Jane Crusinberry was born Henrietta (Harriet) Jane McConnell on October 3, 1892, in Grand Rapids, Michigan to Frank and Bertha McConnell. Both parents were traveling salespeople; Frank sold Malta Vita cereal and Bertha, using her maiden name of B. Skeels, sold soap. Jane and her brother, Thomas Frank, stayed with relatives or were boarded out while their parents traveled. The family moved several times during this period, to Regina, Saskatchewan, Milwaukee, and Chicago.
As a child, Crusinberry took piano and voice lessons, and as a teenager in Chicago she began to earn money as a singer at weddings and funerals. She studied under William Beard and was invited to sing for Frederick Stock, conductor of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. When she was 18, the Violinists Guild of America offered her a scholarship to study in Europe. Instead, she married Jim Crusinberry, a sportswriter for a Chicago newspaper. The couple had one daughter, Patricia. The marriage was unhappy and a series of separations and reconciliations took place.
Jane Crusinberry later tried to resume her career as an opera singer; for three summers she studied in Europe while her parents cared for her daughter. However, in 1933, after the Depression impoverished the McConnells, Jane Crusinberry returned to Chicago permanently. She got a job as a teacher at the Chicago Commons, a settlement house on West Grand Avenue.
Crusinberry's writing career began in 1934 when she wrote a dramatic radio skit to advertise a friend's beauty products. The idea for the skit was “Could a woman over thirty-five find love and romance?” Although the skit was never produced, the idea became the basis for Crusinberry's long-running and successful radio soap opera, The Story of Mary Marlin (originally entitled The Story of Mary Martin). In February 1934 the show was auditioned in Chicago for NBC and a prospective sponsor, the Kleenex Company, but was rejected at the advice of Kleenex's advertising agency. However, the owners of the Kleenex Company liked the show and in October Kleenex purchased the serial for thirteen weeks of local broadcasting. The Story of Mary Marlin was a success and on January 1, 1935, it was picked up by NBC for national broadcasting.
The Story of Mary Marlin continued on the air at least until 1945, earning generally high ratings until its last two years. Through its history, the show was sponsored by Kleenex Co. and Procter and Gamble.
