Ask American Profile 11/1/2009

Colleen Moore, Eliza Dushku, Aaron Brown, Mister Ed

Q  In the 1930s, actress Colleen Moore brought her exquisite toy dollhouse to exhibit at the Davidson Department Store in Sioux City, Iowa. Do you have any information about what happened to it?
—Betty Brunken, Le Mars, Iowa

Moore, a fashionable silent-film superstar of the 1920s, had been fascinated by dolls and dollhouses since childhood. In 1928, she tapped the resources of Hollywood professionals and began work on her Colleen Moore Doll House. Seven years later,  she had an 81-square-foot fairy castle valued at nearly half a million dollars that contained more than 2,000 miniature treasures. Moore took the fantasy structure on a national tour from 1935 to 1939 and raised more than $650,000 for children's charities. The dollhouse now belongs to the Chicago Museum of Science and Industry, where it is known as Colleen Moore's Fairy Castle, and about 1.5 million people enjoy ogling it annually. Moore worked on the dollhouse until her death in 1988 at the age of 87.


Q  I read that Eliza Dushku did a study in South Africa with her mother, a college professor. She is one of my favorite actresses, and I never read about her doing peace missions like I read about Angelina Jolie.
—Paulette van Nord, Cambria, Calif.

Whenever she has spare time, Dushku, 28, who portrays Echo in the Fox TV series Dollhouse, travels with Global Exchange, an international human-rights organization that promotes social, economic and environmental justice. She has been to more than 30 countries, including Iran and Uganda. "My mother got involved with them when she would bring students to different areas, and she needed help planning the trip, so I went with them," she says. Last summer, Dushku met with former child soldiers in Uganda who are trying to reintegrate themselves into society. Her mother has been teaching African politics for 30 years.


Q  My husband and I wonder what has become of CNN news anchor Aaron Brown. He came on after Larry King Live, and King would always say, "Here's my man, Aaron Brown."  
—Sue Gurley, Huntingdon, Tenn.

In November 2005, CNN decided to expand Anderson Cooper 360 to two hours, but it came at the expense of NewsNight With Aaron Brown. Because the veteran journalist, best remembered for his insightful coverage of the attacks of 9/11, remained under contract, he was prevented from returning to television for more than a year. Brown, 60, recently concluded his second season as anchor of the PBS documentary series Wide Angle, and he serves as the Walter Cronkite Professor of Journalism at Arizona State University in Tempe.  


Q  My son says that Mister Ed was really a zebra made to look like a talking horse. I thought he was a gelding named Bamboo. We looked it up on the Internet and found both stories. So what are the real facts about Mister Ed?
—Lesa Herring, Trinity, Texas

Mister Ed, star of the 1961-1966 TV series of the same name, was a horse (of course, of course!), a golden palomino originally named Bamboo Harvester and born in 1949 near El Monte, Calif. Trained by Les Hilton, he was gelded just before the TV series began filming and officially renamed Mister Ed. The zebra tale is a hoax. Season one of Mister Ed was released last month on DVD. 

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