Background
Johnny Mack Brown was born on September 1, 1904 in Dothan, Alabama, one of nine children of Hattie McGillaray and John Henry Brown, a merchant who sold shoes. As a child Brown enjoyed hunting, fishing, and many team sports.
(Take a 2,000-mile journey with the pioneers that braved T...)
Take a 2,000-mile journey with the pioneers that braved The Oregon Trail. Nearly a half-million Americans followed the ruts west in search of a better life, adventure or something more. See rare photos, hear diary excerpts and watch stunning footage in this award-winning film, previously viewed on public television. Thousands of pioneers died during the dangerous trek across the unsettled American West. But those who made it had fascinating stories to tell. Why would anyone choose to take the risky trip in the first place? How did they do it? What was it like to travel by covered wagon? All is revealed in The Oregon Trail. Plus, visit all the key sites along the way, including St. Louis, Ft. Laramie, South Pass, Oregon City and many more!
https://www.amazon.com/Oregon-Trail-na/dp/B00478IT8Q?SubscriptionId=AKIAJRRWTH346WSPOAFQ&tag=prabook-20&linkCode=sp1&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=B00478IT8Q
(Cowboy king Johnny Mack Brown became the first name in ri...)
Cowboy king Johnny Mack Brown became the first name in rip-roaring oaters while riding high for Monogram Pictures in the mid-forties, retiring the beloved Nevada Jack persona (but thankfully keeping the sidekick, Raymond Hatton) to eventually embrace battling the bad guys under the moniker Johnny Mack Brown. The nine nickel-plated six shooter sagas contained in this collection cover this transition as Johnny plays a succession of character variations on his own name (Johnny Macklin, Johnny Mack, Johnny Mackey) before finally saddling up as Johnny Mack Brown! When sold by Amazon.com, this product is manufactured on demand using DVD-R recordable media. Amazon.com's standard return policy will apply.
https://www.amazon.com/Monogram-Cowboy-Collection-Nine-Starring/dp/B01L30S99E?SubscriptionId=AKIAJRRWTH346WSPOAFQ&tag=prabook-20&linkCode=sp1&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=B01L30S99E
(Ride back with us to the golden age of B-Movie Western ma...)
Ride back with us to the golden age of B-Movie Western matinees and saddle up with your favorite stars as they saunter back into the spotlight in this first volume of classic oaters, THE MONOGRAM COWBOY COLLECTION Volume One. Drawing from a stable of later era Monogram matinees, this set pairs up singing cowboy Jimmy Wakely and legendary action hombre Johnny Mack Brown (the only fella tough enough to play Johnny Mack Brown was himself!) in a double quartet of cordite and cow classics. And to put the cherry in your Sarsaparilla we've also included Rod Cameron's CineColor, "bigger budget" Monogram adventure CAVALRY SCOUT! The collection includes: Oklahoma Blues (1948), Partners of the Sunset (1948), Cowboy Cavalier (1948), Gun Law Justice (1949), Outlaw Gold (1950), Man From Sonora (1951), Oklahoma Justice (1951), Texas Lawmen (1951), Cavalry Scout (1951) When sold by Amazon.com, this product is manufactured on demand using DVD-R recordable media. Amazon.com's standard return policy will apply.
https://www.amazon.com/Monogram-Cowboy-Collection-Vol-Discs/dp/B0066E6QXE?SubscriptionId=AKIAJRRWTH346WSPOAFQ&tag=prabook-20&linkCode=sp1&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=B0066E6QXE
Johnny Mack Brown was born on September 1, 1904 in Dothan, Alabama, one of nine children of Hattie McGillaray and John Henry Brown, a merchant who sold shoes. As a child Brown enjoyed hunting, fishing, and many team sports.
Johnny Brown's aptitude for physical activities garnered him an athletic scholarship to the University of Alabama, where he played as halfback and was captain of the football team. In 1926, during his senior year, he caught two clinching touchdown passes in the Rose Bowl game against the University of Washington.
The game brought him national prominence--in part, he later claimed, because it represented the first time a southern team had participated in that championship. He was named to the 1927 All-America football team.
