Clark Gable: Hollywood Goes to War

So you never became a soccer star, but you could still show out during the FIFA World Cup 2022 with cool soccer swag from Frito-Lay, the official USA snack of the FIFA World Cup 2022. Add your picture to the Golden World Soccer Ball, then pass the ball to fellow fans for a chance to score custom swag. Scan the QR code on specially marked bags of Leis, Cheetos or Doritos or visit fritolayscore.com to join the Pass the Ball Challenge. No purchase necessary.

Open to legal residence at 50 USDC. 18 Plus C rules at Fritolayscore.com When the world gets in the way of your music, try the new Bose QuietComfort Earbuds 2. Next-gen earbuds uniquely tuned to the shape of your ears. They use exclusive Bose technology that personalizes the audio performance to fit you, delivering the world's best noise cancellation and powerfully immersive sound so you can hear and feel every detail of the music you love. Bose QuietComfort Earbuds 2. Sound shape to you.

To learn more, visit Bose.com. This is Lee Habib and this is Our American Stories and we tell stories about everything here on this show. From the arts to sports and from business to history and everything in between, including your stories, send them to OurAmericanStories.com.

They're some of our favorites. Clark Gable was a Hollywood star and among the most famous figures in the world when two events altered his life. One of those events was the Japanese sneak attack on Pearl Harbor. He sent a telegram to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt asking for a role in the war effort.

The President replied, stay where you are. Gable didn't. Here to tell the story is Roger McGrath and Roger has appeared on numerous History Channel documentaries and is a regular contributor here on Our American Stories.

Here's McGrath. Clark Gable was known as the king of Hollywood. He appeared in more than 60 movies over a span of 37 years. He won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his role in It Happened One Night, the big hit of 1934. He was nominated for Best Actor two more times. He made the famous top 10 money-making stars list 16 times from 1932 through 1955. From 1934 through 1939, he ranked number two four times. In 1939, he starred as Rhett Butler in Gone with the Wind, the greatest film of the era.

During the depths of the Great Depression, MGM paid him $7,500 a week, equivalent to $150,000 a week today, whether or not he was making a movie. His leading ladies were a who's who of female stars. Before World War II, they included Jean Harlow, Carol Lombard, Joan Crawford, Claudette Colbert, Myrna Loy, Loretta Young, Jeanette McDonald, Vivian Lee, Rosalind Russell, and Lana Turner.

After the war, they included Barbara Stanwyck, Debra Carr, Eva Gardner, Jean Tierney, Sophia Loren, and Marilyn Monroe. Born William Clark Gable at home in February 1901 in Cadiz, Ohio, Gable is German on his father's side and German and Irish on his mother's. His parents come from farm families, but the father becomes a wildcat oil driller.

The mother dotes on her infant son, but she dies when he's only 10 months old. Gable is taken to be raised by a maternal uncle and his wife on their farm. They have no children of their own and love the little Gable boy so much they want to adopt him. Gable's father refuses to allow it, thinking he will soon remarry. Two years later, the father does remarry and takes his now three-year-old son back.

The new wife can't have children of her own and devotes herself to the large for his age boy. Young Gable is rambunctious and loves the outdoors, especially when his father takes him hunting and fishing. Gable also spends each summer back on the uncle farm until he's 12 years old. From then on, he is full-time jobs during the summer, usually driving wagons and delivering goods. By the time Clark Gable is 16 years old, he reaches his full height of six foot one and is 180 pounds of muscle, bone, and sinew. He is his high school baseball team's home run hitter. His towering drives land and cow pastures well beyond the outfield. Gable doesn't return to school for his senior year though.

The United States enters the great war in Europe and manpower shortages begin to appear. Gable gets a job on the production line at the Firestone Tire Plant in Akron. Akron tire plants are running around the clock and the town's population grows to more than 200,000. Gable is in the big city and life is at a pace he has never experienced. It's in Akron that Gable is bitten by the acting bug. He attends a play at the Akron Music Hall and is captivated by the theme and the performances. I clapped my hands until my palms were sore, Gable later said.

I'd never seen anything as wonderful in my life, which I guess had been pretty drab up until then. Whenever he can, Gable is at the music hall. He volunteers to be a call boy, which entails notifying actors in their dressing rooms when it's their time to go on stage. He watches and makes careful mental notes of everything. His enthusiasm is evident to everyone. When an actor playing a household servant suddenly takes sick, Gable is sick.

