Sheila Ryan (1921 - 1975)

Ryan had brown hair, was 5 feet, 2 inches tall, and weighed 107 pounds. A 1940 newspaper story included her in a group of actresses “whose alluring curves alone might have disqualified them from screen careers not so long ago,” in the words of Travis Banton, a Hollywood stylist. Born as Katherine Elizabeth McLaughlin in Topeka, […]

Philip Dorn (1901 - 1975)

Philip Dorn (30 September 1901 – 9 May 1975), born Hein van der Niet and sometimes billed as Frits van Dongen, was a Dutch actor who had a career in Hollywood. Dorn was born in Scheveningen, The Hague, South Holland and made his stage debut at age 14 in Dutch productions. By the 1930s, he was […]

Moms Mabley (1894 - 1975)

Loretta Mary Aiken was born in Brevard, North Carolina on March 19, 1894 to James Aiken and Mary Smith, who married on May 21, 1891, in Transylvania County, North Carolina  Moms Mabley was one of a family of 16 children. Her father owned and operated several businesses, while her mother kept house and took in […]

Evelyn Brent (1901 - 1975)

Born Mary Elizabeth Riggs in Tampa and known as Betty, she was a child of 10 when her mother Eleanor died, leaving her father Arthur to raise her alone. After moving to New York City as a teenager, her good looks brought modeling jobs that led to an opportunity to become involved in the still […]

George Stevens (1904 - 1975)

George Stevens was born in Oakland, California, and his family included his father Landers Stevens and his mother Georgie Cooper, both stage actors. His uncle was drama critic Ashton Stevens. He also had two brothers, Jack and writer Aston Stevens. He learned about the stage from his parents and worked and toured with them on […]

Mary Ure (1933 - 1975)

Born in Glasgow, Mary Ure was the daughter of civil engineer Colin McGregor Ure and Edith Swinburne. She went to the independent Mount School in York, and trained for the stage at the Central School of Speech and Drama in London. Known for her beauty, Ure began performing on the London stage and quickly developed […]

Roy Roberts (1906 - 1975)

Born Roy Barnes Jones in Dade City in Pasco County, near Tampa, Florida, Roy Roberts began his acting career on the stage, first appearing on Broadway in May 1931 before making his motion picture debut in Gold Bricks, a 1936 two-reel comedy short released by 20th Century-Fox. He appeared in numerous films in secondary parts […]

John McGiver (1913 - 1975)

McGiver was born in New York City, the son of Irish immigrants. He graduated from the Jesuit-run Regis High School in Manhattan in 1932. He received a B.A. in English from Fordham University in 1938 and master’s degrees from Columbia University and Catholic University. He became an English teacher and worked as an actor and […]

Robert Strauss (1913 - 1975)

Robert Strauss began his career as a classical actor, appearing in The Tempest and Macbeth on Broadway in 1930. Comedy became his speciality, and he was known best as Stalag 17’s Stanislas “Animal” Kuzawa, a role he created in the original 1951 Broadway production and reprised in the 1953 film adaptation, for which he was […]

Richard Conte (1910 - 1975)

Richard Conte was born Nicholas Peter Conte on March 24, 1910, in Jersey City, New Jersey, the son of Italian-Americans Julia (Fina), a seamstress, and Pasquale Conte, a barber. He graduated from William L. Dickinson High School in Jersey City. Conte worked as a truck driver, messenger, shoe salesman and a singing waiter before starting his […]

William Hartnell (1908 - 1975)

William Hartnell was born in St Pancras, London, England, the only child of Lucy Hartnell, an unmarried mother. He was brought up partly by a foster mother, and also spent many holidays in Devon with his mother’s family of farmers, where he learned to ride. He was the second cousin of fashion designer Norman Hartnell. Hartnell […]

John Gregson (1919 - 1975)

Gregson was born of Irish descent, and grew up in Wavertree, Liverpool, Lancashire, where he was educated at Greenbank Road Primary School and later at St. Francis Xavier’s College. He left school at 16, working first for a telephone company, then for Liverpool Corporation, as the city council was then known, before the Second World […]

Richard Wattis (1912 - 1975)

Richard Wattis was born in Wednesbury, Staffordshire. He attended King Edward’s School and Bromsgrove School, after which he worked for the electrical engineering firm William Sanders & Co (Wednesbury) Ltd. His uncle, William Preston (1874–1941), was the managing director and was the Conservative MP for Walsall from 1924 to 1929. After leaving the family business, Wattis […]

Ben Blue (1901 - 1975)

Born to a Jewish family in Montreal, Quebec, Blue emigrated to Baltimore, Maryland at the age of nine, where he won a contest for the best impersonation of Charlie Chaplin. At the age of fifteen he was in a touring company and later became a stage manager and assistant general manager. He became a dance […]

Pamela Brown (1917 - 1975)

Pamela Mary Brown (8 July 1917 – 19 September 1975) was an English stage and film actress. She was born in Hampstead, London to George Edward Brown, a journalist, and his wife, Helen Blanche (née Ellerton). Brought up in the Roman Catholic faith, she attended St Mary’s School, Ascot. After attending the Royal Academy of Dramatic […]

Kay Johnson (1904 - 1975)

