Jack Elam

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Jack Elam
Elam in 1950s
Born
William Scott Elam

(1920-11-13)November 13, 1920
DiedOctober 20, 2003(2003-10-20) (aged 82)
Years active1944–1995
Spouses
Jean L Hodgert
(m. 1937; died 1961)
Margaret M. Jennison
(m. 1961)
Children3

William Scott "Jack" Elam (November 13, 1920[1] – October 20, 2003) was an American film and television actor best known for his numerous roles as villain in Western films and, later in his career, comedies (sometimes spoofing his villainous image). His most distinguishing physical quality was his misaligned eye. Before his career in acting, he took several jobs in finance and served two years in the U.S. Navy during World War II. Elam performed in 73 movies and in at least 41 television series.

Early life[edit]

Born in 1920 in Miami, Arizona—a small mining town located 85 miles east of Phoenix—Jack was one of two children of Millard Elam (1887-1965) and Alice Amelia, née Kerby (1884-1924)[2][3] Jack's father supported the family by working assorted jobs over the years, including stints as a carpenter, "millman", and accountant.[3][4][a] The Elams by 1924 had moved from Miami to the nearby community of Globe, Arizona, where in September that year Alice died at the age of 30, succumbing to what state medical records cite as a three-year struggle with "general paralysis".[5] After their mother's death, young Jack and his older sister Mildred went to live with various family members until Millard married again in April 1928 to Kansas native Flossie Varney.[6][7] Federal census records show that two years later the children, their father, stepmother, and Flossie's own mother were residing together in Globe, where Millard had a new job as an investigator for a loan company.[8] Flossie was employed as well at the time as a public school teacher, while Jack also contributed to the family's income by periodically working on nearby farms gleaning cotton.[8][9]

Eye injury[edit]

In 1931 Elam suffered a severe injury to his left eye during an altercation with another boy, an injury that ultimately blinded him in that eye and permanently damaged the muscles surrounding it.[10] As Jack grew older, the impaired muscles caused his eye increasingly to "drift" within its socket and not track in unison with his right eye, often giving him a cockeyed appearance. Percy Shain, a veteran film and television critic for The Boston Globe, interviewed Elam in 1974 and quoted the actor's comments about the injury:

"I lost my eye when I was 11 in a fight at—would you believe it?—a boy scout [sic] meeting...It was a big initiation night but I got into a scrap with this other kid and he put a pencil through my eye.

"There was no doctor there and it wasn't looked at until sometime afterward. They finally took out the lens and made it sightless. It was 20 years, though, before it started drifting. If it became an issue I could have it operated on, but at this stage of life I probably won't.
"There was a time, though, when I was making Rawhide, the movie [1951], that I mentioned to Darryl Zanuck [head of 20th Century-Fox] that I could have it fixed. He said, 'Don't do it. It's part of your mystique.' So I never got back to it and it's become my trademark, in a way.

"At this stage, it only causes me minor inconvenience. Sometimes I'm a little off center, or when I'm talking to someone I do it at a slight angle."[11]

Zanuck's remarks about Elam's eye proved to be wise career advice, for despite any lifelong disadvantages that his "lazy eye" created for him personally, it proved to be an asset professionally, at least as a performer. His eye's distinctive appearance, combined with Elam's natural acting abilities, drew the attention of many casting directors of films and television series throughout the 1950s and 1960s.[11]

Education, military service and jobs prior to acting[edit]

Before becoming an actor, Elam completed his high-school education, got married, attended college, worked in a variety of jobs, and, despite being blind in one eye, served two years in the U.S. Navy during World War II.[9] He completed his secondary education in Arizona, graduating from Phoenix Union High School in the late 1930s and then moving to California, where he majored in "business studies" at Modesto[12] and Santa Monica junior colleges.[9][b] During that time, he was also employed in several positions before entering military service, including work as a salesman for a "house trailer agency",[13] as an accountant for the Standard Oil Company, a bookkeeper at the Bank of America, and a manager at the Hotel Bel-Air in Los Angeles.[6][9][14] For a few years after his discharge from the navy, Elam continued to apply his business training as an accountant for Hopalong Cassidy Productions and as an independent auditor for Samuel Goldwyn and other moguls and companies associated with the film industry.[9][15] That work required Jack to spend long hours each day reading and examining in detail large quantities of financial records, a routine that put too much strain on his right eye, his "good eye".[16] "'I only see out of one eye'", he explained in an interview published in The Baltimore Sun in 1974, "'and that eye kept going shut.'" While Elam was widely recognized in Hollywood as "a leading independent auditor in motion pictures", by 1947 he found it necessary to quit that successful occupation entirely.[16] He added, "'I had [my right eye] operated on several times and finally the doctor said he couldn't open it any more. He told me I had to get out of the business immediately or go blind.'"[16]

