Bradley, Lillian E., 1880-1961

Lillian E. Bradley (1880-1961) was a cabaret singer, entertainer, and producer who gave performances for charity and for U.S. troops during World War I.

Born Lillian Elizabeth Rustmann, she married John James Bradley in 1904. Bradley was the son of contractor, William Bradley, whose company built much of the earliest subway infrastructure of New York City. The marriage was an unhappy one and when Bradley left her husband, she began to sing in local venues in order to support herself and her daughter, also called Lillian. Bradley gave concerts and published a single composition, Without You Dear, I'm So Lonely, in 1912. During World War I she organized the Bradley Volunteer Entertainers, soliciting donations to support the performers who went to military hospitals and training camps around the United States. In the 1930s, she presented programming under the auspices of the Lillian Bradley Entertainment Bureau. In 1940, Bradley celebrated her twentieth year in show business, with a lavish Gay Nineties Ball at the Hotel Warwick in New York City. This event was a benefit for the Stagecrafters Dinner Club, and the patrons included Milton Berle, Irving Berlin, Al Jolson, Mary Pickford, and Ed Sullivan. Throughout the 1940s and early 1950s she continued to entertain in hospitals and homes for the aged. She became known for Lillian Russell impersonations.

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