When Ella met Little Richard…

After I had retired from entertaining, I met a elderly lady and I was talking with her one day and she said, “One of the things, my goal in life, one of things I wish I could do before I leave this world.” I said, “What is that Ella?” She said, “I would like to see Little Richard in person.”

Oh, this was fascinating to me because I would not think about her wanting to see Little Richard. She said, “I would love to see Little Richard in person!” Coincidentally, a few days later I was watching television and an announcement came on the television that Little Richard was going to be a guest on a television show in San Francisco called People Are Talking.

So, I called Ella and I said, “Be ready next, I think it was Thursday, I said, “Get dressed up and be ready next Thursday, I’m going to take you someplace.” And she said, “Take me someplace.” I said, “yes.” “Where?” she asked. I said, “no it’s a surprise, just be ready.” So, she said, “I’ll be ready.” I picked her up and I took her to San Francisco. She lived in Pacifica, CA. I took her to San Francisco to the television station and we were seated in the studio audience at People Are Talking, and she still didn’t know why we were there…

They announced, “Our guest today is Little Richard.” (I chuckled…) Ella almost fainted. She said, “I’m going to see Little Richard, I’m going to see Little Richard!” And I said, “You’re going to see Little Richard.”

When he came on the stage she almost fainted a second time. Then he spotted me in the audience and then he told the audience, “that’s my friend Rodger,” and she was, she was just so happy. And so, it was question and answer period there and he said, “This is my friend Rodger. How you been doing Rodger? You look good boy!” We hadn’t seen each other for a long time.

So, after the show was over, I took Ella up front and introduced her to Little Richard and Little Richard shook her hand. Oh, my goodness, oh she was about to faint—she was on cloud 9. She was so happy, oh she was happy. I said, “Richard give her a big hug.”He gave her a big hug and she was in heaven. Oh, she was so happy.

Richard said, “well I’m staying at the Fairmont Hotel. Do you want to come over to have breakfast?” I said,“sure.” So, we went by the Fairmont Hotel; we got right behind the limousine and went to the Fairmont Hotel. I took Ella upstairs, up in Richard’s suite and she had breakfast with Little Richard. She was the happiest human being in the world. That’s one of the people that could say, “Guess who I met?” Ella met Little Richard.