Acting career[edit]

Elam made his screen debut in 1949 in She Shoulda Said No!, an exploitation film in which a chorus girl's habitual marijuana smoking ruins her career and then drives her brother to suicide. Over the next decade as an actor, Elam continued to perform most often in gangster films and Westerns, firmly establishing himself in those genres as a reliable and memorable villain or "heavy". In fact, by the end of the 1950s various American news outlets and moviegoers were referring to him as "'the screen's most loathsome character'".[17]

On television in the 1950s and 1960s, he made multiple guest-star appearances on many popular Western series, including The Lone Ranger, Gunsmoke, The Rifleman, Lawman, Bonanza, Cheyenne, Have Gun – Will Travel, Zorro, The Rebel, F Troop, Tales of Wells Fargo, The Texan, and Rawhide. In 1961, he played a slightly crazed bus passenger on The Twilight Zone episode "Will the Real Martian Please Stand Up?". That same year, he also portrayed the Mexican historical figure Juan Cortina in "The General Without a Cause", an episode of the anthology series Death Valley Days. In 1962, Elam appeared as Paul Henry on Lawman in the episode titled "Clootey Hutter".

Elam in 1963 received a rare opportunity to portray the good guy, appearing as a reformed gunfighter, Deputy U.S. Marshal J. D. Smith, in the ABC/Warner Bros. series The Dakotas, a Western intended as the successor of Cheyenne.[18] The Dakotas ran for 19 episodes.[18] He was then cast as George Taggart, "a former gunfighter who has become a U.S. marshal", in the 1963–1964 NBC/WB series Temple Houston.[19]

In 1966 Jack Elam was cast in his first comedic role by Paramount Pictures, playing Hank in the Western film The Night of the Grizzly starring Clint Walker.[20] The next year, for the Harold Hecht production The Way West, he was chosen for another light-hearted role, playing Preacher Weatherby and providing support to costars Robert Mitchum, Richard Widmark, and Kirk Douglas in a story about a wagon train traveling the Oregon Trail.[21] Then, in 1968, Elam performed in the opening scenes of Sergio Leone's celebrated "spaghetti Western" Once Upon a Time in the West. In that film he portrays one of a trio of gunslingers sent to a train station to kill Charles Bronson's character. Elam in one sequence spends a good portion of his screen time simply trying to rid himself of an annoying fly, finally capturing the elusive insect inside the barrel of his pistol.[22]

In 1969, he played another comedic role in Support Your Local Sheriff!, which was followed two years later by Support Your Local Gunfighter, both opposite James Garner. After his performances in those two films, Elam found his villainous parts dwindling and his comic roles increasing. (Both films were also directed by Burt Kennedy, who had seen Elam's potential as a comedian and directed him a total of 15 times in features and television.) Between those two films, he also played a comically cranky old coot opposite John Wayne in Howard Hawks's Rio Lobo (1970). In 1974–1975, he was cast as Zack Wheeler in The Texas Wheelers, a short-lived comedy series in which he portrayed a long-lost father returning home to raise his four children after their mother dies. Also on television, in 1979, he performed as Frankenstein's monster on the CBS sitcom Struck by Lightning, but the show was cancelled after only three episodes (the remaining eight were unaired (and remain so) in the U.S., though all 11 were aired in the UK in 1980).[citation needed] He then appeared in the role of Hick Peterson in a first-season episode of Home Improvement alongside Ernest Borgnine (season one, episode 20, "Birds of a Feather Flock to Tim").[citation needed]

Elam portrayed Doctor Nikolas Van Helsing, a "crazed proctologist", in the 1981 action-comedy film The Cannonball Run; and three years later, he reprised the role for the production's sequel, Cannonball Run II.[23][24] Elam then played the character Charlie Hankins, a town drunk, in the 1986 "Weird Western" picture The Aurora Encounter.[25] During production, Elam developed what would become a lifelong relationship with an 11-year-old boy in Texas named Mickey Hays, who suffered from progeria. The 1987 documentary I Am Not a Freak portrays the close friendship between Elam and Hays. Elam, in what may be an apocryphal quote, said, "You know I've met a lot of people, but I've never met anybody that got next to me like Mickey."[citation needed]

