(1894– ) USA@

1. Thomas A. Edison

Director | The Trick Cyclist

Thomas A. Edison was born on February 11, 1847 in Milan, Ohio, USA as Thomas Alva Edison. He was a producer and director, known for silent movies such as, The Trick Cyclist (1901), The Patchwork Girl of Oz (1914) and Bicycle Trick Riding, No. 2 (1899). He also produced the first American film ...

2. William K.L. Dickson

Cinematographer | Sandow

Born in France to British parents, William Kennedy-Laurie Dickson stayed in that country until age 19, when he, his mother and sisters (their father had died sometime before) returned to Great Britain. Once there, Dickson--in an early indication of his lifelong fascination with science and ...

3. Fred Ott

Self | Edison Kinetoscopic Record of a Sneeze

Frederick Paul Ott was a skilled machinist and key employee of Thomas A. Edison's laboratories. He began working with Edison in 1874 (at age 14) and became one of the inventor's most valued employees and closest friends. His likeness appears in two of the earliest surviving motion pictures - the ...

4. Buffalo Bill Cody

Writer | Fighting with Buffalo Bill

Buffalo Bill Cody was born on February 26, 1846 in Scott County, Iowa, USA. He was a writer and producer, known for Fighting with Buffalo Bill (1926), Battling with Buffalo Bill (1931) and The Indians Are Coming (1930). He was married to Louise Maude Frederici. He died on January 10, 1917 in Denver...

5. Enoch J. Rector

Director | Corrida de toros

Enoch J. Rector was an American boxing film promoter and early cinema technician. He was born near Parkersburg, West Virginia and attended West Virginia University. He was a partner in Woodville Latham's Kinetoscope Exhibition Company (later the Lambda Company) during the mid-1890s, working with ...

6. J. Stuart Blackton

Director | The Glorious Adventure

In the US from the age of 10, he first worked as a journalist-illustrator for the New York World. Interviewing Thomas A. Edison, he so impressed the inventor with his drawings that Edison suggested he allow some of them to be photographed by the Kinetograph camera. The result was a short film, ...

7. Albert E. Smith

Producer | Vengeance - and the Woman

Pioneering film producer and studio executive Albert E. Smith was born in Favershem, County Kent, England, on June 4, 1875, the son of a gardener. There were nine children in the Smith family--Albert, seven brothers and a sister--and when he was three years old the entire family emigrated to the US...

8. Edwin S. Porter

Director | The White Pearl

In the late 1890s Porter worked as both a projectionist and mechanic, eventually becoming director and cameraman for the Edison Manufacturing Company. Influenced by both the "Brighton school" and the story films of Georges Méliès, Porter went on to make important shorts such as Life of an American ...

9. Gilbert M. 'Broncho Billy' Anderson

Director | The Infant at Snakeville

American actor-director-writer-producer Gilbert M. Anderson, father of the movie cowboy and the first Western star, was born Maxwell Henry Aronson in Little Rock, Arkansas. His parents, Esther (Ash) and Henry Aronson, were from New York. His father was from a German Jewish family, and his mother ...

10. G.W. Bitzer

Cinematographer | The Birth of a Nation

G.W. Bitzer was born on April 21, 1872 in Roxbury, Massachusetts, USA. He was a cinematographer and director, known for The Birth of a Nation (1915), Broken Blossoms or the Yellow Man and the Girl (1919) and Logging in Maine (1906). He was married to Ethel Boddy. He died on April 29, 1944 in ...

11. D.W. Griffith

Director | The Birth of a Nation

David Wark Griffith was born in rural Kentucky to Jacob "Roaring Jake" Griffith, a former Confederate Army colonel and Civil War veteran. Young Griffith grew up with his father's romantic war stories and melodramatic nineteenth-century literature that were to eventually shape his movies. In 1897 ...

12. Henry B. Walthall

Actor | The Birth of a Nation

Henry B. Walthall was a respected stage actor who became a favorite of pioneering film director D.W. Griffith. Born in 1878 in Alabama, Walthall embarked on a law career but quit law school in 1898 to enlist in the US Army in order to fight in the Spanish-American War. Returning from the war he ...

