On April 8, 1941, an actor named Earle Graser was killed in an automobile accident. A tragic event to be sure, but what compounded this tragedy was that Graser had a devoted fan following as the ...
Happy Birthday, Irene Dunne!(Post)Irene Dunne is acknowledged by many classic movie fans to be the greatest actress who never won an Academy Award. It wasn’t for a lack of trying: she was nominated five times—for Cimarron (1931), ...
Happy Birthday, Walter O’Keefe!(Post)If the man born Walter Michael O’Keefe in Hartford, Connecticut on this date in 1900 had pursued his ambition to join the priesthood…well, the Church’s gain would surely have been our loss. We wou ...
Happy Birthday, Tommy Cook!(Post)One night in 1941, child actor Tommy Cook was determined to see the Republic cliffhanger serial Jungle Girl. You see, he had a part in that motion picture as a native boy, Kimbu, so he stealthily ...
Happy Birthday, Mary Lansing!(Post)“The Big Easy” (New Orleans, Louisiana) welcomed actress Mary Lansing on this date in 1911. From 1933 until 1970, Lansing was the wife of fellow thespian Frank Nelson, whom she met while the two o ...
Review: Boston Blackie and the Law (1946)(Post)Previously on the Radio Spirits blog, I discussed Alias Boston Blackie (1942), the third entry in the popular Columbia Pictures movie franchise—it’s a holiday-themed picture, with the events takin ...
Happy Birthday, Bennett Kilpack!(Post)During his long-running stint as the titular sleuth on Mr. Keen, Tracer of Lost Persons, actor Bennett Kilpack—born William Bennett Kilpack on this date in 1883 in Long Melford, Suffolk in the Uni ...
The Robin Hood of Modern Crime(Post)His creator described him as “a buccaneer in the suits of Savile Row, amused, cool, debonair, with hell-for-leather blue eyes and a saintly smile.” That creator was author Leslie Charteris, and t ...
Happy Birthday, Tom Collins!(Post)When actor Walter Paterson committed suicide in 1942, One Man’s Family creator Carlton E. Morse made the decision to eliminate Patterson’s character of “Nicholas Lacey” (the husband of Claudia Ba ...
Happy Birthday, Anton M. Leader!(Post)Although he was born Anton Morris Leader in Boston, Massachusetts on this date in 1913, Mr. Leader was always informally known as “Tony” to his friends and colleagues. This occasionally results in ...
Happy Birthday, Ray Bolger!(Post)Of the artist born Raymond Wallace Bolger on this date in 1904 in Dorchester, Massachusetts, authors Ephraim Katz and Ronald Dean Nolen note in The Film Encyclopedia: “Bolger’s acting, dancing, and ...
“The secret word is anniversary…”(Post)On this date in 1947, the program that finally found a way to make good use of the one-of-a-kind comic talent of Julius “Groucho” Marx premiered: You Bet Your Life. A “quiz show” that really serv ...