I had a blast sharing my Sweet Home Alabama post that appeared a few days ago. Since then, several readers have asked me to share fun facts about myself. You won’t find some of these in my official author bio.
Ten Things Few People Know about Montgomery, Alabama and Anne Randolph, author of the forthcoming Southern Gothic novel, Sweet Bye and Bye.
1. Anne Randolph was born in Montgomery, Alabama on a cold day in September. In the South, September can have temperatures as high as 100 degrees;. So being cold made no sense.
2. 
My grandfather lived in a Neo Classical white columned house with a large porch. Wild hydrangeas grew across the front and a rope swing hung from a pecan tree in the back.
3.
Helen Keller’s sister lived across the street from my grandfather’s house.
4. 
My grandmother was a writer who published short stories in magazines in the 1920s.
5. 
Zelda Sayer, the wife of F. Scott Fitzgerald, lived down the street from my grandmother and would come to her white columned house for writer gatherings.
6.
My cousin, Ann Hebson, was in the 1960s a bestselling author of the Southern novel,The Lattimer Legend.
7.
In the 5th grade I sold more Girl Scout cookies than anyone in the US. In the 4th grade I drug boxes of cookies from door to door and declared, ‘This is for the birds!” In 5th grade I talked my mother into dropping me off with a load of cookies on Saturday mornings at Huntingdon College, two blocks from my house. Girls were either hungry or they had been Girl Scouts.
8. 
My lifetime dream while in Alabama was to be Miss America. From 5th grade through college, I studied beauty pageants and kept a file of answers to questions such as “What is humility?” I never won Junior Miss, Maid of Cotton, or Miss Alabama, but I always made the finals.
9. Working as an actor in Minneapolis — not Montgomery, but both start with an “M” — I built trucks on the Ford assembly line. I was looking for work to pay for my rent in St. Paul. An employment agent announced, “They are hiring 
down on the line at the Ford plant.” The next day at 4:30 AM, I went for my interview which consisted of a physician figuring out how big I was to determine where to put me in the plant. The doctor looked at my application and declared, “Oh my God, my daughter is in theater. Honey, they will put you anywhere in this plant. I’m going to put down light labor only.” I became a Union Masker taping off doors on two-tone trucks. I worked nights and lasted one month; but I did pay my rent!
10. 
While in Alabama, I launched my Stage Directing career which took me from “Opry to Opera”. I began as a Stage Manager at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, which led to work at New York City Opera, Opera Colorado, the English National Opera in London and the Netherlands Opera in Amsterdam, and the Colorado Symphony. Today, I write full time.
Now, tell me a fun fact (or two) that I didn’t know about you. Follow me on Twitter where I help writers find the courage, craft and creativity to write the story of their life.
Contact Anne: annerandolph.com/contact/
Another book of mine, “Stories Gathered at the Kitchen Table: A Collection of Women’s Memoirs” is available at www.Amazon.com or at www.AnneRandolph.com/book