Interviews: 1912 – 1960

The Wunderkind: Orson Welles (Direction Magazine, 1941)

his brief notice is from a much admired American magazine containing many sweet words regarding the unstoppable Orson Welles (1915 – 1985) and his appearance in the Archibald McLeish (1892 – 1982) play, Panic (directed by John Houseman, 1902 — 1988).

The year 1941, Ano Domini, was another great year for the boy genius who seemed to effortlessly triumph with all his theatrical and film ventures. At the time this appeared in print, Welles was filming The Magnificent Ambersons, having recently pocketed an Oscar for his collaborative writing efforts in Citizen Cane. Highly accomplished and multi-married, no study of American entertainment is complete without mention of his name. The anonymous scribe who penned the attached article remarked:

No pretentiously shy Saroyan courtship of an audience about Welles! He really loves his relation to the public. He doesn’t flirt with it.

The Father of American Conservativism (Coronet Magazine, 1961)

Barry Goldwater (1909 – 1998) was the Republican presidential candidate for 1964, and although he lost that contest by wide margins to Lyndon Johnson, his political philosophy has played a vital roll in shaping the direction of American conservative thought. William F. Buckley, Jr. explained why in this article.


In 1887 The New York Times reviewed the first english edition of Das Kapital by Karl Marx, click here to read it…

Mario Moreno: The Mexican Charlie Chaplin (Collier’s Magazine, 1942)

A 1942 article about Mexican film comedian Mario Moreno (1911 – 1993) who was widely known and loved throughout Latin America and parts of the West as Cantinflas, the bumbling cargador character of his own creation. Born in the poorest circumstances Mexico could dish-out, Mario Moreno achieved glorious heights in the entertainment industry; by the time he assumed room temperature in the early Nineties he had appeared in well over fifty films.

Dr. Freud (Pathfinder Magazine, 1939)

This is a profile of Dr. Sigmund Freud that appeared during the last months of his life. In the Spring of 1938 Freud and his family had fled to London in order escape the Nazis.

Al Capone: Tax Evader (Chicagoan, 1931)

Preferring not to be found face-down in the Chicago River, this journalist wrote a very middle-of-the-road sort of article about Al Capone following the thug’s 1931 conviction on tax evasion.

Jackie Robinson: In the Beginning (Yank Magazine, 1945)

This column concerns Jackie Robinson’s non-professional days in sports; his football seasons at Pasadena Junior College, basketball at UCLA and the Kansas City Monarchs. Being an Army publication, the reporter touched upon Robinson’s brief period as a junior officer in the 761st Tank Battalion.


A 1951 article about the Negro Baseball League can be read here


In 1969, Jackie Robinson wrote about African-American racists, click here to read it…


Click here to read a 1954 article about Willie Mays.

Young Frank Sinatra (Yank Magazine, 1945)

Nobody has been able to figure out to anyone’s satisfaction why Sinatra has the effect he has on his Bobby Sox fans. One of his secretaries, a cute dish whose husband is serving overseas, said: ‘The doctors say it’s just because he’s got a very sexy voice, but I’ve been with him a year now and his voice doesn’t do a thing to me’.


Maybe it’s the war.

Johnny Mathis (Coronet Magazine, 1957)

Here is a moving account of the meteoric rise of Johnny Mathis (b. 1935) – from an impoverished child of the San Francisco slums to the last of the great-American crooners.

Johnny Mathis is just 23 years old , though he appears a hungry , vulnerable 17. When he sings a romantic ballad in high falsetto, his large eyes gaze out over the heads of the audience as if in search of someone.

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