This is William Clark Gable, one of the most successful Hollywood leading men ever and one of the most unlikel, his ears were too big and stuck out there were gaps between his teeth and his voice was high and loud. Clark Gable was born Feb. 1st, 1901 in Cades Ohio. He was the only child of William Henry Gable & Adaline Hirschmann Gable. Clark's father was an experienced oil well driller, his mother Adaline was a housewife that unfortunately passed away when Clark was only 10 months old. She died on a fourteenth of november 1901 believed from a seizure that was probably caused from a brain tumor. Clark was sent to live with Adalines family in Meadsville Pennsylvania while his father William return to oil fields in Ohio. There his father meets and marrys Jeannie Dunlap on the sixteenth of April 1903 The couple quickly reclaim young Clark and the family moved to Jenny's hometown Hopedale Ohio. Clark Gable will spend some of the happiest days of his life in Hopedale and in this house. He was pampered by step mother being an only child she considered him as her own. She keep him clean and well-groomed. Clark was considered a good student and love music and the arts, thanks to Jeannie. Now this is Clark showing off his musical talents as a youngster while playing in all adult band and this is clark at Hopewell Highschool in 1916. He's on the second row from the front and second from the right. The next year in 1917 the Clark family moved to this farm at 3150 Alliance Road. It's now county road 125 in Pelmier Ohio. It's near Akron. He attended Edinburgh high school for a short time where he actually rode a horse to school and back each day. Clark soon grew tired of farm work. He quit school at age of 16, got a job in Akron at a rubber tire plant. Now this is the Miller tire company that Clark was working at when he visited the Akron music hall one afternoon after work to see the performance of The Bird of Paradise. Clark Gable knew immediately what he wanted to be. An actor. Acting was better than farming and factory work and he volunteered at the Playhouse doing whatever they wanted him to do sweeping floors running errands he even had one walk-on part as an extra. His first taste of acting was cut short when he learned that Jenny, his stepmother, had died at their farm on January the 11th 1920 of tuberculosis and cancer of the bowels. Jenny is buried in the Palmar cemetery just down the road from their home. William Clark's name is on her tombstone but he's buried in California and died in 1948. Soon after Jeannys death William Clark moved to the oil fields of Oklahoma and Clark soon followed his dad. After two years of working in the oil fields he had saved enough money. Clark joined another theater group unfortunately the group soon went broke leaving Clark and others stranded in Butte Montana making his way finally to Oregan with a fellow actor and after working in several different jobs he managed to join another theater group. There he meets Josephine Dylan, theatre manager and acting coach. She took a personal interest in Clark determined to make an actor out of Clark Gable. She paid to have his teeth fixed, filling in the front gaps. She had his hair styled and told him how to lower his high-pitched voice unfortunately, there's not much you can do about his large ears that stuck out. Now this proved to be the biggest obstacle to getting into the movie business. Years later his ears will be operated on and that will help some. Although Josephine was several years older than Clark the couple were married in December of 1924 and they'll move to Hollywood. Money will be tight and what extra there was from Josephine's acting classes will be spent on Clark trying to break into the movie business. For the next few years Gable will play extras in several silent films and in 1926 Clark and Josephine will separate. He will begin keeping company with wealthy women that he thought could further his career. For awhile he will leave Hollywood and try to return to the state. In 1930 Josephine will file for divorce on grounds of desertion. She will always say that Gable married his second wife Ria Lingham because Ria could do more for his career than she could. Gables marriage to Josephine was strange. He always said that the marriage was never consummated and it was a marriage of convenience only, however, it will be the only marriage for Josephine and she'll always claim to love Clark. She soon fell on hard times after the divorce. A few years later she went to L.B. Mayer saying Clark was not helping her financially and threatened to go to the newspapers. Mayor begin taking two hundred dollars out of Clark's pay to send to Josephine. It was later shown that Gable sent her money to keep her from foreclosure on her modest home. He also left provisions to pay of her mortgage. 