Sybil Bruncheon's "Hysterical Hollywood Histories"... the Creamsicle Trio...

(photo of happier times courtesy of Paul Norman)

... ah, yes! The famous Creamsicle Trio! Known for their occasional appearances on the Lawrence Welk Show, Arthur Murray's TV Party Time, and at various county fairs and 4H Club Jamborees, the Creamsicle Trio had an "on-again-off-again" career from 1954 to 1959.

Originally from Pumpa-Pootah, Iowa, the Nesselroth sisters (Brenda Marie, Fiona Fay, and Gert) started singing in the cradle. Their large extended family marveled at their caterwauling, always on key and in three part harmony right around breast-feeding time. It wasn't long before farmhands, mill workers, and traveling salesmen came a-calling to see the triplets, and they soon became the stars of more than one Sunday church service. The Baptists, Methodists, Adventists, and Lutherans all shared the triplets, booking them at staggered hours from 7:30am to late afternoon year after year, Sunday after Sunday... and finally, at 18 years of age, they were auditioned for the Ted Mack Amateur Hour... and, of course, they won! $811.35!!

They put the money towards a publicist, an agent, three prom gowns in their favorite color (bright sunny orange!), and bus tickets to Duluth to premiere at the Yip 'n' Yodel National Songster Championships! They came in 3rd, but out of fifty-eight entries it wasn't too disappointing, and they won $1162.72 (after fees and taxes) and a contract to tour on the Myron Moskowitz Melody Circuit. Within a month, the manufacturers of Creamsicle brand ice cream offered to sponsor them and buy out their contract from the Moskowitz circuit.

The girls continued to tour the country, but added USO shows with Bob Hope, and appearances on various TV series; Perry Mason (as a three-girl ponzi scheme), Alfred Hitchcock (as a three-girl Siamese triplet), and on the Twilight Zone (as a three-girl ventriloquist act that is eventually killed and partially eaten by their dummies). Soon, orange had become the new favorite color for everything... from fashion to food to interior design and convertibles!

Everything seemed to be going oh-so-well, until the beginning of the free-love 1960s. While touring through Berkeley, California, they were introduced to a world of hippies, love beads, fringe-vests, suede mini-skirts, and marijuana laced with hashish and paprika. Brenda Marie started showing up late for rehearsals and sound checks. Fiona Fay would laugh uncontrollably during scheduling meetings (and even drool). And Gert was found to be secretly dating a boy named Chuck or Charlie Manson who claimed he wanted to be "farmer for Jesus".

It all came to a head on the Ed Sullivan Show when the girls were heard backstage through an open mic to laugh that the public "wouldn't touch those damn Creamsicles if they knew they were made from horses' hooves and old cottage cheese." The studio audience was aghast, and between the screaming caught on-air and the network switchboard lighting up, the girls were snatched from their dressing room and spirited away from a gathering mob on West 54th Street. The news was broken to them on the grey Monday morning... they were finished. Everywhere. FINISHED!... even at the 4H Jamborees. Even in the Jams & Jellies tents...

Whenever and wherever they showed up, people pointed and laughed... or told them that "the Prince of Darkness would swallow them for his diabolical delights"! Their poor parents now became pariahs in their own farm community. And radio ministers preached on Sundays that this was "the wages of sin". Creamsicle even sponsored one national Sunday show called Jolly Bob's Hour of Salvation where Robert "Chuckles" Thumbkin harangued the worshippers in his Cathedral of Cheer and the radio audience at home to reject "preverts and dirty Communists" who made up "false lies about wholesome and nutritious American foods like Creamsicles"...

By 1963, the girls had become nearly homeless. Brenda Marie was working long hours at a lady's lingerie sweatshop attached to the Wayward Women's Shelter on the Bowery. Fiona Fay was occasionally seen in an alleyway nearby on Great Jones Street with a bottle of Muscatel or Woolite... and a sailor. And Gert joined the lower end country fair and carnival circuit as a barker at the Guess Your Weight/Guess Your Age tent... her alto voice and her six pack-a-day Chesterfield habit allowed her to disguise herself as a man. Sad. Very sad.

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