Post by Coopsgirl on Dec 5, 2011 20:09:21 GMT -6
1941 was a very interesting year complete with many pop culture and historical milestones. When most Americans think of the year 1941, the Japanese bombing of the U.S. Pacific Naval fleet stationed at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii probably comes to mind first as that signaled the entrance of the U.S. into WWII.
Memorial built over the remains of the USS Arizona (I took these pics in 1998)
That was on December 7th so let’s go back and see what happened during the rest of the year. In the U.S. the average home purchase price was just over $4000, you could rent a home for about $32 a month, the average person made $1750 a year, gas was about 12 cents a gallon, and a new car would set you back about $850. The National Gallery of Art opened in Washington D.C., the first helicopter flight took place in Stratford, Connecticut and lasted one hour, General Mills introduced a new cereal called Cheerios, and New York City had its third largest snowfall total in history of 18 inches. Franklin Roosevelt was inaugurated to serve his third term as president, the only person in U.S. history to be elected to three terms as afterwards an amendment was added to the Constitution restricting presidents to a maximum of two terms. The New York Yankees won the World Series and star player Joe DiMaggio set a record that still stands today of getting a hit in 56 consecutive games. After 14 years of work by 400 sculptors the carvings of Presidents Washington, Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Lincoln on Mount Rushmore in South Dakota were completed.
The FCC (Federal Communications Commission) approved regularly scheduled commercial television broadcasts beginning in July and the Bulova Watch Company paid just under $10 for the first commercial broadcast on network television. Stardust by Artie Shaw, Take the “A” Train by Duke Ellington, God Bless the Child by Billie Holiday, Chattanooga Choo-Choo by Glen Miller, and Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy by the Andrews Sisters were hit songs in 1941. Rosemary LaPlanche of Los Angeles, California , the runner up in the 1940 Miss America pageant, came out victorious in 1941 and won the crown. The annual beauty pageant which began in 1921 is still held every year. Rosemary traveled the country helping to sale war bonds (she was crowned near the end of 1941 and served as Miss America through 1942) and was signed to a movie contract with RKO and made over 50 films as well as having her own radio show.
Authors James Joyce and Virginia Woolf passed away in 1941 both aged 59. Notable celebrity births included actresses Faye Dunaway, Julie Christie, and Ann-Margret and actors Nick Nolte, Ryan O’Neal, and Beau Bridges.
Here are some ads from the March 1941 issue of Time magazine on which Gary appeared on the cover to show the types of products and services available this year.
By the time the U.S. entered the war at the end of the year in December, fighting across Europe had been raging for two years. People in London and other cities in England endured day and night bombing raids from German pilots known as the ‘blitz’ spanning a nine month period during 1940 and 1941. Gas chambers were used for the first time this year in the Auschwitz concentration camp to kill large numbers of prisoners including Jews, gypsies, and captured Russian soldiers. More people were killed at the Auschwitz camp that at any of the others with estimates ranging between 1-3 million deaths. Not all of the deaths were a result of being sent to the gas chambers as many prisoners died as a result of starvation, disease, or the medical experiments performed on them against their will.
Children survivors of Auschwitz after liberation by Ukrainian soldiers in 1945
en.auschwitz.org/m/index.php?option=com_ponygallery&func=watermark&id=451&Itemid=17
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There were many ugly and horrible things that happened in 1941 but I would like to focus on something positive and good that happened during the year. Seventy years ago three films were released which landed in the list of the 15 top grossing films of the year. Meet John Doe, Sergeant York, and Ball of Fire were each smash hits thanks in large part to the lead actor in each film, Gary Cooper.
Gary had been making films since 1925 and while 1936 had been one of his most successful career years, his work in 1941 blew that right out of the water.
Meet John Doe directed by Frank Capra and costarring Barbara Stanwyck, Walter Brennan, Edward Arnold, and James Gleason was released at the beginning of the year and received both critical praise and commercial success coming in as the 14th highest grossing film of the year. There was much talk that Gary would get an Oscar nomination for his performance in this film as a homeless ex-baseball player turned hero for the common man.
Well, in the summer of that year a film was released that all but assured its leading actor of an Oscar win. That film was Sergeant York and it took the top spot as the highest grossing film of the year. Directed by Howard Hawks, Sergeant York costarred Walter Brennan, Margaret Wycherly, and Joan Leslie and told the amazing true story of Alvin York’s heroic acts performed during WWI. York was the most decorated American soldier to fight in WWI, known as the Great War and the “war to end all wars” prior to WWII. York was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor which is the highest award a soldier can receive. Many soldiers who receive the award are honored posthumously as they are often killed while performing acts worthy of the award. York was an exception as he survived.
