Clinton Eastwood Jr., an American retired actor and director, was born on May 31, 1930 in San Francisco to Clinton Eastwood Sr. and the former Margret Ruth Runner.
Early life Eastwood was unusually large at birth, weighing 11 lb 6 oz (5.16 kg), and was nicknamed "Samson" by the nurses at St. Francis Hospital.guardian.co.uk Gentle man Clint, November 2, 2008.McGilligan (1999), p. 22 He has English, Scottish, Dutch, Welsh, and Irish ancestry. The elder of two siblings, he has a younger sister, Jeanne Bernhardt, born in 1934. His father worked as a salesman and briefly as a detective in San Francisco, according to U.S. Census records,.Zmijewsky, p. 13 and at different jobs in California during the 1930s.CBS Evening News interview, February 6, 2005. In 1940, the Eastwoods settled in Piedmont, California and did not move again until after Clint reached adulthood.McGilligan (1999), p. 34 Eastwood often drops references to the Great Depression in interviews, implying that he comes from a poor family, but according to Sondra Locke, "actually they were never poor, they lived in a very wealthy part of town, had a swimming pool, belonged to the country club, and each drove his own car."
Eastwood was a weak student and records indicate he had to attend summer school. He was held back at Piedmont Junior High School due to poor academic scores, and later attended Piedmont High School from January 1945 to at least January 1946. Despite his athletic and musical talents, Eastwood shunned school teams and the band. He was told he would make a good basketball player, but he was interested in individual pursuits like tennis and golf, a passion he retains today. He transferred to Oakland Technical High School, where the drama teachers encouraged him to take part in school plays, but he was not interested. According to Eastwood, all he had on his mind were "fast cars and easy women".McGilligan (1999), p. 35McGilligan (1999), p. 37 He took auto mechanic courses and studied aircraft maintenance, rebuilding both aircraft and car engines. Eastwood also became a pianist; according to a friend, he "would actually play the piano until his fingers were bleeding". He was scheduled to graduate in January 1949 as a midyear graduate, although it is not clear if he ever did.McGilligan (1999), p. 40 Fritz Manes, a boyhood friend two years younger than Eastwood, said "I think what happened is he just went off and started having a good time. I just don't think he finished high school."
By early 1949 his father moved to a plant in Seattle. Eastwood moved in with a friend in Oakland named Harry Pendleton. He was invited to a house party in Malibu, where he met the film director Howard Hawks who, with John Ford, would influence his career.McGilligan (1999), p.41 Eastwood rejoined his family in the Pacific Northwest, where he operated log broncs at the Weyerhaeuser Company pulp mill in Springfield, Oregon.The King of Western Swing - Bob Wills Remembered. Rosetta Wills. 1998. p. 165 . He worked briefly as a lifeguard after obtaining a certificate from a Red Cross course,McGilligan (1999), p.43 and played ragtime piano at a bar in Oakland.
Military service In March 1951, Eastwood was drafted by the Army and assigned to Fort Ord in California, where he was appointed as a lifeguard and projectionist of training films.Eliot, p. 23 Don Loomis recalled hearing that Eastwood was romancing one of the daughters of a Fort Ord officer, who might have been entreated to watch out for him when names came up for postings.McGilligan, p. 49 To supplement his $67 a month military pay——he held a part-time job on a loading dock for the Spreckels Sugar Refining Company. He visited Carmel for the first time and remarked "someday I'd like to live here".McGilligan (1999), pp. 48–49
On September 30, 1951, while returning from a prearranged tryst with a girlfriend in Seattle,McGilligan (1999), pp. 49 Eastwood was in the radar operator's compartment of a Douglas AD-1Q dive bomber that crashed into the Pacific Ocean off the Point Reyes Peninsula near San Francisco. The aircraft had departed from Sand Point Naval Air Station in Seattle, bound for northern California. During the flight, the rear door would not stay closed, the oxygen system proved inoperable, and the navigation systems and intercom failed. Eventually, during the late afternoon, the plane ran out of fuel and the pilot was forced to ditch the aircraft in the sea several miles off Point Reyes. Both Eastwood and the pilot, Lt. Francis Coleman Anderson (who went missing in action on January 29, 1953) were uninjured and Eastwood was able to swim to shore using a life raft.McGilligan (1999), p. 50 After some difficulty getting onto the beach, Eastwood made his way past Abbotts Lagoon and over a high fence towards a bright light that was nearer to him than Point Reyes Lighthouse. This turned out to be the KPH RCA ship-to-shore receiving station. The single operator at the station initially had trouble understanding Eastwood's explanation of the plane crash, but ultimately called the Coast Guard. He was taken to a "Coast Guard Station" (probably the Point Reyes Lifeboat Station) and reunited with the pilot, who had drifted further north. Eastwood later reflected on his thoughts during the crash, "I thought I might die. But then I thought, other people have made it through these things before. I kept my eyes on the lights on shore and kept swimming."Zmijewsky (1982), p. 16 In 2018, a project was begun to locate the submerged wreck of the plane. (includes text reprint of its original October 1, 1951 newspaper report on the incident)
