BACK ABOUT 1973 I went to hear heavyweight boxing champion Muhammad Ali speak at the National Press Club. As I stood in an elevator waiting to go to the club, Ali and rival Ken Norton boarded. Norton was to make a short speech, too, kind of like a second feature at a movie.
What a revelation! I stood there, looking down on the world heavyweight boxing champion and his No. 1 challenger. Yes, I’m slightly taller than Ali. It gave me a feeling of unprecedented power.
Height is an important factor in life. Over the years, I’ve fed heights into my computer. If the resultant list seems top-heavy with boxers and other athletes, it’s only because their heights are well-publicized..(But that doesn’t apply to tennis players.) The heights of politicians, artists and novelists aren’t readily available. The real heights of movie stars are fuzzt. They exaggerate, just as they do about their youth and measurements.
The vanity of politicians knows no bounds. Fawning biographers and other lackeys exaggerate their hero's height. Among historical figures said to exceed 7 feet are Peter the Great, Charlemagne and a particularly scary British general named Ironsides. Sam Houston’s height also is often greatly inflated.
Women's shoes complicate the problem, of course, and some men wear elevator shoes. The Emperor Augustus did.
There are illogicalities in descriptions of historical figures, and Augustus figures in one of those. He was notably short. And Julius Caesar was considered “tall for a Roman.” Yet each is believed to have been about 5 feet 6.
If numbers are to be believed Emperor Napoleon III was even shorter than his uncle, Napoleon Bonaparte.
We tend to think of President Eisenhower as tall and President Truman as short. But there wasn’t much difference between them.
Granted, it’s a bit of a stretch, but I’ve included heights given in film scripts.
But first, a few words about word usages. My dictionary gives two pronunciations for height. The second adds the “th” sound. I learned the word with the “th” sound. I’ve heard that that’s the way it’s always pronounced in the Midwest. But the dictionary recognizes only one spelling: height.
There’s another problem. It a person six feet tall or six foot tall? Americans seem not to agree on this one. We stumble about trying to decide if we want to foot or feet.
JAMES BOND
● Sean Connery, George Lazenby, Timothy Dalton and Pierce Brosnan are 6-3. Roger Moore is 6-2 Daniel Craig is 5-11.
10 FEET 6 INCHES
● Goliath: Biblical giant. He was six cubits and a span high. “Morning and evening” for 40 days, he defied the armies of Israel. (I Samuel 17.) This was in B.C. 1063. Young David got him with a slingshot in the “valley of the terebinth.”
10 FEET 4½ INCHES
●:Cardiff Giant: hoax. On Oct. 16, 1869, workmen discovered what appeared to be a huge petrified man near Cardiff, N.Y. George Hull, a tobacco farmer and cigar maker in Binghamton, N.Y., had planted what came to be known as the “Cardiff Giant.” He and a partner, H.B. Martin, got a 5-ton block of gypsum and hired two sculptors to produce a “petrified” man. Hull was the model. After three months of preparation, the statue was buried on a farm, where it was arranged that workmen drilling a well would discover it. The giant proved a tremendous tourist attraction, even after it was disclosed as a hoax. The statue is still displayed in the Farmers’ Museum in New York State.
8 FEET 11
●Robert Wadlow of Walton, Ill., was “world’s tallest,” according to Guinness Book of Records.
8 FEET 4 INCHES
● Leonid Stadnik: Ukranian resident is said to be world’s tallest.
BETWEEN 8 FEET AND 7 FEET 5 INCHES
●Johann Svarfdaelingur: circus performer. P.T. Barnum exhibited this Icelandic giant, who weighed 359 pounds..
●7 feet 7 -- Gheorghe Muresan: basketball player.
●7 feet 7 -- Manute Bol: basketball player.
●7 feet 6 -- Shawn Bradley: basketball player. He’s considered the quintessential “big, white stiff.”
●7 feet5--Yao Ming: Chinese basketball player, who wears size 19 shoe. He was first choice in 2002 NBA draft, taken by Houston Rockets.
7 FEET 9 INCHES
● Angus McKaskell: Sideshow performer weighed 425 pounds, died in 1863 at age 34.
7 FEET 8 3/4 INCHES● Sun Ming Ming: basketball player weighs between 335 and 370, wears 19 shoe.
7 FEET 3 INCHES
● Peter Mayhew: Actor played Chewbatta in Star Wars.
7 FEET 4 INCHES
● Jim Cully: boxer. He weighs 275 pounds
● Andre the Giant: wrestler. He weighed 500 pounds.
● John Rankin: boxer. He weighs 269 pounds
● Tip: Bloodhound in Uncle Tom productions, as measured from tip to tip. He weighed 246 pounds.
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“OVER 7 FEET” AND OTHERS IN THAT RANGE
●Maximinus: Roman emperor in 235-238. The first peasant to become emperor was nicknamed “Thrax.” A fearsome warrior, he was described as “over 7 feet.” His troops killed him while he slept.
7 FEET 2 INCHES●Richard Kiel: actor. At 330 pounds, the played a heavy in two James Bond movies, The Spy Who Loved Me in 1977 and Moonraker in 1979. He’s most memorable as the villain with the metal teeth.
●Ewart Potgieter: boxer. He weighs 326 pounds.
7 FEET
●Nicolay Valulev: boxer.
6 FEET 10 INCHES
●Randy Johnson: baseball pitcher.
●George Mikan: basketball player. He inspired awe in the mid 1900s. He was considered a true giant. In today’s NBA, his height would be rather ordinary. He attended DePaul, then played professionally with the Minneapolis Lakers.
6 FEET 9 INCHES
●Johnny Gee: baseball pitcher. He was the tallest player of the 1940s.
●Bevo Francis: basketball player. Playing for tiny Rio Grande College of Ohio, he scored 116 points in a game in the early 1950s..
●Big Jim Folsom: governor of Arkansas. He also was described as 6-9. He weighed 270 pounds
●Michael Crichton: author
6 FEET 8 INCHES
●Brad Garrett: TV actor. He portrayed Jackie Gleason in a TV movie. All the other actors had to wear 7-inch lifts and the set’s furniture was built king sized.. Garrett weighs about 250 pounds.
●Mike Naymick: baseball pitcher. He was with the Indians briefly in 1939-40 and ‘43-44.
●Paul Voelker: political appointee.
6 FEET 7 INCHES
●Charles de Gaulle: The father of modern France, he was both a general and president.
●Ernst Kaltenbrunner: Hitler’s SS leader. He used the title “Gen. Dr.” He had lantern jaw, long arms that dangled, and a saber cut across one cheek..He was executed after World War II.
●Peter the Great: emperor of Russia, 1682-1725. He’s often described as 7 feet, 6-10 and more than 6 1/2 feet tall.
●Vicente Fox: president of Mexico. But this height is when he’s wearing cowboy boots.
6 FEET 6 1/2 INCHES
●Buddy Baer: Boxer-turned-actor. He weighed 245 pounds and played giant in Quo Vadis? and Jack and the Beanstock. He lived 1915-86. Brother Max was heavyweight champion.
●James Arness: TV actor. He’s best remembered as Matt Dillon in Gunsmoke.. He’s sometimes described as 6-7, sometimes as 6-6, so I’ve compromised.
●Howie Schultz: baseball player. He was a first baseman with the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1943-47, then played briefly for the Phillies and Reds. He was called “Stretch” and “Steeple.”
6 FEET 6 1/4 INCHES
● Jess Willard: heavyweight champion, 1915-19. He was the Great White Hope who took the heavyweight title from Jack Johnson. He weighed 250 pounds.
6 FEET 6 INCHES
This was the maximum for the U.S. military. Men above this height were too big for equipment (including ships and planes) and made easy targets. This limit excluded such professional baseball players as Howie “Stretch” Schultz, Johnny Gee and Mike Naymick.
●Grand Duke Nicholas: Russian general. He led czar’s troops during World War I.
● Tommy Tune: British-born dancer.
● Chips Rafferty: Australian actor.
● Clint Walker: cowboy actor.
● Michael Jordan: basketball player. He weighs 216.
●Gorilla Monsoon: wrestler. He weighed about 300 pounds..
●The Grenadier Squaw: native American. She was a sister of Shawnee Chief Cornstalk (murdered in 1777) and was described as about six and a half feet tall.
●Bill Bradley: politician. He played college and pro basketball.
●Fred Thompson: politician.
●Alexander Doniphan: U.S. military leader. He led Doniphan's Thousand on momentus raid into Mexico during Mexican War. He weighed 240 pounds.
6 FEET 5 3/4 INCHES
●Primo Carnera: heavyweight champion, 1933-34. He weighed 267 pounds.
6 FEET 5 INCHES
●Paul von Hindenburg: president of Germany 1925-34. World War I warrior was replaced by Hitler.
●Vince Vaughn: actor.
●Alan Napier: actor.
●Bowie Kuhn: baseball commissioner.
● Ned O’Baldwin: heavyweight champion in 1860s. He was born in Ireland in 1840, shot dead in a New York saloon in 1875.
●Thomas Wolfe: novelist. He’s best remembered for You Can’t Go Home Again.
●Chuck Connors: actor. He starred in TV series “The Rifleman.” Before that, he played pro baseball. He was Cubs’ first baseman in 1951.
●Richard the Lion Heart: king of England in 1189-99. He’s best remembered as a crusader and as the king during the days of the legendary Robin Hood. .
●Stringbean Akeman: Grand Ol' Opery star. Burglars murdered him.
●William Wallace: Scottish patriot. Mel Gibson portrayed him in the 1995 film “Braveheart.” This height smacks of an exaggeration.
●Sterling Hayden: actor. He’s best remembered as Gen. Jack D. Ripper in Dr. Strangelove.
●Fred Gwynne: actor. He’s best remembered for TV series Car 54 Where Are You?.
●David Packard: businessman. He founded Hewlett-Packard..
●Lisa Leslie: basketball player. She weighs 170 pounds.
●Christopher Lee: actor. He’s best known for Dracula roles.
●Osuma bin Laden: Muslim fundamentalist.
●William "Bull" Nelson, Union general. He weighed over 300 pounds. Another Union general murdered him in Louisville, Ky.
● H. Rap Brown: civil rights activist of 1960s.
●Edward Herrman: actor.
6 FEET 4 INCHES
●Van Cliburn: pianist. He weighs 160 pounds.
●Conan O’Brien: TV host.
●Tim Robbins: actor.
●Jack Palance, actor.
●Lois DeFee: Minsky stripper
●Rock Hudson: actor.
●John Phillip Law: actor.
●Chevy Chase: actor.
●John Kerry: politician.
●Bill O’Reilly: newsman.
●Howard Hughes: tycoon weighed less than 100 pounds when he died.
●Casey Jones: railroad engineer.
●Robert Ryan: actor.
●Clint Eastwood: actor.
●Garrison Keillor: entertainer.
●Mark Philippoussis: tennis player weighs 202 pounds.
●George Kennedy: actor. A beefy 230 pounds, he played numerous heavies.
● John Cleese: British comedian.
●Ron Ely: actor. He was Hollywood’s 15th Tarzan.
●Sonny Tufts: actor. He was popular film star of 1940s.
●Vincent Price: actor. He’s best remembered for horror films.
●Rebecca Lobo: basketball player. She weighs 185 pounds.
●Jesse Ventura: politician. Known as “Jesse the Body” during his pro wrestling days, he became unlikely governor of Minnesota.
●Otto "Scarface" Skorzeny: Hitler's favorite commando. He weighed about 207 and is best remembered for rescuing Mussolini from hilltop imprisonment..
●Abraham Lincoln.16th U.S. president, 1861-65. He weighed 180 pounds..
●Christopher Reeve: actor. He’s best remembered for Superman role.
●John Wayne: actor. America’s most popular male star wore size 8½ shoe. He lived 1909-79...
●Donald Sutherland: actor. He’s best known for playing Hawkeye in M*A*S*H.
●Rod Cameron: actor. He graduated from being a stand-in for Fred MacMurray to leads in B Westerns. He’s notorious for divorcing his wife to marry her mother. .
●Liam Neeson: actor. Irish star first drove a truck, then tried boxing.
●Rock Hudson: actor. He was top male movie star of 1950s. His death in 1985 made public aware of AIDs.
●Tom Selleck: actor. He became famous in TV’s Magnum P.I. (1980-88).
●Sir Edmund Ironside: British field marshal. He was so big and bellicose that he’s often described as “over 7 feet.” But the U.S. ambassador to Russia said 6-4, which is likely closer to reality. The ambassador, who apparently wasn’t as terrified of Ironside as most people, added that Ironside weighed 270 pounds.
● Bob Livingston: congressman. The speaker-designate of House, he quickly withdrew in face of scandal in 1999.
●Pat Garrett: sheriff. He shot Billy the Kid.
6 FEET 3 1/2 INCHES
●Charlemagne: king, emperor: Some old-time biographers said he was 7 feet tall. His body was exhumed in 1861 and measured.
●Timothy McVeigh: terrorist.
●King Abdul Aziz of Saudi Arabia.
● George Sanders: actor.
● Edward IV: king of England, 1461-83.
●Charles Lindbergh: aviator. But he was also described as 6-2.
●Blackbeard: pirate. He was described as nearly 6-4 and over 200 pounds.
●William Wolfram: concert pianist. He's said to be 6-3 or 6-4.
●Harvey: white rabbit. He was Jimmy Stewart’s imaginary drinking pal in the film Harvey.
6 FEET 3 INCHES
●Johnny Weismueller: wimmer, actor: Olympic athlete became Hollywood’s most famous Tarzan.
●Jimmy Smits: actor.
●Howard Hughes: aircraft pioneer. Reclusive multimillionaire owned much of Las Vegas.
●Stewart Granger: actor. Suave Brit played Beau Brummel.
●Luis Angel Firpo: Argentine boxer known as “The Wild Bull of the Pampas.” He was considered a giant in 1923 when he knocked Jack Dempsey out of the ring. He weighed 216 pounds..
●Lyndon Johnson: U.S. president, 1963-69. He weighed 210.
●Pancho Gonzalez: tennis player.
●Troy Donahue: actor.
●Walter Matthau, actor. This was his height at age 16. Did he grow?.
●Muhammad Ali: heavyweight champion in 1960s, ‘70s. He weighed 212..
●George Foreman: heavyweight champion in 1973-74. He weighed 220 then..
●Laird Cregar: actor. He weighed well over 200
●Tom Ridge, Homeland Security czar
●James Cobjurn: actor.
●Joel McCrea: actor
●Lee Marvin: actor.
●Ted Danson: actor. Some references say 6-2.
●Jimmy Stewart: actor.
●Gary Cooper, actor.
●James Garner: actor.
●Paul Robeson: actor, singer; he weighed 240 pounds.
●Boris Becker: tennis player weighed 187 pounds.
●Victor McLaglen: actor.
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6 FEET 2 1/2 INCHES
●Thomas Jefferson: 3rd U.S. president, 1801-09.
●Max Baer: heavyweight champion in 1934-35. He weighed 210.
●Lindsay Davenport: tennis player.
●Gregory Peck: actor. His many famous movies included To Kill a Mockingbird. Some references say he was 6-2, some 6-3.
●Victor Mature: actor.
●Lon Chaney Jr.: actor.
6 FEET 2 INCHES
●Sean Connery: actor (James Bond)
●George Lazenby: actor (James Bond)
●Joseph Cotten: actor
●Steve Allen: entertainer weighed 195
●Pierce Brosnan: actor (James Bond)
●Timothy Dalton: actor (James Bond)
●Babe Ruth: baseball star.
●Gene Debs: labor leader
●Brian Aherne: actor.
●Dennis Morgan: actor.
●Micha Auer: actor.
●Anthony Quinn: actor.
●Field Marshal Gustav Mannerheim of Finland.
●Jack Carson: actor.
●Red Skelton: comedian weighed up to 230 pounds.
●Saddam Hussein: dictator weighed 210 in better days.
●Errol Flynn: actor.
●Billy Graham: preacher.
●George Reaves: Superman actor.
●Tony Perkins: actor.
●Eamon DeValera: preisdent of Ireland.
●Preston Foster: actor weighed 200 pounds..
●Walter Pidgeon: actor.
●Burt Lancaster: actor.
●Simon Templer: fictional crime solver known as “The Saint.”
●Rodolfo Graziani: Italian marshal during World War II.
●Jack Elam: actor. He was the wild-eyed villain in many westerns.
●Stanley Goldblum: CEO. He presided over Equity Funding’s billion-dollar bubble. He’s burly, weighing over 200 pounds.
●John Bell Hood: Confederate general. He failed to stop Sherman in Georgia.
●Preston Foster: actor. He weighed 200 pounds.
●Hope Emerson: actress. She weighed 230 pounds when she appeared in postwar films.
●George Washington: 1st president, 1789-1797. He weighed over 200 in later years.
●Sam Houston: president of Texas. Some biographers say he was 6-6. But U.S. Army records say 6-2.
●Oscar Wilde: British playwright.
●Bill Clinton: U.S. president, 1993-2001. He weighs 215. His height was sometimes given at 6-2 1/2, apparently to one-up rival George Bush.
●Edward I: king of of England, 1272-1307. Called “Longshanks,” he was tall for his day.
●Charles II: king of England. 1660-85. Merry Monarch was described as “at least 6-2.” His father, Charles I, was 5-4..
●Chester Arthur: 21st U.S. president, 1881-85. He weighed 225...
●William Howard Taft: 27th U.S. president, 1909-13. He weighed 332 pounds.
●Maria Sharapova: tennis player.
●Alan Alda: actor.
●Lee Van Cleef: actor.
●Johnny Cash: singer.
●George Bush: 41st U.S. president, 1989-93. He weighs 195..
●Charlton Heston: actor. He weighed 220 pounds during prime, is best remembered as Moses. And Ben-Hur..
●Julia Childs: Famed chef is no shriking violet..
●Venus Williams: tennis player. She’s 6-1½, according to some descriptions..
●James J. Braddock: heavyweight champion in 1935-37. The “Cinderella Man” lost his title to Joe Louis. He weighed 195.
●Mark Clark: U.S. general. He was a World War II hero..
●Frank Thornton: actor. He played Capt. Peacock in the beloved British TV series Are You Being Served? He claimed to be 6-2 in the series and this seems a likely height.
●Glenn "Fireball" Roberts: race-car driver.
●Randolph Scott: actor. Legendary cowboy star reportedly was 6-2, which is what it was said to be in film Roberta. The Nevadan describes his character as 6-3. But Scott’s son insists father was 6-4.
6 FEET 1 1/2 INCHES
●George Patton: U.S. general. World War II tank commander weighed 180 pounds.
●Janet Reno: attorney general under President Clinton..
●James J. Jeffries: heavyweight champion, 1899-1904. He weighed 225 pounds.
●Gene Tunney: heavyweight champion, 1926-28. He weighed 190 pounds.
●Henry Fonda: actor.
●Orson Welles: actor/director
6 FEET 1 INCH
●Wild Bill Hickock: U.S. frontiersman and lawman.
● James J. Corbett: heavyweight champion, 1892-97. “Gentleman Jim” weighed 184.
● Roger Moore: James Bond actor.
●Tom Conway: actor
● Rex Harrison: actor.
● Jack Dempsey: heavyweight champion, 1919-26. He weighed 190 pounds.
● Jim Thorpe, athlete; He weighed 185 pounds.
● Max Schmeling: heavyweight champion, 1930-32. German-born Max weighed 188..
● Clark Gable: actor.
●Trevor Howard: actor.
●Duke Ellington: jazz musician. He weighed 185 pounds.
● Sonny Liston: heavyweight champion, 1952-64. He weighed 212.
●Renee Richards: tennis player. A transsexual, she spawned controversy by competing as woman.
●Geena Davis: actress. Some say she’s only 6-0; she wears 11 1/2 shoes..
●Andrew Jackson: 7th U.S. president, 1929-33. In poor health, he weighed only 140 pounds..
●Joey Maxim: light heavyweight boxing champion in the early 1950s.
●Franklin D. Roosevelt: U.S. president, 1932-45. He weighed in the 180s..
●Ronald Reagan: U.S. president, 1981-89. He weighed 185 pounds.
●Robert Mitchum: tough-guy actor.
●Randy Poffo: wrestler. He weighed 191 pounds while playing minor league baseball. Later, as wrestler Macho Man Savage, he undoubtedly weighed more.
●Budge Patty: tennis star of 1950s weighed 172 pounds.
●Clark Gable: actor.
●Bela Lugosi: Dracula actor.
●Van Johnson: actor..
●Bill Murray: actor.
●Vic Seixas: tennis star of 1950s.
●Kelsey Grammer: actor.
●Dan Duryea: actor
●Douglas Fairbanks Jr. actor
“ SLIGHTLY OVER 6 FEET”
●Davy Crockett: frontiersman, congressman.
●James Monroe: 4th U.S. president, 1809-17
●L Frank Baum: wrote Wizard of Oz.
●John Tyler: 10th U.S. president, 1841-45.
●James Buchanan: 15th U.S. president, 1957-61.
●Eamonn de Valera: president, Republic of Ireland, 1959-73.
●James Cook: British sea captain who explored South Seas.
●George Crook: U.S. general. Famed Indian fighter was described as “a little over 6 feet.”
6 FEET AND 1/2 INCH
●John F. Kennedy: U.S. president, 1961-63. Some say he was 6-1. He weighed 170.
● Ingemar Johansson: heavyweight champion, 1959-60. Swede weighed 196.
● Cary Grant: actor.
