Carole Lombard Died in Plane Crash - January 16, 1942

This week (January14-20) in Hollywood History – Marilyn Monroe married Joe Dimaggio (January 14, 1954); Hal Roach was born (January 14, 1892); Ray Bolger died (January 15, 1987); Carole Lombard died in plane crash (January 16, 1942); John Wayne married Esperanza Baur (January 17, 1946); Oliver Hardy was born (January 18, 1892); Cary Grant was born (January 18, 1904); Danny Kaye was born (January 18, 1913); Hedy Lamarr died (January 19, 2000); Audrey Hepburn died (January 20, 1993); Sharon Tate married Roman Polanski (January 20, 1968). 

Highlighted Story of the Week – 

On January 16, 1942, actress Carole Lombard and wife of Clark Gable was killed in a plane crash. Gable and Lombard met in 1932 during the filming of No Man of Her Own. He was just starting out on his trajectory as one of Hollywood’s top leading men and she was a talented comedic actress trying to prove herself in more serious roles. Both were married at the time, Gable to a wealthy Texas widow 10 years his senior and Lombard to actor William Powell and neither showed much interest in the other. When they met again, three years later, Lombard had divorced Powell and Gable was separated from his wife, and things proceeded quite differently. Much to the media’s delight, the new couple was open with their affection. In early 1939, Gable’s wife finally granted him a divorce, and he married Lombard that April. 

In January 1942, shortly after America’s entrance into World War II, Howard Dietz, the publicity director of the MGM film studio, recruited Lombard for a tour to sell war bonds in her home state of Indiana. Gable, who had been asked to serve as the head of the actors’ branch of the wartime Hollywood Victory Committee, stayed in Los Angeles, where he was set to begin filming Somewhere I’ll Find You with Lana Turner. Dietz advised Lombard to avoid airplane travel, because he feared for its reliability and safety, and she did most of the trip by train, stopping at various locations on the way to Indianapolis and raising some $2 million for the war effort. 

On the way home, however, Lombard didn’t want to wait for the train, and instead boarded a TWA DC-3 in Las Vegas with her mother, Elizabeth Peters, and a group that included MGM publicity agent Otto Winkler and 15 others. Shortly after takeoff, the plane veered off course. Warning beacons that might have helped guide the pilot had been blacked out because of fears about Japanese bombers, and the plane smashed into a cliff near the top of Potosi Mountain. Search parties were able to retrieve Lombard’s body, and she was interred in the Great Mausoleum at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California. 

Hysterical with grief and adrift in the empty house he had shared with Lombard, Gable drank heavily and struggled to complete his work on Somewhere I’ll Find You. He was comforted by worried friends, including actress Joan Crawford. That August, Gable decided to enlist in the U.S. Army Air Corp. He spent most of the war in the United Kingdom, and flew several combat missions (including one to Germany), earning several decorations for his efforts. He would remarry twice more, but when he died in 1960 Gable was interred at Forest Lawn, next to Lombard. 

Check back every Wednesday for a new installment of “This Week in Hollywood History.” 

Michael Thomas Barry is the author of six nonfiction books that includes Fade to Black Graveside Memories of Hollywood Greats, 1927-1950. Visit Michael’s website www.michaelthomasbarry.com for more information. His book can be purchased from Amazon through the following link:

 

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Clark Gable, John Ford, Buster Keaton & Hedda Hopper

Who was born on this date:

Actor Clark Gable was born on February 1, 1901 in Cadiz, Ohio. His mother Adeline died when Clark was only seven months old. The acting bug struck Gable when he was fifteen and working as an errand boy at the Akron Theater but this foray into the entertainment industry was short lived, after the death of his step mother; his father moved the family to Oklahoma, where the young Gable worked as a roustabout in the oil fields. Determined to be a star, and against his father’s wishes, Clark left Oklahoma for a job as a stage hand at a small theater in Portland, Oregon. It was there that he met his future wife, Josephine Dillon, a well known Broadway actress. She tutored Clark and brought him to Los Angeles, where they were married on December 13, 1924, the pair would divorce six years later. 

Gable had arrived in the city where he would become a legend. His big break came when veteran actor Lionel Barrymore spotted the young actor in a play and got him several bit parts in movies. Director, Darryl F. Zanuck’s first impression of the young star was brutally honest but very wrong, speaking to Gable he said, “Buddy, your ears are too big. You’ll never make it.” The famed director was being candid but wrong. In the 1931 film, The Free Soul, Gable played a gangster, who roughs up actress Norma Shearer’s character. The studio heads, including Louis B. Mayer, thought this would repulse female film goers but it did not, the film made Clark Gable a star. During his time in Hollywood, Gable was the undisputed “king of the movies,” a box office leader, forty-one of his film’s would gross over sixty-three million dollars and he was reportedly paid more than $48,000 a week on a film set.          

