An Urgent Plea From A Concerned Mom

May 30, 1972

From the desk of Mona Brackett
Wife, Mom and Chief Bottle Washer

Dearest Bradley:

I'm old enough to be your mother, and I'm also old enough to know the amount of mail you receive every week and that this letter that I am writing may never see the light of day or your sparkling blue eyes.

Still, I am writing this as a mission of mercy, and as a concerned mother in the Northern Jersey area. I am asking you to show your father -- your real father, Laddy Breen -- some compassion.

You kids today talk about love and peace. You think you know what love and peace is. But you don't -- you don't at all. I am old enough to remember your father when he was as famous as you are now.

He was a beautiful boy. I was not such a beautiful girl, fat and ugly is more the word, but when I went to see him all alone at Palisades Park that summer, crying my eyes out because I did not have a boyfriend and I didn't think I would ever get married and have children (I have since had three girls, all fans of yours and members of your club). When I went to see him, he sang to me, right from the microphone on stage. He sang to me as if I was the only woman in the world, and I sat there stunned and I will never forget it. It was as if he was feeling the pain I was feeling.

True, it may be true about what they said about him: he didn't have much talent. But his talent did not lie in his voice. It was in his eyes, in his soul, in his human being.

When the scandal broke (I don't know how else to describe the news of your mother getting pregnant by him -- she was even younger than me at the time and the news was nothing less than a real shock moment). When the scandal broke, my heart was broken completely. I don't think I ever recovered.

When my girls watch you on television, I think of your real father. You need to show him some compassion then. He is on the skids, this man. He does not need you to shun him, but to love him and to do what all you kids talk about today: peace and love.

I am writing you to tell you to show your dad some mercy. And also to tell you that even though you wrote my girls a letter saying not to invite Laddy to our fan club meeting, I feel that I may just very well do it, it would be worth the fifty dollars plus gas and tolls.

I want to show him kindness. You should too. He meant a lot to me, and he brought you into this world after all, where you are able to bring happiness to a lot of young girls, and even an old one like me.

I just felt the need to tell you a little about love and the way of the world and the way things should work, especially these days. I hope you hear my plea.

I still love you and your music and your acting,

Mona Brackett
Concerned mother and one-time Laddy Breen fan and now a Bradley Breen fan
My girls too.