6 FEET AND 1/4 INCH
● Jack Johnson: heavyweight champion, 1908-15. First black champ weighed 220 pounds.
6 FEET
● Henry VIII: king of England 1509-47.
● John Travolta, actor.
● Leslie Nielsen: actor.
● Lana Clarkson: actress found dead at Phil Spector’s house.
● Mary Stuart: Queen of Scots. She was beheaded in 1587.
● Henry Figg: first recognized heavyweight champion (1720s). He weighed 185 pounds. He was born in England in 1695.
● William Bainbridge: US naval officer.
● Princess Michael: Member of British royalty. Detractors say she looks like a Valkyrie.
● William T. Sherman. Union general. He was described as “about 6 feet.”
● Ludwig II: king of Bavaria, 1864-86. Mad king’s fantastic castles are tourist attractions.
● Ivan the Terrible: Russian czar, 1533-84. ("about")
● Millard Fillmore: 13th U.S. president, 1950-53.
● Elle Macpherson: model.
●Elvis Presley: entertainer. This height is from his army record; his weight, not part of that, ranged between 165 and 225.
●Dashiell Hammett: author. He created fictional detective Sam Spade.
●James Garfield: 20th U.S. president, 1991. He weighed 185.
●Warren Harding: 29th U.S. president, 1921-23.
●Jerry Ford: 38th U.S. president, 1974-76. He weighed 195..
●Maud Gonne MacBride: founder, Daughters of Erin. She was the poet Yeats' great love.
●Brooke Shields: actress.
●Mr. (Fred) Rogers: TV personality. He weighs 143 pounds.
●Mario Cuomo: politician. He weighed 190 as minor league ballplayer.
●Carolyn Bessette Kennedy: wife of John Kennedy Jr...
●Brad Pitt: actor. He weighs 203.
●Uma Thurman, actress..
●Jack Sharkey: heavyweight champion 1932-33. He weighed 205.
●Bully Hayes: South Sea adventurer/pirate. He weighed 210 pounds..
●Ezzard Charles: heavyweight champion 1949-51. His best weight was 184.
●”Jersey Joe” Walcott: heavyweight champion 1951-52. He weighed 195.
●Joe Walker: explorer. A 200-pounder, he was first white man to see Yosemite.
●Twiggy: famous skinny model of 1960s.
●Paul Kelly: actor. (“about”) He weighed 175.
●Leopold Stokowski: symphony conductor. (“about.)
●Robert Walker: actor..
●Sidney Toler: Charlie Chan actor.
●Nelson Eddy: actor, singer.
●Herbert Marshall: actor.
●Judge Joseph Crater: still missing.
●John Payne: actor.
●Carry Nation: anti-saloon crusader weighed 175 pounds.
●William Powell: actor.
●Dick Powell: But preppy singer-turned movie tough guy was 5-9, according to a 1933 movie he starred in.
●Lionel Barrymore: actor weighed about 190 pounds.
●Dick Powell: actor.
●Ernest Hemingway: novelist weighed 200 pounds.
●Oliver Hardy: comedian weighed 300 pounds.
●Ernest Hemingway: novelist weighed 200 pounds.
ALMOST 6 FEET
●Douglas MacArthur: U.S. general. (“almost”)
●Elizabeth of York: wife of King Henry VII of England, mother of Henry VIII. Her picture is in every deck of playing cards; she’s the queen of hearts. Her body was measured at 5-11½ in recent years. Her father, King William IV, was 6-31/2.
●Ruby Bob Fitzsimmons: heavyweight champion 1897-99. He was described as 5-11 3/4. He was lightest of the heavyweight champs, weighing as little as 167 pounds.
●Floyd Patterson: heavyweight champion 1956-59. “60-62. He was variously described as “almost 6-0,” 5-11 ½ and 6-0. His fighting weight was 182.
●Richard Nixon: U.S. president, 1969-74. He was 5-11½ and weighed 175.
●Joe Frazier: heavyweight champion 1970-72. He was 5-11½ and weighed 210.
●Marvin Hart: heavyweight champion 1905-06. (“just over 5-11”) He weighed 180 to 190.
●Robert Taylor: actor was said to be 5-11 1/2.
●Maurice Chevalier: entertainer was 5-11 1/2.
5 FEET 11 1/4 INCHES
●Daniela Hantuchova: tennis player. A Slovakian, she was 19 in 2002. She was ranked 12 and, some say, rivals Anna Kournikova as the prettiest woman on the tour. Press notices says her legs are 44 inches long, whatever that means.
5 FEET 11 INCHES
●This was minimum for Emperor Napoleon III’s Palace Guard.
●Daniel Craig: James Bond actor
●Glenn Ford: actor.
●Bloody Bill Anderson: Civil War guerrilla
●Anna Nicole Smith: celebrity weighed 178 pounds at death.
● Jack Hawkins: actor.
●Andre Agassi: tennis player weighs 165 pounts.
●William Holden: actor.
●Danny Kaye: actor.
●Allison Janney: actress.
●Althea Gibson: tennis player.
●Robert E. Lee: Confederate general: He weighed a little under 170. His huge head, neck and shoulders made him look taller. From the waist down to his feet he was tiny.
● Susan Anton: actress.
●Paddy Ryan: heavyweight champion 1880-82. He weighed 200 pounds and lost title to John L. Sullivan.
● Archie Moore: light heavyweight champion 1952-60.
● Maxie Rosenbloom: light heavyweight champion 1932-34, Hollywood actor.
● Charles B. Gatewood: U.S. Army lieutenant. He talked Geronimo into surrendering.
● John McEnroe: tennis player.
● Sugar Ray Robinson: legendary boxing champion of the 1940s and ‘50s.
● Hughie Long: governor of Louisiana known as “The Kingfish.”
● Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna: Mexican president and general. He was victor at the Alamo..
● Boss Tweed: politician. Corrupt Tammany Hall leader was described as “not quite 6-0" and he weighed 300 pounds.
●Boris Karloff: actor.
●Mariel Hemingway: model.
●Warner Oland: Charlie Chan actor.
●Maurice Barrymore: actor weighed 170 pounds.
●Grover Cleveland: U.S. president, 1885-89, ‘93-97. He weighed 250 pounds.
●Woodrow Wilson: 28th U.S. president, 1913-21. He weighed 175 to 185.
●Herbert Hoover: 31st U.S. president, 1929-33.
●Michael Collins: Irish patriot and martyr.
●Kurt Russell: actor. He also played minor league baseball.
●Kate Shindle: Miss America of 1997: She was tallest yet.
● Sigourney Weaver: actress.
● Courtney Love: entertainer.
●Rocky Marciano: heavyweight champion 1952-56. He was at his best at 185 pounds.
●Richard II of England, "easily 6 feet" when body exhumed in 1871. He ruled in ---
● Julie Newmar actress. She was the Catwoman on TV’s Batman in the 1960s.
5 FEET 10½ INCHES
●Al Capone: gangster. He weighed 175 pounds in his younger days.
●Leslie Howard: actor.
●Andrew Johnson: 17th U.S. president, 1865-69.
●Monica Seles, tennis player weighs 145 pounds.
●Antonin Dvorak: composer was between 5-10 and 5-11.
●Jackie Gleason: comedian claimed 5-11 1/2, but some sources say 5-10, so this is a compromise. He weighed as much as 260 pounds..
5 FEET 10 INCHES
Female dancers at Moulin Rouge in Paris must be at least 5-10. This also was the average height of U.S. officers during WWII. They weighed 158 on average. This was the average for Nazi Germany’s SS officers.
●Gypsy Rose Lee: exotic dancer, 132 pounds.
●Husband E. Kimmel: admiral. He commanded U.S. Navy at Pearl Harbor in 1941.
●Walter C. Short: lieutenant general. He commanded U.S. Army at Pearl Harbor in 1941. He was slim.
●Alec Guinness: actor.
●George Raft: actor supposedly was 5-10, but some question that.
●Dick Chaney: U.S. vice president. He weighs 210 pounds.
●Bugsy Siegel: mobster. He pioneered Las Vegas gambling, was shot.
● Jimmy Connors: tennis player.
●Lady Di: international celebrity. It’s said she was over 6 feet with heels, wore flats for wedding and let Prince Charles pose for official photos standing on a box.. But other sources say she was 5-7.
●Mel Gibson: actor. He weighs 160 pounds.
●Arnold Schwarzenegger: actor. He claims 6-2..
● John L. Sullivan: heavyweight champion 1892-92. He weighed 200 pounds. His father was 5-3 and 125 pounds, his mother 5-10 and 180 pounds, meaning that mom was bigger than some of his opponents.
●Franklin Pierce: 14th U.S. president, 1853-57.
●Harry Truman: 33rd U.S. president, 1945-53. He weighed 185 pounds.
●Dwight D. Eisenhower: 34th U.S. president, 1953-61. He weighed 175 pounds.
●Nicole Kidman: actress. With heels, she’s half a head taller than (now ex-) husband Tom Cruise.
●Gwyneth Paltrow: actress.
●Daryl Hannah: actress. She once played a 50-foot woman.
● Sylvester Stallone: actor.
● Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle: old-time movie comedian weighed 270 pounds.
● Serena Williams: tennis player..
● The Sundance Kid (Harry Longbaugh): western outlaw. He weighed about 170 pounds.
●Rebecca Romijn-Stamos: actress/model.
●Robert Louis Stevenson: author weighed 119 pounds.
●Charlize Theron: actress.
●Father Charles E. Coughlin: controversial radio commendator of 1930s.
●Alec Guinness: actor.
●Kathleen Turner: actress.
●Ingrid Bergman: actress.
●Franchot Tone: actor.
●Doc Holliday: dentist and gunfighter.
●Wilbur Wright: inventor of airplane weighed 140 pounds.
●Dean Martin: singer/actor.
●Bob Hope: entertainer.
●Yul Brynner: actor.
●Judy Holliday: actress. But other reference say she was 5-7 and, if dieting, weighed 125 pounds.
●Montgomery Clift: actor.
●Rebecca Romijn-Stamos: actress/model.
●Rudolph Valentino: but actor claimed to be “near 6 feet.”
●Bert Reynolds: actor.
●Alexis Smith: willowy actress.. Some sources say 5-9, but she seemed even taller than 5-10.
5 FEET 9 3/4 INCHES
● Jane Leeves: actress..
5 FEET 9 1/2 INCHES
●Jimmy Carter: U.S. president, 1977-81. He weighs 155 pounds.
●Ben Franklin: founding father. He was described as "5-9 or 5-10."
●Claire Chennault: World War II general.
●Paul Newman: actor.
5 FEET 9 1/4 INCHES
● Melanie Griffiths: actress..
5 FEET 9
This is the average height of the American male.
●Arthur Wellesley: Duke of Wellington. He was slim.
● Frank Stranahan: golfer
●”Two-Ton Tony Galento: boxer and wrestler. The Ring guide lists him at only 200 pounds, but he likely weighed nearer 235. He was born in 1910 and considered huge for his era.
●Fred Astaire: dancer, actor. He weighed 140 pounds.
●Diego Rivera: Mexican artist. He was described as 1.8 meters and 136 kilograms. That apparently would make him 300 pounds.
● Rosemary Forsyth: actress. Canadian-born, she began as a model.
● Jesse James: outlaw. Actually he was usually described as between 5-8 and 5-10..
● John Edgar Hoover: FBI director. This is the best estimate; he claimed 5-11, critics claimed 5-6..
● Beau Bridges: actor.
● Lon Chaney Sr.: actor.
●Fletcher Christian: ship’s officer. He led the mutiny against Captain Bligh of the Bounty.
●Calvin Coolidge: 30th U.S. president, 1923-29
●Ron Howard: Actor weighed 145 when he played Richie Cunningham in Happy Days.
●Trisha Yearwood: country music singer.
●Cindy Crawford: model..
● Tom Cruise: actor. He claims to be 5-9 but likely isn't.
●Cameron Diaz: actress.
●Diane Sawyer: TV personality.
●Julia Roberts: actress.
●Mira Sorvino: actress.
●Eliot Ness: lawman. His “Untouchables” fought Al Capone.
●Melanie Griffith: actress.
●Butch Cassidy: western outlaw. He was immortalized in film Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.
●Mata Hari: World War I spy. French executed her in 1917 for spying for Germans.
● Rod Laver: tennis player. Legendary Australian of a generation ago is shorter than many present female players..
●Richard Barthelmess: actor.
●Tony Curtis: actor.
●Douglas Fairbanks Sr.: actor.
●John Barrymore: actor.
●Kirk Douglas, actor.
●Charles Boyer: actor.
●Richard Burton: acvtor.
●British Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin.
●Jack Lemmon: actor.
●Marie Windsor: actress who was “Queen of the B’s.”.
●Steve McQueen: actor.
●Spencer Tracy: actor.
BETWEEN 5 FEET 8 AND 5 FEET 9● Tom Bosley: actor. He played father on Happy Days, was 5-8 3/4 and 213 pounds.
● Rutherford Hayes: 19th U.S. president, 1877-81. He was 5-8 ½ and weighed 170 to 180.
● Sophia Loren: actress.
● Frank Sinatra: entertainer.
● Adolf Hitler: He was described as 5-8 1/2.
● Peter Sellers: actor was described as 5-8 1/2.
● Orville Wright: inventor of airplane weighed 150 pounds.
● Loren Bacall: actress.
5 FEET 8 INCHES
This was the minimum height for the Roman army during the glory days of the empire. This minimum was lowered to 5-5 when the Western empire was waning. But see the supposed average height of Italian soldiers during WWII. This also was the minimum for SS officers, as set by Heinrich Himmler. This is also the minimum height for for Las Vegas showgirls.
●Lillie Langtry: actress, lover of British King Edward VII.
●Rod Laver: tennis player weighed 150 pounds.
●Mario Lanza, singer, actor: He weighed 240 in 1954. In ‘57 he dieted to 185 by eating only veal and salads. He soon died.
●Kirstie Alley: actress (weight varies between 145 and 220.)
●Robin Williams: actor.
●Meg Ryan: actress.
●James Dean: actor.
●Maureen O’Hara: actress.
●Jackie Chan: actor.
●Red Adair: firefighter.
●Scott Adams: artist (Dilbert).
●Shirley Jones: actress.
●Jane Fonda: actress.
●Tony Randall: actor
●Georges Simenon: French mystery novelist. He weighed 150 pounds.
●Catherine Zita Jones: actress.
●Geronimo: native American leader.
●Zane Gray: novelist famous for his Westerns. He weighed 150 pounds.
●Michael Dukakis: politician. He lost presidential election in 1988.
●Burt Reynolds: actor. He claims 5-11.
●Zachary Taylor: 12th U.S. president, 1849-50. He weighed175 in his prime, 200 as president.
●Teddy Roosevelt: 26th U.S. president, 1901-09. He weighed 200 pounds.
●Billy Crystal: comedian, actor.
●Chris Farley: comedian, actor. He weighed 296 pounds.
●Ivana Trump: The Donald’s ex. This is her height without heels.
●John Singleton Moseby: Confederate raider. He weighed about 125 pounds.
●Melvin Purvis: FBI agent. He shot John Dillinger outside theater in Chicago. He weighed 135 pounds.
●Anna Kournikova: tennis player and glamor girl.
●Julie Andrews: actress.
●Andy Rooney: TV personality.
●James Morrison: Bounty mutineer.
●Lee Harvey Oswald: JFK’s assassin.
●Thomas E. Dewey: unsuccessful presidential candidate, 1944, ‘48: He looked smaller. Critics said he looked like the little man on the wedding cake.
●Joseph E. Johnston: Confederate general. Friends described him as between 5-7 and 5-9. He weighed 150 pounds.
●Tom Cruise: actor claims to be 5-2, 200 pounds, likely is nearer 5-7. This listing is a compromise.
5 FEET 7 1/2 INCHES
● F. Scott Fitzgerald: author. He was described as just under 5-8.
●William IV: king of England, 1830-37. “Sailor Billy” was described as 5-7 or 5-8 and as ●Britain’s “least dignified monarch.”
●John Garfield: actor.
●Humphrey Bogart: actor weighed 136 pounds at age 18.
●Shelley Long: actress.
●Katharine Hepburn: actress.
●Greta Garbo: actress.
●Groucho Marx: commedian.
5 FEET 7 INCHES
●Nicholas II: last czar of Russia, 1894-1917.
●Harry Hopman: tennis player, coach; he weighed 133 pounds.
●James Cagney: actor.
●Brigette Bardot: actress.
●Adele Jergens: actress.
●Alan Ladd: actor weighed 150 pounds.
●Stan Laurel: commedian.
●Gene Kelly: actor/dancer.
●Doris Day: actress/singer.
●Bing Crosby: actor/singer.
●Kirstie Alley: actress.
●Puff Daddy: entertainer.
●Jane Russell: actress.
●Premier Ariel Sharon of Israel; he weighs 255 pounds.
●Betty Pack: spy for U.S. during World War II.
●Ann Miller: dancer/actress; She’s best remembered for On the Town. But she appeared taller than Fred Astaire, who supposedly was 5-9.
●Alfred Hitchcock: director.
●Maria Callas: opera diva.
●Rocky Graziano: middleweight champion, entertainer..
●Christopher Isherwood: British writer. He was the basis for Cabaret.
●MacKenzie Phillips: actress.
●Charles Bronson: tough-guy actor. He claims to be 5-11.
●Ross Perot: billionaire, candidate for president.
●Lady Di: international celebrity.
●Princess Anne: daughter of British queen.
●Prince Albert: husband of Queen Victoria of England.
●Audrey Hepburn: actress. She was too tall for ballet, so she tried acting.
●John Quincy Adams: 2nd U.S. president, 1797-1801. He weighed 175 pounds.
●Ulysses.S. Grant: 18th president, 1869-77. He was 5-1 when he first went to West Point.
●William McKinley: 25th president, 1897-1901. He weighed nearly 200 in an era when paunchiness was equated with prosperity.
●Tommy Burns: heavyweight champion, 1906-08. He was shortest ever to hold title. He weighed 170 pounds.
●Martina Hingis: tennis star.
●Angelina Jolie: actress
●Hilary Swank: actress. She weighs 118.
●Capucine: actress. She was in two of the Pink Panther films.
●Tawny Kitean: actress. The police blotter showed her as 5 feet 7, 145 pounds and 40 years old when she was booked in 2002 for punching husband, pitcher Chuck Finley (6-6, 225) of the Cleveland Indians.
5 FEET 6 1/2 INCHES
●Princess Grace: former actress. At 18, Grace Kelly weighed 126 pounds.
●Anita Ekberg: actress
●Bob Costas: sports announcer
● Henry Winkler: actor. “The Fonz” weighs 134 pounds..
●Olivia de Havilland: actress. This is her height in heels, according to a police lineup chart in The Dark Mirror.
●Dustin Hoffman: actor. Many think he’s even shorter.
●Winston Churchill: prime minister of Britain. Successor Anthony Eden was a whole head taller.
●Bernard Montgomery: British general. Monty was about the same as Winston Churchill, judging from photos.
●Jamie Lee Curtis: actress.
●Napoleon: French emperor. Modern historians say he was “5-6-plus,” noting that the 5-2 height often reported for him resulted from confusion over old systems of measurement. If this is so, he was taller than nephew Napoleon III.
● Louis XVI: king of France. This was his height with his head. Actually, he’s described as “5-6 or 5-7.”
● Augustus Caesar: Roman emperor. He was “just over 5-6,” according to a biographer. This might be inaccurate, though. Suetonius, the historian, says it's much exaggerated. He notes that everyone, in first meeting Augustus, was surprised to see how small he was.
●Benjamin Harrison: 23rd U.S. president, 1889-93.
●Henry Winkler: actor (the Fonz)
●Claude Rains: actor.
●Eleanor Powell: actress.
5 FEET 6 INCHES
●Benito Mussolini: Italian dictator. He literally looked up to Hitler, who was relatively tall. Figuratively, he looked down on him as "effeminate." Mussolini was always photographed amid short people and it was said he would permit only short people around him. He weighed 162 in 1943.
●Rita Hayworth (actress)
●Herman Goering: Hitler’s top henchman weighed up to 265 pounds. Photos show Heinrich Himmler about Goering's height).
●O. Henry: author. He had a slight build..
●King George V of U: Wise guys called him "George the Four-Fifths."
●Edward VII: He was king of England in 1901-10. He looked taller, maybe because he was a king, maybe because he was a bully.
●Edward VII: He was king of England in 1936. Upon abdication he became Duke of Windsor..
●Alfred Hitchcock: Master of movie suspense was short and fat.
●Dustin Hoffman (but see above).
●John Paul Jones: Some say founder of U.S. Navy was 5-7, some say 5-5. This is a compromise.
●John Adams: The second president was described as “about 5-6.”.
●Harry Houdini: escape artist/entertainer.
●Louis Lepke: labor-racketeer and mobster.
●Kate Winslet: actress. She weighed 185 as teenager.
●George Wallace: Alabama governor.
●Pete Conrad: astronaut. He was third man on the moon.
●Dorothy Malone: actress. Her character was described as 5-6 in Flaxie Martin.
●Rudyard Kipling: author.
●Julius Caesar: Roman general, dictator. (“about”).
●Elisha Cook Jr.: This is the noted character actor’s height, according to Humphrey Bogart’s description in The Maltese Falcon. Cook is also remembered as the little farmer who got shot in Shane.
●Goldie Hawn: actress.
●The Little Mermaid in Copenhagen.
