Kitty Merkel
The Cooch Dancer
Born: Alabama, 1927

Kitty grew up in the Southern bible belt. She was the oldest of four children. Her family was very religious. Her father Henry was a minister, her mother Ethel played the organ for the church bake sale and Bazaar. Kitty was a wild and rebellious child. She was very difficult for her parents to control. She joined the G.E. Circus as a means of escaping her conservative parents, and the very small town she lived in. She has been married four times, her last marriage to Frank produced two daughters. When Kitty and Frank divorced, the girls were three and six years old. Frank took them to California with him when he left the circus, and Kitty has never heard from her daughters since. They do not know what their mother does, nor do they know she is still alive.