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Shirley Temple Black, actress and diplomat, dies at 85 Shirley Temple Black, actress and diplomat, dies at 85
(about 14 hours later)
Shirley Temple Black, the former child star and diplomat whose films in the 1930s cheered Depression-weary moviegoers and made her the most famous little girl in the world, died Monday night at age 85 of undisclosed causes. During the depths of the Great Depression in the 1930s, Shirley Temple was so transcendent a star that her admirers stretched from Main Street to the White House. She began her movie career as a curly-haired moppet of 4 and embodied plucky good cheer and an effervescent can-do American spirit.
A statement from her family said she died at 10:57 p.m., at her home in Woodside, Calif. Recognizable for her dimpled cheeks, bright smile and precocious professionalism as a singer, dancer and comedienne, Miss Temple was the top box-office attraction in the United States from 1935 to 1938.
“She was surrounded by her family and caregivers,” the statement said. “We salute her for a life of remarkable achievements as an actor, as a diplomat, and most importantly as our beloved mother, grandmother, great-grandmother and adored wife for 45 years of the late and much missed Charles Alden Black.” “When the spirit of the people is lower than at any other time during this Depression,” President Franklin D. Roosevelt once said, “it is a splendid thing that for just 15 cents, an American can go to a movie and look at the smiling face of a baby and forget his troubles.”
Shirley Temple began her career as a curly-haired moppet of 4. From 1935 to 1938, she was the top box-office attraction in the United States. Her films took in $20 million in just a few years and saved her studio, 20th-Century Fox, from bankruptcy. After dancing and singing her way through dozens of movies as the most famous little girl in the world, Miss Temple later became known as Shirley Temple Black during a second career as a U.S. ambassador. She died Feb. 10 at her home in Woodside, Calif. She was 85.
Her movies became classics of pre-World War II cinema and have remained popular with children and adults. In 1999, the American Film Institute included the actress on its list of the 50 Greatest Screen Legends. She was a Kennedy Center honors recipient in 1998. Her death was announced by her publicist, Cheryl Kagan. The cause was not disclosed.
By 1938, the year “Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm” was released, the youngster's income was the seventh-highest in the country, behind that of six industrialists. Her movies were classics of pre-World War II cinema, and in 1999, the American Film Institute included Miss Temple on its list of the 50 greatest screen legends. She was a Kennedy Center Honors recipient in 1998.
Fame made it impossible for Miss Temple to lead a normal life. She was tutored at the studio, accompanied everywhere by bodyguards and secluded at home. Her life was insured for $795,000, with 20th-Century Fox as the sole beneficiary. In 1938 the year one of her best-regarded films, “Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm,” was released the 10-year-old Miss Temple had the seventh-highest income in the country.
She stopped making movies in 1949, but later worked in television. She became active in Republican politics and, as Shirley Temple Black, served as White House chief of protocol during Gerald Ford's administration, as a delegate to the United Nations and an ambassador to Ghana and Czechoslovakia. But fame made it impossible for her to lead a normal life. She was tutored at the studio and accompanied everywhere by bodyguards. She was not allowed to swim for fear of damaging the curls her mother set in her hair each night. She was kept apart from other children, to prevent her from catching their illnesses.
Despite her long absence from films, the Shirley Temple image remains an enduring one, and is still aggressively marketed by makers of dolls and other memorabilia and by Shirley Temple fan clubs and collectors groups. After she stopped making movies in 1949, she served as White House chief of protocol, a delegate to the United Nations and an ambassador to Ghana and Czechoslovakia.
As a child, her movies made her a heroine for adults as well as children. Simplistic plots often cast her as a motherless tyke who found happiness and shared it, cheerfully singing or dancing her way out of trouble and spreading cheer wherever she went. She first sang her signature song, “On the Good Ship Lollipop” in the movie “Bright Eyes,” one of nine films she made in 1934 alone. “I’ve led three lives: the acting part, wife and mother which is a career and international relations,” she told The Washington Post in 1998. “I’m proud of my career, the first one, and I’m proud of the other two, too.”
Another movie released that year, “Stand Up and Cheer,” made her a national sensation. By the time she was 6, she had appeared in 20 films. The simplistic plots of Miss Temple’s movies often cast her as a motherless tyke who found happiness and shared it with others. She first sang her signature song, “On the Good Ship Lollipop” in the movie “Bright Eyes,” one of nine films she made in 1934.
