Welcome to...

...the real "Yours, Mine and Ours" family website.

UPDATE February 4, 2008
Lars (Larry) Klassen, a classmate of Greg Beardsley's at Junipero Memorial High School (class of 1965) wrote from Quito, Ecuador: "I recall overnighting one time at the Beardsley place on Rio Road in Carmel. It was rather like attending a boarding school/summer camp/military barracks all at the same time. Lots of hustle and bustle. I particularly remember being impressed with assembly-line system they used for preparing school lunches; definitely the institutional food preparation approach, at least for sack lunches!" Larry has two younger brothers who also had Beardsleys as classmates. "JMHS held an all year reunion in Monterey in 1995 and my brother Rusty and I attended, but frankly, I don't remember if Greg or any of the siblings attended that year." Thanks for sharing, Lars!

UPDATE October 10, 2007
Brandi Means, former step-child of Greg Beardsley and proud issuer of the nation's first amber alert (in her capacity as an employee of the State of California, Caltrans), writes to share her memories of Greg as a wonderful father who shared his Cat Stevens music with her. She loved the Christmas gatherings and insists, "Aunt Lousie was a doll. I looked up to her being a nurse. Uncle Rusty was just cool all around. Helen and Frank were great parents, as well as grands."

UPDATE October 20, 2006. Nice pic of Helen and Dick North.

UPDATE 11/13/2006. Well I'll be doggoned! That's not a photo! It's a portrait, painted by Janette!

I wonder if she ever painted a portrait of her mom and Frank?

UPDATE July 24, 2006
Attention, infamous eighteen (or 20, rather)! Your old schoolmate, Cathy J. Fields, now Cathy Penn, would love to hear from any of you (fatcatpat@verizon.net). Her dad, Chester James Fields, Jr., worked with Frank in the navy. Her mom is Dorothy Fields; siblings are John, Cindy, Cole, Debbie, Celia, Leif and Laura. Drop her a line if you want to catch up!

UPDATE November 30, 2005
Welcome and thanks to Debbie Humm-Bremser, the '21st' Beardsley child. See "Feedback from Visitors" for her contributions.

UPDATE Nov. 22, 2005

Here's the Monterey Herald story interviewing original family members about the 2005 remake.

UPDATE October 23, 2005:
See "Feedback from Visitors" section for material from Judy Tripp-Neu (nee SCHLAICK).

UPDATE April 27, 2005:
Veronica, if you're out there, Michelle LaPointe (mllapointe@att.net) says hello! See what she has to say in the "Feedback from visitors" section.

DISCUSSION BOARD
Join the Yours, Mine and Ours Yahoo Discussion Board at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Yours_Mine_and_Ours/.

And now, on with the page.

Yes, there really was a Frank Beardsley and Helen North Beardsley, and they really did get married (on Sept. 9, 1961) and create a family with 18 children (eventually 20). In fact, they're so real, legal trouble broke out between the YOURS MINE & OURS filmmakers and the BRADY BUNCH tv people over story rights. After Frank retired from the Navy, the family went into the baker business with the kids helping out after school and on weekends. Helen has since died; Frank married for a third time.

John Dorn, the husband (separated) of Rosemary, says "the whole family is the most wonderful group of people I have ever met!" He also shares this tidbit, one of Frank's common sayings: "Remember, none of you kids are famous without the others."

(We regret to report an email from Chuck Myer stating that John Dorn passed away November 24, 2003 in Sonora, CA.)

Speaking of lots of others, John reports that his and Rosemary's 17-year-old daughter, Monica, has sixty cousins!

These photos are from WHO GETS THE DRUMSTICK, the family's story as told by the mother. The book is out of print and woefully expensive, even at www.abe.com. Helen Beardsley is the author and it was published by Random House of New York in 1965. Below the pictures are some notes on differences between the film and the book. Enjoy!

This photo shows all 20 children, including the two Helen and Frank had after they got married (Joseph and Helen).

The kids display their wedding duds. I only see 17. According to Rick Rodewald, husband of Joanie, the one missing is Teresa, but Daniel Fortier thinks Teresa is the curly-haired little girl on the floor and that straight, dark-haired Joan is the one that's missing.

