Profile[]
Name: Mary (Kornman) (Newman)
Nickname: None
Played By: Mary Kornman (actress)
Born: 1915
Relatives: father (name unrevealed), mother (name unrevealed), older sister (name unrevealed), Millie (sister), David Kornman (brother), Sheldon (brother-in-law), Gertie (cousin)
Clubs: 4th Ave. Athalatick Club ("cashear"), Junior Police Squad, Manhattan Club, Junior Fire Squad 2
First Short: Young Sherlocks
Last Short: The Fourth Alarm! (original), Reunion In Rhythm (cameo)
Character[]
Bio: Mary Newman (family name mentioned in Mary, Queen Of Tots) was the first cute and winsome darling of the Little Rascals and "the innocent cause of many a black eye" as described in The Champeen!. Several boys wanted to be her favorite friend, and it may be these reasons for her highly sheltered life when we see her story on how she became a member of the gang. Her family, the Newmans, turns out to be very upper class with a big house, estate and servants with the money to keep it in Mary, Queen Of Tots. Her father is revealed to be a horse-owner in Derby Day, and her mother is often off on social gatherings, leaving a nanny behind to raise Mary to be a society girl. However, Mary is very lonely and she really wants to have friends, so when the gardener brings her dolls who resemble the boys of the neighborhood, she becomes friends with the actual boys and begins to follow them around. She does ride a limo to Mr. Tuttle's shoe store in The Cobbler.
Despite her look as a potential beauty queen, Mary is a tomboy at heart. She is not afraid to play baseball in the street with the others in Official Officers. She even gets to pretend to be a police officer in that short and a firefighter in The Fourth Alarm!, dangerously carrying and tossing dynamite and black powder from a second story window. Her mother also gets her into being a child actress in Dogs Of War!, which lasts up until her friends invade the studio and lay waste to it.
Mary becomes the true love of Mickey Daniels through their adventures. She confesses she finds him cute behind the freckles and he takes her on rides on a bike in The Love Bug and a goat-drawn cart in July Days. However, Mary leaves town when she is sent to finishing school shortly after her older sister marries in Thundering Fleas, and Mickey doesn't see her again for several years until meeting her at Elmira College.
In 1933, Mary returns to town as a teacher to replace Miss Crabtree at the Adams Street Grammar School, now in a bigger building in Fish Hooky. She's now a very beautiful woman, and Mickey is the truant officer, still very much in love with her. When Mary takes the kids to the Seaside Amusement Park, she runs into Mickey again, and he confesses to being in love with her and wanting to marry her, reminding her of her promise to marry him in Circus Fever, all the time with Spanky just a few feet behind them listening to the gushy love talk. When he can't get any sleep, he orders Mickey to just stop talking and kiss her so he can get some rest.
It's not known if Mary and Mickey actually get married, but they are seen together when Mary returns to a school reunion in Reunion In Rhythm where she gets to meet Miss Jones, the teacher who succeeds her.
Quotes:
- "If I didn't have this fiddle I'd show y'!" - Mickey Daniels
"I'll hold it for you, Mickey." - Mary in Commencement Day - "They're my dollies - They've all come to life!" - Mary in Mary, Queen Of Tots
- "This is a new gentleman friend of mine--" - Mary in Every Man For Himself
- "Why is ghosts allus white - Ain't they no colored ghosts?" - Farina to Mary
"Colored people can't be ghosts; how could you see them in the dark?" - Mary to Farina in Shivering Spooks - "The Chief lost his pants in the first alarm." - Mary in The Fourth Alarm!
Notes/Trivia[]
- Mary Kornman is the only original Rascal to not appear in Our Gang, the first "Little Rascals" short. This confusion seems to come from the Maltin and Bann "The Little Rascals" book where they seem to have confused her with Rascal Anna Mae Bilson. She actually first appears in Young Sherlocks, the third short in the series.
- Boys To Board, Giants Vs. Yanks, Back Stage, Sunday Calm and The Mysterious Mystery! are the only episodes where she does not appear in until her last appearance (before Fish Hooky).
- Mary, Joe, Stymie, Mickey, Farina, Butch, Spanky and Scotty are the only Rascals to return to Our Gang after leaving the series. She appears as the adult version of her character in Fish Hooky and Reunion In Rhythm.
- Mary is not to be confused with Mary Ann Jackson, Marianne, Marianne Jones or Marianne Edwards.
- Mary and Mickey are the only main characters to receive a spinoff which was The Boy Friends.