Crescendo: A star is born

Judy Garland was raised in the spotlight and never experienced the normal childhood of going to school or playing with friends. She was born on June 10, 1922 in Grand Rapids, Minnesota and under the name of Frances Ethel Gumms. Her parent, Ethel and Frank Gumm were vaudevillians, so it was common for Garland to be on the stage with her parents. Garland was in an act with her sisters, Mary-Jane and Virginia Gumm; they performed as the “Gumm Sisters”. For those who saw the sisters’ act instantly fell in love with the young Judy because she had already developed a soulful, jazz-esque, deep voice at such a young age. As time moved on and Judy’s voice continued to develop, she was able to sing at a comparable level to many adults, even though she was only ten years old.
It was at the Chicago World’s Fair of 1934 that the comic George Jessel suggested that if the girls change their last name to Garland they would get better ratings for their act. The name Garland derived after a drama critic Robert Garland and from that day on, the whole family changed their name to Garland. However they all changed their first names to have official professional names. Mother Garland gave the young Judy her first name from her favorite Hoagy Carmichael song, “Judy”. A year later the Gumm Sisters group broke up because the eldest sister was getting married.