●Ava Gardner: actress
●Lillian Russell: actress grew to 165 pounds in the 1920s.
●Cyd Charisse: dancer/actress.
●Lon McCallister: actor.
●Cullen Landis: silent film hero.
●Raquel Welsh: actress.
5 FEET 5½ INCHES
●T.E. Lawrence: “Lawrence of Arabia.”
●Admiral Horatio Nelson: British naval hero.
● J. Lionel Cowen: manufacturer of toy trains. The famous founder of Lionel Trains was described as "a little over 5-5."
●J.R.R. Tolkien: writer.
●Ann Sheridan: actress.
●Fred Patek: ballplayer.
●Albie Pearson: ballplayer.
●Emperor Hirohito of Japan.
●Rabbit Maranville: ballplayer.
●Roman Polanski: director.
●Jules Verne: novelist.
●Audie Murphy: war hero, actor. This was his height upon induction into the U.S. Army. He emerged as World War II’s most decorated hero, then became a Hollywood actor..
●Martin Van Buren: 8th U.S. president, 1837-41. He was described as “not quite 5-6.”
●Marilyn Monroe: actress.
●Harpo Marx: actor.
● Janet Leigh: actress.
● Dustin Hoffman: actor.
●William Faulkner: novelist.
●Gene Sarazen, golfer.
5 FEET 5
This is the average height of Italian soldiers in World War II.
●King Tut: Actually, the mummy of the Egyptian pharaoh was measured at 5-5 1/8..
●Aristotle Onassis: Greek shipping tycoon.
●Hirohito: Japanese emperor.He appeared shorter than that in photos beside future Duke of Windsor.
●Samantha Eggar: actress.
●Earl Boykins: basketball player. A guard with Golden State Warriors, he was NBA's smallest player in 2003. He weighs 133.
●Edward G. Robinson: actor.
●Demi Moore; actress. She weighs 130 pounds
●Evita Peron: legendary wife of Argentine dictator. She was subject of play and movie entitled Don’t Cry for Me Argentina.”
●Emperor Napoleon III of France: He ruled in 1852-70. He had very short legs and was perhaps shorter than his more-famous uncle.
●Jimmy Hoffa: labor leader. .
●Gus Grissom: astronaut.
●Armand Hammer: industrialist.
●Spike Lee: director.
●Vaslav Njinsky: ballet dancer.
●Aristotle Onassis: tycoon.
●Geoffrey the Giraffe: This was his height at birth, Dec. 25, 2002, at NYC’s Bronx Zoo.
●Ann-Margret: This is her official height but she looks smaller when photographed with Elvis...
●Frederick Funston, the "little colonel" (115 pounds) who captured Emilio Aquinaldo in March 1901 during war in Philippines (father was 6-2, 200-pound "Foghorn" Funston, a Civil War officer who bcame a U.S congressman).
●Evil King John: He ruled England in 1199-1216.
●Manfred von Richthofen: Germany’s Red Baron shot down 80 Allied planes in World War I..
●Axis Sally: German disc jockey during World War II. Mildred Gillars died in Ohio.
●Queen Mary, wife of George V.
●Barbara Stanwyck: actress.
●Virginia Mayo: actress.
●Martin Bormann: Nazi.
●Mama Cass Elliott: singer weighed up to 250 pounds.
●Pete Lorre: actor. But he looked nearer 5-2.
●Syngman Rhee: politician.
●Mickey Cohen: gangster.
●Gina Lollabrigida: actress.
●Alan Ladd: tough-guy actor. He stood on boxes when filmed with taller actresses..
●Baby Face Nelson: bandit.
●Richard Dreyfuss: actor.
●Fightin' Joe Wheeler: Confederate major general lived to fight in Cuba as U.S. general. He weighed 120 pounds.
● Joel Grey: Actor is best known for role in Cabaret..
●Lou Costello: comedian.
●William Mahone: Confederate general was described as barely 5 1/2 feet tall. He weighed less than 100 pounds. (The name was pronounced “Muh-hown.")
5 FEET 4 3/4 INCHES
●Baby Face Nelson: gangster.
5 FEET 4½ INCHES
●Sir Francis Drake: England’s noted privateer (pirate) was described as “under 5-5.”
●Willie Keeler: Wee Willie hit em where they ain’t when playing baseball for old Baltimore Orioles...
●Elizabeth Taylor: actress's best weight is 120 to 122 pounds.
●Jeanette MacDonald: actress/singer.
●Rosanna Podesta: actress.
●Adam Worth: master criminal. He was model for Professor Moriarity in Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories. Worth was described as 5-4 or 5-5 and 130/135 pounds..
5 FEET 4 INCHES
The Floradora Girls, a public sensation of 1901, were each 5-4 and 130 pounds -- the ideal of the era.
The Average Japanese officer was 5-4 during WWII, partially because food at notorious military academy at Ichigaya was so sparse and bad. They weighed 128 pounds on average.
●Joan Crawford: actress.
●Virginia Hill: gun moll weighed 130 pounds.
●Charles I: British king.
●Pablo Picasso: artist. (“about”)
●Madonna: entertainer. She weighs 101.
●Hercule Poiret: fictitious detective.
●Carmen Electra: actress.
●Hideki Tojo: premier of Japan. He was executed after World War II. He weighed 155 pounds, was bald and wore horn-rimmed glasses
●Ludvig von Beethoven: composer.
●Mario Andretti: race driver.
●Sir Tom Phillips: British admiral. As commander-in-chief of the Far Eastern Fleet, he presided over British naval disaster in which cruiser Repulse and battleship Prince of Wales were lost to Japanese Dec. 8, 1941. He was called “Tom Thumb” because of his size and it was said he was “all brain and no body.” He was killed in the debacle..
●Ginger Rogers: actress. She’s best remembered as Fred Astaire’s dancing partner.
●Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: composer.
●Meyer Lansky: gangster. He was “prime minister” of organized crime.
●Phil Sheridan: Civil War general. He weighed 115 pounds.
●Josef Stalin: Soviet dictator.
●Clara Bow: actress.
●Vivian Leigh: actress.
●U.S. Gen. John S. Casement: Civil War commander, building of Union Pacific Railroad.
●Michael J. Fox: actor.
●Donald Meek: character actor. Bald and humorous, he was in many famous movies but is perhaps most familiar as frightened traveling salesman in Stagecoach. He weighed 130 pounds.
●Liz Ray: Washington, D.C. secretary: The notorious non-typer weighed 108 pounds..
●Elizabeth II: queen of England. ("just under").
●Queen Mum (Elizabeth): late mother of Elizabeth II.
●James Madison: 3rd U.S. president, 1809-17. He weighed 100 pounds.
●John Harvey Kellogg: cereal maker. Dr. Kellogg made Battle Creek, Mich., famous.
●Elizabeth Taylor, actress.
●Winona Ryder: actress.
●Barbara Hutton: heiress to Woolworth fortune.
●Composer Ludwig von Beethoven: composer. This height is from a Bose ad, but is this credible?
●Jeanette Macdonald: actress, singer. This is according to her description of herself in the film Rosemarie.
●Rod Serling: TV writer.
●Chris Antley: jockey.
●Haile Selassie: Ethiopian emperor.
●Gustav Mahler: composer.
●Sammy Davis Jr.: entertainer.
●Moe Howard: actor.
●Barry Fitzgerald: actor.
●John Hancock: politician.
●Burgess Meredith: actor.
●Rick Moranis: actor.
●Guy Lombardo: band leader.
●Pablo Picasso: artist
●Igor Stravinsky: composer.
●Emperor Haile Selassie I of Ethiopia.
●James McNeill Whistler: artist.
●Auguste Rodin: sculptor.
●Martin Scorsese: director.
●Arnold Schoenberg: composer.
●Mel Brooks: actor/director.
●Robert Blake: actor and murder defendant.
5 FOOT 3 1/2 INCHES
● Scott Hamilton: skater.
●Olyvia de Havilland: actress.
5 FOOT 3 INCHES
● Truman Capote: author best known for Breakfast at Tiffany’s.
● Charles Aznavour: singer.
● Tyrone "Muggsy" Bogues: basketball player.
●Voltaire: philosopher.
●John Wesley: religious leader.
●Paul Simon: musician.
● Actress Betty Grable: actress, pin-up.
● Mohandas Gandhi: political leader.
● Anthony Armstrong-Jones: photographer. He married and divorced Britain’s Princess Margaret.
● Vladimir Lenin: ruler of Soviet Union..
● Mickey Rooney: actor.
● Isokoru Yamamoto: Japanese admiral. He masterminded attack on Pearl Harbor.
● William Bonney: Billy the Kid. He weighed 125 pounds.
● Marilyn Monroe: actress. American film goddess of the 1950s was described as 5-2 or 5-4. She wore, some say, a size 16 dress.
● Nikita Khrushchev: Russian premier.
● Voltaire (Francois Marie Arouet): French writer and philosopher.
● Bette Davis: actress.
● Jessica Simpson: celebrity.
● Jay Gould: Wall Street chiseler's height was approximate. Some sources say 5-6, some 5-0. This listing is a compromise.
●King Ibn Talil Hussein of Jordan.
●Charles Manson: murderer weighs 130 pounds.
5 FEET 2 1/2 INCHES
●Rosemary Casals: tennis player.
5 FEET 2 INCHES
This is the minimum height for the French Foreign Legion.
● Fiorello LaGuardia: mayor of New York City. Some sources say 5-0.
● Honore de Balzac: novelist.
● Eva Longoria: actress
● Buckminster Fuller: scientist.
● Julie Christie: actress.
● Yuri Garagin: cosmonaut.
● Margaret Mead: anthropologist.
●Skinner Belfield: baseball player. He caught for the 1948 Newark Eagles of the Negro leagues.
●Charles Ponzi: swindler and father of pyramid schemes..
●Francisco Madero: Mexican president, 1911-13.
●Horatio Alger: author. Besides writing inspirational books for boys, he was a child molester.
●Dudley Moore: British musician and comedian was, some say, 5-2 1/2.
● Jacob “Little Augie” Orgen: gangster. NYC mobster of the '30s was killed by Louis Lepke.
●Yasser Arafat: politician.
●Carole Lombard: actress.
●Claudette Colbert: actress. (This is approximate. She was half an inch taller than Mae West.)
●Sen. Theodore Bilbo of Mississippi.
●John C. Fremont: explorer.
●Chang Bunker: Siamwse twin (but brother Eng was 5-3.)
●Julius Streicher: Nazi war criminal.
●Carlos Marcello: gangster. Some think this Louisiana godfather "hit" JFK..
5 FEET 1 INCH
●Mae West: actress. Some friends claimed she was under 5-0 without special shoes.
●Thomas C. Hindman, Confederate major general. But Joe Wheeler supposedly was war's smallest general.
●June Allyson: actress.
●Edvard Grieg: composer.
●St. Francis of Assisi.
●Debby Reynolds: actress.
●Marquis de Sade: notorious historical figure. He was “5-1 or 5-2.".
●Thomas Hardy: novelist. He was "barely over 5 foot."
●Henri Toulouse-Lautrec: artist. But other sources say he was 4-11, or even “4½ feet tall.”
●Mary Miles Minter; actress. She was suspect in notorious murder of director William Desmond Taylor.
5 /feet 0 3/4 INCHES
● John Keats: English poet.
5 /feet 0 1/2 INCHES
● Mary Pickford: actress.
5 FEET
●Abigail Van Buren: advice columnist.
●Dolly Parton: country singer.
●Georgia Sothern: stripper.
●Vittorio Emanuelle: Italian king in Mussolini era. He was described as “barely 5 foot.”.
●Benito Juarez: Mexican president 1857-72.
●David Ben-Gurion: politician.
●Milton Friedman: economist.
●Patty Duke: actress.
●Stephen A. Douglas: politician.
●Andrew Carnegie: tycoon.
●Thomas Hart Benton: artist.
●Gracie Allen: comedienne.
●Annie Oakley: entertainer.
●Natalie Wood: actress.
●Harriet Tubman: teacher.
●Shari Lewis: entertainer.
●Immanuel Kant: philosopher.
●Lorenz Hart: lyricist.
●Danny DeVito: actor.
●Josef Goebbels: German propagandist. He weighed 100 pounds.
●Izzy Einstein: Prohibition agent No. 1. He weighed 225. He and partner became nationally famous as “Izzy and Moe.” Jackie Gleason did a TV movie of this name in 1985.
●Princess Margaret: late sister of Queen Elizabeth II. She was often described as "just over 5 foot" but one source says she barely hit 5-0 even with her special high heels.
●Guiseppe Zangara: bricklayer, assassin. Zangara, 32, tried to kill President Franklin D. Roosevelt on Feb. 15, 1933 in Miami. He was so short he couldn't see over crowd. His five shots went wild. One killed the mayor of Chicago, Anton Cermak..
●Clara Barton: founder of American Red Cross..
●Drew Barrymore: actress.
●Pearl Hart: female bandit in Arizona.
●Helen Hayes, actress. In the movie Airport, she’s described as 5-0.
●Jean Paul Marat: revolutionist. He was murdered during French Revolution.
●Lupe Velez: actress.
●Estelle Astraire: dancer.
●Father Divine: Late preacher was said to be "about 5 feet."
●Maurice Ravel: composer.
●Mr. Ed: talking horse. Improbable TV star measured 15 hands.
“UNDER 5-0"
●Isidoro De Lara: composer. He was born Isidore Cohen in London in 1857. His operas included "The Light of Asia" and "Amy Robsart." Facially, he was handsome, and he had a fine baritone voice. He was charming, dynamic and confident, despite his size and his hunched back. He was notorious for cuckolding Prince Albert of Monaco, breaking up his marriage with Princess Alice.
4 FEET 11 INCHES
●Mother Teresa: future saint.
● Olga Korbut: gymnast.
● Cathy Rigby: gymnast.
● Harriet Beecher Stowe: author
● Nancy Walker: actress.
●Gloria Swanson: actress.
●Victoria: British queen 1837-1901. She weighed 181 pounds in old age..
●Carmen Miranda: actress. The bananas on her hats made her look taller..
●Willie Shoemaker: jockey. He became “Bill” as he grew older, richer..
●Judy Garland; actress. Her weight ranged from 90 pounds to 185..
●Engelbert Dollfuss: chancellor of Austria. He was known as "Millimetternich" and “Tiny.” The Nazis killed him in 1934.
●Barbara Boxer: politician.
●Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec: artist
●Nell Carter: entertainer.
●Kristen Chenoweth: actress.
●Anita Loos: writer.
●Tammy Faye Bakker: evangelist.
4 FOOT 10½ INCHES
To qualify for the Japanese armed forces, a male had to be at least 4-10 ½ , 103 pounds and have a chest measurement more than half his height
4 FEET 10 INCHES
●Robert Reich: former U.S. Labor secretary. That's what he says, but some think he's smaller.
●Edith Piaf: French singer. She weighed 90 pounds.
●Sister Nirmala: nun. She’s Mother Teresa's successor.
●Brenda Lee: U.S. pop singer.
●Bonnie Parker: outlaw weighed 85 pounds.
●Margaret Mitchell: author (Gone With the Wind).
●Charlotte Bronte: author.
4 FEET 9 1/2 INCHES
●Mary Lou Retton: gymnast.
4 FEET 9 INCHES
●Linda Hunt: actress.
●Alicia de Larrocha: concert pianist.
4 FEET 8 INCHES
●Gary Coleman: actor.
4 FEET 7 INCHES
●Dr. Ruth Westheimer: psychologist.
4 FEET 6 INCHES AND LESS
Napoleon lowered the minimum for the Grande Armee to 4-6, obviously because he was killing off so many of his men.
●4 feet 6: Alexander Pope: British poet.
●4 feet 2 -- Queen Matilda: wife of William the Conquerer of England. This height was noted by those who opened her tomb in 1967. You have to wonder if they opened the right tomb, though.
●4 feet 0 -- Johnny Roventini: bellboy in commercials. His “Call for Philip Morris” was seen and heard in cigarette ads in 1933-74. He died 11/30/1998 in Suffern, N.Y., at age 88.)
●Herve Villachaize: actor (Love Boat).
●3-10 -- Billy Barty: actor. He made films in the early 1930s and was still making them in the ‘90s. He weighs 80 pounds..
●3-7 -- Eddie Gaedel, major league baseball player. His insistence that he’d played in the big leagues led to many bar fights, which he always lost, and perhaps led to his fatal beating in 1961. If fact, he was the midget Bill Veeck sent up to bat for the St. Louis Browns in 1951. He weighed 65 pounds.
●2-8 Verne Troyer: actor (villainous Mini-Me married 6-2 woman).
●2-5:-- George S. Stratton: circus performer (less euphemistically, he was a freak). He was from Bridgeport, Conn. He became “Gen.. Tom Thumb,” P.T. Barnum's midget. He was 2-1 at 5 years old, when first displayed. He’d grown to 2-5 by Feb. 10, 1862, when he married Mercy Lavinia Warren Bump at Grace Church in NYC. This was the first marriage for both.
●2-2 1/2 -- Calvin Phillips lived 1791-1812.
●1-10 1/2 -- Gul Mohanned who lived 1957-97, is said to have been world’s shortest person.
● An oldtime magician named Bukinger (?) was also 29 inches tall. might check him in library.
13 1/2 INCHES
●Oscar, the Academy Award.
VAGUE DESCRIPTIONS
●The Empress Eugenie, wife of Napoleon III, was described as above average height.
●President William Henry Harrison was described as average height.
●President James Knox Polk was just under medium height.
COMPARING HEIGHTS
We can try to fill in some blanks by using our ingenuity. Hollywood films are a big help, especially if we can see if the women are wearing high heels or not.
John Garfield and George Raft were shorter than Marie Windsor, offered to stand on boxes when filmed with her. Maureen O’Hara recalls Garfield standing on an “apple box” when filming beside her.
Some comparisons:
●Gen. Henri Giraud of France was nearly as tall as Charles de Gaulle.
Jay Leno looks about two inches shorter than Arnold Schwarzenegger. The latter claims to be 6-2 but is nearer 5-10.
●Economist John Kenneth Galbreath is very tall, perhaps about 6-6.
●Fidel Castro likely is about 6-3 or 6-4.
●Vladimir Putin looks about 5-11.
●Judging from photos, Gen. George Marshall likely was roughly 5-10.
●Judging from photos, Gen. John Pershing likely was roughly 5-8. He was quite burly.
●Hitler’s biographers can write 1,200 pages without revealing his height. He probably was about 5-9. Judging by photos, he was 2 or 3 inches taller than Goering, 3 inches taller than Mussolini and 4 inches taller than Goebbels.
●Martin Luther King Jr. was small.
●SS Gen. Sepp Dietrich was little more than 5 feet tall, judging by photos.
●Samuel Gompers, the labor leader of the early 1900s, was very small, not much over five feet apparently
WEIGHT
History has had some notorious heavyweights. Some are listed below. Unfortunately, the heights of most of these people aren’t known.
● Konishiki was champion sumo wrestler who weighed 630 pounds.
● Movie actor Andy Devine weighed 300 pounds.
● Movie actor Sebastian Cabot weighed 280 pounds.
● Major Gen. Sterling Price weighed more than 300 pounds at the end of the Civil War. He commanded a Confederate army in Missouri..
● Willis B. "Bill" Chapman umpired in the Big State League in 1951-52. He weighed between 405 and 410 pounds. He wore a size 56 chest protecotr, which the manufacturer called the largest ever made.
● Gen. William Shafter led U.S. troops in Cuba during the Spanish-American War. He weighed 300 pounds and needed two privates to hoist him on his horse. His troops joked that he was three men rolled into one.
● Diamond Jim Brady, famous boyfriend of Lillian Russell, weighed 250 pounds.
● Union Gen. George Thomas grew enormous after the Civil War.
● Actor Sydney Greenstreet weighed nearly 300 pounds.
● Two British monarchs, King Henry VIII and Queen Anne, grew so fat they needed derrick arrangements to help them out of bed.
● Actor Victor Buono, 44, weighed about 300 when he died in 1982. He’s best remembered as the accompanist in What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?.
● Politician William Jennings Bryan weighed 180 until the late 1890s, then gained 30 pounds.
●Composer Jacques Offenbach is said to have weighed 90 pounds.
Dieting has killed more than one film star. Mario Lanza, 38, died in a clinic in Rome in 1957. A crash diet killed Laird Cregar, 28, in 1944.
Sunday, December 2, 2007
Who Married Whom
PEOPLE NOWADAYS JOKE about Jennifer Lopez. They say she’s the “Serial Bride.” But she’s just a beginner at the Marriage Derby. Elizabeth Taylor, Lana Turner, Hedy Lamarr and the Gabor sisters had it down pat, acquiring husbands amid great ballyhoo. Men such as Claude Rains and George Brent generally accumulated spouses more quietly.
There’ve been many embarrassingly quick divorces. Some newlyweds didn’t get through the first night.
In the listings below, generally assume the marriage ended in divorce, unless otherwise noted.
HUSBANDS
Prince Aly Khan
The Indian-born Prince of Playboys lived 1911-60. His many affairs involved Kim Novak, Juliette Greco and Gene Tierney. He died in a car wreck. His wives:
1) Joan Guinness in about 1936-48; he stole her from Loel Guinness, British M.P. Aly and Joan had two sons.
2) Rita Hayworth (movie star) in 1948-53. They had a daughter Yasmin.
Lew Ayres
Hollywood actor was born in 1908. He was married to actresses Lola Lane (1931-33) and Ginger Rogers (1934-41).
