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As a little girl, Beverly Boegaholtz entertained herself with paper dolls and style shows starring her dog.

Small wonder she's now the regal retailer who's been an Indianapolis fashion icon for 45 years. Her memory book is strewn with trips to the couture capitals of the world.

Now, as senior vice president of Jacobson's, Beverly Boegaholtz Rice is in charge of fashion and merchandising strategy for the Jackson, Mich.-based corporation's 24 upscale specialty stores.

Breaking the glass-beaded ceiling has come naturally to the statuesque 5-foot-9-inch green-eyed blonde who was born in Evansville on Groundhog's Day in 1934.

When she was 2, Rice's family moved to Furnace Mill, Ind., when her grandfather died. "My dad came to shore up the farm and help my grandmother manage the place," she recalls. She has cherished pre-school memories of romping among her father's prized Guernsey cattle, horses, lambs, piglets and chickens, and fleeing the rooster who chased her around the yard.

But her idyllic childhood came crashing to an end at the beginning of World War II when her proud parents, Howard and Grace Boegaholtz, lost the family farm through no fault of their own. Using the power of eminent domain, the government seized the farm to make way for Camp Atterbury.

"He had to sacrifice the cattle — his pride and joy — at pennies on the dollar," Rice laments. "He cast around for awhile and then we moved to Edinburgh when he bought a Pure Oil filling station. Ultimately, he became president of the Johnson County Commissioners and was instrumental in building Johnson County Memorial Hospital. His life evolved. But when Camp Atterbury came, it was very traumatic."

During the turmoil, Grace Boegaholtz shielded her little daughter by giving her paper dolls. "I didn't have any brothers or sisters, so I had to amuse myself. My favorite pastime was to dress and undress my paper dolls," recalls the chic clothier.

She transformed the Boegaholtz driveway into an imaginary runway. "I would dress up Snuggles, my white Collie dog, with remnants and scraps of old curtains and valances," laughs the woman who later wrapped Indianapolis women in finery. "I would make hoods and capes for Snuggles. Then I would put him in my wagon and walk him up and down the driveway."

Rice loved school. Her knack for business exhibited itself early. "My second grade teacher, Miss Wright, set up a little grocery store to teach us our numbers. When the other kids would go out for recess, she would allow me to stay inside to set up the store and put it back into order. I would place the miniature merchandise on the shelves and tidy it up. I was a shopkeeper even then," she laughs.

She also minded the store at Edinburgh High School where she was president of her class for three out of four years, played clarinet in the band, and was a Girl Scout and Rainbow Girl. Singing mezzo-soprano, she was a soloist in the First Presbyterian Church choir. Her love of singing and performing led her to consider a career in show business. She went as far as auditioning at the Indiana University School of Music.

"I had done amateur acting and was in a choral group with six gals who sang at I.U. And I would have gone into show business if I had not had severe supervision from my mother who hissed, ‘Life upon the wicked stage.' It was tough for me to take," she says with a tinge of regret. "She didn't dictate, but she held a very strong counsel. Mother saw more for me than the stage."

With her Broadway dreams dashed, Rice immersed herself in studies at the I.U. School of Business. "I took business law, accounting, economics, statistics and everything heavy to prepare myself. Because I knew merchandising was the next best thing to show business," she laughs. One of very few women in the School of Business, Rice graduated with honors in textile merchandising in 1956.

Even as a child, she was fascinated with L.S. Ayres in Indianapolis, insisting on lunching there when the family came to the city. So although she was offered positions at Neiman Marcus, Foley's and Battlesteins in Texas, she accepted an offer from Ayres.

She had worked there as an intern before graduation. With diploma in hand, then, she joined Ayres as manager of its College Board. Right off, the store sent her to her first New York market. If she wasn't hooked before, surely she was then!

She rapidly moved up the ranks to assistant to the fashion director, then Gown Room buyer, fashion director, and divisional merchandise manager of better apparel.