While in college, the tall, good-looking Brown caught the attention of character actor George Fawcett, who suggested he try for a career in films. Brown opted to finish college instead.
For a few months after college, Brown worked as assistant coach for the Alabama football team. While traveling with the team in California in January 1927, he visited Fawcett and arranged to take a screen test at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM). He made his film debut almost immediately, playing a bit part in the baseball comedy Slide, Kelly Slide.
Before the year was out, he had graduated to leading-man status, playing opposite Marion Davies in The Fair Co-ed. This film led to a long-term contract with MGM. For the next few years, Brown was a leading juvenile player for MGM and was loaned to other studios, appearing with such notable stars as Greta Garbo, Norma Shearer, and Mary Pickford. Despite a strong Southern accent, he made a smooth transition to talking pictures.
He made his singing debut in Montana Moon (1930), playing a simple cowboy whose serenades win the heart of Joan Crawford. The part in which he was best received, and for which he is perhaps best remembered, was the title role in Billy the Kid (1930), directed by King Vidor.
Silent Western star William S. Hart reputedly coached Brown for the role, sharing his knowledge of guns and horses with the young actor. Despite this success, Brown's career at MGM was on the wane. With the advent of the 1930's, the studio looked for a harder edge in its juvenile actors and began to cultivate the talents of Clark Gable. Playing a newspaperman, Brown was shot halfway through The Secret Six (1931); his friend Gable avenged his death and got his girl.
Brown was cut out of his next film, Laughing Sinners, entirely, and his scenes were reshot with Gable. MGM terminated Brown's contract, and for a few years Brown experimented with a variety of parts, many of them athletes or light juveniles. By the mid-1930's, however, he had settled into the saddle as a star of Westerns produced by a succession of studios, principally "Poverty Row" institutions like Republic and Monogram Pictures.
Brown remained a Western star until 1952, performing in hundreds of films with his horse, Reno. He had less financial security and status than he had enjoyed at MGM, but he later maintained that he had never liked appearing in that studio's drawingroom comedies and much preferred being a B-picture star. The Browns raised four children of their own as well as Johnny's youngest brother during their years in Hollywood and maintained an active social and athletic life in the film capital. The family was known for its musical evenings. In addition to performing in feature films, Brown made serials and hosted a radio show, "Under Western Skies. "
His appeal as a Western star was mainly to children, and his multimedia exposure included a series of Dell comics chronicling his adventures as a hero of the frontier, Johnny Mack Brown Western Comics, that was published well into the 1950's. As early as the late 1940's, however, Brown's career was faltering, in part because of a weight problem that rendered his rugged Western persona difficult to maintain. Both his film and football careers were remembered, however, and he was elected to the College Football Hall of Fame in 1957. He graduated to character roles in the 1950's and eventually had spot parts on such television programs as "Perry Mason" and "Wells Fargo. "
In 1961 Brown was hired as host/manager for a restaurant owned by a friend.
Brown returned to films briefly in the mid-1960's, appearing in Requiem for a Gunfighter (1965), The Bounty Killer (1965), and Apache Uprising (1966). In the last he played his first and last villain, a craven sheriff.
In April 1970 an Esquire retrospective titled "Big Jocks" found Brown in "sort of semi-like retirement. " Despite remarks about his considerable weight, the magazine's writers paid tribute to the affable actor, noting that he had been "as big a gun as Gene Autry or Hopalong Cassidy. "
Brown died at age 70 from a cardiac condition in Woodland Hills, California.
(Cowboy king Johnny Mack Brown became the first name in ri...)
(Ride back with us to the golden age of B-Movie Western ma...)
(Take a 2,000-mile journey with the pioneers that braved T...)
(HardPress Vintage Comic Book Collection)
Quotations: He told syndicated columnist Bob Thomas, "It's hard work, but I find I like it. I figure it's much the same as acting--I'm dealing with people. . Besides, it gives me something to do. . You can't sit at home waiting for the phone to ring. "
Upon graduation Johnny Brown married his college sweetheart, Cornelia ("Connie") Foster; they had four children. By the early 1960's, with their children grown, Johnny and Connie Brown had moved from their Hollywood mansion to a modest apartment.