- [Dorothy] The first job I'd applied for
and they liked the piano playing,
but they said I was too young.
I had to be 18.
- [Jay] And so what did you do?
- Well, I lied about my age. (laughing)
(upbeat piano music)
- [Jay] It was 1934 when 17 year old Dorothy Olson Pauletti
arrived in Chicago (upbeat piano music)
and we're visiting her 85 years later.
(upbeat piano music)
- I am 102 years old. (laughing)
- [Jay] For nearly eight decades,
Dorothy has been a busy working pianist in Chicago,
playing in hotels, nightclubs, restaurants, and on radio.
(upbeat piano music)
Dorothy Olson Pauletti grew up in Bloomington, Illinois.
Let me see this one.
Dorothy's first job was at age nine.
- [Dorothy] This is back in Bloomington now.
- [Jay] A local furniture store started selling pianos.
- So I was in the window
playing the piano so I helped them sell pianos.
- [Jay] Well, and this is you here.
She was a prodigy at the age of nine.
- Oh.
Prodigy?
- That's what it says right there.
(laughing) (upbeat piano music)
When 17 year old Dorothy arrived in Chicago,
she stayed with relatives and found work right away.
- I started auditioning at hotel lounges
and that worked out very well,
so, and I found out that agents were interested in me.
I don't know why.
- [Jay] Because you had talent.
- Well, no, because they would get 10% of my salary,
that's why.
- [Jay] Dorothy was always a solo act
and she became a regular at places like
the Hotel North Park, the Drake, LaSalle,
Pick Congress, and her favorite,
The Empire Room at the Palmer House.
- Every job I've had has been nothing but fun because
the idea of an entertainer is to entertain
and to get people involved.
I had them singing, I had him playing duets with me,
and almost everybody would have a favorite song.
Some of the songs go way back
but so do I.
(upbeat piano music)
♪ And you and I keep wondering why ♪
- [Jay] Dorothy married, had two kids,
and she kept right on playing.
- I've been listening to my mother
ever since I was in the womb.
She was a working mom.
She was, and she'd get dressed
in the formals and she'd make our dinner and
she'd go off to work and we'd have a babysitter.
No matter what time she got home from working,
she would get up and make breakfast for us
and get us off to school.
- [Jay] And those formals?
Dorothy made them and all her clothes herself.
(upbeat piano music)
Dorothy says it was very common for customers
to want to buy the piano player a drink.
- When people wanted to buy me a drink, I would say,
well, no, this is my job.
Do you drink on your job?
And then none of them ever did, or they said they didn't.
(laughing)
(upbeat piano music)
- [Jay] Dorothy played pop, classical, jazz,
and humorous songs like 'The Drinking Man's Diet'.
♪ For breakfast, there's corn flakes and vodka, ♪
♪ But corn flakes have carbohydrates ♪
♪ So I don't eat those fattening cornflakes ♪
♪ I eat the vodka straight ♪
♪ Drink, drink ♪
Dorothy Olson Pauletti's last paying gigs
were in her mid nineties,
though clearly she's still got the chops.
♪ If pounds you would burn off, then turn on your Smirnoff ♪
♪ And drink, ♪
♪ Drink, ♪
♪ Drink! ♪
(laughing and clapping)
Soon after that story first aired,
the Palmer House invited Dorothy to return
to the Empire Room.
(staff cheering)
She was welcomed by cheering staff.
- Oh.
- [Jay] Then she and her family were treated to lunch
in the Empire Room and serenaded by Chicago musicians.
(upbeat piano music)
And then, at 102,
Dorothy Olson Pauletti played the Empire Room one last time.
(upbeat piano music)
(audience clapping)