Editing Clara Bow (section)

==Early life==
Bow was born in [[Prospect Heights, Brooklyn]], at 697 Bergen Street,{{sfnp|Stenn|2000|loc=[https://books.google.com/books?id=mm3gQqcl20UC&pg=PA8 pp. 8–9]}} in a "bleak, sparsely furnished room above [a] dilapidated Baptist Church".{{sfn|Morella|Epstein|1976|p=9}} Her birth year, according to the [[US Census]]es of 1910 and 1920, was 1905. In US census records, enumerated April 15, 1910, and January 7, 1920, Bow's age is stated 4 and 14 years, respectively. The 1930 census stated an age of 23,<ref name="Census, Population Schedule 1930">{{cite United States census |url=https://archive.org/details/californiacensus00reel124/page/n247/mode/1up |title=1930 United States Federal Census |year=1930 |location=Beverly Hills, Los Angeles, California, USA  |roll= |page=1-B |line=79 |enumdist=19-822 |nafilm=2339859 |accessdate=2023-02-28 |via=Internet Archive}} More legible version at {{cite web |title=1930 United States Federal Census for Clara Bow |url=https://www.ancestry.com/imageviewer/collections/6224/images/4532344_00251?pId=89477598 |website=Ancestry.com |url-access=subscription}}</ref> and on her gravestone of 1965, the inscription says 1907, but 1905 is the year accepted by a majority of sources.<ref name=":0">{{Cite magazine |date=February 7, 2024 |title=Clara Bow: Biography, Silent Film Actor, "It Girl" |url=https://www.biography.com/actors/a45863068/clara-bow |access-date=February 7, 2024 |magazine=[[Billboard (magazine)|Billboard]]}}</ref>

Bow was her parents' third child. Her two older sisters, born in 1903 and 1904, had died in infancy.{{sfnp|Stenn|2000|p=8}} Her mother, Sarah Frances Bow (née Gordon, 1880–1923), was told by a doctor not to become pregnant again, for fear the next baby might die as well. Despite the warning, Sarah became pregnant with Clara in late 1904. In addition to the risky pregnancy, a heat wave besieged New York in July 1905, and temperatures peaked around {{convert|100|°F|°C|abbr=on}}.<ref name="New York Times 1905 p. 1">{{cite news |newspaper=[[The New York Times]] |date=July 20, 1905 |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1905/07/20/archives/63-die-of-heat-cool-wave-today-temperature-was-75-at-midnight-and.html |title=63 Die of Heat Cool Wave To-Day |volume=54 |issue=17,344 |page=1}}</ref> Years later, Clara wrote: "I don't suppose two people ever looked death in the face more clearly than my mother and I the morning I was born. We were both given up, but somehow we struggled back to life."<ref name="photoplay">Bow, Clara. [[Adela Rogers St. Johns|St. Johns, Adela Rogers]] (ed.) "My life, by Clara Bow" ''[[Photoplay]]'' (February, March and April 1928). (reprinted at [http://www.maxwelldemille.com/ClaraBow/clarastory.html Clara Bow: My Life Story as told to Adela Rogers St. Johns] – Maxwell DeMille Productions)</ref>

Bow's parents were descended from English and Scots-Irish immigrants who had come to America the generation before.{{sfnp|Stenn|2000|loc=[https://books.google.com/books?id=mm3gQqcl20UC&pg=PA6 p. 6]}} Bow said that her father, Robert Walter Bow (1874–1959), "had a quick, keen mind... all the natural qualifications to make something of himself, but didn't... everything seemed to go wrong for him, poor darling".<ref name="photoplay"/> By the time Clara was four and a half, her father was out of work.{{sfn|Morella|Epstein|1976|p=12}} Between 1905 and 1923, the family lived at 14 different addresses, but seldom outside Prospect Heights, with Clara's father often absent.{{sfn|Morella|Epstein|1976|p=17}} "I do not think my mother ever loved my father", she said. "He knew it. And it made him very unhappy, for he worshipped her always."<ref name="photoplay"/>

When Bow's mother was 16, she fell from a second-story window and suffered a severe head injury.{{sfnp|Stenn|2000|loc=[https://books.google.com/books?id=mm3gQqcl20UC&pg=PA6 p. 6]}} She was later diagnosed with "[[psychosis]] due to [[epilepsy]]".{{Efn|This was a condition apart from the seizures known to cause disordered thinking, delusion, paranoia, and aggressive behavior.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.med.nyu.edu/cec/living/disorders/psychosis.html |title=psychosis and epilepsy |publisher=[[NYU Langone Medical Center]] |access-date=August 19, 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090505061805/http://www.med.nyu.edu/cec/living/disorders/psychosis.html|archive-date=May 5, 2009}}</ref>}}{{sfnp|Stenn|2000|loc=[https://books.google.com/books?id=mm3gQqcl20UC&pg=PA26 p. 26]}} From her earliest years, Bow had learned how to care for her mother during the seizures, as well as how to deal with her psychotic and hostile episodes. She said her mother could be "mean to me—and she often was", but "she didn't mean to be and that it was because she couldn't help it".<ref name="photoplay"/> Still, Bow felt deprived of her childhood; "As a kid I took care of my mother, she didn't take care of me".{{sfn|Morella|Epstein|1976|p=24}} 

Sarah worsened gradually, and when she realized her daughter was set for a movie career, Bow's mother told her she "would be much better off dead". One night in February 1922, Bow awoke to a butcher knife held against her throat by her mother. Clara was able to fend off the attack, and locked her mother in her room. In the morning, Bow's mother had no recollection of the episode. Later, she was committed to a "sanatarium" by Robert Bow.<ref name="photoplay"/>