13. Carl Laemmle

Frankenstein

The roots of Universal Pictures can rightfully be traced back to 1906 when Carl Laemmle returned home to Chicago after a stint as a bookkeeper in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, and opened up a chain of nickelodeons. This in turn led to the ambitious 39-year-old organizing a film exchange network he boldly ...

14. Florence Lawrence

Actress | Not Like Other Girls

Florence Lawrence was the first film player whose name was used to promote her films and the studio (Independent Moving Pictures Company [IMP]) for which she worked. Before her, actors and actresses worked anonymously, partly out of fear that stage managers would refuse to hire them if they were ...

15. Mack Sennett

Producer | A Small Town Idol

Mack Sennett was born Michael Sinnott on January 17, 1880 in Danville, Quebec, Canada, to Irish immigrant farmers. When he was 17, his parents moved the family to East Berlin, Connecticut, and he became a laborer at American Iron Works, a job he continued when they moved to Northampton, ...

16. Mary Pickford

Actress | Coquette

Mary Pickford was born Gladys Louise Smith in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, to Elsie Charlotte (Hennessy) and John Charles Smith. She was of English and Irish descent. Pickford began in the theater at age seven. Then known as "Baby Gladys Smith", she toured with her family in a number of theater ...

17. Blanche Sweet

Actress | Anna Christie

Born into a family of show people, Blanche Sweet first appeared on the stage when she was 18 months old. She was a dancer by the time she was four and a talented actress by 1909 when she started work at the Biograph with D.W. Griffith. By 1910, aged 14, she was four years younger than Mary Pickford...

18. Henry Lehrman

Producer | Why Sailors Go Wrong

Austrian-born Henry Lehrman entered the film industry in 1909 while working as a trolley conductor. Legend has it that he cornered director D.W. Griffith and claimed to be an agent for the French-based Pathe company, sent by them to work with Griffith. By the time Griffith found out that Lehrman's ...

19. Frank Norris

Writer | Greed

Frank Norris was born on March 5, 1870 in Chicago, Illinois, USA. He was a writer, known for Greed (1924), Moran of the Lady Letty (1922) and Life's Whirlpool (1916). He was married to Jeanette Black. He died on October 25, 1902 in San Francisco, California, USA.

20. John Bunny

Actor | Her Old Sweetheart

When John Bunny died the New York Times stated, "The name John Bunny will always be linked to the movies." Little did movie fans of 1915 realize that he would be completely forgotten the next year and completely omitted from many books on silent movies 70-80 years later.

Bunny was the ninth in a ...

21. Alice Guy

Director | The Woman of Mystery

The world's first female filmmaker, French-born Alice Guy entered the film business in 1896 as a secretary at Gaumont, a manufacturer of movie cameras and projectors who had purchased a "cinématographer" from its inventors, the Lumiere brothers. The next year Gaumont became the world's first motion...

22. Jesse L. Lasky

Producer | The Dictator

Lasky, one of the first pioneers of the Hollywood film industry and its first genuine 'mogul', was not only a consummate showman and entrepreneur, but a jack-of-all-trades. Born in San Francisco in September 1880, the son of a shoe salesman, he attended high school in San Jose and held down his ...

23. Adolph Zukor

Sullivan's Travels

Adolph Zukor was a poor Hungarian immigrant when he arrived in the United States in 1889. He tried his hand in the fur trade (starting as a sweeper for $2 a week pay) and proved his entrepreneurial acumen by steady advancement, eventually setting up successful businesses in New York and Chicago. By...

24. Otto Kahn

Producer | ¡Que viva Mexico!

Otto Kahn was born on February 21, 1867 in Mannheim, Grand Duchy of Baden [now Baden-Württemberg, Germany]. He was a producer and actor, known for ¡Que viva Mexico! (1932), Thunder Over Mexico (1933) and Eisenstein in Mexico (1933). He was married to Adelaide Wolff. He died on March 29, 1934 ...

25. Lillian Gish

Actress | The Night of the Hunter

Lillian Diana Gish was born on October 14, 1893, in Springfield, Ohio. Her father, James Lee Gish, was an alcoholic who caroused, was rarely at home, and left the family to, more or less, fend for themselves. To help make ends meet, Lillian, her sister Dorothy Gish, and their mother, Mary Gish, ...