Gary’s last film of the year Ball of Fire, released in December, paired him again with director Howard Hawks and actress Barbara Stanwyck along with seven wonderful character actors playing loveable and naïve professors including Oskar Homolka, Henry Travers, S.Z. Sakall (aka Cuddles), Tully Marshall, Leonid Kinskey, Richard Haydn, and Aubrey Mather. There is a clever reference to Sergeant York in this film as one of the bad guys says “I saw this in a movie once” before he licks his finger and wets the sight on his gun just as Gary did while playing Alvin York.
Gary played very different characters in each of these films from a homeless drifter turned pop culture icon, to a farmer who became a national war hero, and then finally a sweet and innocent professor who finds true love with a burlesque dancer on the run from the mob. Despite their differences one thing each of these characters has in common is they are all men who were put in unusual circumstances that were completely outside of each one’s comfort zone and yet they each reached some measure of success.
I am not much of a fan of modern Hollywood. When I was a child and a teenager (in the 80s and 90s) I went to the movies as often as possible, sometimes every weekend. I lived in a small town and it was a treat to go see a movie at our old one screen theater. When I was in high school and old enough to drive, my friends and I would make the 35 minute to trip to Humble (just outside of Houston) and go to the much fancier multi-screen theaters. It didn’t really matter much what was showing because we knew there would be something we liked to choose from and for the most part we always went back home happy. Around the time I finished undergraduate school (1999) movie quality was beginning to decline, at least in my opinion. There were still good movies to be seen but they were becoming fewer and farther between. I can count the new films I’ve seen over the past decade on both hands and probably have a finger or two leftover.
It’s hard to imagine an actor having the kind of year Gary did in 1941 in today’s Hollywood. His success in ’41 garnered Gary his second Oscar nomination for Best Actor and his first win for Sergeant York. For the next two years Gary was nominated for a Best Actor Oscar for Pride of the Yankees and For Whom the Bell Tolls. As a result of his outstanding work in three hit films, Gary’s status as a bona fide first rate talent and star was solidified and he remained an A-list actor and very beloved for the rest of his career spanning another 20 years.
Gary and Joan Fontaine with their Best Actor and Best Actress Oscars
Personally each of these films played a part in my finding and falling head over heels in love with the man from Montana. Sergeant York was the first film of Gary’s I ever saw. When I was around 10 or 11 we watched the film in school. We all enjoyed it very much and I remember that my favorite part was when Alvin ran off one of Gracie’s suitors much to her chagrin. Everyone in the class liked that part and it got a big laugh out of us. It was nearly 20 years before I saw another one of his films in 2005. I’m not sure how I managed to miss them as I watched AMC (back when they used to show classic films) and TCM quite a bit when I was in high school and college. One night in November 2006 I was flipping through the channels late at night and I happened upon Ball of Fire. I recognized Gary from Pride of the Yankees which I had seen the year before and loved but I was too sleepy to watch the rest of it and decided I would just wait for TCM to show it again. I promptly forgot about the film until the next month when Gary was selected as TCM’s Star of the Month and I saw a promo for it advertising Ball of Fire. So when December 21 rolled around I got a snack (a juicy red pear – yum!) and sat down on the couch ready to watch the film. Meet John Doe was up on the schedule first to be followed by Ball of Fire. As soon as Gary came on the screen my jaw dropped open and I sat straight up absolutely mesmerized by what I was seeing. I remember kind of quietly saying to myself “he’s gorgeous” and all throughout the movie I kept asking myself why I hadn’t noticed that before.
Gary may have been famous for his impeccable style and always looking very put together but seeing him looking like a dirty, unshaven bum is what made me finally notice him. For the record, I am not normally attracted to men who look homeless (ha!) but there’s something about a good looking actor playing a down on his luck guy that almost always catches my eye. Anyway I don’t think I ever finished eating that pear but that’s okay. It was well worth the cost of a wasted piece of fruit to find Gary and his wonderful films.
From that day on my love for Gary and appreciation of his remarkable acting abilities has continued to grow and I’m so happy to have this site up and running and be able to share my pictures, articles, and love of Gary with other devoted fans as well.