In 1986, Elam also co-starred on the short-lived comedy series Easy Street as Alvin "Bully" Stevenson, the down-on-his-luck uncle of Loni Anderson's character, L. K. McGuire. In 1988, Elam co-starred with Willie Nelson in the made-for-television movie Where The Hell's That Gold?[26]

In 1994, Elam was inducted into the Hall of Great Western Performers of the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City, OK.[27]

Personal life and death[edit]

Elam was married twice, first to Jean Louise Hodgert from 1937 until her death from colon cancer on January 24, 1961.[28][c] Seven months later, in August 1961, Elam married again, then to Margaret M. Jennison.[29] The couple remained together for 42 years, until 2003, when Jack died of congestive heart failure at their home in Ashland, Oregon.[6][10]

Filmography[edit]

Film[edit]

List of performances in films
Title Year Roles Notes
Mystery Range 1947 Burvel Lambert
Wild Weed 1949 Raymond – Henchman
The Sundowners 1950 Earl Boyce
Key to the City 1950 Councilman Uncredited
Quicksand 1950 Man at Bar Uncredited
One Way Street 1950 Arnie Uncredited
A Ticket to Tomahawk 1950 Fargo Uncredited
Love That Brute 1950 Henchman #2 in Cigar Store Uncredited
High Lonesome 1950 Smiling Man
American Guerrilla in the Philippines 1951 The Speaker
The Texan Meets Calamity Jane 1951 Henchman Uncredited
Bird of Paradise 1951 The Trader
Rawhide 1951 Tevis
The Bushwackers 1951 Cree
Finders Keepers 1952 Eddie
Rancho Notorious 1952 Mort Geary
The Battle at Apache Pass 1952 Mescal Jack
High Noon 1952 Charlie – Drunk in Jail Uncredited
Montana Territory 1952 Gimp
Lure of the Wilderness 1952 Dave Longden
My Man and I 1952 Celestino Garcia
The Ring 1952 Harry Jackson
Kansas City Confidential 1952 Pete Harris
Count the Hours 1953 Max Verne
Ride, Vaquero! 1953 Barton
Gun Belt 1953 Rusty Kolloway
The Moonlighter 1953 Slim
Appointment in Honduras 1953 Castro
Jubilee Trail 1954 Whitey
Ride Clear of Diablo 1954 Tim Lowerie
Princess of the Nile 1954 Basra
The Far Country 1954 Frank Newberry
Cattle Queen of Montana 1954 Yost
Vera Cruz 1954 Tex
Tarzan's Hidden Jungle 1955 Burger
The Man from Laramie 1955 Chris Boldt
Man Without a Star 1955 Knife Murderer Uncredited
Kiss Me Deadly 1955 Charlie Max
Moonfleet 1955 Damen
Wichita 1955 Al
Artists and Models 1955 Ivan
Kismet 1955 Hasan-Ben
Jubal 1956 McCoy – Bar 8 Rider
Pardners 1956 Pete
Thunder Over Arizona 1956 Deputy Slats Callahan
Dragoon Wells Massacre 1957 Tioga
Gunfight at the O.K. Corral 1957 Tom McLowery
Lure of the Swamp 1957 Henry Bliss
Night Passage 1957 Shotgun
Baby Face Nelson 1957 Fatso Nagel
The Gun Runners 1958 Arnold
Edge of Eternity 1959 Bill Ward
The Girl in Lovers Lane 1960 Jesse
The Last Sunset 1961 Ed Hobbs
The Comancheros 1961 Horseface (Comanchero)
Valley of the Dragons[citation needed] 1961 (uncredited) head caveman
Pocketful of Miracles 1961 Cheesecake
4 for Texas 1963 Dobie
The Rare Breed 1966 Simons
The Night of the Grizzly 1966 Hank
The Way West 1967 Preacher Weatherby
The Last Challenge 1967 Ernest Scarnes
Firecreek 1968 Norman
Never a Dull Moment 1968 Ace Williams
Sonora 1968 Slim Kovacs
Once Upon a Time in the West 1968 Snaky – Member of Frank's Gang
Support Your Local Sheriff! 1969 Jake
The Cockeyed Cowboys of Calico County 1970 Kittrick
Dirty Dingus Magee 1970 John Wesley Hardin
The Wild Country 1970 Thompson
Rio Lobo 1970 Mr Phillips
Support Your Local Gunfighter 1971 Jug May
The Last Rebel 1971 Matt
Hannie Caulder 1971 Frank Clemens
Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid 1973 Alamosa Bill
Knife for the Ladies 1974 Jarrod (Sheriff)
Creature from Black Lake 1976 Joe Canton
Hawmps! 1976 Bad Jack Cutter
The Winds of Autumn 1976 J. Pete Hankins
Pony Express Rider 1976 Crazy Charlie
Grayeagle 1977 Trapper Willis
Hot Lead and Cold Feet 1978 Rattlesnake
The Norseman 1978 Death Dreamer
The Apple Dumpling Gang Rides Again 1979 Big Mac
The Sacketts 1979 Ira Bigelow
The Villain 1979 Avery Simpson
The Cannonball Run 1981 Doctor Nikolas Van Helsing
Soggy Bottom, U.S.A. 1981 Troscliar Boudreaux
Jinxed! 1982 Otto
Sacred Ground 1983 Lum Witcher
Lost 1983 Mr. Newsome
Cannonball Run II 1984 Doctor Nikolas Van Helsing
The Aurora Encounter 1986 Charlie Hankins
Hawken's Breed 1987 Tackett
Once Upon a Texas Train 1988 Jason Fitch
Big Bad John 1990 Jake Calhoun
The Giant of Thunder Mountain 1991 Hezekiah Crow
Suburban Commando 1991 Col. Dustin 'Dusty' McHowell
Shadow Force 1992 Tommy
Uninvited 1993 Grady