26. Harry Carey

Actor | Mr. Smith Goes to Washington

Born in New York City to a Judge of Special Sessions who was also president of a sewing machine company. Grew up on City Island, New York. Attended Hamilton Military Academy and turned down an appointment to West Point to attend New York Law School, where his law school classmates included future ...

27. Dorothy Gish

Actress | Nell Gwyn

Dorothy Gish was born into a broken family where her restless father James Lee Gish was frequently absent. Mary Robinson McConnell a.k.a. Mary Gish, her mother, had entered into acting to make money to support the family. As soon as Dorothy and her sister Lillian Gish were old enough, they became ...

28. Jack Pickford

Actor | Brown of Harvard

Nepotism certainly has had its advantages in Hollywood, none more so than in the cinematic career of Jack Pickford, whose famous older sis, "America's Sweetheart" Mary Pickford, saw to it that Jack had every advantage her star weight could muster. In Jack's case, it only added fuel to a ...

29. Laurence Trimble

Director | Brawn of the North

Laurence Trimble was born on February 15, 1885 in Robbinston, Maine, USA. He was a director and writer, known for Brawn of the North (1922), The Love Master (1924) and Far from the Madding Crowd (1915). He was married to Marian Constance Blackton and Jane Murfin. He died on February 8, 1954 in ...

29. John Huston

Director | The Treasure of the Sierra Madre

An eccentric rebel of epic proportions, this Hollywood titan reigned supreme as director, screenwriter and character actor in a career that endured over five decades. The ten-time Oscar-nominated legend was born John Marcellus Huston in Nevada, Missouri, on August 5, 1906. His ancestry was English,...

30. Anita Loos

Writer | Gentlemen Prefer Blondes

While she is now best known for her book "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes," Anita Loos was one of Hollywood's foremost early screenwriters. She began writing screen scenarios for the 'Biograph Company' at an early age (though not 12, as she later claimed), and the first to be produced, The New York Hat (...

31. Pancho Villa

Producer | Life of Villa

Francisco "Pancho" Villa was born Doroteo Arango to rural peasant parents in San Juan del Rio, Mexico, on June 5, 1878. He later took several aliases, the most popular and well-known being "Pancho Villa". Raised in poverty in Durango, he turned to cattle rustling and robbery as a young man. The ...

32. James Cruze

Actor | The Covered Wagon

Coming from a Mormon family in Utah, James Cruze was reportedly part Ute Indian. He worked as a fisherman to pay his way through drama school. Among his former wives were actresses Betty Compson (also from Utah) and Marguerite Snow. He was also married to Alberta McCoy (died on July 7, 1960), who ...

33. Viola Dana

Actress | Two Sisters

Viola Dana (real name Virginia Flugrath) was born in Brooklyn, NY, on June 26, 1897. She was the middle sister of three sisters (the other two were Edna Flugrath and Shirley Mason). She made her film debut in 1914 in Molly the Drummer Boy (1914). The following year she received top billing playing ...

34. Lois Weber

Director | Suspense

Lois Weber, who had been a street-corner evangelist before entering motion pictures in 1905, became the first American woman movie director of note, and a major one at that. Herbert Blaché, the husband of Frenchwoman Alice Guy, the first woman to direct a motion picture (and arguably, the first ...

35. Phillips Smalley

Director | The Hand That Rocks the Cradle

Phillips Smalley was born on August 7, 1865 in Brooklyn, New York, USA. He was a director and actor, known for The Hand That Rocks the Cradle (1917), The Merchant of Venice (1914) and Captain Courtesy (1915). He was married to Phyllis Lorraine Ephlin and Lois Weber. He died on May 2, 1939 in ...

36. Lon Chaney

Actor | He Who Gets Slapped

Although his parents were deaf, Leonidas Chaney became an actor and also owner of a theatre company (together with his brother John). He made his debut at the movies in 1912, and his filmography is vast. Lon Chaney was especially famous for his horror parts in movies like e.g. Quasimodo in The ...