Here's the family on vacation at Disneyland. While military brat Michelle Keener notes that 1) Disney used to let military families visit the park free on nights they closed the park to everyone else, and 2) the military also used to raise a person's pay as the number of dependents increased (interesting!), Joanie's husband, Rick Rodewald, explains this image was part of the television commercial campaign the family did for Langendorf Bread.

Check out the curved shaped of the table that lets everybody see everybody else at mealtime.

Nineteen kids (including Frank's and Helen's first baby, Joseph) wait eagerly for Christmas.

Notes comparing book and movie

The humor in the book is more wit than physical comedy.

The book is very philosophical and reflective, pro love and life and kindness and goodness. Idealistic, hopeful about humanity's potential.

The family moved into the father's home in Carmel, not a new "neutral territory" home. They added on to the house and planned extensively. The sleeping arrangements were planned like this: Mike's room and the Greg-Rusty room on first floor, Colleen-Rosemary-Louise room and Tommy-Nick-Gerald(and I think Phillip) room on 2nd floor, Veronica-Susan-Germaine-Jean room and Janette-Mary-Joan-Teresa rooms on 3rd floor near parents. Daniel Fortier once asked Helen in a letter why Phillip's bedroom isn't mentioned in the sleeping arrangement breakdown and she assured him "...he had a bed. Just which one is hard to say. We changed children around frequently during the years..."

The kids are very sweet. The older ones enjoy playing with and being nice to the younger ones while the younger ones idolize the olders ones. All were eager to become brothers and sisters. All were supportive of the marriage and even pressured their parents to rush it.

The book includes extensive humorous descriptions of the first post-marriage grocery shopping and shoe-buying expeditions.

The only significant drawback mentioned was the necessity of a strict "no pets" rule (since 18 pets would be a zoo!).

An advertising firm named Young & Rubicam put the Beardsley family in a commercial for the Langendorf Bread Company. Filming in their home took 12 days.

The children actually WANTED the adoption to happen, but Frank and Helen hesitated because of criticism from strangers (and one of Dick's relatives) suggesting Dick would have wanted his children to remain "stamped" with his name.

Frank and Helen figured from the start that they would probably have additional kids together because of how they felt about each other.

The Fortier Files

"I suppose having nineteen kids is carrying things a bit too far.
But if we had to do it over again, who would we skip...YOU?"

To date it would seem that the world's leading Beardsley fan-expert is Daniel Fortier (dfortier5@ontera.net - he'd love to hear from family members or other fans). He has conducted extensive on-line research about the family and is pleased to have received a personal letter from Helen.

Frank's father's name was Charles Henry Beardsley (like Rusty). He was born on November 13th, 1873 in California. His mother's maiden name was Mahoney. Charles died in San Francisco at the age of 82 on August 18th, 1956.

Frank's mother, Mary Ellen Grennan was born on May 28th, 1876 in California. Note that Frank gave his daugher Mary his mom's name and he gave Susan his mom's middle name. Mary Beardsley also died in her 80's and she too died in San Francisco. She was 83 when she died on December 5th, 1959, less than 11 months before Frank's wife Frances died.

Janette, Nick, Tom, Phillip and Gerald ALL changed their names back to North! This is particularly intriguing in the cases of Phillip and Gerald, who were quite young (both under 4) when their biological father died.

Birth order changes: In the movie, it's Susan, Veronica, Mary. In real life, it's Mary, Susan, Veronica. Rosemary and Greg were also transposed and so were Nick and Janette.

Here's a little cheat chart courtesy of Daniel and Rebecca to help you match actors to Beardsleys and Norths.

