Who is Carole Lombard

Carole Lombard was born in 1908 in Fort Wayne Indiana, the sister to two older brothers and enjoyed being quite a tomboy from the time she was little. Her mother and father split up and in 1916 her mother took them to live California. It was there that she was first discovered playing baseball in the street by director Allan Dwan and landed a role in the silent film "A Perfect Crime" (1921).

In 1924 she was elected "May Queen" while attending Fairfax high school. In 1925 she was given a contract at Fox Film studios and shortly thereafter quit school to pursue acting full time. She thrived in silent films roles for the next several years. When sound films came in to existence she continued acting and starred in several dozens of films. In 1930 she signed with Paramount pictures and it was there that she became a true Hollywood star throughout the next several years. She was a leading actress in screwball comedies during this time in movies like "Twentieth Century" (1934) and the unforgettable "My man Godfrey" (1936).

She met William Powell in 1930 and was married to him on June 26th, 1931 despite a 16-year age difference. Powell was very much a homebody when compared with Lombard and he was quite serene and calm, not taking to excitement. Carole Lombard was quite outgoing and loved the outdoors and adventure. The two were divorced in 1933, but they stayed friends and helped each other quite a bit through the years even starring in "My Man Godfrey" together in 1936 years after the break-up. Later in life she helped Powell see through a bout with cancer. While she was married to Powell she met Clark Gable when they starred in "No Man of Her Own" together in 1932. Due to the fact that she was married she had no romantic attachment to Gable at this time.

Sometime after her divorce to Powell she was dating Russ Columbo, a popular crooner at the time. Studios would use his voice and violin playing talents to make other actors sound good on film. He was shot and killed in a bizarre accident in 1934 while visiting photographer Lansing Brown. Brown lit a match on part of an antique pistol that he kept on his desk. This set off a charge left in the pistol and fired a lead shot that had been in the pistol for some 65 years and was forgotten about. The bullet then ricocheted off of Brown's desk and into the left eye of Columbo. He laid in pain for several hours after being rushed to the hospital until he passed away. Several friends and family members of the singer's were on hand when the news came from the doctor.

Carole Lombard was devistated and rumors flew over the young crooner's mysterious death and wheather the two had been engaged or not.

In 1936 she attended a party where she made a grand entrance. All the guests invited were told to wear something white so, in her comic style, she showed up in an ambulance and was brought out of it on a stretcher. At this party she met up once again with fellow actor Clark Gable and the two began seeing each other frequently.

After the two had spent much time together Clark Gable bartered with MGM for divorce settlement money. He refused to act in gone with the wind until MGM would pay a divorce settlement to his then wife Ria Langham. Once this business was settled he and Carol Lombard were married just a few weeks later. Neither star took a break for honeymooning until after Gable was done with his role as Rhett Butler in Gone With the Wind, which he was filming at the time of their marriage. The love these two shared for the next several years was epic. They lived together on a 20-acre farm in Encino, California. The two raised chickens rode horses and hunted there. The time they spent together there was reportedly the best time in their lives. Some home movies exist of the two enjoying the outdoors on the ranch. Though they tried, they could not seem to have any children together.

When Pearl Harbor was attacked the two offered their services to Washington in any capacity they could to help the war effort. Lombard was a staunch patriot and was dead set on finding a way of helping the war in some way.

Eventually Lombard went on tour to sell war bonds to help the government pay for the upcoming war and materiel that would be needed to fight it. She made a record-setting stop in Indiana and sold two million dollars worth of war bonds. She was very anxious to get home after this trip and wanted to take an airplane flight although her mother did not. Carole won and they took a flight back toward home.

That night after re-fueling in Las Vegas the plane crashed in to a mountain killing all 22 people on board. Clark Gable rushed to the area with an MGM publicity man and was persuaded to stay at the place where they were lodging while search crews tried to find any survivors and sort out what had happened. Some time later while waiting impatiently he recieved a wire that all those aboard were killed. He rode back to Los Angeles on the train that carried the bodies of Carole and her mother. When he got there he bought three crypts at Forest Lawn cemetery, one for Carole, one for her mother and one for himself. This is where the three of them are interred, together forever.

She was declared the first female war casualty by Franklin D Roosevelt and was offered a military funeral. The Hollywood victory committee wanted to erect a monument in her honor for serving her country but Gable declined all of this stating that he would abide by her wishes to be buried in a modest crypt. Her death had an enormous impact on stars that had been close to her and especially Gable, who then joined the military and helped the war effort by making war training films and flying combat missions as a gunner.

Carole Lombard was a very selfless and generous person, often helping those around her, never asking for anything in return. An electrician who had worked on one of her film crews became injured, losing one leg in an airplane accident. The studio then fired him. Lombard got him his job back and had him assigned to all her movies. Look at the events leading up to her demise and you will see how she was trying her hardest to help the war effort, she had just attended the first war rally in the nation and helped to sell two million dollars worth of war bonds. Acts like this are rarely heard of out of stars this huge. She was really showing her true colors and her true intentions when she gave so selflessly.

In August of 1940 MGM received a letter addressed to Mr. Clark Gable care of MGM studios. The writer claimed to be an ex-convict who had done time in Folsom prison. In the letter he wrote that a man approached him who he remembered being in prison with. This man outlined a grand plan to kidnap Clark Gable and Carole Lombard for ransom. In his plan he would kidnap them both while disguised a police officer. He would then drive them to a remote location and chain or handcuff Carole Lombard to a bed with a time bomb underneath it. Once this was done he would demand a ransom and when he was paid this ransom he would drop Clark Gable off at the location with the keys to get her loose. There would be just enough time left on the clock on the time bomb for Gable to get inside and get his wife out. This would give the would-be felon just enough time to escape before police could be called. The man that wrote the letter said he was only relaying what the other ex-con told him and he was only trying to help avoid disaster, having turned his fellow ex-convict down in an offer to help.

He then left an address where he was staying and stated he would be there right after he got off of work every night. The FBI got the letter and when they tried to find the fellow that wrote it the leads that came up were dead. He was no longer in the boarding house where he had been. He reportedly left one day without paying the boarding fee.

Nothing else has ever been heard from him. No one knows if he was being honest about what had happened when he had a chance meeting with this fellow convict or if he was just concocting stories. Clark Gable and Carole Lombard were both victims of several threats and letters like these. During the Great Depression in the 1930's Gable would get letters from fans, adoring ladies and folks who would make threaten him for money. I found all this very interesting and thought I would share. This information comes straight from the FBI files.