| Glenn Ford  AKA Gwyllyn Samuel Newton Ford
Born: 1-May-1916
Birthplace: Portneuf, Quebec, Canada
Died: 30-Aug-2006
Location of death: Beverly Hills, CA
Cause of death: unspecified
Remains: Buried, Woodlawn Cemetery, Santa Monica, CA
Gender: Male
Race or Ethnicity: White
Sexual orientation: Straight
Occupation: Actor Nationality: United States
Executive summary: Gilda, Blackboard Jungle Military service: US Coast Guard; USMC; US Naval Reserve (Captain) Glenn Ford was born in Canada, where his father was a railroad conductor. The family moved to California when Ford was eight, and he grew to think of himself as an American. He attended Santa Monica High School, where he appeared in several school plays. His first professional role was in a stage production of Lillian Hellman's lesbian melodrama The Children's Hour.
He became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 1939, and served in two wars. In 1941, months before Pearl Harbor was attacked, Ford joined the Coast Guard Auxiliary, where he was on duty some evenings and occasional weekends. Already a movie star, he asked for "regular duty", to be treated as one of the guys, not a celebrity. He later put his acting career on hold to fight in World War II, serving in the U.S. Marines from 1943-45 and seeing action in the Pacific. When he was discharged he signed up with the U.S. Naval Reserves, where he served for decades, rising to the rank of captain. He visited U.S. troops in Korea and Vietnam on well-publicized morale-building trips during those wars. And in a 1993 interview Ford confided that he had also been sent on five secret missions into Vietnam during that war. Asked for details, all he would say was, "They asked me to go, and I went".
Ford also signed on with the French Foreign Legion, while filming The Green Glove in Europe in 1952. He went out for a night of heavy drinking and the next morning discovered he had joined. After four days of arguments and apologies, he got out of it when the film's producer explained to a Legion officer that if they kept Ford, the movie would have to cease production, and about 150 Frenchmen would be out of work.
Early in his career, Ford was a noted womanizer. For several years he shared a hotel room with friends and fellow star William Holden -- they were never there at the same time, but either man could bring women for trysts. In addition to his four wives, Ford carried on a long-time affair with his six-time co-star Rita Hayworth. He was also a close friend of Charmaine London, Jack London's widow, although it remains uncertain whether their relationship was platonic or romantic.
Ford made more than 90 films, but if present-day audiences remember him at all, it is for his small but heart-tugging performance as Pa Kent, Superboy's adoptive father in Superman, with Christopher Reeve. His Blackboard Jungle with Sidney Poitier is considered his greatest, but Fate Is the Hunter with Rod Taylor still soars, too. Ford also starred in several terrific film noir pieces, including the classic Gilda with Rita Hayworth, Fritz Lang's The Big Heat with Gloria Grahame, Émile Zola's Human Desire with Grahame again, plus a few fading noirs from the '60s, The Money Trap with Elke Sommer and Experiment in Terror with Lee Remick.
He handled light comedy adroitly in Frank Capra's Pocketful of Miracles with Bette Davis, Teahouse of the August Moon with Marlon Brando, and It Started with a Kiss with Debbie Reynolds and Eva Gabor. In the film The Courtship of Eddie's Father, years before the sitcom, he played the Bill Bixby role to little Ron Howard's Eddie.
Almost half his films were westerns -- Anthony Mann's Cimarron, The Desperadoes with Randolph Scott, or The Man from Colorado with William Holden. He also played well against type as the bad guy in 3:10 to Yuma with Van Heflin. A brief cameo in the Kurt Russell's 1993 western Tombstone was going to serve as Ford's farewell to cinema, but due to health concerns he was unable to play the role. He also had two short-lived TV series in the 1970s, playing a cop on Cade's County with Edgar Buchanan, and later playing a preacher on The Family Holvak with Julie Harris.
Father: Newton Ford (railroad executive, b. 1890, d. 1940)
Mother: Hannah Mitchell (homemaker)
Girlfriend: Laraine Day (actress, together early 1940s)
Girlfriend: Brenda Joyce (actress, b. 1917, together early 1940s)
Girlfriend: Rosemary Lane (actress, b. 1914, together early 1940s, d. 1974)
Girlfriend: Jinx Falkenburg (Chilean actress, b. 1919, together 1940s, d. 2003)
Girlfriend: Carmen Miranda (Portuguese singer-actress)
Girlfriend: Michèle Morgan (French actress, b. 1920, together early 1940s)
