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Andy Devine
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Andy Devine
7 October 1905, Flagstaff, Arizona, USA
Date of Death
18 February 1977, Orange, California, USA (leukemia) 
Birth Name
Andrew Vabre Devine
Height
6' (1.83 m)
Mini Biography
Spouse
Dorothy Devine (28 October 1933 - 18 February 1977) (his death) 2 children
Trade Mark
High-pitched, raspy voice
Trivia
The main street of Kingman, Arizona, near Devine's birthplace of Flagstaff, Arizona, is named Andy Devine Boulevard.
Was once honorary mayor of Van Nuys, California.
Father of Tad Devine and Denny Devine, who played his sons in Canyon Passage (1946).
Played Hap Gorman on the first season of the MGM/NBC TV series "Flipper" (1964).
Mentioned in the song Pencil Thin Mustache by Jimmy Buffett.
Was a licensed amateur (ham) radio operator with the call sign WB6RER. The call is now owned by an amateur radio club in Kingman, AZ, which holds an annual event in memory of their favourite son.
His high-pitched, gravelly voice was the result of a childhood accident. While running with a stick (some accounts say a curtain rod) in his mouth, he tripped and fell, ramming the stick through the roof of his mouth. For almost a year, he was unable to speak at all. When he did get his voice back, at length, it had the wheezing, almost duo-toned quality that would ultimately make him a star. Another account of his throat injury says he was sliding down the banister in his father's hotel and somehow damaged his throat.
John Ford picked him to play Buck, the stagecoach teamster in Stagecoach (1939) because he had actual experience driving a six horse team.
He was awarded 2 stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, one for radio at 6258 Hollywood Boulevard and for television at 6366 Hollywood Boulevard.
According to an in-depth article by Joe Collura for "Classic Images," Andy was born in Flagstaff, Arizona but moved with his family west to Kingman in Mohave County. While there his father, Thomas, served as the Mohave County treasurer and owned the Hotel Beale. His father later suffered from stomach cancer and traveled to Los Angeles for treatment, where he died during surgery.
Played professional football at one point and used the name Jeremiah Schwartz in order to avoid jeopardizing his amateur standing.
Best known for his sidekick role opposite Guy Madison in the western series "Adventures of Wild Bill Hickok" (1951). As Jingles P. Jones, he rode a horse named Joker. The role was originally offered to but turned down by Burl Ives.
Made his stage debut as Cap'n Andy in Guy Lombardo's 1957 production of "Show Boat" at a theatre in Long Island.
Was an avid pilot and owned a flying school that trained flyers for the government during World War II.
John Wayne and James Stewart were among those who attended his funeral.
Also had a kids TV show on one of the local Los Angeles TV stations called "Andy and Froggy" where his sidekick was a frog puppet.
Andy Devine is reminisced by Jimmy Buffett in Jimmy's hit song, "Pencil Thin Mustache", in 1974. (It is song #10 on Buffett's Greatest Hits Album, "Songs you know by Heart"). It is a song about the entertainment of Jimmy's youth, while growing up in the 1950s. Jimmy pays tribute to Andy in the chorus, "I wish I had a pencil thin mustache, The "Boston Blackie" kind. A two toned Ricky Ricardo jacket and an autographed picture of Andy Devine".
Salary
Stagecoach (1939)$10,000
Career
Rotund comic character actor of American films. Born Andrew Vabre Devine in Flagstaff, Arizona, the later-to-be Rotund comic character actor was raised in nearby Kingman, Arizona, the son of Irish-American hotel operator Thomas Devine and his wife Amy. Devine was an able athlete as a student and actually played semi-pro football under a phony name (Jeremiah Schwartz, often erroneously presumed to be his real name). Devine used the false name in order to remain eligible for college football. A successful football player at St. Mary & St. Benedict College, Arizona State Teacher's College, and Santa Clara University, Devine went to Hollywood with dreams of becoming an actor. After a number of small roles in silent films, he was given a good part in the talkie The Spirit of Notre Dame (1931) in part due to his fine record as a football player.
His sound-film career seemed at risk due to his severely raspy voice, the result of a childhood injury. His voice, however, soon became his trademark, and he spent the next forty-five years becoming an increasingly popular and beloved comic figure in a wide variety of films. In the 1950s, his fame grew enormously with his co-starring role as Jingles opposite Guy Madison's "Adventures of Wild Bill Hickok" (1951), on television and radio simultaneously. In 1955, before the Hickok series ended, Devine took over the hosting job on a children's show retitled "Andy's Gang" (1955), in which he gained new fans among the very young. He continued active in films until his death in 1977. He was survived by his wife and two sons.
