Did you know it was Valeska Suratt Day?

Jun. 29—Valeska Suratt may be the most enigmatic Hautean to ever receive a mayoral proclamation naming a day after her.

In the Indiana Theatre's rotunda, Mayor Duke Bennett read his proclamation declaring Tuesday — which would have been her 140th birthday — Valeska Suratt Day before 20 admirers. He admitted that before being approached to participate in the event, he had never heard of the silent film actress.

"You learn something new all the time," the mayor said.

After that, everyone crossed the street to the Swope Art Museum to see hardcore fan Bill Piper's collection of memorabilia — two tables of photographs and lobby cards, some original and others reprints.

Suratt was a silent film star for a relatively brief period of time, known for playing vamps in movies like "The Belle of the Boulevard" and "A Rich Man's Plaything;" no prints of any of her films are known to exist. The only known existing footage of her is two minutes from a newsreel. She was also a Vaudevillian performer and appeared on Broadway. She was also known as a fashion icon.

She died a pauper in 1962; her grave at Highland Lawn Cemetery did not have a headstone for 40 years until another fan, Dot Lewis Hamann, started a Go Fund Me fundraiser to pay for one's installation.

Piper, who's president of the Historical Society in Crawford County and maintains a website dedicated to Surratt's memory (https://valeskasuratt.com/), has pored over old movie magazines and newspapers online in an effort to reconstruct the plots of her movies. He's satisfactorily completed four recaps.

"When I heard she was a Hoosier who had been in silent films, that sort of piqued my interest," Piper said of his fascination with Suratt. "The vamp genre is fascinating from a historical point of view, and that got my interest."

Aside from the films, what happened to the actual Suratt? That, too, remains a mystery.

"I'm not sure what happened," Piper said. "Once the vamp phase ended, she kind of left film and went back to Vaudeville. After the mid '20s, she kind of falls off the radar."

"She had all this fame and this fortune and she kind of went off the rails and got a little strange and couldn't get movie roles," Hamann said. "She just didn't become bigger."

Piper has heard a rumor that Suratt wrote a screenplay, "Mary Magdalene," which somehow made its way to legendary producer Cecil B. DeMille. He didn't buy her script, but went on to make "King of Kings." The rumor suggests she unsuccessfully sued him and was blackballed after that.

What is known is Suratt returned to Terre Haute and became involved with the Red Cross.

Hamann's yearlong effort to get Suratt a tombstone proved fruitful — it was installed earlier this year and a dedication ceremony is tentatively scheduled sometime this summer.

"It's kind of awful that you were somebody and then you become nobody and nobody cares," she says of the reason for her efforts, adding that the cemetery included Surratt on its tours even when she had no monument.

"At least now for people taking a tour of Highland Lawn, there's something there to look at."

David Kronke can be reached at 812-231-4232 or at david.kronke@tribstar.com.