37. Cecil B. DeMille

Producer | The Ten Commandments

His parents Henry C. DeMille and Beatrice DeMille were playwrights. His father died when he was 12, and his mother supported the family by opening a school for girls and a theatrical company. Too young to enlist in the Spanish-American War, Cecil followed his brother William C. de Mille to the New ...

38. Herbert Brenon

Director | Beau Geste

Herbert Brenon was born on January 13, 1880 in Dublin, Ireland, UK [now Republic of Ireland]. He was a director and writer, known for Beau Geste (1926), Ivanhoe (1913) and Sorrell and Son (1927). He was married to Mrs. Herbert Brenon. He died on June 21, 1958 in Los Angeles, California, USA.

39. Frank Borzage

Director | Bad Girl

Frank Borzage was born on April 23, 1894 in Salt Lake City, Utah, USA. He was an actor and director, known for Bad Girl (1931), 7th Heaven (1927) and No Greater Glory (1934). He was married to Juanita Scott, Edna Skelton and Rena Rogers. He died on June 19, 1962 in Hollywood, Los Angeles, ...

40. Thomas H. Ince

Producer | The Devil

Thomas H. Ince was born into a family of stage actors. He appeared on the stage at age six and worked with a number of stock companies, making his Broadway debut at 15. Vaudeville work was inconsistent, so he was a lifeguard, a promoter and part-time actor. His stage career was a failure but by ...

41. William Mulholland

42. Frank D. Williams

Cinematographer | An Arabian Knight

Frank D. Williams was born on March 21, 1893 in Nashville, Missouri, USA. He was a cinematographer, known for An Arabian Knight (1920), Queen of the Sea (1918) and The Dragon Painter (1919). He was married to Mildred E. Hansen and Porter Lee. He died on October 16, 1961 in Ventura County, ...

43. Charles Chaplin

Writer | The Great Dictator

Considered to be one of the most pivotal stars of the early days of Hollywood, Charlie Chaplin lived an interesting life both in his films and behind the camera. He is most recognized as an icon of the silent film era, often associated with his popular character, the Little Tramp; the man with the ...

44. Wilfred Buckland

Art_director | Terror Island

Wilfred Buckland was born on January 1, 1866. He was an art director and production designer, known for Terror Island (1920), Hawthorne of the U.S.A. (1919) and Almost Human (1927). He was married to Veda Buckland. He died on July 18, 1946 in Hollywood, California, USA.

45. Hal Roach

Producer | One Million B.C.

Hal Roach was born in 1892 in Elmira, New York. After working as a mule skinner, wrangler and gold prospector, among other things, he wound up in Hollywood and began picking up jobs as an extra in comedies, where he met comedian Harold Lloyd in 1913 in San Diego. By all accounts, including his own,...

46. Art Acord

Actor | Set Free

Art Acord was born on April 17, 1890 in Stillwater, Oklahoma, USA. He was an actor, known for Set Free (1927), The Set-Up (1926) and Winners of the West (1921). He was married to Edna Nores, Edythe Sterling and Louise Lorraine. He died on January 4, 1931 in Chihuahua, Chihuahua, Mexico.

47. Marshall Neilan

Actor | Daddy-Long-Legs

In the early days of silent pictures, Marshall Neilan was a top director for Goldwyn Pictures. He had also directed a small number of Louis B. Mayer's independently produced melodramas, but there was a mutual dislike between the two men. During the festivities inaugurating the merger of Metro and ...

48. Harold Lloyd

Actor | Safety Last!

Born in Burchard, Nebraska, USA to Elizabeth Fraser and J. Darcie 'Foxy' Lloyd who fought constantly and soon divorced (at the time a rare event), Harold Clayton Lloyd was nominally educated in Denver and San Diego high schools and received his stage training at the School of Dramatic Art (San ...

49. Mack Swain

Actor | The Gold Rush

Mack Swain was born in 1876 and soon became a talented vaudevillian. In 1913 he was hired by Mack Sennett and appeared in a few Mabel Normand pictures until a year later he became even bigger when Charlie Chaplin arrived at the Keystone Studio. Swain later created a character by the name of Ambrose...

