part nine page two
Born Kermit Maynard on 20 September 1897 in Vevay, Indiana, USA, The brother of western star Ken Maynard, Kermit Maynard was a star halfback on the Indiana University college team. He began his career as a circus performer, billed as "The World's Champion Trick and Fancy Rider." He entered films in 1926 as a stunt man (using the stage name Tex Maynard), often doubling for his brother Ken. In 1927, Kermit starred in a series for Rayart Films, the ancestor of Monogram Pictures, then descended into minor roles upon the advent of talking pictures, taking rodeo jobs when things were slow in Hollywood. Independent producer Maurice Conn tried to build Kermit into a talkie western star between 1931 and 1933, and in 1934 launched a B-series based on the works of James Oliver Curwood, in which the six-foot Maynard played a Canadian mountie. The series was popular with fans and exhibitors alike, but Conn decided to switch back to straight westerns in 1935, robbing Maynard of his attention-getting gimmick. Kermit drifted back into supporting roles and bits, though unlike his bibulous, self-indulgent brother Ken, Kermit retained his muscular physique and square-jawed good looks throughout his career. After his retirement from acting in 1962, Kermit Maynard remained an active representative of the Screen Actors Guild, lobbying for better treatment and safer working conditions for stuntpersons and extras. Kermit appeared in four movies with John Wayne, Kermit passed away on 16 January 1971 in North Hollywood, California, USA.
Born Eleanor Luicime Compson on 19 March 1897, Beaver, Utah, USA, The prolific silent screen actress and educated in the public schools of Salt Lake City. Her mother got her started playing the violin when she was just a child, and by her early teen years she was so expert at the instrument that she was asked to play in vaudeville sketches with various touring circuits, where her youth and beauty charmed audiences and got her noticed by Hollywood producers. In 1914 Betty accepted an offer from producer Al Christie to act in Universal comedies. Betty excelled at the more gentle type of slapstick humour, displayed in films like "Paths To Paradise" 1925 with Raymond Griffith, and she also managed to perform well in successful dramas such as "The Miracle Man" 1919, "The Little Minister" 1921 and "The Docks of New York" 1928. She made the transition to sound quite smoothly and impressed audiences with her acting abilities in films like "The Great Gabbo" and "Street Girl" (both 1929), the latter including a great scene showing Betty playing her own violin. Betty married three times, once to director James Cruze, and her last marriage to Jack Gall until his death in 1962. She had no children. One of her movies was called God's Country and the Man 1937 were archive footage was used showing John Wayne in a long shot, Betty passed away on 18 April 1974 in Glendale, California, USA.
Born Alphonse Ethier on 10 December 1874, Virginia City, Nevada, USA, Inaugurating his film career around 1918, actor Alphonse Ethier sometimes spelled his first name "Alphonz." In the late 1920s, Ethier became a favorite of young director Frank Capra, who displayed the actor to good advantage in several of his Columbia silent productions, as well as the early-talkie The Donovan Affair 1929. After essaying such sizeable roles as the Marshal in Raoul Walsh's The Big Trail, Ethier settled into minor parts, usually as executives and government officials. Alphonse Ethier retired in 1938. Alphonse appeared in two movies with John Wayne, Picture from The Big Trail 1930, Alphonse passed away on 4 January 1943 in Hollywood, California, USA.
Born Erville Alderson on 11 September 1882, Kansas City, Missouri, USA, A character actor whose film career spanned from Hollywood's Silent Era until the 1950s. Born in Kansas City, Missouri, on September 11, 1882, Erville would start his film career in 1918 at the age of 36 in Her Man 1918. Film pioneer D.W. Griffith utilized Erville in many of his films, including 1924's America 1924 and Isn't Life Wonderful 1924. In 1926, Erville was in Sally of the Sawdust 1925, and for the first time, worked behind as well as in front of the camera, as the movie's Assistant Director. By the time talkies became the norm, Erville found his age and white hair earned him many "old codger" roles as everything from a sheriff to a blank clerk, although a lot of his roles fell into the the "uncredited" bit category. Despite this, he did manage to make his mark in several credited roles, with one of the best being his portrayal of Nate Tompkins in 1941's Sergeant York 1941. His last film role would be uncredited in 1957's The Spirit of St. Louis 1957. Erville appeared in four movies with John Wayne, Picture from Haunted Gold 1932, Erville passed away on 11 September 1882 in Kansas City, Missouri, USA.
