Clark Gable in Tampa Part 4: His Ears Aren’t So Big After All

Continuing in our series of Clark Gable being interviewed at the Tampa International Airport in February 1958, here’s Part 4, in which you find out he loves huckleberries, if he still loves acting, and if he’d consider going to the moon:

His Ears Aren’t So Big After All

by Ramona Demery, Tribune Staff Writer

I’m rather new at this thing, I guess you call it a cub reporter. Well, not even that, for my job is to keep the floor clean, file weddings and write garden club notices.

Then along came a chance to interview Clark Gable. What a madhouse: four women firing questions at once. This one just gave up, folded up the notebook, and watched. (I took a notebook along because reporters in movies do.)

His ears aren’t so big after all; his hair is somewhat gray, mostly on the sides and in the back; and his mustache is there. He wore a dark sit with a white line, and boots with a little buckle on the side.

Such a gracious person. He just stood there, smiling and winking, calling everybody Sugar, and emoting along with the rest of us.

Those other girls just weren’t going to run out of questions, but I finally did get to ask a few. I found out that Mr. Gable just loves huckleberries, and if he had to do it all over again he would still be an actor.

“Acting never bores me at all. Of course, I may bore others…” he said.

In view of his experience during the war as photographer in the nose of a B-17 would he be willing to take the same assignment on the first rocket to the moon?

“No,” he said. And then after hesitating, “I don’t think so.”

Last question, “Do you think American movies will ever be as realistic sex-wise as foreign ones

Mr. Gable thought about his one a moment. “….I think producers would like to,” he said, “but censors won’t let them. Probably because there are more children here who see movies.”

Well that was that. Somebody said his wife was there. I didn’t see her.