50. Raoul Walsh

Editor | The Birth of a Nation

Raoul Walsh's 52-year directorial career made him a Hollywood legend. Walsh was also an actor: He appeared in the first version of W. Somerset Maugham's "Rain" renamed Sadie Thompson (1928) opposite Gloria Swanson in the title role. He would have played the Cisco Kid in his own film In Old Arizona ...

51. Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle

Actor | Coney Island

Roscoe Arbuckle, the youngest of nine children, reportedly weighed 16 pounds at birth in Smith Center, Kansas on March 24, 1887. His family moved to California when he was one year old. At age 8 he first appeared on the stage. His first part was with the Webster-Brown stock company. From then until...

52. Mabel Normand

Actress | Mickey

Mabel Normand was one of the comedy greats of early film. In an era when women are deemed 'not funny enough' it seems film history has forgotten her contributions. Her films debuted the Keystone Cops, Charlie Chaplin's tramp and the pie in the face gag. She co-starred with both Chaplin and Roscoe "...

53. William Fox

Producer | 7th Heaven

Starting at the age 8 he had a series of jobs before starting his own business in 1900, which was sold to buy a Brooklyn nickelodeon in 1904. As the new owner with an empty house, Fox hired a coin manipulator and a barker to attract patrons into the dark 146-seat theatre. Once audiences adequately ...

54. Wallace Reid

Actor | Carmen

The son of writer-theater producer-director-actor Hal Reid, Wallace was on stage by the age of four in the act with his parents. He spent most of his early years, not on the stage, but in private schools where he excelled in music and athletics. In 1910, his father went to the Chicago studio of "...

55. Alma Rubens

Actress | The Rejected Woman

Alma Rubens was born Alma Genevieve Reubens in San Francisco, California. She was interested in entertaining at an early age. Like most young girls, she enjoyed fantasy play acting and by the time she was 19 had become a full-fledged star. She didn't have to wait long like some of the starlets who ...

56. Erich von Stroheim

Actor | Sunset Blvd.

Erich von Stroheim was born Erich Oswald Stroheim in 1885, in Vienna, Austria, to Johanna (Bondy), from Prague, and Benno Stroheim, a hatter from Gleiwitz, Germany (now Gliwice, Poland). His family was Jewish.

After spending some time working in his father's hat factory, he emigrated to America ...

57. Allan Dwan

Director | Bound in Morocco

Allan Dwan was born on April 3, 1885 in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. He was a director and writer, known for Bound in Morocco (1918), A Perfect Crime (1921) and Panthea (1917). He was married to Marie Shelton and Pauline Bush. He died on December 28, 1981 in Woodland Hills, Los Angeles, California, ...

58. Karl Brown

Writer | Flames

Karl Brown was born on December 26, 1896 in McKeesport, Pennsylvania, USA. He was a writer and cinematographer, known for Flames (1932), Stark Love (1927) and White Legion (1936). He was married to Edna Mae Cooper. He died on March 25, 1990 in Woodland Hills, Los Angeles, California, USA.

59. Thomas Dixon Jr.

Writer | The Birth of a Nation

American novelist, writer and minister Thomas Dixon was born in Shelby, NC. His father was a Baptist minister and, by inheritance, a slave-owner. As a young boy Dixon helped out on the farms the family owned; although he would later say he detested farm labor, he admitted that it helped him to ...

60. Adela Rogers St. Johns

Writer | What Price Hollywood?

Adela Rogers St. Johns was born Nora Adela Rogers on May 20, 1894 in Los Angeles, California, the daughter of legendary criminal defense attorney Earl Rogers, a brilliant barrister who drank himself to death at an early age. Lionel Barrymore won a Best Actor Oscar playing a mouthpiece based on her ...

61. John Ford

Director | The Quiet Man

John Ford came to Hollywood following one of his brothers, an actor. Asked what brought him to Hollywood, he replied "the train". He became one of the most respected directors in the business, in spite of being known for his westerns, which were not considered "serious" film. He won six Oscars, ...

62. Alvin Wyckoff

Cinematographer | The Lost Jungle

Alvin Wyckoff was born on July 3, 1877 in New York, USA. He was a cinematographer and actor, known for The Lost Jungle (1934), Rose of the Rancho (1914) and María Elena (1936). He was married to Alice Olivia Johannson and Jessie Wyckoff. He died on July 30, 1957 in Los Angeles, California, ...

