Tag: Our Miss Brooks
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RIP GLORIA MCMILLAN
1933-2022 Gloria McMillan is probably best known to the world as Harriet Conklin on the radio and television sitcom “Our Miss Brooks” (starring Eve Arden). She also played the role in a 1956 big screen version of the show from Warner Brothers. She began playing the role in 1948 on radio. The character was daughter…
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GALE on LUCY: REAL PRO
July 28, 1966 By GALE GORDON (For Cynthia Lowry) EDITOR’S NOTE – Gale Gordon is a familiar television face – usually apoplectic – that goes back to the old “Our Miss Brooks” and “Dennis the Menace” days. (1) Here he writes, with vast affection, of the joys of playing straight man for Lucille Ball. HOLLYWOOD…
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LUCY PLEASES PUBLIC
June 30, 1952 Incredibly, this newspaper has misspelled the author’s name. Louella (not Luella) Parsons wrote about Hollywood from 1914 to 1965. At her peak, her columns were read by 20 million people in 700 newspapers worldwide. Louella (or Lolly, as she was sometimes called) was mentioned on “I Love Lucy” and “The Lucy Show,” usually in…
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EVE ARDEN
April 30, 1908 Eunice Mary Quedens (aka Eve Arden) was born in Mill Valley, California, near San Francisco. She was interested in show business from an early age. At 16, she made her stage debut after quitting school to joined a stock company. She made her screen debut (using her given name) in Columbia’s Song…
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FLORENCE BATES
April 15, 1888 Florence Bates (nee Florence Rabe) was born in San Antonio, Texas. After earning her degree in mathematics, Florence went to law school and became the first woman attorney in the history of the state of Texas. She traveled abroad extensively and was fluent in many languages. After the crash of 1929, she moved…
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WILL WRIGHT
March 26, 1891 William Henry Wright was born in San Francisco, California. He was one of those familiar character actors who seems to have been born old. He specialized in playing crusty old codgers, rich skinflints, crooked small-town politicians, and the like. Wright worked as a newspaperman before beginning a career in show business. He started…
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PAULA WINSLOWE
March 23, 1910 Paula Winslowe was born Winifred Margaret Reyleche in Grafton, North Dakota. She was sometimes billed as Paula Winslow. On radio, she played Peg Riley on “The Life of Riley” from 1944 to 1951. On television, the role was played by Rosemary DeCamp (1948), and then Marjorie Reynolds (1953). Her first experience in Hollywood was…
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MAURICE MARSAC
March 23, 1915 Maurice Marsac was born on March 23, 1915 in Croix, Nord, France. He made his screen debut (appropriately) as a French policeman in Paris After Dark (1945), a film that employed many French World War II immigrants. He also appeared in two 1952 Paris-set films: Assignment: Paris and April in Paris. Later…
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KATHLEEN FREEMAN
February 17, 1919 Kathleen Freeman was born in Chicago. She began her career as a child, dancing in her parents’ vaudeville act. After studying music at UCLA she went into acting full-time, working on the stage, and finally entering films in 1948. In a career that spanned more than 50 years, she portrayed acerbic maids, secretaries, teachers,…
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JOSEPH KEARNS
February 12, 1907 Joseph Sherrard Kearns was born in Salt Lake City, Utah, but his family moved to California when he was very young. His mother was a concert pianist, from whom Kearns derived his love of music. He and his family were devout Mormons, whose ancestors were Mormon pioneers. In 1916 he joined The…