Clara spoke about the incident later:

[[File:Bayridgehighschool1920.jpg|thumb|upright=1.25|Bay Ridge High, in a 1920 postcard]]

{{blockquote|text=It was snowing. My mother and I were cold and hungry. We had been cold and hungry for days. We lay in each other's arms and cried and tried to keep warm. It grew worse and worse. So that night my mother—but I can't tell you about it. Only when I remember it, it seems to me I can't live.{{sfn |St. Johns |1930 |p=[https://archive.org/details/newmoviemagazine02weir/page/40/mode/1up 40]}}}}

According to Bow's biographer, [[David Stenn]], Bow was raped by her father at age sixteen while her mother was institutionalized.{{sfnp|Stenn|2000|loc=[https://books.google.com/books?id=mm3gQqcl20UC&pg=PA265 p. 265]}}<ref name="King">{{cite news |last1=King |first1=Susan |title=Alluring 'It' Girl Clara Bow: Tormented Hollywood Outsider |url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1999-jun-12-ca-45582-story.html |work=[[Los Angeles Times]] |date=June 12, 1999}}</ref>{{sfn |Berkin |Miller |Cherny |Gormly |2003 |pp=[https://archive.org/details/makingamericahis02berk/page/720/mode/2up 720–721]}} On January 5, 1923, Sarah died at the age of 43 from her epilepsy. When relatives gathered for the funeral, Bow was so upset that she "went crazy" and tried to jump into the grave to be with her, shouting that they were "hypocrites" and that they hadn't loved or cared for her mother while she was alive.<ref name="photoplay"/>

Bow attended P.S. 111, P.S. 9, and P.S. 98.{{sfnp|Stenn|2000|loc=[https://books.google.com/books?id=mm3gQqcl20UC&pg=PA11 pp. 11–14]}} "P.S." stands for "Public School" in New York City. As she grew up, she felt shy among other girls, who teased her for her worn-out clothes and "carrot-top" hair. She said about her childhood, "I never had any clothes.&nbsp;... And lots of time didn't have anything to eat. We just lived, that's about all. Girls shunned me because I was so poorly dressed."{{sfn |Savage |2007 |pp=[https://archive.org/details/teenagecreationo00sava_0/page/227/mode/1up 227]–[https://archive.org/details/teenagecreationo00sava_0/page/228/mode/1up 228]}}

From first grade, Bow preferred the company of boys, stating, "I could lick any boy my size. My right arm was quite famous. My right arm was developed from pitching so much&nbsp;... Once I hopped a ride on behind a big fire engine. I got a lot of credit from the gang for that."<ref name="photoplay"/> A close friend, a younger boy who lived in her building, burned to death, something that haunted her. She heard his screams and ran to his aid, rolling him up in carpet to stop the fire, but he died in her arms.<ref name="photoplay"/> In 1919, Bow enrolled in [[Bay Ridge High School|Bay Ridge High School for Girls]]. "I wore sweaters and old skirts&nbsp;... didn't want to be treated like a girl". Her mother had a long spell of good health, and changed Bow's appearance, cutting her hair more femininely. Bow said that "there was one boy who had always been my pal&nbsp;... he kissed me&nbsp;... I wasn't sore. I didn't get indignant. I was horrified and hurt&nbsp;... I knew I could never go back to being a tomboy."<ref name="photoplay"/>

Bow's interest in sports and her physical abilities led her to plan for a career as an athletics instructor. She won five medals at the "[[cinder track]]s" and credited her cousin [[Homer Baker]]—the national half-mile ({{circa}} 800&nbsp;m) champion in 1913 and 1914 and 660-yard ({{circa|600}}&nbsp;m) world-record holder—for being her trainer.<ref name="Bow 1924">{{cite news |last=Bow |first=Clara |title=Clara Bow says she is fast—on a cinder track |newspaper=The Boston Globe |volume=105 |issue=83 |page=63 |via=Newspapers.com |date=1924-03-23 |url=https://bostonglobe.newspapers.com/clip/119959583/clara-bow-says-she-is-fast-on-a-cinder/}}</ref> The Bows and Bakers shared a house—still standing—at 33 Prospect Place in 1920.{{sfnp|Stenn|2000|loc=[https://books.google.com/books?id=mm3gQqcl20UC&pg=PA26 p. 26]}}<ref name="Census, Population Schedule 1920">{{cite United States census |url=https://archive.org/details/14thcensusofpopu1159unit/page/n347/mode/1up |title=1930 United States Federal Census |year=1920 |location=Bourough of Brooklyn, NY  |roll=T625_1159 |page=3B |line=78 |enumdist=551 |nafilm=T625, 2076 |accessdate=2023-03-01 |via=Internet Archive}} More legible version at {{cite web |title=1920 United States Federal Census for Clara Bow |url=https://www.ancestry.com/imageviewer/collections/6061/images/4313507-00353?pId=95007009 |website=Ancestry.com |url-access=subscription}}</ref><ref name="Baker 1920">{{cite web |last=Baker |first=Homer  |author-link=Homer Baker |title=33 Prospect Place, Passport application, No. 20276 |series=U.S., Passport Applications, 1795-1925 |via=Ancestry.com |date=June 24, 1920 |url=https://www.ancestry.com/sharing/2146053?mark=197e00bdec4904530b9687e3fbbe9ae46a351046553ec63e77373c1506b04cf9 |url-access=subscription |access-date=2023-03-01}} Baker applied for a passport to compete in the [[1920 Olympic Games]] in [[Antwerp]], [[Belgium]].</ref>