oh, just that old treadle.
Professionals use electrical equipment.
Oh, my gracious, well, won't a new one be frightfully expensive?
Not one, two. And I've hired two helpers.
Oh, dear, I never dreamed you were going to take it so seriously
when I suggested it that day.
I mean, getting so deep.
Well, maybe it runs in the family.
Mother told me that when she and Dad came to Kansas and started their farm,
they gave up everything for what they wanted to do,
and it turned out just fine.
Nail, I never knew you to talk that way.
I thought you always said Parsons was so boring.
Oh, it wasn't that.
It was just that I wanted something else,
something I'd accomplished for myself.
You know, Nail, I feel kind of sorry for you.
And yet at the same time, I'm jealous.
Why, Liz?
Well, you're going to lose your shirt on this enterprise,
but if I know you, you're sure going to have a darn good time doing it.
We sat in the spare room, Katie and Mrs. Herbert and I.
We stitched yard after yard of pink ruffles by day
and dreamed about them at night.
We cut and we tucked, we fitted, we stitched and we pressed,
and we kept drinking coffee from a bottomless pot.
But we weren't going fast enough.
So I worked out a system where each of us made a share of each dress.
And somehow, suddenly, the month was up.
Well, Miss, you did pretty good getting them here when you said you would.
Oh, well, thanks.
Now, I got an idea.
You know how extravagant brides are when they're buying their trousseaux.
Yes?
Well, I figured they'd spend a dollar on a house dress.
So I decided to put an ad in the star.
Oh, oh, that's real generous of you.
Could I see it?
Oh, sure.
Let's see now.
I saw that ad this morning.
I know they put it in.
It's funny. I could swear.
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Here it is.
Where?
Way down here, see?
Oh.
Well, I suppose it wouldn't have been in good taste to take anything big and splashy, say, like a two-inch ad.
See, how many brides do you think there are in this town?
Young lady, I don't know why I ever let you talk me into taking a risk like this anyway.
Risk?
Mr. Ballinger, you think you're in deep in this, but you haven't even got your toes wet.
I've bought two electric machines, all that cloth, paid helpers, and I've got exactly $3.69 left.
Now, do you want to back out?
No, no, no. Since you put it that way, may as well leave the stuff here.
And you might ring me up one of these days.
I'll let you know if the ad pulled any customers.
When I got home, Katie and Mrs. Herbert were there waiting.
We sat in the kitchen, not saying anything, just rocking, drinking coffee.
I don't know what we expected, but there certainly wasn't any use of our just sitting there now the dresses were finished.
Oh, it looks like this rain's going to keep up, don't it, dear?
Yes, sure does.
I wish I knew how to thank you both. You've been so wonderful. I'll fill up your cup.
Oh, thanks.
Mrs. Herbert, more coffee.
Yes, thanks. There's the phone now.
Yes, it is, isn't it?
Hey, Tung, isn't that your ring?
It's our ring, all right. Hello?
Hello, this is Ballinger. I had to come into my office to get away from the noise. I got a riot on my hands out there.
A riot?
Yeah, listen, I'll open the door.
Oh, boy!
Why didn't you warn me about those dresses of yours?
What is it? What's happening?
I ran out of the entire eighteen dozen already, that's what.
And now I got a mob of women on my hands, sores of boil, because I got none left.
Oh!
Why, my own wife's one of them.
Say, how soon can you deliver me some more, and how many?
Well, I think I...
I think, just get busy, and keep them coming to me fast you can turn them out.
You know, you got a gold mine here, Miss Donnelly?
A gold mine? Oh, no. A golden needle.
You are listening to The Golden Needle, starring Dorothy McGuire on the cavalcade of America.
Sponsored by the DuPont Company, makers of better things for better living through chemistry.
In 1916, Nell Donnelly, a young Kansas City girl, managed to talk a local merchandise manager into ordering some attractive cotton dresses she made.
Until this time, the only thing available to women for wear around the house were shapeless, ugly mother hubbards.
Her dresses caught on. She rolled up her sleeves and set to work.
Now, girlish dreams of far-off places were gone. Nell was in a world of reality.
We cut, and we stitched. We added designs.
We began making dresses to wear on the street, to church, and to work as well as at home.
And we always reflected the mode of the day.
When the high-fashion hem began climbing kneeward, ours climbed.