Gable is given the opportunity to replace him, said Gable. I had one line, your cab is here, madam. I thought I'd die while I was waiting to go on. When I didn't fall on my face, I thought I was an actor. It was all over then as far as my future was concerned.

I never wanted to be anything else. With the end of the war and the sharp cut back on production, Akron falls on hard times. Many lose their jobs, including Gable. He struggles on with odd jobs for another year before leaving and joining his father, who is wild cat drilling in Oklahoma. His father finds him a job as an apprentice tool dresser, swinging a 16 pound sledgehammer to sharpen the cutting edges of drilling bits. After six months of daily 12 hour shifts, his muscles are bulging and he weighs 205 pounds. Even among the rugged oil field workers, Gable stands out.

Tired of swinging a sledgehammer, Gable gets a job in an oil refinery, but the work is just as rugged, said Gable. I was part of an eight man gang that cleaned out the sludge, which was almost like asphalt from stills and storage tanks as soon as they were emptied. The interior temperature and oil fumes were so terrific that only one man would go in at a time with a rope around his waist in case he passed out. Working with a pick and shovel, you could only tolerate it for about two minutes.

So you are in and out every 16 minutes throughout the 12 hour shift. I saw lots of men get a little hysterical. They started to laugh and I had to be hauled out and sent home. And you're listening to Roger McGrath to pick the early life of actor Clark Gable. And what a life when we come back. More of the story of Clark Gable here on Our American Stories. Lee Habib here, the host of Our American Stories. Every day on this show, we're bringing inspiring stories from across this great country. Stories from our big cities and small towns.

But we truly can't do the show without you. Our stories are free to listen to, but they're not free to make. If you love what you hear, go to our American stories.com and click the donate button. Give a little, give a lot.

Go to our American stories.com and give. From New York to the CW app and CWTV.com on December 9th. When the world gets in the way of your music, try the new Bose QuietComfort Earbuds 2. Next gen earbuds uniquely tuned to the shape of your ears. They use exclusive Bose technology that personalizes the audio performance to fit you. Delivering the world's best noise cancellation and powerfully immersive sound. So you can hear and feel every detail of the music you love. Bose QuietComfort Earbuds 2, sound shape to you.

To learn more, visit Bose.com. Hey, there's a better way to fly. Instead of being stuck in endless lines and packed onto planes, try simplifying your travel with Surf Air. Save an average of two hours on every trip and avoid crowded airports with a new way to fly private. With Surf Air, you'll fly from smaller airports closer to your home. There are no lines, no waiting and no stress. Surfair.com, the best alternative to commercial air travel that makes flying easy. Get a free quote on your next flight at SurfAir.com.

There's a better way to fly private. And we continue with our American stories and you're listening to Roger McGrath, who also happens to be the author of Gunfighters, Highwaymen and Vigilantes, Violence on the Frontier. And McGrath has done countless hours on the West with us.

And you can just Google his name on our search bar on our website. And you'll hear so many beautiful and good and compelling stories by McGrath. And by the way, Greg Hengler, who's also the producer on this piece, studied on McGrath when he was in college.

And McGrath is one of the great history teachers at UCLA. Now let's return to McGrath and the story of Clark Gable. When Gable turns 21, he comes in a small inheritance from his mother's side of the family.

It's enough money to quit the oil fields and pursue acting. His father explodes when Gable tells him he's leaving. They almost come to blows and vowed never to see each other again. For two years, Gable's on the road with a traveling tent show playing minor roles. The show gets stranded in Butte, Montana in a terrible blizzard, which forces the cancellation of the rest of its tour. Another member of the show tells Gable he has relatives in Oregon who might have work for them. The two hop a freight train and arrive in Oregon half frozen, hungry and broke. Gable finds a job at a lumber mill unloading logs from delivery trucks.

He eventually earns enough money to make his way to Portland. In Oregon's big city, he strings wire for a telephone company, is briefly engaged to actress Frances Dorfler, and appears on stage with the Astoria Players. Gable's life changes dramatically when he meets Josephine Dillon, a former Broadway actress who is opening an acting studio in Portland. Within weeks, Gable is not only Dillon's star student, but also living with her. He is 23 and she is 39.

