Nancy Kulp
Encyclopedia
Nancy Jane Kulp was an American character actress best known as Miss Jane Hathaway on the popular television series The Beverly Hillbillies
The Beverly Hillbillies
The Beverly Hillbillies is an American situation comedy originally broadcast for nine seasons on CBS from 1962 to 1971, starring Buddy Ebsen, Irene Ryan, Donna Douglas, and Max Baer, Jr....

.

Early life

Kulp was born in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania
Harrisburg, Pennsylvania
Harrisburg is the capital of Pennsylvania. As of the 2010 census, the city had a population of 49,528, making it the ninth largest city in Pennsylvania...

, the only child of Robert I. Kulp, a traveling salesman, and his wife, Marjorie S. Kulp. The family moved from Mifflintown, Pennsylvania
Mifflintown, Pennsylvania
Mifflintown is a borough in and the county seat of Juniata County, Pennsylvania, United States. The population was 861 at the 2000 census.-Geography:Mifflintown is located at ....

, to Dade County, Florida, prior to 1935.

Kulp obtained her bachelor's degree in journalism from Florida State University
Florida State University
The Florida State University is a space-grant and sea-grant public university located in Tallahassee, Florida, United States. It is a comprehensive doctoral research university with medical programs and significant research activity as determined by the Carnegie Foundation...

 in 1943, then known as Florida State College for Women, worked on a master's degree in English and French at the University of Miami
University of Miami
The University of Miami is a private, non-sectarian university founded in 1925 with its main campus in Coral Gables, Florida, a medical campus in Miami city proper at Civic Center, and an oceanographic research facility on Virginia Key., the university currently enrolls 15,629 students in 12...

, and was a member of Pi Beta Phi
Pi Beta Phi
Pi Beta Phi is an international fraternity for women founded as I.C. Sorosis on April 28, 1867, at Monmouth College in Monmouth, Illinois. Its headquarters are located in Town and Country, Missouri, and there are 134 active chapters and over 330 alumnae organizations across the United States and...

 Women's Fraternity. In the early 1940s she also was a feature writer for the Miami Beach Tropics newspaper, writing profiles of celebrities such as the Duke and Duchess of Windsor and Clark Gable.http://articles.latimes.com/1991-02-05/news/mn-889_1_beverly-hillbillies

In 1944 Kulp left the University of Miami to volunteer for United States Naval Reserve service in World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

. As a member of the WAVES
WAVES
The WAVES were a World War II-era division of the U.S. Navy that consisted entirely of women. The name of this group is an acronym for "Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service" ; the word "emergency" implied that the acceptance of women was due to the unusual circumstances of the war and...

 (Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service), Lt. J. G. Kulp received several decorations, including the American Campaign Medal
American Campaign Medal
The American Campaign Medal was a military decoration of the United States armed forces which was first created on November 6, 1942 by issued by President Franklin D. Roosevelt...

, the National Defense Medal, and the Good Conduct Medal
Good Conduct Medal
The Good Conduct Medal is one of the oldest military awards of the United States military. The Navy Good Conduct Medal was first issued in 1869, followed by a Marine version in 1896. The Coast Guard Good Conduct Medal was issued in 1923 and the Army Good Conduct Medal in 1941. The Air Force was...

. She left the service in 1946.

Kulp married Charles Malcolm Dacus on April 1, 1951 in Dade County, Florida; they divorced in 1961.

Late in life Kulp indicated to author Boze Hadley in a 1989 interview that she was lesbian. "As long as you reproduce my reply word for word, and the question, you may use it... I'd appreciate it if you'd let me phrase the question. There is more than one way. Here's how I would ask it: 'Do you think that opposites attract?' My own reply would be that I'm the other sortI find that birds of a feather flock together. That answers your question."