41 years after her divorce from Clark Gable on the 11th of November 1971, Josephine Dylan will die of a long time illness at a sanatorium in Glendale. She'll be buried at the Calvary Cemetery in East Los Angeles. Josephine was 87 years old. While Clark was separated from Josephine in 1930 he met Maria Langham while in New York working back on the stage. Although Ria as she was called, was several years older than Gable, she was from a socially prominent wealthy Texas family and could afford to help his career back to where he really wanted to be in hollywood working on movies. They were married April 3rd, 1931. Gable will be her fourth marriage and his second. While married to Ria Langham, and with her help, he will become more sophisticated and polished. His movie career will begin to drastically improve. He will get his first speaking role in The Painted Desert with William Boyd. Now this was before Boyd became Hopalong Cassidy. MGM will offer Clark a contract after seeing his performance in The Painted Desert. They will give him his first leading role in Dance Fools Dance with Joan Crawford. Clark Gable will be a leading man for the next 30 years. In 1932 he stars in Red Dust with Jean Harlow. The next year he teams up again with Joan Crawford in Dancing Lady. Also, a young Fred Astaire will make his first dancing appearance on the screen During the filming of Dancing Lady Gable will become hospitalized with infected teeth. the infection will spread through his body causing him to have to have all of his teeth pulled. This caused delay in filming and cost the studio money. As punishment, Clark was rented out to the low-budget Columbia Pictures for a comedy called It Happened One Night. Gable thought the picture was awful he didn't like it. The picture was turned down by several actresses before Claudette Colbert agreed, at double her wages, to take it. Colbert and Gable both thought the little movie was stupid but the public loved it. It will be the only Academy Award Clark Gable will ever receive. The movie will recieve five Academy Awards putting Clark Gable back in the good graces of MGM executives. In the early part of 1935 Gable will star with Loretta Young in The Call of the Wild. During the filming Loretta and Gable will become romantically involved, or at least that's what everyone thought. After filming Loretta will discovered that she's pregnant Both Loretta and Clark have morals clauses in their contracts and if the studio found out about her pregnancy they would both lose their contracts. Loretta took a long trip to Europe. Judy, their daughter was born in November that year. Loretta went to great lengths to hide the fact that Judy was her own daughter. She claimed to have adopted Judy and it was years before Judy discovered that Loretta Young and Clark Gable were her natural parents. Clark Gable will never publicly acknowledged his daughter. In 1940, when Judy was four years old Loretta Young will marry producer Tom Lewis. Judy will take Lewis last name. Tom and Loretta will have two sons during their marriage. Christopher and Peter. Loretta and Tom will divorce in 1969 after a bitter battle. She will not marry again unti 1993 at the age of 80. She'll meet Gene Louis, a fashion designer that years earlier had designed her gowns for the Loretta Young show. They will remain married until his death four years later in 1997. That same year she married Gene Louis, Loretta will buy this house at 1075 Mantanna avenue in Palm Springs and live there until her death in 2004. Loretta Young will died of ovarian cancer on August 12th, 2000 at the age of 87, while staying at the home of her sister Georgina Montavon the wife of Ricardo Montavon. Judy Lewis the daughter of Loretta Young and Clark Gable will die of cancer on November 25th, 2011 at the age of 76, 51 years after her father Clark Gable's death and 11 years after her mother Loretta Young. The same year 1935 that Clark Gable stared with Loretta Young in The Call of the Wild, he will also share billing with Charles Laughton in Mutiny on the Bounty. He didn't like it because he was told he had to shave off his famous mustache to get the part. He felt better after being nominated for the academy award. The next year he will star with Jeanette MacDonald in San Francisco and in 1937 he'll be paired with a younger actress Jean Harlow in Saratoga. Harlow had been in poor health before filming began and on the 29th of May, during a love scene Harlow actually collapsed in Gables arms from exhaustion. Doctors diagnosed her with gall bladder