Born Espera Oscar DeCorti on 3 April 1907 in Gueydan, Louisiana, USA, While maintaining his whole life that he was part Cree and part Cherokee, actor Iron Eyes Cody was in fact born Espera DeCorti, a second generation Italian-American. He started out as a Wild-West-show performer, like his father before him. His earliest recognizable film appearances date back to 1919's Back to God's Country. While his choice of film roles was rather limited in the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s, Cody made himself a valuable Hollywood commodity by offering his services as a technical advisor on Indian lore, customs, costuming and sign language. In between his TV work and personal appearances with the Ringling Bros. Circus and other such touring concerns, Iron Eyes continued accepting supporting roles in Hollywood westerns of the 1950s; he played Chief Crazy Horse twice, in Sitting Bull 1954 and The Great Sioux Massacre 1965. He appeared in two movies with John, The Big Trail 1930 & The Big Stampede 1932, Iron Eyes passed away on January 4, 1999 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
Born Edward L. Hall on 3 February 1912 in Chicago, Illinois, USA, A handsome bit player in films of the 1940s, Eddie Hall enjoyed a rare second lead in Shadows of Death, a 1945 Buster Crabbe Western from PRC which also featured Hall's father-in-law at the time, perennial B-Western "baddie" Charles King. Eddy appeared in three movies with John Wayne, Eddy passed away on 19 February 1963 in Granada Hills, California, USA.
Born Albert J. Drezden on 17 July 1900 in Chicago, Illinois, USA, Portly Curley Dresden usually played henchmen in B-Westerns and is recognizable in scores of low-budget oaters by his black mustache and nasty demeanor. Onscreen from the silent era through 1945, Dresden later worked as a delivery man for a Spokane, WA, newspaper. Curley appeared in nine movies with John Wayne, Picture from Santa Fe Stampede 1938, Curley passed away on 7 June 1953 in The Norland Hotel, Spokane, Washington, USA.
Born Lennie B. Osborne on 20 July 1884, Knox County, Texas, USA, Bud Osborne's almost 50-year career in films began - as far as is known - in 1912 with, naturally, a western. Originally from Texas, Osborne worked for "Wild West" shows where he was noted for his astonishing prowess in handling six-horse stagecoaches, a talent that carried over into films. He began as a stuntman but the fact that he not only was a cowboy but actually looked like one meant that he was soon playing cowboys in front of the camera, in addition to his stunting and horse-handling chores. His stocky, somewhat rugged appearance and Texas accent carried him easily through the transition to talkies, and he soon became one of the busiest supporting players in westerns of the 1930s and 1940s (altogether he appeared in more than 550 films, in addition to much television work, almost all of it in westerns). Age began catching up with him in the 1950s, and he wound out his career appearing in several of director Edward D. Wood Jr.'s no-budget horror and sci-fi extravaganzas. Bud appeared in eighteen movies with John Wayne, Picture from Santa Fe Stampede 1938, Bud passed away on 2 February 1964, Hollywood, California, USA.
Born Marceline Newlin on 24 April 1908 in Colorado Springs, Colorado, USA, The younger sister of actress Alice Day, Marceline Day achieved stardom in the mid-'20s, appearing opposite such stars as John Barrymore and Lon Chaney. Adept at comedy, she also starred with such top comics as Buster Keaton and Harry Langdon. Her career faltered in the early '30s, however, and she was soon reduced to appearing in low-budget thrillers and action pictures. She retired in the mid-'30s. Marceline only appeared in one John Wayne movie, Picture from The Telegraph Trail 1933, Marceline passed away on 16 February 2000 in Cathedral City, California, USA.
Born Virgil James Montani in 1880, Genoa, Italy, A former boxer from Italy and the second husband of notorious socialite/actress Evelyn Nesbit, Jack Clifford appeared opposite his wife in Threads of Destiny 1914. Much busier in the talkie era, Clifford played innumerable bit roles from 1931 to 1949, including the nasty dogcatcher in Jackie Cooper's Skippy 1931, Uncle Tom in Shirley Temple's Dimples 1936, and assorted lawmen in B-Westerns. Clifford's final role was that of a henchman in several episodes of television's The Lone Ranger series. Jack appeared in two movies with John Wayne, Picture from King Of The Pecos 1936, Jack passed away on 10 November 1956, New York, New York, USA.
Born Horace B. Carpenter on 31 January 1875 in Grand Rapids, Michigan, USA, A veteran of Selig two-reelers in the early 1910s, burly American character actor Horace B. Carpenter came to the forefront after joining the Lasky Feature Play Company (later Paramount) in 1914. For pioneering director Cecil B. DeMille, Carpenter played Spanish Ed in The Virginian (1914) and Jacques D'Arc in Joan the Woman (1916), both still extant, before striking out on his own, directing and acting in some of the cheapest Westerns and action melodramas ever produced. Returning to acting exclusively after the changeover to sound, Carpenter continued to play his stock-in-trade, kindly fathers and ranchers in scores of B-Westerns. Thus, it came as an unpleasant surprise when the veteran actor, out of sheer poverty one imagines, accepted to play Dr. Meinschultz, devouring a cat's eye in the 1934 exploitation thriller Maniac. Carpenter survived this indiscretion with his career somewhat intact and continued to play scores of supporting roles and bit parts. Horace appeared in thirteen movies with John Wayne, Picture from Three Faces West 1940, Horace passed away on 21 May 1945, Hollywood, California, USA.
