This week I am featuring my 3 x great grand aunt on my adopted mother's branch, Georgiana Matilda Blore, who was an undertaker. She married Adam Rushworth Murgatroyd, whose father was a Vicar in West Thurrock, to become Mrs Murgatroyd.
The undertakers business was started by Georgiana's father and then passed to her brother before eventually passing to her in 1835. It was then carried on by both Georgiana and her husband at their premises in Stafford Row, Pimlico, London.
It has always been taken as Gospel that the phrase "Heavens to Murgatroyd" was first used in a 1944 film by Bert Lahr, who was the Cowardly Lion in The Wizard of Oz. Subsequently, Hanna-Barbera gave the catch phrase to Snagglepuss and the rest is history.
Wouldn't it have been the perfect marketing tool for Georgiana and Adam to use in their undertakers business, or even perhaps by Adam's father in his capacity as Vicar ..... "Heaven through Murgatroyd" would have been a good handle.
Sadly, although I have trawled through old newspapers and magazines, I have yet to find an advertisement for the business or the church, let alone one that uses this phrase or anything like it. Nice to dream though !
The undertakers business was started by Georgiana's father and then passed to her brother before eventually passing to her in 1835. It was then carried on by both Georgiana and her husband at their premises in Stafford Row, Pimlico, London.
It has always been taken as Gospel that the phrase "Heavens to Murgatroyd" was first used in a 1944 film by Bert Lahr, who was the Cowardly Lion in The Wizard of Oz. Subsequently, Hanna-Barbera gave the catch phrase to Snagglepuss and the rest is history.
Wouldn't it have been the perfect marketing tool for Georgiana and Adam to use in their undertakers business, or even perhaps by Adam's father in his capacity as Vicar ..... "Heaven through Murgatroyd" would have been a good handle.
Sadly, although I have trawled through old newspapers and magazines, I have yet to find an advertisement for the business or the church, let alone one that uses this phrase or anything like it. Nice to dream though !
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