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

by McCormick, Jane

  “I’ve never really gotten over losing my children,” I said, putting my head on his shoulder. “I never had a guy who seemed to understand.”

  Johnny said he liked that I cared so much about my children and he made me feel like a person who mattered. He was completely charming, making me believe he loved me.

  “I’ve been thinking about you since we met. I can’t get you off my mind,” he said. “I just want to take you home and keep you forever.”

  Now he knew my weaknesses and he knew how to manipulate a vulnerable young woman like me who was twenty years younger than him.

  He pulled out a wad of money and paid for dinner. Then he asked me if I’d like to come to his place for a drink.

  As we drove down the Strip, I asked, “What casino did you say you worked for, Johnny?”

  “Well, I don’t work anywhere now. They laid me off down at the Golden Nugget. I was dealing there last week. You must have misunderstood me honey,” he said. I figured I had misunderstood, because we were smoking pot when he told me he was employed.

  I wondered if he was ever working there because he had said he was pit boss and now he was saying he was a dealer. I knew he was a liar now but I was so much in love with being in love that I just blew it off. I should have run from him then and I don’t know why I didn’t.

  After we made love Johnny told me he had been with other women, “women who worked in whorehouses.” He said he was the kind of guy who stayed home and took care of the house and the money. This was the life he had lived ever since he was a young man in Philadelphia.

  He said he had served three years in jail for taking a seventeen-year-old across state lines. He was a city bus driver and at the end of his shift he returned to the bus terminal. When he went back to clean the bus, he found a girl sleeping in the back.

  He said, “Hi, where do you live? I’ll take you home.”

  She was a young runaway teen and she begged him to take her to another whorehouse in another state where she could make more money.

  He invited her to stay at his place and they had some beers and got into the sack together. She was a great lay. He learned a lot about lovemaking from a pro.

  The next day he drove her across the state line and took her to the other whorehouse. She told him to come back in two weeks and to bring some clothes because if he was with her, he’d never have to work again.

  Two weeks later he put all of his stuff in his car and picked her up at the whorehouse. They went to a motel and she opened her purse and Johnny could see that it was full of money. She dumped it out on the bed and he said, “Holy shit. There must be over five hundred dollars there. Did you make all of that goddamn money screwing?” He laughed as he scooped up the cash. “Men are real suckers aren’t they?”

  After a week, Johnny took her back to the whorehouse and three days later the police busted the operation. While the police were booking her they asked how she’d gotten to the whorehouse and she told them that Johnny drove her there.

  The police went to the motel and arrested Johnny for transporting a young girl across a state line for prostitution. The Mann Act is a 1910 Federal Law that makes it a crime to induce someone to cross state lines for immoral purpose and illegally arranging cash transactions to conceal their purpose. It addresses the problem of prostitution and immorality in general. That’s why he ended up in prison for three years.

  After he’d gotten out of prison he was looking for work and he met a woman named Dorothy who worked as a prostitute in brothels. He’d been milling the idea over in prison, where he learned about pimping and prostitution and how to manipulate and control low self-esteemed women to turn tricks and give away all their money. He figured if he could get a woman to think that he loved her, and that she loved him, she would do anything for him and let him control all the money. That was the con that Johnny lived by.

  The two of them had a daughter and he stayed home to take care of her while Dorothy worked. That’s how he learned about being a kept pimp and how he learned where all the whorehouses were in the country. In true controlling-pimp fashion, he began to beat the shit out of Dorothy regularly. Once she got beat so bad that he got scared and left her on the highway to die. Luckily, she found a way to fight for her life and survived.

  But his pimping didn’t stop there. He moved in with an even younger prostitute and moved her around the circuit, living off of her profits. I didn’t know about this until one day she showed up outside of his trailer home. We were inside and I could hear her having a fit. I didn’t know who she was at the time, but after she left I learned that she had been his prostitute. He told me they had a son, but when he met me he didn’t want anything more to do with her or their son. I never asked questions.

  Now he was looking for work, saying he hoped to get a job as a pit boss at the Golden Nugget. He wanted to go straight, so he said. That was bullshit.