And when the waistline dropped down, down, down to the hips...
Well, didn't you wear them?
I traveled. I went to New York. I saw woolens in England, new trends in Paris.
Oh, I lived my dream of the golden needle.
Then, all at once, with no warning, the whole world seemed to be out of a job.
The Depression.
Some of us women set to work ladling out soup to a long line of hungry men at the county soup kitchen.
Hello.
Hello, ma'am. They told me there was this place I could get something to eat.
Yes, that's right.
I don't like doing this. I never asked for anything.
Here you are, sir. Your soup.
You may find that a ghost of a chicken has strolled through it.
Gosh, ma'am, that's the first time I've thought anything was funny, and I don't know how long.
Well, I believe in facing the unvarnished truth.
What did you do before?
Shipping clerk. Then I got to be head of the department.
Look, you go over to the Donnelly Garment Company and tell them a tall Irish-looking gal at the soup kitchen suggested that you drop by.
Hey, ma'am, you're kidding. That ain't part of...
No, I'm not kidding. Believe it or not, we have vacancies in our shipping department.
Now go on before somebody else gets that job.
Yes, ma'am. Pardon my curiosity, Miss Donnelly, but I've been watching you.
Oh, why, Senator Reed, I didn't see you standing there. Good evening.
Good evening. I hope you don't mind my paying your kitchen a visit.
I've been out walking and I heard about what you ladies are accomplishing here.
Mine? Why, I'm glad you did.
Don't know anybody with a lot of nice fat stewing hands they'd like to donate.
I'll see what I can do.
Hey, tell me, Miss Donnelly, just how many jobs at your dress factory have you handed out today along with the soup?
Why, I didn't hand any out, Senator. We're short of help at the plant.
Oh, you're joking, of course.
Oh, why? Is there any law against needing more employees?
No, but in these times it's certainly unique.
Senator, I owe a great deal of happiness to the people who've bought my clothes through the years.
Mm-hmm, I see your point, but you can hardly keep a factory going on gratitude.
In other words, I'm sentimental and I don't really belong in business.
Oh, I didn't mean that precisely, but I think a woman may be inclined to let emotion cloud her better judgment.
Oh, we're making good clothes, Senator. Clothes people can still afford to buy, and we're thriving.
Now, doesn't that suggest that a woman and her sentiment may have some place in business?
After that, I expected to see the Honorable James A. Reed, former senator from Missouri,
because his law firm was retained by our company.
But what I hadn't dared to expect during the times we met to discuss, oh, very general topics, was that we would fall in love.
And then one evening, I heard a voice in my head, and I thought,
oh, very general topics, was that we would fall in love. And then one evening, as we drove through the snowy streets of Kansas City...
Nell, look, the skaters are all out on the duck pond.
Oh, let's stop.
All right.
You know, as long as I've lived in this city, I've never found out what happens to ducks in the winter.
I'll see if I can't launch an investigation.
Nell.
Yes, Jim.
You want a big wedding?
Certainly not.
You told me that surroundings, the trappings, as it were, mean a great deal to you.
Well, they used to. I used to think the most important things in the world were to travel and, well, to be somebody.
And now that I have traveled and grown up with my business...
If only fulfillment could equal the dream, eh? I'm afraid I know.
But, Jim, it has equaled the dream. Does that sound strange, to be so pleased and proud about a factory?
No, no. I only hope you won't mind too much giving it up.
Giving it up?
Nell, we're going to be married. You do intend to close the plant, don't you?
Oh, I ought to be on the bias. This will never do.
No.
Oh, hello, Katie. You worked too hard on that design, Nell.
Well, I wanted it in the new collection.
You snip when you ought to snap.
I know, I know. You're right. Katie, tell me something.
More than half the women in this plant are married and they're raising families.
And yet they do their job here successfully. Now, why shouldn't I do the same?
It's Senator Reed.
Yes. You don't approve?
Sure, why shouldn't I?
I just don't see why you look so worried. You're frowning all the time.
Well, he's asked me to marry him, but Katie expects me to give up my work.
No, not really.
Now, you mustn't blame him. It's part of the tradition he was raised in.
A woman is a wife or she works outside the home, never both at once.
And I can see his point of view. He knows how much time I spend here at the plant.
He knows he practically never see me.
But what's going to become of the company?