63. William C. de Mille

Director | The Splendid Crime

William Churchill de Mille, the older brother of Hollywood legend Cecil B. DeMille (W.C. retained the family spelling of his name) and father of Tony Award-winning choreographer Agnes de Mille, was born in Washington, North Carolina, on July 25, 1878. His father, Henry C. DeMille, was a playwright ...

64. David Belasco

Soundtrack | The Man Without a Face

David Belasco was born on July 25, 1853 in San Francisco, California, USA. He was a writer and producer, known for The Man Without a Face (1993), The Return of Peter Grimm (1935) and Sweet Kitty Bellairs (1930). He was married to Cecilia Loverich. He died on May 14, 1931 in New York City, New York,...

65. Ben Turpin

Actor | Yankee Doodle in Berlin

First of all, the cross-eyed comedian of silent days was not born that way. Supposedly his right eye slipped out of alignment while playing the role of the similarly afflicted Happy Hooligan in vaudeville and it never adjusted. Ironically, it was this disability that would enhance his comic value ...

66. Norma Talmadge

Actress | Camille

Norma Talmadge was born on May 26, 1895, in Jersey City, New Jersey. The daughter of an unemployed alcoholic and his wife, Norma did not have the idyllic childhood that most of us yearn for. Her father left the family on Christmas Day and his wife and three daughters had to fend for themselves. Her...

67. Harry McCoy

Writer | The Girl from Everywhere

Harry McCoy was born on December 10, 1889 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA. He was an actor and writer, known for The Girl from Everywhere (1927), Call It Luck (1934) and Present Arms (1927). He died on September 1, 1937 in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, USA.

68. Sessue Hayakawa

Actor | The Bridge on the River Kwai

Sessue Hayakawa was born in Chiba, Japan. His father was the provincial governor and his mother a member of an aristocratic family of the "samurai" class. The young Hayakawa wanted to follow in his father's footsteps and become a career officer in the Japanese navy, but he was turned down due to ...

69. Fannie Ward

Actress | The Cheat

Fannie Ward was a star of light comedies on Broadway and in vaudeville. Internationally famous, she was at the height of her career in the first decade of the 20th century. She debuted on Broadway at 19 in "Pippino" (1890). She went on to starring roles in "The Marriage of William Ashe", "Madam ...

70. John Gilbert

Actor | The Big Parade

John Gilbert was born into a show-business family - his father was a comic with the Pringle Stock Company. By 1915 John was an extra with Thomas H. Ince's company and a lead player by 1917. In those days he was assistant director, actor or screenwriter. He also tried his hand at directing. By 1919 ...

71. Alice Terry

Actress | The Conquering Power

Alice started as an extra in films at age 15. She worked in "Inceville" and would appear as several characters in 'Civilization (1916)'. In 1917, she would meet director Rex Ingram and they would marry in 1921. It was also in 1921 that Alice would gain acclaim as Marguerite in 'The Four Horsemen of...

72. Woodrow Wilson

Self | The Adventures of a Boy Scout

Thomas Woodrow Wilson was an American politician and academic who served as the 28th president of the United States from 1913 to 1921. A member of the Democratic Party, Wilson served as the president of Princeton University and as the governor of New Jersey before winning the 1912 presidential ...

73. Agnes de Mille

Oklahoma!

Agnes de Mille was born on September 18, 1905 in Harlem, Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA. She was an actress, known for Oklahoma! (1955), The Ragamuffin (1916) and Carousel (1956). She was married to Walter Foy Prude. She died on October 7, 1993 in Greenwich Village, Manhattan, New York ...

74. William S. Hart

Actor | The Money Corral

A storybook hero, the original screen cowboy, ever forthright and honest, even when (as was often the case) he played a villain, William S. Hart lived for a while in the Dakota Territory, then worked as a postal clerk in New York City. In 1888 he began to study acting. In 1899 he created the role ...

