Hazel Avery Strakosch

Born October 8, 1892 in Brooklyn, per her 1916 passport application. The travel was to the Far East, with her mother.

At age 12, Hazel Strakosch appears in 1905 New York State Census for Bedford, Westchester County, living with her grandmother, Hulda Whitlock. She won the girls' prize for Hudson-Fulton (counties) schools Essay Contest in 1909 for best "essay on the discovery of the Hudson River or on the application of steam to navigation thereon," at the public high school in Katonah, NY (Hazel Strakosch).

Avery Strakosch Heller's 1916 passport application references divorce from Walter E. Heller, whom Avery had married in Chicago in 1912. Passport application gives her occupation as "writer," resided 25 W. 36th St., New York. The page following the passport application contains a photograph and affidavits.

Marriage of Hazel Avery Strakosch and Walter E. Heller, Chicago, 1912:

• Name: Walter E. Heller, 21
• Birth Year (Estimated): 1891
• Spouse's Name: Hazel Avery Strakosch, 20
• Spouse's Birth Year (Estimated): 1892
• License Type: Marriage, 08 Oct 1912 -- two weeks before Walter's 22nd birthday on October 21, 1912.
• Event Place: Chicago, Cook, Illinois
• GS Film number: 1030531 , Digital Folder Number: 4271758 , Image Number: 1236 , Reference ID: 609153

Walter E. Heller was probably the Walter Heller, 19, of the 1910 U.S. Census for Chicago, Cook County, Illinois, whose father, age 62, was an immigrant from Hungary, and whose mother was already deceased. A Walter Heller b. Oct. 21, 1890 registered for the WWI draft in 1917 -- stating he had a wife]. That Walter was the same Walter E., b. Oct. 21, 1890, who was son of Isidore the Hungarian immigrant, per birth record in Chicago. In February 1915, when he was working as a jeweler in Chicago, the same Walter E. Heller applied for a passport for travel to Europe on business. The image following the passport application -- which says nothing about a spouse -- contains a photograph and affidavits. He made the voyage in June 1915, returning through Ellis Island on the liner Nieuw Amsterdam out of Rotterdam -- stating Marital Status Single. In The New York Dramatic Mirror of March 1913-April 1914 (link exists but does not work), Edgar Strakosch (father of Avery) was said to be going East to live nearer his daughter Mrs. Walter E. Heller of Chicago. Walter E. Heller's father, Isidore Heller, had a butchery-manufacturing business in Chicago and commissioned a house built by Frank Lloyd Wright in 1897, before Wright had fully developed his Prairie style. The article on this house states that Isidore lent Walter E. Heller $5000 in 1919 to start a finance corporation, which became Walter E. Heller & Co. A profile of Heller and the company appeared in TIME magazine of February 15, 1960. Walter E. Heller married Florence Grunsfeld Heller on Feb. 22 1917, making her the wife referred to on his June 1917 WWI draft registration card. They were divorced in 1953, as Walter E. Heller became involved in another party's divorce scandal (Mt. Vernon, Illinois, Register-News, 23 Nov 1955, p. 19). Walter E. Heller, b. Oct. 21, 1890, died April 1969 in Chicago.

Avery Strakosch published short stories and profiles in magazines including The New Yorker and theatrical trade publications through the 1930s. These included:

• In Literary Digest of June 12, 1915 cites a letter from Avery Strakosch discussing "musical and theatrical arts" in Europe prior to World War I, and refers to the letter's writer as "Mr."
• Avery Strakosch, "Lived in a Sultan's Harem," Musical America, February 20, 1915.
• "How Scotti Makes Up", about the opera singer Antonio Scotti's many characters for the stage, in Theatre Magazine, January 1916.
• A profile of rare book dealer A.S.W. Rosenbach, "Napoleon of Books," in the April 14, 1928 New Yorker
• On the use of glass in interior design, in Collier's Magazine of Oct. 26, 1935. Other Collier's pieces are listed at UNZ.org.
• Short story "I Married an Artist," in the October 3, 1936 Saturday Evening Post. In 1937 it became a movie.
• Profile of Paul Robeson in Look of March 10, 1942.
• A list of Avery Strakosch fiction appears at The FictionMags Index

"Pawnbrokers have less chance to be dishonest than other men," wrote Avery Strakosch in The Century Magazine in February 1929. "They are all under municipal supervision. They are under oath to make a written report, on special cards furnished by the police, of every loan they make."

Avery Strakosch was also an artists' representative in New York. In July 1916, an advertisement in The Music News showed she represented a baritone singer. She opened an office called Strakosch, Ltd. in 1917. In 1923 Avery Strakosch visited Ohio as "publicity representative for J. Fischer & Bro." and told a music trade show how impressed she was with the state of music in Ohio: Music Trade Review of May 26, 1923.