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- Pio Pico was born on 5 May 1801 in San Gabriel, California, USA. He was married to María Ignacia Alvarado. He died on 11 September 1894 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
- Henry J.W. Dam was born on 27 April 1856 in San Francisco, California, USA. Henry J.W. was a writer, known for Her Silent Sacrifice (1917). Henry J.W. was married to Dorothy Dorr. Henry J.W. died on 26 April 1906 in Havana, Cuba.
- Director
- Writer
- Producer
Francis Boggs is an obscure figure in the history of cinema, but an important one. It was he who brought the movies to Los Angeles in 1909 when he established a permanent L. A. film studio for the Chicago-based Selig Polyscope Company. In a four-year film career he wrote and directed nearly 200 one-reel films. Today only three are known to survive. He was also the first victim of movieland murder. Boggs was an actor, who toured mining towns in California and finally in Chicago, where he became associated with former magician and minstrel-show operator William Nicholas Selig in filmmaking. He returned to California to shoot the climactic scenes of The Count of Monte Cristo (1908) and ended up playing the lead role as well. He set up Selig's Los Angeles operation in 1909. In 1911 he was shot and killed by a mentally disturbed employee (the attack also wounded Selig) and was soon forgotten, his work eventually crumbling to dust. But Francis Boggs is as much, if not more, responsible for establishing the American film industry in California as any of the more well-known film pioneers.- Director
- Cinematographer
- Editor
William Taylor Casanova was born in 1865 in San Francisco, California, USA. William was a director and cinematographer, known for Desafio en México (1897). William died on 14 July 1912 in Orizaba, Veracruz, Mexico.- Sidney Barrington was born on 27 October 1869 in San Francisco, California, USA. He was an actor, known for The Prisoner of Zenda (1913). He was married to Minnie Belle. He died on 11 January 1913 in New York, New York, USA.
- Actress
- Writer
Florence Barker was born on November 22, 1891 in Los Angeles, California. Her father, Norman Barker, was a farmer and she had four siblings. When she was a teenager she began acting with stock companies. She fell in love with actor Joe De Grasse, who was 18 years her senior; they moved in together and he helped guide her career. In 1908 she made her film debut in D.W. Griffith's "An Awful Moment." Over the next three years she appeared in more than 50 films, including "The Course of True Love," "The Diamond Star," and "The Newlyweds" with Mary Pickford. She became one of the first American actresses to make films in Europe. About acting she said "I love the work and would advise any actress to make a try for the pictures. The work is arduous to be sure. No one ever attained success unless it was accomplished by close and concerted application." The talented young actress was signed by Powers Players in 1912. She was given leading roles in the comedies "Her Yesterday" and "The Petticoat Detective." Her performances got good reviews and her future seemed bright. She also wrote the script for her 1912 comedy "Priscilla's Comedy." While visiting her mother in early 1913 she became ill. Tragically, on February 15, 1913 she died from pneumonia at only 21 years old. She was cremated and her ashes were buried at Evergreen Cemetery in Los Angeles, California.- Actor
- Stunts
Lincoln Beachey was born on 3 March 1887 in San Francisco, California, USA. He was an actor, known for A Girl of Yesterday (1915), The Universal Boy (1914) and Niagara Falls Celebration (1911). He died on 14 March 1915 in San Francisco, California, USA.- Actor
- Writer
Elmer Booth was born on 9 December 1882 in Los Angeles, California, USA. He was an actor and writer, known for His Auto's Maiden Trip (1912), Why He Gave Up (1911) and Abe Gets Even with Father (1911). He was married to Irene Outtrim. He died on 16 June 1915 in Los Angeles, California, USA.- Jack London was the best-selling, highest paid and most popular American author of his time.
