Rat Pack Party Girl: From Prostitute to Women’s Advocate

by McCormick, Jane

  I loved smoking pot. The diet pills had worn off by then, and the pot made me feel good, not energetic or lively like the pills. It made me giggle until my sides were sore. I felt warm and spacey. After an hour or so I was very hungry. I found a bag of chocolate chip cookies and devoured the whole thing.

  The other girls were almost as giddy and they laughed and laughed at me. I finally passed out at about 7 A.M.

  A few hours later a loud, hard knock on the door woke us all.

  “Who is it?” I asked gruffly through the door. I had a throbbing hangover and the noise hurt my head. I was in no mood for company.

  The man on the other side said, “Miss Harvey, the hotel manager wants to see you as soon as possible.”

  Laurie and Audrey were sound asleep and Annette was taking a shower. I put on some clothes, ran a brush through my hair, and walked to the manager’s office in the lobby.

  He met me outside his office and asked me to come in. He was a middle-aged American and looked serious as he peered at me grimly over a pair of horn-rimmed glasses.

  “Miss Harvey, I regret to inform you that you and your girls will have to leave this island,” he said.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “You know very well what I’m talking about.” His back was rigid, his face hard.

  “No, I don’t.”

  “I’m talking about your display by the pool last night. We do not put up with that kind of action in this hotel. Nor do we put up with the other things you’re doing here.”

  “You’re acting holier-than-thou. I’ve seen your local girls floating around the hotel. It’s pretty obvious what they’re up to.”

  “I don’t know whom you’re referring to, but whoever they might be, they live here on the island,” he said.

  “Yeah, you’re taking care of your own. Right!”

  He didn’t respond to my comment. “You’re not welcome here Miss Harvey and neither are your three friends.”

  I could see I wouldn’t win the argument. “Well you’d better arrange to get our tickets fixed so we can get out of here,” I said.

  “I’m already taking care of that. You ladies be out in front in an hour. The car will pick you up then.”

  “Thanks a lot,” I snapped and walked out of the office, slamming the door.

  I thought about what happened as I stormed back to the room. The hotel hadn’t asked the guys to leave, but it had no problem kicking out four women. It didn’t seem fair. If the men hadn’t wanted us to do the stuff we did, we wouldn’t even have been there.

  Annette, Laurie and Audrey were astounded when I told them we had to leave, but they dressed and packed in a few minutes. In a huff, I called Mike and woke him up, thinking he might have some influence and could get the manager to change his mind.

  He was sympathetic. “I can’t believe they would treat you like that,” he said, still groggy. “I’m sorry honey but there’s not much I can do. But I’ll call you when I get back to New York.”

  We were doomed. There was nothing to do but leave the place with our heads up and our chests out.

  Together the four of us paraded through the lobby to the front of the hotel. We could hear people whispering and a few pointed in our direction. It didn’t faze us. We sashayed out of that fancy hotel like four beauty queens on a runway.

  The hotel van was waiting and the driver didn’t waste any time. He drove at least sixty miles per hour and we were at the airport in minutes. Someone couldn’t wait to be rid of us. At the airport the driver showed us our new tickets—first-class, the only seats left on the plane.

  The driver unloaded our bags, showed us to the terminal entrance, and drove off in a cloud of dust. Twenty minutes later, four exhausted ladies from Las Vegas left Grand Bahamas. Soon we were flying over the United States and back to Nevada. Not that we were aware of it—we slept the entire way.

  Chapter 12

  Johnny Patterson and Shoemaker

  One evening I went to the Flame Restaurant near the Desert Inn for a drink. The Flame was frequented by the locals and known for their steaks. The décor had sexy leather red booths with black and gold trim. Small beaded lights outlined the back walls with soft recessed lighting. I sat at the bar and ordered a cocktail. I was tired and needed to get away from the Strip and not be bothered by tricks.

  Ted the bartender was a friendly guy. The minute I pulled a cigarette from my purse he’d rush over to light it. If I put out a cigarette, he’d come over and clean the ashtray. Vegas services prided themselves on that and the Flame treated their locals no differently than they were treated on the Strip. When my drink was near empty he’d be right there to fill it and that service always came with a smile, a joke and a caring ear. That’s Vegas and that’s something that I liked.

