March 3 Birthday Wishes

Charles Stevens [1893 - 1964]

Beatrice Gray [1911 - 2009]

Harold J. Stone [1913 - 2005]

James Doohan [1920 - 2005]

Howdy Pards!!

Beatrice gray was an actress during the 40's and 50's, who appeared in a series of Westerns, like Unconquered and on the Gene Autry show. She is probably better known for being the mother of Actor Billy Gray, who played the part of Bud on the 50's sitcom, Father Knows Best, with Robert Young and Jane Wyatt.

Harold.J.Stone was one of the best supporting actors in Hollywood. I've watched this guy for years. He played every role imaginable, hard nosed rancher, detective, avenging father, bullying father, greedy rancher and outlaw. He and Actor Bert Freed were cut from the same cloth and played almost the same parts from week to week.

James Doohan was another excellent supporting actor during the 50's, 60.s 70's and 80's. He found his most enduring role, as the engineer on the original Star Trek series with William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy. He will always be remembered as " Scotty" the fella who could repair anything, could beam anyone anywhere and was always saying" but Captain, I've got no power". A little trivia about Doohan. He fathered a child in his 80's and after he passed on, part of his ashes were launched into space into" the final frontier".

Ed

Charles Stevens acted in 100's of westerns during his career (his first western being The Good Bad Man in 1916 & his last on an episode of Rawhide in 1961) one classic part being that of the fellow who is shooting up the bar that Wyatt Earp drags out of the saloon in My Darling Clementine and from that action is offered the marshal's badge. Stevens said that he is the grandson of Geronimo, a claim that has never been able to be proved or disproved. He played mostly Indians and Mexicans and worked opposite such stars as Errol Flynn, Wallace Beery, Randolph Scott, Gene Autry, Bill Elliott, Rod Cameron, Kirk Douglas, Robert Taylor, Richard Dix, and Douglas Fairbanks Sr. A long, illustrious career.
Harold J. Stone, Jim and I had the opportunity to visit him a couple of times. He, too, had a great career. When we first met him in 1983 he told us that there was a time when he could not take a vacation because they kept him so busy, but at this time he couldn't break into a studio because no one there remembers him.

Jimmy Doohan was nearly killed during the Normandy invasion. He was a lieutenant in the Canadian Artillery. After landing at Juno, and killing two German snipers, he was shot that night by a nervous Canadian soldier on sentry duty. He was hit by 6 rounds from a Bren gun: four in the leg, one in the chest, and one trough his right middle finger. The shot in the chest was stopped by a cigarette case in his jacket pocket! His finger was amputated, and he did a good job hiding it throughout his acting career. He could do a number of different dialects, and, besides playing Scotty, did other voices for various characters on the original Star Trek and the animated Star Trek series.

Howdy Tom!!

Once again, Tom, Thanks for talking to us about your friend, Harold .J. Stone. He was as good an actor as it gets!! I guess the fact that he told you, no one in Hollywood remembered him, gives us some insight into who is running Hollywood these past 3 or 4 decades. ANYONE who watched ANY film during the 50's, 60's and 70's, should have known who Harold.J.Stone was. It was this same youth oriented culture, that brought about the retirement of Sean Connery. He said at a press conference, when he announced his retirement from film, that he was tired of being told how to act by young producer/directors, who didn't know anything about the film industry!! This reminds me of an interview with Rod Steiger In his later years, He auditioned for a part in a film and the idiot giving the audition, asked him if he could play a southern Sheriff!!!!!!!! Aparrently the nitwit had never heard of, In The Heat Of The Night or the t.v. series starring Carroll O'Connor, which it spun off or the Oscar, Steiger won for his role!

Ed

Brother Jim reminded me of what Mickey Simpson told us. At an interview he was asked by this young dude behind the desk as what films he had been in. Mickey replied, "Among other things I have done seven films for John Ford." The nut behind the desk replied, "John Ford. Who's he?" George Wallace (who played many a bad man in westerns back in the 50's before leaving Hollywood to return to the Broadway stage -- he later returned in the 80's and 90's to filmwork) told us at an audition he was asked who some of the people were that he had worked with. He mentioned Dana Andrews and the casting jerk asked, "Dana Andrews? Who's SHE?" Yep, the Hollywood today has no idea of who made the place what it was. Matt Clark (Culpepper Cattle Company, Jeremiah Johnson, Monte Walsh, etc) told us when he was working on a film he was reading a book on Montgomery Clift and no one knew who he was....or Preston Sturges either.
Like you said, Ed, it "gives us some insight into who is running Hollywood these past 3 or 4 decades." Tom.