He was born John Griffith Chaney, on January 12, 1876, in San Francisco. He was raised by his mother Flora Wellman and his stepfather John London (he didn't know who his father was until his adulthood). After graduation from a grammar school he worked 12 to 18 hours a day at a cannery. Jack had a special relationship with his black foster mother, Virginia (Jenny) Prentiss. She loaned him some money and in 1891 he bought a sloop and became an oyster pirate. A few months later he joined the California Fish Patrol. In 1893 he joined the crew of a sealing schooner, bound for Japan. His first story, "Typhoon off the Coast of Japan", based on his sailing experiences, was published in November of 1893. Still unemployed, he became a tramp and hoboed around the country. In 1894 he was arrested for vagrancy and spent a month in jail, where he was a witness to "awful abysses of human degradation." His entire life, after these events, became a race to erase the traumatizing memories of his childhood and youth.
He continued his self-education at the Oakland Public Library. Among his readings were works by Gustave Flaubert and Lev Tolstoy. In 1896 he was admitted to the University of California, but after a year was forced to leave due to financial reasons. In 1897 he went to the Canadian Yukon and joined the Klondike Gold Rush. There he experienced all the hardships of uncivilized life and suffered from--among other things--severe frostbite, scurvy, malaria and dysentery. This left his health seriously impaired. London's struggles for survival inspired "To Build a Fire" (1902), which is considered his best short story. Writing became his ticket out of poverty; a way, in his words, to "sell his brains". His first marriage to Bess Maddern began as a friendship, not love, and ended 3 years later, leaving her with two daughters. His second marriage to Charmian Kittrdge, an editor, lasted until his death.
"The Call of the Wild" (1903) was his biggest success. "The Sea-Wolf" (1904) was turned into the first full-length American movie. Later came "The Iron Heel" (1908), a premonition of the Orwellian world, and the autobiographical "Martin Eden" (1909). The highest-paid writer of his time, he earned over $2 million yet he was always broke. In 1905 he bought a ranch in California, where he designed the first concrete silo in the state. His books provided operating income. He once said, "I would write a book for no other reason than to add three or four hundred acres to my magnificent estate." His ecological approach and effort to adapt the ideas of Asian sustainable agriculture was ahead of his time. In 1913 his Big House was ruined by a devastating fire and Jack was financially and mentally hurt. He built a small cottage and made big plans, but he lived only 3 more years. His 1400-acre ranch is now a National Historic Landmark, named Jack London State Historic Park. The writer's cottage was preserved by his wife Charmian, who lived there until her death in 1955.
His changing views and philosophy were often misunderstood as he grew out of his own mistakes. At one time he wrote, "I have been more stimulated by [Friedrich Nietzsche] than by any other writer in the world." Later London disregarded the "superman" theory of Nietzsche, calling himself Nietschze's "intellectual enemy." His readings of Carl Jung contributed to his complex philosophy. His other influences ranged from Rudyard Kipling and Robert Louis Stevenson to Charles Darwin, Aldous Huxley and Karl Marx. While sympathizing with the Mexican revolution in "The Mexican", he wrote differently about it when he was sent to Mexico as a reporter in 1914. By age 40, somewhat disillusioned, he resigned from the Socialist party and from various clubs. During his last years London was in extreme pain, caused by complications from kidney failure (uremia is recorded on his death certificate). He was laid to rest at his ranch according to his will: "And roll over me a red boulder from the ruins of the Big House." - Ruth Darling was born on 12 February 1893 in California, USA. She was an actress, known for Manhattan Madness (1916), Fifty-Fifty (1916) and The Hidden Woman (1922). She was married to Chester M. Franklin. She died on 11 September 1918 in San Francisco, California, USA.
- Hal August was born on 23 August 1890 in Oakland, California, USA. He was an actor, known for Into the Lion's Pit (1914), The Taint of an Alien (1914) and The Romance of an Actor (1914). He died on 21 September 1918 in Great Lakes, Illinois, USA.
- Frank Hallack was born on 29 November 1890 in Los Angeles, California, USA. He was an actor, known for An Evil of the Slums (1914), A Seaside Samaritan (1913) and The Unhappy Pair (1913). He died on 21 September 1918 in Illinois, USA.
