SUSAN BLAKELY, Actress and Supermodel
Photo by Dean Keefer
In a "past life" our ED was a talent agent in Hollywood. When meeting her new clients at the Paul Kohner Agency she was surprised to find that one of them had a connection to St. Joe!
In Susan's own words,,,
My connection to Saint Joe is through my mother Mary Louise Karns, and her family. She grew up on a farm there that had been in the Karns family since 1837 shortly after the Platt purchase opened the land for settlement. So they were true early settlers before the town was even established. Her parents were Susie and Landis Karns and her sister was Harriet Karns…who became Harriet Weaver when she married Frank Weaver who farmed the land with my grandfather.
Since my father was in the army, we traveled continuously all over the country and the world. But when people asked where we were from, I always said, "St Joe, Missouri." We were very close to my grandparents and my aunt & uncle and their kids, Lanny, Cindy and Jenny. I was really crazy about my grandmother who I called Mama Susie. I am guessing she went to the symphony if they had it then (my aunt and uncle went). She was always into the arts. She took me to the Kansas City Starlight Theatre, and to the fancy retail store in town called Einbenders. It seems strange now, but that was such an exciting outing. We would get all dressed up, going to town and shop and have lunch. I’ve always been grateful that she was still alive when I started modeling and studying acting in New York because she was so supportive of me and my career. I am still close with my cousins Cindy and Jenny (unfortunately my cousin Lanny has passed).
I am proud to say that I actually did a little film promotion for the Pony Express in around 1990 or 1991.
