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Amanda Blake. Before making it in show business, she worked as a telephone operator.
Inducted into the Hall of Great Western Performers of the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum in 1968. Amanda Blake's death certificate listed the immediate cause of death as cardiopulmonary arrest due to liver failure and cytomegalo virus (CMV) hepatitis. CMV hepatitis is AIDS-related according to Sacramento internist Dr. Lou Nishimura. The AIDS virus was thought to have been contracted from her last husband, Mark Spaeth, a member of the city council of Austin, Texas. The openly bisexual Spaeth (1939-1985), also died of complications of the disease.After being forced to undergo oral cancer surgery in 1984, the American Cancer Society awarded her with its Courage Award. In 1961 she sold her residual rights to "Gunsmoke" (1955) for $100,000. Smoked 2-3 packs of cigarettes a day until being diagnosed with oral cancer in 1980.

Reno Browne. Real name : Josephine Ruth Clarke 1921 - 1991. Reno  was one of a few female equestrians who ranked among the better riders, be they man or woman.  She became Reno Blair in her earlier Monogram films, but returned to the Reno Browne moniker in the later westerns
American B-Western actress. Growing up in her native Reno, Nevada, she made her entree into films with small parts in films shooting on location in the Reno area. She travelled to Hollywood and got work as a trick rider and stuntwoman and eventually as a leading lady in low- budget Westerns for Monogram and Republic. She starred opposite Johnny Mack Brown in several films and married another cowboy star, Lash La Rue. She also had her own radio program in the 1940s, "Reno Rides the Range." She retired to her hometown of Reno and died there at the age of 70.

Jeanne Crain was born in Barstow, California, on May 25, 1925. The daughter of a high school English teacher and his wife, Jeanne was moved to Los Angeles not long after her birth after her father got another teaching position in that city.  She went briefly to Warner Brothers for the filming of Duel in the Jungle (1954) The film was lukewarm at best. Jeanne, then, signed a contract, that same year, with Universal Studios with promises of better, high profile roles. She went into production in the film Man Without a Star (1955) which was a hit with audiences and critics. After The Joker Is Wild (1957) in 1957, Jeanne took time off for her family and to appear in a few television programs. She returned, briefly, to film in Guns of the Timberland (1960) in 1960. The films were sporadic after that. In 1967, she appeared in a low-budget suspense yarn called Hot Rods to Hell (1967). Her final film was as Clara Shaw in 1972's  Skyjacked (1972). Jeanne died of a heart attack in Santa Barbara, California, on December 14, 2003. Her husband Paul Brooks had died two months earlier.

Gail Davis. Born on October 25th, in Little Rock, Arkansas. Birth name. Betty Jeanne Grayson.Inducted into the National Cowgirl Museum and Hall of Fame in Fort Worth, Texas. [October 28, 2004].  In 1947 she made her motion picture debut in a comedy film short. She then appeared in minor roles in another four films until landing a supporting role under star Roy Rogers in a 1948 Western film, The Far Frontier. Between 1948 and 1953, Davis appeared in more than three dozen films, all but three of which were in the Western genre, including twenty films with or for the production company of the singing cowboy star, Gene Autry. According to Holly George Warren's book, Public Cowboy No. 1, Gail Davis had an affair with Gene Autry, who discovered her and put her in many of his westerns and produced her starring series "Annie Oakley" (1954). The affair lasted for many years.

Joanne Dru. Birth name : Joanne Letitia LaCock. The daughter of a West Virginia druggist, Joanne came to New York in 1940. In New York, she worked as a model and was cast by Al Jolson, as one of the showgirls in his Broadway play "Hold Onto Your Hats." When the show closed in 1941, Joanne married popular singer Dick Haymes and went with him to Hollywood. Two years later, she would become well known with her role of Tess in the classic Western Red River (1948). She followed that with another Western titled She Wore a Yellow Ribbon (1949), again playing opposite John Wayne. With two of the best Westerns directed by John Ford and Howard Hawks, the scripts submitted to her were predominately Western and she became typecast. This was from a woman who said, "I simply hated horses..." In 1950, she was cast in another Western called Wagon Master (1950), which became the basis for the Ward Bond Television Series called "Wagon Train" (1957). Even though she did other roles besides Westerns, those roles were not what she is remembered for.

Maureen O Hara.  Birth name: Maureen FitzSimons. In America, the early performing arts accomplishments of young Maureen FitzSimons (who we know as Maureen O'Hara) would definitely have put her in the child prodigy category. However, for a child of Irish heritage surrounded by gifted parents and family, these were very natural traits. Maureen made her entrance into this caring haven on August 17, 1920, in Ranelagh (a suburb of Dublin), Ireland. Maureen has an enviable string of all-time classics to her credit that include the aforementioned "The Hunchback of Notre Dame",  How Green Was My Valley (1941), Miracle on 34th Street (1947), Sitting Pretty (1948), The Quiet Man (1952), The Parent Trap (1961) and McLintock!(1963). Add to this the distinction of being voted one of the five most beautiful women in the world and you have a film star who was as gorgeous as she was talented.Although at times early in her career Hollywood didn't seem to notice, there was much more to Maureen O'Hara than her dynamic beauty. In her career Maureen starred with some of Hollywood's most dashing leading men, including Tyrone Power, John Payne, Rex Harrison, James Stewart, Henry Fonda,  Brian Keith, Sir  Alec Guinness and, of course, her famed pairings with "The Duke" himself, John Wayne. She starred in five films with Wayne, the most beloved being  The Quiet Man (1952)

