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Gossip Friday: No Marriage
From January 1955 (Louella Parsons): A rumor from several sources today had Clark Gable and Kay Williams Spreckels, ex-wife of multi-millionaire Adolph Spreckels, in an elopement. A telephone call to the Gable home in the San Fernando Valley brought the information that Gable was week-ending at the ranch home of a friend and that he and Mrs. Spreckels were expected home for dinner. When questioned about a marriage, the servant who answered the phone said: “As far as I know, there isn’t any marriage.” A few days before Christmas, Mrs. Spreckels stopped at my house and when I asked if she and “The King,” as the popular Gable is known,…
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1950: From Now On There’ll Be No Ghosts for Clark and Sylvia (Part 2)
From Now On There’ll Be No Ghosts for Clark ad Sylvia–They’re Madly in Love by Sheilah Graham Associated Newspaper Article January 13, 1950 Hollywood, Calif–Jan. 12–A week before Clark Gale’s atomic elopement with Lady Sylvia Stanley, a columnist printed the story that for seven years, ever since the tragic death of Carole Lombard in a plane crash, Clark had kept her bedroom at their Encino ranch untouched. Every dress was in the same place. Her perfume was just as it was on the blond-colored dressing table. Gable, when he read the story, hit the roof. “It’s completely false and ridiculous,” he said. Everything belonging to Carole, the third and youngest…
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Gossip Friday: Still No Queen
From November 1954: Rumor or No: The King hasn’t chosen his Queen! When Clark Gable made a fast trip to the hospital to pick up his old friend Kay Williams Spreckels who had suffered a slight accident, many people jumped to the conclusion that romance was in the air. Actually, Clark maintains friendship of longstanding with Kay, as with Virginia Grey, and if he ever talked of marriage to either, no one says so. Clark, who will be fifty-three on February 1, has confided to intimates that there is only the slimmest chance that he’ll ever wed again. Furthermore, he is not going to dispose of his ranch on Petit…
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Gossip Friday: Thanksgiving in the Desert
From December 1959: The Thanksgiving holiday and the Polo Matches at Eldorado attracted many visitors to the Palm Desert area. Clark Gable and Kay Spreckles had lunch on the terrace at Shadow Mountain Club while the children played tennis. Hugh O’Brien escorted pretty redheaded Doris Hurley to the Polo Fields. Also on hand for Thanksgiving were Mr. and Mrs. Walter Lanz. Mr. Lanz is the creator of Woody Woodpecker and his wife is Woody’s voice. They were guests at the Shadow Terrace in Palm Desert.
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Happy 100th Birthday, Judy Garland!
Judy Garland, born Frances Gumm on June 10, 1922, would have been 100 years old today! Although Judy and Clark Gable never co-starred together, they were both on the MGM roster and Judy’s big break into stardom was because of her singing her adulation for a certain Mr. Gable. At the beginning of 1937, 14-year-old Judy was contracted to MGM but they didn’t really know what to do with her. She was extremely talented, yes, but was too young to sing romantic songs. Judy was set to appear on the radio show “Ole Maestro,” a radio variety program run by Ben Bernie. The vintage torch song “You Made Me Love…
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Clark Gable in Tampa Part 5: Mrs. Gable is Nice
For the last segment of our series of interviews Clark Gable gave at the Tampa International Airport in February 1958, it appears that as the female reporters were hounding Clark asking him mundane questions, a male reporter managed to talk to Kay Gable. Mrs. Gable is Nice, Male Reporter Says by Leland Hawes, Tribune Staff Writer I had Mrs. Gable all to myself–for 10 nice minutes while her crinkle-browed husband was nearly “skwushed” by a squad of inquiring reporters, female variety. A cool, cool blonde with blue, blue eyes, Kay Gable didn’t twitter an eyelash at the spectacle of her chunk-of-man surrounded by palpitating pulchritude. “It’s really rather refreshing to…
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Clark Gable in Tampa Part 1: Virility and Charm–And His Voice is Husky Yet Soft
Since it’s Clark Gable’s birthday month, we will be featuring a series of small articles that were printed in the Tampa Tribune in February 1958. It was around his birthday that Clark Gable and wife Kay Spreckels arrived at the Tampa International Airport, en route to a cruise to the West Indies. Is any of this earth shattering information? No. But if you wanted to know what Clark thought of chemise dresses, if he ever unclogged sinks at home, if he thinks women should know how to cook, if he thinks Rhett ever came back to Scarlett, what his favorite cake is and if he likes to die in movies,…
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Gossip Friday: So Much for that Resolution
From January 1955: Clark Gable’s resolution for 1955–to stay single. But if Kay Spreckels wants to change his mind–she’s the only gal who can do it. ____ And that she did, becoming the fifth Mrs. Gable in July of that year.
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{New Article} 1954: Gable and His Girls
This 1954 article was written by everybody in Hollywood’s favorite “frenemy,” the infamous Louella Parsons. Most of the articles of this period, between Clark’s ill-fated marriage to Sylvia Ashley and his subsequent union with Kay Williams, focus on all of Clark’s girlfriends and who will be the next Mrs. Gable. The King laughed when I persisted in asking about beautiful blonde Grace Kelly (the new Hollywood sensation) with whom Clark was supposed to have been very much in love with they were making ‘Mogambo,’ and of Suzanne Dadolle, the French charmer of the odd name, with whom his name was later linked all over Europe. Grace is supposed to have…
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1954: Gable and His Girls
By Louella Parsons Modern Screen, May 1954 Hollywood’s most famous reporter felt like a prying D.A. but when Louella finished with Clark, she had a full confession There never will be another Mrs. Clark Gable! “I’ll never marry again,” Clark told me, quietly. And then he smiled, “But I shall always enjoy the company of lovely ladies.” As disheartening as this news will be to the femmes who consider The King the most attractive man on the screen and the dozens of beauties all over the world who would love to become Mrs. Gable Number Five, the statement was made by Mr. G. himself with almost cheerful finality on the…