Acting career

Shortly after her marriage, Kulp moved to Hollywood, California
Hollywood, Los Angeles, California
Hollywood is a famous district in Los Angeles, California, United States situated west-northwest of downtown Los Angeles. Due to its fame and cultural identity as the historical center of movie studios and movie stars, the word Hollywood is often used as a metonym of American cinema...

 to work in a studio publicity
Public relations
Public relations is the actions of a corporation, store, government, individual, etc., in promoting goodwill between itself and the public, the community, employees, customers, etc....

 department, but director George Cukor
George Cukor
George Dewey Cukor was an American film director. He mainly concentrated on comedies and literary adaptations. His career flourished at RKO and later MGM, where he directed What Price Hollywood? , A Bill of Divorcement , Dinner at Eight , Little Women , David Copperfield , Romeo and Juliet and...

 convinced her that she should work in front of the camera.

Her film debut as a character actress was in 1951 in The Model and the Marriage Broker. She appeared in subsequent films, including Shane, Sabrina
Sabrina (1954 film)
Sabrina is a 1954 comedy-romance film directed by Billy Wilder, adapted for the screen by Wilder, Samuel A. Taylor, and Ernest Lehman from Taylor's play Sabrina Fair...

, and A Star is Born
A Star Is Born (1954 film)
A Star Is Born is a 1954 American musical film directed by George Cukor. The screenplay written by Moss Hart was an adaptation of the original 1937 film, which was based on the original screenplay by Robert Carson, Dorothy Parker, and Alan Campbell...

' ' Culp has an uncredited bit part in a crowd scene as a fan of Donald O'Connor in one of the opening scenes in the 1956 movie "Anything Goes".' After working in television on The Bob Cummings Show
The Bob Cummings Show
The Bob Cummings Show is an American sitcom starring Robert "Bob" Cummings which was produced from January 2, 1955 to September 15, 1959, and originally sponsored by R.J. Reynolds' Winston cigarettes...

, she returned to movies in Forever, Darling
Forever, Darling
Forever, Darling is a 1956 American romantic comedy film with fantasy overtones, starring Lucille Ball, Desi Arnaz, and James Mason, and directed by Alexander Hall...

, The Three Faces of Eve
The Three Faces of Eve
The Three Faces of Eve is a 1957 American film adaptation of a case study by Corbett H. Thigpen and Hervey M. Cleckley. It was based on the true story of Chris Costner Sizemore, also known as Eve White, a woman who suffered from Dissociative Identity Disorder formerly known as multiple personality...

, The Parent Trap and The Aristocats
The Aristocats
The Aristocats is a 1970 American animated feature produced and released by Walt Disney Productions in 1970 and stars Eva Gabor and Phil Harris, with Roddy Maude-Roxby as Edgar the butler, the villain of the story...

.

A reviewer once described Kulp as possessing the "face of a shriveled balloon, the figure of a string of spaghetti and the voice of a bullfrog in mating season." She was also described as television's homeliest girl.http://articles.latimes.com/1991-02-05/news/mn-889_1_beverly-hillbillies Fans found her delightfully swank, kindly dignified, attractively thin, with a sophisticated soprano voice. She was also described as the epitome of geek chic.

Television appearances

In 1955, Kulp joined the cast of The Bob Cummings Show
The Bob Cummings Show
The Bob Cummings Show is an American sitcom starring Robert "Bob" Cummings which was produced from January 2, 1955 to September 15, 1959, and originally sponsored by R.J. Reynolds' Winston cigarettes...

 (aka Love That Bob) with Bob Cummings, portraying pith-helmeted neighborhood bird-watcher Pamela Livingstone.

In 1956, she appeared in the episode "Johnny Bravo" of Clint Walker
Clint Walker
Norman Eugene Walker, known as Clint Walker , is an American actor best known for his cowboy role as "Cheyenne Bodie" in the TV Western series, Cheyenne.-Life and career:...

's ABC
American Broadcasting Company
The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...

 series Cheyenne
Cheyenne (TV series)
Cheyenne is a western television series of 108 black-and-white episodes broadcast on ABC from 1955 to 1963. The show was the first hour-long western, and in fact the first hour-long dramatic series of any kind, with continuing characters, to last more than one season...

