Trivia: Born Randolph Crane, this virile, weathered, prototypical cowboy star with a gallant manner and slight Southern accent enlisted for service in the U.S. Army during World War I at age 19. After returning home he got a degree in engineering, then joined the Pasadena Community Playhouse. While golfing, Scott met millionaire filmmaker Howard Hughes, who helped him enter films as a bit player. In the mid '30s he began landing better roles, both as a romantic lead and as a costar. Later he became a Western star, and from the late '40s to the '50s he starred exclusively in big-budget color Westerns (39 altogether). From 1950-53 he was one of the top ten box-office attractions. Later in the '50s he played the aging cowboy hero in a series of B-Westerns directed by Budd Boetticher for Ranown, an independent production company. He retired from the screen in the early '60s. Having invested in oil wells, real estate, and securities, he was worth between $50-$100 million.

Trivia: The daughter of an engineer, Ella Raines completed her education at the University of Washington. After stage experience, Raines was signed for films by a production company headed by Charles Boyer and Howard Hawks. When this enterprise failed to yield fruit, Raines went with Universal Studios in 1943, where she received her best screen role: the inquisitive, extremely adaptable heroine in the 1943 film noir Phantom Lady. Impressed by this performance, Paramount producer/director Preston Sturges borrowed Raines from Universal to co-star with Eddie Bracken in Hail the Conquering Hero (1944). Her film career flagging in the late '40s, Raines married a military officer and retired to England. After divorcing her husband in the early '50s, she starred in the popular syndicated TV series Janet Dean, Registered Nurse, which she co-produced with Joan Harrison, who'd previously produced Phantom Lady. Ella Raines' final film appearance was in the 1956 British effort Man in the Road.

Trivia: American leading man William Bishop studied law at the University of West Virginia before settling upon an acting career. He came to Hollywood at the tail end of the "victory casting" period, when the major studios were hiring any and all handsome young actors to fill the gap until the major male stars like Gable and Fonda came back from the war. Under contract to MGM, Bishop was seen in sizeable but non-descript supporting roles in such films as A Guy Named Joe (1943) and Song of the Thin Man (1947). In the 1950s, the muscular, jut-jawed Bishop specialized in westerns like The Texas Rangers (1952), Redhead from Wyoming (1953) and Phantom Stagecoach (1954). His best showing during this period was as Carter Doone in Columbia's Technicolor costumer Lorna Doone (1952). For 39 weeks in 1954, Bishop costarred with Michael O'Shea and James Dunn in It's a Great Life, a TV sitcom about two ex-GIs living together in a small apartment. William Bishop died of cancer in his Malibu home at the age of 42; he had just completed work on his last film, The Oregon Trail (1959), in which he was billed just below star Fred MacMurray.

Trivia: Intending to become a dentist like his father, American actor Edgar Buchanan wound up with grades so bad in college that he was compelled to take an "easy" course to improve his average. Buchanan chose a course in play interpretation, and after listening to a few recitations of Shakespeare he was stagestruck. After completing dental school, Buchanan plied his oral surgery skills in the summertime, devoting the fall, winter and spring months to acting in stock companies and at the Pasadena Playhouse in California. He was given a screen test by Warner Bros. studios in 1940, received several bit roles, then worked himself up to supporting parts upon transferring to Columbia Pictures. Though still comparatively youthful, Buchanan specialized in grizzled old westerners, with a propensity towards villainy or at least larceny. The actor worked at every major studio (and not a few minor ones) over the next few years, still holding onto his dentist's license just in case he needed something to fall back on. Though he preferred movie work to the hurried pace of TV filming, Buchanan was quite busy in television's first decade, costarring with William Boyd on the immensely popular Hopalong Cassidy series, then receiving a starring series of his own, Judge Roy Bean, in 1954. Buchanan became an international success in 1963 thanks to his regular role as the lovably lazy Uncle Joe Carson on the classic sitcom Petticoat Junction, which ran until 1970. After that, the actor experienced a considerably shorter run on the adventure series Cade's County, which starred Buchanan's close friend Glenn Ford. Buchanan's last movie role was in Benji (1974), which reunited him with the titular doggie star, who had first appeared as the family mutt on Petticoat Junction.

