Gwyllyn Samuel Newton Ford (May 1, 1916 – August 30, 2006), known as Glenn Ford, was a Canadian-American actor. He was most prominent during Hollywood's Golden Age as one of the biggest box-office draws of the 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s, and had a career that lasted more than 50 years.
Ford often portrayed ordinary men in unusual circumstances. Although he starred in many genres of film, some of his most significant roles were in the film noirs Gilda (1946) and The Big Heat (1953), and the high school drama Blackboard Jungle (1955). However, it was for comedies or westerns that he received acting laurels, including three Golden Globe Nominations for Best Actor – Motion Picture Musical or Comedy, winning for Pocketful of Miracles (1961). He also played a supporting role as Superman's mild mannered alter-ego Clark Kent's adoptive farmer father, Jonathan Kent, in the first film of the franchise series Superman (1978).
Five of his films have been selected for the National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically or aesthetically" significant: Gilda (1946), The Big Heat (1953), Blackboard Jungle (1955), 3:10 to Yuma (1957) and Superman (1978).
Early life
Gwyllyn Samuel Newton Ford was born on May 1, 1916, in Sainte-Christine-d'Auvergne, Quebec, Canada[ the son of Hannah Wood (née Mitchell) and Newton Ford, an engineer with the Canadian Pacific Railway. Through his father, Ford was a great-nephew of Canada's first Prime Minister, Sir John A. Macdonald, and was also related to America's eighth President Martin Van Buren (1782-1862, served 1837-1841). In 1922, when Ford was age six, the family emigrated southwest across the border into the United States, first to Venice, California, and then to Santa Monica, west of Los Angeles; his father, Newton became a motorman on a tram / streetcar for the Venice Electric Tram Company, a job he held until he died at age 50 in 1940, when his son Glenn was age 24.
While attending Santa Monica High School, Glen was active in school drama productions with other future actors such as James Griffith. After graduation around 1934, he began working in small theater groups. While in high school, he took odd jobs, including working for future famous comedian / entertainer Will Rogers, who taught him horsemanship. Ford later commented that his father had no objection to his growing interest in acting, but told him, "It's all right for you to try to act, if you learn something else first. Be able to take a car apart and put it together. Be able to build a house, every bit of it. Then you'll always have something." Ford heeded the paternal advice and decades later during the 1950s, when he was one of Hollywood's most popular actors, he regularly worked on plumbing, wiring, and air conditioning at his home.
At age 23, Ford gave up his status as a subject of the King (Canadian citizenship) and became a naturalized citizen of the United States on November 10, 1939, taking the oath of allegiance.
World War II and Eleanor Powell
Ten months after Ford's portrait of a young anti-Nazi exile, the United States entered World War II with the Imperial Japanese surprise attack on the Pearl Harbor naval and air bases in Hawaii. After playing a young pilot in his 11th Columbia film, Flight Lieutenant (1942), Ford went on a cross-country 12-city tour to sell war bonds for Army and Navy Relief. In the midst of the many stars also donating their time – from Bob Hope to Cary Grant to Claudette Colbert – he met the popular dancing star Eleanor Powell. The two soon fell in love; they attended the official opening of the Hollywood USO canteen together in October.
Ford made The Desperadoes (1942), another Western. Then, while making another war drama, Destroyer with ardent anti-fascist Edward G. Robinson, Ford impulsively volunteered for the United States Marine Corps Reserve on December 13, 1942. The startled studio had to beg the Marines to give their second male lead four more weeks to complete shooting on their picture. In the meantime, Ford proposed to Eleanor Powell, who subsequently announced her retirement from the screen to be near her fiancé as he started Marine Corps boot camp.
Ford recalled later to his son that his friend William Holden, who had joined the U.S. Army Air Corps, and Ford had "talked about it and we were both convinced that our careers, which were just getting established, would likely be forgotten by the time we got back ... if we got back."
He was assigned in March 1943 to active duty at the Marine Corps Base in San Diego. With his Coast Guard service, he was offered a position as a Marine Corps officer, but Ford declined, feeling it would be interpreted as preferential treatment for a movie star and instead entered the Marines as a private. He trained at the Marine base in San Diego, where Tyrone Power, the number-one male movie star at the time, was also based. Power suggested Ford join him in the Marines' weekly radio show Halls of Montezuma, broadcast Sunday evenings from San Diego. Ford excelled in training, winning the Rifle Marksman Badge, being named "Honor Man" of the platoon and being promoted to sergeant by the time he finished.
