During World War II, the movie capital “enlisted” in a burst of patriotic enthusiasm.
The Hollywood Canteen was formed by Bette Davis and John Garfield as a club for servicemen on leave, stars participated in war bond drives, and even the superstars appeared on USO tours to entertain the troops both in the United States and abroad.
Those who actually joined up to fight included Clark Gable, James Stewart, Robert Montgomery, Tyrone Power, Robert Taylor, Van Heflin, Ronald Reagan, Lew Ayres, Glenn Ford, Jeffrey Lynn, Burgess Meredith, Gene Raymond and Douglas Fairbanks Jr.
Gene Autry, the singing cowboy and No. 1 western star, put away his guitar and Stetson for an Army uniform and served as a flight officer with the Air Transport Command. Victor Mature walked out on an unfinished picture and popped into the Coast Guard. Crooner-actor Rudy Vallee also joined up.
Dashing swashbuckler Errol Flynn had his ego crushed when he was classified 4-F and turned down by the military because of a heart defect, recurring malaria and tuberculosis.
Wayne Morris had his budding career interrupted by serving with valor as a Navy pilot. During his combat tour, Morris was credited with shooting down seven Japanese aircraft in aerial dogfights and sinking an enemy gunboat and two destroyers. He was awarded four Distinguished Flying Crosses and two Air Medals. Morris was discharged from the service as a lieutenant commander and went on to resume his acting career, appearing in such war-related films as Task Force (1949) and Paths of Glory (1957). James Stewart got in the thick of it by joining up and subsequently flying 20 combat missions over Germany as a bomber pilot. During his wartime service, Stewart rose from private to full colonel. He retired from military service in 1968 as a brigadier general in the Air Force Reserve, the highest-ranking entertainer in the U.S. military.
Both Robert Taylor and Tyrone Power became commissioned officers in the Navy’s Air Transport Command. Taylor served as a flight instructor and also directed 17 Navy training films. Power logged more than 1,100 hours of flying time with the Air Transport Command, much of it between Guam and Kwajalein, Saipan and Chimu Airstrip, Okinawa. On several occasions he came under heavy enemy fire.
Robert Montgomery, who served as a commissioned officer in the Navy during the war, commanded a PT boat in the Pacific and was an operations officer aboard a destroyer during the D-Day invasion. He was awarded the Bronze Star and was decorated as a Chevalier of the French Legion of Honor for his participation in the Normandy invasion.
Glenn Ford and Lee Marvin served with the U.S. Marines during the war. Marvin saw action in the Pacific, where he was wounded.
One of the screen’s biggest stars at the time, Carole Lombard (wife of Clark Gable), became Hollywood’s first “victim” of the war. Lombard, who was at the peak of her achievement and popularity, was killed in a plane crash in January 1942 while returning to California from a bond-selling tour in Indiana.
Shortly after Lombard’s death her husband, amid a blaze of publicity, joined the Army Air Force.
Gable rose in rank from lieutenant to major and received the Distinguished Flying Cross and Air Medal for participating in several combat missions over Germany and France while heading a photographic unit.