	"They wrote FANNY HILL in 1786 and they haven't come up with anything new since!" Frank was born Sept. 11, 1915 in Marin County. He retired from the navy in 1968 and purchased 3 bakeries.
	"Doctor, I'm not lonely. I have eight children." Helen, author of "Who Gets the Drumstick" (which inspired YOURS, MINE AND OURS) was born April 5, 1930 and died April 26, 2000 after a long battle with Parkinson's disease and a stroke. She had 44 grandchildren and 2 great grandchildren at the time. She became a cardiovascular technologist at 43 and also returned to school to study medical transcribing. She and Frank retired in 1986 and moved to Santa Rosa. Helen's first husband, Dick, died June 7, 1960, at age 35.
	"Which one of us do you want to cook?" Michael Francis Beardsley b - August 2, 1944, Seattle, WA Tim Matheson, who portrayed Mike in the film, has probably had the most post-YMO success, starring in many Disney films and portraying villains in A VERY BRADY SEQUEL and FLETCH.
	"My mom's having a baby!" Charles Henry Beardsley (Rusty) b. January 23, 1946, Seattle, WA
	"You're not an elf!" "I'm practicing." Gregory Paul Beardsley (Greg) b. October 31, 1947, Tsingtao, China Internet research suggests Greg, too, has adopted! Thatta boy!
	"We loved our mother just as much as they loved their father!" Rosemary Ann Beardsley b. November 1, 1948, Oakland, California
	A flower can bloom in a crowded city but a growing girl needs privacy. Louise Antoinette Beardsley b. January 10, 1950, Oakland, California Interesting note from Jenni Crocker. Suzanne Cupito, who portrayed Louise, would later be known as Morgan Brittany.
	"Why don't you get a haircut!" Colleen Marie North Beardsley b. June 1, 1950, Oak Harbor, Washington
	"I can't find my pajamas!" "Sleep without them for one night." "I'd rather die!" Janette Deen North b. June 15, 1951, Kodiak, Alaska
	"Could you just point?" Mary Cecelia Beardsley b. August 11, 1951, Oakland, California
	"Nicky says the good die young and that's why Daddy died." Nicholas Richard North(Nick) b. July 16, 1952, Kodiak, Alaska
	"I can't eat if everybody's gonna cry!" Susan Ellen Beardsley b. December 6, 1952, Oakland, California
	"Twenty percent chance of rain!" Thomas Roderick North (Tom) b. October 17, 1953, Oak Harbor, Washington. Like Eric Shea, Mitch Vogel, the actor who portrayed Tommy, appeared on "Little House on the Prairie" and was a regular on "Bonanza/Ponderosa."
	"Are you gonna tell the lady you have 10 little children at home, two of them given away?" Veronica Marion Beardsley b. September 13, 1954, Honolulu, Oahu, Hawaii
	"I'm 11 red A, I'm 11 red A." Jean Louise North Beardsley b. December 12, 1955, Uchitomari, Okinawa, Japan
	"I can live without bacon, though some people are pigs about it." Phillip Anthony North b. February 7, 1957, Great Lakes, Illinois The actor who plays Phillip is brother to Christopher Shea, the voice of Linus in the early CHARLIE BROWN specials (thanks, hlbchk@juno.com). The next time you watch the movie, close your eyes while Phillip is speaking and notice how much it reminds you of "Sure, Charlie Brown, I can tell you what Christmas is all about." Eric Shea also appeared in THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE and is probably the second most successful child actor from the cast (after Tim "Mike" Matheson).
	"Oh, have a heart! Leave them on someone else's doorstep!" Germaine Marie Beardsley b. March 19, 1957, Honolulu, Oahu, Hawaii Germaine, one of the two Beardsley babies making a much heralded homecoming on the wedding night, was played by Ricky Nelson's daughter, Tracy (FATHER DOWLING MYSTERIES).
	Gerald Joseph North b. October 14, 1958, Oak Harbor, Washington Gerald had no lines in the film but is the little chow-hound pigging out next to Mom when the parents suggest adoption at the dinner table. He also reaches for her adoringly during the Christmas carol scene. The actors playing Gerald and Teresa are siblings in real life.
	"Can I hold MY sister? Joan Frances Beardsley b. March 8, 1960, San Jose, California
	Teresa Rose North Beardsley b. August 30, 1960, Oak Harbor, Washington
	"Is he MY brother or YOUR brother? Joseph John Beardsley (Joe) b. July 14, 1962, Fort Ord, California
	Helen Monica Beardsley b. April 19, 1964, Fort Ord, California One photo in the book (see top of page) shows the family debating names for this final child. Apparently, Kuan Yin, Chinese Goddess of fertility, was not considered.

Class affiliations designated for North or Beardsley children at Carmel High per http://www.carmelhighalumni.org:

Mike Beardsley 1963
Charles (Rusty) Beardsley 1964
Mary Beardsley 1969
Janet North 1969
Nick North 1970
Tom Beardsley 1971
Veronica Beardsley 1972
Phillip North 1975
Gerald Beardsley 1977
Joan Beardsley 1978

From the Fortier files:

Louise, Greg, and Rosemary graduated from Junipero Memorial High School in Monterey. Susan and Colleen attended a private convent school for gifted girls. Louse is under the impression that all the children graduated from high school. By the time Teresa, Joe and Helen graduated high school, the Beardsleys were living in Fresno. Joan may have stayed in the Monterey area to graduate from Carmel (and Teresa perhaps from Junipero?).

