Missing Gracie Fields scrapbooks recovered

Seb Lassandro (Chairman of the Gracie Fields Appreciation Society) and Sarah Hodgkinson (Resource Officer-Museum) with the Gracie Fields scrapbooks

Scrapbooks charting the life of Gracie Fields which have been missing since around 1984 when the Gracie Fields archive was donated to the people of Rochdale following Gracie’s husband’s, Boris Alperovici’s, death, have been recovered.

Approximately 70 of the scrapbooks made it to the Rochdale Borough Museum but 20 of the books went missing before they reached the museum and their whereabouts have been unknown since.

Seb Lassandro, the President of the Gracie Fields Appreciation Society, is thrilled the books have been returned to their rightful home. He said: “These missing volumes will provide a valuable insight into Gracie’s contribution to the war effort and also through the 1930’s when Gracie was at the height of her career.”

Sarah Hodgkinson, Resource Officer for the Museum, is also delighted and the books are now safely stored at the Arts and Heritage Resource Centre.

A quick glance at the books has revealed that Gracie Fields was the highest paid film-star of the 1930s and also the highest paid concert artist of the late 1940s, being paid £100 per minute for a series of concerts in 1948.

Several of the books are still missing so the search continues.