Taylor Holmes (1878 - 1959)

Taylor Holmes was born on May 16, 1878, in Newark, New Jersey. Holmes began his stage career in vaudeville and made his first professional appearance at Keith’s Theatre in Boston in 1899. In 1900, Holmes appeared George Bernard Shaw’s Candida in Chicago, the first production in the United States. Noted British theater critic William Archer saw […]

Harry Horner (1910 - 1994)

Harry Horner was born in the town of Holitz (presently called Holice), which now belongs to Czech republic, to German-speaking Jewish parents[citation needed] in Bohemia. He began his career working with Max Reinhardt in Vienna. When Reinhardt moved to the United States in the early 1930s, Horner travelled with Max Reinhardt’s production group acting as his […]

Douglas Fowley (1911 - 1998)

Douglas Fowley was born Daniel Vincent Fowley in The Bronx in New York City. He appeared in more than 240 films and later in dozens of television programs. He began acting while attending St. Francis Xavier Military Academy. Fowley began as a singing waiter and then worked as a copy boy for The New York Times, […]

Anthony Brooklier (1913 - 2016)

Anthony Brooklier Anthony Brooklier, a prominent Los Angeles attorney who went from defending his father, a powerful mob boss, to representing celebrities, corrupt businessmen, drug kingpins and the Hollywood Madam Heidi Fleiss, died Tuesday. He was 70. Anthony Brooklier died of suicide at his Century City residence, according to the Los Angeles County coroner’s office. His death stunned […]

Joe Esposito (1938 - 2016)

Joe Esposito Joe Esposito (born January 22, 1938-November 23,2016) was a veteran author and publisher, who along with his long-time business partner Daniel Lombardy, have several best selling books to their credit. Joe Esposito is best known for his association with Elvis Presley. He first met Presley while serving in the military in 1958. They […]

Fidel Castro (1926 - 2016)

Fidel Castro Fidel Castro, the fiery apostle of revolution who brought the Cold War to the Western Hemisphere in 1959 and then defied the United States for nearly half a century as Cuba’s maximum leader, bedeviling 11 American presidents and briefly pushing the world to the brink of nuclear war, died on Friday. He was […]

Regis Toomey (1898 - 1991)

Born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Regis Toomey was one of four children of Francis X. and Mary Ellen Toomey, and attended Peabody High School. He initially pondered a law career, but acting won out and he established himself as a musical stage performer. Educated in dramatics at the University of Pittsburgh, where he became a brother […]

Dick Purcell (1908 - 1944)

Dick Purcell was born Richard Gerald Purcell, Jr. in Greenwich, Connecticut. An only child, he attended Catholic grade school and high school, before enrolling as a student at Fordham University in The Bronx in New York City. While in New York City, Dick Purcell began his acting career in theatre, appearing in at least three […]

Minta Dufree (1889 - 1975)

Minta Dufree met Roscoe Arbuckle when he was attempting to get started in theater, and the two married in August 1908. Durfee entered show business in local companies as a chorus girl at the age of seventeen. She was the first leading lady of Charlie Chaplin. Durfee and Arbuckle separated in 1921, just prior to […]

Roscoe Arbuckle (1887 - 1933)

Roscoe Conkling “Fatty” Arbuckle (March 24, 1887 – June 29, 1933) was an American silent film actor, comedian, director, and screenwriter. Starting at the Selig Polyscope Company he eventually moved to Keystone Studios, where he worked with Mabel Normand and Harold Lloyd. He mentored Charlie Chaplin and discovered Buster Keaton and Bob Hope. Arbuckle was […]

Ford Sterling (1883 - 1939)

Ford Sterling (November 3, 1883 – October 13, 1939) was an American comedian and actor best known for his work with Keystone Studios. One of the ‘Big 4’ he was the original chief of the Keystone Cops. Born George Franklin Stich in La Crosse, Wisconsin, he began his career in silent films in 1911 with […]

Edgar Kennedy (1890 - 1948)

Edgar Kennedy was born on April 26, 1890 in Monterey County, California to Canadian-born Neil Kennedy and Annie Quinn. He attended San Rafael High School before taking up boxing. He was a light-heavyweight and once went 14 rounds with Jack Dempsey. After boxing, he worked as a singer in vaudeville, musical comedy and light opera. Making […]

James Finlayson (1887 - 1953)

Born in Larbert, Stirlingshire, Scotland to Alexander and Isabella (nêe Henderson) Finlayson, James Finlayson worked as a tinsmith before pursuing an acting career. After the death of both his parents, he emigrated to the U.S. in 1911 at the age of 24 with his brother Robert. He married Emily Cora Gilbert, an American citizen from Iowa, […]

James Parrott (1897 - 1939)

James Gibbons Parrott was born in Baltimore, Maryland, to Charles and Blanche Thompson Parrott. In 1903, his father died from a heart attack, leaving the family in bad financial shape, which forced them to move in with a relative. Charley Jr. quit school, so he could go to work, in order to support his mother […]

Leroy Shield (1893 - 1962)

Leroy Shield (October 2, 1893 – January 9, 1962) was an American film score and radio composer. A native of Waseca, Minnesota, Shield was an employee of RCA Victor’s National Broadcasting Company, for which he composed and conducted on-air musical pieces. Starting approximately 1922 (seven years before the Victor Talking Machine was bought by RCA and […]