However, the relationship is not sexual. Dillon is fascinated by the prospect of turning Clark Gable, who she sees as a diamond in the rough, and is the only woman in her life to come into the rough into not just a good actor, but a star. After a year of working with Gable, often to the neglect of her other students, Dillon decides to relocate to Los Angeles and establishes an acting studio in Hollywood. Gable arrives in Hollywood no longer an awkward novice, but a fairly competent actor. He also has acquired a degree of refinement and sophistication along with his natural personal charm.

To avoid scandal concerning the relationship, Gable and Dillon agree to a marriage of convenience. For the next several years, Gable appears in minor roles in movies, but in ever greater roles in the theater. He goes on the road with several different productions, and it's here he hones his acting chops until critics begin to take notice of them. He plays a great variety of characters, from a big city newspaper reporter to an innocent naive sailor to a ruthless gangster.

He even sings and dances in a musical comedy. After his performance as the male lead in Eugene O'Neill's Pulitzer Prize-winning play Anna Christie, a critic says of Gable, he took the spotlight early in the play and threw the character's ready wit and wisdom kept the audience in an uproar from the opening scene to the final curtain. Rave reviews confirm Gable's progress as an actor, but something else is happening that portends his future stardom.

Dozens of women are at the stage door waiting for him to leave the theater at each of his appearances. Clark Gable's first significant movie role comes in the Painted Desert, released in 1931. By the end of 1931, he appears in 10 more films and moves from supporting roles to leading man. 1932 sees Gable as the male lead in four major motion pictures.

His leading ladies are the greatest female stars of the day. He's making 2,000 a week, something like 40,000 a week today, and the nation is in the depths of the Great Depression. His star continues to rise through 1933 and 34, and his salary is doubled.

It will double again. His movies are box office and critical successes, especially It Happened One Night, which wins five Academy Awards, including Best Picture. Gable wins the Oscar for Best Actor. Secretaries find it difficult to keep up with his fan mail, and his hit movies continue. China Seas, Call of the Wild, Mutiny on the Bounty, San Francisco, Test Pilot, Too Hot to Handle, Gone with the Wind.

Women, money, cars, homes are his. Clark Gable is the king of Hollywood. In 1939, Gable marries the love of his life, Carole Lombard. He continues to star in movies, and so too does Lombard, until the Japanese sneak attack on Pearl Harbor throws the United States into World War II.

A patriot, Lombard raises money for the war by going on a bond tour. On a return to Los Angeles, though, the plane she is on crashes into a mountain in Nevada, with the loss of all on board. Devastated, Gable spends weeks swilling whiskey, but sobers up and completes a movie for MGM. Against the strong objections of the studio bosses, the 41-year-old king of Hollywood now enlists as a private in the Army Air Corps. I don't want to sell bonds, declares Gable.

I don't want to make speeches, and I don't want to entertain. I just want to be sent where the going is tough. Because of his age, commanding presence, and experience, Gable is accepted for officer's candidate school. He's ordered to report to a camp at Miami, Florida for a 13-week officer's course. He travels by train, and wherever the train stops, women by the hundreds are there waiting. When Gable asks to change trains in New Orleans, a crowd of 5,000 female fans makes it impossible for him to catch his connecting train.

He arrives in Miami a day late. For all his heavy smoking and drinking, Gable's in excellent condition, as build and prowess impress the other candidates. But most of them keep their distance, thinking Gable must have an awfully high opinion of himself. Sensing the tension, Gable removes his false teeth and waves them at the other men. Look at the king of Hollywood, he says.

Sure looks like the jack now, doesn't he? Everyone laughs, and Gable is suddenly just one of the guys. Physically, Gable sails through OCS, outperforming men half his age. Academically, a high school dropout struggles until he decides to treat classroom material like a movie script.