John Barrymore
Famed actor lived 1882-1942. He had four unsuccessful marriages. One was to poetress Michael Strange and one to actress Dolores Costello (divorced in 1935).
Werner von Blomberg
This German general was a widower with grown children when he married Eva Gruhn on Feb. 12, 1938. The general’s downfall came quickly when she was revealed as a former prostitute. The general’s political enemies, Hermann Goering and Heinrich Himmler, greased the skids. The general stood by his new wife.
Humphrey Bogart
Hollywood legend lived 1899-1957.
1) Helen Menken (actress) in 1926-27.
2) Mary Philips (actress) in 1928-37.
3) Mayo Methot (actress) in 1938-44.
4) Lauren Bacall (actress) 1945-until he died in ‘57.
Ernest Borgnine
Hollywood actor was born in 1917. His five wives included at least two actresses: Katy Jurado in 1959-64 and Ethel Merman very briefly in 1964.
Marlon Brando
1) Anna Kashfi (actress), 1957-59; they had son Christian.
2) Movita Castenada (actress), 1960-68.
3) Tarita
George Brent
Hollywood actor lived 1904-79. He made 11 films with Bette Davis, who reportedly wanted to marry him.
1)
2) Ruth Chatterton in 1932-34.
3) Constance Worth in 1937.
4) Ann Sheridan in 1942-43.
5)
6)
Julius Caesar
He was dictator of Rome in 49-44 B.C.
1) Cornelia, 84 B.C.; she died in 68.
2) Pompeia; he divorced her.
3) Calpurnia, 59 B.C.-on; she warned him but he was murdered in 44 B.C.
Nicolas Cage
Hollywood leading man was born in 1964.
1)
2) Lisa Marie Presley in 2002 for 108 days.
3) Alice Kim; he was 40 when he married sushi waitress, 20, in 2004.
Louis Calhern
Hollywood character actor lived 1895-1956. His wives included Ilka Chase (1926-26), Julia Hoyt, Natalie Schaefer and Marianne Stewart.
Jack Carson
Popular supporting actor lived 1910-63. Actress Lola Albright was among his four wives (1952-58).
Johnny Carson
Tonight Show emcee died in 2005.
1) Jody -- (childhood sweetheart) in 1949-63. They had three sons.
2) Joanne Copeland in 1963-72.
3) Joanna Holland 19??-85.
4) Alexis Maas 1987-on. He was 62, she in her 30s, when they wed.
Charlie Chaplin
Film legend lived 1889-1977.
1) Mildred Harris in 1918-20; she was 16 and a film extra when they wed. Later, she was billed as “Chaplin’s First Wife” when she teamed with Phil Silvers in vaudeville.
2) Lolita MacMurray in 1924; they had Charles Jr. and Sidney. (She changed name to Lita Grey.)
3) Paulette Goddard in 1933-42; she was 19 when they wed.
4) Oona O’Neill in 1943; she was 18. Father Eugene, the playwright, strongly disapproved. She became the mother of Geraldine, later an actress, in 1944.
Bing Crosby
Crooner/actor lived 1903-77.
1) Dixie Lee in 1930; she was mother of four sons and died in 1952.
2) Kathryn Grant in 1957; she was 30 years younger than he. They had two sons and a daughter.
Tom Cruise
Hollywood leading man was born in 1962.
1) Mimi Rogers (actress).
2) Nicole Kidman (actress); they’re divorced.
Robert Cummings
Film and TV actor lived 1908-90. Married three times, he fathered seven children.
Tony Curtis
Leading man was born in 1925. His three marriages include those to Janet Leigh (actress) in 1951-62 (a much publicized marriage that produced Jamie Lee in 1957) and to Christine Kauffmann (actress) in 1963-67.
Richard Harding Davis
Famous war correspondent lived 1864-1916. He married at least twice. He divorced Cecil Clark, a Chicago socialite, to marry Ziegfeld dancer Bessie McCoy.
Sammy Davis Jr.
Many-talented entertainer lived 1925-90.
1)
2) May Britt (actress) in 1960-68.
3)
Paul Douglas
Pro football player-turned actor lived 1907-59.
1)
2)
3)
4) Virginia Field (actress).
5) Jan Sterling, his widow.
Clint Eastwood
Born in 1930, he became a TV star, then a Hollywood star. He’s had seven kids, some by wives. He’s had special affairs with Sandra Locke and Frances Fisher. Wives:
1) Maggie Johnson in 1953-80. She got $25 million divorce settlement in 1984.
2) Dina Ruiz.
Douglas Fairbanks Sr.
Film legend lived 1883-1939.
1) Anna Beth Sully in 1907. (They had Douglas Jr. in 1909.)
2) Mary Pickford in 1920-36. (They separated in 1933.)
3) Lady Sylvia Ashley in 1936.
Douglas Fairbanks Jr.
Film actor was born in 1909..
1) Joan Crawford (actress) in 1928-33.
2) Mary Lee Hartford in 1938. (She died in 1988.)
Mel Ferrer
Actor was born in 1917. Actress Audrey Hepburn was the fourth of his five wives.
Eddie Fisher
Singer was born in 1928.
1) Debbie Reynolds. After they had Carrie Fisher, he divorced her to marry:
2) Liz Taylor in 1959 amid great publicity; she divorced him in ‘64 to marry Richard Burton.
3) Connie Stevens, actress-singer; they divorced.
Errol Flynn
Hollywood leading man lived 1909-59. He was cavorting with Beverly Aadland, 16, when he died.
1) Lili Damita (Ziegfeld girl/actress) in 1935-42.
2) Nora Eddington in 1943-49.
3) Patrice Wymore (actress) in 1950-59.
Henry Fonda
Leading man lived 1905-82.
1) Margaret Sullavan (actress) in 1931-33. She committed suicide in ‘60.
2) Frances Seymour Brokaw in 1936-50. She committed suicide after having Jane and Peter.
3) Susan Blanchard in 1950-66. (He married her eight months after first wife’s death. In 1999 Susan used surname Blanchard when she wed widower Richard Widmark.)
4) Afdera Franchetti in 1947-61. They divorced.
5) Shirlee Adams from 1966 on. She’d been a stewardess and model.
Glenn Ford
Leading man was born in 1916 in Quebec and died in 2006 in Beverly Hills.
1) Eleanor Powell (dancer/actress) in 1943-59. She was six years his senior. They had son Peter.
2) Kathryn Hays (actress) in 1966-68.
3) Cynthia Howard (actress) in 1977-84. He was 32 years her senior..
Clark Gable
“The King” of Hollywood lived 1901-60.
1) Josephine Dillon (actress 14 years his senior) in 1924-30.
2) Rhea Langham (Texas socialite 17 years his senior) in 1931; they split in 1935.
3) Carole Lombard in 1939. She died in plane crash in 1942.
4) Lady Sylvia Ashley in 1947. This lasted a couple of years. (She lived 1904-77.)
5) Kay Spreckels in 1955. She was the mother of his only legitimate child, John Clark Gable, born just after the father’s death.
Hermann Goring
Adolf Hitler’s deputy and air force chief lived 1893-1946.
1) Baroness Karin von Folk-Kantzow; a Swede, in Munich in 1922; she'd been divorced before marrying Goring; she died of TB in 1931.
2) Emmy Sonnemann (actress) on April 10, 1935. They were still married when he committed suicide.
Kelsey Grammer
He’s been a TV favorite for many years.
1) Doreen Alderman in 1982-90.
2) Leigh-Anne Csuhany in 1992-93.
3) Camille Donatacci in 1997-.
Stewart Granger
London-born leading man lived 1913-93.
1) Elspeth March (actress) in 1939-49.
2) Jean Simmons (actress) in 1950-60.
3) unknown; divorced.
Cary Grant
Film icon lived 1904-86.
1) Virginia Cherrill (actress) in 1933-35.
2) Barbara Hutton (heiress) in 1942-45.
3) Betsy Drake (actress) in 1949-59.
4) Dian Cannon (actress) in 1965-68. She had his only child, a girl.
5) Barbara Harris in 1981 until his death.
Georg Friedrich Handel
This famous composer lived 1685-1759. Oddly, nothing is known about his private life, even if he was married or not.
Rex Harrison
British-born leading man lived 1908-90.
1) Marjorie Thomas in 1934-42.
2) Lilli Palmer (actress) in 1943-57.
3) Kay Kendall (actress) in 1957-59.
4) Rachel Roberts (actress) in 1962-71.
5) Elizabeth Harris in 1971. She’d divorced actor Richard Harris.
6) Mercia Tinker in 1978.
Dick Haymes
Foreign-born singer/actor had constant marital, financial and legal problems; five of his six marriages ended in divorce. Like Lew Ayres, he aroused public ire by not serving in the military during World War II.
1)
2) Joanne Dru (actress) 1941-49.
3) Nora Eddington (Errol Flynn’s non-actress ex).
4) Rita Hayworth in 1953-54.
5)
6)
Van Heflin
Low-key actor lived 1910-71.
1)
2) Frances Neal (bit player) in 1942-67
Henry VIII
He lived 1491-1547. As King of England, he had no end of marital woes.
1) Catherine of Aragon in 1509-(divorced). She was mother of Bloody Mary.
2) Anne Boleyn in 1533-36 (beheaded). She was mother of Elizabeth.
3) Jane Seymour in 1536-37 (died after childbirth).
4) Anne of Cleves in 1540-40 (annulled).
5) Kathryn Howard in 1540-42 (beheaded).
6) Katherine Parr in 1543-47 . She outlived him by a year.
Rock Hudson
He was born in 1925. Hollywood leading man was married to Nancy Gates in 1955-58. He died of AIDS in 1985.
Howard Hughes
Eccentric tycoon lived 1905-76. He had many liaisons, perhaps most notably with actress Terry Moore. Wives:
1) Ella Rice (Houston socialite) in the 1920s; she divorced him after three years.
2) Jean Peters (actress, 20 years his junior) in 1957-71.
Jack Johnson
Heavyweight champion lived 1878-1946.
1) Mary Austin (colored) left him in Cripple Creek, Colo.
2) Etta Terry Duryea (white) in 1909. She shot herself Sept. 11, 1912.
3) Lucille Cameron (white) in 1912-24. This brought prosecution/persecution under the Mann Act.
4) Irene Marie Pineau (white) in 1925.
Al Jolson
Legendary entertainer lived 1886-1950.
Third of four wives was actress Ruby Keeler in 1928-39.
Curt Jurgens
Suave German film actor’s five wives included Eva Bartok (1955-56).
John F. Kennedy
President lived 1917-63. The purported marriage listed first below remains controversial.
1) Durie Macolm in 1947; Palm Beach socialite had many husbands.
2) Jacqueline Bouvier in 1953-on.
Fernando Lamas
Film actor lived 1915-82.
1)
2)
3) Arlene Dahl (actress) in 1954-60 (although he’d been going with Lana Turner).
4) Esther Williams (actress) from 1967 until he died in 1982.
Burt Lancaster
Hollywood leading man was born in 1913. He married a fellow circus acrobat, June Ernst, while on a carnival tour in 1935. They separated “immediately.”
Alan Jay Lerner
Musician half of wonderful Lerner-Lowe team lived 1918-86. Actress Nancy Olson was the third of his eight wives. The eighth one, his widow, was British actress Liz Robertson. He left behind many debts and lawsuits, but some wonderful works: My Fair Lady, Brigadoon, etc.
Gordon MacRae
Singer-actor lived 1921-86.
1) Sheila Stephens (actress) in 1941-67.
2) unknown.
Tommy Manville
This nutty heir had more dollars than sense. He married 11 times, earning the nickname “Marrying Manville.”
One wife, actress Bonita Francine Edwards, wed him Nov. 18, 1941 in Bridgefield, Conn. That Dec. 9, she arrived in Reno to establish residency for divorce. She cited incompatibility.
One wife, Marie (Sunny) Ainsworth, wed him Aug. 25, 1943 in the New York Supreme Court in NYC. This lasted 7 hours and 45 minutes.
Songwriter Anita Frances Roddy-Eden married him July 10, 1952. On July 23, he announced a breakup. They’d argued about him leaving their suite at the Waldorf Astoria.
Gene Markey
Screenwriter and producer (1895-1980) wasn't famous, but he didn’t care; he married beautiful women, including Joan Bennett (1932-37), Hedy Lamarr (1939-40) and Myrna Loy (1946-50).
Dean Martin
Singer/actor was born in 1917. Six of his eight children were living in 2004.
1) Betty in 1940-49.
2) Jeannie in 1949-73, still alive at 77 in 2004.
3) Catherine in 1973-76.
Tony Martin
Singer/actor was born in 1912.
1) Alice Faye (singer/actress) in 1937-40.
2) Cyd Charisse (actress, dancer) from 1948-on
Kid McCoy
His real name was Norman Selby and he once claimed the light heavyweight boxing title. He was married eight to 10 times, although thrice to the same woman. Like Lana Turner, he’s known for the death of a non-spouse. He was convicted of manslaughter in 1924 for shooting the woman he was living with, Teresa Mors. He did eight years in San Quentin before paroled in 1932.
Burgess Meredith
Although born way back in 1908 he was still in movies in the 1990s (the Grouchy Old Men sequence).
1)
2)
3) Paulette Goddard (actress) in 1944-49.
4) divorced.
Arthur Miller
Noted playwright died Feb. 10, 2005 at age 89.
1) Mary Slattery. They had two children.
2) Marilyn Monroe (actress) in 1956-61.
3) Inge Morath (photographer) in 1962-on. They had one daughter.
Napoleon I
1) Mme. Josephine de Beauharnais. She was a widow when they wed March 9, 1796; he divorced her in 1809 because heir was lacking. (She was born Marie Josephine Rose Tascher de la Pagerie.)
2) Marie Louise in April 1810. She didn't go into exile with him.
Nero
He was emperor of Rome in 54-68 B.C.
1) Octavia; she was his step-sister. She died in 62 B.C. at about age 20.
2) Poppaea Sabina; she died when he beat her.
3) Statilia Messalina, who survived him.
Jack Nicholson
Leading man was born in 1937. Despite many romances, he apparently has been married only once, to actress Sandra Knight in 1962-67.
Aristotle Onassis
Shipping magnate lived 1906-75.
1) Tina Livenos; she was 17, he 40.
2) Jackie Kennedy.
John Payne
Hollywood leading man lived 1912-89. He wasn’t John Wayne, but he was popular.
1) Anne Shirley (actress) in 1942-43.
2) Gloria DeHaven (actress) in 1944-50.
3) Non-actress.
Jack Pickford
Film star lived 1896-1933.
1) Olive Thomas (actress) in 1917 until her death in 1920.
2) Marilyn Miller (actress) in 1922-27.
3) Mary Muhern (Ziegfeld girl) in 1930-32.
Dick Powell
Leading man/director/producer lived 1904-63.
1)
2) Joan Blondell (actress) in 1936-44.
3) June Allyson (actress) in 1945 until his death.
William Powell
The Thin Man lived 1892-1984.
1) Eileen Wilson (actress) in 1915-31.
2) Carole Lombard (actress) in 1931-33.
(He was engaged to actress Jean Harlow when she died in 1937.)
3) Diana “Mousie” Lewis (actress) 1940-until he died at 92.
Tyrone Power
Leading man lived 1913-58. His three wives included Annabella (1939-48) and Linda Christian (1949-55).
Edmund Purdom
British film star was born in 1924. His three wives included one named Alicia who sued for divorce in 1960. Purdom countersued, naming John F. Kennedy co-respondent. Purdom then was married to Linda Christian in 1962-63.
Claude Rains
Familiar character actor lived 1889-1967. He married six times but it wasn’t a case of rounding up the usual suspects. He apparently was married to only one actress, Isabel Jeans (in 1913-20), and she wasn’t exactly famous.
Ronald Reagan
Actor/politician lived 1911-2004.
1) Jane Wyman (actress) in 1940-48. They had daughter Maureen in 1941 and adopted son Michael in 1945.
2) Nancy Davis (actress) from 1952-on. They had daughter Patti in 1952 (she used stage name of Patti Davis) and son Ronald in 1958.
John Rolfe
He was planter in Virginia colony.
1) She died in Virginia about 1610.
2) Pocahontas in 1614-17. She died in England.
3) She died in Virginia about 1620.
Mickey Rooney
Born in 1920, he became famous as Judy Garland’s co-star, but they never married. He went bankrupt in 1962, his $12 million in earnings gone, much to alimony.
1) Ava Gardner (actress) in 1942-43.
2) Betty Jane Rase.
3) Martha Vickers (actress) in 1949-52.
4)
5) Barbara Ann Thomason. She was murdered 1966 by lover Milos Milosevic, who committed suicide.)
6)
7)
8) Jan Chamberlin in 1978, his longest, still going in 2005. She writes country-western songs.They sell insurance on TV.
Porfirio Rubirosa
Dominican Republic's playboy/diplomat had plenty of international relations. Born in 1909, he married the boss' daughter. Ultimately, he died in car crash in 1965. But despite his infamous track record, he and his last wife reportedly had lived happily for eight years.
1) Flor de Oro Trujillo in 1931-mid-‘30s; daughter of Dominican dictator was 17.
2) Danielle Darrieux (French movie star) in 1942-c.46.
3) Doris Duke (richest woman in world) in 1947-48.
4) Barbara Hutton (second richest woman) in 1953-c.53. (This lasted 73 days.)
5) Odile Rodin (French actress) in 1957. She was 19 when wed.
Albert Salmi
Longtime character actor was born in 1928 and committed suicide in 1990.
x) Peggy Ann Garner (actress) in 1956-63.
x) Roberta. (They were estranged when he shot and killed her in Seattle. He then killed himself.)
George Sanders
Veteran actor, who could play the perfect cad, was born in 1906, became bored, so he said, and committed suicide in 1972.
1)
2) Zsa Zsa Gabor (actress) in 1949-57.
3) Benita Hume in 1958-67. She died of cancer.
4) Magda Gabor in 1970 or ‘71; it was annulled two weeks later.
Randolph Scott
Cowboy actor lived 1898-1987.
1) Marion du Pont Somerville (heiress) in 1920s.
2) Patricia “Pat”; they’d been married 43 years when he died.
Peter Sellers
Goofy British-born film star lived 1925-80.
1) Anne Hayes (actress) in 1951-63.
2) Britt Eklund (actress) in 1964-68.
3)
4) Lynne Frederick (actress) from 1977 until his death.
Artie Shaw
Sorting out his personal life is like putting toothpaste back in the tube. The retired bandleader who was born Arthur Jacob Awshawsky turned 93 in 2003. His wives included Hollywood legends Ava Gardner (1945) and Lana Turner (1940-41), plus composer Jerome Kern’s daughter Betty, nurse Margaret Allen, actress Doris Dowling and Mrs. Kathleen Herwig, who really was Kathleen Winsor, author of the scandalous Forever Amber. All his wives are accounted for, but the sequence, or batting order, if you will, is unclear. One is tempted to think that Shaw finally found the woman he wanted when he married Keyes. Actually, they simply never applied for divorce.
1) Jane Karns, when he was 19; this was annulled.
2)
3)
4)
5)
6)
7)
8) Actress Evelyn Keyes in 1957, and they’ve been married ever since (but separate many years).
Frank Sinatra
Legendary entertainer lived 1915-98.
1) Nancy Barbato in 1939-51. She had Nancy, Frank Jr. and Christina.
2) Ava Gardner (actress) in 1951-57.
3) Mia Farrow (actress) in 1966-68. He was 50, she 21, when they wed.
4) Barbara Marx (nee Blakely and widow of Zeppo) 1976-on.
Sylvester Stallone
“Rocky” was born in 1946.
1) Former theatre usher in 1974-85; they had two sons.
2) Brigitte Nielsen (actress) from about 1986. They were divorced in 1988.
Jimmy Stewart
Leading man lived 1908-97. He didn't marry until he was 41. He and wife Gloria had four children during their near-half-century marriage.
Leopold Stokowski
Symphony conductor lived 1882-1977.
1) Olga Samaroff (pianist) 19??-23; her real name was Lucy Hickenlooper.
2) Evangeline Johnson (Johnson & Johnson heiress) in 1926-?
3) Gloria Vanderbilt (heiress) in 1945, when she was 23. She divorced him in 1962.
Billy Bob Thornton
Popular film actor was born in 1955.
1) Melissa Lee Gatlin in 1978-80.
2) Toni Lawrence in 1986-88.
3) Cynda Williams in 1990-92.
4) Pietra Dawn Cherniak in 1993-97.
5) Angelina Jolie in 2000-03.
Franchot Tone
Uppity actor lived 1905-68. He made major headlines when he fought actor Tom Neal for Barbara Payton in a restaurant. He lost.
1) Joan Crawford (actress) in 1935-39.
2) Jean Wallace (actress) in 1941-48.
3) Barbara Payton (actress) in 1956-59.
Spencer Tracy
Longtime leading man lived 1900-67.
He married Louise Treadwell, a stage actress, in 1923, and technically she became his widow when he died. A Catholic, he scorned divorce. But beginning in 1942 he began a long relationship with actress Katharine Hepburn.
Rudolph Valentino
Hollywood’s legendary Latin lover lived 1895-1926.
1) Jean Acker (actress). She locked him out on wedding night Nov. 5, 1919.
2) Natasha Rambova, actress nee Winifred Shaunessy; he was arrested for bigamy. After two such misadventures, it’s no wonder he didn’t remarry. Besides that, he died.