Miss Temple became an international start with “Little Miss Marker,” based on a Damon Runyon story and made while she was on loan to Paramount Pictures. “Little Miss Marker” and another movie released that year, “Stand Up and Cheer!,” made her a national sensation. She had appeared in 20 films by the time she was 6. Miss Temple was 13 before she learned that Hollywood publicists had trimmed a year off her age, making her appear one year younger than she actually was.
Typical of her movies was “The Little Colonel,” an Old South story with Lionel Barrymore as the grandfather who had disowned one of her parents. Tap dancer Bill Robinson, considered one of the greatest performers in the country, was her sidekick, and their staircase dance together is one of the iconic movie scenes of the period. She followed the movie with another Civil War-era film with Robinson, “The Littlest Rebel.” An endearing role came in “Curly Top” (1935), in which Miss Temple played an orphan and sang “Animal Crackers in My Soup.” One of her most memorable movie moments came in “The Little Colonel” (1935), an Old South story in which tap dancer Bill “Bojangles” Robinson played her sidekick. Their staircase dance together remains one of the iconic movie scenes of the period and was one of the first times black and white actors appeared on equal terms in the same film.
Writer Charles Eckert observed that Shirley Temple played characters whose “capacity for love was indiscriminate, extending to pinched misers or to common hobos. It was a social, even a political force on a par with the idea of democracy or the constitution.” Miss Temple called Robinson “Uncle Billy” and made three other films with him, including “Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm.”
President Franklin D. Roosevelt commented that it was “a splendid thing that for just 15 cents, an American can go to a movie and look at the smiling face of a baby and forget his troubles.” Miss Temple was “in perpetual motion dancing, strutting, beaming, wheedling, chiding, radiating, kissing,” film historian Charles Eckert wrote in 1974. “And since her love was indiscriminate, extending to pinched misers or to common hobos, it was a social, even a political, force on a par with the idea of democracy or the Constitution.”
As head of the struggling 20th-Century Fox studio, Darryl F. Zanuck worked to make a national sensation out of his young star. Shirley-endorsed products were sold in the millions, and at age 7, her popularity kept the studio from going under. She was awarded a special Academy Award when she was 7 “in grateful recognition of her outstanding contribution to screen entertainment.” The head of the struggling 20th Century Fox studio, Darryl F. Zanuck, worked to make a national sensation out of his young star. Products endorsed by Miss Temple were sold in the millions, and her popularity kept the studio from going under.
By age 8, Miss Temple was performing in demanding song-and-dance routines and starring in prestigious literary adaptations, such as “Wee Willie Winkie,” directed by John Ford, and “Heidi.” Next came “Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm,” “Little Miss Broadway” and “The Little Princess.” She made her last movie as a child star, “The Blue Bird,” in 1940. It was her 44th film. Luminaries who paid visits to Miss Temple in Hollywood included Amelia Earhart, Albert Einstein, J. Edgar Hoover and Eleanor Roosevelt. She received an honorary child-sized Oscar in 1935.
Age had caught up with Hollywood's biggest child star when she was 11 and too old to play a moppet. When the studio let her go, she said she was thrilled to be able to lead the life of a normal girl, and she enrolled in school for the first time. She returned to make several films as a teenager and young adult, but she met with limited success. “As long as our country has Shirley Temple,” Franklin Roosevelt said, “we will be all right.”
Her later films included the popular World War II melodrama “Since You Went Away” for producer David O. Selznick; “The Bachelor and the Bobby Soxer,” opposite Cary Grant and Myrna Loy; and director John Ford's “Fort Apache,” with John Wayne and Henry Fonda. That movie marked the screen debut of her young husband, John Agar, who played her love interest and had gotten into movies after serving as a sergeant in the Army Air Corps during World War II. Miss Temple made her 44th and final movie as a child star, “The Blue Bird,” in 1940, when she was 12. By then, she had outgrown the role of the winsome little girl. She was finally able to lead the life of an ordinary person and enrolled in school for the first time.
The actress had escaped the tight control of her parents by marrying at age 17. But she and Agar soon divorced, and at 21, she was eager to take her first real vacation. In Hawaii, she met Charles Black, a California businessman who became her second husband. She had limited success with the few films she made as a teenager and young adult, such as the World War II melodrama “Since You Went Away” (1944) and “The Bachelor and the Bobby Soxer” (1947), opposite Cary Grant and Myrna Loy.
She never made a feature film after 1949, but she acted on television in the late 1950s and early 1960s as the host of “Shirley Temple's Storybook,” a monthly anthology series in which she narrated and sometimes appeared in adaptations of children's tales. She appeared in director John Ford’s “Fort Apache” (1948), with John Wayne and Henry Fonda, playing the love interest of her first husband, a young actor named John Agar. They were married in 1945, allowing her to escape the tight control of her parents.