Here's a comparison of movie ages versus real ages. Movie ages reflect the opinions of Rebecca and Daniel. Actors portraying Beardsleys are welcome to chime in with corrections! : ) Real ages are recorded as years and months with a colon between.

NAME	Frank	Helen	Mike	Rusty	Greg	Rosemary
Movie	late 40s	late 30s	18	17	15	16
Reality	46	31:5	17:1	15:8	13:10	12:10

NAME	Louise	Colleen	Janette	Mary	Nick	Susan
Movie	12	16	14	5	15	11
Reality	11:8	11:3	10:3	10:1	9:2	8:9

Tom	Veronica	Jean	Phillip	Germaine	Gerald	Joan	Teresa
9	7	7	6	2	3	1	1
7:11	7:0	5:9	4:7	4:6	2:11	1:6	1:0

"I thought I saw the house cringe as we drove up."

As mentioned above, the family did NOT move into a new home after marrying but expanded on Frank's.

According to Daniel (who contributed these images), folks who've resided in the Beardsley house since the family's move to Fresno include Mike Monroe, Danielle Dress, Adrienna Sanches and James W. Silveria. Daniel has heard that, at one time, the home served as a facility for recovering alcoholics and drug addicts (bathroom total increased to 8! They've since been removed again).

Here are links to the floor plan, drawn by Helen for Daniel Fortier, of the 5,500 sq. foot. Beardsley house.

Top Floor
Middle Floor
Bottom Floor

Feb. 6, 2004: Don't know how long this link will last, but the house was put on the market. Nice find, Daniel!

Questions I'd love to ask

"Have you ever been forced to appear in public in a dress that has had THREE former owners, re-styled by an old sail maker?"

No one assumes that everything was perpetually hunky dory in the Beardsley/North household, then or now. Plus, one can't escape the political implications of the book. Clearly Frank and Helen were two people who loved their faith at a time when proponents of birth control and sexual freedom were accusing the Catholic Church of inhuman repression. But the raison d'être for this page is, in this insulationist, materialistic era of woefully inverted values, the Beardsleys and Norths may hold incredible insight into the process of valuing people more than physical comfort. If I could, I'd like to ask them:

Were you envied or embarrassed? Both? Which moreso?

What things caused resentment of the marriage (and the creation of a house with 18 kids) and what things caused appreciation for it?

What did you have to go without because of a large family, and what things did you miss most?

What was different about how your family functioned compared to how families function now?

In what ways did the families stay segregated (as Beardsleys and Norths) and in what ways were they most integrated?

What impact did the movie have on your lives? Did it increase scrutiny? Has there been any follow-up publicity (articles, television news stories) about the family in the past 35 years?

What was most inaccurate in the movie? About the book? What was most accurate?

Do strangers recognize your names?

How and to what degree do the family members stayed in touch?

Feedback from visitors

Aaron G. Poff (agpoff41@hotmail.com) was married to Helen's sister, Kay, and frequently visited the family. He greatly admired them, attributing their loving, grateful attitudes to their tragic sense of loss over the deaths of Dick and Frances and their appreciation for how love could heal their pain and enrich their lives. As for the movie, he observes that, while Helen had a fine sense of humor, she was never as silly as some parts of the movie suggested.

Michelle LaPointe wrote me recently concerning the planned remake of YMO:

"I was an eighth-grade classmate of Veronica Beardsley (called 'Ronnie,' then, at least at school) when the original was made in 1968. My sister was in the same grade as Philip and Germaine. (Philip, who was quite a spirited kid, used to answer the phone 'Beardsley's cookie jar. Which crumb do you want to talk to?' I don't think his parents were too happy about that.)

"Our family went to the movie premiere they held in Carmel, along with most of our classmates and half the town (at least it seems that way in memory). Lucille Ball came and did a few days of public appearances; my mother, sister, and I went to Macy's to get her autograph.

"I remember...