In 1957, Rice was one year out of college and already a buyer for Ayres when she met the man who would become her husband. "I had just come back from lunch and was standing under the Ayres clock when this tall, young man came up and said, ‘Aren't you Beverly Boegaholtz? I'm Larry Rice from Franklin.' "

"I knew his name because he had played basketball for Franklin High School, which was Edinburgh's arch enemy. When we met under the clock, he was going to the University of Cincinnati." When she finally accepted his invitation, "he took me to a show at the Murat. I tried to be outgoing and he was just a clam. He didn't have much to say and I thought, ‘Oh, what a deadbeat.'

"And then he confessed that he was scared to death because he had never dated a girl who wore eye shadow and perfume and lived in her own apartment."

Larry courted her for five years. Though he was still in school, they were married Aug. 6, 1961, in Edinburgh's First Presbyterian Church. The newlyweds honeymooned in Europe, where they traveled in a rented Volkswagen, stayed in pensions, and adhered to Fielding's $5-a-day guidelines.

Larry became an architect and joined James Associates. "When we were married, it was very unusual for a man to have a wife who had a career and a profession such as mine. I knew that if I had children, they would occupy my entire time. And if I was going to go the route of a career in a business that I loved, then that would occupy my entire time. You can't have it all. We have many fine examples of young professional career women at Jacobson's who are balancing more balls in the air than I can imagine. And they're doing a fine job as mothers and professionals. But, in my day, I didn't see it for me," she explains about their decision not to have children.

Nevertheless, she has been a maternal mentor to many young retailers. Fashion executive and former Ayres buyer Beth Young credits Rice for her success. "She taught me how to be successful in business and still be a lady," Young says gratefully.

Rice herself is grateful for the mentoring she received from former Ayres fashion director Elizabeth Patrick. "She was absolutely like my own mother. She had no children and I filled a void. She nurtured me," Rice reminisces. "And so did Associated Merchandising Corp.'s Vi Meison and Vogue magazine's Mildred Gilbert. Mildred had a farm in Romney, Ind., and we were close to her dying day."

Two to three hundred children flock to the Rice home each Halloween to see her witch routine. "I love Halloween," admits the woman who becomes totally animated describing the mechanical bat she and Larry use to extract youngsters' screams of delight.

In 1973, Rice became the first female vice president of Ayres. The '70s also marked her favorite fashion decade. In 1971, she introduced the pantsuit to Indianapolis. "I bought an Yves Saint Laurent brown wool jersey pantsuit from the couture in Paris for $3,300. It was sold to a Crystal Room customer and then I developed one of the finest ad campaigns I've ever done. It was a fashion revolution, the only one I've ever experienced firsthand, and probably the only one I ever will," she says with sparkling eyes. "Saint Laurent was one of the many who were innovating design and going into a new way of liberated thinking about clothing that has seen us through the '80s, '90s, and into 2000. He was the threshold."

There were restaurant thresholds Beverly Rice wasn't allowed to cross when she was wearing a pantsuit. "The King Cole restaurant wouldn't seat me. Women were supposed to wear skirts. It was the beginning of the revolution and some restaurants here and in New York weren't going along with it. In time, they had to alter what they were up to. But I was gracious about being turned away. I respect people and I just felt sorry for them that they didn't know any better," says the merry soul.

She acknowledges Saint Laurent is her favorite designer; she got his autograph on his first visit to New York, when he still was designing for Christian Dior.

During her years at Ayres, Rice traveled to many countries in Europe and the Orient. She was there, in Paris, for renowned designer Balenciaga's final show, and watched Coco Chanel's last collection when the legend made her last appearance in her usual spot at the top of the mirrored staircase.

In 1983, she walked away from her favorite Tea Room lunch — Chicken Velvet Soup — and took early retirement from Ayres. That same year, she was named vice president and general manager of Gidding-Jenny. The following year, she opened its upscale specialty store in the Fashion Mall. In 1988, she joined N. Theobald as vice president and general manager. In 1997, she was hired at Jacobson's.

It was a reunion of old friends from Ayres. Jacobson's chairman and CEO is P. Gerald Mills, who at one time was president of Ayres.

