'The Mouseketeer and Her Fans' - Rita Rose

Rita Rose ran Annette Funicello's national fan club for almost three decades.
The fan club started in 1961 when Rita was a sophomore at North Central High School in Indianapolis.
Rita wrote to Annette, and Annette gave her permission to run the club.
Members paid dues of $$2 a year and received photographs and fanzines.
Annette signed photographs, answered questions, and provided information about her career for the fan club members.
Rita and Annette became friends, and Rita was invited to Annette's wedding to Jack Gilardi in 1965.
In 1987, Annette was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis while filming Back to the Beach.
By 1992, Annette was walking with a cane, and by 1994, she was in a wheelchair.
Annette's autobiography was published in 1994 by Hyperion.
Annette passed away from complications of MS in 2013.
Rita spoke at Annette's celebration of life at Disney Studios.

Annette was selected by Walt Disney to be on The Mickey Mouse Club from 1955 to 1958.
She later co-starred in beach movies with Frankie Avalon.
Being famous never fazed Annette.
She was brought up in a close-knit Italian family and practiced her Catholic faith.
Her father was an auto mechanic, and her mother was a housewife.
Annette's mother enrolled her in dance classes because she was shy.
Walt Disney saw her in a performance of Swan Lake at the Hollywood Bowl and called her in for an audition.
She became the last of the original twenty-four Mouseketeers.
Her school became a red trailer on the Disney lot.
She helped her parents buy a bigger house with her paycheck.
As a teenager, Annette wanted to get married and have nine kids.
At age twenty-two, she married her agent and had three children.
She moved into semi-retirement, making occasional television appearances and doing commercials for Skippy Peanut Butter.
Annette actively participated in the fan club and formed friendships with its members.
She was called Annie by her friends and treated everyone with kindness and warmth.
Rita visited Annette several times at her home in Encino, California.
Rita also saw her at Walt Disney World in 1989 and in Cleveland in 1990.

A young man from Detroit called Rita and demanded Annette's home address.
He showed up on Rita's doorstep after being unable to find Annette in California.
The man was arrested and found carrying a six-inch Bowie knife.

Rita decided to write a book about Annette.
She wanted to include stories from family, colleagues, and friends.
Annette's children were going to write their own book.
Avalon, Fabian, and Paul Petersen declined to participate.
Shelley Fabares and Sharon Baird were key to making the book work.
Rita contacted lesser-known actors and singers through Facebook.
Steve Stevens provided stories about his encounters with Annette.
Additional stories came from Disney publicists and Mouseketeers.
The book became "Tributes from Fans and Friends".
Theme Park Press was looking for fresh, new insights.
Most of Annette's celebrity friends had already paid tribute to her in the media.
The more obscure people in her life were very forthcoming.
Rita presented the stories in interview format or as narratives.
She relied on other people for information.

Jackie Musgrave helped edit the book.
Rita sent the first few chapters to the publisher and received a contract within a week.
Annette Funicello: Tributes from Fans and Friends is the ultimate fanzine.
The book includes stories about Annette’s kindness, sense of humor, and professionalism from music producers, a choreographer, a childhood friend, Disney publicists, a cousin, and a late-in-life friend who helped Annette during the early stages of her illness.
Familiar contributors included Fabares, Bobby Rydell, Tommy Kirk, and Connie Francis.