Rudy Vallee
Singer/actor lived 1901-86.
1)
2) Actress Fay Webb.
3) Actress Jane Greer in 1943-44.
4) Eleanor Norris.
John Wayne
Hollywood legend lived 1907-79. He married three wives, all Latinos, and had seven children.
Orson Welles
Hollywood's supposed genius lived 1915-85.
1) Virginia Nicholson (Chicago socialite/actress) 1934-39.
2) Rita Hayworth (actress) in 1943-47.
3) Paoli Mori (actress) in 1956-?
Gene Wilder
Film actor was born in 1935.
1)
2)
3) Gilda Radner; she died in 1989.
4) Karen Webb (speech therapist) in 1991-.
Florenz Ziegfeld
The great showman of his era died in 1932.
1) Anna Held. (Some say they were wed in 1897, some in 1901; she divorced him in 1912.
2) Billie Burke (actress) from 1914-on.
WIVES
June Allyson
Popular and pert actress was born in 1917. In 2005 she was living with her third husband in Ojai, California.
1) Dick Powell. They had two kids before she became a widow in 1963.
2)
3) Dr. David Ashrow.
Julie Andrews
British-born leading lady of stage and screen was born in 1935.
1) Tony Walton (set designer).
2) Blake Edwards (director) in 1970.
Estelle Astaire
Brother Fred’s dancing partner quit show business to marry.
1) Lord Charles Cavendish, until his death before WWII.
2) After the war she married Kingman Douglass (1947 in Warrenton, Va., where they settled).
Mary Astor
Hollywood actress lived 1906-87. She’s best remembered as the double-dealing leading lady in The Maltese Falcon. The custody suit involving the daughter by her second marriage led to public disclosure of Miss Astor’s scandalously sexy diary in 1936.
1) Kenneth Hawks (director and brother of director Howard Hawks). Plane crash killed him in 1930.
2) She then married a doctor.
Lauren Bacall
Leading lady was born in 1924.
1) Humphrey Bogart (actor) 1945-until he died in ‘57.
2) Jason Robards Jr. (actor) in 1961-73.
Lucille Ball
TV queen lived 1911-89.
1) Desi Arnaz in 1941-60. They had two children.
2) Gary Morton (nightclub comedian) in 1961. (But has anyone ever seen him?)
Anne Bancroft
Actress, best remembered as “Mrs. Robinson,” died in 2005.
1) Martin May (builder); marriage lasted three years.
2) Mel Brooks (director) in 1964. They were still married when she died.
Brigitte Bardot
French star was born in 1934.
1) Roger Vadim (director) in 1952-57.
2) Jacques Charrier.
3) Gunther Sachs.
Nora Bayes
Flo Ziegfeld’s singer had five husbands, second of whom was Jack Norworth.
Constance Bennett
Leading lady lived 1904-65.
1) She married at 16; it was annulled.
2) steamship/railroad heir in 1926-29.
3) Gilbert Roland (actor) in 1941-44.
4)
5)
Joan Bennett
Constance’s sister lived 1910-90. A leading lady, too, she had four husbands.
1) She had a youthful marriage in about 1926-28.
2) Gene Markey (producer/writer) in 1932-37. He later married Hedy Lamarr.
3) Walter Wanger (producer) in 1940-65. He was jailed for shooting and wounding her agent.
4) David Wilde (critic).
Ingrid Bergman
Legendary star lived 1915-82.
1) Dr. Peter Lindstrom; they wed in 1937, had daughter Pia; Ingrid deserted family in 1949.
2) Roberto Rossellini (1950-annulled 1958). Both left their spouses to live together at first, igniting furor. Liaison/marriage produced a son and twin girls (including Isabella).
3) Lars Schmidt. They divorced in 1975.
Joan Blondell
Popular blonde film star lived 1909-79.
1) George Barnes (cameraman) in 1933-35.
2) Dick Powell (actor) in 1936-45.
3) Mike Todd (producer) in 1947-50.
Fanny Brice
Famed Ziegfeld entertainer lived 1891-1951.
1) Frank White, barber in Springfield, Mass.; she met him in 1911, they were together a few days but marriage lasted a year on paper.
2) Nicky Arnstein (a gangster, he went to prison. She divorced him in 1927, but still loved him. A soap opera, yes, and it was the basis for the film Funny Girl.)
3) Billy Rose in 1929. She divorced him in ‘36 so he could marry Eleanor Holm.
Diahann Carroll
Singer was enjoying divorced life in 2006.
1) Monte Kay, casting director
2) Freddie Glusmann, restaurateur
3) Robert DeLeon, editor
4) Vic Damone, singer; since divorced
Madeleine Carroll
Blonde leading lady of films lived 1906-87.
1)
2) Sterling Hayden (actor) in 1942-46
3) Henri Lavorel (French film producer).
4) Andrew Heiskell, 1950-65; he published Life magazine.
Cher
Singer/actress was born in 1946. Her mother reportedly was married 10 times, but it’s Cher’s record that follows:
1) Sonny Bono (entertainer) in 1964-74.
2) Gregg Allman (rocker) in 1975-77.
Linda Christian
Born in 1923, she was one of those “actresses” famous for being famous (or notorious), rather than for being in movies. She had many loves. Her husbands included Tyrone Power in 1949-55 and Edmund Purdom in 1962-63.
Ina Claire
Ziegfeld star and film actress lived 1892-1985.
1)
2) John Gilbert (actor) 1929-31.
3)
Joan Crawford
Hollywood great and “Mommie Dearest” lived 1904-77. Each of her four marriages lasted four years.
1) Douglas Fairbanks Jr. in 1929-33. He was five years his senior.
2) Franchot Tone (actor) in 1935-39. She dumped Clark Gable for him.
3) Phillip Terry (minor actor) in 1942-46.
4) Alfred Steele (president of Pepsi-Cola) in 1955-59. A heart attack killed him.
Arlene Dahl
Decorative leading lady was born in 1924.
1) Lex Barker (actor) in 1951-52.
2) Fernando Lamas (actor) in 1954-60.
3)
4)
5)
6)
Geena Davis
She’s had four husbands but the sequence is unclear. She was married to actor Jeff Goldblum in 1987-90, and later to director Renny Harlin. Her fourth husband is surgeon Reza Jarrahy. They had twins in 2004, when she was 48, he 33. Media offered no further details on how she did it.
Doris Day
Singer/actress was born in 1924.
1) She was 17 when she married a musician.
2) She married again, briefly, at age 22, but soon resumed her legendary virginity.
3) Marty Melcher in 1951; when he left her a widow in 1968 she thought she had the $22 million she’d earned. She didn’t.
Laraine Day
Leading lady was born in 1917. Her second marriage was one of Hollywood’s oddest. Leo, the guy who stole Babe Ruth’s wristwatch, had more enemies that she had fans. Moreover, she risked ruining her career.
1) Ray Hendricks (singer) in 1942-47.
2) Leo Durocher (baseball manager) in 1947-60.
3) TV producer Michael Grilikhes. They were still living near Hollywood in 2005.
Marlene Dietrich
Leading lady lived 1901-92. While living in Germany she married Rudolf Sieber, a studio functionary, in 1924. They had a daughter Maria in 1925. The whole family wound up in Hollywood, but Sieber drifted off to become a chicken farmer. He seems to have been unmissed.
Doris Duke
Heiress' collection of spouses included playboy Porfirio Rubirosa in 1947-48.
Deanna Durbin
Singer/actress was born in Canada in 1921.
1)
2)
3) Charles Henri David (French movie director); he died in 1999 after 48 years of their marriage.
Ann Dvorak
Actress who graced many B flicks lived 1912-79. The first of her three husbands was director Leslie Fenton (1932-46).
Alice Faye
Singer and film actress lived 1912-98.
1) Tony Martin (singer) in 1936-40.
2) Phil Harris in 1941 and apparently still wed and both alive as late as 1994.
Rhonda Fleming
Actress was born in 1922. Her husbands usually weren’t actors but that doesn't seemed to have helped.
1)
2)
3)
4) Hall Bartlett (producer/director) in 1966-71.
5)
Jane Fonda
Famed leading lady was born in 1937.
1) Roger Vadim (director) in 1965.
2) Tom Hayden in 1973-80. He became a politician.
3) Ted Turner in 1984. They’re divorced.
Joan Fontaine
Leading lady was born in 1917.
1) Brian Aherne (actor) in 1939-45.
2) William Dozier (producer) in 1946-51.
3) Collier Young (writer/producer) in 1952-61.
4)
Zsa Zsa Gabor
Celebrity actress was born in 1918, give or take a few years. She says she’s had nine husbands, which means she's perhaps a couple ahead of sister Eva. An unknown scriptwriter once provided a wonderful bit of Gabor-ish dialogue for Spring Byington in a Mr. Ed TV episode. Miss Byington was talking on a telephone to an unseen person, and her lines went something like this: “You’re getting married again, darling? Is he handsome? Oh, he has eight million dollars. What’s he do? You don’t know. Well, it’ll come out at the property settlement. Whatever you get, you deserve it. You’ve worked so hard at marriage . . . .”
1) Burham Belge (Turkish diplomat) in 1937.
2) Conrad Hilton. (Hotel magnate’s son Nicky married Liz Taylor.)
3) George Sanders, who later married Zsa Zsa’s sister Magda
4)
5)
6)
7) Michael O’Hara.
8) Filipe de Alba, but voided because divorce from O’Hara was questionable, and, too, because the marriage was doubtful: a sea captain performed it, but not in international waters.
9) Prince Frederick von Anhalt in 1986 (49 years after her first marriage).
Judy Garland
Singer/actress/entertainer lived 1922-69.
1) David Rose (orchestra leader) in 1941-45. He was Martha Raye’s ex-husband.
2) Vincente Minnelli (director) in 1945-51.
3) Sid Luft. They divorced in 1965.
4) Mark Herron (actor) in 1966-67. He was seven years her junior.
5) Mickey Deans (discotheque owner) in 1967. He was 11 years her junior.
Ava Gardner
Legendary leading lady lived 1922-90.
1) Mickey Rooney (actor) in 1942-43.
2) Artie Shaw (band leader) in 1945-47.
3) Frank Sinatra (entertainer) in 1951-57.
Peggy Ann Garner
Former child star lived 1931-84.
1) Richard Hayes (actor) in 1951-53
2) Albert Salmi (actor) in 1956-63.
3) Non-actor.
Paulette Goddard
Leading lady claimed she was born in 1911. But 1905 is more likely. When she died in 1990 she left $20 million to New York University, which she hadn’t attended.
1) Edward James (president of Southern States Lumber Company). They divorced in 1931.
2) Charlie Chaplin (actor) in 1936-42.
3) Burgess Meredith (actor) in 1944-49.
4) Erich Maria Remarque (author of All Quiet on the Western Front) from 1958 until he died in 1970.
Melanie Griffith
Hollywood leading lady was born in 1957.
1) Don Johnson (actor) in 1976-79.
2) Don Johnson in 1989.
Jean Harlow
Hollywood’s blonde bombshell lived 1911-37. She was engaged to actor William Powell when she died.
1) Charles F. McGrew 2nd, a young Chicago bond broker, in 1927-29.
2) Paul Bern (studio functionary) in July 1932. His death was ruled a suicide in September 1932.
3) Harold Rosson (studio functionary) in 1933-34.
June Haver
Glamorous blonde actress was born in 1926.. After a brief and unsuccessful marriage, her new fiance died, causing her to enter a convent. A year later she married Fred MacMurray. She died June 4, 2005.
1)
2) Fred MacMurray from 1954 till his death in ‘91.
June Havoc
Actress and kid sister of Gypsy Rose Lee was born in 1916.
1) at age 13.
2) at age 19.
3) director William Spier.
Rita Hayworth
Hollywood “Love Goddess” lived 1918-87. He had only two children.
1) Edward Judson in 1937-43; a businessman, he was 22 years her senior.
2) Orson Welles in ‘43, though she was engaged to Victor Mature; they had Rebecca.(she was 57 in 2003) but quickly divorced.
3) Prince Aly Khan in ‘49-51; they had Princess Jasmin in 1950; Aly died in car crash in 1960.
4) Dick Haymes (singer) in ‘53-55.
5) James Hill (producer) in 1957-61.
Audrey Hepburn
Leading lady lived 1929-1993.
1) Mel Ferrer (actor) in 1954-68.
2) Italian psychiatrist nine years her junior in 1969.
Katharine Hepburn
Leading lady married Ludlow Ogden Smith, a Philadelphia socialite, on Dec. 12, 1928. She left him Jan. 2, 1929. They divorced in 1934 and supposedly remained lifelong friends. Her main love interest was actor Spencer Tracy, who was married to someone else.
Libby Holman
Broadway’s foremost “torch singer” lived 1904-71, causing trouble wherever she went. Her only child, Christopher Reynolds, died climbing mountains in 1950. She committed suicide.
1) Zachary Smith Reynolds (heir to Reynolds tobacco fortune) in 1931-32; seven years her junior, he was shot and killed. Libby was held for a time, then released.
2) Ralph Holmes (actor) in 1939-45; he was 11 years her junior and committed suicide.
3) Louis Shanker, artist, in December 1960.
Barbara Hutton
Heiress had many husbands. Cary Grant was among those of the ‘40s. Among those in the ‘50s was Baron Gottfried von Cramm, the internationally famous tennis player the Nazis imprisoned as a homosexual. He was born in 1909 and died in a car wreck near Cairo in 1976.
1) “Prince” Alexis Mdivani, about 1932-35. (He died in car wreck in 1936.)
2) Count Haugwitz Hardenberg Reventlow, 1935- ; son Lance, who became well-known racing driver, was born in 1937.
3) Cary Grant (film star) in 1942-45.
4?) Gottfried Von Cramm.
Betty Hutton
Actress/singer was born in 1921. References say she was divorced five times. She says she was married only four times.
Jennifer Jones
Film star was born in 1919.
1) Robert Walker (actor) in 1939-45.
2) David O. Selznick (producer) in 1949; he died in 1965.
3) Norton Simon (industrialist) in 1971-.
Shirley Jones
Singer/actress was born in 1934. She married actor Jack Cassidy and starred in TV’s The Partridge Family with step-son David Cassidy. Her son Shaun Cassidy became an actor. After divorce, she married actor Marty Ingels.
Evelyn Keyes
Film actress is remembered as Scarlett O’Hara’s sister. She was born in 1919. Her husbands included directors Charles Vidor (1943-44) and John Huston (1946-50) and band leader Artie Shaw (from 1957-on, although they long ago separated). She lived with producer Mike Todd in 1953-56.
Aimee Semple McPherson
Famed evangelist lived 1890-1944. She was born Aimee Elizabeth Kennedy and accumulated names, much like Mme. Schumann-Heink (below).
1) Robert Semple, missionary who died of malaria in China.
2) Harold McPherson, grocery clerk, married two years.
3) Dave Hutton, church singer.
But it was with Kenneth G. Ormiston that Sister Aimee had her notorious fling.
Hedy Lamarr
Leading lady was born in 1913.
1) Fritz Mandl (Austrian munitions manufacturer) about 1933-37.
2) Gene Markey (writer) in 1939-40.
3) John Loder (actor) in 1943-47.
4)
5)
6)
Angela Lansbury
Film and TV actress was born in London in 1925.
1) Richard Cromwell in 1945-46.
2) Peter Shaw from 1949-on.
Janet Leigh
Leading lady was born in 1927.
1) Early divorce.
2) Early divorce.
3) Tony Curtis (actor) in 1951-62. They had daughter Jamie Lee in 1958.
Julie London
Singer-turned actress lived 1926-92.
1) Jack Webb (actor) in 1945-53.
2) Bobby Troup, her co-star in TV’s Emergency.
Jennifer Lopez
Singer/actress has been labeled the modern “serial bride.”
1) Waiter Ojani Noa in 1997; this lasted little more than a year.
2) Dancer Chris Judd in 2001; this lasted nine months. (He made $2,222 an hour.)
3) Although she had been scheduled to marry actor Ben Affleck in September 2003, she married a singer named Anthony.
Myrna Loy
The perfect screen wife had less luck in real life, and she never married an actor–much less her frequent co-star, William Powell. She lived 1905-93.
1) Arthur Hornblow Jr. (producer) in 1936-42.
2) John Hertz Jr. (rental-car heir) in 1942-44.
3) Gene Markey (screenwriter, producer) in 1946-50.
4) Howland Sergeant in 1951-60. He was a deputy secretary of state under Dean Acheson.
Jeanette MacDonald
Hollywood legend lived 1901-65 and never once really married Nelson Eddy. In 1937 she married an actor who looked like him, though: Gene Raymond. They were still married when she died.
Marie MacDonald
Unsuccessful actress known as “The Body” kept her name in headlines through marriages and scandals. Some records say she had seven marriages (including remarriages), but other records say she had eight husbands. Born in 1923, she committed suicide in 1965.
Marilyn Miller
Broadway legend lived 1898-1936.
1) Frank Carter (singer died in car crash; jealous, Ziegfeld had fired him.)
2) Jack Pickford in 1922-27.
3) Chester O'Brien (chorus boy/stage manager) in October 1934.
Marilyn Monroe
Film legend lived 1926-62.
1) Jim Dougherty (aircraft plant worker) in about 1942.
2) Joe DiMaggio (baseball star) January 1954-October ‘54.
3) Arthur Miller (playwright) June 1956-Jan. 21, 1961.
Kim Novak
Hollywood leading lady was born in 1933. During her heyday in the ‘50s, she was linked to most of the world’s most eligible bachelors.
1) Richard Johnson (actor). They married briefly.
2) veterinarian in 1976.
Merle Oberon
Film star lived 1911-79.
1) Alexander Korda (director/producer) in 1939-45.
2) Lucien Ballard (cinematographer) in 1945-49.
3) Italian industrialist in 1957-73.
4) Robert Wolders, many years her junior.
Anny Ondra
Polish actress lived 1903-87.
1) Karel Lamac (director), she divorced him in 1933 to marry:
2) Max Schmeling (he’d been world’s heavyweight boxing champion in 1930-32).
Debra Paget
Decorative film star was born in 1933.
1) David Street (actor/singer) in 1958. Annulment came four months later.
2) Budd Boetticher (director) in 1960-61, but they separated after 22 days.
3) Ling-Chieh Kung (Texas oilman) in 1964-71.
Eleanor Parker
Leading lady was born in 1922. She had four husbands and four children.
Suzy Parker
Top model died in 2003 at 69. She was living with her third husband, Bradford Dillman.
Jean Peters
Hollywood actress was born in 1926.
1) Howard Hughes in 57-71; she and tycoon were secretly wed and soon separated.
2) Stanley Hough (TV executive).
Mary Pickford
Immensely popular actress lived 1893-1979.
1) Owen Moore (actor) in 1911-19. He’d become a drunk.
2) Douglas Fairbanks Sr. (actor) in 1920-36.
3) Buddy Rogers (actor, band leader) in 1937-on; he was 11 years her junior.
Jane Powell
Singer/actress was born in 1929.
1)
2)
3)
4) David Parlour (producer/writer) in 1978-81.
5) Dickie Moore (former actor) in 1988.
Jessie Reed
She was famous as the world’s highest-paid chorus girl.
1) Oliver Debrow, comedian. She divorced him after he was involved in a murder.
2) Louis Herzberg, 1918; a quick divorce ensued.
3) Dan Caswell (heir to Cleveland fortune). She divorced him.
4) William F. Young (Chicago advertising man).
5) Leonard Reno (WWI flyer and wealthy publisher’s son).
Debbie Reynolds
Entertainer was born in 1932.
1) Eddie Fisher (singer) in 1955-59. They had Carrie and Todd Fisher.
2) Owner of shoe store chain 1960-75; she became responsible for $2 million of his debts.
3) Real estate developer in 1984.
Ginger Rogers
Leading lady lived 1911-95.
1) Jack Pepper (vaudevillian) in 1928-31.
2) Lew Ayres (actor) in 1934-41.
3)
4) Jacques Bergerac (actor) in 1953-57.
5) William Marshall (actor/director) in 1961-62.
Jane Russell
1) Bob Waterfield (football star) in 1943-68. He was bigger in some ways than she was then.
2) Roger Barrett (actor) in 1968. He died less than three months later.
3) Real estate agent.
Lillian Russell
Undisputed Queen of show business lived 1861-1922, and is said to have had only one flaw. Poor Lillian. As old friend Marie Dressler observed: “She was none too clever about men.” And she never married longtime friend and escort Diamond Jim Brady.
1) Harry Braham (orchestra leader) in 1879-c80.
2) Edward Solomon (orchestra leader) in 1883-?(They had daughter Dorothy in 1884 but Lillian had marriage annulled after he was arrested for bigamy in London in late 1885.
3) Giovanni Perugini (opera tenor) briefly in 1894. This phony's real name was Jack Chatterton.
(Jesse Lewisohn was a longtime boyfriend in this interval. He ran off with Brady’s girlfriend.)
4) Alexander P. Moore (publisher of Pittsburgh Leader newspaper) on June 12, 1912. They were still married when she died.
Meg Ryan
Leading lady was born in 1961. She married actor Dennis Quaid in 1991.
Mme. Ernestine Schumann-Heink
Opera diva lived 1861-1936.
1) Ernest Heink.
2) Paul Schumann.
3) unknown.
Norma Shearer
Hollywood leading lady lived 1899-1971. Her marriage in 1927 to a studio bigwig assured career success. But after he died, her career faded.
1) Irving Thalberg in 1927. He died in 1936.
