Film & TV / Theatre & dance / Politics
George Murphy
1902–1992 · actor, dancer, U.S. senator
Song-and-dance star of 1930s–40s Hollywood musicals and U.S. senator from California, who spent part of his boyhood in Detroit.
- Born
New Haven, Connecticut- Died
Palm Beach, Florida
aged 89- Birth name
- George Lloyd Murphy
- Detroit years
- 1915–1917
- Field
- Film & TV, Theatre & dance, Politics
01 / The Detroit story
The Detroit story
George Murphy was born in New Haven, Connecticut, the son of Mike Murphy, a noted athletic trainer and coach. Two years after his father's death in 1913, Murphy's mother moved the family to Detroit to live with her parents, and he spent part of his boyhood in the city. After his mother's death he left on a partial athletic scholarship for the Peddie School in New Jersey, then graduated from the Pawling School in New York in 1921 and attended Yale. He worked odd jobs, including as a toolmaker for the Ford Motor Company, before dancing his way into nightclubs, Broadway and, from 1930, Hollywood musicals such as Broadway Melody of 1938 and For Me and My Gal. He led the Screen Actors Guild from 1944 to 1946 and received an honorary Oscar in 1951. In 1964 he was elected U.S. senator from California.
Highlights
- Leading man in Hollywood musicals from 1930 to 1952
- President of the Screen Actors Guild (1944–1946)
- Honorary Academy Award (1951)
- U.S. senator from California (1965–1971)
- The only U.S. senator with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame