Billie Marie Green

Remembering you , Billie! Happy birthday!

Remembering another recent recollection . . . Billie was increasingly reflecting on her many rich memories. We were talking on the phone, and she mentioned Antonia Brico. She talked about the documentary Antonia Brico: Portrait of a Woman that Judy Collins directed in 1974 and that she had worked on as well. She wondered about it and whether it still listed her in the credits.

Since she no longer had her computer, I later searched and found it was available on YouTube and other venues for streaming. After watching it, I called her to let her know. There, in reverse type, on the last of the dark screens listing credits one by one, a single name appeared: "Billie Green, production secretary."

She was thrilled to know her days in New York working for Judy were memorialized on the web. Antonia Brico was the first woman conductor of the Berlin symphony and one of the first woman conductors worldwide. The 2018 movie The Conductor was also based on her life. Antonia Brico was Judy Collins´s music instructor when growing up. The black and white documentary contains excellent footage and narration by Brico with Judy as her interviewer and insight into Judy Collins´s early musical training. Be sure to watch it!

Below, one of Billie's watercolors!

Dearest Billie, How well all of us who were graduate students in the English Department at Iowa State looked forward to your smiling face each morning when we stopped in the office, where you brought so much joy to faculty, other office staff, and students alike. With your New Yorker cartoons posted on bulletin boards, witty newspaper clippings, updates on the latest novels you were reading, and zealous pursuit of helping us in every possible way, you worked tirelessly to make the office run. And you made friends of all of us and kept us in your life and those days vivid in your and our memory.

It is some comfort to know that so often in the last weeks and months, in spite of whatever trouble you had keeping up your former pace, you so often said you felt so blessed to have lived such a long life, to still be able to live in your own home, and to have Juanita´s help in doing so. And you were reading avidly as always and searching the internet to catch up on the amazing range of artists, musicians, and music producers you had come to know in your years in the Village in New York and working and traveling with Judy Collins. What an exciting time to have been in the city, just as Collins, Baez, Dylan were first performing. How often I told you that you should record the stories you told!

The last two texts I have from you are about Nancy Cosby in Montana and how she was going to Judy Collin´s concert on the Monday of the week before you left us and how she was going to try to go backstage and greet her for you-and later that Nancy had called and what peace it gave you to know she had been able to do so:

"Forgot to mention Montana. Nancy will see Judy Collins in concert Monday night and if Judy is receiving backstage, Bing (Nancy Crosby) will greet her for me and tell her I sincerely thank her for all the memories."

"It is flurrying here, just below freezing. Made contact with Judy Colins through Montana friend at concert in Missoula. We still love each other. Very, very moving. Would love to tell you about it. It brough me great peace. Perhaps to be continued. I am worried about her health. I´m worried about my health."

All of us whom you befriended thank you for our fond memories, Billie. Remembering too, my recent visit to Ames now and always! Nancy Barta-Smith

Dearest Billie, How well all of us who were graduate students in the English Department at Iowa State looked forward to your smiling face each morning when we stopped in the office, where you brought so much joy to faculty, other office staff, and students alike. With your New Yorker cartoons posted on bulletin boards, witty newspaper clippings, updates on the latest novels you were reading, and zealous pursuit of helping us in every possible way, you worked tirelessly to make the office run. And you made friends of all of us and kept us in your life and those days vivid in your and our memory.

It is some comfort to know that so often in the last weeks and months, in spite of whatever trouble you had keeping up your former pace, you so often said you felt so blessed to have lived such a long life, to still be able to live in your own home, and to have Juanita´s help in doing so. And you were reading avidly as always and searching the internet to catch up on the amazing range of artists, musicians, and music producers you had come to know in your years in the Village in New York and working and traveling with Judy Collins. What an exciting time to have been in the city, just as Collins, Baez, Dylan were first performing. How often I told you that you should record the stories you told!

The last two texts I have from you are about Nancy Cosby in Montana and how she was going to Judy Collin´s concert on the Monday of the week before you left us and how she was going to try to go backstage and greet her for you-and later that Nancy had called and what peace it gave you to know she had been able to do so:

"Forgot to mention Montana. Nancy will see Judy Collins in concert Monday night and if Judy is receiving backstage, Bing (Nancy Crosby) will greet her for me and tell her I sincerely thank her for all the memories."

"It is flurrying here, just below freezing. Made contact with Judy Colins through Montana friend at concert in Missoula. We still love each other. Very, very moving. Would love to tell you about it. It brough me great peace. Perhaps to be continued. I am worried about her health. I´m worried about my health."

All of us whom you befriended thank you for our fond memories, Billie. Remembering too, my recent visit to Ames now and always! Nancy Barta-Smith