George Walsh

George Frederick Walsh (March 16, 1889 – June 13, 1981) was an American actor. An athlete who became an actor and later returned to sport, he enjoyed 40 years of fame and was a performer with dual appeal, with women loving his sexy charm and men appreciating his manly bravura.

Known variously as "the Laughing Athletic Thunderbolt", "the Apollo of the Silver Sheet", "the Screen's Greatest Athlete" and "the King of Smiles", Walsh's movie career stretched from the start of true US filmmaking to the Golden Era (22 years) during which time he was featured in approximately 80 productions. He was attached to such studios as Mutual, Chadwick, Triangle, Fox, Universal, Goldwyn, United Artists, and Paramount.

Early life George Frederick Walsh was born in New York City to Elizabeth T. Bruff, the daughter of Irish Catholic immigrants, and Thomas W. Walsh, a clothing manufacturer who was born in England and came to the United States when he was 14 years old. He had a brother, film director Raoul Walsh, and a sister, Alice. He was active in track and field in high school, and he was a running back and punter in football at Fordham University and Georgetown University. He was also briefly with the Brooklyn Dodgers. Their horse Sunset Trail competed in the 1937 Kentucky Derby, won by War Admiral, who went on to win the U.S. Triple Crown. Sunset Trail finished sixteenth in a field of twenty runners.

In the 1940s Walsh married for a second time, and enjoyed many years of happy retirement in California. The destruction/loss of two-thirds of his movies meant he could not be included in silent film compilations on TV in the 1960s and the 70s. Regardless, he was interviewed by historians and journalists who sought him out for actor profiles, Hollywood articles, and movie anecdotes.

Death He died in Pomona, California of pneumonia at the age of 92. He is buried in San Gabriel Cemetery, Los Angeles.

Selected filmography

The Birth of a Nation (1915) - Minor Role (uncredited) The Fencing Master (1915) A Bad Man and Others (1915) Don Quixote (1915) The Serpent (1916) Gold and the Woman (1916) Blue Blood and Red (1916) The Beast (1916) Intolerance (1916) The Island of Desire (1917) Melting Millions (1917) The Book Agent (1917) The Honor System (1917) The Pride of New York (1917) The Yankee Way (1917) Some Boy! (1917) Jack Spurlock, Prodigal (1918) On the Jump (1918) The Kid Is Clever (1918) - Himself/Kirk White I'll Say So (1918) Luck and Pluck (1919) Never Say Quit (1919) Help! Help! Police! (1919) Putting One Over (1919) The Winning Stroke (1919) The Shark (1920) A Manhattan Knight (1920) The Plunger (1920) The Dead Line (1920) Dynamite Allen (1921) With Stanley in Africa (1922) Vanity Fair (1923) Rosita (1923) Slave of Desire (1923) Reno (1923) The Miracle Makers (1923) Souls for Sale (1923) - Himself (uncredited) American Pluck (1925) Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ (1925) (he recorded almost the entire film, but was replaced by Ramon Novarro) Blue Blood (1925) A Man of Quality (1926) The Prince of Broadway (1926) The Test of Donald Norton (1926) Striving for Fortune (1926) The Kick-Off (1926) Back to Liberty (1927) The Broadway Drifter (1927) The Winning Oar (1927) His Rise to Fame (1927) Combat (1927) Inspiration (1928) Me and My Gal (1932) Out of Singapore (1932) The Return of Casey Jones (1933) The Bowery (1933) Black Beauty (1933) Cleopatra (1934) The Live Wire (1936)