- True Boardman was born on 21 April 1880 in Oakland, California, USA. He was an actor, known for Tarzan of the Apes (1918), Stingaree (1915) and The Further Adventures of Stingaree (1917). He was married to Virginia True Boardman. He died on 28 September 1918 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
- Myrtle Gonzalez was born on 28 September 1891 in Los Angeles, California, USA. She was an actress, known for The Level (1914), The Little Sheriff (1914) and The Chalice of Courage (1915). She was married to Allen Watt and J. Parks Jones. She died on 22 October 1918 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
- Writer
- Director
Charles Emmett van Loan was born on 29 June 1876, at San Jose, California, the son of Richard and Emma Van Loan. His father was a captain in the Salvation Army and his mother an adjutant (a rank that has since been discontinued). As young boy in San Bernardino, Charles was often called upon to beat the drum at Salvation Army functions.
Charles began as a writer for the Los Angeles Morning Herald and later the Los Angeles Examiner. In New York he worked as a sports writer on the Evening Journal and the American, before becoming associate editor for the Saturday Evening Post. When Charles left the New York American he was able to bring in his friend, Damon Runyon, to replace him as sports writer.
During his career Charles, whose passion was baseball, became known as one of America's most popular sports writers, humorist and writer of short stories. He was a prolific contributor of sports stories for leading magazines, in particular the Saturday Evening Post. According to the Philadelphia Public Ledger, Charles had the largest following of men readers of any magazine fiction writer. The Bonehead" (1911), "The Ten-Thousand Dollar Arm and Other Tales of the Big League" (1912), and "Art and the Dollar" (1919) were among his most popular stories.
Charles Emmett van Loan died of chronic nephritis on 2 March 1919, while on business trip to Abington, Pennsylvania. It was thought at the time that a broken arm suffered in an automobile accident in 1914 may have contributed to his early death. He was survived by his wife, the former Emma C. Lenz (1880-1954), a daughter Virginia and his son Richard. Charles' father collapsed and died of a heart attack upon hearing of his son's passing.- Writer
- Director
- Actor
B.F. Clinton was born on 29 June 1879 in San Francisco, California, USA. He was a writer and director, known for The Water Cure (1916), £20,000 (1916) and A Kract Affair (1916). He was married to Mrs. B.F. Clinton. He died on 18 November 1919 in New York, USA.- Norbert Maynard Cills was born on August 24th, 1887 in San Francisco County, California to Henry Cills and Mae [Saunders] Cills.
He married Maisia Felnus (born in Middleton, New York and daughter of John William Felnus and Katherine Marie [Mack] Felnus) on August 29th, 1907 in Manhattan, New York. They had a son, Henry Charles Cills, on January 13th, 1909 in Manhattan, New York.
He described himself as "tall, of medium build, with light brown hair and blue eyes" on his World War I draft registration.
He was the husband of Jean Cills at the time of his death. He died of broncho-pneumonia at St. Joseph's Hospital in San Francisco on February 20th, 1920 at the age of 32 years, 5 months, and 27 days, and buried at Holy Cross Catholic Cemetery, Colma, San Mateo County, California on February 21st, 1920. He is buried in Section M, Row 14A, Grave 36 with Marian [Saunders] Millar.
The inscription on his tombstone reads:
Oh! Beautiful life. Oh! Wonderful clay. Which God in his wisdom has taken; With breaking hearts, we lay you away Our faith in his love unshaken. - Gladys Field was born in 1889 in San Francisco, California, USA. She was an actress, known for Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1920), The Bad Man's Christmas Gift (1910) and The Railroad and the Widow (1912). She was married to John M. O'Brien. She died on 13 August 1920 in Mount Vernon, New York, USA.
- Sam Edwards was born in 1851 in San Francisco, California, USA. He was an actor, known for The Chamber Mystery (1920) and Diplomatic Flo (1914). He died on 2 May 1921 in Chicago, Illinois, USA.