  But I had fallen in love with him before I knew any of this and I couldn’t help my feelings. I felt so sorry for him. I wanted to love and take care of him and I knew I could help him pay off his bills. “I’ll show him what a high-class hustler can do,” I thought. “He’s never seen the kind of money I can make!” What a messed up girl I was.

  As I listened to Johnny telling me about his problems, I dreamed my own dreams. I saw Johnny getting a real job, our working together to pay off his back bills, then my quitting the profession to live in home with a picket fence where we would raise my daughters. Everything would be perfect—a simple life like that of other married couples, happy families full of love and trust. I would be able to give my girls something I never had—a chance to grow and learn without being afraid.

  “I don’t know what it is, but I think I could fall in love with you,” Johnny said.

  “Well, I am in love with you,” I said.

  We stayed together in his trailer for three days. I didn’t turn any tricks. I didn’t go back to my apartment. We took bubble baths together and drank champagne. Johnny cooked meals for me and we made love all the time, day and night.

  Finally I went back to my apartment to prepare for a night on the Strip. I wanted to show Johnny how much I could make in one night. I’d give him cash to pay off his bills. Then he would get that pit boss job and tell me I would never have to hustle again.

  I hoped I’d meet a high roller that night so I could show Johnny how connected I was in town and we could start making my dream come true.

  Every day for the next week, sometime between 3 A.M. and 4 A.M., I drove to Johnny’s place with stacks of hundred-dollar chips and handfuls of bills. I threw them into the air as I walked in the door. We laughed at all the men who gave me so much money. He called them “stupid jerks” as he scooped up my earnings and put them into his dresser drawer. He said he was going to buy me a home on Sunrise Mountain and that I’d be able to get my daughters and have them live with us. I was so happy!

  Johnny was an immaculate housekeeper and I never had to do any of the work around the place. I never cooked, washed clothes or ironed. Johnny took care of it all. I was his racehorse and he kept me rested for the next run.

  In turn I pampered him with everything he wanted. I gave him money and he bought custom-made clothes, monogrammed silk shirts, alligator shoes and leather jackets. He traded in my T-bird and bought a classic white Thunderbird with a hardtop that snapped off and a continental kit on the back. He said it was for me, but he bought it with my money. He never got that pit boss job and the only money he had was mine—I think about that man now and wonder what I was thinking.

  I thought that if I could make more money than any woman he had known before me, Johnny would help me fulfill my goals. In reality, I was giving up my independence, letting him control me and my money. I was in love with him, I thought, but I didn’t really know what love was.

  Once after a big night on the town, I came back to my apartment and Johnny was waiting for me. I opened my purse and poured out all the money I’d made on the table so he’
d see I had a good night.

  “Honey you’re just a little moneymaker, aren’t you?” Johnny said as he put his arms around me and squeezed me tight.

  “I told you I’d do good out there,” I smiled.

  “Baby, we have enough dough. Let’s go to Palm Springs for a week,” he suggested.

  I had been working seven days a week. I was excited about his idea, so the next day off we went. Johnny checked us into a beautiful place in Palm Springs. It had a Jacuzzi and we sat in it the first night and drank a bottle of tequila we had picked up along the way. We went to dinner at the best restaurants and shopped in the finest shops, buying things for Johnny, for the girls and for me. I loved Zsa Zsa Gabor’s shop.

  The next day Johnny called and invited a friend to our room. Ginger was a tall redhead in her forties, the madam of a brothel in Palm Springs. I’d never met a madam and it was fun to talk with her. Little did I know that she knew Johnny from the past because he had had girls working for her. I always thought that it was degrading and belittling for women to work in brothels.

  But a pimp knew the madam would take care of a girl’s health and business. She made sure the girl saw a doctor, who gave her penicillin shots whether she needed them or not. Usually the pimp just wanted to make some money so he lied to his girls, saying it was all to protect against the clap and gonorrhea. Then the madam provided the girls with johns, and her bouncer would never let the girls leave the house—they were like slaves.