I don't know, Katie. I don't know what to do.
Nellie, you can't stop now. These are hard times. Banks closed.
People are out of work. They lose faith.
Every business that closes down, never mind the reason, is one more drop in the bucket.
I know. During wars they talk about morale.
I say these times are war times too. A different enemy, that's all. Morale.
Katie, you've done it.
Done what?
If he could see what it's like at the plant, if I could show him how it practically runs itself, maybe...
Oh, maybe Katie, he might change his mind.
A little on the noisy side, isn't it?
I said it reminds me of the Senate during a budget session.
You're not as wrong as you think. This is the cutting room.
Good Lord, how do any of them know what they're doing?
You'd be surprised at the number of experts we have. Actually, the plant practically runs itself.
Excuse me, Miss Dunley.
Oh, yes, Amos.
Just got a call from the design room. They've got an idea. They want to talk over with you.
Okay, call them back for me, will you? I'll be over as soon as I can.
Sure thing. Who was that fellow?
I remember seeing his face before.
Well, you ought to. He used to be chairman of the county board of supervisors.
What? What's he doing here?
Supervising. We have lots of people like that who never expected to see the inside of a dress factory.
But they're doing just fine. And as I say, the place practically runs itself.
I hate to interrupt you right now, but...
What is it, Katie?
The new buttons haven't come in yet. We can't finish the blue and white fork it out till they do.
Well, put Elizabeth to work on it. She'll get them to come through.
All right, Miss.
Elizabeth? Not your old school friend.
Sure. She's very valuable. The jobbers can't get a word in edgewise when she gets started.
They have to deliver the goods. Now, let's see. I was about to show you...
Morning, Miss Donnelly.
Well, good morning, Charlie. What's troubling you?
We got a problem with that new material. The needles keep breaking.
Well, let's have a look.
I had an idea. It sounds crazy, but...
Most good ideas do. What is it?
Well, the reason the needles break is they get too hot.
I think if we install little electric fans here to sort of cool them...
Well, it sounds crazy all right, but go ahead and try it.
Thanks, Miss Donnelly.
Miss Donnelly?
Yes, Clara? I was doing this scene with lingerie tape the way they sent instructions from the design room.
But I think I know a way. I can maybe do it so it's double stitched.
Oh, do you really think so? Let's see.
Could a mere man look too?
Oh, Jim, good heavens. I forgot all about you.
I know. It's quite obviously an absorbing business.
And here, I brought you here to the plant just so I could convince you it practically runs itself.
Well, doesn't it? From what I've seen so far, everybody in the place is busy trying something, some crazy idea.
My mother had a crazy idea once, Jim, when she told me about the golden needle, knowing very well I'd believe her.
And you still believe her, even now?
More than ever, oh, Jim. I'm sorry, but even for us, I could never give it up.
My dear, I don't want you to give it up. Why, you've got me believing in it too.
More years have passed now. We've come successfully through difficult times.
As for the Nelly Don dress, it even survives something called a new look.
Today, in our plant in Kansas City, hundreds of machines are busy stitching.
Stitching on the dresses which go out every day, they help make American women more attractive.
And as far as I'm concerned, every single one of those sewing machines is equipped with a golden needle.
Our star, Dorothy McGuire, will return in a moment. Now, our star, Dorothy McGuire.
Thank you. Last year's polio epidemic was the worst in our history. Not a single state escaped.
This year, the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis will again devote all its efforts to fighting this terrible disease and aiding its victims.
It needs your help as much as you can give. Join the March of Dimes, won't you? Thank you. Good night.
Next week, Cavalcade will present another popular Hollywood star, Robert Taylor.
The interchangable Mr. Whitney. Be sure to listen. This is Ted Pearson speaking.
Tonight's original Cavalcade play, The Golden Needle, was based on the career of Nell Donnelly and was written especially for radio by Virginia Radcliffe.
Music was composed by Arden Cornwell and conducted by Donald Voorhees. The program was directed by John Zoller.
Dorothy McGuire may soon be seen in the 20th Century Fox picture, Mother Didn't Tell Me.
Cavalcade of America comes to you from the stage of the Belasco Theater in New York and is presented by the DuPont Company of Wilmington, Delaware,
the makers of Better Things for Better Living through Chemistry.
Stay tuned for the Baby Snook Show followed by Bob Hope on NBC.