Trivia: American actor Arthur Kennedy was usually cast in western or contemporary roles in his films; on stage, it was another matter. A graduate of the Carnegie-Mellon drama department, Kennedy's first professional work was with the Globe Theatre Company touring the midwest in abbreviated versions of Shakespearian plays. From here he moved into the American company of British stage star Maurice Evans, who cast Kennedy in his Broadway production of Richard III. Kennedy continued doing Shakespeare for Evans and agit-prop social dramas for the Federal Theatre, but when time came for his first film, City for Conquest (1940), he found himself in the very ordinary role of James Cagney's musician brother. Throughout his first Warner Bros. contract, Kennedy showed promise as a young character lead, but films like Bad Men of Missouri (1941), They Died with Their Boots On (1942) and Air Force (1943) did little to tap the actor's classical training. After World War II service, Kennedy returned to Broadway, creating the role of Chris Keller in Arthur Miller's All My Sons (1947). This led to an even more prestigious Miller play, the Pulitzer Prize winning Death of a Salesman (1948), in which Kennedy played Biff. Sadly, Kennedy was not permitted to repeat these plum roles in the film versions of these plays, but the close association with Miller continued on stage; Kennedy would play John Proctor in The Crucible (1957) and the doctor brother in The Price (1965). While his film work during this era resulted in several Academy Award nominations, Kennedy never won; he was honored, however, with the New York Film Critics award for his on-target portrayal of a newly blinded war veteran battling not only his handicap but also his inbred racism in Bright Victory (1951). The biggest box office success with which Kennedy was associated was Lawrence of Arabia (1962), wherein he replaced the ailing Edmund O'Brien in the role of the Lowell Thomas character. Working continually in film and TV projects of wildly varying quality, Kennedy quit the business cold in the mid-1980s, retiring to live with family members in a small eastern town. Kennedy was so far out of the Hollywood mainstream in the years before his death that, when plans were made to restore the fading Lawrence of Arabia prints and Kennedy was needed to re-record his dialogue, the restorers were unable to locate the actor through Screen Actor's Guild channels -- and finally had to trace him through his hometown telephone directory.

Trivia: Born in Canada, he was brought up in New York City. For a while he was a professional swimmer in a water carnival. He became a stage actor, appearing in many productions in stock and on Broadway; he often appeared in Shakespeare. In the mid '40s he began working in films, at first in lead roles that tended to be introspective; as time went by, he was cast in secondary roles, often as a pessimistic bad guy. For his work in All the King's Men (1949) he received a Best Supporting Actor Oscar nomination. In the '60s his career began to dry up, and he appeared in many low-budget Italian films; however, he stayed busy as a screen actor into the '80s, often appearing in action or horror films. He co-directed and co-produced the film Outlaw Territory (1953). From 1949-56 he was married to actress Joanne Dru.

Trivia: A gangling young Southerner and lead actor in comedies, Courtland played juveniles in the early to mid '40s, then served in World War II; upon his return he played young leads and second leads, generally in action-adventure flicks. After six year of doing native-language films in Germany and Italy, he did a variety of work for Disney in the '50s (starred in the TV series The Saga of Andy Burnett, sang the title song for Old Yeller, did all the male voiceovers for the cartoon Noah and the Ark, and narrated and sang for the TV show The Boy and the Falcon), all of which led to a position as a producer for Disney. In the '60s, Courtland gave up acting to produce for Disney and elsewhere (for an example, he produced the '60s TV show The Flying Nun). He was married at one time to actress Polly Bergen.

