Word: oxnard
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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...stories of significant trivia drew more mail recently than anything we have printed in some time. It was the story of Lucy Hicks, leading cook, confidante, philanthropist, and bordello-boss of Oxnard, Calif. The sharp eye of one of our editors found the bones of the story tucked obscurely away in a Pacific Coast paper. As TIME told it fully for the first time, Lucy, after 30 years, to the astonishment and embarrassment of her fellow townsmen, was found to be a man. "Her" supreme accolade probably came from the TIME subscribers who nominated "her" for TIME...
Landmark. As Oxnard grew (1945 pop.: 18,979), Lucy's lone bawdyhouse expanded into a half-block of frame buildings, each well furnished, neatly painted and with window boxes full of geraniums. In Ventura County she became as well known as Oxnard's huge American Crystal Sugar Co. refinery. Lucy was the more spectacular sight. She wore bright, low-cut silk dresses from which her slatlike collarbones protruded, and she affected picture hats and high-heeled shoes. Her wigs were her pride -she had a long, black, wavy one, a short, straight, bobbed one, and for special occasions...
Lucy was accepted by easygoing Oxnard as commercially, not personally, involved in the operation of her bordellos. She not only kept on cooking in Oxnard's big houses, but tended children, helped dress many an Oxnard daughter for parties. The town thought little of seeing fat and prosperous Oxnard dames driving to Lucy's house to borrow one of her legendary recipes. When a new Catholic priest came to town, Lucy prepared the barbecue with which the parish welcomed him. She gave generously to the Red Cross, the Boy Scouts and charities, cackling happily: "Jist...
Tears & Champagne. When the U.S. went to war, Lucy gave expensive going-away parties for the sons of prominent families, served the best of champagne. When an Oxnard boy was killed in action, Lucy would visit the bereaved family and bawl like a cow with a thistle in its throat. When President Roosevelt died, Oxnard newspapers carried a paragraph of solemn comment from Lucy as well as from churchmen and other civic leaders...
...last week the Navy traced a case of venereal disease to Lucy's establishment. Despite her protests, her claim that she had never been anything but a proprietor, Oxnard's Dr. Hilary R. Mangan insisted on examining Lucy as well as her girls. A few minutes later the doctor had news the like of which Oxnard had not heard since the San Francisco earthquake...