- Eunice Woodruff was born on 12 December 1910 in Los Angeles, California, USA. She was an actress, known for Virtuous Sinners (1919), The Lady of Red Butte (1919) and Vive la France! (1918). She died on 15 July 1921 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
- Doris Wooldridge was born on 2 April 1892 in San Francisco, California, USA. She was an actress, known for The Unfaithful Wife (1915) and The Bondman (1916). She died on 17 July 1921 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
- Fred Starr was born in 1878 in San Francisco, California, USA. He was an actor, known for Riders of the Dawn (1920), Man of the Forest (1921) and The Lure of the Circus (1918). He died on 20 August 1921 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
- Herbert Bost was born on 2 March 1899 in Fresno, California, USA. He was an actor, known for Injustice (1919). He was married to Nancy Williams. He died on 22 August 1921 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
- Katherine Griffith was born on 30 September 1876 in San Francisco, California, USA. She was an actress, known for Tess of the D'Urbervilles (1913), Huckleberry Finn (1920) and A Little Princess (1917). She was married to Harry Griffith. She died on 17 October 1921 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
- Master Breezy Reeves Jr, born Reeves Barnes Eason, also billed as "Breezy" Eason Jr, was born in California in 1914, son of actor/film director B. (William) Reeves Eason and actress Jimsy Mayo. Handsome, cute blonde boy who starred in mostly westerns from the age of two. He was known as 'Universal's Littlest Cowboy' until he was hit by a truck at the age of six while riding his bike to a music lesson near his home at 6200 Fountain Avenue in Los Angeles. He never regained consciousness and died of his injuries after surgery at California Hospital.
- John Crockett grew up around horses, and was working on a ranch in the San Joaquin Valley as a "horse breaker" before joining the Los Angeles County Police Department as a patrolman in late 1919. His tenure as a policeman was short-lived, as he was subsequently discharged from the position in October of 1921 for being absent without leave for a period of several days.
- California Truman was born on 22 November 1848 in California, USA. He was an actor, known for Who Cares? (1919). He died on 5 April 1922 in California, USA.
- Actor
- Writer
Frank Bacon was born on 16 January 1864 in Marysville, California, USA. He was an actor and writer, known for Lightnin' (1925), Lightnin' (1930) and The Magnavox Theater (1950). He was married to Jane Jennie Weidman (actress). He died on 19 November 1922 in Chicago, Illinois, USA.- George Hernandez was born on 6 June 1863 in Placerville, California, USA. He was an actor, known for Just Out of College (1920), The White Medicine Man (1911) and Making a Man of Him (1911). He was married to Anna Dodge. He died on 31 December 1922 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
- Actor
- Director
- Writer
Edwin Stevens was born on 16 August 1860 in San Francisco, California, USA. He was an actor and director, known for The Boy Girl (1917), Love Insurance (1919) and The Little Minister (1921). He was married to Louise Weller. He died on 3 January 1923 in Los Angeles, California, USA.- Additional Crew
John J. Gleason was born in 1872 in California, USA. He is known for The Giants-White Sox Tour (1914), Our Mutual Girl (1914) and Our Mutual Girl, No. 10 (1914). He died on 12 March 1923 in New York City, New York, USA.- Gus Pixley was born in November 1879 in San Francisco, California, USA. He was an actor, known for An 'Uncle Tom's Cabin' Troupe (1913), The Girl from Porcupine (1921) and The Hungarian Nabob (1915). He was married to Mary Malatesta. He died on 2 June 1923 in Saranac Lake, New York, USA.
- Stunts
- Actor
Beverly Homer DeLay, known as B.H. DeLay, was an innovator and a aviator actor of French descent. He was born on August 12, 1892 in the Oakland bay area of California. DeLay was also an engineer educated at the University of California as well as the prestigious, centuries old University of Heidelberg in Germany.
B.H. DeLay's company performed at least half a dozen stunt firsts for the movies, including the first change from plane to train and train to plane. Another DeLay first was from saddle to plane, as well as auto to plane. "Daredevil" DeLay was the first to knock down a building with a plane on screen too.