  Then I noticed a man sitting at the other end of the bar. He was handsome, well dressed and looked to be in his early twenties. When he looked over at me he smiled and seemed to be attracted to me. I was lonely and wanted to get to know a guy who was not a trick.

  I smiled sweetly at him and he came over and offered to buy me a drink. He had high cheekbones, a square jaw and piercing brown eyes. As we talked I could see his bulging muscles underneath his tailored shirt and sports coat. He introduced himself as Johnny Patterson and told me that he was a pit boss at the Golden Nugget.

  I told him that I’d just moved to Vegas and was looking for a job. I didn’t want him to know that I was a hustler that had two daughters to support like I would normally tell my tricks with hopes of getting more money from them.

  But this guy was not a trick. I thought he was a hard working local who wanted to get away from the Vegas jungle for a drink. After a few drinks he asked me if I’d like to go to a friend’s house to smoke some pot.

  “Yeah, let’s go!” Johnny pulled out a wad of money and paid the bar bill. Then he drove me in his immaculately clean white 1959 Cadillac Deville. It was loaded with every bell and whistle a caddy could have. It had skirts on the back wheels and sexy big fins pointing to the sky. He opened the car door and I melted into the white calf skin leather seat.

  He drove me to his friend’s house just a few blocks away. Mike was a clean-cut guy who immediately served us some drinks and then brought out the pot. I hadn’t smoked any pot since the Bahamas. After a few hits we got the giggles and the munchies so Mike ordered a pizza and left to pick it up.

  That’s when Johnny moved next to me on the couch. He looked softly into my eyes and a funny feeling came over me. He put his arm around me and kissed me. I felt like I had been hit by a bolt of lightning because he was such a good kisser. I missed kissing because I never kiss my tricks. We sat and kissed until Mike returned with the pizza.

  Mike had to work later, so he went to bed and Johnny asked me to his place for another drink. He drove me to his trailer located a few blocks past Fremont Street. It was a sixty-five-foot home that had a small kitchen, living room and bedroom.

  Before finishing our drinks we ended up in the bedroom. Johnny was an expert at lovemaking. Unlike my tricks, which I controlled sexually, Johnny took control by kissing and massaging me all over, allowing me to have an orgasm. That was something that I hadn’t had for a long time and that’s how he got me to fall for him.

  He drove me back to the Flame Restaurant the next afternoon and kissed me goodbye and said, “Can I see you tonight”

  “Oh yes you can!” I said.

  In fact, for the next few hours Johnny was all I thought about. I didn’t want to go out and turn tricks with some old son of a bitch for money when I thought I’d found the love of my life. He seemed perfect. He had a good job, had a nice clean home and drove the hottest car in town. I wanted to be with someone I cared about and who cared about me.

  Before meeting Johnny the next day, I went to the Sands Hotel and was talking to Nick Kelly when he said, “Have you seen Betty? She got her boobs pumped up!”

  “What do you mean—pumped up?”

  “Some doctor in
town is putting something in them. It perks them right up.”

  I looked down at my breasts and pushed them up: “I need some of that stuff.”

  “Oh no you don’t. You’re perfect as you are. Seriously Jane, you don’t want to do that to your body. You never know what that stuff will do,” Nick said.

  “Yeah,” I said, laughing, “Mine need a boost, that’s what.”

  I’d just turned twenty and my breasts were starting to droop, probably the result of having two children. I wanted my breasts to be as firm and attractive as they were when I was sixteen.

  “Well Jane, if you want to talk to Betty about it she’ll be in the cocktail lounge after the second show.”

  “Thanks Nick.” I gave him a hug and a peck on the cheek before leaving.

  Betty was a Copa showgirl and in the 1960s, each of the hotels required two or three showgirls to sit in the cocktail lounge after their shows to talk with customers for an hour or two.