75. Jean Hersholt

Actor | Greed

If ever there was a Great Dane in Hollywood it was Jean Hersholt - and one of its great hearts as well. He was from a well-known Danish stage and entertainment family that had toured throughout Europe performing with young Jean as an essential cast member. He graduated from the Copenhagen Art ...

76. Clarence G. Badger

Director | Rangle River

A graduate of the Boston Polytechnic Institute, Clarence Badger had a varied early career as an artist, stage actor, editor and journalist with several newspapers and magazines (including "The Youth's Companion"), before entering the film business with Mack Sennett in 1915. At Sennett's ...

77. Gloria Swanson

Actress | Sunset Blvd.

Gloria Swanson was born Gloria May Josephine Svensson in Chicago, Illinois. She was destined to be perhaps one of the biggest stars of the silent movie era. Her personality and antics in private definitely made her a favorite with America's movie-going public. Gloria certainly didn't intend on ...

78. Bobby Vernon

Director | For the Love of Fanny

Bobby Vernon was born in the U.S. in 1897, was trained in Vaudeville and became a talented comic in the silent era. He began working in 1913, appearing in Lon Chaney's Almost an Actress (1913) and later worked for Mack Sennett, who teamed him up with young Gloria Swanson in 9 comedies between 1916 ...

79. A. Edward Sutherland

Director | Sky Devils

British-born A. Edward ("Eddie") Sutherland started in vaudeville and acted in films from 1914 at Keystone (he was one of the original Keystone Kops). He became a director in 1925, first with Paramount (1925-31), then at United Artists (1931-32), again with Paramount (1933, 1935-37), then Universal...

80. Tom Mix

Actor | Dick Turpin

The son of a lumberman, Tom Mix joined the army as a young man and was an artillery sergeant during the Philippine campaign from 1898 to 1901, though he never saw action. In fact, Mix deserted from the army and carefully kept the facts about his military service a closely guarded secret. About 1903...

81. Victor Fleming

Director | Gone with the Wind

Victor Fleming entered the film business as a stuntman in 1910, mainly doing stunt driving - which came easy to him, as he had been a mechanic and professional race-car driver. He became interested in working on the other side of the camera, and eventually got a job as a cameraman on many of the ...

82. Bessie Love

Actress | The Broadway Melody

Bessie Love was born in Texas. Her cowboy father moved the family to Hollywood, where he became a chiropractor. As the family needed money, Bessie's mother sent her to Biograph Studios, hoping she would become an actress. D.W. Griffith saw she was pretty and had some acting talent, and put her in ...

83. Seena Owen

Actress | The Flame of the Yukon

Seena Owen was born in Spokane, WA, on Nov. 14, 1894. Her first film was A Yankee from the West (1915) under the name of Signe Auen, when she was 21. The following year she appeared (as "Attarea") in D.W. Griffith's epic Intolerance (1916). In 1919 she played Barbara Riggs in the well-received A ...

84. Douglas Fairbanks

Actor | The Thief of Bagdad

Douglas Fairbanks was born Douglas Elton Thomas Ullman in Denver, Colorado, to Ella Adelaide (nee Marsh) and Hezekiah Charles Ullman, an attorney and native of Pennsylvania, who was a captain for the Union forces during the Civil War. Fairbanks' paternal grandparents were German Jewish immigrants, ...

85. King Vidor

Director | War and Peace

King Vidor was an American film director, film producer, and screenwriter of Hungarian descent. He was born in Galveston, Texas to lumberman Charles Shelton Vidor and his wife Kate Wallis. King's paternal grandfather Károly (Charles) Vidor had fled Hungary as a refugee following the failed ...

86. Beatrice DeMille

Writer | The Heir to the Hoorah

Beatrice DeMille was born on January 30, 1853 in Liverpool, England, UK. She was a writer and assistant director, known for The Heir to the Hoorah (1916), The Devil-Stone (1917) and Unconquered (1917). She was married to Henry C. DeMille. She died on October 8, 1923 in Hollywood, Los Angeles, ...

87. Lewis J. Selznick

Producer | War Brides

Lewis J. Selznick, one of the pioneers of studio film production and the father of Oscar-winning Gone with the Wind (1939) producer David O. Selznick, was born Lewis Zeleznik in Kiev, Ukraine, Russian Empire, into a poor Jewish family with 18 children. Selznick migrated to London at the age of 12, ...

