Louella Parsons

Louella Parsons
Parsons in 1937
Born	Louella Rose Oettinger (1881-08-06)August 6, 1881 Freeport, Illinois, U.S.
Died	December 9, 1972(1972-12-09) (aged 91) Santa Monica, California, U.S.
Resting place	Holy Cross Cemetery
Occupations	Gossip columnist screenwriter
Years active	1902–1965
Spouses	John Dement Parsons ​ ​ (m. 1905; div. 1914)​ John McCaffrey Jr. ​ ​ (m. 1915; div. 1929)​ Harry W. Martin ​ ​ (m. 1930; died 1951)​
Children	Harriet Parsons
Awards	Hollywood Walk of Fame

Louella Rose Oettinger, (August 6, 1881 – December 9, 1972) known professionally as Louella Parsons, was an American gossip columnist and a screenwriter. At her peak, her columns were read by 20 million people in 700 newspapers worldwide.

She was the first writer of a dedicated column on motion pictures in the United States, writing one in 1914 for the Chicago Record-Herald.^[1] She later started a similar column for the New York Morning Telegraph, being lured away by William Randolph Hearst's New York American in 1924 because she had championed Hearst's mistress Marion Davies.^[2] She subsequently became an influential figure in Hollywood and remained the unchallenged "Queen of Hollywood gossip" until the arrival of the flamboyant Hedda Hopper, with whom she feuded for years.