. She appeared in 1955-1956 as "Anastasia" in three episodes of the NBC sitcom It's a Great Life
It's a Great Life
It's a Great Life is an American situation comedy which aired on NBC from 1954 to 1956...

.

Kulp appeared in one episode of I Love Lucy
I Love Lucy
I Love Lucy is an American television sitcom starring Lucille Ball, Desi Arnaz, Vivian Vance, and William Frawley. The black-and-white series originally ran from October 15, 1951, to May 6, 1957, on the Columbia Broadcasting System...

. In the 1957 episode "Lucy meets the Queen," she showed Lucy and Ethel how to properly curtsy. She also appeared in several episodes of Perry Mason
Perry Mason (TV series)
Perry Mason is an American legal drama produced by Paisano Productions that ran from September 1957 to May 1966 on CBS. The title character, portrayed by Raymond Burr, is a fictional Los Angeles defense attorney who originally appeared in detective fiction by Erle Stanley Gardner...

, The Jack Benny Program
The Jack Benny Program
The Jack Benny Program, starring Jack Benny, is a radio-TV comedy series that ran for more than three decades and is generally regarded as a high-water mark in 20th-century American comedy.-Cast:*Jack Benny - Himself...

., 87th Precinct
87th Precinct (TV series)
87th Precinct is an American crime drama starring Robert Lansing, Gena Rowlands, and Ron Harper, which aired on NBC on Monday evenings during the 1961–1962 television season.-Synopsis:...

, The Twilight Zone
The Twilight Zone (1959 TV series)
The Twilight Zone is an American anthology television series created by Rod Serling, which ran for five seasons on CBS from 1959 to 1964. The series consisted of unrelated episodes depicting paranormal, futuristic, dystopian, or simply disturbing events; each show typically featured a surprising...

 and The Outlaws
The Outlaws (1960 TV series)
Outlaws is an NBC Western television series, starring Barton MacLane as U.S. marshal Frank Caine, who operated in a lawless section of Oklahoma Territory about Stillwater. The program aired 50 one-hour episodes from September 29, 1960, to May 10, 1962. The first season was shot in black-and-white,...

, and briefly played a drunken waitress with slightly slurred speech in a 1959 episode of Maverick
Maverick (TV series)
Maverick is a western television series with comedic overtones created by Roy Huggins. The show ran from September 22, 1957 to July 8, 1962 on ABC and stars James Garner as Bret Maverick, a cagey, articulate cardsharp. Eight episodes into the first season, he was joined by Jack Kelly as his brother...

 featuring James Garner
James Garner
James Garner is an American film and television actor, one of the first Hollywood actors to excel in both media. He has starred in several television series spanning a career of more than five decades...

 entitled "Full House."

In 1962, she landed her breakout role of Jane Hathaway, the love-starved bird-watching perennial spinster
Spinster
A spinster, or old maid, is an older, childless woman who has never been married.For a woman to be identified as a spinster, age is critical...

, on The Beverly Hillbillies
The Beverly Hillbillies
The Beverly Hillbillies is an American situation comedy originally broadcast for nine seasons on CBS from 1962 to 1971, starring Buddy Ebsen, Irene Ryan, Donna Douglas, and Max Baer, Jr....

 television series. She remained with the show until its cancellation in 1971. In 1967, she received an Emmy Award
Emmy Award
An Emmy Award, often referred to simply as the Emmy, is a television production award, similar in nature to the Peabody Awards but more focused on entertainment, and is considered the television equivalent to the Academy Awards and the Grammy Awards .A majority of Emmys are presented in various...

 nomination for her role.

After The Beverly Hillbillies cancellation in 1971, Kulp appeared in roles on The Brian Keith Show
The Brian Keith Show
The Brian Keith Show is an American sitcom that aired on NBC from September 1972 to March 1974. The series stars Brian Keith and Shelley Fabares.-Synopsis:...

 and Sanford and Son
Sanford and Son
Sanford and Son is an American sitcom, based on the BBC's Steptoe and Son, that ran on the NBC television network from January 14, 1972, to March 25, 1977....

