Birthday:
Birthday:

Frances Gifford had a somewhat unorthodox introduction to the movie business. Born and raised in Long Beach, California, she had no ambition to be an actress, and in fact had applied to UCLA when, at age 16, she and a friend got to visit the Samuel Goldwyn Studios, where they watched a movie being shot. A studio exec saw her and asked if she would take a screen test. She did, the studio was impressed with the result and put her under contract. Nothing much came of it, however, other than bit parts, and she moved to RKO. Nothing much happened there, either. She had married actor James Dunn and decided to retire, which she did, in 1938. Off the screen for almost two years, she got a small part in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939), and her career began to revive. She was signed by Paramount, which soon loaned her to Republic, where she made the film she is probably most remembered for: the serial Jungle Girl (1941), based on an Edgar Rice Burroughs story. Unfortunately, her career never really took off, and she bounced around among several studios. In 1948 she was involved in an auto accident in which she received severe head injuries. Although she seemed to recover physically, her career took a nosedive, and she made her last film in 1953. In 1958 newspaper stories reported that as a result of the injuries sustained in the accident, she was admitted to a California state mental hospital. Nothing further was heard from her or about her until 1983, when a writer for a film magazine found her in Pasadena. She had apparently fully overcome her physical and mental problems and was working for the city library. She died of emphysema in Pasadena in 1994.
Birthday: December 07, 1920
Death: January 15, 1994

October 19, 1939

December 11, 1942

June 19, 1941

February 13, 1947

July 01, 1938

September 08, 1942

April 18, 1941

November 23, 1943

January 20, 1943

August 21, 1953

March 05, 1942

March 03, 1938

October 08, 1937

September 06, 1945

April 12, 1950

April 01, 1947

June 28, 1940

June 21, 1941

May 23, 1945

November 04, 1945

February 25, 1938

November 12, 1937

July 02, 1937

April 30, 1943

June 13, 1942

June 25, 1942

June 20, 1941

November 07, 1942

December 04, 1939

November 09, 1948

April 26, 1940

October 29, 1937

March 05, 1942

January 01, 1944

August 23, 1944

May 31, 2004