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Gossip Friday: Christmas with Carole
From December 1936: Clark Gable will spend [Christmas] morning at Carole Lombard’s home and then an afternoon at the races to watch his horse Beverly Hills and back to Carole’s for a turkey dinner.
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Gossip Friday: Salesmanship Going in for Showmanship
From December 1936: Salesmanship is going in for showmanship. Door-to-door salesmen and street vendors are imitating the stars to get their products across. Clark Gable was the first to discover the new sales method. As he was driving to his MGM “Parnell” set the other morning, Clark noticed a man dressed like Charlie Chaplin, with mustache, big shoes, cane and a derby hat. The fellow would ring a doorbell, do a Chaplin routine, and then go into a sales talk. Clark, interested by the demonstration, stopped to talk to the salesman, who, it developed, was selling Christmas cards. “It’s a swell way to get the attention of customers,” said the…
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Gossip Friday: Burning up the Wires
From December 1937: The latest of those rumored accidents to movie stars had Carole Lombard jittery on the “Food for Scandal” set. Clark Gable, according to the story, had been injured in an auto crash. Carole burned up the wires trying to find Clark who was out of town. When she finally did, she was so relieved she told him to call her every half hour on the set. And what is more, set workers declare he did.
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Gossip Friday: A Hollywood Myth
From December 1931: For a while, Mrs. Clark Gable was sort of a Hollywood myth. Nobody had seen her, nobody knew her. But evidently this attractive lady has decided to step into the light and is now frequently seen at the Brown Derby or the Embassy Club. Still, none of the magazines can get a picture of her for publication. Clark absolutely refuses; he says it’s not fair to her to mix her up in publicity stories. If you didn’t already know that there’s a Mrs. In the Gable family we’re sorry we disillusioned you. He certainly has what it takes to set the girls’ hearts aflutter from Podunk to…
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Gossip Friday: Surprise of the Month
From November 1950: Surprise of the month was seeing Clark Gable at the local opening of the San Francisco opera. And in tails! Maybe you don’t think the king’s marriage to Sylvia Fairbanks hasn’t changed him. Another surprise twosome was George Jessel and Jane Wyman.
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Gossip Friday: Memories of Clark Gable
From January 1961, (Sara Hamilton, Photoplay magazine’s gossip columnist): Hollywood without Clark Gable will never be the same. There never was and never will be anyone to take his place. With his passing an era is over, never to return. I can still see him standing on the porch of his Encino home, brown tweed jacket over his broad shoulders, looking more the hero of a romantic novel than he ever did on the screen. I remember the evening he said, with mock seriousness, “Now Sara, here’s $30. We’re going to The Dunes, outside Palm Springs, for a little gambling and I expect you to make us both a fortune,”…
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Remembering Clark Gable
Clark Gable died 63 years ago today. He was 59 years old. The Los Angeles Evening Herald Express, Thursday, November 17, 1960: Marilyn Monroe Weeps for Gable by Bus Engleman It was my sad task to break the news of Clark Gable’s death to Marilyn Monroe, who co-starred with “The King of Hollywood” in the last picture he’ll ever make. “Oh, God, what a tragedy,” Marilyn sobbed, almost unable to believe it. I had gone to her apartment at 44 E, 57th St. at 4am and called her on the house phone. Her maid awakened her and she came to the phone sleepy voiced. The news that the man she…
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Happy Veterans Day
Happy Veterans Day to those who served. Clark Gable joined the Army Air Corps in August 1942, after the death of his wife Carole Lombard left his aimless and shattered. He was 41 years old. He was not the only Hollywood heavyweight to join World War II, not by a long shot. A fan magazine in April 1943 published these pictures in a salute: Pictured are Richard Greene (British Army), Victor Mature (Coast Guard), Henry Wilcoxon (Coast Guard), James Stewart (Army), Ronald Reagan (Army), Jeffrey Lynn (Army), David Niven (British Army), William Holden (Army), Henry Fonda (Navy), Clark Gable (Army), Glenn Ford (Marines), Douglas Fairbanks Jr. (Navy), Robert Stack (Navy),…
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Gossip Friday: Found His Destiny
From March 1943: From the most authentic source, to Movieland [magazine] exclusively, comes some pretty distressing news for Gable fans. The big fellow, whom everyone in Hollywood worshipped, feels he has found his destiny in the Army. He likes being Captain Gable. He wants to keep on being Captain Gable, even after peace is declared. He says that he will never return to the screen. Naturally, if our government asks him to make propaganda shorts or even feature films, he will do that, though he would prefer not to. But as for regular acting in the make-believe stories, that he refuses. Don’t cheer yourself up with the idea that Clark…
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Gossip Friday: Resentful Ex-Mrs. Gable
From June 1939: Josephine Dillon Resents Title of Ex-Mrs. Gable “It has been exactly one week since anyone referred to me as the former Mrs. Clark Gable,” said Josephine Dillon to your reporter a few days ago. She added, “You don’t know what a struggle it has been for me to become a personality in my own name. They never say, ‘Josephine Dillon, period.’–always ‘Josephine Dillon, ex-wife of Clark Gable.’ Why don’t you write a story,” concluded the dramatic coach, “of us poor unfortunates whose apparently sole claim to present attention or fame is a label in the past tense.” As a matter of record, I do not think it…
