Henry Brazeale Walthall was an American film actor.

Walthall began his career as a stage actor, appearing on Broadway in a supporting role in William Vaughn Moody’s The Great Divide in 1906?1908. His career in movies began in 1908, in the film Rescued from an Eagle’s Nest, which also featured another young actor named D.W. Griffith. As the industry grew in size and popularity, Griffith emerged as a director and Walthall found himself a mainstay of the Griffith company, frequently working alongside such Griffith regulars as Owen Moore, Kate Bruce and Jack and Mary Pickford. He followed Griffith’s departure from New York’s Biograph to California’s Reliance-Majestic Studios in 1913.

Given the relatively short length of films in the early years, Walthall frequently found himself cast in dozens of films each year. For those still unfamiliar with his face however, he gained national attention in 1915 for his role as Colonel Ben Cameron in Griffith’s highly influential and controversial epic The Birth of a Nation. Walthall’s portrayal of a Confederate veteran rounding up the Ku Klux Klan won him large-scale fame, and Walthall was soon able to emerge as a leading actor in the years leading up to the 1920s, parting ways with Griffith.

He continued through the 1920s, appearing in The Plastic Age with Gilbert Roland and Clara Bow and a 1926 adaptation of The Scarlet Letter opposite Lillian Gish. Now in his 40s, he found his roles increasingly more of the “character” variety. Having experience as a stage actor, Walthall continued his career into the 1930s until his death.

Henry Jaynes Fonda was an American film and stage actor.

Fonda made his mark early as a Broadway actor. He also appeared in 1938 in plays performed in White Plains, New York, with Joan Tompkins. He made his Hollywood debut in 1935, and his career gained momentum after his Academy Award-nominated performance as Tom Joad in The Grapes of Wrath, a 1940 adaptation of John Steinbeck’s novel about an Oklahoma family who moved west during the Dust Bowl. Throughout six decades in Hollywood, Fonda cultivated a strong, appealing screen image in such classics as The Ox-Bow Incident, Mister Roberts and 12 Angry Men. Later, Fonda moved toward both more challenging, darker epics as Sergio Leone’s Once Upon a Time in the West and lighter roles in family comedies like Yours, Mine and Ours with Lucille Ball.

Fonda was the patriarch of a family of famous actors, including daughter Jane Fonda, son Peter Fonda, granddaughter Bridget Fonda, and grandson Troy Garity; his family and close friends called him “Hank”. In 1999, he was named the sixth Greatest Male Star of All Time by the American Film Institute.

Fonda was born in Grand Island, Nebraska to advertising-printing jobber William Brace Fonda and his wife, Elma Herberta, in the second year of their marriage. The Fonda family had emigrated westward from Genoa, Italy, to the Netherlands in the 16th century, and then to the United States in the 17th century, settling in the town now called Fonda, New York.

Henry King was an American film director. Before coming to film, King worked as an actor in various repertoire theatres, and first started to take small film roles in 1912. He directed for the first time in 1915, and grew to become one of the most commercially successful Hollywood directors of the 1920s and 1930s. He was nominated for the best director Oscar twice, but did not win on either occasion. In 1944, he was awarded the first ever Golden Globe Award award for best director for his film The Song of Bernadette, based on the novel of the same name by Franz Werfel. He worked most often with Tyrone Power and Gregory Peck.

Henry King was one of the 36 founders of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which awards the Oscars every year. He directed over 100 films in his career.

Henry Koster was born Herman Kosterlitz in Berlin, Germany. He became a film director and later moved to Hollywood. Koster’s father, a salesman, left home when Henry was a young man. Koster still managed to finish gymnasium in Berlin while working as short story writer and cartoonist.

Koster was introduced to cinema about 1910 when his uncle opened a very early movie theater in Berlin. Koster’s mother played the piano to accompany the films, leaving the young boy to occupy himself by watching the films. After working initially as a short story writer, Koster was subsequently hired by a Berlin movie company as scenarist, became assistant to director Curtis Bernhardt. Bernhardt became sick one day and asked Koster to take over as director. In about 1931 or 1932, Koster directed two or three films in Berlin for UFA.

Koster, who was in the midst of directing a film, had already been the subject of anti-Semitism, and knew he had to leave. He lost his temper at an SA officer at his bank during lunch hour, and knocked the officer out. He went directly to the railroad station and left Germany for France, where he was rehired by Bernhardt. Eventually Koster went to Budapest and met and married Kato Kiraly in 1934. In Budapest he met Joe Pasternak, who represented Universal in Europe, and directed three films for him.

In 1936 Koster got a contract to work with Universal Pictures in Hollywood, and he travelled to the United States to work with Pasternak, other refugees and his wife. Although Koster did not speak English, he convinced the studio to let him make Three Smart Girls, for which he personally coached 14-year-old star Deanna Durbin. This picture, a big success, pulled Universal out of bankruptcy. Koster’s second Universal film, One Hundred Men and a Girl, with Durbin and Leopold Stokowski put the studio, Durbin, Pasternak, and Koster on top.

Helen Mack was an American actress. Mack started her career as a child actress in silent films, moving on to Broadway plays, and touring the vaudeville circuit. Her greater success as an actress was as a leading lady in the 1930s. Eventually Mack transitioned into performing on radio, and then into writing, directing, and producing some of the best known radio shows during the Golden Age of Radio. Later in life, Mack billed herself as a professional writer, writing for Broadway, stage, and television. Her career spanned the infancy of the motion picture industry, the beginnings of Broadway, the final days of Vaudeville, the transition to “talking pictures”, the Golden Age of Radio, and the rise of television.

Helen Mack, born Helen McDougall was the daughter of William George McDougall, a barber, and Regina McDougall, who had a repressed desire to become an actress. She obtained her education as a youth at the Professional Children’s School of New York City. Vera Gordon was a friend who helped her along as a child actress. She appeared on Broadway, in vaudeville, in stock as well as silent films. Mack debuted on stage in The Idle Inn with Jacob Benami. She performed with Roland Young in The Idle Inn and toured America with William Hodge in Straight Through The Door.

Her Fox Film screen test came in March 1931 and within three weeks she was on the studio lot. Mack began her film career, first billed as Helen Macks, in Success. The motion picture featured Brandon Tynan, Naomi Childers, and Mary Astor. In Zaza, Mack worked with Gloria Swanson. She also had a small role in D. W. Griffith’s last film The Struggle. She made her debut as a leading lady opposite Victor McLaglen in While Paris Sleeps and was cast with John Boles in his initial Fox Film venture, Scotch Valley. Mack played in several westerns in the early 1930s. Among these are Fargo Express with Ken Maynard and The California Trail with Buck Jones.