Television[edit]

List of performances in television
Title Year Role Episode
The Restless Gun 1957 Link Jared "Trail to Sunset"
Lawman 1958 Flynn Hawks "The Deputy"
The Restless Gun 1958 Tony Molenauer "Hornitas Town"
Have Gun – Will Travel 1958 Joe Gage "The Man Who Lost" (Written by Ida Lupino)
The Texan 1958 Tug Swann "The Eastener"
The Rifleman 1958 Sim Groder "Duel of Honor"
Gunsmoke 1959 Dolph Quince "Jayhawkers"
Gunsmoke 1959 Steed "Saludos"
The Texan 1959 Luke Watson "South of the Border"
The Texan 1959 Dud Parsons "Lady Tenderfoot"
The Rifleman 1959 Gavin Martin "Tension"
Tombstone Territory 1959 Wally Jobe "Day of the Amnesty"
Gunsmoke 1960 Clint Dodie "Where'd They Go"
The Twilight Zone 1961 Crazy Man "Will the Real Martian Please Stand Up?"
Bonanza 1961 Dodie Hoad "The Spitfire"
Cheyenne 1961 Count Nicholas Potosi "Massacre at Gunsight Pass"
Gunsmoke 1961 Ben "Love Thy Neighbor"
The Untouchables 1962 Jug Alverson "Pressure"
Cheyenne 1962 Deputy J. D. Smith "A Man Called Ragan"
Cheyenne 1962 Calhoun Durango "The Durango Brothers"
Have Gun – Will Travel 1962 Arnold Shaffner "One, Two, Three"
Gunsmoke 1964 Hector "Homecoming"
Gunsmoke 1964 Specter "Help Me, Kitty"
Daniel Boone 1965 Petch S1/E18 - "The Sound of Fear"
Gunsmoke 1965 Sam Band "Clayton Thaddeus Greenwood"
Gunsmoke 1965 Del Ormand "Malachi"
Gunsmoke 1966 Jim Barrett "My Father, My Son"
Bonanza 1967 Buford Buckalew "A Bride for Buford"
The Wild Wild West 1967 Zack Slade "The Night of Montezuma's Hordes"
Gunsmoke 1968 William Prange "The First People"
Gunsmoke 1969 Pack Landers The Sisters
Bonanza 1970 Honest John "Honest John"
The Virginian 1970 Harve Yost "Rich Man, Poor Man"
Gunsmoke 1971 Lucas Murdoch "Murdoch"
Gunsmoke 1971 Titus Spangler "P.S. Murry Christmas"
Gunsmoke 1972 Pierre Audubon "The River- Parts 1 & 2"
The Texas Wheelers 1974–1975 Zack Wheeler Main role; 8 episodes
Phyllis 1975-1976 Van Horn A lovable wino, 3 episodes
How the West Was Won 1976 Cully Madigan 2 episodes
Eight is Enough 1978,1980 Joe Simons 2 episodes
Sweepstakes 1979 Frank Episode: "Billy, Wally and Ludmilla, and Theodore"
Easy Street 1986 Alvin "Bully" Stevenson 22 episodes
Home Improvement 1992 Hick Peterson "Birds of a Feather Flock to Taylor"
Bonanza: The Return 1993 Buckshot Television movie
Bonanza: Under Attack 1995 Buckshot Television movie