In the years that followed, many of her movies gained new popularity on videotape, DVD and television. With each new generation, she continued to be one of the most merchandized actresses in film history. She had a daughter at 18, but she and Agar soon divorced. She later met Charles A. Black, a California businessman who had never seen any of her movies. After their marriage in 1950, the couple briefly lived in Bethesda while her husband was based at the Pentagon with the Navy.
Shirley Temple dolls are still manufactured, decades after her career ended, and have long been sought by collectors, some of whom attend annual Shirley Temple conventions. Her face appeared on clothing, cereal boxes, playing cards, dish soap and hundreds of other items that are briskly traded by memorabilia dealers. A nonalcoholic, cherry-garnished drink named in her honor and suitable for children is still offered on menus around the world. Her marriage to Black introduced her to the world of politics and diplomacy, and Mrs. Black campaigned on behalf of Dwight D. Eisenhower and Richard M. Nixon.
Her marriage to Black introduced her to the world of Republican politics and, from there, diplomatic life. In the 1950s, the Blacks campaigned on behalf of the Dwight D. Eisenhower-Richard M. Nixon ticket, and for a time, they lived in the Washington area. Mrs. Black ran in a losing bid for the U.S. House of Representatives as a Republican in a special election in 1967. Two other prominent California politicians at the time, U.S. Sen. George L. Murphy (R) and Gov. Ronald Reagan (R), who was elected president in 1980, had been actors who had appeared in movies with the young child star.
Mrs. Black was appointed a delegate to the United Nations by President Richard M. Nixon in 1969, helped campaign for her golfing buddy, President Gerald Ford, and was his ambassador to Ghana from 1974 to 1976. Ford named her chief of protocol of the United States in 1976. In 1989, President Ronald Reagan named her ambassador to Czechoslovakia, where she served four years. “Politicians are actors, too, don’t you think?” Mrs. Black once said. “Usually if you like people and you’re outgoing, not a shy little thing, you can do pretty well in politics.”
She was also a delegate to the Stockholm Conference on the Environment in 1972 and served for two years as a special assistant to Russell Train at the Council on Environmental Quality. In 1969, Mrs. Black was appointed a delegate to the United Nations by President Nixon. After Nixon’s resignation in 1974, Vice President Gerald R. Ford named Mrs. Black ambassador to Ghana. She later served briefly as chief of protocol of the United States, an advisory position at the State Department, in 1976 and 1977. In 1989, Reagan named her ambassador to Czechoslovakia, where she served three years as the country emerged from decades of communist rule.
Mrs. Black was born in Santa Monica, Calif., on April 23, 1928. Her father was a banker and her mother a housewife who thought her daughter was destined to be in show business. After undergoing a mastectomy in 1972, Mrs. Black gave a news conference from her hospital room and later wrote about her experience in McCall’s magazine. She was among the first celebrities to discuss breast cancer in a public forum.
She made her first movie appearances in “Baby Burlesks,”a series of one-reel shorts that parodied movies and movie stars of the day. “I did it because I thought it would help other women, my sisters,” she told The Post in 1998. Within two weeks, she was back on the job with the White House Council on Environmental Quality.
In her autobiography, “Child Star,” Mrs. Black wrote that she once asked for an accounting of her investments. She said she discovered that, of more than $3 million she had made since childhood, only $44,000 remained in her name. Half her earnings had gone to her parents and much of the rest paid the living expenses of other family members and a dozen household workers, she said. Her father had ignored a court order and had failed to deposit money in her trust account. Shirley Jane Temple was born in Santa Monica, Calif., on April 23, 1928. Her father was a banker and her mother a housewife who thought her daughter was destined to be in show business.
After she had mostly retired from show business in 1949, she helped raise funds for the National Multiple Sclerosis Society; her brother had the illness. Her involvement in the national campaign helped interest her in political work. In 1955, after her husband became head of business administration at the Stanford Research Institute, the Blacks moved to San Francisco. She became interested in world affairs and turned down acting offers,until her return in “Shirley Temple's Storybook” on NBC-TV in 1958. The young Miss Temple was taking dance classes by the time she was 3. She made her first film appearances in “Baby Burlesks,” a series of one-reel shorts that parodied movie stars of the day.
As a young adult, she persuaded the Ideal Toy Co. to manufacture a new version of the 1930s Shirley Temple doll. She made personal appearances at stores that attracted thousands of fans, and in six months the company sold more than 300,000 dolls. In her 1988 autobiography, “Child Star,” Mrs. Black wrote that she once asked for an accounting of her investments. She discovered that, of more than $3 million she had made since childhood, she had only about $30,000 to her name. Half her earnings had gone to her parents and much of the rest paid the living expenses of other family members and a dozen household workers, she said. Despite a court order, she wrote, her father failed to deposit money in her trust account.