B.H. DeLay managed Ince Airfield (of the director and producer, Thomas Ince, well known for inventing the motion picture studio system) before owning it himself. DeLay was involved with over 50 motion pictures, including westerns, comedies and dramas. He acted and performed aerials with Ruth Roland, Oliver Hardy, Larry Semon, Al St. John, Helen Holmes, Viola Dana, Warner Oland, Thomas Ince, Al Wilson, Frank Clarke, Ormer Locklear and many other notables.
He conducted a movie stunt pilot training school at his airfield in Venice. DeLay worked with over 25 motion picture companies including the original Warner Bros, Pathé, Vitagraph, Astra, Universal, and Fox.
DeLay was only 30 when he died in a sabotaged plane crash performing in front of crowds of thousands at Ocean Park on the 4th of July in 1923. He was in the middle of a loop-the-loop in his plane, the "Wasp", when the wings folded back; barreling him nose first into the earth. The plane burst into flames shortly after he was pulled from the wreckage. Pins in his wings were found to be a substandard size of only 3/8 of an inch, rather than 1/2 or 3/4, indicating wing tampering. Several headlines from Venice and other Los Angeles newspapers state that DeLay was murdered through sabotage while performing on 4th of July, 1923. It remains an unsolved murder mystery.
Not only was B.H. DeLay an innovator, he was a humanitarian who frequently organized and performed in aviation or actor benefits for individuals and organizations in need.- Actor
Lee Glowner was born on 21 October 1866 in California, USA. He was an actor. He died on 9 July 1923 in California, USA.- Actor
- Director
- Writer
Born in San Francisco's Castro District, Allen Holubar was the first of five children of Constantin Josef Holubar and Margaret Allen C. Holubar, who immigrated from Bohemia in 1875 and married Margaret, a Scots woman, in San Francisco (Allen was born at 44 Caselli Ave. in a house that still stands). Despite parental pressures to be a machinist, Allen worked his way up from sweeping floors to acting, starting at the Alcazar & Alhambra Theatres in San Francisco. He was evidently a prominent dramatic actor, known widely across the US from 1908-1912. However, in the words of a San Francisco newspaper at the time, "He forsook legitimate drama for the moving picture screen" in 1913. After starring in several landmark films, he began directing and was one of Carl Laemmle's first directors at Universal Pictures. Later, after having differences with Laemmle, he founded his own production company, Allen Holubar Pictures, in 1917.
As an up-and-coming producer, he was famous for being the first to coordinate a movie shoot (Hurricane's Gal (1922)) using radio. In the words of a local paper, "Mr. Holubar has successfully performed the unprecedented task of using the wireless waves to direct the movements of an airship, a destroyer and a schooner, maneuvering all of these within his camera's range as he supervised these activities from a hydroplane far above."
He died of postoperative complications from gallstone surgery at the height of his career in 1923. His wife, the former actress Dorothy Phillips, did not act again until the mid-'60s, when she played an old woman in Cat Ballou (1965), starring Lee Marvin and Jane Fonda.- James Kyrle MacCurdy was born on 20 May 1875 in Stockton, California, USA. James Kyrle was a writer, known for Broken Hearts of Broadway (1923) and A Little Girl in a Big City (1925). James Kyrle was married to Kate Woods Fiske. James Kyrle died on 5 December 1923 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
- Don Likes was born on 1 July 1895 in San Diego, California, USA. He was an actor, known for Sandy (1918), A Phantom Husband (1917) and Wooden Shoes (1917). He died on 22 December 1923 in California, USA.
- Frank Hayes was born on 17 May 1871 in San Francisco, California, USA. He was an actor, known for Vanity Fair (1923), A Hoosier Romance (1918) and After His Own Heart (1919). He was married to Lottie Harriet Ward Christensen Kemp (maiden name: Ward). He died on 28 December 1923 in Hollywood, California, USA.
- Alma Belwin was born on 19 August 1893 in San Francisco, California, USA. She was an actress, known for The Ivory Snuff Box (1915). She died on 8 May 1924 in Boston, Massachusetts, USA.