Ava Gardner. Born on a tobacco farm, where she got her lifelong love of earthy language and going barefoot, Ava grew up in the rural South. At age 18, her picture in the window of her brother-in- law's New York photo studio brought her to the attention of MGM, leading quickly to Hollywood and a film contract based strictly on her beauty. With zero acting experience, her first 17 film roles, 1942-5, were one-line bits or little better. After 3 failed marriages, dissatisfaction with Hollywood life prompted Ava to move to Spain in 1955; most of her subsequent films were made abroad. By this time, stardom had made the country girl a cosmopolitan, but she never overcame a deep insecurity about acting and life in the spotlight. Her last quality starring film role was in The Night of the Iguana (1964), her later work being (as she said) strictly "for the loot". In 1968, tax trouble in Spain prompted a move to London, where she spent her last 22 years in reasonable comfort. Her film career did not bring her great fulfillment, but her looks may have made it inevitable; many fans still consider her the most beautiful actress in Hollywood history.

Jennifer Holt. Born Elizabeth Marshall, was the daughter of film star Jack Holt and Margaret Wood Holt; she had an older half-sister from her mothers' previous marriage, named Imogene and a brother, Charles John Holt III, nicknamed Tim Holt. She would later change her name to Jennifer for professional reasons. Finding few opportunities on Broadway, Jennifer returned to Hollywood. While visiting her brother Tim at a rodeo in Reno, Nevada, she met Jerry Colonna's agent, Bruce Geer, who was able to negotiate a deal with producer Harry Sherman of Colonna's services for a part in the Hopalong Cassidy film Stick to Your Guns (1941), she was billed as "Jacqueline Holt". Following its release, she signed a six-year contract with Universal Pictures using the professional name of "Jennifer Holt". In her film career, she starred with William Boyd (Hopalong Cassidy), Russell Hayden, Rod Cameron, Johnny Mack Brown, Tex Ritter, Eddie Dean and Lash La Rue. In her later years, Jennifer attended events like the Raleigh Western Film Fair 1989 and Sierra Film Festival in Lone Pine, California 1992. She died on a visit in Dorset, England, UK at age 77.

Birth Name: Maria Cristina Estella Marcella Jurado de Garcia
Katy Jurado was born Maria Christina Jurado Garcia into a wealthy family on January 16, 1924, in Guadalajara, Mexico at a bullfight Jurado was spotted by John Wayne and director Budd Boetticher.  She made her big breakthrough in American films, in the role of Gary Cooper's former mistress in High Noon (1952). The role of saloon owner Helen Ramirez in the Cooper classic necessitated her moving to Hollywood. Jurado received two Golden Globe nominations from the Hollywood Foreign Press Association for her role in High Noon (1952), Most Promising Newcomer and Best Supporting Actress, winning the latter. Jurado was blessed with extraordinary eyes, which were both beautiful and expressive, their beauty and strength never fading with age. Two years after High Noon, Jurado received an Academy Award nomination as Best Supporting Actress for her role as Spencer Tracy's Indian wife in Edward Dmytryk's Broken Lance (1954), making her the first Mexican actress thus honored.

Virginia Mayo. Virginia Clara Jones was born on November 30, 1920 in St. Louis, Missouri, the daughter of a newspaper reporter and his wife. The family had a rich heritage in the St. Louis area: her great-great-great-grandfather served in the American Revolution and later founded the city of East Saint Louis, Illinois, located right across the Mississippi River from its namesake. Virginia was interested in show business from an early age. Performances by her  in the Western genre. Along the Great Divide with Kirk Douglas, Colorado territory-Joel McCrea, Fort Dobbs, Fort Utah and Great day in the Morning, the Proud Ones

Barbara Stanwyck. Birth name: Ruby Catherine Stevens. Today Barbara Stanwyck is remembered primarily as the matriarch of the family known as the Barkleys on the TV western "The Big Valley" (1965), wherein she played Victoria. She excelled in  westerns, Union Pacific (1939) being one of her first and TV's "The Big Valley" (1965) (her most memorable role) being her last. In 1983, she played in the ABC hit mini-series "The Thorn Birds" (1983), which did much to keep her in the eye of the public. She turned in an outstanding performance as Mary Carson. Barbara was considered a gem to work with for her serious but easy going attitude on the set. She worked hard at being an actress, and she never allowed her star quality to go to her head. She was nominated for four Academy Awards, though she never won. She turned in magnificent performances for all the roles she was nominated for, but the "powers that be" always awarded the Oscar to someone else. However, in 1982 she was awarded an honorary Academy Award for "superlative creativity and unique contribution to the art of screen acting." Sadly, Barbara died on January 20, 1990, leaving 93 movies and a host of TV appearances as her legacy to us.