Inspiration One

IndustryCentral serves the individuals who's work contributes to the Motion Picture and Television Industry. However we do so with the highest respect and admiration for those who pioneered the skills, techniques, and crafts that we employ in the modern era. We place a strong emphasis on those who have inspired us within these pages with tributes to their works in all areas of the medium.

We are fortunate that the uniqueness of our product is one that has provided an enduring library (now preserved digitally) of the works of those who have inspired us and we begin with no greater a male role model than Clark Gable.

William Clark Gable was born on February 1, 1901 in Cadiz, Ohio, to Adeline (Hershelman) and William Henry Gable, an oil-well driller. He was of German, Irish, and Swiss-German descent. When he was seven months old, his mother died, and his father sent him to live with his maternal aunt and uncle in Pennsylvania, where he stayed until he was two. His father then returned to take him back to Cadiz. At 16, he quit high school, went to work in an Akron, Ohio, tire factory, and decided to become an actor after seeing the play "The Bird of Paradise". He toured in stock companies, worked oil fields and sold ties. On December 13, 1924, he married Josephine Dillon, his acting coach and 15 years his senior. Around that time, they moved to Hollywood, so that Clark could concentrate on his acting career. In April 1930, they divorced and a year later, he married Maria Langham (a.k.a. Maria Franklin Gable), also about 17 years older than him.