Frankie Baker and Albert Britt

Disir

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"NEGRO SHOT BY WOMAN
Allen Britt, colored, was shot and badly wounded shortly after 2 o'clock yesterday morning by Frankie Baker, also colored. The shooting occurred in Britt's room at 212 Targee Street, and was the culmination of a quarrel. The woman claimed that Britt had been paying attentions to another woman. The bullet entered Britt's abdomen, penetrating the intestines. The woman escaped after the shooting."

- St Louis Globe-Democrat,
October 16, 1899.


Just 48 hours after Frankie Baker pulled that trigger, a ballad telling her story was already being sold on the city's street corners. Allen wasn't even dead yet - he didn't finally succumb to his wounds until October 19 - but already the balladeers had him six feet under. The song's been in constant circulation ever since.
The fact that Allen's murder took place just a few blocks from where Stagger Lee had killed Billy Lyons four years before means the two ballads have always tended to get tangled up with one another, swapping fragments of their lyrics at will. It's no surprise that many of Frankie's musical biographers - Bob Dylan, Elvis Presley, Mississippi John Hurt - have tackled Stag's story too, but what is unique about her is the degree of interest that Hollywood's always shown.
From Mae West's 1933 outing She Done Him Wrong to the 1991 vehicle for Al Pacino and Michelle Pfeiffer, Frankie has seldom been off the silver screen. She's trod the theatre's boards pretty regularly too, appearing in both John Huston's 1930 play about her crime and Terrence McNally's Frankie & Johnny in the Clair de Lune, which was given a London production as recently as 2005. As we'll see, very few of these productions have bothered themselves much with the facts, but they have ensured that the two lovers' names remains firmly linked together in all our minds.
'Frankie was a beautiful, light brown girl who liked to make money and spend it'
Frankie Baker was a young prostitute, aged about 24 when the killing took place, who lived and worked at 212 Targee Street in the heart of St Louis' flourishing vice district. Richard Clay, a former neighbour, described her like this: "She was a beautiful, light brown girl, who liked to make money and spend it. She dressed very richly, sat for company in magenta lady's cloth, diamonds as big as hen's eggs in her ears. There was a long razor scar down the side of her face she got in her teens from a girl who was jealous of her. She only weighed about 115lbs, but she had the eye of one you couldn't monkey with. She was a queen sport."
Allen Britt, who was about 17 when he died, shared Frankie's Targee Street rooms, and seems to have acted as her pimp. He was a talented piano player and known as a snappy dresser. He was also cheating on Frankie with an 18-year-old prostitute called Alice Pryar.
The film director John Huston, then a struggling writer, interviewed Clay for a footnote essay to his play, the text of which was published in 1930. "Frankie loved Albert all right," Clay recalled. "He was wise for his years but not old enough to be level with any woman. Frankie was ready money. She bought him everything he wanted, and kept his pockets full. Then while she was waiting on company he would be out playing around."
Clay, who had sat with Allen while he died in City Hospital, also gave Huston his own account of what had happened on the fatal night. He said Frankie had surprised Allen with Alice at the Phoenix Hotel, calling him out into the street for a furious public row. Allen, Clay said, had refused to go home with Frankie, so she'd returned to Targee Street alone. Allen turned up there about dawn, admitted he'd spent the night with Alice, and threatened to leave Frankie for good. According to Clay, Frankie had then started crying and started out the door to find Alice. Allen threatened to kill her if she took another step, and that's when the fight broke out(1).
Frankie and Johnny

Allen was taken to the hospital and Frankie was arrested. The police took her to the hospital where Allen identified her as the shooter. Though Allen Britt didn’t die until three days later, the evening of the murder, “barroom bard” Bill Dooley was performing a ballad he wrote called “Frankie Killed Allen.”

Trial: November 13, 1899

In many versions of the songs Frankie is executed, sometimes in the electric chair, but in reality, the coroner's jury called the killing justifiable homicide in self-defense. She was still required to stand trial and on November 13, 1899 she was acquitted by Judge Willis B. Clark.

Verdict: Not guilty - justifable homicide in self-defense.
Murder by Gaslight: Frankie Baker - "He Done Her Wrong"

You can see a picture of Frankie Baker here:
Frankie Baker | University of Missouri-St. Louis Digital Library

Of course the primary argument has always been over the murder ballad itself and, subsequently, the movies that followed it. Many articles note Frankie Baker kept on moving. They acknowledge she passed away in a mental institution. No articles I have come across have ever been able to do justice to Frankie Baker as a human. The following link provides information on how this woman was tortured and repeatedly humiliated. One of the hardest things to digest is that she was 12 years older than Albert Britt. She met him when he was 15 and he was dead at 17.

She is human here:

Encyclopedia of African American Popular Culture [4 volumes]

 
An old rock song claimed "Frankie and Johnnie were lovers". Johnnie Rivers says Stagger Lee and Billie were lovers. It's best to enjoy the songs instead of going crazy trying to equate real life to 20th century pop.
 