  The showgirls were elegant women who met strict job requirements, including having an outgoing personality, a beautiful face with a perfect set of teeth, a fantastic body, needed to be at least five-foot-eight, and own a pair of voluptuous breasts.

  At the beginning of each show, the girls walked onto the stage balancing densely decorated and heavy headdresses. They wore beautifully designed topless gowns that exposed their breasts. When they walked the stage, they moved left to right with arms outstretched, dragging long trains of their gowns spread behind them. They posed for twenty minutes or so, unimaginably glamorous. The presentation then was pure, elegant art.

  Showgirls were a huge casino attraction. The minute someone saw a showgirl walk into the lounge or casino, you’d hear them say, “Oh look, there’s a showgirl.” Everyone would turn around and stare as if she were a goddess.

  This was also another game that the casino played to make people stay around longer and spend more money.

  Knowing Betty would be in the Regency lounge that evening, I made sure I was there too. I asked her about her boob job and she gave me the doctor’s phone number. I called him the next day.

  The doctor was right down the street from the Sahara. An older man, popular with many of the girls on the Strip, he authorized prescriptions for diet and sleeping pills and provided other services that Vegas girls needed. During this visit he checked my breasts and took my vital signs. Then he had me watch a slide show regarding silicone injection.

  Afterwards he said, “I’ve tested this silicone on my wife. I’ve shot it into her breasts, her cheeks, the sides of her eyes and her behind and she’s more beautiful than ever. I think you’re going to be real happy with the results. It’s safe and your breasts will still be beautifully standing at attention when you’re eighty. You’ll need only one injection to each breast. You’ll see instant improvement.” He left the room for a minute then returned with an inch-wide, foot-long tube filled with raw silicone.

  The doctor injected a local anesthetic under my breasts to numb the area and said, “Hold perfectly still while I inject this soft gel. You shouldn’t feel a thing.” Starting with my left breast, he inserted the two-inch needle and slowly pushed the stuff in.

  “As the slides showed you, the soft silicone is placed within the sealed-off cavity in your breasts, which makes them feel naturally soft to the touch. You’ll never have to worry about your breasts sagging.” He repeated the injection in my right breast. In ten minutes it was done.

  When I sat up and touched my breasts, I immediately felt the change. Now I understood why Betty was happy and I was surprised at the simplicity of the procedure.

  “Just massage them three times a day, or have your old man massage them, and everything will be okay,” the doctor said, laughing.

  My breasts felt a little sore but it was fine. Now they looked as they had when I was sixteen. They were perky and full right away, and I felt sexier than ever.

  That evening I called Johnny and we spent the next few days at his trailer. He thought my boob job was a great improvement and was more than happy to massage them for me. He went wild and served drinks, cooked dinner, washed the dishes, poured a bath, lit candles and massaged my sore feet. I loved being pampered and he told me what every girl wants to hear, that I was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen.

  After twenty-four hours of Johnny’s pampering it was time to get back to work. Johnny took me back to the Flame and he passionately kissed me goodbye. I was so happy and went to have my hair and nails done. Afterwards I went back to my apartment, slipped into a thousand-dollar evening gown and drove to the Desert Inn.

  As I walked into the cocktail lounge I noticed a handsome, itty-bitty guy with a tall, slender woman sitting at one of the tables. They looked like they were having a ball so I sat down at a table next to them. After ordering a drink, I looked over and asked where they were from.

  “My name is Babs and this is my husband, Willie Shoemaker,” the woman said.

  “You mean the famous jockey Willie Shoemaker?”

  “You got it. Why don’t you join us?”

  After a few more drinks Babs said, “Let’s go dancing up at the Sky Room!”

  The three of us took an elevator to the Sky Room on the third floor tower of the Desert Inn. There a three-piece band performed before a small dance floor in the window-walled room overlooking the Strip.

  We carried on as if we’d known each other for years. After the two of them danced, Willie asked me to dance, reaching out to pull me from my lounge chair. Pulling me close, he nestled his face between my breasts as he guided me around the floor.

  “Now you know why I love tall women,” he laughed.