. She also appeared in Broadway productions, including Morning's at Seven
Morning's at Seven
Morning's at Seven is a play by Paul Osborn.Its plot focuses on four aging sisters living in a small Midwestern town in 1938, and it deals with ramifications within the family when two of them begin to question their lives and decide to make some changes before it’s too late.The original Broadway...

 in 1981.

Political career

In 1984, after working with the Democratic State Committee in her home state of Pennsylvania "on a variety of projects" over a period of years, Kulp ran for the US House of Representatives
United States House of Representatives
The United States House of Representatives is one of the two Houses of the United States Congress, the bicameral legislature which also includes the Senate.The composition and powers of the House are established in Article One of the Constitution...

 as a Democrat
Democratic Party (United States)
The Democratic Party is one of two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Republican Party. The party's socially liberal and progressive platform is largely considered center-left in the U.S. political spectrum. The party has the lengthiest record of continuous...

 from Pennsylvania but was unsuccessful.http://www.nytimes.com/1984/02/02/us/campaign-notes-actress-in-pennsylvania-to-run-for-congress.html?scp=5&sq=%22nancy%20kulp%22&st=cse As an opponent of a Republican incumbent, Bud Shuster
Bud Shuster
Elmer Greinert "Bud" Shuster is an American politician who represented Pennsylvania in the United States House of Representatives as a Republican from 1973 to 2001. He is best known for his advocacy of transportation projects that critics deride as "pork barrel" spending.-Career:Shuster was born...

, in a Republican district in a year in which US President Ronald W. Reagan won a landslide reelection, Kulp was the underdog despite the otherwise favourable climate for liberal Democrats in Pennsylvania as a whole. To her dismay, Hillbillies co-star Buddy Ebsen
Buddy Ebsen
Buddy Ebsen was an American character actor and dancer. A performer for seven decades, he had starring roles as Jed Clampett in the long-running television series The Beverly Hillbillies and as the title character in the 1970s detective series Barnaby Jones, and played Barnaby Jones in the movie...

 supported Shuster and even appeared in a radio commercial in which he called Kulp "too liberal
Liberalism
Liberalism is the belief in the importance of liberty and equal rights. Liberals espouse a wide array of views depending on their understanding of these principles, but generally, liberals support ideas such as constitutionalism, liberal democracy, free and fair elections, human rights,...

". Ebsen claimed that Kulp was exploiting her celebrity status and did not have a grasp on the issues. Shuster defeated Kulp with sixty-seven percent of the vote.

After her political defeat, Kulp worked for Juniata College
Juniata College
Juniata College is a private liberal arts college located in Huntingdon, Pennsylvania. It is named after the Juniata River — one of the principal tributaries of the Susquehanna River. In 1876 it became the first college founded by the Church of the Brethren and has been co-educational since...

 in Pennsylvania as an Artist in Residence. Later she taught acting and retired to a farm in Connecticut and later, Palm Springs, California
Palm Springs, California
Palm Springs is a desert city in Riverside County, California, within the Coachella Valley. It is located approximately 37 miles east of San Bernardino, 111 miles east of Los Angeles and 136 miles northeast of San Diego...

.

Death

Kulp was diagnosed with cancer in 1990 and underwent chemotherapy. By 1991, the cancer had spread, and Kulp died on February 3 at a friend's home in Palm Desert, California
Palm Desert, California
Palm Desert is a city in Riverside County, California, United States, in the Coachella Valley, approximately east of Palm Springs. The population was 48,445 at the 2010 census, up from 41,155 at the 2000 census...

. She is interred at Westminster Presbyterian Cemetery in Mifflintown, Pennsylvania
Mifflintown, Pennsylvania
Mifflintown is a borough in and the county seat of Juniata County, Pennsylvania, United States. The population was 861 at the 2000 census.-Geography:Mifflintown is located at ....

.

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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