Gale Storm

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Gale Storm
Birth name Josephine Owaissa Cottle
Born April 5, 1922 (1922-04-05) (age 86)
Bloomington, Texas, United States
Genre(s) Traditional Pop
Years active 1950s
Label(s) Dot
Website Official Gale Storm Web Site

Josephine Owaissa Cottle (born April 5, 1922), better known as Gale Storm, is an American actress/singer. Her sister gave Josephine her middle name, an American Indian word meaning, "bluebird."

Contents

[edit] Early life

Born in Bloomington, Texas, Storm was raised by her family as Josephine Cottle. Her father, William Walter Cottle died after a year-long illness when she was just 13 months old, and her mother, Minnie Corina Cottle, struggled to raise five children alone. Josephine was the youngest with two brothers and two sisters.

Storm's mother Minnie took in sewing, then opened a millinery shop in nearby McDade, which failed, and then moved the family to Houston.

The young Josephine learned to be an accomplished dancer and became an excellent ice skater at Houston's Polar Palace. At the Albert Sydney Johnson Junior High and San Jacinto High School she performed in the drama club. When she was a 17-year-old senior in high school, two of her teachers (Miss Collier and Miss Oatman) urged her to enter "The Gateway to Hollywood Contest" held at the CBS Radio Studio in Hollywood, California where first prize was a one-year contract with a movie studio. She won and was immediately given the stage name "Gale Storm," while her performing partner, Lee Bonnell from South Bend, Indiana became "Terry Belmont." Josephine and Lee fell deeply in love and married two years later as soon as her mother would allow it. The Bonnells, as they were known privately, had four children (Phillip, Peter, Paul, and Susie). Josephine was widowed after 45 years of marriage. She now has eight grandchildren and four great-grandchildren (Clay, Shaun, Haylee, and Ty). Josephine was also widowed by her second husband of eight years, Paul Masterson. Today, Josephine Cottle Bonnell Masterson, better known to the world as Gale Storm, lives in Monarch, California near two of her sons. Storm today remains busy with attendance at charity benefits and at film festivals.

[edit] Career rise in films

After winning the contest in 1940, the new ingenue known as Gale Storm made several fims for the studio, RKO Radio Pictures, the first being Tom Brown's School Days. Storm also worked steadily in a number of low-budget films released during this period. In 1941 she sang in several Soundies, three-minute musicals produced for "movie jukeboxes."

Across town in Hollywood, she acted and sang in Monogram Pictures' popular Frankie Darro series, and played ingenue roles in other Monogram features, with the East Side Kids, Edgar Kennedy, and The Three Stooges. Monogram had always had to rely on established actors who had already made their reputations, but with Gale Storm the studio finally had a star of its own. She starred in the studio's most elaborate productions, both musical and dramatic. For example, Storm shared top billing in Monogram's Cosmo Jones in The Crime Smasher (1943), opposite Edgar Kennedy, Richard Cromwell, and Frank Graham in the role of Jones, a character derived from network Radio.

American audiences warmed to Storm during this period and her fan mail increased as a result. All told, she performed in more than three dozen motion pictures for Monogram. The early exposure from these film appearances paved the way for her future success in other media. Gale Storm went on to become an American icon of the 1950s, starring in two highly successful television series, and it was in this decade that her singing career took off.

[edit] Television icon of the '50s and beyond

In network television, the then still-"new" media, Storm's career skyrocketed from 1952 to 1955, with her starring role in My Little Margie. The show, which co-starred former silent film actor Charles Farrell, was originally a summer replacement for I Love Lucy, and it ran for 126 episodes.

Storm's popularity was capitalized upon with her follow-up namesake role in The Gale Storm Show (aka Oh! Susanna), featuring another silent movie staple, ZaSu Pitts. This program ran for 143 episodes between 1956 and 1960. Both programs later became local television station staples, shown countless times in reruns.

Storm appeared regularly on other television programs in the 1950s and 1960s as well. For example, she did a stint as one of the What's My Line? Mystery Guests on the popular Sunday Night CBS-TV program.

[edit] Recording artist and Billboard hitmaker

In Gallatin, Tennessee, a 10-year-old girl, Linda Wood, was watching Gale Storm on a Sunday night television comedy show hosted by Gordon MacRae in 1954, singing one of the popular songs of the day. Linda's father, hearing the singing, asked Linda who was singing and was told it was Gale Storm from My Little Margie.

Linda's father was Randy Wood, president of Dot Records, and he liked the sound so well that he called to sign Gale Storm before the end of the television show. Her first record, "I Hear You Knockin'" (a cover version of a rhythm and blues hit by Smiley Lewis, in turn based on the old Buddy Bolden standard "The Bucket's Got A Hole In It") sold over a million copies.

It was followed in 1957 by the haunting ballad of lost love, "Dark Moon" that went to No. 4 on the Billboard Hot 100. In her career, Gale Storm had several top ten songs, headlined in Las Vegas, and appeared in numerous stage plays.

[edit] Storm's legacy

In 1981, she published her autobiography, I Ain't Down Yet, which described, among other things, her battle with alcoholism. More recently, she was interviewed by author David C. Tucker for The Women Who Made Television Funny: Ten Stars of 1950s Sitcoms, published in 2007 by McFarland and Company.

Gale Storm has four stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for her contributions to Radio, Music,Television and Motion Pictures.

Gale Storm signs autographed photos with her and Charles Farrell from the "My Little Margie" program at conventions. In the past she attended the Memphis Film Festival, the Friends of Old-Time Radio and the Mid-Atlantic Nostalgia Convention.

[edit] Recordings

[edit] Singles

  • 1956: I Hear You Knocking/Never Leave Me (Dot 15412) (#2)
  • 1956: Memories Are Made of This/Teenage Prayer (Dot 15436)
  • 1956: Why Do Fools Fall in Love/I Walk Alone (Dot 15448)
  • 1956: I Ain't Gonna Worry/Ivory Tower (Dot 15458) (#6)
  • 1956: Tell Me Why/Don't Be That Way (Dot 15474)
  • 1956: Now Is The Hour/A Heart Without A Sweetheart (Dot 15492)
  • 1956: My Heart Belongs To You/Orange Blossoms (Dot 15515)
  • 1957: Lucky Lips/On Treasure Island (Dot 15539)
  • 1957: Dark Moon/A Little Too Late (Dot 15558) (#4)
  • 1957: On My Mind Again/Love By The Jukebox Light (Dot 15606)
  • 1957: Go 'Way From My Window/Winter Warm (Dot 15666)
  • 1957: I Get That Feeling/A Farewell To Arms (Dot 15691)
  • 1957: You/Angry (Dot 15734)
  • 1957: South Of The Border/Soon I'll Wed My Love (Dot 15783 )
  • 1958: Oh Lonely Crowd/Happiness Left Yesterday (Dot 15861)
  • 1960: I Need You So/On Treasure Island (Dot 16057)
  • 1960: Please Help Me I'm Falling/He Is There (Dot 16111)

[edit] External links

[edit] Further reading

  • Sitcom Queens: Divas of the Small Screen by Michael Karol (2005) ISBN 0-595-40251-8
  • The Women Who Made Television Funny: Ten Stars of 1950s Sitcoms by David C. Tucker (2007) ISBN 0-7864-2900-3