  It felt odd to be dancing with a man so short, and I couldn’t believe he was doing that to me in front of his wife. I turned to see Babs’s reaction, but she just laughed. Of course, she didn’t know that I was a hustler, but I would never have taken advantage of them. In fact, I had forgotten entirely about making money, having decided to spend the evening having fun with them.

  Then Wilbur Clark, owner of the Desert Inn, and his wife Toni, joined our table. Willie introduced me to Wilbur. He remembered meeting me when I was with Sam Snead during the golf tournament. Wilbur was a charismatic businessman with thinning white hair in his early sixties. Toni was a classy brunette dressed in a white evening gown with a diamond necklace, bracelet, and earrings.

  Wilbur asked whether we’d like to see Hello Dolly. We loved the idea, so Wilbur got into his Cadillac with Willie in the front seat beside him and the three women sitting in back. We rode to the Rivera, where Betty Grable was performing. When we got to the front door of the Rivera Willie jumped out of the car and opened the back door. I moved my legs one by one and put my high-heeled feet on the ground as Willie extended his right hand. I reached to him and he pulled me from the seat like a feather.

  “God Willie, I can’t believe how strong you are,” I said.

  “That’s from holding those horses back,” he chuckled.

  Then I looked at his feet. “Those are the smallest feet I’ve ever seen.”

  “Honey, hold out your hand,” he responded.

  He laid his foot right in the palm of my hand. It reached only from the end of my middle finger to my wrist. I was blown away.

  “Yeah but he’s larger in other areas,” Babs laughed.

  When we got to the showroom door the maître d’ escorted us to the best seats in the house. While we waited for the performance to begin, Babs and I had the waitress spike Willie’s drinks with a little extra alcohol. Willie seldom drank much and I doubt he appreciated it.

  After the show, Wilbur drove us back to the Desert Inn. By that time I was exhausted and excused myself and drove back to the apartment.

  All the shows were free to celebrities and casino owners. I ended up seeing Hello Dolly five more times during the 1960s, with five different tricks, always pretending it was the first time. I saw Engelbert Humperdinck (whom I tricked once), Tom Jones, Ray Charles, Aretha Franklin, D
ionne Warwick, the Mamas and Papas, the Fifth Dimension, Elvis Presley, Don Rickles, the Supremes, Stevie Wonder, Ike and Tina Turner, Sonny and Cher, Fats Domino, and many other fabulous performers. Some were just lounge acts then, still hoping to achieve the stardom they eventually won.

  I woke up late that afternoon feeling good about the night before. It was nice to be with a happily married couple for a change. I wanted to have a life like theirs, because you could see they loved each other and I wanted that feeling and hoped it would be with Johnny. That seemed like a good start. Falling in love again was a wonderful and wholesome feeling. I hoped to get my sweet girls back and live a happy life together in our new home.

  Chapter 13

  Johnny’s Love

  I had been on my own for about a year and I wanted to get out of prostitution because there was no emotion or commitment expected from the tricks who were cheaters and liars to their wives and themselves. It was purely a performance for me, pleasure for the johns and a money-making deal for the casinos. It was the women who were the victims and they had no voice.

  I wanted a hard-working, honest man to share my life and feelings with. I wanted to be honored and respected by society and God. Johnny had a job, car and place to live. He was understanding, gentle, and romantic. Now I had to tell him the truth about myself. It was time he knew who he was involved with, before feelings were hurt.

  I wanted to look good for my next date with Johnny because I had a lot I wanted to tell him. We had arranged to meet at the Flame Restaurant so I drove over and strolled into the lounge and spotted Johnny sitting in a booth looking very classy in his blue silk shirt and sports coat.

  Johnny, happy to see me, immediately rose and welcomed me with a hug and a kiss. Shivers went up and down my spine. All through dinner he gazed into my eyes, making me feel warm and comfortable.

  While sipping our cocktails, I told him about my daughters. I hadn’t said anything about them earlier because I just wanted to be happy for a change and not discuss the pain of being separated from the kids. Johnny slid over to my side and put his loving arms around me. He said, “I’m sorry that happened to you. That judge must have been crazy because most women get their children.”