He was a coat buyer at Ayres when their friendship began. "I met him 43 years ago. It's ironic that after all these years, we're working together again," she says. "We have a camaraderie. Ayres was a rarefied atmosphere when it was privately owned. If you had any kind of ability or talent, they gave you every opportunity. All you had to do was show up and try to do your best. Lyman Ayres' philosophy was that ‘the best was none too good for the customer.' "

She gives no quarter to those who consider Indiana behind the fashion times. "I've been in this racket for 45 years and there is nothing of value and consequence that Hoosiers haven't accepted with glee. They do not buy fads. They buy fashion and they buy quality and they know the difference. It's one of the most moxie audiences you'll ever want to run up against," she asserts.

An admitted clothes horse, she has closets full of quality. But like many women, she has a favorite outfit. "It's a Bill Blass that I bought 28 years ago and I've kept it. Bill has told me that I have to give it up because it's so old. But I told him that I've never furloughed a Bill Blass. I have every Bill Blass that I've ever bought. I have never given one away or given it up. And that's true of the few Saint Laurents that I have. I learned a long time ago that sometimes you have to stretch your budget to buy something that you really love. When you divide the times that you wear it, into the cost of the garment, there comes a time when the garment is paying you back.

"The most expensive things I've ever bought have been compromises. I didn't like them to start with and maybe wore them once or twice. They are expensive because they didn't pay me back. I would rather wear something old that I really love than to buy something new that I'm not in love with," she says.

What Bill Blass doesn't know is that Rice wore his long black velvet skirt and jewel-encrusted black velvet jacket again in 1997 to an Indiana Children's Wish Fund ball. It was the same night she found out that she had breast cancer, a subject she doesn't like to discuss. "My husband said, ‘We're not going.' And I said, "I'm not going to sit here and cry in my beer."

But Rice does choke back tears when she tells about her parents both dying the same year. "My mother was grounded early in her life with cancer. She was in her late 40s when she was diagnosed with breast cancer and had a double mastectomy. I was 13 years old. She survived that until she ultimately died of cancer in January 1966. My father had always had heart problems and he died in April, the same year. Suddenly, when your parents are gone, you're old. No matter what your age is. Your anchor, your little row boat, is cut off. And you're drifting. I was lucky to have Larry to hold on to."

Her sadness turns to laughter when the size-8 executive is asked how fashion designers deal with the nation's problem with obesity. "They don't pay any attention to it, but they hate it. And they can't understand why men and women will allow themselves to grow obese. … I blame it on fast food restaurants. I think our diet is the culprit," she proclaims.

In the fashion field, though, Rice is excited about the demise of minimalism. "Everything evolves. We go out of one thing and into another. It's usually about a seven-year cycle. The only thing that has defied the cycle recently is animal prints. They should have been gone years ago and now they have become a classic. I think it has to do with ecology. Look how advertisers are treating dogs. There are dogs in every advertisement," says the loving owner of Dachshund puppies Belle and Scarlet. (Larry and Bev have had three Dachshunds that lived to be 17 years old: Estee (Lauder), Adele (Simpson) and Lady Red Velvet.)

She attributes the resurgence of accessories to the "quest for individuality. A lot of clothes, unfortunately, look alike. The one thing you can do — independent of everybody else — is to sign your signature by the accessories that you wear. That is your personal statement. Accessories are among the better investments that you can make. If they are good, they will increase in value. The only thing that will wear out ultimately are shoes and boots."

Does she plan to retire with her stylish leather boots on? The 65-year-old legend says, "I've retired three times and it hasn't worked."

That's good news to her many fans and colleagues. Over the years, she's received various honors, including Northwood University's Distinguished Women's Award in 1976. (Mrs. J.C. Penney and former United States senator from Maine Margaret Chase Smith were in her "class".) Last October, Rice was the recipient of the first Distinction in Fashion Award given by the Indianapolis Chapter of Fashion Group International.

It was presented with flourishes and ruffles — which, by the way, are "in" again!