  At the end of each day a madam paid her girls sixty percent for each trick they turned. The house got forty percent, and the girl had to pay for her doctor visit, food, and extra expenses, like cigarettes. After that, the rest went to her, and she gave it to her pimp, who told his girl she was his only squeeze. But most had two or three.

  After a two-week stay, the madam called the pimp to come get his girl—she wanted new girls to keep her tricks interested. The pimp would pick her up in his new Cadillac. He’d give her a two-week rest. He’d pamper her, buying new clothes and perfumes, care for any visual physical injuries, heal her psychologically by telling her the things she wanted to hear, and then he’d take her to another brothel. For him it was all about money and she thought he really loved her. But she was wrong.

  When a john came to the brothel, he’d order a drink and look the women over in their sexy lingerie. After choosing his pleasure, he’d pay the madam for the amount of time he wanted to spend with the girl. The girl took the trick to a room that had a red light over the door, inside and out. When time was up, the bouncer checked on the girl. If the trick wanted more time, he handed over more money or was told to get his pants on. The bouncer took care of the tricks that got out of hand, so the girls liked having the bouncer around.

  I thought that was a terrible way to live. I felt sorry for the girls who had fallen into the kind of a trap I was in: those who thought this was a high-class life but ended up feeling like lowly trash. Some were in it for protection, but it’s still prostitution, no matter if you earn ten dollars or a thousand. It’s the same nasty business.

  At the end of our week in Palm Springs, I was kind of wondering just who this guy was. But the sex was heaven, and I craved being held and loved by someone and made love to by someone that wasn’t a boring trick. I never had sex with a trick that I enjoyed—tricking was not about achieving orgasm.

  Driving back to Vegas, we stopped to get gas and have a drink or two at a nearby bar. Johnny had too much and asked me to drive his Caddy, handing over the keys.

  As soon as we got on the highway he complained about my driving, and he kept it up. Nothing I did was right. Finally I said, “If you wanted to drive the car, why didn’t you do it and leave me alone?

  “Pull this damn car over,” he said.

  We were in the middle of the desert so it was easy for me to pull over right away. He got out, walked around the car, and opened the door. He grabbed my left arm and yanked me out of the car and down onto the pavement. His eyes were angry.

  “Bitch, get around there in the passenger seat and shut up,” he yelled. “And don’t start bawling either.”

  After a moment he realized what he’d done and reached to pull me from the ground. “Oh, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to do that honey.”

  I didn’t know what to think. Suddenly I was afraid. I didn’t understand his treating me like that. He didn’t say a word the rest of the way back, except that when I cried a little, he asked me to stop crying. I did and he said he had lost his manners.

  When we got back to my apartment, Johnny was instantly himself again. He opened the car door for me, saying, “Come on you little love baby. Come on in and let me wipe your tears.”

  “Why did you treat me like that?” I asked. I was still hurt and shaken up, but I was willing to let him make me feel better.

  Johnny took me inside, rolled us a joint, and fixed me a drink. He was very sweet, apologizing again and again for the way he had treated me, blaming it on the drinking. Then he made love to me all night long.

  I forgave him for his abusive behavior because that’s what I’d experienced all my life; the home I grew up in, the relationships I was a part of. I thought this was the only way to keep us together. I wish I had known better.

  Chapter 14

  Sinatra, Martin and Marnell

  One afternoon in February of 1962, George, Frank’s valet, called and told me to come down to the Regency Lounge at the Sands because Frank was in town. I dressed in my beautiful Ship ‘n Shore designer dress and rushed to meet him. Frank was happy to see me, standing up and giving me a kiss on the cheek. Sammy and Annette were sitting with him at the table and it seemed like the continuation of a party that never ended.

  After the excitement settled down Frank said, “Honey, I’m going to go out to the tables to try and cheer up some of these people around here!” Then he raised his arm and turned to the bar and shouted, “Hoss, get over here!”

  Hoss was Dan Blocker from the most popular television series of the day, Bonanza. He was a six-foot-four stocky man that talked like a Texan. He walked over to our table and Frank said, “Would you mind sitting over here and watching my Baby Jane while I go out and deal cards?”