2) a ski instructor in 1942; he was 20 years her junior.
Ann Sheridan
Leading lady lived 1915-67.
1) Edward Norris (actor) in 1936-39.
2) George Brent (actor) in 1942-43.
3) Scott McKay (actor).
Sylvia Sidney
This major Broadway star, born in 1911, made bad decisions in Hollywood. She also picked the wrong husbands; she was thrice divorced.
1) Bennett A. Cerf (publisher) in 1935-36.
2) Luther Adler (actor) in 1938-46.
3)
Jean Simmons
Leading lady was born in 1929 in London. In 2004 she was living in California and still working.
1) Stewart Granger (actor) in 1950-60.
2) Richard Brooks (director) in 1960-1977.
Barbara Stanwyck
Brassy leading lady lived 1907-90.
1) Frank Fay; they divorced in 1935.
2) Robert Taylor (actor) in 1939-52.
Elizabeth Taylor
Born in 1932 in London, she’s been a worldwide celebrity longer than any other living commoner.
1) Nick Hilton, hotel heir.
2) Michael Wilding (actor) in 1952-57.
3) Mike Todd (killed in crash of his plane, “The Lucky Liz.”)
4) Eddie Fisher (singer); he was a friend of Todd who dumped wife Debbie Reynolds.
5) Richard Burton (actor) 1964-74. She left Fisher amid great scandal.
6) Richard Burton in 1975-76.
7) Sen. John Warner of Virginia in 1978-82.
8) Larry Fortensky (construction worker) in 1991-97. They met at Betty Ford Clinic.
Shirley Temple
Born in 1928, she became the most successful child star ever.
1) John Agar (actor) in 1945-49. She was 17 when wed.
2) Charles Black, TV executive in 1950-on.
Olive Thomas
Born Oliveretta Duffy in 1884, she became a major Broadway and Hollywood star. Her questionable death in 1920 was ruled suicide.
1) Bernard Krug Thomas (businessman) about 1900. She was about 16.
2) Jack Pickford (actor) in 1917. They were still married when she died.
Lana Turner
Hollywood leading lady (born 1920) married eight times to seven husbands and was divorced seven times. This doesn’t take into account her notorious affair with gangster Johnny Stompanato. It was ruled that Turner’s daughter Cheryl Crane killed Stompanato in 1958 in a justifiable homicide.
1) Artie Shaw (band leader) in 1940-41.
2) Stephen Crane (actor-turned-restaurateur).
3) Stephen Crane, weeks after first was annulled.
4) Bob Topping (rich playboy) in 1948-52. His brother owned half of the New York Yankees.
5) Lex Barker (actor) in 1953-57.
6) Fred May (businessman).
7) Robert Eaton (businessman).
8) Ronald Dante (nightclub performer).
Vivian Vance
Born between 1907 and ‘13, she became Lucille Ball’s TV sidekick. She married Philip Ober in what was billed as her first marriage. Some critics claimed she’d forgotten about two previous husbands. She died in 1979.
Gloria Vanderbilt
Heiress married four times.
1) Pat DiSicco. This slippery Hollywood agent specialized in getting beat up in bars; the couple split in 1945.
2) Leopold Stokowski (conductor); he was 42 years her senior. They married one day after she divorced No. 1 and they remained married 10 years.
3) Sidney Lumet (movie director).
4) Wyatt Emory Cooper (writer) in 1963. They had Anderson Cooper, the TV caster; dad died in 1968.
Bessiewallis “Wallis” Warfield
This American-born daughter of Teackle Warfield and the former Alice Montague got the king of England to abdicate. She died in 1986.
1) Earl Winfield Spencer Jr. in November 1916. They divorced in 1926.
2) Ernest Aldridge Simpson in 1928.
3) Duke of Windsor in 1937. They were still married when he died in 1972.
Esther Williams
Famed swimmer/actress was born in 1923.
1)
2)
3) Fernando Lamas (actor) in 1967 until his death in 1982.
Fay Wray
Actress was born in 1907. They dimmed the lights on the Empire State Building when she died in 2004.
1) John Monk Saunders. He wrote Wings, The Dawn Patrol, etc.; they had a daughter, Susan.
2) Robert Riskin. He wrote scripts for It Happened One Night, Lost Horizon and other Frank Capra films; they had daughter Victoria and son Robert Jr.
3) Sanford Rothenberg. He was Riskin’s doctor; not till 16 years after Riskin died did Wray wed the doctor. He died in 1991.
Jane Wyman
Actress was born in 1914.
1) Myron Futterman (dress manufacturer) in 1934-35.
2) Ronald Reagan (actor) in 1940-48. They had two children.
3) Freddie Karger (orchestra leader) in 1952 until divorced.
4) Freddie Karger in 1961-65.
BRIEF ENCOUNTERS
Britney Spears married Jason Allen Alexander early Saturday Jan. 3, 2004 in Las Vegas. They got an annulment Monday, 55 hours later. It was reported that the quasi-groom earned $560,000 for his 55-hour adventure ($10,200 a hour).
Rudolph Valentino might have topped that. He and Jean Acker didn’t last through the wedding night, although getting an actual divorce did take some time. About the same thing happened to Burt Lancaster, and, separately, to Texas hero Sam Houston. Katharine Hepburn didn’t fare much better.
Gloria Swanson and Wallace Beery married in March 1916 in Hollywood, but separated three weeks later. He said she wanted a fancy life, he wanted a simple life. She said she wanted a baby, he didn’t.
Ethel Merman and Ernest Borgnine were a volatile couple. George Brent had a quickie marriage in 1937. Others who had such brief matrimonial disasters include singer Guy Mitchell, who returned from an abbreviated honeymoon and unchivalrously proclaimed his bride a “boudoir washout.”
FAMOUS MARRIAGES
These weren’t necessarily long or short, happy or sad, for better or worse. But they did capture the public fancy:
■Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton--particularly the first time around.
■Marilyn Monroe and Joe DiMaggio.
■Vivian Leigh and Laurence Olivier.
■Halle Berry and David Justice the ballplayer.
■Howard Duff and Ida Lupino.
■Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford.
■Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall.
■Buddy Rogers and Mary Pickford.
■John Barrymore and Dolores Costello.
■William Holden and Brenda Marshall.
■Bob Waterfield and Jane Russell.
■Sonny Bono and Cher.
■Dinah Shore and George Montgomery.
■Vic Damone and Pier Angeli.
■Melvyn Douglas and Helen Gahagan.
■Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta-Jones.
■Leo Durocher and Laraine Day.
■Lou Tellegen and Geraldine Farrar. (The divorce was ugly.).
■Jack Webb and Julie London. (They eventually divorced.)
■Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz.(They eventually divorced.)
■Lee Majors and Farrah Fawcett.
■Dick Powell and June Allyson.
■Charles Laughton and Elsa Lanchester.
■Phil Harris and Alice Faye.
■Fibber and Molly. (Jim and Marion Jordan)
■George Burns and Gracie Allen (wed Jan. 7, 1926).
■Jack Benny and Mary Livingstone.
■Joanne Woodward and Paul Newman.
■Larry Parks and Betty Garrett.
■Ozzie Nelson and Harriet Hilliard.
■John Agar and Shirley Temple, briefly.
■Vivian Blaine and Milton Rackmil, president of Universal Pictures and Decca Records. They've since divorced.
■Florenz Ziegfeld and Anna Held.
■Florenz Ziegfeld and Billie Burke.
■Elliott Roosevelt (son of FDR) and actress Faye Emerson.
LONG MARRIAGES
Not all celebrity marriages are temporary. Here are some that weren’t:
■Ossie Davis and Ruby Dee, married 56 years when he died in 2005 at 87.
■Kirk and Anne Douglas celebrated their 50th anniversary in 2004.
■Alice Faye and Phil Harris, wed 1941; she died in 1998.
■Fred MacMurray and June Haver, 1954 till his death in 1991.
■Joel McCrea and Frances Dee were married from 1933 until he died in 1990.
■Alexis Smith and Craig Stevens, 1944 until her death in 1993.
■Virginia Mayo and Michael O’Shea, from 1947 until he died in 1973. She didn’t remarry.
■James and Gloria Stewart were married about 48 years.
■Jack Benny and Mary Livingstone.
■Bob Hope.
■Randolph and Pat Scott had been married 43 years when he died.
■Ralph Bellamy and Alice Murphy (although he often lost the girl in the movies).
■Eddie Cantor and Ida Tobias, from 1914 on. She was his childhood sweetheart
■Will Rogers and Betty Blake.
■Michael York and nonactress Pat York; wed in 1968, still in 1999.
■Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward since Jan. 29, 1958.
■Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontaine.
■Jessica Tandy and Hume Cronyn.
■Richard Widmark and screenwriter Jean Hazelwood had been married 55 years when she died in 1997. Two years later he wed Susan Blanchard, 74; she was Henry Fonda’s third wife.
■Fred Astaire and Phyllis Livingston Potter (nee Baker). She predeceased him by many years.
SECRET MARRIAGES
■Prince of Wales and Mrs. Maria Fitzherbert, a twice-married Catholic in 1785. He became Britain’s King George IV.
■John F. Kennedy and Durie Macolm in 1947.
KINKY MARRIAGES
■Cowboy actor Rod Cameron divorced his wife to marry her mother.
■Greer Garson married Richard Ney, who had played her son in Mrs. Miniver (1942). They were married in 1943-47. He was born in 1918. She was born in 1908
■Actress Gloria Grahame married her husband's son by a previous marriage, making her former husband her father-in-law. She had children by each marriage. Try to figure the relationships between everyone concerned. For starters, one child was also her son-in-law and her step-grandson.
■Prince Richard Metternich married his niece, permissible in some counties. Taking it another way, the famous Austrian chancellor, Klemens von Metternich, had a son Richard, who also became chancellor, and a daughter. The daughter married Count Moritz Sandor and had a daughter Pauline. Richard married Pauline. She was eight years his junior and often was termed “hideously ugly.”
EXPENSIVE DIVORCES
■ Harrison Ford, 61, spent $118 million to divorce Melissa Mathison, 53, in about 2003. They’d been married 20 years.
Other divorces in $100 million range:
■ Norman and Frances Lear in 1985.
■ Steven Spielberg and Amy Irving 1989.
■ Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman in 2001.
■ Neil Diamond and Marcia Murphey in 1985
THEY NEVER MARRIED
Greta Garbo
Diamond Jim Brady
Clifton Webb (he always lived with his mother)
U.S. President James Buchanan
Lizabeth Scott
Queen Elizabeth I
There’ve been many embarrassingly quick divorces. Some newlyweds didn’t get through the first night.
In the listings below, generally assume the marriage ended in divorce, unless otherwise noted.
HUSBANDS
Prince Aly Khan
The Indian-born Prince of Playboys lived 1911-60. His many affairs involved Kim Novak, Juliette Greco and Gene Tierney. He died in a car wreck. His wives:
1) Joan Guinness in about 1936-48; he stole her from Loel Guinness, British M.P. Aly and Joan had two sons.
2) Rita Hayworth (movie star) in 1948-53. They had a daughter Yasmin.
Lew Ayres
Hollywood actor was born in 1908. He was married to actresses Lola Lane (1931-33) and Ginger Rogers (1934-41).
John Barrymore
Famed actor lived 1882-1942. He had four unsuccessful marriages. One was to poetress Michael Strange and one to actress Dolores Costello (divorced in 1935).
Werner von Blomberg
This German general was a widower with grown children when he married Eva Gruhn on Feb. 12, 1938. The general’s downfall came quickly when she was revealed as a former prostitute. The general’s political enemies, Hermann Goering and Heinrich Himmler, greased the skids. The general stood by his new wife.
Humphrey Bogart
Hollywood legend lived 1899-1957.
1) Helen Menken (actress) in 1926-27.
2) Mary Philips (actress) in 1928-37.
3) Mayo Methot (actress) in 1938-44.
4) Lauren Bacall (actress) 1945-until he died in ‘57.
Ernest Borgnine
Hollywood actor was born in 1917. His five wives included at least two actresses: Katy Jurado in 1959-64 and Ethel Merman very briefly in 1964.
Marlon Brando
1) Anna Kashfi (actress), 1957-59; they had son Christian.
2) Movita Castenada (actress), 1960-68.
3) Tarita
George Brent
Hollywood actor lived 1904-79. He made 11 films with Bette Davis, who reportedly wanted to marry him.
1)
2) Ruth Chatterton in 1932-34.
3) Constance Worth in 1937.
4) Ann Sheridan in 1942-43.
5)
6)
Julius Caesar
He was dictator of Rome in 49-44 B.C.
1) Cornelia, 84 B.C.; she died in 68.
2) Pompeia; he divorced her.
3) Calpurnia, 59 B.C.-on; she warned him but he was murdered in 44 B.C.
Nicolas Cage
Hollywood leading man was born in 1964.
1)
2) Lisa Marie Presley in 2002 for 108 days.
3) Alice Kim; he was 40 when he married sushi waitress, 20, in 2004.
Louis Calhern
Hollywood character actor lived 1895-1956. His wives included Ilka Chase (1926-26), Julia Hoyt, Natalie Schaefer and Marianne Stewart.
Jack Carson
Popular supporting actor lived 1910-63. Actress Lola Albright was among his four wives (1952-58).
Johnny Carson
Tonight Show emcee died in 2005.
1) Jody -- (childhood sweetheart) in 1949-63. They had three sons.
2) Joanne Copeland in 1963-72.
3) Joanna Holland 19??-85.
4) Alexis Maas 1987-on. He was 62, she in her 30s, when they wed.
Charlie Chaplin
Film legend lived 1889-1977.
1) Mildred Harris in 1918-20; she was 16 and a film extra when they wed. Later, she was billed as “Chaplin’s First Wife” when she teamed with Phil Silvers in vaudeville.
2) Lolita MacMurray in 1924; they had Charles Jr. and Sidney. (She changed name to Lita Grey.)
3) Paulette Goddard in 1933-42; she was 19 when they wed.
4) Oona O’Neill in 1943; she was 18. Father Eugene, the playwright, strongly disapproved. She became the mother of Geraldine, later an actress, in 1944.
Bing Crosby
Crooner/actor lived 1903-77.
1) Dixie Lee in 1930; she was mother of four sons and died in 1952.
2) Kathryn Grant in 1957; she was 30 years younger than he. They had two sons and a daughter.
Tom Cruise
Hollywood leading man was born in 1962.
1) Mimi Rogers (actress).
2) Nicole Kidman (actress); they’re divorced.
Robert Cummings
Film and TV actor lived 1908-90. Married three times, he fathered seven children.
Tony Curtis
Leading man was born in 1925. His three marriages include those to Janet Leigh (actress) in 1951-62 (a much publicized marriage that produced Jamie Lee in 1957) and to Christine Kauffmann (actress) in 1963-67.
Richard Harding Davis
Famous war correspondent lived 1864-1916. He married at least twice. He divorced Cecil Clark, a Chicago socialite, to marry Ziegfeld dancer Bessie McCoy.
Sammy Davis Jr.
Many-talented entertainer lived 1925-90.
1)
2) May Britt (actress) in 1960-68.
3)
Paul Douglas
Pro football player-turned actor lived 1907-59.
1)
2)
3)
4) Virginia Field (actress).
5) Jan Sterling, his widow.
Clint Eastwood
Born in 1930, he became a TV star, then a Hollywood star. He’s had seven kids, some by wives. He’s had special affairs with Sandra Locke and Frances Fisher. Wives:
1) Maggie Johnson in 1953-80. She got $25 million divorce settlement in 1984.
2) Dina Ruiz.
Douglas Fairbanks Sr.
Film legend lived 1883-1939.
1) Anna Beth Sully in 1907. (They had Douglas Jr. in 1909.)
2) Mary Pickford in 1920-36. (They separated in 1933.)
3) Lady Sylvia Ashley in 1936.
Douglas Fairbanks Jr.
Film actor was born in 1909..
1) Joan Crawford (actress) in 1928-33.
2) Mary Lee Hartford in 1938. (She died in 1988.)
Mel Ferrer
Actor was born in 1917. Actress Audrey Hepburn was the fourth of his five wives.
Eddie Fisher
Singer was born in 1928.
1) Debbie Reynolds. After they had Carrie Fisher, he divorced her to marry:
2) Liz Taylor in 1959 amid great publicity; she divorced him in ‘64 to marry Richard Burton.
3) Connie Stevens, actress-singer; they divorced.
Errol Flynn
Hollywood leading man lived 1909-59. He was cavorting with Beverly Aadland, 16, when he died.
1) Lili Damita (Ziegfeld girl/actress) in 1935-42.
2) Nora Eddington in 1943-49.
3) Patrice Wymore (actress) in 1950-59.
Henry Fonda
Leading man lived 1905-82.
1) Margaret Sullavan (actress) in 1931-33. She committed suicide in ‘60.
2) Frances Seymour Brokaw in 1936-50. She committed suicide after having Jane and Peter.
3) Susan Blanchard in 1950-66. (He married her eight months after first wife’s death. In 1999 Susan used surname Blanchard when she wed widower Richard Widmark.)
4) Afdera Franchetti in 1947-61. They divorced.
5) Shirlee Adams from 1966 on. She’d been a stewardess and model.
Glenn Ford
Leading man was born in 1916 in Quebec and died in 2006 in Beverly Hills.
1) Eleanor Powell (dancer/actress) in 1943-59. She was six years his senior. They had son Peter.
2) Kathryn Hays (actress) in 1966-68.
3) Cynthia Howard (actress) in 1977-84. He was 32 years her senior..
Clark Gable
“The King” of Hollywood lived 1901-60.
1) Josephine Dillon (actress 14 years his senior) in 1924-30.
2) Rhea Langham (Texas socialite 17 years his senior) in 1931; they split in 1935.
3) Carole Lombard in 1939. She died in plane crash in 1942.
4) Lady Sylvia Ashley in 1947. This lasted a couple of years. (She lived 1904-77.)
5) Kay Spreckels in 1955. She was the mother of his only legitimate child, John Clark Gable, born just after the father’s death.
Hermann Goring
Adolf Hitler’s deputy and air force chief lived 1893-1946.
1) Baroness Karin von Folk-Kantzow; a Swede, in Munich in 1922; she'd been divorced before marrying Goring; she died of TB in 1931.
2) Emmy Sonnemann (actress) on April 10, 1935. They were still married when he committed suicide.
Kelsey Grammer
He’s been a TV favorite for many years.
1) Doreen Alderman in 1982-90.
2) Leigh-Anne Csuhany in 1992-93.
3) Camille Donatacci in 1997-.
Stewart Granger
London-born leading man lived 1913-93.
1) Elspeth March (actress) in 1939-49.
2) Jean Simmons (actress) in 1950-60.
3) unknown; divorced.
Cary Grant
Film icon lived 1904-86.
1) Virginia Cherrill (actress) in 1933-35.
2) Barbara Hutton (heiress) in 1942-45.
3) Betsy Drake (actress) in 1949-59.
4) Dian Cannon (actress) in 1965-68. She had his only child, a girl.
5) Barbara Harris in 1981 until his death.
Georg Friedrich Handel
This famous composer lived 1685-1759. Oddly, nothing is known about his private life, even if he was married or not.
Rex Harrison
British-born leading man lived 1908-90.
1) Marjorie Thomas in 1934-42.
2) Lilli Palmer (actress) in 1943-57.
3) Kay Kendall (actress) in 1957-59.
4) Rachel Roberts (actress) in 1962-71.
5) Elizabeth Harris in 1971. She’d divorced actor Richard Harris.
6) Mercia Tinker in 1978.
Dick Haymes
Foreign-born singer/actor had constant marital, financial and legal problems; five of his six marriages ended in divorce. Like Lew Ayres, he aroused public ire by not serving in the military during World War II.
1)
2) Joanne Dru (actress) 1941-49.
3) Nora Eddington (Errol Flynn’s non-actress ex).
4) Rita Hayworth in 1953-54.
5)
6)
Van Heflin
Low-key actor lived 1910-71.
1)
2) Frances Neal (bit player) in 1942-67
Henry VIII
He lived 1491-1547. As King of England, he had no end of marital woes.
1) Catherine of Aragon in 1509-(divorced). She was mother of Bloody Mary.
2) Anne Boleyn in 1533-36 (beheaded). She was mother of Elizabeth.
3) Jane Seymour in 1536-37 (died after childbirth).
4) Anne of Cleves in 1540-40 (annulled).
5) Kathryn Howard in 1540-42 (beheaded).
6) Katherine Parr in 1543-47 . She outlived him by a year.
Rock Hudson
He was born in 1925. Hollywood leading man was married to Nancy Gates in 1955-58. He died of AIDS in 1985.
Howard Hughes
Eccentric tycoon lived 1905-76. He had many liaisons, perhaps most notably with actress Terry Moore. Wives:
1) Ella Rice (Houston socialite) in the 1920s; she divorced him after three years.
2) Jean Peters (actress, 20 years his junior) in 1957-71.
Jack Johnson
Heavyweight champion lived 1878-1946.
1) Mary Austin (colored) left him in Cripple Creek, Colo.
2) Etta Terry Duryea (white) in 1909. She shot herself Sept. 11, 1912.
3) Lucille Cameron (white) in 1912-24. This brought prosecution/persecution under the Mann Act.
4) Irene Marie Pineau (white) in 1925.
Al Jolson
Legendary entertainer lived 1886-1950.
Third of four wives was actress Ruby Keeler in 1928-39.
