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Let Freedom Ring (1939 Film)
''Let Freedom Ring'' is a 1939 in Sepiatone Western directed by Jack Conway, starring Nelson Eddy and Virginia Bruce. Plot The railroad is coming to Clover City. Railway owner Jim Knox ( Edward Arnold) wants to increase his profit by purchasing more than just the right of way for his railroad. He wants the surrounding land and he is willing to use illegal methods to get what he wants. When Pop Wilkie (George 'Gabby' Hayes) refuses to sell, his home is burned to the ground. Witnesses are willing to testify that Knox's employee, Gagan (Trevor Bardette), started the fire but when the case is taken to the local court, Judge Bronson (Guy Kibbee), loyal to Knox, dismisses the charges. Farmer Thomas Logan (Lionel Barrymore) also refuses to sell. Logan is expecting his son Steve (Nelson Eddy), a recent graduate of Harvard Law School, to fight for the rights of the farmers of Clover City. Knox visits Logan at his farm and while everyone is busy in the house, Gagan goes to the barn to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jack Conway (filmmaker)
Hugh Ryan "Jack" Conway (July 17, 1887 – October 11, 1952) was an American film director and film producer, as well as an actor of many films in the first half of the 20th century. Biography He was born as Hugh Ryan Conway, on July 17, 1887, in Graceville, Minnesota, USA. Conway started out as an actor, joining a repertory theater group straight out of high school. He then moved into films, and in 1911, became a member of D.W. Griffith's stock company, appearing primarily in Westerns. Four years later, he made his mark as a director and gained valuable experience at Universal (1916–17 and 1921–23), before moving on to MGM in 1925. He remained there until 1948, often helming prestige assignments featuring the studio's top male star, Clark Gable: ''Boom Town'' (1940), ''Honky Tonk'' (1941), and ''The Hucksters'' (1947) – all solid box-office hits. Conway was one of a team of MGM contract directors, who forsook any pretense to a specific individual style in favor of work ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Guy Kibbee
Guy Bridges Kibbee (March 6, 1882 – May 24, 1956) was an American stage and film actor. Early years Kibbee was born in El Paso, Texas. His father was editor of the '' El Paso Herald-Post'' newspaper, and Kibbee learned how to set type at age 7. At the age of 14, he ran away to join a traveling show. His younger brother was actor Milton Kibbee. Career Kibbee began his entertainment career on Mississippi riverboats. He became an actor in traveling stock companies. He began to lose his hair at 19. In his early days on stage, he was a romantic leading man. In 1930, he made his debut on Broadway in the play ''Torch Song'', which won acclaim in New York and attracted the interest of Hollywood. Shortly afterwards, Paramount Pictures signed Kibbee, and he moved to California. He later became part of Warner Bros.'s stock company, contract actors who cycled through different productions in supporting roles. Kibbee's specialty was daft and jovial characters; he is perhaps best rememb ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Oh! Susanna
"Oh! Susanna" is a minstrel song by Stephen Foster (1826–1864), first published in 1848. It is among the most popular American songs ever written. Members of the Western Writers of America chose it as one of the Top 100 Western songs of all time. Background In 1846, Stephen Foster moved to Cincinnati, Ohio, and became a bookkeeper with his brother's steamship company. While in Cincinnati, Foster wrote "Oh! Susanna", possibly for his men's social club. The song was first performed by a local quintet at a concert in Andrews' Eagle Ice Cream Saloon in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, on September 11, 1847. It was first published by W. C. Peters & Co. in Cincinnati in 1848. Blackface minstrel troupes performed the work, and, as was common at the time, many registered the song for copyright under their own names. As a result, it was copyrighted and published at least twenty-one times from February 25, 1848, through February 14, 1851. Foster earned just $100 ($ in 2016 dollars) for the so ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Yankee Doodle
