Jane Hathaway

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Jane Hathaway is a fictional character in the 1960's television comedy, The Beverly Hillbillies, as well as its 1993 movie remake. In the television show, she was played by actress Nancy Kulp and in the movie, she was played by actress Lily Tomlin.

[edit] Drysdale's conscience

Jane is the highly efficient and very able assistant/executive secretary to Milburn Drysdale, the pompous and sometimes greedy president of the Commerce Bank of Beverly Hills. She is quite helpful to Drysdale's biggest clients, the Clampett family, in getting to know about the mysteries (to them at least) of city living.

In fact, Jane was a very knowledgable woman who had the Clampett family's best interests in mind. She had a wonderful relationship with Jed Clampett and was always very patient and helpful to him.

At first, she mistook the Clampetts for their servants, but once the situation was straightened out, and she realized who they really were, (nearly losing her job in the process) she became quite friendly to them.

Jane lives alone in an efficiency apartment near the beach, and is an avid bird watcher (a bow to Nancy Kulp's first character that of pith helmeted bird-watcher Pamela Livingston on The Bob Cummings Show). She is also hinted at as being a vegetarian due to her drinking of various vegetable juices as nightcaps before she goes to bed.

She is affectionately called "Miss Jane" by the Clampett family, and she is well respected by them and is considered family, even by Granny, who is the most indignant of the Clampetts when it comes to city living.

She has an unrequited crush on Jethro Bodine, and yet she always perseveres that she will land him.

In truth, Jane is always poised and polished, and drives a red convertible, which is extremely helpful, as Drysdale is always using her to either mollify the Clampetts whenever they are upset about something, or doing her best to extricate them from another of Drysdale's schemes which had gone awry.

Working for someone who is very greedy and quite conniving can sometimes get on Jane's nerves, and whenever her boss goes too far (as he often does) she yells, "CHIEF!!!", in exasperation.

Also highly exasperating to her is his penchant for using her for the most mundane tasks, such as housecleaning; babysitting or dressing in really goofy outfits among other things; and/or possibly using her as a potential fall guy when one of his schemes goes dangerously awry or could be considered criminal in nature. He even had, at one time, had Jane put in a straitjacket when she almost stopped one of his most conniving schemes.

Sometimes, her annoyance with Milburn can be quite noticeable and vocal, as noted when she dealt with his namesake nephew, Milby. She thought very little of him, seeing him as nothing more than an avaricious, grasping, greedy, conniving little moneygrubber; basically as a younger version of his uncle.

While other kids played, she pointedly told her boss in one episode, he was opening a pawn shop when he was six; and getting expelled from three military schools in one year for usury. She was pleased however, when Milburn punished Milby for almost fleecing the Clampetts out of over $200,000 of antiques in their house, by taking his money belt.

During the show's final year on the air, she and her boss were in total conflict. During this time, she really lost her patience with him, and finally resigned from her job. Marshalling the bank's secretarial pool, she created GRUN (Girls Resist Unfair Neglect), getting bitten by the Women's Liberation movement. She even gained allies in Granny, even though she wasn't sure what women's Lib meant or what it was all about; and Elly May, whom she always got on with. Eventually, though, she regained her job.

However, despite all the sparring, she is usually the conscience of her boss, and in essence, a needed support for Drysdale although he has made many attempts to get rid of her, so he could connive with impunity. These attempts often met with failure, as he realized that he really can't afford to be without her.