Singer Ketty Lester built a career across music, television, film, and stage. Her rendition of Dick Haynes’ 1945 hit “Love Letters” climbed to number five on the pop chart and number two on the R&B chart in Billboard during spring 1962. The song had served as the title theme for the 1945 Jennifer Jones film.
Born Revoyda Frierson on August 16, 1934, in Hope, Arkansas, Lester grew up as one of fifteen children in a farming family. A 1955 scholarship took her to California, where she enrolled at San Francisco City College to study nursing. She sang in church and the school choir, performed in summer stock theater, and competed as a contestant on the 1950s game show You Bet Your Life. At the Purple Onion club, country singer and comedienne Dorothy Shay introduced her to producers Ed Cobb and Lincoln Mayorga. Era Records issued the resulting single, “I’m a Fool for You” backed with “Love Letters,” yet disc jockeys and listeners favored the sparse, steamy B-side, which became a Top Five pop hit. The follow-up, a cover of George Gershwin’s “But Not for Me” from the musical Girl Crazy, reached number 41 pop in summer 1962.
Her self-titled album appeared that year and included the singles “You Can’t Lie to a Liar” and a cover of Woody Guthrie’s “This Land Is Your Land.” Another Era release paired “Fallin Angel” with “Lullaby for Lovers.” She cut “West Coast” backed with the ballad “I’ll Be Looking Back” for Capitol, “I Said Goodbye to My Love” backed with “Queen for a Day” for Everest, and “Measure of a Man” backed with “Cracker Box Livin’,” plus “Show Me” backed with “Since I Fell for You,” and the album Same for the Pete label.
Further sessions took her to RCA for the albums Soul of Me and Where Is Love and the singles “Better World,” “Roses Grow With Thorns,” “You Go Your Way,” “Some Things Are Better Unsaid,” and “The Luck of Ginger Coff.” Tower issued When a Woman Loves a Man along with the single “Love Me Just a Little Bit.” She also recorded the Christian album I Saw Him for Mega Records.
Although offered the lead in Julia before Diahann Carroll took the role, Lester appeared in the films Just for Fun, Up Tight, Uptown Saturday Night, The Terminal Man, Street Knight, House Party 3, and Blacula, as well as the television movies Louis Armstrong: Chicago Style and Percy and Thunder. Guest spots included Sanford and Son, Laugh-In, Quantum Leap, Hill Street Blues, Love American Style, The FBI, the 1975 Harry O episode featuring Maureen McCormick, That Girl, Marcus Welby, and Lou Grant. She became a regular cast member on Little House on the Prairie as Hester Sue Terhune and joined the daytime casts of Days of Our Lives as Helen Grant and Rituals. An Off-Broadway Theater Award recognized her performance in a revival of A Cabin in the Sky. She later had a recurring role as Vivica A. Fox’s grandmother on the 1998 sitcom Getting Personal.
