Portland Hoffa

Hoffa was born January 25, 1905, in Portland, Oregon{{sfn|DeLong|1996|pages=131–132}}{{sfn|Unterbrink|1987|p=62}}{{efn|Some news sources erroneously state that Hoffa was born in Portland, Maine, but this is disputed by several bibliographic sources that cite Portland, Oregon as her birthplace, as well as 1920 U.S. Census Records from when she resided with her family in New York City, that list her birthplace as Oregon.United States Census, 1920. [https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:MJ1Z-CP1 Portland Hoffa in household of Frank Hoffa], Manhattan Assembly District 19, New York, New York, United States; citing ED 1334, sheet 9A, line 41, family 224, NARA microfilm publication T625 (Washington D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 1992), roll 1221; FHL microfilm 1,821,221. {{closed access}} {{url|https://archive.today/20200429094820/https://i.ibb.co/1mWR2W5/dist.jpg|Archived copy}} of census page.}} to Frederick Hoffa and Mary Hoffa (née Keesey).{{sfn|Unterbrink|1987|p=62}} As with most of her other siblings, including sister Lebanon and brother Harlem, she was named after the city in which she was born.{{cite news|last1=Van Raalte|first1=Joseph|title=Bo Broadway|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/5520610/the_evening_independent/|work=The Evening Independent|agency=Central Press|date=January 11, 1930|location= Massillon, Ohio|page=4|via = Newspapers.com}} Additionally, she had two younger sisters, Lastone and Doctor Fredericka known as Fredericka. Her father, an itinerant optometrist, was a native of Washington state of German descent, while her mother was from Pennsylvania. Her father was Jewish, while her mother was a Presbyterian.{{sfn|Warner|2004|p=7}} By the time Hoffa was 15 years old, she and her family had relocated to New York City and were residing in Manhattan.{{Cite web|date=2015-01-28|title=Portland, Lebanon, Harlem, Lastone and Doctor Fredericka Hoffa|url=https://forum.nameberry.com/t/portland-lebanon-harlem-lastone-and-doctor-fredericka-hoffa/243251|access-date=2021-11-10|website=Nameberry|language=en}}

File:Fred Allen and Portland Hoffa 1941.JPG in 1941]]

In New York, Hoffa performed as a dancer in vaudeville and Broadway stage productions, and met Fred Allen while performing in The Passing Show in 1922 and joined him in his vaudeville routines (centered on his clever jokes spun off his weakness as a juggler). The couple married in 1927 at St. Malachy's Church in Manhattan{{cite news|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/49896514/daily-news/|work=New York Daily News|date=March 19, 1956|title=TV Memorial Forgone|page=345|via=Newspapers.com}} before Allen began his long-running radio work in 1932. Because Allen was a devout Roman Catholic, Hoffa converted to Catholicism before the two married.{{sfn|Warner|2004|p=7}}

A frequent performer opposite Allen, Hoffa became familiar for her distinctive high-pitched voice,{{sfn|Wertheim|1979|p=164}} her brief routines involving jokes bounced off or from her mother, and, later, strolling Allen's Alley with her husband, after asking him what his question of the week for the Alley denizens would be. Allen himself likened Hoffa's voice to "two slate pencils mating or a clarinet reed calling for help."{{sfn|Poupard|2000|p=53}}

File:Portland Hoffa 1940 photo.jpg

Although Hoffa performed under her real name on her husband's show, the character she portrayed as "Portland Hoffa" in the radio broadcasts was not Allen's wife; instead, she depicted an enthusiastic girl of indeterminate age, around thirteen years old. One of Allen's sponsors loathed the character played by Hoffa, and kept urging Allen to drop her from the show. Allen ignored these requests for as long as he could, then finally—in an angry outburst at a sales meeting—told the executive that the broadcasts were bearable only due to Hoffa's presence, and that if she were removed from the program then Allen would quit.{{citation needed|date=December 2009}}

Allen's declining health was the main reason he ceased hosting his own show after 1949, but Hoffa often joined him as a semi-regular on Tallulah Bankhead's radio variety show, The Big Show (1950–52). She also appeared as the "mystery guest" on one episode of television's What's My Line, on which Allen had become a panelist from 1954 until his death in early 1956. Hoffa and Allen had also appeared in such films as Is Everybody Listening? (1947) and the Jack Benny vehicle Buck Benny Rides Again (1940).{{citation needed|date=October 2015}}

Allen died in 1956. In 1959, Hoffa married bandleader Joe Rines, who later worked as an advertising executive. Hoffa and Rines lived long enough to celebrate a silver wedding anniversary, allowing Hoffa an unusual second such anniversary in one lifetime.{{citation needed|date=October 2015}} In 1965, she compiled a large volume of her first husband's correspondence, which was edited into and published as Fred Allen's Letters. Rines died in 1986.