Catherine Townsend Johnson was born in Mount Vernon, New York in 1904. Her father was architect Thomas R. Johnson, who worked in the firm of Cass Gilbert, the architect of several noteworthy buildings in New York City, including the Woolworth Building, the New York Customs House, and many library buildings. Kay, as she was known, […]

Rupert Davies (1916 - 1976)

Rupert Davies was born in Liverpool. After service in the British Merchant Navy he was a Sub-Lieutenant Observer with the Fleet Air Arm during the Second World War. In 1940, the Swordfish aircraft in which he was flying ditched in the sea off the Dutch coast, following which Davies was captured and interned in the […]

Ray Corrigan (1902 - 1976)

Ray Corrigan’s career in Hollywood began as a physical fitness instructor and physical culture trainer to the stars. In the early 1930s he did stunts and bit parts in several films. Many of his early roles were in ape costumes, for example, as a gorilla in Tarzan and His Mate (1934) and an “orangopoid” in […]

Warner Anderson (1911 - 1976)

Warner Anderson (March 10, 1911 – August 26, 1976) was an American actor. Anderson was born to “a theatrical family” in Brooklyn, New York, March 10, 1911. Anderson had a small part in a film in 1915. A contemporary newspaper article about the movie Sunbeam, in which Anderson appeared in 1917, noted, “Warner Anderson is one of […]

Victor Francen (1888 - 1977)

Victor Francen (5 August 1888 – 18 November 1977), born Victor Franssens, was a Belgian-born actor with a long career in French cinema and in Hollywood. Victor Francen was born in Tienen, the son of a chief of police. He worked in trade in Belgium before settling in Paris where he trained in dramatic art under […]

Andy Devine (1905 - 1977)

Born in Flagstaff, Arizona, on October 7, 1905, Andy Devine grew up in Kingman, where his family moved when he was a year old. His father was Thomas Devine Jr., born in 1869 in Kalamazoo County, Michigan. Andy’s grandfather, Thomas Devine Sr., was born in 1842 in County Tipperary, Ireland, and emigrated to the United […]

Billy Halop (1920 - 1976)

Billy Halop came from a theatrical family; his mother was a dancer and his sister, Florence Halop, was an actress who worked on radio and in television. In 1933, he was given the lead, Bobby Benson, in the popular new radio show “The H-Bar-O Rangers,” an early credit of Don Knotts as well. From 1934 to […]

Frankie Darro (1917 - 1976)

Frankie Darro was born on December 22, 1917 in Chicago, Illinois as Frank Johnson, Jr. His parents, Frank Johnson, Sr. and his wife Ada were known as The Flying Johnsons, a flying circus act with the Sells Floto Circus; it was a profession that his father attempted to train him in, and he cured Frankie’s […]

Cathy Downs (1924 - 1976)

Cathy Downs was born in Port Jefferson, New York. She was the daughter of James Nelson Downs and Edna Elizabeth Newman. A former Vogue cover model, she was brought to Hollywood in 1944 by a 20th Century-Fox talent scout. Downs began her film career with a small roles in State Fair (1945) and The Dolly Sisters […]

Roger Livesey (1906 - 1976)

Livesey was born in Barry, Wales. Although most articles about him indicated that his parents were Samuel Livesey and Mary Catherine (née Edwards), later research has shown that his father was actually Joseph Livesey. The confusion may have arisen because his mother Mary married Samuel (Joseph’s brother) after Joseph’s death and the death of Samuel’s […]

Linda Watkins (1908 - 1976)

At the age of sixteen Linda Watkins’ parents sent her to study at the Theatre Guild. After six months she began to appear with the guild’s summer repertory program in Scarborough, New York. Instead of finishing her studies at the guild, she pursued a job at the office of Charles Hopkins. When he asked Watkins […]

Margaret Leighton (1922 - 1976)

Born in Barnt Green, Worcestershire, Margaret Leighton made her stage debut as Dorothy in Laugh With Me (1938), which was also performed that year for BBC Television. She became a star of the Old Vic. Her Broadway debut was as the Queen in Henry IV (1946) starring Laurence Olivier and Ralph Richardson during a visit […]

Larry Thor (1916 - 1976)

A native of Lundar, Manitoba, Canada, Larry Thor was a soldier, a construction worker, a farmer, and a rancher before he went into broadcasting. His first experience in radio came in 1937 as an unpaid singer at CFAR in Flin Flon, Manitoba, Canada. He soon became the writer for CFAR, a job he held for […]

Mary Nash (1884 - 1976)

Mary and her younger sister, writer/actress Florence, were born to James H. Ryan, a lawyer, and his wife, Ellen Frances (née McNamara). The sisters adopted the surname of their stepfather, Philip F. Nash, a vaudeville booking executive, who married their mother after the death of their father. Fortuitously the name change would avoid conflict with […]

Sybil Thorndike (1882 - 1976)

Sybil Thorndike was born in Gainsborough, Lincolnshire, to Arthur Thorndike and Agnes Macdonald. Her father was a Canon of Rochester Cathedral. She was educated at Rochester Grammar School for Girls, and first trained as a classical pianist, making weekly visits to London for music lessons at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. Her childhood home […]