KC Made Billie Into Joan

Thirty years ago today – May 10, 1977 – the big story on most of the morning TV shows was the announcement that one of Hollywood’s most legendary movie stars, Joan Crawford, had died at age 72. Although Crawford was technically a native of San Antonio, Texas (she was born there as Lucille Fay LeSueur in 1905), Kansas City claimed her as a hometown girl since she arrived in town as a 10-year-old with her mother, her brother and her stepfather. She went by “Billie Cassin” back then, and she spent most of her formative years here. She lived in Kansas City, in fact, right up to the day she hopped on the Missouri Pacific westbound train for Hollywood on New Year’s Day in 1925.