Twice widowed and childless, Hoffa died of natural causes in Los Angeles on December 26, 1990,{{cite web|url=http://projects.latimes.com/hollywood/star-walk/portland-hoffa/|work=Los Angeles Times|title=Portland Hoffa|series=Hollywood Star Walk|url-status=live|archive-url=https://archive.today/20200429094030/http://projects.latimes.com/hollywood/star-walk/portland-hoffa/|archive-date=April 29, 2020|access-date=April 29, 2020}} aged 85. She was survived by her two younger sisters, Lastone Hershkowitz of New York and Los Angeles, and Frederika Bond of Bellingham, Washington.{{cite news|work=The New York Times|url=http://www.nytimes.com/1990/12/30/obituaries/portland-hoffa-dies-fred-allen-s-partner.html|date=December 30, 1990|title=Portland Hoffa Dies; Fred Allen's Partner|url-status=live|archive-url=https://archive.today/20130104061016/http://www.nytimes.com/1990/12/30/obituaries/portland-hoffa-dies-fred-allen-s-partner.html|archive-date=January 4, 2013|access-date=April 29, 2020}} She is interred with her first husband Fred Allen at the Gate of Heaven Cemetery in Hawthorne, New York. Hoffa has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 1640 Vine Street.

{{Noteslist}}

{{reflist}}

{{Ref begin|30em}}

• {{cite book|last=DeLong|first=Thomas A.|year=1996|title=Radio Stars: An Illustrated Biographical Dictionary of 953 Performers, 1920 through 1960|publisher=McFarland|location=Jefferson, North Carolina|isbn=978-0-7864-2834-2}}
• {{cite book|last=Fuller-Seeley|first=Kathryn|year=2017|title=Jack Benny and the Golden Age of American Radio Comedy|publisher=University of California Press|location=Berkeley|isbn= 978-0-520-29504-9}}
• {{cite book|last=Laurie|first=Joe Jr.|title=Vaudeville: From the Honky-tonks to the Palace|location= New York|publisher= Henry Holt|year=1953}}
• {{cite book|last=Pitts|first=Michael|year=2012|title=Western Movies: A Guide to 5,105 Feature Films|edition=2nd|publisher=McFarland|location=Jefferson, North Carolina|isbn= 978-1-476-60090-1}}
• {{cite book|last=Poupard|first=Dennis|year=2000|title=Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism|location=Detroit, Michigan|publisher=Gale Research Company|isbn=978-0-787-62739-3}}
• {{cite book|last=Terrace|first=Vincent|year=2018|title=Encyclopedia of Unaired Television Pilots, 1945–2018|publisher=McFarland|location=Jefferson, North Carolina|isbn= 978-1-476-67206-9}}
• {{cite book|last=Unterbrink|first=Mary|title=Funny Women: American Comediennes, 1860–1985|year=1987|publisher=McFarland|location=Jefferson, North Carolina|isbn= 978-0-899-50226-7}}
• {{cite book|last=Warner|first=Sam Bass Jr.|pages=3–13|chapter=Introduction: O'Connor's Boston|editor1=O'Connor, Thomas|editor2=O'Toole, James|editor3=Quigley, James|year=2004|title=Boston's Histories: Essays in Honor of Thomas H. O'Connor|publisher=Northeastern University Press|location=Boston|isbn= 978-1-555-53582-7}}
• {{cite book|last=Wertheim|first=Arthur Frank |author1-link=Arthur Frank Wertheim|year=1979|title=Radio Comedy|publisher=Oxford University Press|location=Oxford|isbn=978-0-195-02481-4}}

{{Ref end}}

• Fred Allen, Much Ado About Me (Boston: Little, Brown, 1956).
• Frank Buxton and Bill Owen, The Big Broadcast: 1920–1950 (New York: Flare Books/Avon, 1972).

{{Commons category}}

• [http://www.fredallen.org/portland-hoffa-wife.html Portland Hoffa Radio Career with Fred Allen]
• {{IMDb name|id=1206939}}
• {{IBDB name}}
• {{FAG|101820353}}

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Hoffa, Portland}}

Category:1905 births

Category:1990 deaths

Category:20th-century American actresses

Category:20th-century American comedians

Category:20th-century Roman Catholics

Category:Actresses from Manhattan

Category:Actresses from Portland, Oregon

Category:American musical theatre actresses

Category:American people of German-Jewish descent

Category:American radio actresses

Category:American Roman Catholics

Category:American vaudeville performers

Category:American women comedians

Category:Burials at Gate of Heaven Cemetery (Hawthorne, New York)

Category:Catholics from New York (state)

Category:Jews from Oregon

Category:Comedians from Manhattan

Category:Comedians from Portland, Oregon

Category:Converts to Roman Catholicism