History Of Hints Heloise’s Column Meets Demands Of Generations

So, you say you’re disorganized.

Who isn’t?

But you’re different, you say, in that you want to do something about it.

Then consider this your lucky day. Ponce Kiah Marchelle Heloise Cruse Evans can tell you - in fact, she will tell you - what to do about it.

“Buy a different color pen for each family member,” she says. “On your family calendar, write everybody’s activities in their designated color. Save one color for family events. It’s a colorful way to be organized!”

Evans, who is better known by her single celebrity moniker of Heloise, has a gigabyte’s worth of such household hints to share. And why not? It’s her job.

The Hints From Heloise syndicated column runs daily in some 500 newspapers around the world, including The Spokesman-Review.

The above hint opens her 1996 desk calendar.

And it’s only one of many she has dreamed up or developed in her San Antonio, Texas, home over the two decades since inheriting the column from her mother, the late Heloise Bowles.

“It’ll be 20 years next year, which is amazing to me,” Heloise sighs.

Twenty years. That’s nearly how long it’s been since Heloise’s mother, who created the column for a Honolulu newspaper in 1959, died unexpectedly at age 58.

“She had a heart attack,” her daughter says. “She was in the hospital recovering from pneumonia.”

Heart failure was the only thing the original Heloise seemingly didn’t have a cure for. If, instead, she’d been looking for a first-rate astringent, she’d no doubt have suggested vinegar.

And if she were looking for the perfect someone to succeed her, she likely would not have found anyone more qualified than her own daughter.

Now 44, and boasting her mother’s trademark prematurely gray hair, Heloise II - as her mother once dubbed her in print - hadn’t planned on taking over the column. But it wasn’t a hardship to do so, either.

After all, she’d worked summers for her mother until she graduated from college in 1974. And for the next three years, she learned the business side of her mother’s job by serving as office manager.

“It was quite a smooth transition from the business aspect,” she says of the first months following her mother’s death. “The emotional part of it, was, needless to say, pretty tough. Losing my mother, losing my boss, having a new role. … But I’m still learning, I’ll tell you. No one can ever prepare you for this.”

Not completely, at any rate. Every day brings a new challenge.

Every generation brings a new set of reader demands.

From the beginning, Heloise says, “I wrote about things that were important to me. Here I was, 25, single and I lived alone.” And even though her mother was divorced at the time, Heloise says, “she still thought of everybody as being a housewife.”

By the mid-‘70s, though, it was clear many women were not repeating the lifestyles of their mothers. Many women were opting for careers over families, while many others were opting for careers and families.

So the column had to change. And Heloise changed it.

“We address consumer issues that mother really didn’t address very often,” she says.

Some of those issues are what Heloise describes as “heart hints,” which she does in conjunction with the American Heart Association. Others involve unusual situations that are a little more complicated than how to best clear a clogged toilet.

For example, one reader wanted to know how to clean her veteran father’s Purple Heart. After investigating, Heloise found that instead of trying to clean the medal, it was best to simply apply for a replacement. So she passed on the requisite information.

The item elicited a lot of replies.

One woman, Heloise says, wrote that her ex-Marine husband had lost his Purple Heart. So, following Heloise’s directions, she requested a new one.

“When it arrived in time for his birthday, I gave it to him,” the woman wrote. “I had never seen my 6-feet-2, 250-pound husband cry.”

“It just sent chills,” says Heloise.

Clearly, this kind of column fodder is closer to Ann Landers than traditional Heloise. But then, that is how Heloise had adapted to the ‘90s.

“The column is written for anyone or everyone who needs this kind of help,” she says. “Whereas, in my mother’s day it was written strictly to housewives because that was the ‘Donna Reed’ era.”

Yet there always is room for the more traditional hints. And when judging the best ones, Heloise takes two things into consideration.

“Generally, the best ones are those that save you money,” she says. “How to stretch the tube of toothpaste or how to get an extra washing out of a bottle of shampoo.” (Add a little water, she says, for an extra couple or three hair washings.)

“The other ones,” she says, “are those that save you time or frustration.”

Many hints are geography-dependent. For those areas hit hardest by winter, she says, finding a way to save on your monthly energy bill might be a priority. And, getting back to Ann Landers territory, adhering to that priority might entail more marital negotiation than anything else.

Heloise and her husband David, for example, always fought over the thermostat. She likes a house temperature of 70, while he prefers 65.

They compromised on 68.

“And if I get cold, I put a sweater on,” she says. “And if he gets hot, he puts a pair of shorts on. I know that sounds simple, but after 15 years of us going (she impersonates a catfight), this winter has not been as grumpy as it has been in the past.”

In the end, though, Heloise can’t get away from tradition. And so no story about her column could end without some reference to vinegar.

Is there, for example, anything that you cannot clean with vinegar?

“Pearls,” she says. “And maybe suede.”

“But it’s great for windows,” she quickly adds. “There’s hardly anything that you can’t clean with vinegar.”

Somewhere, Heloise I is smiling.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color Photo

MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: S-R sponsors Hints for Heloise contest Heloise isn’t the only one with worthy household hints to share. Often her daily column features the work of readers. We at the Spokesman-Review figure our readers deserved a chance to get in on the action, too. That’s why we’re sponsoring a Hints For Heloise contest. So if you’ve ever devised a time-saving and/or effort-saving hint, here’s your chance to earn a bit of Heloise-type fame. To enter, just send your hint - clearly explained - on a sheet of paper to: Hints For Heloise, c/o Dan Webster, The SpokesmanReview, Spokane, WA 99201. Entries must be postmarked no later than Friday, March 15. All entries will be judged by Heloise herself, and the top 10 winners of her choice will receive free copies of her book “Heloise Hints for All Occasions.” Heloise’s top choice also will receive a $50 gift certificate to The Bon. Final results will be announced sometime in May.