88. 'Snub' Pollard

Actor | Rollin' Plains

In recalling silent movie comedian Harry "Snub" Pollard, his slight frame (5' 6"), bullet-shaped head and dark, droopy mustache are definitive identification badges. Born in Melbourne, Australia as Harold Fraser on November 9, 1889, he started off performing with the Pollard's Lilliputian Opera ...

89. Bebe Daniels

Actress | 42nd Street

Bebe Daniels already had toured as an actor by the age of four in a stage production of "Richard III". She had her first leading role at the age of seven and started her film career shortly after this in movies for Imperial, Pathe and others. At 14 she was already a film veteran, and was enlisted ...

90. Tully Marshall

Actor | Scarface

Tully Marshall intended to pursue a legal career, until he tried a dramatic course at Santa Clara University. He started stage work in San Francisco in 1883 and moved to New York in 1887, where he played in various roles on Broadway and on the road. After a few small parts in films he was given the...

91. Ramon Novarro

Actor | Ben-Hur A Tale of the Christ

Ramon Novarro was born José Ramón Gil Samaniego on February 6, 1899 in Durango, Mexico, to Leonor (Gavilan) and Dr. Mariano N. Samaniego Siqueiros, a prosperous dentist. Ramon and his family moved to Los Angeles in 1913, as refugees from the Mexican Revolution. After stints as a ballet dancer, ...

92. Wallace Beery

Actor | A Date with Judy

In 1902, 16-year-old Wallace Beery joined the Ringling Brothers Circus as an assistant to the elephant trainer. He left two years later after a leopard clawed his arm. Beery next went to New York, where he found work in musical variety shows. He became a leading man in musicals and appeared on ...

93. Harry Lauder

Actor | Huntingtower

Harry Lauder was born on August 4, 1870 in Portobello, Edinburgh, Scotland, UK. He was an actor and writer, known for Huntingtower (1927), Ali G Indahouse (2002) and Auld Lang Syne (1929). He was married to Annie Vallance. He died on February 26, 1950 in Strathaven, Lanarkshire, Scotland, UK.

94. Douglas MacLean

Actor | Never Say Die

Douglas MacLean was born on January 10, 1890 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA. He was an actor and producer, known for Never Say Die (1924), Introduce Me (1925) and Seven Keys to Baldpate (1925). He was married to Florence Barton, Barbara Barondess, Lorraine MacLean and Faith Adelaide Cole. He ...

95. Ben F. Reynolds

Cinematographer | Vengeance

Ben F. Reynolds was born on July 21, 1890 in Michigan, USA. He was a cinematographer, known for Vengeance (1930), Greed (1924) and Men Without Names (1935). He was married to Adelaide Reynolds and Sarah ?. He died on February 14, 1948 in Los Angeles, California, USA.

96. Buster Keaton

Actor | The General

Joseph Frank Keaton was born on October 4, 1895 in Piqua, Kansas, to Joe Keaton and Myra Keaton. Joe and Myra were Vaudevillian comedians with a popular, ever-changing variety act, giving Keaton an eclectic and interesting upbringing. In the earliest days on stage, they traveled with a medicine ...

97. Joseph M. Schenck

Sherlock Jr.

People liked Joseph M. Schenck. Anyone who knew both him and his brother Nicholas Schenck would comment on how different they were. He came to New York in 1893 and, with his younger brother, built a drugstore business. They risked some profits and made more money in amusement parks. Marcus Loew ...

98. Chester Conklin

Actor | Modern Times

Iowa-born Chester Conklin was raised in a coal-mining area by a devoutly religious father who hoped that his son would go into the ministry. However, Chester got the performing bug one day when he gave a recitation at a community singing festival and won first prize. Knowing his father would never ...

99. John H. Collins

Director | Children of Eve

John H. Collins was born on December 31, 1889 in New York City, New York, USA. He was a director and writer, known for Children of Eve (1915), The Girl Without a Soul (1917) and Riders of the Night (1918). He was married to Viola Dana. He died on October 23, 1918 in New York City, New York, USA.