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If you are any fan of the Adam West Batman tv show back in the 70s, then you’ll be saddened to hear that one of the three beloved actors who played Catwoman, Ms. Eartha Kitt, has passed away. She died from colon cancer at the age of 81.

Eartha was born in 1926 on a South Carolina cotton plantation.  Her mother was part Cherokee and African-American, her father Germa and Dutch descent, who’s surname was Kitt who’s father was the owner of the plantation Eartha was born on. From an early age she was ostracized because of her mixed-race heritage. At 8 years old, Earth was given away by her mother to go live with her aunt Anna Mae Riley in Harlem.Â

After her Riley’s death, she was sent to live in New York City with her biological mother Mamie Kitt. As a teen ager in New York, Eartha auditioned for the Katherine Dunham Dance Troupe. By age 19 she eventually won a spot as a featured dancer and vocalist and toured worldwide with the company. While touring in Paris, she was spotted by a nightclub owner and booked as a featured singer at his club.Â

Welles gave Eartha her first starring role as Helen of Troy in Dr. Faustus. Welles and Eartha had a torrid affair where Welles nicnamed her “the most exciting woman in the world.”  She eventually landed Charles Revson, as another lover, who was the founder of the Revlon cosmetic company, who custom made a flaming red lipstick, for Eartha, that was called Fire and Ice.Eartha’s famous cat-like purr and unique persona earned her fans and fame quickly. Â

She sang many hit songs, including the 1953 Christmas song. She became well known in Britain when she scored a Top 40 hit in 1980 with the disco classic ‘Where Is My Man?’ that found her new audiences in nightclubs. It was in the Batman series in the 1960s that Eartha became a household name after Julie Newmar left the show. Unfortuntely it was during a White House luncheon with the Johnsons that she made some anti-war statements that upset the First Lady, Lady Bird Johnson. That incident put a hold on her career.

She made a comeback in the 1970s by doing New York’s Broadway, and later appeared regularly in theatre shows and concert halls. One of her more unusual roles was as Kaa the python in a 1994 BBC Radio adaptation of The Jungle Book. Eartha was born to a 14-year-old girl who was raped on a cotton plantation and was handed over to another family before being sent to live with an aunt in New York.