infection. After several days and not returning to the set, Gable visits Jean at her home. He becomes concerned when he sees her condition. On the 6th of June and days after she had collapsed on the set of Saratoga, she's taken to the Good Samaritan Hospital in Los Angeles with a new diagnosis of acute kidney infection. The medicine prescribed for her gallbladder was now killing her. In 1937 there was no antibiotics for kidney infection after arriving at the hospital Jean quickly slipped into a coma and on the 7th of June, 1937 at 11:37am Jean Harlow will pass away at the age of 26. She will be buried in the mausoleum at Forrest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale. Clark Gable will attend Jeans funeral with his new love interest Carole Lombard. It will be two more years in 1939 before Gable gets his divorce from Maria Langham and is able to marry Carole Lombard. That same year Clark Gable with star in his most famous role as Rhett Butler in Gone with the Wind. The studio will up his salary so that he can afford to pay Maria her demand so that she will give him a divorce. Ria will stay in Hollywood a few years after divorcing Clark. She will date other actors but she will never remarry. She will eventually return to Houston. She will pass away on September the 24th 1966 at the age of 82. She's buried in the Glendale cemetery in Houston. She'll be remembered in Houston society as once being the wife of Clark Gable. It was well known that the studio heads decided that the part of Rhett Butler could only be played by Clark Gable. Even though Gable will refuse to use a southern accent. Carole Lombard had hoped that she would get the part of Scarlett O'Hara so that she could work with Clark. However, the part of Scarlett went to Vivian Leigh. Gone with the Wind will become one of the best-known films ever. It will secure the film legend of Clark Gable. It will recieve 10 Academy Awards. Gable will be nominated for best actor, but he won't win. However, his co-star Vivien Leigh will. One of the most famous lines in movie history "Frankly my dear, I don't give a damn" that one word cost the studio $5,000 and they said it was completely worth it. Clark Gable was now finally divorced from Ria and Lombard had been divorced from William Dick Powell since 1933. After a break in the filming of Gone with the Wind, Carol and Clark and best man Outto Winkle drove to Kingman Arizona on the 29th of March 1939 and got married. Gable said this time with Lombard was the happiest time of his entire life. The couple bought a farm in Encino California located at 16645 Ashley Oaks. They raised chickens, horses and cows. Clark bought a tractor Carol redecorate the house and seemed content to be a housewife and love the idea of being Carole Lombard Gable. Only a few weeks after the start of World War 2 Carole Lombard was asked to go on a Bond Drive in order to help the war cause. At the same time Clark was filming Somewhere I'll find You with Lana Turner. Carol had just finished what will be her last film To Be or Not to Be with Jack Benny and Robert Stack. The volunteer left by train heading for Indiana on the 12th of January, 1942. After a successful Bond Drive, Carol was anxious to get back to her home and her husband. She was accompanied by her mother Elizabeth Peters. Clark Gable's publicity agent and best man at his wedding Outto Winkler was also alone. The TWA transcontinental flight 3 will stop in Las Vegas Nevada to refuel. Clark Gable was anxious to see his wife returning early. He goes to the airport to wait his wife's arrival. The DC 3 with 22 people aboard left Las Vegas minutes after 7pm on January 16th, 1942. 30 miles southwest of Vegas for no apparent reason flight 3 explodes into a nevada mountain side killing all aboard. Rescuers are seen here removing Carol Lombards body wrapped in a blanket. Carol and her mother will be buried in the mausoleum at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale California. The same mausoleum that Jean Harlow was buried in some four years earlier. Carole Lombard was 33 years old. The entire nation will mourn alone with Clark Gable the death of his wife. Clark will keep their home in Encino the rest of his life. He will refuse to allow any changes to her bedroom for years. Friends say he was emotionally devastated. Both Clark and Carol were very patriotic but he felt that bond drives was not enough, so after her death he enlisted and did 13 weeks of officer training school. He ended up assigned to the 351st bombardment group. His job was to film a record of bombing missions. This is a picture taken by Captain Clark. Now this is Captain Clark getting ready to go on a mission. He