Betsy Gay, 'Little Rascals' Star, Dies at 96: 'She Will Be Deeply Missed'

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Betsy Gay died on June 13 at the age of 96
Gay, also a yodeler, starred in the Our Gang comedy series, which was later renamed The Little Rascals
'She will be deeply missed,' her friend Robert Satterfield wrote on Facebook, noting that Gay attended the 'very last' Little Rascals reunion in 2014Betsy Gay, a former child star known for her work in the Our Gang comedy films, has died. She was 96.
Gay, who appeared in the series in the 1930s before it was renamed The Little Rascals, died in Bakersfield, Calif., on Friday, June 13, her friend Robert Satterfield announced on Facebook. The news has since been shared by Variety, which also cited Satterfield.
Gay joined the Our Gang series in the 1930s, eventually appearing in the shorts as Effie, the girlfriend of Alfalfa, until 1938. She made appearances in projects including Our Gang Follies of 1938 and Came the Brawn as part of the group, per IMDB.
Her other notable appearances included The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, At the Circus and Mystery Plane, as she acted in more than 40 films until she turned 13, according to a Hillbilly Music biography shared by her friend.
The Our Gang shorts, released between 1922 and 1944 and created by producer Hal Roach, spawned later iterations including the 1994 film, The Little Rascals.
In a 2011 interview with Darwin Lee Hill, shared by the Southern Music Research Center, Gay reflected on getting her start in the film business.
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"Those days, there was a lot of kids who worked in movies," she said. "One mother told my mother, 'You ought to take Betsy to [the studio], they come there all the time looking for kids to be in Our Gang comedies.' So she took me over there and sure enough, a month later, a man came over... he took us in and we were in Our Gang movies."
In 1941, Gay launched a career in Western music when she practiced yodeling after being asked to appear in an Andy Clyde short for Columbia Pictures, per her biography.
She continued to act into her teens at the Pasadena Playhouse in productions of Quality Street, A Kiss For Cinderella and Heroes Unlimited and appeared in the 1943 film What's Buzzin', Cousin?
Her other accomplishments in music include performing alongside Stuart Hamblen and his Lucky Stars in the '40s, winning the California State Yodeling Championship in both 1945 and 1946, appearing on radio and recording music under both Capitol Records and Decca Records, with the latter alongside Russ Morgan's band. She also was a regular cast member on Country America on KABC TV alongside Johnny Cash, Faron Young, The Everly Brothers and more from 1957 to 1959.
Gay shared five children — Mimi, Gigi, Tommy, Suzy and Cathy —with her husband Thomas Cashen, who she wed in 1954, per her biography.
"She will be deeply missed," Satterfield wrote on Facebook, noting that Gay was in attendance at the "very last" Little Rascals reunion in 2014.
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