"Yankee Doodle" is a traditional song and nursery rhyme, the early versions of which predate the Seven Years' War and American Revolution. It is often sung patriotically in the United States today. It is the state anthem of Connecticut. Its Roud Folk Song Index number is 4501. The melody is thought to be much older than both the lyrics and the subject, going back to folk songs of Medieval Europe. Origin The tune of "Yankee Doodle" is thought to be much older than the lyrics, being well known across western Europe, including England, France, Netherlands, Hungary, and Spain. Johnson, Helen Kendrick The melody of the song may have originated from an Irish tune "All the way to Galway" in which the second strain is identical to Yankee Doodle. The earliest words of "Yankee Doodle" came from a Middle Dutch harvest song which is thought to have followed the same tune, possibly dating back as far as 15th-century Holland. It contained mostly nonsensical words in English and Dutch: "Ya ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Emory Parnell
Emory Parnell (December 29, 1892 – June 22, 1979) was an American vaudeville performer and actor who appeared in over 250 films in his 36-year career. Early years Born in St. Paul, Minnesota, Parnell trained as a musician at Morningside College, a Methodist institution in Sioux City, Iowa. He spent eight months in the Arctic in 1929, looking for gold in that area's wastelands. He also worked as a telegrapher. Music Parnell spent his early years as a concert violinist. He performed on the Chautauqua and Lyceum circuits until 1930, when he relocated to Detroit, Michigan, to narrate and act in commercial and industrial films. A 1923 newspaper article described an upcoming Lyceum performance of "Emory Parnell, the one man band," saying that Parnell "plays an accordion, the snare drum and base icdrum, all at the same time." During part of the Chautauqua years, Parnell had a family act that included his wife. In 1970, she recalled, " covered every state as well as Canada, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Luis Alberni
Luis Alberni (October 4, 1886 – December 23, 1962) was a Spanish-born American character actor of stage and films. Early years Alberni was born in Barcelona, Spain, on October 4, 1886. He acted in stock theater for four years in Marseille before he went back to Barcelona, earned a BA degree, and studied law. Career Alberni was acting in Bordeaux when American humorist Wilson Mizner and playwright Paul Armstrong invited him to come to the United States, offering their help. In April 1912, he sailed to New York City as a steerage passenger aboard the S/S ''Nieuw Amsterdam''. In New York, Alberni acted on both stage and screen. His first motion picture performance was in the 1915 Jewish drama, '' Children of the Ghetto''. On the stage, he appeared in more than a dozen Broadway plays between 1915 and 1928, including ''39 East'', ''Dreams for Sale'' and the original production of ''What Price Glory?'' in 1924–1925. In the sound film era, he had notable roles as Jacopo in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lionel Royce
Lionel Royce (born Leon Moriz Reiss; March 30, 1891 – April 1, 1946) was an Austrian-American actor of stage and screen, also known during his European career as Leo Reuss. He began his career in theater in Vienna, Austria, in 1919, before moving to Berlin in 1925. Being Jewish, his work began to be restricted in the 1930s in Nazi Germany. Fleeing the Nazis he returned to Austria in 1936, where to hide his heritage, he created the persona of Kaspar Brandhofer, a Tyrolian peasant, and became a sensation as a natural actor on the stage in Vienna. When he admitted his ruse, he became blacklisted in Austria, after which he emigrated to the United States in 1937. He had an active film career in the United States, appearing in almost 40 films between 1938 and 1946. While on tour with the USO, he died in Manila in 1946. Early life He was born in the city of Dolyna, in what is now Ukraine, to Jewish parents. In 1913 he entered the Academy of Music and Performing Arts in Vienna. At ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Billy Bevan
Billy Bevan (born William Bevan Harris, 29 September 1887 – 26 November 1957) was an Australian-born vaudevillian, who became an American film actor. He appeared in more than 250 American films between 1916 and 1950. Career Bevan was born in the country town of Orange, New South Wales, Australia. He went on the stage at an early age, traveled to Sydney and spent eight years in Australian light opera, performing as Willie Bevan. He sailed to America with the Pollard’s Lilliputian Opera Company in 1912, and later toured Canada. Bevan broke into films with the Sigmund Lubin studio in 1916. When the company disbanded, Bevan became a supporting actor in Mack Sennett movie comedies. An expressive pantomimist Pantomime (; informally panto) is a type of musical comedy stage production designed for family entertainment. It was developed in England and is performed throughout the United Kingdom, Ireland and (to a lesser extent) in other English-speaking ..., Bevan's quiet sc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Eddie Dunn (actor)