References
www.historyorb.com/events/date/1941
www.popculturemadness.com/Music/Pop-Old/1941.html
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1941_in_film
www.missamerica.org/our-miss-americas/1940/1941.aspx
www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/blitz.htm
en.auschwitz.org/m/
Memorial built over the remains of the USS Arizona (I took these pics in 1998)
That was on December 7th so let’s go back and see what happened during the rest of the year. In the U.S. the average home purchase price was just over $4000, you could rent a home for about $32 a month, the average person made $1750 a year, gas was about 12 cents a gallon, and a new car would set you back about $850. The National Gallery of Art opened in Washington D.C., the first helicopter flight took place in Stratford, Connecticut and lasted one hour, General Mills introduced a new cereal called Cheerios, and New York City had its third largest snowfall total in history of 18 inches. Franklin Roosevelt was inaugurated to serve his third term as president, the only person in U.S. history to be elected to three terms as afterwards an amendment was added to the Constitution restricting presidents to a maximum of two terms. The New York Yankees won the World Series and star player Joe DiMaggio set a record that still stands today of getting a hit in 56 consecutive games. After 14 years of work by 400 sculptors the carvings of Presidents Washington, Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Lincoln on Mount Rushmore in South Dakota were completed.
The FCC (Federal Communications Commission) approved regularly scheduled commercial television broadcasts beginning in July and the Bulova Watch Company paid just under $10 for the first commercial broadcast on network television. Stardust by Artie Shaw, Take the “A” Train by Duke Ellington, God Bless the Child by Billie Holiday, Chattanooga Choo-Choo by Glen Miller, and Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy by the Andrews Sisters were hit songs in 1941. Rosemary LaPlanche of Los Angeles, California , the runner up in the 1940 Miss America pageant, came out victorious in 1941 and won the crown. The annual beauty pageant which began in 1921 is still held every year. Rosemary traveled the country helping to sale war bonds (she was crowned near the end of 1941 and served as Miss America through 1942) and was signed to a movie contract with RKO and made over 50 films as well as having her own radio show.
Authors James Joyce and Virginia Woolf passed away in 1941 both aged 59. Notable celebrity births included actresses Faye Dunaway, Julie Christie, and Ann-Margret and actors Nick Nolte, Ryan O’Neal, and Beau Bridges.
Here are some ads from the March 1941 issue of Time magazine on which Gary appeared on the cover to show the types of products and services available this year.
By the time the U.S. entered the war at the end of the year in December, fighting across Europe had been raging for two years. People in London and other cities in England endured day and night bombing raids from German pilots known as the ‘blitz’ spanning a nine month period during 1940 and 1941. Gas chambers were used for the first time this year in the Auschwitz concentration camp to kill large numbers of prisoners including Jews, gypsies, and captured Russian soldiers. More people were killed at the Auschwitz camp that at any of the others with estimates ranging between 1-3 million deaths. Not all of the deaths were a result of being sent to the gas chambers as many prisoners died as a result of starvation, disease, or the medical experiments performed on them against their will.
Children survivors of Auschwitz after liberation by Ukrainian soldiers in 1945
en.auschwitz.org/m/index.php?option=com_ponygallery&func=watermark&id=451&Itemid=17
[/img]
There were many ugly and horrible things that happened in 1941 but I would like to focus on something positive and good that happened during the year. Seventy years ago three films were released which landed in the list of the 15 top grossing films of the year. Meet John Doe, Sergeant York, and Ball of Fire were each smash hits thanks in large part to the lead actor in each film, Gary Cooper.
Gary had been making films since 1925 and while 1936 had been one of his most successful career years, his work in 1941 blew that right out of the water.
Meet John Doe directed by Frank Capra and costarring Barbara Stanwyck, Walter Brennan, Edward Arnold, and James Gleason was released at the beginning of the year and received both critical praise and commercial success coming in as the 14th highest grossing film of the year. There was much talk that Gary would get an Oscar nomination for his performance in this film as a homeless ex-baseball player turned hero for the common man.
Well, in the summer of that year a film was released that all but assured its leading actor of an Oscar win. That film was Sergeant York and it took the top spot as the highest grossing film of the year. Directed by Howard Hawks, Sergeant York costarred Walter Brennan, Margaret Wycherly, and Joan Leslie and told the amazing true story of Alvin York’s heroic acts performed during WWI. York was the most decorated American soldier to fight in WWI, known as the Great War and the “war to end all wars” prior to WWII. York was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor which is the highest award a soldier can receive. Many soldiers who receive the award are honored posthumously as they are often killed while performing acts worthy of the award. York was an exception as he survived.