Awards and recognition[edit]

Notes[edit]

  1. ^ The spellings of Alice Kerby's first name and maiden name vary in both official and unofficial records. They are spelled "Alyce" and "Kirby" in some records, including on her 1918 marriage documents to Millard Elam and on her 1924 death certificate. The surname of her parents, however, is consistently spelled "Kerby" on the family's grave markers. See photographs of those markers at Find a Grave and refer to "Arizona, County Marriages, 1871-1964", license and certificate of Millard Elam and Alyce A. Kirby, September 28, 1918, Miami, Gila County, Arizona; original marriage documents preserved at Arizona Department of Libraries, Archives, and Public Records, Phoenix. Retrieved via FamilySearch, October 2, 2022.
  2. ^ According to Jack Elam's entry in the 1940 federal census, by April that year he had attained the equivalent of "C-1" or one year of college education. See "Sixteenth Census of the United States: 1940 Population Schedule", household of Jack M. Elam and Jean L. Elam, Los Angeles City, Los Angeles County, California, April 29, 1940; digitized image of original census page, Enumeration District 14, 60-1131; NARA. Retrieved via FamilySearch, December 30, 2022.
  3. ^ Although California marriage records document that Jack Millard Elam and Jean Louise Hodgert married in Los Angeles on April 20, 1944, the U.S. Census of 1940 documents that the couple that year were already living together in the city as husband and wife. See the 1940 census reference previously cited herein as well as the "California, County Marriages, 1850-1952" database, which includes a microfilm copy of a 1944 marriage certificate of Jack Millard Elam and Jean Louise Hodgert.

References[edit]