...that Ronnie was smart, sensible, good at volleyball, and a kid you could trust
...that you could tell the Norths from the Beardsleys because most of the Beardsleys had red hair. Many members of one side of the family (I forget if it was North or Beardsley) also had a crooked little finger.
...that their house, at least the couple of times that I visited it after school, was remarkably quiet and orderly, especially in comparison to our house, even though we only had six kids. The Beardsley pantry held the biggest jar of peanut butter I have ever seen, then or since."

I think we thought of the family as interesting and unusual, but not fascinating. The big questions were logistical: how many kids shared a bedroom, how did they manage mealtimes, how many cars did it take to get everyone to church? We went to a Catholic school, so everyone knew big families - just not that big! By my age, we also knew that sometimes parents died and that the widowed remarried. Their situation was definitely recognized as being both brave and out of the ordinary but not strange.

The Beardsley kids I knew were normal, fun, interesting kids. I don't remember them being in the newspaper except for the movie stuff, although they may have. They certainly didn't behave like celebrities.

I remember being fascinated by the teenagers in the family. Very few of my friends had older siblings, and at the time I thought that anyone over the age of 14 had to be sophisticated and independent. Plus they all had jobs, which I thought was cool. And there were a lot of them.

The movie was definitely a cool experience. They didn't make it in Carmel, but they had one of the premieres there, and it was very exciting. Everybody dressed up to go, everybody was talking about it. It was one in a series of memorable events in a fairly momentous period.

Carmel was small, but not 'small-town America.' We always had celebrities in town: retired and vacationing movie stars, the spillover from the Pebble Beach Pro-Am Golf Tournament every year. In the two years I lived there, 1967 and 1968, we also had the Monterey Pop Festival, the burial of the hippie movement at Haight-Ashbury (so a lot of the hippies moved to Carmel), and a visit to our school from Governor Brown and Lady Bird Johnson, wife of then-President Lyndon B. Johnson. Monterey was also one of the jumping-off points for soldiers going to Vietnam.

The movie wasn't exactly like the family. They scrambled everybody's ages, left out most of the red hair, and set it in San Francisco, which was nothing like our town. Of the kids I knew, the one who was most different from her character in the movie was Louise, who I remember as being reserved. The kid who was most like his character was Philip. But nobody seemed to mind the differences; it was a good movie, and no one expected a documentary.

I only knew the younger kids, but the Beardsleys absolutely functioned like a single family. Without the physical differences, you couldn't tell which was which. At school, at least, they seemed just our family, only on a grander scale.

Judy Tripp-Neu (nee SCHLAICK) writes:
I went to school at Junipero Memorial High School and graduated with Rosemary Beardsley. I considered her my friend and shared many lunches together on the warm pavement which formed the quad for our small high school. We were taught by the Dominican Sisters of San Rafael and earned a very highly respected diploma from the school.

Rosemary was quiet and yet very introspective. Rusty was funny and given to laughter. Both had the red hair and freckles. They were good students and it was not uncommon for all of us to spend time studying together.

As I remember, after the Graduation Mass, our entire class was invited to the Beardsley home for breakfast. Despite their large family, they were generous and kind to outsiders and I don't remember the kids ever going without or complaining that they had to make concessions that eliminated them from any of the school activities.

The movie did not seem to change any of the family. There was some hoopla when it premiered in Carmel, but by and large, all of the family members that I met through the four years in Junipero seemed quite unaffected by it. If someone asked if they were "that family," they readily owned up to it and patiently answered polite questions.

Sister Monica Gillespie, OP, was the principal of Junipero Memorial High School the last three years that we were there, and she was very close to the family. I believe the last child, Helen, may have her name as a middle name.

Debbie Humm-Bremser, whom the Beardsleys used to call their '21st child,' lived next door and owned Cindy, the black cocker spaniel mentioned in DRUMSTICK. "When I married in 1984, I'm proud to say that 16 of the twenty kids were there." (Missing: Collien, Rusty, Mike, Nick. Click here to see Debbie with Frank and Helen on her wedding day.)

Debbie sent in the following:

Monterey Penninsula Herald 1968 article on Beardsley nut store.

'Similar' article about the blended Frank McHugh/Eileen White family.

I'm Rebecca Webb and I can be reached via e-mail at:
webbrl@morris.umn.edu

Here's my Homepage.