was also trained as an Ariel gunner. There were no free rides. His plane was hit several times once by spitfire and other times by strapnal, barely missing him. Major Gable resigned from service June 12th, 1944 for being over age for combat. In 1945 Adventure, with a Greer Garson will be his first movie after his military career. In 1947 he will star in the Hucksters with Deborah Carr and Ava Gardner and in 1948 it'll be Homecoming with Lana Turner and Anne Baxter.The next year in 1949, almost eight years after Carole Lombards death, Clark Gable will marry model and actress Sylvia Ashley, the widow of her second husband Douglas Fairbanks senior. They will slip away from reporters on the 20th of December 1949 to a friend's home near Santa Barbara and marry. After a two-week honeymoon in Hawaii the couple returned to the ranch house Sylvia will start redecorating the house, even Carol's bedroom, the marriage seemed doomed from the beginning. While still married to Sylvia Clark with star in Key to the City with no other than Loretta Young. This must have been awkward for both actors, and in 1952 Clark Gable and Sylvia Ashley will divorce after less than two-and-a-half years of marriage. Sylvia will marry once more after Clark. She will die the 29th of June,1977 of bone cancer at the age of 73. The next year in 1953, MGM cancels his contract along with Greer Garson's Judy Garland's and others. They were cutting back on high salary actors. During 1954 Clark became withdrawn and depressed. He was always a heavy drinker but it became worse. Things will improve in 1955 as a freelance actor he will team up with Susan Hayward in Soldier of Fortune for 20th Century Fox and on July the 11th, 1955 Clark were marry for his final time. It will be his fifth marriage and her fourth. He will marry Kay Williams Speckle. Kay had a son and daughter from a previous marriage that Clark will come to love. The same year that Clark marrys Kay, he stars in The Tall Man with Jane Russell. In 1958 at the age of 57 he will work with Burt Lancaster in Run Silent Run Deep. In 1960 at the age of 59 and after decades of being the most consistent box-office performer ever, Clark Gable will star in his last screen performance in The Misfits. His co-star will be Marilyn Monroe Montgomery Clift and Eli Wallach. Eli Wallach is considered one of the best character actors in Hollywood. He will die years after The Misfits in New York City on June 24th, 2014 at the age of 98. Montgomery Cliff will die of a heart attack six years after fame in The Misfits on July the 23rd, 1966 at the age of 45. The last words that Montgomery Clift will speak is when a friend asked him if he wished to watch The Misfits on television with him. His answer was absolutely not. Marilyn Monroe will die of a drug overdose two years later after finishing Misfits on the 5th of August, 1962. She was 36 years At the beginning of Misfits Clark Gable received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame on February the 8th, 1960. It's located at 1608 Vine Street. In order to play his part as the old cowboy Gaylord Landing, Clark lost 35 pounds and had to cut back on the booze. When Marilyn became too infatuated with her co-sta,r as she often did while shooting movies, they say that Clark would pull out his teeth and do his best impression of Gabby Hayes. That usually did the trick. During filming of Misfits Clark Gable will learn his wife Kay is pregnant with his son he will never see. Clark was delighted and looking forward to the future. Three days after finishing filming, Clark Gable will be rushed to the hospital on the 6th of November 1960 while complaining with chest pains. Ten days later on the 16th of November 1960, William Clark Gable will die of a blood clot related to heart troubles. Kay will allow Clark to be intombed next to his third wife Carole Lombard. Clark Gable was 59 years old. His only son John Clark Gable will be born March the 20th,1961. Four months after Clark Gable's death. Kay Williams Gable will never remarry. She will later sale their Encino ranch. Developers were divide the ranch into the Gable Estates. Clark once asked Kay if she wanted to decorate the Encino home. Her answer was no, Carol had good taste so why should I. This to me was a sign of a kind lady. Kay Gable will go into a Houston hospital for triple bypass heart surgery in May of 1983. She will never regain consciousness and die on May 25th, 1983. She will be entombed close to Clark Gable and Carole Lombard at the Forrest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale. Kay Gables with 66 years old. John Clark Gable will grow up to follow his famous father's footsteps into show business.