Gable’s film career spanned nearly four decades from 1923 to 1961, he appeared in eighty-one films some of which included; Hell Divers (1931), Strange Interlude (1932), Manhattan Melodrama (1934), Wife vs. Secretary (1936), San Francisco (1936), They Met in Bombay (1941), Across the Wide Missouri (1951), and Band of Angels (1957). He was nominated for three best acting Oscar’s, his first and only win was in 1934’s, It Happened One Night, he was nominated but lost in 1936 for Mutiny on the Bounty and 1940 playing the legendary role of Rhett Butler in Gone with the Wind.  

In 1932 on the set of the film, No Man of Her Own, Clark Gable met the love of his life, Carole Lombard. Their first meeting was uneventful, and did not leave a lasting impression. Years later in 1936, at a Hollywood party the pair were again united and hit it off. There was one hitch, they two movie stars were still married, Lombard to Robert Powell and Gable to Maria Langham. This minor detail did not stop the pair from seeing one another and a scandalous affair ensued. The two eventually got divorces from their respective spouses and married on March 29, 1939, during a break in the filming of Gone with the Wind. During his marriage to Lombard, Gable has been characterized as being at his happiest. Carole Lombard’s youthful, yet blunt personality was a good match for Gable. Tragedy struck on January 16, 1942, when Lombard was killed in plane crash, while on a war bond publicity drive. This devastated Gable, and although he would go on to make an additional twenty-seven films, he was never emotionally the same person.  

Gable died from a heart attack on the evening of November 16, 1960 at Hollywood Presbyterian Hospital in Los Angeles. He had just wrapped up filming The Misfits, co-starring Marilyn Monroe, when he was stricken by a minor heart condition. He returned home immediately and appeared to be recovering when the fatality occurred. His death is alleged to have been caused by extreme physical exertion and tension on the set of the film. At the time of his death, his fifth wife Kay was five months pregnant. On March 20, 1961, she gave birth to a boy, John Clark Gable. His private funeral was held at the Church of the Recessional at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, where numerous Hollywood notables were present; pallbearers were Jimmy Stewart, Spencer Tracy and Robert Taylor. Gable was accorded full military honors for his military service during World War II. Gables widow Kay consented to his burial beside his third wife, actress Carole Lombard in the Great Mausoleum at Forest Lawn.

Director John Ford is considered by many to be America’s greatest film director, he was born John Martin Feeney on February 1, 1894 in Cape Elizabeth, Maine. He was known as “Pappy” to his closest friends and his storied and award winning directorial film career spanned nearly five decades from 1917 to 1966 and included one hundred and forty-four motion pictures. The hardnosed director was best known for his numerous Westerns starring John Wayne, Jimmy Stewart, and Henry Fonda. He is credited with discovering John Wayne and giving him his first big break in motion pictures (Stagecoach, 1939). Wayne and Ford made numerous films together and the pair remained very close friends all their lives. Ford’s major film credits include: Young Mr. Lincoln (1939), The Battle of Midway (1942, he won a best documentary Oscar), They Were Expendable (1945), Fort Apache (1948), She Wore a Yellow Ribbon (1949), Rio Grande (1950), Mister Roberts (1955), The Searchers (1956), The Horse Soldiers (1959), The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962), and How the West was Won (1962). 

During his legendary film career Ford was nominated for five best director Academy Awards, winning four times and include: The Informer (1935, won), Stagecoach (1939, nominated), The Grapes of Wrath (1940, won), How Green is My Valley (1941, won), and The Quiet Man (1952, won). Ford died on August 31, 1973 at his home in Palm Desert, California from cancer. His funeral was held at the Blessed Sacrament Catholic Church in Hollywood and in attendance were over 1,400 mourners, counted among them were numerous members of Hollywood’s elite. He was eulogized as “the incomparable mater of his trade” by both John Wayne and Cardinal Timothy Manning. He is buried at Holy Cross Cemetery in Los Angeles.    

Who died on this date:

On February 1, 1966, actor Buster Keaton died. He was born on Piqua, Kansas. He was best known for his silent films, in which his trademark was physical comedy with a consistently stoic expression, earning him the nickname "The Great Stone Face.” Keaton made his first film appearance in The Butcher Boy (1917). Other notable film credits include The Playhouse (1921), Cops (1922), The Electric House (1922), Our Hospitality (1923), The Navigator (1924), Sherlock, Jr. (1924), Seven Chances (1925), and The General (1927). Keaton signed with MGM in 1928, a business decision that he would later call the worst of his life. He realized too late that the studio system would severely limit his creative input. He later made numerous TV appearances. Keaton died from lung cancer on February 1, 1966 in Woodland Hills, California and is buried at Forest Lawn Hollywood Hills.

