The year 1944 in film involved some significant events, including the wholesome, award-winning Going My Way plus popular murder mysteries such as Double Indemnity, Gaslight and Laura.
Ella Mae Morse was an American singer of popular music whose 1940s and 1950s recordings mixing jazz, blues, and country styles influenced the development of rock and roll. Her 1942 recording of "Cow-Cow Boogie" with Freddie Slack and His Orchestra gave Capitol Records its first gold record. In 1943, her single "Get On Board, Little Chillun", also with Slack, charted in what would soon become the R&B charts, making her one of the first white singers to do so. Morse stopped recording in 1957 but continued to perform and tour into the 1990s. In 1960 she received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
The Rockford Peaches were a women's professional baseball team who played from 1943 through 1954 in the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League. A founding member, the team represented Rockford, Illinois.
The Motion Picture & Television Fund (MPTF) is a charitable organization that offers assistance and care to those in the motion picture and television industries and their families with limited or no resources, including services such as temporary financial assistance, case management, and residential living.
Jerome Palmer Cowan was an American stage, film, and television actor.
AFI's 100 Years...100 Stars is the American Film Institute's list ranking the top 25 male and 25 female greatest screen legends of American film history and is the second list of the AFI 100 Years... series.
Reveille with Beverly is a 1943 American musical film starring Ann Miller, Franklin Pangborn, and Larry Parks directed by Charles Barton, released by Columbia Pictures, based on the Reveille with Beverly radio show hosted by Jean Ruth Hay. It is also the name of the subsequent soundtrack album.
Anne Gwynne was an American actress and model who was known as one of the first scream queens because of her numerous appearances in horror films. Gwynne was also one of the most popular pin-ups of World War II. She is the maternal grandmother of actor Chris Pine.
"Jersey Bounce" is a song written by Tiny Bradshaw, Eddie Johnson, and Bobby Plater with lyrics by Buddy Feyne who used the pseudonym Robert B. Wright.
Samuel Southey Hinds was an American actor and former lawyer. He was often cast as kindly authority figures and appeared in more than 200 films until his death.
Whoopee! is a 1930 American pre-Code musical comedy film directed by Thornton Freeland and starring Eddie Cantor, Ethel Shutta, and Eleanor Hunt. It was photographed in two-color Technicolor. Its plot closely follows the 1928 stage show produced by Florenz Ziegfeld.
Saratoga is a 1937 American romantic comedy film written by Anita Loos and directed by Jack Conway. The film stars Clark Gable and Jean Harlow in their sixth and final film collaboration and features Lionel Barrymore, Frank Morgan, Walter Pidgeon, Hattie McDaniel and Margaret Hamilton.
Joe Sawyer was a Canadian film actor. He appeared in more than 200 films between 1927 and 1962, and was sometimes billed under his birth name.
Ladies Courageous is a 1944 war film based on the novel Looking For Trouble (1941) by Virginia Spencer Cowles. Directed by John Rawlins, the film stars Loretta Young and Geraldine Fitzgerald. It tells the story of the paramilitary Women's Auxiliary Ferrying Squadron formed in the United States during World War II. Film historians and scholars consider Ladies Courageous an à-clef story of famed aviator Jacqueline Cochran and test pilot Nancy Harkness Love's work to mobilize women pilots to contribute to the war effort.
Inside Job is a 1946 American crime film noir directed by Jean Yarbrough starring Preston Foster, Ann Rutherford, Alan Curtis and Milburn Stone.
Moon Over Las Vegas is a 1944 American musical comedy film directed by Jean Yarbrough and starring Anne Gwynne, David Bruce and Barbara Jo Allen.
Fireball Forward is a 1972 American TV movie. It was directed by Marvin J. Chomsky and written by Edmund H. North. It was produced by Frank McCarthy who called it "son of Patton": it follows a hard luck Army division in 1944 France, and the General who must lick it into shape. The film was a pilot for a proposed TV series.
Charlie McCarthy, Detective is a 1939 American comedy film starring Edgar Bergen, Charlie McCarthy and Robert Cummings.