He had acting ambitions, so after college, he went to Hollywood, where he marked time working as a lifeguard at Venice Beach, within easy distance of the studios. It was in 1933 on a film, Doctor Bull, directed by John Ford at Fox Studios, that Andy met his wife-to-be, Dorothy House. They were married on October 28, 1933, in Las Vegas, Nevada, and remained united until his death on February 18, 1977. Although it was first thought that his peculiar voice would prevent him from moving to the talkies, it became his trademark. Devine told people that his speech resulted from a childhood accident. (He said that he had been running with a curtain rod in his mouth at the Beale Hotel in Kingman, and when he fell, it pierced the roof of his mouth. 
When he was able to speak, he had a wheezing, duo-tone voice.) However, a biographer explains that this wasn't true, but was one of several stories about his voice fabricated by Devine. Devine's son Tad told an Encore Westerns Channel interviewer (Jim Beaver, reporting from 2007 Newport Beach Film Festival) that the accident had indeed happened, but that Devine was uncertain whether it was the cause of his unique voice. When asked if he had strange nodes on his vocal cords, Devine replied, "I've got the same nodes as Bing Crosby, but his are in tune."
He appeared in more than 400 films and shared with Walter Brennan, another character actor, the rare ability to move with ease from "B" Westerns to "A" pictures. His notable roles included ten films as sidekick "Cookie" to Roy Rogers, a role in Romeo and Juliet (1936), and "Danny" in A Star Is Born (1937). He made several appearances in films with John Wayne, including Stagecoach (1939), Island in the Sky (1953), and as the frightened marshal in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962).
While most of his characters were reluctant to get involved in the action, he played the hero in Island in the Sky, as an expert pilot who leads his fellow aviators through the arduous search for a missing airplane. Although Devine was known generally for his comic roles, Jack Webb cast him as a police detective in Pete Kelly's Blues (1955); Devine lowered his voice and was more serious than usual. His film appearances in his later years included movies such as Zebra in the Kitchen, The Over-the-Hill Gang, and "Coyote Bill" in Myra Breckinridge.
Star on Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6366 Hollywood Blvd. Devine also worked in radio. He is well-remembered for his role as "Jingles", Guy Madison's sidekick in The Adventures of Wild Bill Hickok, which Devine and Madison reprised on television. He appeared over 75 times on Jack Benny's radio show between 1936 and 1942, often appearing in Benny's semi-regular western series of sketches "Buck Benny Rides Again". Benny frequently referred to Devine as "the mayor of Van Nuys." In fact Devine served as honorary mayor of that city, where he lived preferring to be away from the bustle of Hollywood, from May 18, 1938 to 1957, when he moved to Newport Beach.
Devine worked in television. He hosted a children's TV show, Andy's Gang on NBC from 1955 to 1960. During this time, he also made multiple appearances on NBC's The Ford Show, Starring Tennessee Ernie Ford. He played "Hap" on the TV series Flipper, also on NBC, in the 1960s. He starred in a Twilight Zone episode called "Hocus-Pocus and Frisby" as "Frisby", a talkative fibster faced with an alien invasion. He was also a frequent guest star on many television shows throughout the 1950s and 1960s, including the role of Jake Sloan in the 1961 episode "Big Jake" of the acclaimed NBC anthology series The Barbara Stanwyck Show, He was Honest John Denton in the episode "A Horse of a Different Cutter" of the short-lived ABC series The Rounders.
Devine also cameoed as Santa Claus during one of Batman and Robin's famous Batrope climbs on the 1960s live-action Batman TV series. The episode was originally broadcast on December 22, 1966, just three days before Christmas. During the appearance he directly addresses the viewers wishing them a Merry Christmas. Finally, Devine performed voice parts in animated films, including "Friar Tuck" in Disney's Robin Hood. He provided the voice of Cornelius the Rooster in several Kellogg's Corn Flakes TV commercials. In 1973, Devine came to Monroe, Louisiana, at the request of George C. Brian, an actor and filmmaker who headed the theater department at the University of Louisiana at Monroe, to perform in Edna Ferber's Show Boat.
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