On February 1, 1966, famed gossip columnist Hedda Hopper died. She was born Elda Furry on May 2, 1885 in Hollidaysburg, Pennsylvania. Hopper film career began in 1916 with The Battle of Hearts. As her movie career waned in the mid-1930s, Hopper looked for other sources of income. In 1937, she was offered the chance of a lifetime and embarked on a career doing something she was quite adept at, gossip. Her column called "Hedda Hopper's Hollywood" debuted in the Los Angeles Times on February 14, 1938. After years of struggling as an actress, she had finally found her niche. She christened the home she purchased in Beverley Hills "The House That Fear Built.” She was known for hobnobbing with the biggest names in the industry, for getting a "scoop" before almost anyone else most of the time, and for being vicious in dealing with those who displeased her, whether intentionally or not. Hopper died on February 1, 1966 from pneumonia and is buried at Rose Hill Cemetery in Altoona, Pennsylvania.

Janet Gaynor, Carole Lombard and Bette Davis

Who was born on this date:

Actress Janet Gaynor was the first winner of the Academy Award for lead actress and the youngest ever to win the award (until Marlee Matlin in 1986). She was born Laura Gainer on October 6, 1906 in Philadelphia. Gaynor had a long career in show business with over sixty film, theater, and television credits from 1924 until 1981. She was one of Hollywood’s top stars from the late 1920’s through the 1930’s. The classic virgin-heroine type on screen, her personal life mirrored her on screen persona. A devout Quaker, Gaynor lived at home with her mother until she got married. She was one of the few actresses to successfully move from silent pictures to talkies. Gaynor’s major film credits include; High Society Blues (1930), Daddy Long Legs (1931), State Fair (1933), The Farmer Takes a Wife (1935), and A Star is Born (1937).  

Gaynor won the lead actress Academy award (1927-1928) for performances in three films, Sunrise (1927), 7th Heaven (1927), and Street Angel (1928). During the first years of the Academy Awards, actors and actresses could win for multiple films. Gaynor’s award winning performances during 1927-1928, were a real challenge to box office champ, Gloria Swanson’s dominance. Gaynor was nominated for a second best actress Academy Award in 1937 in A Star is Born, but lost to Luise Rainer.                            

At the peak of her film career in 1938, Gaynor abruptly retired from films and married MGM dress designer Gilbert Adrian. Her retirement from show business lasted until 1959, when she returned to the Broadway stage in Midnight Sun. On September 5, 1982, Gaynor was seriously hurt in an automobile accident in San Francisco, which also injured fellow actress Mary Martin. Unfortunately, Gaynor never fully recovered from these injuries. Chronic illness followed the accident and on September 14, 1984, almost two years after the tragic car crash, Gaynor died from pneumonia at a Palm Springs, California area hospital. In accordance with her final wishes, there was no memorial or funeral service. Gaynor is interred at Hollywood Forever Cemetery next to her first husband, Gilbert Adrian in the Garden of Legends.

Actress Carole Lombard was born on October 6, 1908 in Fort Wayne, Indiana. She was known as the Queen of the 1930s screwball comedies. Lombard made her film debut at the age of twelve after in A Perfect Crime (1921). In the 1920s, she worked in several low-budget productions. Lombard achieved a few minor successes in the early 1930s but was continually cast in second-rate films. It was not until 1934 that her career began to take off. That year, director Howard Hawks encountered Lombard at a party and became enamored with her saucy personality, thinking her just right for his latest project. Film credits include Bolero (1934), My Man Godfrey (19336), for which she earned a best actress Academy Award nomination, Nothing Sacred (1937), Fools for a Scandal (1938), Made for Each other (1939), Vigil in the Night (1940), Mr. & Mrs. Smith (1941),  and To Be or Not to Be (1942). 

In October 1930, Lombard met William Powell. They had worked together in the films Man of the World and Ladies' Man. Unlike many of Lombard's other suitors at the time, Powell was urbane and sophisticated. He also appreciated her blunt personality and bawdy sense of humor. They married on June 26, 1931.She did not believe their sixteen-year age difference would present a problem, but friends felt they were ill-suited, as Lombard had an extroverted personality while Powell was more reserved. They divorced in 1933, but remained good friends and worked together without acrimony, notably in My Man Godfrey. In 1934, following her divorce from Powell, she carried on relationships with actors Gary Cooper and George Raft. Also during 1934, Lombard met and began a serious affair with crooner Russ Columbo. Columbo reportedly proposed marriage, but was killed in a freak shooting accident at the age of 26. To reporters, Lombard said Columbo was the love of her life.