Awaiting assignment at Camp Pendleton Marine Corps base, Ford volunteered to play a Marine raider – uncredited – in the film Guadalcanal Diary, made by Fox, with Ford and others charging up the beaches of Southern California. He later showed this to his little boy Peter, along with his many other black-and-white battle scenes in other films. Frustratingly for Ford, filming battle scenes was the closest he would ever get to any enemy action. After being sent to Marine Corps Schools Detachment (Photographic Section) in Quantico, Virginia, three months later, Ford returned to the San Diego base in February 1944 and was assigned to the radio section of the Public Relations Office, Headquarters Company, Base Headquarters Battalion, where he resumed work on the Halls of Montezuma film.
Just as Eleanor, now his wife, was expecting the birth of their child and Ford himself was looking forward to Officers Training School, he was hospitalized at the U.S. Naval Hospital in San Diego with what turned out to be duodenal ulcers, which afflicted him for the rest of his life. He was in and out of the hospital for the next five months and finally received a medical discharge on the third year anniversary of Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1944. Though without the combat duty he had been hoping for, Ford was awarded several service medals for his three years in the Marines Reserve Corps: the American Campaign Medal, the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal, and the World War II Victory Medal, created in 1945 for anyone who had been on active duty since December 1941. After the war, Ford continued his military career in the U.S. Naval Reserve well into the Vietnam War era, achieving the rank of captain.
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Death
Ford retired from acting in 1991 at age 75 with heart and circulatory problems. He suffered a series of minor strokes that left him in frail health in the years preceding his death. He died at his Beverly Hills home on August 30, 2006, at the age of 90.[
If you want to read a lot more, go here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glenn_Ford
- SERVES
- 4
- COOK TIME
- 15 Min
Here's an easy way to make a classic breakfast "sandwich." Our Breakfast Pita Pockets are stuffed with two breakfast favorites: cheesy scrambled eggs and bacon! Everyone in your family is going to love these!
- 8 slices bacon
- 4 eggs
- 1 tablespoon water
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
- 1 tablespoon butter
- 1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese
- 4 (6-inch) pita breads, cut in half and warmed
- In a large skillet over medium-high heat, cook bacon for 6 to 8 minutes or until crispy; drain on paper towel and cut each slice in half.
- In a medium bowl, combine eggs, water, salt and pepper; mix well. In a medium skillet, melt butter over medium heat; add egg mixture and scramble until firm. Remove skillet from heat and sprinkle cheese over eggs.
- Spoon eggs equally into each pita. Place four pieces of bacon into each pita. Serve immediately.
Clergy Appreciation Day on the second Sunday in October reminds us to recognize the work of ministers, pastors, and priests in the United States. This national day also falls in National Clergy Month, which is observed each October.
Many congregations take up a special offering on this day to bless their pastors. Others use the entire month of October to find different means to bless the leaders with meals, gifts, and even paid vacations. As an individual, there are several ways to show your clergy appreciation.
- Tell others – Tell them how much your church leader does for the congregation – and let your pastor overhear you.
- Volunteer – churches offer more opportunities for volunteering than just about anywhere. Don’t wait to be voluntold.
- Pray for your clergy – It should probably be in the first slot, but it seemed so obvious.
- Write a note – Thank your minister for being an excellent leader, for his or her compassion, or even something specific.
- Ask – Find out where you can help. Some clergy don’t delegate enough or (see volunteer) so few people volunteer, they’ve taken all the burdens upon themselves.
Join your congregation in celebrating your clergy. Recognize them for their leadership, compassion, stewardship, and faith.
HOW TO OBSERVE CLERGY APPRECIATION DAY
Thank your clergy for the work they do. Being a pastor or other clergy member has its good days, and bad. Yet all leaders need to be recognized for their work and efforts.
Be sure you also personally thank them for all they do to help you and your family!
CLERGY APPRECIATION DAY HISTORY
Hallmark Cards first started Clergy Appreciation National Day of Honor in 1992. The day later changed to Clergy Appreciation Day and is sometimes referred to as Pastor Appreciation Day.