Trivia: A grandson of the legendary Apache chief Geronimo, Charles Stevens (often billed as Charles "Injun" Stevens because of his ethnic background) made his film bow as an extra in The Birth of a Nation (1915). The close friend and "mascot" of cinema idol Douglas Fairbanks Sr., Stevens appeared in all but one of Fairbanks' starring films, beginning with 1915's The Lamb. He was often seen in multiple roles, never more obviously than in Fairbanks' The Black Pirate (1926). His largest role during his Fairbanks years was Planchet in The Three Musketeers (1921) and its sequel The Iron Mask (1929). In talkies, Stevens was generally cast as a villain, usually an Indian, Mexican, or Arab. Outside of major roles in early sound efforts like The Big Trail and Tom Sawyer (both 1930), he could be found playing menacing tribal chiefs and bandits in serials and B-pictures, and seedy, drunken "redskin" stereotypes (invariably named Injun Joe or Injun Charlie or some such) in big-budget films like John Ford's My Darling Clementine (1946). He was also much in demand as a technical adviser on Native American lore and customs. Charles Stevens remained active until 1956, 17 years after the death of his pal and mentor Doug Fairbanks.

Trivia: The father of actors Houseley Stevenson Jr. and Onslow Stevens, Houseley Stevenson Sr. was one of the founders and principal directors of the famed Pasadena Playhouse. After a four-decade-plus stage career, Stevenson came to films in 1936. At first, he played bits, but as he moved into his sixties the size of his roles increased. The hollow-cheeked, stubble-chinned actor was especially adept at playing elderly derelicts whose dialogue usually ran along the lines of "Whatsa matter, son? Hidin' from the law?" Houseley Stevenson was at his very best in two Humphrey Bogart films: In Dark Passage (1947), he played the seedy plastic surgeon Dr. Coley, while in Knock on Any Door he was seen as the philosophical rummy "Junior."

Trivia: One of several male models to achieve some success in action films of the '20s, Hermon Reed Howes was forever saddled with the tag "Arrow Collar Man," despite the fact that he had been only one of several future luminaries to have posed for famed artist J.C. Leyenecker's memorable Arrow ads. (Future screen actors Fredric March and Brian Donlevy also did yeoman duty for the company.)A graduate of the University of Utah and the Harvard Graduate School, Howes had served two and a half years in the navy prior to entering onto the stage. He became a leading man for the likes of Peggy Wood and Billie Burke, and entered films in 1923, courtesy of low-budget producer Ben Wilson, who cast the handsome newcomer as the lead in a series of breathless melodramas released by Rayart. Howes reached a silent screen pinnacle of sorts as Clara Bow's leading man in Rough House Rosie (1927), but his starring days were over with the advent of sound. There was nothing inherently wrong with Howes voice, but it didn't do anything for him either. His acting before the microphone seemed too stiff. He was still as handsome as ever, but his good looks were often hidden behind a scruffy beard or mustache. The veteran actor then drifted into supporting roles in B-Westerns and serials, his appearances sometimes devoid of dialogue, and more often than not, he was unbilled. Howes did his fair share of television in the '50s as well, but ill health forced him to retire after playing a police inspector in Edward D. Wood Jr.'s The Sinister Urge, filmed in July of 1960 and a guest spot on television's Mr. Ed. He died of cancer at the Motion Picture Country House and Hospital in Woodland Hills, CA.

Trivia: Born in Italy, Frank Yaconelli emigrated to the U.S. after WWI, where he thrived in vaudeville as a monologist, dialectician, and comic musician. Yaconelli went to Hollywood in 1929, spending the next three decades playing innumerable character bits in such films as W.C. Fields' The Barber Shop (1933) and the Marx Brothers' A Night at the Opera (1935). In the early '40s, he began showing up as comic relief in Tex Ritter's B-Westerns. Frank Yaconelli later played Pancho opposite Gilbert Roland's Cisco in a series of Cisco Kid Westerns for Monogram.