Edward Frank Dunn (March 31, 1896 – May 5, 1951) was an American actor best known for his roles in comedy films, supporting many comedians such as Charley Chase (with whom he co-directed several short films), Charlie Chaplin, W. C. Fields and Laurel and Hardy. Dunn was born in Brooklyn, New York. As a high school student in Waco, Texas, he began performing with some fellow students on a local radio station. He broke into films with the Vitagraph studio in 1915, working with the studio's star comedians Mr. and Mrs. Sidney Drew and Larry Semon. By 1927 he was working with stop-motion animator Charley Bowers at Educational Pictures, as a supporting player in Bowers's live-action comedies. In 1929 his career took a decided turn for the better when he signed with the Hal Roach studio. He became a member of the Roach stock company, appearing prominently in short subjects and featurettes starring Laurel and Hardy, Thelma Todd, and Charley Chase. Dunn and Chase worked so closely that ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sarah Padden
Sarah Ann Padden (16 October 1881 – 4 December 1967) was an English-born American theatre and film character actress. She performed on stage in the early 20th century. Her best-known single-act performance was in ''The Clod'', a stage production in which she played an uneducated woman who lived on a farm during the American Civil War. Early life Born in England to an Irish immigrant father, Michael Padden, and an English mother, the family emigrated to the United States on the S/S ''Ohio'' from England passing through the Port of Philadelphia in 1889. The future actress took part in recitations in the Catholic school she attended in Chicago, where her fellow students enjoyed her talent as a mimic. Her parents wanted her to enter a convent, but a liberal-minded priest, Father Dorney, encouraged her ambition to become an actress. He assisted her in obtaining her first stage role, a theatrical featuring Otis Skinner.''Sarah Padden's Start'', New York Times, December 17, 191 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Louis Jean Heydt
Louis Jean Heydt (April 17, 1903 – January 29, 1960) was an American character actor in film, television and theatre, most frequently seen in hapless, ineffectual, or fall guy roles. Early life Heydt was born in 1903 (not 1905, as many sources have it) in Montclair, New Jersey, the son of German parents George Frederick Heydt, a jeweler and the secretary and executor for Louis Comfort Tiffany, and the former Emma Foerster.''The New York Times'', August 18, 1928 He was educated at Montclair High School, Worcester Academy. and Dartmouth College, graduating from the latter in 1926. He initially wanted to be a journalist and worked as a reporter for ''The New York World''. Career Stage Heydt received his start in the theatre while visiting a classmate backstage while ''The Trial of Mary Dugan'' was in rehearsal. As an actual reporter, he caught the attention of the producers and was offered the role of a reporter in the play. He made his stage debut therein and went on to a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
My Country, 'Tis Of Thee
"America (My Country, 'Tis of Thee)" is an American patriotic song, the lyrics of which were written by Samuel Francis Smith. The song served as one of the ''de facto'' national anthems of the United States (along with songs like "Hail, Columbia") before the adoption of "The Star-Spangled Banner" as the official U.S. national anthem in 1931. The melody used is the same as that of the national anthem of the United Kingdom, "God Save the King". History Samuel Francis Smith wrote the lyrics to "America" in 1831 while a student at the Andover Theological Seminary in Andover, Massachusetts. The use of the same melody as the British royal anthem can be described as a contrafactum which reworks this symbol of British monarchy to make a statement about American democracy. Well-known composer Lowell Mason had requested that Smith translate or provide new lyrics for a collection of German songs, among them one written to this melody. Smith gave Mason the lyrics he had written, and the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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