Sam Wood (1884 - 1949)

Samuel Grosvenor “Sam” Wood (July 10, 1883 – September 22, 1949) was an American film director and producer, who was best known for directing such Hollywood hits as A Night at the Opera, A Day at the Races, Goodbye, Mr. Chips, and The Pride of the Yankees. He was also involved in a few acting […]

Karl Freund (1890 - 1969)

Karl Freund was born to Jewish parents in Dvůr Králové (Königinhof), Bohemia. His career began in 1905 when, at age 15, he was hired as an assistant projectionist for a film company in Berlin, where his family had moved in 1901. Freund worked as a cinematographer on over 100 films, including the German Expressionist films The […]

Fred Niblo (1874 - 1948)

Fred Niblo was born Frederick Liedtke (several sources give “Frederico Nobile”, apparently erroneously) in York, Nebraska, to a French mother and a father who had served as a captain in the American Civil War and was wounded at the Battle of Gettysburg. Using the stage name, Fred Niblo, Liedtke began his show business career performing […]

Edward Bowes (1874 - 1946)

Edward Bowes’ father died when he was six years old, and young Bowes worked as he could to augment the family income. After leaving grammar school he worked as an office boy and then went into the real estate business, until the cataclysmic 1906 San Francisco earthquake wiped out his fortune. He then went to […]

Clayton Moore (1914 - 1999)

Clayton Moore Clayton Moore grew up in Chicago, Illinois and although his father wanted him to become a doctor, he had visions of something a little more glamorous. Naturally athletic, he practiced gymnastics during family summer vacations in Canada, eventually joining the trapeze act The Flying Behrs at 19. During the 1934 Chicago World’s Fair, […]

Scotty Moore (1931 - 2016)

Scotty Moore Scotty Moore, the pioneering rock guitarist whose sharp, graceful style helped Elvis Presley shape his revolutionary sound and inspired a generation of musicians that included Keith Richards, Jimmy Page and Bruce Springsteen, died Tuesday. He was 84. Scotty Moore died at his home in Nashville, said biographer and friend James L. Dickerson, who […]

Jack Lord (1920 - 1998)

Jack Lord Jack Lord is worth millions. He and CBS own Hawaii Five-0, and it’s made both of them rich. Yet Jack Lord sacrificed much to become the star of the longest running series on the air. The man who plays Steve McGarrett is incredibly complex, and so, Modern People exclusively got the whole, strange, […]

Florence Henderson (1934 - 2016)

Florence Henderson Florence Henderson, who went from Broadway star to become one of America’s most beloved television moms in “The Brady Bunch,” has died, her manager and her publicist said. She was 82. Henderson died Thursday night at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, after being hospitalized the day before, said her publicist, David Brokaw. […]

Leon Russell (1942 - 2016)

Leon Russell Leon Russell, renowned multi-instrumentalist and songwriter who collaborated with Bob Dylan, George Harrison, the Rolling Stones and Elton John over the course of 50 years in the music industry, died Sunday. He was 74. “Leon Russell died on Nov. 13, 2016 in Nashville at the age of 74. His wife said that he […]

Margaret Illington (1879 - 1934)

Margaret Illington ill-ing-ton (July 23, 1879 – March 11, 1934) was a stage actress popular in the first decade of the 20th century. She later made an attempt at silent film acting by making two films with Adolph Zukor’s Famous Players-Lasky franchise. After her film and theater career were over she settled down as the […]

Daniel Frohman (1851 - 1940)

Daniel Frohman (August 22, 1851 – December 26, 1940) was an American theatrical producer and manager, and an early film producer. Daniel Frohman was born to a Jewish family in Sandusky, Ohio. In his younger days he worked as a clerk at the New York Tribune, and while there witnessed the fatal shooting of the reporter […]

Frank Reicher (1875 - 1965)

Frank Reicher was born in Munich, Germany, the son of actor Emanuel Reicher  and Hedwig Kindermann, a popular German prima donna who was a daughter of the famous baritone August Kindermann. Reicher’s parents divorced in 1881 and his mother died two years later while at Trieste. His sister, Hedwiga Reicher, would also become a Hollywood […]

Eve Unsell (1887 - 1937)

Eve Unsell underwent training as a journalist and magazine writer for the Kansas City Post and attended Emerson College in Boston for her postgraduate year, studying literature and drama. The theatrical agent, Beatrice DeMille was so impressed with one of Unsell’s short stories that she hired young Eve as a play reader for her theatrical […]

Evangeline Booth (1865 - 1950)

Evangeline Booth was born in South Hackney, London, England, the seventh of eight children born to William Booth and Catherine Mumford, who had earlier in the year founded The Christian Mission, which became the Salvation Army in 1878. Catherine Booth had recently read Uncle Tom’s Cabin and wanted to name her baby ‘Eva’, but William […]

Ballington Booth (1857 - 1940)

Born in Brighouse, England, Ballington Booth was the second child of William and Catherine Booth, founders of The Salvation Army in 1878. As a teenager, he began preaching at Salvation Army open-air meetings, where he would often end by singing and playing his concertina. He became a Colonel in The Salvation Army at the age […]