Lombard's most famous relationship came in 1936 when she became involved with actor Clark Gable. They had worked together previously in 1932, but at the time Lombard was still happily married to Powell and knew Gable to have the reputation of a roving eye. They were indifferent to each other on the set and did not keep in touch. It was not until 1936, when Gable came to the Mayfair Ball that Lombard had planned, that their romance began to take off. Gable, however, was married at the time to oil heiress Ria Langham, and the affair was kept quiet. The situation proved a major factor in Gable accepting the role of Rhett Butler in Gone with the Wind, as MGM head Louis B. Mayer sweetened the deal for a reluctant Clark Gable by giving him enough money to settle a divorce agreement with Langham and marry Lombard. Gable divorced Langham on March 7, 1939 and proposed to Lombard in a telephone booth at the Brown Derby. On March 29, 1939, during a break in production on Gone with the Wind, Gable and Lombard drove out to Kingman, Arizona and were married in a quiet ceremony with only Gable's press agent, Otto Winkler, in attendance.

When the US entered World War II at the end of 1941, Lombard traveled to her home state of Indiana for a War bond rally with her mother, Bess Peters, and Clark Gable's press agent, Otto Winkler. After raising over $2 million in defense bonds, Lombard addressed her fans, saying: "Before I say goodbye to you all, come on and join me in a big cheer! V for Victory!" On January 16, 1942, Lombard, her mother, and Winkler boarded a a DC-3 airplane to return to California. After refueling in Las Vegas took off and 23 minutes later, crashed into "Double Up Peak" near the 8,300 ft level of Mt. Potosi, 32 statute miles southwest of Las Vegas. All 22 aboard, including 15 army servicemen, were killed instantly. Shortly after her death at the age of 33, Gable (who was inconsolable and devastated by her loss) joined the U.S. Army Air Corp. Lombard is interred at the Forest Lawn Memorial Park, Glendale. Although Gable remarried, he was interred next to her when he died in 1960.

Who died on this date: 

On October 6, 1989, actress Bette Davis died. She was known as “the First Lady of the American Screen.” Davis was born Ruth Elizabeth Davis on April 5, 1908 in Lowell, Massachusetts. An outgoing child, the young Bette Davis was destined for a career on the stage and film. She studied and excelled in acting under famed drama coach John Murray Anderson. In 1929, Davis made her successful Broadway stage debut in Broken Promises. It was in this performance that Hollywood began to take notice of the future award winning actress. In 1930, studio executives at Universal Pictures who offered her a contract and her film debut followed the next year (1931) in Bad Sister. The next few pictures that followed were less than successful for Davis and she was dropped by Universal Pictures. Fortunately, Warner Brothers gave her a second chance; she co-starred alongside Academy Award winning actor George Arliss in The Man Who Played God (1932). This began what would become a successful eighteen year association with Warner Studios. This relationship was very contentious; she often fought with studio head Jack Warner over top movie roles and even sued the studio in an attempt to break her contact. Davis’ storied film career spanned nearly six decades 1931 to 1989, and included over one hundred and twenty television and motion picture performances. Her first big smash hit came in 1934’s, Of Human Bondage, loaned out to RKO Pictures by Warner Studios; Davis cemented her place in Hollywood lore by playing the role of the sullen heroine, Mildred Rogers for which she was nominated for an Academy Award.

During her legendary film career, Davis was nominated for eleven Academy Awards and won twice, her nominated films include: Of Human Bondage (1934), Dark Victory (1939), The Letter (1940), The Little Foxes (1941), Now, Voyager (1942), Mr. Skeffington (1944), All About Eve (1950), The Star (1952) , and What Ever Happened to Baby Jane (1962). In 1935, Davis won the first of two best actress Oscars for her portrayal of Joyce Heath in Dangerous and won a second award in 1938 in Jezebel. During the late 1930’s through the mid-1940’s, Davis’ stature in the film industry grew with every film but by the end of the decade, her career began to wane and seemed headed for oblivion. A renaissance occurred when she co-starred alongside Anne Baxter in 1950’s best picture, All About Eve. Her performance in this film is considered by many to be one of the greatest of all time. During her storied film career she reigned as one of the most successful and durable stars having clawed and scratched her way to the top the film business. The award winning actress known for her toughness, huge eyes and haute acting style died on October 6, 1989 in Neuilly, France from breast cancer. Davis’ ornate crypt is found at Forest Lawn Memorial Park, Hollywood Hills outside of the Court of Remembrance. Her epitaph reads; Bette Davis, April 5, 1908 – October 6, 1989; “She did it the hard way.”