Curt Jurgens
Suave German film actor’s five wives included Eva Bartok (1955-56).
John F. Kennedy
President lived 1917-63. The purported marriage listed first below remains controversial.
1) Durie Macolm in 1947; Palm Beach socialite had many husbands.
2) Jacqueline Bouvier in 1953-on.
Fernando Lamas
Film actor lived 1915-82.
1)
2)
3) Arlene Dahl (actress) in 1954-60 (although he’d been going with Lana Turner).
4) Esther Williams (actress) from 1967 until he died in 1982.
Burt Lancaster
Hollywood leading man was born in 1913. He married a fellow circus acrobat, June Ernst, while on a carnival tour in 1935. They separated “immediately.”
Alan Jay Lerner
Musician half of wonderful Lerner-Lowe team lived 1918-86. Actress Nancy Olson was the third of his eight wives. The eighth one, his widow, was British actress Liz Robertson. He left behind many debts and lawsuits, but some wonderful works: My Fair Lady, Brigadoon, etc.
Gordon MacRae
Singer-actor lived 1921-86.
1) Sheila Stephens (actress) in 1941-67.
2) unknown.
Tommy Manville
This nutty heir had more dollars than sense. He married 11 times, earning the nickname “Marrying Manville.”
One wife, actress Bonita Francine Edwards, wed him Nov. 18, 1941 in Bridgefield, Conn. That Dec. 9, she arrived in Reno to establish residency for divorce. She cited incompatibility.
One wife, Marie (Sunny) Ainsworth, wed him Aug. 25, 1943 in the New York Supreme Court in NYC. This lasted 7 hours and 45 minutes.
Songwriter Anita Frances Roddy-Eden married him July 10, 1952. On July 23, he announced a breakup. They’d argued about him leaving their suite at the Waldorf Astoria.
Gene Markey
Screenwriter and producer (1895-1980) wasn't famous, but he didn’t care; he married beautiful women, including Joan Bennett (1932-37), Hedy Lamarr (1939-40) and Myrna Loy (1946-50).
Dean Martin
Singer/actor was born in 1917. Six of his eight children were living in 2004.
1) Betty in 1940-49.
2) Jeannie in 1949-73, still alive at 77 in 2004.
3) Catherine in 1973-76.
Tony Martin
Singer/actor was born in 1912.
1) Alice Faye (singer/actress) in 1937-40.
2) Cyd Charisse (actress, dancer) from 1948-on
Kid McCoy
His real name was Norman Selby and he once claimed the light heavyweight boxing title. He was married eight to 10 times, although thrice to the same woman. Like Lana Turner, he’s known for the death of a non-spouse. He was convicted of manslaughter in 1924 for shooting the woman he was living with, Teresa Mors. He did eight years in San Quentin before paroled in 1932.
Burgess Meredith
Although born way back in 1908 he was still in movies in the 1990s (the Grouchy Old Men sequence).
1)
2)
3) Paulette Goddard (actress) in 1944-49.
4) divorced.
Arthur Miller
Noted playwright died Feb. 10, 2005 at age 89.
1) Mary Slattery. They had two children.
2) Marilyn Monroe (actress) in 1956-61.
3) Inge Morath (photographer) in 1962-on. They had one daughter.
Napoleon I
1) Mme. Josephine de Beauharnais. She was a widow when they wed March 9, 1796; he divorced her in 1809 because heir was lacking. (She was born Marie Josephine Rose Tascher de la Pagerie.)
2) Marie Louise in April 1810. She didn't go into exile with him.
Nero
He was emperor of Rome in 54-68 B.C.
1) Octavia; she was his step-sister. She died in 62 B.C. at about age 20.
2) Poppaea Sabina; she died when he beat her.
3) Statilia Messalina, who survived him.
Jack Nicholson
Leading man was born in 1937. Despite many romances, he apparently has been married only once, to actress Sandra Knight in 1962-67.
Aristotle Onassis
Shipping magnate lived 1906-75.
1) Tina Livenos; she was 17, he 40.
2) Jackie Kennedy.
John Payne
Hollywood leading man lived 1912-89. He wasn’t John Wayne, but he was popular.
1) Anne Shirley (actress) in 1942-43.
2) Gloria DeHaven (actress) in 1944-50.
3) Non-actress.
Jack Pickford
Film star lived 1896-1933.
1) Olive Thomas (actress) in 1917 until her death in 1920.
2) Marilyn Miller (actress) in 1922-27.
3) Mary Muhern (Ziegfeld girl) in 1930-32.
Dick Powell
Leading man/director/producer lived 1904-63.
1)
2) Joan Blondell (actress) in 1936-44.
3) June Allyson (actress) in 1945 until his death.
William Powell
The Thin Man lived 1892-1984.
1) Eileen Wilson (actress) in 1915-31.
2) Carole Lombard (actress) in 1931-33.
(He was engaged to actress Jean Harlow when she died in 1937.)
3) Diana “Mousie” Lewis (actress) 1940-until he died at 92.
Tyrone Power
Leading man lived 1913-58. His three wives included Annabella (1939-48) and Linda Christian (1949-55).
Edmund Purdom
British film star was born in 1924. His three wives included one named Alicia who sued for divorce in 1960. Purdom countersued, naming John F. Kennedy co-respondent. Purdom then was married to Linda Christian in 1962-63.
Claude Rains
Familiar character actor lived 1889-1967. He married six times but it wasn’t a case of rounding up the usual suspects. He apparently was married to only one actress, Isabel Jeans (in 1913-20), and she wasn’t exactly famous.
Ronald Reagan
Actor/politician lived 1911-2004.
1) Jane Wyman (actress) in 1940-48. They had daughter Maureen in 1941 and adopted son Michael in 1945.
2) Nancy Davis (actress) from 1952-on. They had daughter Patti in 1952 (she used stage name of Patti Davis) and son Ronald in 1958.
John Rolfe
He was planter in Virginia colony.
1) She died in Virginia about 1610.
2) Pocahontas in 1614-17. She died in England.
3) She died in Virginia about 1620.
Mickey Rooney
Born in 1920, he became famous as Judy Garland’s co-star, but they never married. He went bankrupt in 1962, his $12 million in earnings gone, much to alimony.
1) Ava Gardner (actress) in 1942-43.
2) Betty Jane Rase.
3) Martha Vickers (actress) in 1949-52.
4)
5) Barbara Ann Thomason. She was murdered 1966 by lover Milos Milosevic, who committed suicide.)
6)
7)
8) Jan Chamberlin in 1978, his longest, still going in 2005. She writes country-western songs.They sell insurance on TV.
Porfirio Rubirosa
Dominican Republic's playboy/diplomat had plenty of international relations. Born in 1909, he married the boss' daughter. Ultimately, he died in car crash in 1965. But despite his infamous track record, he and his last wife reportedly had lived happily for eight years.
1) Flor de Oro Trujillo in 1931-mid-‘30s; daughter of Dominican dictator was 17.
2) Danielle Darrieux (French movie star) in 1942-c.46.
3) Doris Duke (richest woman in world) in 1947-48.
4) Barbara Hutton (second richest woman) in 1953-c.53. (This lasted 73 days.)
5) Odile Rodin (French actress) in 1957. She was 19 when wed.
Albert Salmi
Longtime character actor was born in 1928 and committed suicide in 1990.
x) Peggy Ann Garner (actress) in 1956-63.
x) Roberta. (They were estranged when he shot and killed her in Seattle. He then killed himself.)
George Sanders
Veteran actor, who could play the perfect cad, was born in 1906, became bored, so he said, and committed suicide in 1972.
1)
2) Zsa Zsa Gabor (actress) in 1949-57.
3) Benita Hume in 1958-67. She died of cancer.
4) Magda Gabor in 1970 or ‘71; it was annulled two weeks later.
Randolph Scott
Cowboy actor lived 1898-1987.
1) Marion du Pont Somerville (heiress) in 1920s.
2) Patricia “Pat”; they’d been married 43 years when he died.
Peter Sellers
Goofy British-born film star lived 1925-80.
1) Anne Hayes (actress) in 1951-63.
2) Britt Eklund (actress) in 1964-68.
3)
4) Lynne Frederick (actress) from 1977 until his death.
Artie Shaw
Sorting out his personal life is like putting toothpaste back in the tube. The retired bandleader who was born Arthur Jacob Awshawsky turned 93 in 2003. His wives included Hollywood legends Ava Gardner (1945) and Lana Turner (1940-41), plus composer Jerome Kern’s daughter Betty, nurse Margaret Allen, actress Doris Dowling and Mrs. Kathleen Herwig, who really was Kathleen Winsor, author of the scandalous Forever Amber. All his wives are accounted for, but the sequence, or batting order, if you will, is unclear. One is tempted to think that Shaw finally found the woman he wanted when he married Keyes. Actually, they simply never applied for divorce.
1) Jane Karns, when he was 19; this was annulled.
2)
3)
4)
5)
6)
7)
8) Actress Evelyn Keyes in 1957, and they’ve been married ever since (but separate many years).
Frank Sinatra
Legendary entertainer lived 1915-98.
1) Nancy Barbato in 1939-51. She had Nancy, Frank Jr. and Christina.
2) Ava Gardner (actress) in 1951-57.
3) Mia Farrow (actress) in 1966-68. He was 50, she 21, when they wed.
4) Barbara Marx (nee Blakely and widow of Zeppo) 1976-on.
Sylvester Stallone
“Rocky” was born in 1946.
1) Former theatre usher in 1974-85; they had two sons.
2) Brigitte Nielsen (actress) from about 1986. They were divorced in 1988.
Jimmy Stewart
Leading man lived 1908-97. He didn't marry until he was 41. He and wife Gloria had four children during their near-half-century marriage.
Leopold Stokowski
Symphony conductor lived 1882-1977.
1) Olga Samaroff (pianist) 19??-23; her real name was Lucy Hickenlooper.
2) Evangeline Johnson (Johnson & Johnson heiress) in 1926-?
3) Gloria Vanderbilt (heiress) in 1945, when she was 23. She divorced him in 1962.
Billy Bob Thornton
Popular film actor was born in 1955.
1) Melissa Lee Gatlin in 1978-80.
2) Toni Lawrence in 1986-88.
3) Cynda Williams in 1990-92.
4) Pietra Dawn Cherniak in 1993-97.
5) Angelina Jolie in 2000-03.
Franchot Tone
Uppity actor lived 1905-68. He made major headlines when he fought actor Tom Neal for Barbara Payton in a restaurant. He lost.
1) Joan Crawford (actress) in 1935-39.
2) Jean Wallace (actress) in 1941-48.
3) Barbara Payton (actress) in 1956-59.
Spencer Tracy
Longtime leading man lived 1900-67.
He married Louise Treadwell, a stage actress, in 1923, and technically she became his widow when he died. A Catholic, he scorned divorce. But beginning in 1942 he began a long relationship with actress Katharine Hepburn.
Rudolph Valentino
Hollywood’s legendary Latin lover lived 1895-1926.
1) Jean Acker (actress). She locked him out on wedding night Nov. 5, 1919.
2) Natasha Rambova, actress nee Winifred Shaunessy; he was arrested for bigamy. After two such misadventures, it’s no wonder he didn’t remarry. Besides that, he died.
Rudy Vallee
Singer/actor lived 1901-86.
1)
2) Actress Fay Webb.
3) Actress Jane Greer in 1943-44.
4) Eleanor Norris.
John Wayne
Hollywood legend lived 1907-79. He married three wives, all Latinos, and had seven children.
Orson Welles
Hollywood's supposed genius lived 1915-85.
1) Virginia Nicholson (Chicago socialite/actress) 1934-39.
2) Rita Hayworth (actress) in 1943-47.
3) Paoli Mori (actress) in 1956-?
Gene Wilder
Film actor was born in 1935.
1)
2)
3) Gilda Radner; she died in 1989.
4) Karen Webb (speech therapist) in 1991-.
Florenz Ziegfeld
The great showman of his era died in 1932.
1) Anna Held. (Some say they were wed in 1897, some in 1901; she divorced him in 1912.
2) Billie Burke (actress) from 1914-on.
WIVES
June Allyson
Popular and pert actress was born in 1917. In 2005 she was living with her third husband in Ojai, California.
1) Dick Powell. They had two kids before she became a widow in 1963.
2)
3) Dr. David Ashrow.
Julie Andrews
British-born leading lady of stage and screen was born in 1935.
1) Tony Walton (set designer).
2) Blake Edwards (director) in 1970.
Estelle Astaire
Brother Fred’s dancing partner quit show business to marry.
1) Lord Charles Cavendish, until his death before WWII.
2) After the war she married Kingman Douglass (1947 in Warrenton, Va., where they settled).
Mary Astor
Hollywood actress lived 1906-87. She’s best remembered as the double-dealing leading lady in The Maltese Falcon. The custody suit involving the daughter by her second marriage led to public disclosure of Miss Astor’s scandalously sexy diary in 1936.
1) Kenneth Hawks (director and brother of director Howard Hawks). Plane crash killed him in 1930.
2) She then married a doctor.
Lauren Bacall
Leading lady was born in 1924.
1) Humphrey Bogart (actor) 1945-until he died in ‘57.
2) Jason Robards Jr. (actor) in 1961-73.
Lucille Ball
TV queen lived 1911-89.
1) Desi Arnaz in 1941-60. They had two children.
2) Gary Morton (nightclub comedian) in 1961. (But has anyone ever seen him?)
Anne Bancroft
Actress, best remembered as “Mrs. Robinson,” died in 2005.
1) Martin May (builder); marriage lasted three years.
2) Mel Brooks (director) in 1964. They were still married when she died.
Brigitte Bardot
French star was born in 1934.
1) Roger Vadim (director) in 1952-57.
2) Jacques Charrier.
3) Gunther Sachs.
Nora Bayes
Flo Ziegfeld’s singer had five husbands, second of whom was Jack Norworth.
Constance Bennett
Leading lady lived 1904-65.
1) She married at 16; it was annulled.
2) steamship/railroad heir in 1926-29.
3) Gilbert Roland (actor) in 1941-44.
4)
5)
Joan Bennett
Constance’s sister lived 1910-90. A leading lady, too, she had four husbands.
1) She had a youthful marriage in about 1926-28.
2) Gene Markey (producer/writer) in 1932-37. He later married Hedy Lamarr.
3) Walter Wanger (producer) in 1940-65. He was jailed for shooting and wounding her agent.
4) David Wilde (critic).
Ingrid Bergman
Legendary star lived 1915-82.
1) Dr. Peter Lindstrom; they wed in 1937, had daughter Pia; Ingrid deserted family in 1949.
2) Roberto Rossellini (1950-annulled 1958). Both left their spouses to live together at first, igniting furor. Liaison/marriage produced a son and twin girls (including Isabella).
3) Lars Schmidt. They divorced in 1975.
Joan Blondell
Popular blonde film star lived 1909-79.
1) George Barnes (cameraman) in 1933-35.
2) Dick Powell (actor) in 1936-45.
3) Mike Todd (producer) in 1947-50.
Fanny Brice
Famed Ziegfeld entertainer lived 1891-1951.
1) Frank White, barber in Springfield, Mass.; she met him in 1911, they were together a few days but marriage lasted a year on paper.
2) Nicky Arnstein (a gangster, he went to prison. She divorced him in 1927, but still loved him. A soap opera, yes, and it was the basis for the film Funny Girl.)
3) Billy Rose in 1929. She divorced him in ‘36 so he could marry Eleanor Holm.
Diahann Carroll
Singer was enjoying divorced life in 2006.
1) Monte Kay, casting director
2) Freddie Glusmann, restaurateur
3) Robert DeLeon, editor
4) Vic Damone, singer; since divorced
Madeleine Carroll
Blonde leading lady of films lived 1906-87.
1)
2) Sterling Hayden (actor) in 1942-46
3) Henri Lavorel (French film producer).
4) Andrew Heiskell, 1950-65; he published Life magazine.
Cher
Singer/actress was born in 1946. Her mother reportedly was married 10 times, but it’s Cher’s record that follows:
1) Sonny Bono (entertainer) in 1964-74.
2) Gregg Allman (rocker) in 1975-77.
Linda Christian
Born in 1923, she was one of those “actresses” famous for being famous (or notorious), rather than for being in movies. She had many loves. Her husbands included Tyrone Power in 1949-55 and Edmund Purdom in 1962-63.
Ina Claire
Ziegfeld star and film actress lived 1892-1985.
1)
2) John Gilbert (actor) 1929-31.
3)
Joan Crawford
Hollywood great and “Mommie Dearest” lived 1904-77. Each of her four marriages lasted four years.
1) Douglas Fairbanks Jr. in 1929-33. He was five years his senior.
2) Franchot Tone (actor) in 1935-39. She dumped Clark Gable for him.
3) Phillip Terry (minor actor) in 1942-46.
4) Alfred Steele (president of Pepsi-Cola) in 1955-59. A heart attack killed him.
Arlene Dahl
Decorative leading lady was born in 1924.
1) Lex Barker (actor) in 1951-52.
2) Fernando Lamas (actor) in 1954-60.
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Geena Davis
She’s had four husbands but the sequence is unclear. She was married to actor Jeff Goldblum in 1987-90, and later to director Renny Harlin. Her fourth husband is surgeon Reza Jarrahy. They had twins in 2004, when she was 48, he 33. Media offered no further details on how she did it.
Doris Day
Singer/actress was born in 1924.
1) She was 17 when she married a musician.
2) She married again, briefly, at age 22, but soon resumed her legendary virginity.
3) Marty Melcher in 1951; when he left her a widow in 1968 she thought she had the $22 million she’d earned. She didn’t.
Laraine Day
Leading lady was born in 1917. Her second marriage was one of Hollywood’s oddest. Leo, the guy who stole Babe Ruth’s wristwatch, had more enemies that she had fans. Moreover, she risked ruining her career.
1) Ray Hendricks (singer) in 1942-47.
2) Leo Durocher (baseball manager) in 1947-60.
3) TV producer Michael Grilikhes. They were still living near Hollywood in 2005.
Marlene Dietrich
Leading lady lived 1901-92. While living in Germany she married Rudolf Sieber, a studio functionary, in 1924. They had a daughter Maria in 1925. The whole family wound up in Hollywood, but Sieber drifted off to become a chicken farmer. He seems to have been unmissed.
Doris Duke
Heiress' collection of spouses included playboy Porfirio Rubirosa in 1947-48.
Deanna Durbin
Singer/actress was born in Canada in 1921.
1)
2)
3) Charles Henri David (French movie director); he died in 1999 after 48 years of their marriage.
Ann Dvorak
Actress who graced many B flicks lived 1912-79. The first of her three husbands was director Leslie Fenton (1932-46).
Alice Faye
Singer and film actress lived 1912-98.
1) Tony Martin (singer) in 1936-40.
2) Phil Harris in 1941 and apparently still wed and both alive as late as 1994.
Rhonda Fleming
Actress was born in 1922. Her husbands usually weren’t actors but that doesn't seemed to have helped.
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2)
3)
4) Hall Bartlett (producer/director) in 1966-71.
5)
Jane Fonda
Famed leading lady was born in 1937.
1) Roger Vadim (director) in 1965.
2) Tom Hayden in 1973-80. He became a politician.
3) Ted Turner in 1984. They’re divorced.
Joan Fontaine
Leading lady was born in 1917.
1) Brian Aherne (actor) in 1939-45.
2) William Dozier (producer) in 1946-51.
3) Collier Young (writer/producer) in 1952-61.
4)
Zsa Zsa Gabor
Celebrity actress was born in 1918, give or take a few years. She says she’s had nine husbands, which means she's perhaps a couple ahead of sister Eva. An unknown scriptwriter once provided a wonderful bit of Gabor-ish dialogue for Spring Byington in a Mr. Ed TV episode. Miss Byington was talking on a telephone to an unseen person, and her lines went something like this: “You’re getting married again, darling? Is he handsome? Oh, he has eight million dollars. What’s he do? You don’t know. Well, it’ll come out at the property settlement. Whatever you get, you deserve it. You’ve worked so hard at marriage . . . .”
1) Burham Belge (Turkish diplomat) in 1937.
2) Conrad Hilton. (Hotel magnate’s son Nicky married Liz Taylor.)
3) George Sanders, who later married Zsa Zsa’s sister Magda
4)
5)
6)
7) Michael O’Hara.
8) Filipe de Alba, but voided because divorce from O’Hara was questionable, and, too, because the marriage was doubtful: a sea captain performed it, but not in international waters.
9) Prince Frederick von Anhalt in 1986 (49 years after her first marriage).
Judy Garland
Singer/actress/entertainer lived 1922-69.
1) David Rose (orchestra leader) in 1941-45. He was Martha Raye’s ex-husband.
2) Vincente Minnelli (director) in 1945-51.
3) Sid Luft. They divorced in 1965.
4) Mark Herron (actor) in 1966-67. He was seven years her junior.
5) Mickey Deans (discotheque owner) in 1967. He was 11 years her junior.
Ava Gardner
Legendary leading lady lived 1922-90.
1) Mickey Rooney (actor) in 1942-43.
2) Artie Shaw (band leader) in 1945-47.
3) Frank Sinatra (entertainer) in 1951-57.
Peggy Ann Garner
Former child star lived 1931-84.
1) Richard Hayes (actor) in 1951-53
2) Albert Salmi (actor) in 1956-63.
3) Non-actor.
Paulette Goddard
Leading lady claimed she was born in 1911. But 1905 is more likely. When she died in 1990 she left $20 million to New York University, which she hadn’t attended.