While other candidates are sleeping at night, he sits in a lighted latrine and memorizes page after page of subject matter until he can recite the material. He finishes OCS in the middle of the morning, and then he finishes OCS in the top one quarter of his class, and at the request of the other candidates, delivers the graduation address. After commissioning, Gable spends several more months training at gunnery schools. Having spent years hunting and shooting skeet, he excels as a gunner and is promoted to first lieutenant by the end of January 1943. There's no question that Gable will be a top aerial gunner, but the war department and the army also want him to make training films with footage from actual combat. And you're listening to a heck of a story about the biggest star in the world at the time, and at the age of 41 after suffering perhaps the greatest loss of his life, the love of his life, in lists. I don't want to raise no money for bonds, I want to go where the going is tough. When we come back, more of this remarkable story, a story of sacrifice, a story of love of country.

And at 41, the story of Clark Gable continues here on Our American Stories. When the world gets in the way of your music, try the new Bose QuietComfort Earbuds 2, next-gen earbuds uniquely tuned to the shape of your ears. They use exclusive Bose technology that personalizes the audio performance to fit you, delivering the world's best noise cancellation and powerfully immersive sound, so you can hear and feel every detail of the music you love. Bose QuietComfort Earbuds 2, soundshaped to you.

To learn more, visit Bose.com. Imagine air travel that's simple, hassle-free, and fast. That's Surf Air. Save hours on every trip, avoid busy, crowded terminals, and fly from airports closer to your home. No crowds, no long lines, no stress. With Surf Air's private flights, you're in control of your travel day, not the other way around. SurfAir.com, the most convenient way to fly. Get a free quote on your next flight at SurfAir.com.

There's a better way to fly private. And we continue with our American stories and the story of Clark Gable and his military service in World War II. We've heard about the man, his life, and my goodness, all of the tough work he did prepared him for, well, the physical nature of war, the psychological nature of war. Well, that's another thing.

Let's pick up where we last left off. Here's Roger McGrath. After more training, Gable is deployed with the 351st Bomb Group to Polebrook, England, some 80 miles north of London. His arrival in April 1943 is first announced by German radio broadcasts, which say he will be welcomed in Germany when his plane is shot down. Hitler has a large collection of American films, and as stated more than once, his favorite Hollywood actor is Clark Gable. German Air Minister Hermann Göring announces that any pilot who shoots down Gable's plane will receive the equivalent of $5,000, something like $100,000 today. If Gable survives the shoot-down and is captured, the German pilot will also be promoted and given a paid vacation. Exactly how many combat missions Clark Gable flies is not known because he is not a regular crew member for any particular bomber, but simply climbs aboard whenever he can to shoot aerial footage or serve as a replacement for a wounded real gunner. The logbooks record Gable on five missions, but he probably flies more than 20. His commanding officer, Colonel William Hatcher, says, let damn fool insist on being a rear gunner on every mission.

Gable's first officially recorded combat mission comes in May 1943. He's aboard a B-17 on a bombing raid targeting factories in German-occupied Belgium. Besides filming, he also serves as a gunner.

Not wanting to diminish his dexterity for camera work, he wears white leather gloves and suffers frostbite. Two B-17s are shot down and others sustained damage. His second mission takes him to a German airfield in France, but clouds are obscuring the target and the B-17s cannot drop their bombs. German fighters, though, come up through the clouds to attack the American bombers.

Several sustained damage, but none are lost. Gable's third mission targets chemical plants in German-occupied Norway. It's the longest flight for the Eighth Air Force yet. Two B-17s suffer damage from flak.

His fourth mission is almost his last. The target is a synthetic oil plant in Germany's Ruhr Valley. In a massive air raid by several bomb groups, 300 planes participate. Twenty-five American bombers are shot down and double that number badly damaged.

Many men are killed or wounded. In the midst of the battle, Gable wedges himself behind the top turret gunner to film German fighters as they make passes at the American bomber, which is named Ain't It Gruesome. Bursts of machine gun fire rip into the B-17 and then a 20 millimeter shell comes up through the top turret but miraculously doesn't explode. The shell rips through the heel of Gable's boot and then misses his head by inches. Although shot full of holes, Ain't It Gruesome makes it back to base. When reporters see Gable with a mangled boot and ask him how it happened, Gable says, I didn't know it happened.

I didn't know anything about it until we had dropped 11,000 feet and could get off oxygen and look around. Only then did I see the hole in the turret. Gable's next mission targets a shipping port used by the Germans on the coast of France.