"NEGRO SHOT BY WOMAN
Allen Britt, colored, was shot and badly wounded shortly after 2 o'clock yesterday morning by Frankie Baker, also colored. The shooting occurred in Britt's room at 212 Targee Street, and was the culmination of a quarrel. The woman claimed that Britt had been paying attentions to another woman. The bullet entered Britt's abdomen, penetrating the intestines. The woman escaped after the shooting."

- St Louis Globe-Democrat,
October 16, 1899.


Just 48 hours after Frankie Baker pulled that trigger, a ballad telling her story was already being sold on the city's street corners. Allen wasn't even dead yet - he didn't finally succumb to his wounds until October 19 - but already the balladeers had him six feet under. The song's been in constant circulation ever since.
The fact that Allen's murder took place just a few blocks from where Stagger Lee had killed Billy Lyons four years before means the two ballads have always tended to get tangled up with one another, swapping fragments of their lyrics at will. It's no surprise that many of Frankie's musical biographers - Bob Dylan, Elvis Presley, Mississippi John Hurt - have tackled Stag's story too, but what is unique about her is the degree of interest that Hollywood's always shown.
From Mae West's 1933 outing She Done Him Wrong to the 1991 vehicle for Al Pacino and Michelle Pfeiffer, Frankie has seldom been off the silver screen. She's trod the theatre's boards pretty regularly too, appearing in both John Huston's 1930 play about her crime and Terrence McNally's Frankie & Johnny in the Clair de Lune, which was given a London production as recently as 2005. As we'll see, very few of these productions have bothered themselves much with the facts, but they have ensured that the two lovers' names remains firmly linked together in all our minds.
'Frankie was a beautiful, light brown girl who liked to make money and spend it'
Frankie Baker was a young prostitute, aged about 24 when the killing took place, who lived and worked at 212 Targee Street in the heart of St Louis' flourishing vice district. Richard Clay, a former neighbour, described her like this: "She was a beautiful, light brown girl, who liked to make money and spend it. She dressed very richly, sat for company in magenta lady's cloth, diamonds as big as hen's eggs in her ears. There was a long razor scar down the side of her face she got in her teens from a girl who was jealous of her. She only weighed about 115lbs, but she had the eye of one you couldn't monkey with. She was a queen sport."
Allen Britt, who was about 17 when he died, shared Frankie's Targee Street rooms, and seems to have acted as her pimp. He was a talented piano player and known as a snappy dresser. He was also cheating on Frankie with an 18-year-old prostitute called Alice Pryar.
The film director John Huston, then a struggling writer, interviewed Clay for a footnote essay to his play, the text of which was published in 1930. "Frankie loved Albert all right," Clay recalled. "He was wise for his years but not old enough to be level with any woman. Frankie was ready money. She bought him everything he wanted, and kept his pockets full. Then while she was waiting on company he would be out playing around."
Clay, who had sat with Allen while he died in City Hospital, also gave Huston his own account of what had happened on the fatal night. He said Frankie had surprised Allen with Alice at the Phoenix Hotel, calling him out into the street for a furious public row. Allen, Clay said, had refused to go home with Frankie, so she'd returned to Targee Street alone. Allen turned up there about dawn, admitted he'd spent the night with Alice, and threatened to leave Frankie for good. According to Clay, Frankie had then started crying and started out the door to find Alice. Allen threatened to kill her if she took another step, and that's when the fight broke out(1).
Frankie and Johnny

Allen was taken to the hospital and Frankie was arrested. The police took her to the hospital where Allen identified her as the shooter. Though Allen Britt didn’t die until three days later, the evening of the murder, “barroom bard” Bill Dooley was performing a ballad he wrote called “Frankie Killed Allen.”

Trial: November 13, 1899

In many versions of the songs Frankie is executed, sometimes in the electric chair, but in reality, the coroner's jury called the killing justifiable homicide in self-defense. She was still required to stand trial and on November 13, 1899 she was acquitted by Judge Willis B. Clark.

Verdict: Not guilty - justifable homicide in self-defense.
Murder by Gaslight: Frankie Baker - "He Done Her Wrong"

You can see a picture of Frankie Baker here:
Frankie Baker | University of Missouri-St. Louis Digital Library

Of course the primary argument has always been over the murder ballad itself and, subsequently, the movies that followed it. Many articles note Frankie Baker kept on moving. They acknowledge she passed away in a mental institution. No articles I have come across have ever been able to do justice to Frankie Baker as a human. The following link provides information on how this woman was tortured and repeatedly humiliated. One of the hardest things to digest is that she was 12 years older than Albert Britt. She met him when he was 15 and he was dead at 17.

She is human here:

Encyclopedia of African American Popular Culture [4 volumes]



Interesting; never heard that piece of history.

Thanks for posting some interesting threads in this forum, much better than the usual idiotic conspiratard spam and tabloid political trash and fake news that have become the norm here.
 

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