Girlfriend: Judy Canova (vaudeville comedian, b. 1913, together early 1940s, d. 1983)
Girlfriend: Patti McCarty (Dorothy Lamour's secretary, b. 1921, together early 1940s, d. 1985)
Girlfriend: Evelyn Ankers (actress, together 1940s, d. 1985)
Girlfriend: Joan Crawford (actress, together 1941-42)
Wife: Eleanor Powell (actress, m. 1943, div. 1959, d. 1982)
Son: Peter Ford (Los Angeles County deputy sheriff, b. 5-Feb-1945, with Powell)
Girlfriend: Rita Hayworth (actress, long affair through the 1960s)
Wife: Kathryn Hays (actress, b. 1933, m. 28-Mar-1966, div. 1969)
Wife: Cynthia Hayward (actress, b. 1944, m. 1974, div. 1977)
Wife: Jeanne Baus (m. 1993, div. 1993)
High School: Santa Monica High School, Santa Monica, CA
Columbia Pictures
Freemasonry
National Cowboy Hall of Fame
French Legion of Honor
Hollywood Walk of Fame 6933 Hollywood Blvd (motion pictures)
Endorsement of Liggett Group Chesterfield cigarettes
Naturalized US Citizen 1939
Risk Factors: Smoking
TELEVISION
The Family Holvak Rev. Tom Holvak (1975)
Cade's County Sam Cade (1971-72)
FILMOGRAPHY AS ACTOR
Final Verdict (9-Sep-1991)
Raw Nerve (28-Jun-1991)
Border Shootout (1990)
Casablanca Express (22-Dec-1989)
Happy Birthday to Me (15-May-1981)
Virus (26-Jun-1980)
The Sacketts (15-May-1979)
The Visitor (22-Mar-1979)
Day of the Assassin (1979)
Superman (15-Dec-1978) · Pa Kent
Evening in Byzantium (14-Aug-1978)
Once an Eagle (2-Dec-1976)
Midway (18-Jun-1976) · Rear Adm. Raymond A. Spruance
Santee (Sep-1973) · Santee
The Brotherhood of the Bell (17-Sep-1970)
Smith! (21-Mar-1969)
Heaven With a Gun (1969) · Jim Killian
Day of the Evil Gun (1-Mar-1968) · Lorn Warfield
The Last Challenge (22-Dec-1967) · Marshal Dan Blaine
A Time for Killing (15-Aug-1967)
Rage (9-Dec-1966)
Is Paris Burning? (26-Oct-1966)
The Money Trap (7-Sep-1965) · Joe Baron
The Rounders (8-Jan-1965) · Ben Jones
Dear Heart (2-Dec-1964) · Harry Mork
Fate Is the Hunter (16-Oct-1964)
Advance to the Rear (15-Apr-1964)
Love Is a Ball (24-Apr-1963) · John Davis
The Courtship of Eddie's Father (6-Mar-1963) · Tom Corbett
Experiment in Terror (13-Apr-1962) · John Ripley
Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (7-Feb-1962)
Pocketful of Miracles (19-Dec-1961) · Dave the Dude
Cimarron (16-Feb-1961) · Yancey Cravat
Cry for Happy (Jan-1961)
The Gazebo (16-Dec-1959) · Elliott Nash
It Started with a Kiss (19-Aug-1959)
Torpedo Run (24-Oct-1958) · Lt. Cmdr. Barney Doyle
Imitation General (20-Aug-1958) · Master Sgt. Murphy Savage
The Sheepman (7-May-1958) · Jason Sweet
Cowboy (19-Feb-1958) · Tom Reese
Don't Go Near the Water (14-Nov-1957) · Lt. Max Siegel
3:10 to Yuma (7-Aug-1957) · Ben Wade
The Teahouse of the August Moon (29-Nov-1956) · Capt. Fisby
The Fastest Gun Alive (12-Jul-1956) · George Temple
Jubal (6-Apr-1956) · Jubal Troop
Ransom! (24-Jan-1956) · David G. Stannard
Trial (7-Oct-1955) · David
Interrupted Melody (25-Mar-1955) · Dr. Thomas King
Blackboard Jungle (19-Mar-1955) · Richard Dadier
The Violent Men (26-Jan-1955) · John Parrish
The Americano (19-Jan-1955)
Human Desire (5-Aug-1954) · Jeff Warren
Appointment in Honduras (16-Oct-1953) · Jim Corbett
The Big Heat (14-Oct-1953) · Dave Bannion
Plunder of the Sun (26-Aug-1953) · Al Colby
The Man from the Alamo (Aug-1953) · John Stroud
Terror on a Train (5-Feb-1953) · Peter Lyncort
Affair in Trinidad (30-Jun-1952) · Steve Emery
Young Man with Ideas (2-May-1952) · Maxwell Webster
The Green Glove (12-Mar-1952)
The Secret of Convict Lake (3-Aug-1951) · Jim Canfield
Follow the Sun (25-Apr-1951) · Ben Hogan
The Redhead and the Cowboy (15-Mar-1951)
The Flying Missile (24-Dec-1950)
Convicted (Aug-1950)
The White Tower (24-Jun-1950) · Martin Ordway
The Doctor and the Girl (29-Sep-1949) · Dr. Michael Corday
Mr. Soft Touch (1-Aug-1949) · Joe Miracle
Lust for Gold (10-Jun-1949) · Jacob Walz
The Undercover Man (21-Mar-1949) · Frank Warren
The Return of October (26-Oct-1948)
The Loves of Carmen (23-Aug-1948) · Don Jose
The Man from Colorado (7-Aug-1948) · Col. Owen Devereaux
The Mating of Millie (8-Mar-1948)
Framed (7-Mar-1947) · Mike Lambert
Gallant Journey (24-Sep-1946) · John Montgomery
A Stolen Life (6-Jul-1946) · Bill Emerson
Gilda (14-Feb-1946) · Johnny Farrell
Destroyer (16-Aug-1943) · Mickey Donohue
The Desperadoes (25-May-1943) · Cheyenne Rogers
Go West, Young Lady (27-Nov-1941)
Texas (9-Oct-1941) · Tod Ramsey
So Ends Our Night (27-Feb-1941)
Blondie Plays Cupid (31-Oct-1940) · Charlie
The Lady in Question (31-Jul-1940) · Pierre Morestan
Babies for Sale (14-Jun-1940) · Steve Burton
Heaven with a Barbed Wire Fence (3-Nov-1939)
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