The American bombers are jumped by German fighters and suffer extensive damage. When the nose gunner in Gable's B-17 is wounded, Gable takes his place. Between missions, Gable heads to the MGM offices in London and screens footage that he and other members of his film unit have shot. He also visits David Niffin, who is now in the British Army and stationed near London but living in a house off base. I came home one night, said Niven, to find a large American Air Force officer sitting in my chair. On his knee was my son. Serving him from my last bottle of whiskey was my wife.

It was a great reunion. He became devoted to my family, always showing up with unheard-of goodies such as concentrated orange juice and nylons from the bountiful American PX. Back at the 351st Bomb Group, Gable rides a motorcycle around the base and becomes acquainted with everyone from privates to colonels. He writes letters of condolence to families of his fellow airmen who die and regularly visits patients in the base hospital. Clark Gable was a human with a heart, said a sergeant. When Bob Hope and his troop came to the base to put on an outdoor show, there were thousands of guys in the audience with Clark tucked in there somewhere. Hope stood in the mic, trying his damnedest to get Clark on the stage. Hope kept joking, I know there's a celebrity out there.

Where is he? But he couldn't get him to even stand up. The guys laughed, and some sitting near Clark shouted, here, and started to applaud and whistle. Clark half got up, smiled, and gave half a wave, and then put his head down. The applause and whistling went on, gee, it must have been for 10 minutes.

Everybody thought it was great. In October 1943, Gable was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross in the Air Medal. He's ordered home, arriving in November with 50,000 feet of film. He's stationed at Hal Roach Studios in Culver City, now used by the Army Signal Corps for the production of training and recruiting films. The studios are nicknamed Fort Roach.

Also serving at Fort Roach is Captain Ronald Reagan. Gable works on turning his 50,000 feet of footage into training films. Visits military hospitals and makes appearances at war bond rallies. By May 1944, he's finished with his film projects and is promoted to major. He now hopes for an assignment to the Pacific theater of the war. When he learns the Army will not allow him in combat again, he requests a discharge and is separated from active duty in mid-June. Gable doesn't return to making movies until the war is over in Europe and nearly over in the Pacific.

Sane is uncomfortable doing so when men are still dying in combat. He stars in 22 movies following World War II. Because of his movies, most people today still know of Clark Gable, the actor. What they don't know is that he left his life as the king of Hollywood to play his greatest role, a real-life role, as Captain Clark Gable, an aerial gunner in a B-17 facing German fighters in the skies over Europe. And great work by Roger McGrath and he does great work for us regularly. He's one of our most regular contributors. By the way, McGrath is a U.S. Marine and I don't say former because once a Marine, always a Marine.

And you could tell there was a special connection to the material. Clark Gable's greatest role of his life playing Captain Clark Gable himself in war and aerial gunner, the B-17s. And imagine that Hermann Göring put a bounty on Clark Gable's head. And I just love that quote from one of his commanders, the damn fool insists on being a rear gunner on every mission. And that tells you everything you need to know about Clark Gable. When he's in, he's in all the way. A beautiful story about a great star, the star behind the star, the real man.

Clark Gable's story, his World War II story here on Our American Stories. Technology that personalizes the audio performance to fit you. Delivering the world's best noise cancellation and powerfully immersive sound so you can hear and feel every detail of the music you love. Bose QuietComfort Earbuds 2, sound shape to you.

To learn more, visit Bose.com. Imagine air travel that's simple, hassle-free and fast. That's Surf Air. Save hours on every trip, avoid busy, crowded terminals and fly from airports closer to your home. No crowds, no long lines, no stress. With Surf Air's private flights, you're in control of your travel day, not the other way around. SurfAir.com, the most convenient way to fly. Get a free quote on your next flight at SurfAir.com.

There's a better way to fly private. Passing the ball is fun. The Frito-Lay Pass the Ball Challenge is more fun. Join Frito-Lay, the official USA snack of the FIFA World Cup 2022 for their Pass the Ball Challenge. Look for the Golden World Soccer Ball and explore the ever-growing community. Then, pass the ball to friends for a chance to score custom swag. Grab a specially marked bag of Lay's, Cheetos or Doritos and scan the QR code or visit FritoLayScore.com. No purchase necessary. Open the legal residence at the USDC. 18 plus C rules at FritoLayScore.com.