Born Trevor Bardette on 19 November 1902, Nashville, Arkansas, USA, American actor Trevor Bardette could truly say that he died for a living. In the course of a film career spanning three decades, the mustachioed, granite-featured Bardette was "killed off" over 40 times as a screen villain. Entering movies in 1936 after abandoning a planned mechanical engineering career for the Broadway stage, Bardette was most often seen as a rustler, gangster, wartime collaborator and murderous backwoodsman. His screen skullduggery carried over into TV; one of Bardette's best remembered video performances was as a "human bomb" on an early episode of Superman. Perhaps being something of a reprobate came naturally to Trevor Bardette — or so he himself would claim in later years when relating a story of how, as a child, he'd won ten dollars writing an essay on "the evils of tobacco," only to be caught smoking behind the barn shortly afterward. Trevor appeared in three movies with John Wayne, Picture from Three Faces West 1940, Trevor passed away on 28 November 1977, Los Angeles, California, USA.
Born Ferris Taylor on 25 March 1888, Texas, USA, In films from 1933, American character actor Ferris Taylor excelled in "official" roles. Taylor played the Mayor in a couple of Paramount's Henry Aldrich films, and elsewhere was cast as governors, senators, and at least one president. His bombastic characterizations were enhanced by the patently phony toupee he wore on occasion. Ferris Taylor spent his last few film years in short subjects, overacting to his heart's content, opposite the likes of Andy Clyde and the Three Stooges. Ferris appeared in three movies with John Wayne, Picture from Santa Fe Stampede 1938, Ferris passed away on 7 March 1961, Hollywood, California, USA.
Born Dick Rush in 1884 in Austria, Portly, raspy-voiced American character actor Dick Rush was in films from 1920 until the early '40s. Rush was generally a comedy foil, most memorably for Harold Lloyd. Little Rascals devotees will remember Rush as the side-show impresario in Arbor Day (1936), who shows up at the end of the picture to whisk midget George and Olive Brasno away from their forced participation in a grade-school assembly show. Otherwise, he played a variety of cops, guards, mob leaders, and train conductors. Dick Rush spent his last active years as a featured player at RKO Radio. Dick appeared in three movies with John Wayne, Picture from Santa Fe Stampede 1938. Death unknown.
Born Guy Edward Hearn on 6 September 1888 in Dayton, Washington, USA, Actor Edward Hearn's Hollywood career extended from 1916 to 1951. A leading man in the silent era, Hearn was seen in such roles as Philip Nolan, the title character in Man without a Country (1925). His first talkie effort was Frank Capra's The Donovan Affair (1929). Capra never forgot Hearn, securing minor roles for the actor when his star faded in the early 1930s. Edward Hearn spent his last two decades in films playing dozens of cops, jurors, and military officers, essaying bits in features and supporting roles in serials and short subjects. Edward appeared in five movies with John Wayne, Picture from King Of The Pecos 1936, Edward passed away on 15 April 1963 in Los Angeles County, California, USA.
Born Mary MacDonald on 19 January 1896 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA, The sister of silent screen star Katherine MacDonald and a former photographer's model, blonde Mary MacLaren had danced in the Broadway revue The Passing Show of 1914 before making her screen debut in 1916. A favourite of pioneering woman director Lois Weber, MacLaren starred as the poor working girl in Shoes 1916 and was Marie Walcamp's maid in the anti-abortion drama Where Are My Children 1916. For another early woman director, Ida May Park, MacLaren played an actress betrayed by a Broadway wolf and reduced to living in squalor in the evocative Bread 1918 and she was a regal Anne of Austria in Fairbanks' The Three Musketeers 1921. Like most of her contemporaries, MacLaren's career waned in the 1920s and she was reduced to minor roles after the changeover to sound. After playing scores of maids, nurses and dowagers, MacLaren left films around 1948 to travel with her husband, a British military officer. Sadly, when she resurfaced in the 1970s, a newspaper reporter discovered her living in abject poverty in her once palatial Hollywood home. MacLaren's tragic story was widely reported and in her final years she became a popular guest at various silent screen revivals. Mary appeared in three movies with John Wayne, Picture from Westward Ho! 1935, Mary passed away on 9 November 1985 in Hollywood, California, USA.