Ms. Temple Black’s last foray into television was in January 1965, when she shot a situation comedy pilot, “Go Fight City Hall,” in which she played a social worker. It was made on the 20th Century-Fox lot. Her first day on the set, there was a banner and party in the commissary. “If there had not been a Shirley Temple, there would not be a 20th Century-Fox,” a spokesman said. “For reasons some may find inexplicable, I felt neither disappointment nor anger,” she wrote. “Perhaps years spent ignoring such matters had insulated me from disillusion.”
In 2002, the studio installed a monument in her honor on its main lot. She and her husband, an official with the Stanford Research Institute (now SRI International), settled near San Francisco in the 1950s. Her husband died in 2005. Survivors include a daughter from her first marriage; two children from her second marriage; a granddaughter; and two great-granddaughters.
Survivors include two daughters and a son, a granddaughter and two great-granddaughters, the family statement said. Mrs. Black, who had a brother with multiple sclerosis, began raising funds for the National Multiple Sclerosis Society in the 1950s. She served in the 1960s as the organization’s president, which fed her growing interest in public service.
Films of Shirley Temple She did not make another feature film after 1949 and increasingly withdrew from the world of show business. From 1958 to 1962, she was the host of “Shirley Temple’s Storybook,” an NBC-TV series in which she narrated and sometimes acted in adaptations of children’s tales. She also appeared in a 1965 situation-comedy pilot, “Go Fight City Hall,” which was filmed at the same studio where she had made many of her films three decades earlier.
1932: “Runt Page,” “War Babies,” “The Pie-Covered Wagon,” “New Deal Rhythm,” “Glad Rags to Riches,” “Kid's Last Stand,” “Kiddin' Hollywood,” “Polly Tix in Washington” (all one-reel shorts produced by Educational Films) As Miss Temple grew up and evolved into Mrs. Black, she remained relatively untainted by her early fame. She never resented the demands placed on her by her parents or studio and seemed to take joy in the hard work behind the song-and-dance routines that made her America’s littlest sweetheart.
1933: “Kiddin' Africa” (Educational Films), “The Red-Haired Alibi” (Tower Productions/Columbia), “Dora's Dunking Doughnuts” (Educational Films), “Out All Night” (Universal), “Merrily Yours (Educational Films), “Pardon My Pups” (Educational Films), “Managed Money” (Educational Films), “To the Last Man” (Paramount Pictures), “What To Do?” (Educational Films) “Most important of all, I was at peace with myself,” she wrote in her autobiography. “I just stood there in my socks, paid attention and worked with an uncluttered pose.”
1934: “Carolina” (20th Century-Fox), “Mandalay” (First National/Warner Brothers), “New Deal Rhythm” (Paramount), “Change of Heart” (Fox), “Bottoms Up” (Fox), “Stand Up and Cheer” (Fox), “Little Miss Marker” (Paramount), “Now I'll Tell” (Fox), “Baby, Take A Bow” (Fox), “Now And Forever” (Paramount), “Bright Eyes” (Fox) Matt Schudel contributed to this report.
1935: “The Little Colonel” (Fox), “Our Little Girl” (Fox), “Curly Top” (Fox)
1936: “The Littlest Rebel” (Fox), “Captain January” (Fox), “Poor Little Rich Girl” (Fox), “Dimples” (Fox), “Stowaway” (Fox)
1937: “Wee Willie Winkie” (Fox), “Heidi” (Fox)
1938: “Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm” (Fox), “Little Miss Broadway” (Fox), “Just Around the Corner” (Fox)
1939: “The Little Princess” (Fox), “Susannah of the Mounties” (Fox)
1940: “The Blue Bird” (Fox), “Young People” (Fox)
1941: “Kathleen” (Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer)
1942: “Miss Annie Rooney” (United Artists)
1943: “Since You Went Away” (United Artists)
1944: “I'll Be Seeing You” (United Artists)
1945: “Kiss and Tell” (Columbia)
1946: “Honeymoon” (RKO), “The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer” (RKO)
1947: “That Hagen Girl” (Warner Bros.)
1948: “Fort Apache” (RKO ), “Adventure in Baltimore” (RKO)
1949: “Mr. Belvedere Goes to College” (Fox), “The Story of Seabiscuit” (Warner Bros.), “A Kiss for Corliss” (United Artists)