1) Edward James (president of Southern States Lumber Company). They divorced in 1931.
2) Charlie Chaplin (actor) in 1936-42.
3) Burgess Meredith (actor) in 1944-49.
4) Erich Maria Remarque (author of All Quiet on the Western Front) from 1958 until he died in 1970.
Melanie Griffith
Hollywood leading lady was born in 1957.
1) Don Johnson (actor) in 1976-79.
2) Don Johnson in 1989.
Jean Harlow
Hollywood’s blonde bombshell lived 1911-37. She was engaged to actor William Powell when she died.
1) Charles F. McGrew 2nd, a young Chicago bond broker, in 1927-29.
2) Paul Bern (studio functionary) in July 1932. His death was ruled a suicide in September 1932.
3) Harold Rosson (studio functionary) in 1933-34.
June Haver
Glamorous blonde actress was born in 1926.. After a brief and unsuccessful marriage, her new fiance died, causing her to enter a convent. A year later she married Fred MacMurray. She died June 4, 2005.
1)
2) Fred MacMurray from 1954 till his death in ‘91.
June Havoc
Actress and kid sister of Gypsy Rose Lee was born in 1916.
1) at age 13.
2) at age 19.
3) director William Spier.
Rita Hayworth
Hollywood “Love Goddess” lived 1918-87. He had only two children.
1) Edward Judson in 1937-43; a businessman, he was 22 years her senior.
2) Orson Welles in ‘43, though she was engaged to Victor Mature; they had Rebecca.(she was 57 in 2003) but quickly divorced.
3) Prince Aly Khan in ‘49-51; they had Princess Jasmin in 1950; Aly died in car crash in 1960.
4) Dick Haymes (singer) in ‘53-55.
5) James Hill (producer) in 1957-61.
Audrey Hepburn
Leading lady lived 1929-1993.
1) Mel Ferrer (actor) in 1954-68.
2) Italian psychiatrist nine years her junior in 1969.
Katharine Hepburn
Leading lady married Ludlow Ogden Smith, a Philadelphia socialite, on Dec. 12, 1928. She left him Jan. 2, 1929. They divorced in 1934 and supposedly remained lifelong friends. Her main love interest was actor Spencer Tracy, who was married to someone else.
Libby Holman
Broadway’s foremost “torch singer” lived 1904-71, causing trouble wherever she went. Her only child, Christopher Reynolds, died climbing mountains in 1950. She committed suicide.
1) Zachary Smith Reynolds (heir to Reynolds tobacco fortune) in 1931-32; seven years her junior, he was shot and killed. Libby was held for a time, then released.
2) Ralph Holmes (actor) in 1939-45; he was 11 years her junior and committed suicide.
3) Louis Shanker, artist, in December 1960.
Barbara Hutton
Heiress had many husbands. Cary Grant was among those of the ‘40s. Among those in the ‘50s was Baron Gottfried von Cramm, the internationally famous tennis player the Nazis imprisoned as a homosexual. He was born in 1909 and died in a car wreck near Cairo in 1976.
1) “Prince” Alexis Mdivani, about 1932-35. (He died in car wreck in 1936.)
2) Count Haugwitz Hardenberg Reventlow, 1935- ; son Lance, who became well-known racing driver, was born in 1937.
3) Cary Grant (film star) in 1942-45.
4?) Gottfried Von Cramm.
Betty Hutton
Actress/singer was born in 1921. References say she was divorced five times. She says she was married only four times.
Jennifer Jones
Film star was born in 1919.
1) Robert Walker (actor) in 1939-45.
2) David O. Selznick (producer) in 1949; he died in 1965.
3) Norton Simon (industrialist) in 1971-.
Shirley Jones
Singer/actress was born in 1934. She married actor Jack Cassidy and starred in TV’s The Partridge Family with step-son David Cassidy. Her son Shaun Cassidy became an actor. After divorce, she married actor Marty Ingels.
Evelyn Keyes
Film actress is remembered as Scarlett O’Hara’s sister. She was born in 1919. Her husbands included directors Charles Vidor (1943-44) and John Huston (1946-50) and band leader Artie Shaw (from 1957-on, although they long ago separated). She lived with producer Mike Todd in 1953-56.
Aimee Semple McPherson
Famed evangelist lived 1890-1944. She was born Aimee Elizabeth Kennedy and accumulated names, much like Mme. Schumann-Heink (below).
1) Robert Semple, missionary who died of malaria in China.
2) Harold McPherson, grocery clerk, married two years.
3) Dave Hutton, church singer.
But it was with Kenneth G. Ormiston that Sister Aimee had her notorious fling.
Hedy Lamarr
Leading lady was born in 1913.
1) Fritz Mandl (Austrian munitions manufacturer) about 1933-37.
2) Gene Markey (writer) in 1939-40.
3) John Loder (actor) in 1943-47.
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5)
6)
Angela Lansbury
Film and TV actress was born in London in 1925.
1) Richard Cromwell in 1945-46.
2) Peter Shaw from 1949-on.
Janet Leigh
Leading lady was born in 1927.
1) Early divorce.
2) Early divorce.
3) Tony Curtis (actor) in 1951-62. They had daughter Jamie Lee in 1958.
Julie London
Singer-turned actress lived 1926-92.
1) Jack Webb (actor) in 1945-53.
2) Bobby Troup, her co-star in TV’s Emergency.
Jennifer Lopez
Singer/actress has been labeled the modern “serial bride.”
1) Waiter Ojani Noa in 1997; this lasted little more than a year.
2) Dancer Chris Judd in 2001; this lasted nine months. (He made $2,222 an hour.)
3) Although she had been scheduled to marry actor Ben Affleck in September 2003, she married a singer named Anthony.
Myrna Loy
The perfect screen wife had less luck in real life, and she never married an actor–much less her frequent co-star, William Powell. She lived 1905-93.
1) Arthur Hornblow Jr. (producer) in 1936-42.
2) John Hertz Jr. (rental-car heir) in 1942-44.
3) Gene Markey (screenwriter, producer) in 1946-50.
4) Howland Sergeant in 1951-60. He was a deputy secretary of state under Dean Acheson.
Jeanette MacDonald
Hollywood legend lived 1901-65 and never once really married Nelson Eddy. In 1937 she married an actor who looked like him, though: Gene Raymond. They were still married when she died.
Marie MacDonald
Unsuccessful actress known as “The Body” kept her name in headlines through marriages and scandals. Some records say she had seven marriages (including remarriages), but other records say she had eight husbands. Born in 1923, she committed suicide in 1965.
Marilyn Miller
Broadway legend lived 1898-1936.
1) Frank Carter (singer died in car crash; jealous, Ziegfeld had fired him.)
2) Jack Pickford in 1922-27.
3) Chester O'Brien (chorus boy/stage manager) in October 1934.
Marilyn Monroe
Film legend lived 1926-62.
1) Jim Dougherty (aircraft plant worker) in about 1942.
2) Joe DiMaggio (baseball star) January 1954-October ‘54.
3) Arthur Miller (playwright) June 1956-Jan. 21, 1961.
Kim Novak
Hollywood leading lady was born in 1933. During her heyday in the ‘50s, she was linked to most of the world’s most eligible bachelors.
1) Richard Johnson (actor). They married briefly.
2) veterinarian in 1976.
Merle Oberon
Film star lived 1911-79.
1) Alexander Korda (director/producer) in 1939-45.
2) Lucien Ballard (cinematographer) in 1945-49.
3) Italian industrialist in 1957-73.
4) Robert Wolders, many years her junior.
Anny Ondra
Polish actress lived 1903-87.
1) Karel Lamac (director), she divorced him in 1933 to marry:
2) Max Schmeling (he’d been world’s heavyweight boxing champion in 1930-32).
Debra Paget
Decorative film star was born in 1933.
1) David Street (actor/singer) in 1958. Annulment came four months later.
2) Budd Boetticher (director) in 1960-61, but they separated after 22 days.
3) Ling-Chieh Kung (Texas oilman) in 1964-71.
Eleanor Parker
Leading lady was born in 1922. She had four husbands and four children.
Suzy Parker
Top model died in 2003 at 69. She was living with her third husband, Bradford Dillman.
Jean Peters
Hollywood actress was born in 1926.
1) Howard Hughes in 57-71; she and tycoon were secretly wed and soon separated.
2) Stanley Hough (TV executive).
Mary Pickford
Immensely popular actress lived 1893-1979.
1) Owen Moore (actor) in 1911-19. He’d become a drunk.
2) Douglas Fairbanks Sr. (actor) in 1920-36.
3) Buddy Rogers (actor, band leader) in 1937-on; he was 11 years her junior.
Jane Powell
Singer/actress was born in 1929.
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2)
3)
4) David Parlour (producer/writer) in 1978-81.
5) Dickie Moore (former actor) in 1988.
Jessie Reed
She was famous as the world’s highest-paid chorus girl.
1) Oliver Debrow, comedian. She divorced him after he was involved in a murder.
2) Louis Herzberg, 1918; a quick divorce ensued.
3) Dan Caswell (heir to Cleveland fortune). She divorced him.
4) William F. Young (Chicago advertising man).
5) Leonard Reno (WWI flyer and wealthy publisher’s son).
Debbie Reynolds
Entertainer was born in 1932.
1) Eddie Fisher (singer) in 1955-59. They had Carrie and Todd Fisher.
2) Owner of shoe store chain 1960-75; she became responsible for $2 million of his debts.
3) Real estate developer in 1984.
Ginger Rogers
Leading lady lived 1911-95.
1) Jack Pepper (vaudevillian) in 1928-31.
2) Lew Ayres (actor) in 1934-41.
3)
4) Jacques Bergerac (actor) in 1953-57.
5) William Marshall (actor/director) in 1961-62.
Jane Russell
1) Bob Waterfield (football star) in 1943-68. He was bigger in some ways than she was then.
2) Roger Barrett (actor) in 1968. He died less than three months later.
3) Real estate agent.
Lillian Russell
Undisputed Queen of show business lived 1861-1922, and is said to have had only one flaw. Poor Lillian. As old friend Marie Dressler observed: “She was none too clever about men.” And she never married longtime friend and escort Diamond Jim Brady.
1) Harry Braham (orchestra leader) in 1879-c80.
2) Edward Solomon (orchestra leader) in 1883-?(They had daughter Dorothy in 1884 but Lillian had marriage annulled after he was arrested for bigamy in London in late 1885.
3) Giovanni Perugini (opera tenor) briefly in 1894. This phony's real name was Jack Chatterton.
(Jesse Lewisohn was a longtime boyfriend in this interval. He ran off with Brady’s girlfriend.)
4) Alexander P. Moore (publisher of Pittsburgh Leader newspaper) on June 12, 1912. They were still married when she died.
Meg Ryan
Leading lady was born in 1961. She married actor Dennis Quaid in 1991.
Mme. Ernestine Schumann-Heink
Opera diva lived 1861-1936.
1) Ernest Heink.
2) Paul Schumann.
3) unknown.
Norma Shearer
Hollywood leading lady lived 1899-1971. Her marriage in 1927 to a studio bigwig assured career success. But after he died, her career faded.
1) Irving Thalberg in 1927. He died in 1936.
2) a ski instructor in 1942; he was 20 years her junior.
Ann Sheridan
Leading lady lived 1915-67.
1) Edward Norris (actor) in 1936-39.
2) George Brent (actor) in 1942-43.
3) Scott McKay (actor).
Sylvia Sidney
This major Broadway star, born in 1911, made bad decisions in Hollywood. She also picked the wrong husbands; she was thrice divorced.
1) Bennett A. Cerf (publisher) in 1935-36.
2) Luther Adler (actor) in 1938-46.
3)
Jean Simmons
Leading lady was born in 1929 in London. In 2004 she was living in California and still working.
1) Stewart Granger (actor) in 1950-60.
2) Richard Brooks (director) in 1960-1977.
Barbara Stanwyck
Brassy leading lady lived 1907-90.
1) Frank Fay; they divorced in 1935.
2) Robert Taylor (actor) in 1939-52.
Elizabeth Taylor
Born in 1932 in London, she’s been a worldwide celebrity longer than any other living commoner.
1) Nick Hilton, hotel heir.
2) Michael Wilding (actor) in 1952-57.
3) Mike Todd (killed in crash of his plane, “The Lucky Liz.”)
4) Eddie Fisher (singer); he was a friend of Todd who dumped wife Debbie Reynolds.
5) Richard Burton (actor) 1964-74. She left Fisher amid great scandal.
6) Richard Burton in 1975-76.
7) Sen. John Warner of Virginia in 1978-82.
8) Larry Fortensky (construction worker) in 1991-97. They met at Betty Ford Clinic.
Shirley Temple
Born in 1928, she became the most successful child star ever.
1) John Agar (actor) in 1945-49. She was 17 when wed.
2) Charles Black, TV executive in 1950-on.
Olive Thomas
Born Oliveretta Duffy in 1884, she became a major Broadway and Hollywood star. Her questionable death in 1920 was ruled suicide.
1) Bernard Krug Thomas (businessman) about 1900. She was about 16.
2) Jack Pickford (actor) in 1917. They were still married when she died.
Lana Turner
Hollywood leading lady (born 1920) married eight times to seven husbands and was divorced seven times. This doesn’t take into account her notorious affair with gangster Johnny Stompanato. It was ruled that Turner’s daughter Cheryl Crane killed Stompanato in 1958 in a justifiable homicide.
1) Artie Shaw (band leader) in 1940-41.
2) Stephen Crane (actor-turned-restaurateur).
3) Stephen Crane, weeks after first was annulled.
4) Bob Topping (rich playboy) in 1948-52. His brother owned half of the New York Yankees.
5) Lex Barker (actor) in 1953-57.
6) Fred May (businessman).
7) Robert Eaton (businessman).
8) Ronald Dante (nightclub performer).
Vivian Vance
Born between 1907 and ‘13, she became Lucille Ball’s TV sidekick. She married Philip Ober in what was billed as her first marriage. Some critics claimed she’d forgotten about two previous husbands. She died in 1979.
Gloria Vanderbilt
Heiress married four times.
1) Pat DiSicco. This slippery Hollywood agent specialized in getting beat up in bars; the couple split in 1945.
2) Leopold Stokowski (conductor); he was 42 years her senior. They married one day after she divorced No. 1 and they remained married 10 years.
3) Sidney Lumet (movie director).
4) Wyatt Emory Cooper (writer) in 1963. They had Anderson Cooper, the TV caster; dad died in 1968.
Bessiewallis “Wallis” Warfield
This American-born daughter of Teackle Warfield and the former Alice Montague got the king of England to abdicate. She died in 1986.
1) Earl Winfield Spencer Jr. in November 1916. They divorced in 1926.
2) Ernest Aldridge Simpson in 1928.
3) Duke of Windsor in 1937. They were still married when he died in 1972.
Esther Williams
Famed swimmer/actress was born in 1923.
1)
2)
3) Fernando Lamas (actor) in 1967 until his death in 1982.
Fay Wray
Actress was born in 1907. They dimmed the lights on the Empire State Building when she died in 2004.
1) John Monk Saunders. He wrote Wings, The Dawn Patrol, etc.; they had a daughter, Susan.
2) Robert Riskin. He wrote scripts for It Happened One Night, Lost Horizon and other Frank Capra films; they had daughter Victoria and son Robert Jr.
3) Sanford Rothenberg. He was Riskin’s doctor; not till 16 years after Riskin died did Wray wed the doctor. He died in 1991.
Jane Wyman
Actress was born in 1914.
1) Myron Futterman (dress manufacturer) in 1934-35.
2) Ronald Reagan (actor) in 1940-48. They had two children.
3) Freddie Karger (orchestra leader) in 1952 until divorced.
4) Freddie Karger in 1961-65.
BRIEF ENCOUNTERS
Britney Spears married Jason Allen Alexander early Saturday Jan. 3, 2004 in Las Vegas. They got an annulment Monday, 55 hours later. It was reported that the quasi-groom earned $560,000 for his 55-hour adventure ($10,200 a hour).
Rudolph Valentino might have topped that. He and Jean Acker didn’t last through the wedding night, although getting an actual divorce did take some time. About the same thing happened to Burt Lancaster, and, separately, to Texas hero Sam Houston. Katharine Hepburn didn’t fare much better.
Gloria Swanson and Wallace Beery married in March 1916 in Hollywood, but separated three weeks later. He said she wanted a fancy life, he wanted a simple life. She said she wanted a baby, he didn’t.
Ethel Merman and Ernest Borgnine were a volatile couple. George Brent had a quickie marriage in 1937. Others who had such brief matrimonial disasters include singer Guy Mitchell, who returned from an abbreviated honeymoon and unchivalrously proclaimed his bride a “boudoir washout.”
FAMOUS MARRIAGES
These weren’t necessarily long or short, happy or sad, for better or worse. But they did capture the public fancy:
■Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton--particularly the first time around.
■Marilyn Monroe and Joe DiMaggio.
■Vivian Leigh and Laurence Olivier.
■Halle Berry and David Justice the ballplayer.
■Howard Duff and Ida Lupino.
■Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford.
■Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall.
■Buddy Rogers and Mary Pickford.
■John Barrymore and Dolores Costello.
■William Holden and Brenda Marshall.
■Bob Waterfield and Jane Russell.
■Sonny Bono and Cher.
■Dinah Shore and George Montgomery.
■Vic Damone and Pier Angeli.
■Melvyn Douglas and Helen Gahagan.
■Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta-Jones.
■Leo Durocher and Laraine Day.
■Lou Tellegen and Geraldine Farrar. (The divorce was ugly.).
■Jack Webb and Julie London. (They eventually divorced.)
■Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz.(They eventually divorced.)
■Lee Majors and Farrah Fawcett.
■Dick Powell and June Allyson.
■Charles Laughton and Elsa Lanchester.
■Phil Harris and Alice Faye.
■Fibber and Molly. (Jim and Marion Jordan)
■George Burns and Gracie Allen (wed Jan. 7, 1926).
■Jack Benny and Mary Livingstone.
■Joanne Woodward and Paul Newman.
■Larry Parks and Betty Garrett.
■Ozzie Nelson and Harriet Hilliard.
■John Agar and Shirley Temple, briefly.
■Vivian Blaine and Milton Rackmil, president of Universal Pictures and Decca Records. They've since divorced.
■Florenz Ziegfeld and Anna Held.
■Florenz Ziegfeld and Billie Burke.
■Elliott Roosevelt (son of FDR) and actress Faye Emerson.
LONG MARRIAGES
Not all celebrity marriages are temporary. Here are some that weren’t:
■Ossie Davis and Ruby Dee, married 56 years when he died in 2005 at 87.
■Kirk and Anne Douglas celebrated their 50th anniversary in 2004.
■Alice Faye and Phil Harris, wed 1941; she died in 1998.
■Fred MacMurray and June Haver, 1954 till his death in 1991.
■Joel McCrea and Frances Dee were married from 1933 until he died in 1990.
■Alexis Smith and Craig Stevens, 1944 until her death in 1993.
■Virginia Mayo and Michael O’Shea, from 1947 until he died in 1973. She didn’t remarry.
■James and Gloria Stewart were married about 48 years.
■Jack Benny and Mary Livingstone.
■Bob Hope.
■Randolph and Pat Scott had been married 43 years when he died.
■Ralph Bellamy and Alice Murphy (although he often lost the girl in the movies).
■Eddie Cantor and Ida Tobias, from 1914 on. She was his childhood sweetheart
■Will Rogers and Betty Blake.
■Michael York and nonactress Pat York; wed in 1968, still in 1999.
■Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward since Jan. 29, 1958.
■Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontaine.
■Jessica Tandy and Hume Cronyn.
■Richard Widmark and screenwriter Jean Hazelwood had been married 55 years when she died in 1997. Two years later he wed Susan Blanchard, 74; she was Henry Fonda’s third wife.
■Fred Astaire and Phyllis Livingston Potter (nee Baker). She predeceased him by many years.
SECRET MARRIAGES
■Prince of Wales and Mrs. Maria Fitzherbert, a twice-married Catholic in 1785. He became Britain’s King George IV.
■John F. Kennedy and Durie Macolm in 1947.
KINKY MARRIAGES
■Cowboy actor Rod Cameron divorced his wife to marry her mother.
■Greer Garson married Richard Ney, who had played her son in Mrs. Miniver (1942). They were married in 1943-47. He was born in 1918. She was born in 1908
■Actress Gloria Grahame married her husband's son by a previous marriage, making her former husband her father-in-law. She had children by each marriage. Try to figure the relationships between everyone concerned. For starters, one child was also her son-in-law and her step-grandson.
■Prince Richard Metternich married his niece, permissible in some counties. Taking it another way, the famous Austrian chancellor, Klemens von Metternich, had a son Richard, who also became chancellor, and a daughter. The daughter married Count Moritz Sandor and had a daughter Pauline. Richard married Pauline. She was eight years his junior and often was termed “hideously ugly.”
EXPENSIVE DIVORCES
■ Harrison Ford, 61, spent $118 million to divorce Melissa Mathison, 53, in about 2003. They’d been married 20 years.
Other divorces in $100 million range:
■ Norman and Frances Lear in 1985.
■ Steven Spielberg and Amy Irving 1989.
■ Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman in 2001.
■ Neil Diamond and Marcia Murphey in 1985
THEY NEVER MARRIED
Greta Garbo
Diamond Jim Brady
Clifton Webb (he always lived with his mother)
U.S. President James Buchanan
Lizabeth Scott
Queen Elizabeth I
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