  1. ^ Other sources cite 1916 and 1918. The year 1920 is stated on both his birth and death certificates. Arizona Certificate of Live Birth for William Scott Elam Archived October 1, 2020, at the Wayback Machine
  2. ^ Television Western Players 1960-1975: A Biographical Dictionary, Everett Aaker, McFarland Inc., 2017, p. 1926
  3. ^ a b "Arizona, Birth Certificates and Indexes, 1855-1930", William Scott Elam, Miami, Gilda County, Arizona, November 13, 1920, Bureau of Vital Statistics, Arizona State Board of Health, Phoenix. Microfilm image of original birth certificate signed by attending physician Cyril M. Crow, M.D.; retrieved online via FamilySearch archives, Salt Lake City, Utah, October 2, 2022.
  4. ^ "Fourteenth Census of the United States: 1920 Population Schedule", household of Millard Elam, Miami, Arizona, January 23–24, 1920; digitized image of original census page, ED [Enumeration District] 42, sheet 11B, line 85, family 257; National Archive Records Administration. Image of original census page retrieved via FamilySearch, December 11, 2022.
  5. ^ "Arizona Deaths, 1870-1951", digital image of original death certificate of Alice Kirby Elam, September 7, 1924; Globe, Gila County, Arizona; Department of Library and Archives, Phoenix, Arizona. Image of original death certificate retrieved via FamilySearch, October 1, 2022.
  6. ^ a b c McCormick, Tiffany. "Jack Elam (1920-2003)", Oregon Encyclopedia, a project of Portland State University and The Oregon Historical Society, Portland, Oregon. Retrieved December 21, 2022.
  7. ^ "Arizona, County Marriages, 1871-1964," Millard Elam and Flossie I. Varney, April 8, 1928; Maricopa, Pinal County, Arizona; microfilm copy (004251440) of original marriage license and certificate, Arizona Department of Libraries, Archives, and Public Records, Phoenix. Retrieved via FamilySearch, October 2, 2022.
  8. ^ a b "Fifteenth Census of the United States: 1930 Population Schedule", household of Millard Elam, Miami, Gila County, Arizona, April 8, 1930; digitized image of original census page, ED 42, sheet 11B, line 85, family 257; NARA. Retrieved via FamilySearch, October 2, 2022.
  9. ^ a b c d e Exshaw, John (2003). "Jack Elam: Veteran baddie, he acted in more than 50 films", obituary, The Guardian (London, UK), October 28, 2003, p. 25. Retrieved via ProQuest Historical Newspapers (Ann Arbor, Michigan) through subscription at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Library, October 2, 2022.
  10. ^ a b Martin, Douglas (2003).
  11. ^ a b Shain, Percy (1974). "Mean Jack Elam really isn't", The Boston Globe (Boston, Massachusetts), September 22, 1974, p. B7. Retrieved via ProQuest, October 2, 2022.
  12. ^ "Jack Elam". www.historicmodesto.com. Retrieved November 26, 2023.
  13. ^ "Sixteenth Census of the United States: 1940 Population Schedule", household of Jack M. Elam, Los Angeles, Los Angeles County, California, April 29, 1940; digitized image of original census page, Enumeration District 14, 60-1131; NARA. Retrieved via FamilySearch, December 30, 2022.
  14. ^ Magers, Boyd. "Characters and Heavies: Jack Elam", Western Clippings, Albuquerque, New Mexico. Retrieved July 27, 2014.
  15. ^ Wadey, Paul (October 23, 2003). "Jack Elam Archetypal villain in film and TV westerns". The Independent. Archived from the original on May 11, 2008. Retrieved November 27, 2009.
  16. ^ a b c "Jack Elam hadn't been bad for years", interview, The Baltimore Sun, July 30, 1974, p. B4. Retrieved via ProQuest, October 4, 2022.
  17. ^ Aikman, Bonnie (1962). "D.C. Studios: We'd Better Dig Up a Sheriff...", Evening Star (Washington, D.C.), December 2, 1962, p. 35. Retrieved via "Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers", Library of Congress and the National Endowment for the Humanities, Washington, D.C., January 11, 2023.
  18. ^ a b "The Dakotas (WB)(1963) Larry Ward, Jack Elam, Chad Everett, Mike Greene". January 11, 2023. Archived from the original on September 4, 2004.
  19. ^ "Jeffrey Hunter Will Star in Title Role of 'Temple Houston'", N.B.C. trade release issued July 18, 1963 by National Broadcasting Company, New York, N.Y. Retrieved via Internet Archive, San Francisco, California, January 11, 2023.
  20. ^ "The Night of the Grizzly (1966)", catalog, American Film Institute (AFI), Los Angeles, California. Retrieved January 5, 2023.
  21. ^ "The Way West (1967)", catalog, AFI. Retrieved January 4, 2023.
  22. ^ "Once Upon a Time in the West The opening sequence 1", seven-minute digitized segment from Once Upon a Time in the West (1968), posted by "prytz1000" on the streaming service YouTube "7 years ago" [2016]. Retrieved January 4, 2023.
  23. ^ "The Cannonball Run (1981)". Allrovi. Archived from the original on June 6, 2019. Retrieved January 5, 2023.
  24. ^ "The Cannonball Run (1981)" and "Cannonball Run II (1984)", AFI catalog. Retrieved January 5, 2023.
  25. ^ "'Aurora' paced well with kindly charm". Fort Worth Star-Telegram. March 7, 1986. pp. 1B, 2B. Retrieved via Newspapers.com, January 5, 2023.
  26. ^ "Where the Hell's That Gold (1988) Western Movie", digitized copy of full film (1:26:33), originally uploaded to YouTube by "Massmo" [c. 2015]. Retrieved January 5, 2023.
  27. ^ "Great Western Performers". National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum. Retrieved January 4, 2023.
  28. ^ "California, County Birth and Death Records, 1800-1994", database with images, microfilm copy of original death certificate of Jean Hodgert Elam, January 24, 1961; California Department of Health, Sacramento. Retrieved via FamilySearch archives.
  29. ^ "California Marriage Index, 1960-1985", database with marriage certificate of Jack Elam and Margaret M. Jennison, Los Angeles, California, August 23, 1961; Center of Health Statistics, California Department of Health Services, Sacramento. Retrieved via FamilySearch archives, December 31, 2022.

Further reading[edit]

  • McCormack, Tiffany. "Jack Elam". The Oregon Encyclopedia.
  • Mahar, Ted (October 4, 1998). "A Sampling of Elam's Movies". The Oregonian. p. L10.
  • 1920 United States Census, Arizona, Gila County, Miami
  • 1924 September 7; Arizona Original Certificate of Death for Alice Amelia Kerby Elam
  • 1930 United States Census, Arizona, Gila County, Miami
  • 2003 October 20; Oregon Certificate of Death for Jack Elam

External links[edit]