  Dan smiled gently at me with his blue eyes and said, “Yeah sure, she’s a beauty. I wouldn’t mind sitting with her!”

  Frank left and Dan took his seat next to me.

  The big man reached out for my hand and his engulfed mine like a gorilla’s but it was as gentle and soft as butter. I’d seen him many times on Bonanza and I enjoyed being with the genuinely sweet guy that he was.

  Minutes later, Peter Lawford and Dean Martin walked in and joined us.

  The energy was high. The waitress rushed to take drink orders and the hotel staff hurried to move tables and chairs next to ours in the roped off area.

  Annette and I laughed at the guys as they joked around. The celebrity watchers were going absolutely crazy seeing so many stars at one time. They didn’t know that all of them were going to be in town for only a few hours before leaving for the movie set in Utah to shoot Sergeants 3.

  Then Lindsay, Dennis and Phillip Crosby, and Johnny Rivers walked into the lounge. The Crosby boys were Bing Crosby’s sons. Together they formed a singing group and had been on famous television shows like the Ed Sullivan Show and in various movies. Johnny was a handsome dreamboat of a guy. He was somewhat shy and seemed thankful to meet us. They sat down at the table next to ours and after a few minutes Lindsay turned to us to say hi. Lindsay was a cute curly haired blond with a quick wit, close to my age and full of energy. He told us he’d won a part in Sergeants 3 as Private Wills and was excited to get started on the shoot.

  Then Lindsay introduced Johnny Rivers to us. He was a quiet guy who was just starting out as a singer. Lindsay was excited about his talent and he encouraged him to go out and do his own show. Johnny didn’t think he had the right stuff to make it big in the music business, but Lindsay kept saying he was good and that he knew good talent
when he saw it. Little did anyone know that Johnny had become a successful rock ‘n’ roll singer, songwriter, guitarist and music producer. He was known for a string of songs between 1964 and 1968, among them “Memphis” (a Chuck Berry cover), “Mountain of Love,” “The Seventh Sin,” and “Secret Agent Man.” In 1964 he signed a one-year contract with Whisky a Go-Go to open a new nightclub on Sunset Boulevard.

  Lindsay kept looking at me so he reached out his hand and introduced himself. I told him that I lived in Vegas and invited him to give me a call next time he was in town.

  Then Frank returned and said, “We’re getting ready to cut out. We’re going on location in Utah,” then he looked at me and asked, “Do you want to go with me?”

  “Oh I’d love to but I can’t. I have other plans already,” I told them, “but thanks for inviting me.” Smiling, I was thinking to myself that I just wanted to go home and curl up with Johnny.

  “I’ll have George give you a call when I’m back in town,” Frank said. He reached over, gave me kiss on the cheek and slipped four hundred dollars into my hand. Then all the guys were gone.

  I drove to Johnny’s trailer and when I got there he was relaxing in his red satin smoking jacket. He looked sexy and it made me feel at home with the smells of a home cooked dinner in his immaculately clean house. I threw the cash I’d gotten from Frank on the table and told him about the celebrities. Johnny was impressed and he broke out a bottle of champagne to celebrate.

  As we got silly he grabbed his camera and said, “None of my chicks that I’ve had are as sexy as you. Let me take a picture of you with your bra and panties on.” I laughed, thinking he was just being a guy. I was very modest but I dug him so much that I’d do anything he asked, and that included him taking a picture of me naked.

  At that point, I never knew what happened to my heart and soul but he now had me loving him. It broke my heart when Johnny didn’t tell me I had to stop turning tricks if I was going to be with him. You see, he never said, “Baby I don’t want you doing that shit out there anymore.” No, he loved it when I would bring home seven thousand, ten thousand and thirty thousand after a night and day out. He wasn’t in love with me. He was in love with the money. Little did I know that I had ended up with a “no good loving pimp” who would sit home and clean the house, watch television and drink while I was going out on the Strip. It was so wrong and that type of life was sickening and it was killing me inside and out.