Gary’s last film of the year Ball of Fire, released in December, paired him again with director Howard Hawks and actress Barbara Stanwyck along with seven wonderful character actors playing loveable and naïve professors including Oskar Homolka, Henry Travers, S.Z. Sakall (aka Cuddles), Tully Marshall, Leonid Kinskey, Richard Haydn, and Aubrey Mather. There is a clever reference to Sergeant York in this film as one of the bad guys says “I saw this in a movie once” before he licks his finger and wets the sight on his gun just as Gary did while playing Alvin York.
Gary played very different characters in each of these films from a homeless drifter turned pop culture icon, to a farmer who became a national war hero, and then finally a sweet and innocent professor who finds true love with a burlesque dancer on the run from the mob. Despite their differences one thing each of these characters has in common is they are all men who were put in unusual circumstances that were completely outside of each one’s comfort zone and yet they each reached some measure of success.
I am not much of a fan of modern Hollywood. When I was a child and a teenager (in the 80s and 90s) I went to the movies as often as possible, sometimes every weekend. I lived in a small town and it was a treat to go see a movie at our old one screen theater. When I was in high school and old enough to drive, my friends and I would make the 35 minute to trip to Humble (just outside of Houston) and go to the much fancier multi-screen theaters. It didn’t really matter much what was showing because we knew there would be something we liked to choose from and for the most part we always went back home happy. Around the time I finished undergraduate school (1999) movie quality was beginning to decline, at least in my opinion. There were still good movies to be seen but they were becoming fewer and farther between. I can count the new films I’ve seen over the past decade on both hands and probably have a finger or two leftover.
It’s hard to imagine an actor having the kind of year Gary did in 1941 in today’s Hollywood. His success in ’41 garnered Gary his second Oscar nomination for Best Actor and his first win for Sergeant York. For the next two years Gary was nominated for a Best Actor Oscar for Pride of the Yankees and For Whom the Bell Tolls. As a result of his outstanding work in three hit films, Gary’s status as a bona fide first rate talent and star was solidified and he remained an A-list actor and very beloved for the rest of his career spanning another 20 years.
Gary and Joan Fontaine with their Best Actor and Best Actress Oscars
Personally each of these films played a part in my finding and falling head over heels in love with the man from Montana. Sergeant York was the first film of Gary’s I ever saw. When I was around 10 or 11 we watched the film in school. We all enjoyed it very much and I remember that my favorite part was when Alvin ran off one of Gracie’s suitors much to her chagrin. Everyone in the class liked that part and it got a big laugh out of us. It was nearly 20 years before I saw another one of his films in 2005. I’m not sure how I managed to miss them as I watched AMC (back when they used to show classic films) and TCM quite a bit when I was in high school and college. One night in November 2006 I was flipping through the channels late at night and I happened upon Ball of Fire. I recognized Gary from Pride of the Yankees which I had seen the year before and loved but I was too sleepy to watch the rest of it and decided I would just wait for TCM to show it again. I promptly forgot about the film until the next month when Gary was selected as TCM’s Star of the Month and I saw a promo for it advertising Ball of Fire. So when December 21 rolled around I got a snack (a juicy red pear – yum!) and sat down on the couch ready to watch the film. Meet John Doe was up on the schedule first to be followed by Ball of Fire. As soon as Gary came on the screen my jaw dropped open and I sat straight up absolutely mesmerized by what I was seeing. I remember kind of quietly saying to myself “he’s gorgeous” and all throughout the movie I kept asking myself why I hadn’t noticed that before.
Gary may have been famous for his impeccable style and always looking very put together but seeing him looking like a dirty, unshaven bum is what made me finally notice him. For the record, I am not normally attracted to men who look homeless (ha!) but there’s something about a good looking actor playing a down on his luck guy that almost always catches my eye. Anyway I don’t think I ever finished eating that pear but that’s okay. It was well worth the cost of a wasted piece of fruit to find Gary and his wonderful films.
From that day on my love for Gary and appreciation of his remarkable acting abilities has continued to grow and I’m so happy to have this site up and running and be able to share my pictures, articles, and love of Gary with other devoted fans as well.
References
www.historyorb.com/events/date/1941
www.popculturemadness.com/Music/Pop-Old/1941.html
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1941_in_film
www.missamerica.org/our-miss-americas/1940/1941.aspx
www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/blitz.htm
en.auschwitz.org/m/