- Writer
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Carlyle Moore was born on 17 June 1875 in Oakland, California, USA. He was a writer and assistant director, known for Stop Thief (1920), Stop Thief! (1915) and The Unknown Purple (1923). He was married to Ethelyn Palmer. He died on 26 June 1924 in Milford, New Jersey, USA.- Frances Burnham was born on 19 April 1895 in Los Angeles, California, USA. She was an actress, known for The Love Thief (1916), Who's Your Servant? (1920) and The Price Woman Pays (1919). She was married to Noble Warren Sheldon. She died on 10 July 1924 in Monrovia, California, USA.
- Frank Chance was born on 9 September 1877 in Fresno, California, USA. He was married to Edythe L. Chance. He died on 15 September 1924 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
- Jimmy Murphy was born on 12 September 1894 in San Francisco, California, USA. He died on 15 September 1924 in Syracuse, New York, USA.
- Ben Deeley, also known as J. Bernard Deeley and N. Bernard Deeley, according to various sources, grew up in Folsom, California. As a teenager, he competed to sign up 100 subscribers to the Sacramento Bee, which would earn him a free bicycle. He entered vaudeville in the 1900s, appearing in several blackface acts. For sixteen years, he wore blackface as the title character in an act entitled "The New Bell Boy." He also wrote the lyrics to several songs, including "The Alamo Rag" and "We've Kept the Golden Rule." Deeley entered films in 1914, beginning with comedy shorts. In early 1924, he returned to vaudeville, again in a blackface act.
He met his first wife, Maria Wayne, while doing vaudeville in Los Angeles. But they separated, and Wayne entered films. Deeley divorced her in Chicago, citing abandonment. He had already met actress Barbara La Marr, and they had appeared in a vaudeville act together. He married La Marr in New Jersey in 1918. But this marriage was also doomed. La Marr had married Philip Ainsworth in 1916, but they soon sued each other for divorce. Ainsworth was then sent to San Quentin, after passing bad checks. Eight months later, La Marr married Deeley. La Marr then contended her marriage to Deeley was not legal since she had not lived a year in Illinois. They separated, and La Marr filed for divorce, but eventually dropped the suit. She then sought an annulment, which was granted in 1920. Things got worse for Deeley when an attorney, Herman Roth, was arrested on extortion charges. The lawyer had threatened La Marr, telling her he planned to amend a divorce complaint he had filed on behalf of Deeley so as to include seven names of prominent film personalities (including Roscoe Arbuckle) as correspondents. Before these issues could be straightened out, Deeley died of double pneumonia in Los Angeles, on September 23, 1924. He was 46. - Lawrence Katzenberg was born on 12 February 1883 in California, USA. He was an actor, known for Rule G (1915). He died on 29 October 1924 in San Joaquin, California, USA.
- Baby Corrigan was born on 4 November 1915 in Los Angeles, California, USA. She was an actress, known for Her Soul's Song (1916). She died on 27 December 1924 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
- Virginia Richdale Kerrigan was born on 4 November 1915 in Los Angeles, California, USA. She was an actress, known for Good and Evil (1916). She died on 27 December 1924 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
- Actor
- Director
- Writer
George Field was born on 18 March 1877 in San Francisco, California, USA. He was an actor and director, known for Blood and Sand (1922), Young Wild West's Mexican Mix-Up (1912) and Young Wild West Cornered by Apaches (1912). He was married to Winifred Greenwood. He died on 9 March 1925 in California, USA.- Brownie Brownell was born on 8 July 1886 in Santa Rosa, California, USA. She was an actress, known for Jewel (1915), The Phantom Fortune (1915) and Luke Wins Ye Ladye Faire (1917). She died on 18 March 1925 in Shanghai, China.
- Director
- Actor
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Ray Grey was born on 19 February 1890 in San Diego, California, USA. He was a director and actor, known for Down on the Farm (1920), Loose Change (1922) and Stand Pat (1922). He was married to Florence Anna Pauly. He died on 18 April 1925 in Glendale, California, USA.