In 1996, I wrote the foreword to a collection of Li'l Abner comic strip reprints. It was an article about the 1959 Li'l Abner movie based on the musical stage production. In it, I mentioned an actress named Wynne Miller, who replaced Edie Adams on Broadway in the role of Daisy Mae, and I said she was the daughter of the famed bandleader, Glenn Miller. (I have this piece online. You can read it here.) It's taken until now — like, this morning — for anyone to catch this error. Wynne Miller is the niece of Glenn Miller, not his daughter.
Trying to figure out how I got this wrong, I dug out my file for that article. I interviewed seven different people who were involved with the Broadway and/or Hollywood versions and in every note I wrote where someone mentioned her, it says "Glenn Miller's daughter." It also says that in a news clipping that my researcher Xeroxed at the Academy library but that's not much of an excuse. I still should have cross-checked it.
My apologies to Ms. Miller…who is still performing, by the way, often in tributes to her late uncle. (See here and here for recent appearances.) I've made worse mistakes in my life but even the small ones nag at me.