During his military service Eastwood became friends with future successful TV actors Richard Long, Martin Milner and David Janssen. Eastwood left Fort Ord in the spring of 1952 and moved north to Seattle where he worked as a lifeguard for some time. However, as he had little money and few friends in Seattle, he moved back south to L.A.McGilligan (1999), p.54 During this time he worked managing an apartment house in Beverly Hills by day (into which he then moved) and worked at a Signal Oil gas station by night.McGilligan (1999), p. 55Zmijewsky (1982), p. 17 In May 1953, Eastwood met 22-year-old secretary Margaret Neville Johnson on a blind date, after which he continued to see other women, including a fellow member of a small theater company in Seattle, during his annual summer job lifeguarding at Kennydale Beach Park.McGilligan (1999), p. 54 Despite the overlapping entanglement, he married Johnson shortly before Christmas 1953 in South Pasadena;McGilligan (1999), p. 56 at the time of their wedding, Eastwood's other girlfriend in Seattle was about seven months pregnant. This unidentified woman gave birth to Laurie Alison Eastwood Warren Murray on February 11, 1954, in either Seattle or Renton, Washington, and placed the infant for adoption."Clint Eastwood Is Extremely Close With His Kids! Meet the ‘Gran Torino’ Star’s 8 Children". Closer. May 2, 2022. Clint Eastwood's 8 Children: Everything to Know After concluding his part-time work, he briefly attended Los Angeles City College and held several jobs digging foundations for residential swimming pools, which he continued in between his early films.Zmijewsky (1982), p. 19
Early work
Becoming an actor According to the CBS press release for Rawhide, Universal (known then as Universal-International) film company happened to be shooting in Fort Ord and an enterprising assistant spotted Eastwood and invited him to meet the director.McGilligan (1999), p. 52 However, the key figure, according to his official biography was a man named Chuck Hill, who was stationed in Fort Ord and had contacts in Hollywood. While in L.A., Hill had reacquainted with Eastwood and with the help of an attractive telephone operator who was attracted to him, managed to succeed in sneaking Eastwood into a Universal studio and showed him to cameraman Irving Glassberg. Glassberg arranged for director Arthur Lubin to meet Eastwood at the gas station where he was working in the evenings in L.A. Lubin, like Glassberg was highly impressed, remarking, "so tall and slim and very handsome looking".McGilligan (1999), p. 60 He swiftly arranged for Eastwood's first audition but was rather less enthusiastic, remarking, "He was quite amateurish. He didn't know which way to turn or which way to go or do anything". Nevertheless, he told Eastwood not to give up, and suggested he attend drama classes, and later arranged for an initial contract for Eastwood in April 1954 at $100 a week. Some people in Hollywood, including Eastwood's wife Maggie, were suspicious of Lubin's intentions towards Eastwood; he was homosexual and maintained a close friendship with Eastwood in the years that followed.McGilligan (1999), p.84 After signing, Eastwood was required to perform in front of staff members, including actress Myrna Hansen. He played Alan Squier, a disillusioned English intellectual from The Petrified Forest and in one scene was required to strip in front of the Universal staff.McGilligan (1999), p.61 He was initially criticised for his speech and awkward manner; he was soft-spoken and in performing in front of people was cold, stiff and awkward.McGilligan (1999), p. 62 Fellow talent school actor John Saxon, described Eastwood as, "being like a kind of hayseed.. Thin, rural, with a prominent Adam's Apple, very laconic and slow speechwise."McGilligan (1999), p. 63 According to Eastwood's biographer, Patrick McGilligan, the new trainee was not naturally disposed to being a leading man, and he lacked creative imagination in improvisation; McGilligan further observed that although Eastwood had a sense of humor and was successful with women off screen, he did not project those qualities in his early acting.
Universal Studios: Training and development
In May 1954, Eastwood made his first real audition, trying out for a part in Six Bridges to Cross, a film about the Brinks robbery that would mark the debut of actor Sal Mineo. Director Joseph Pevney was not impressed by his acting and rejected him for any role. Later he tried out for Brigadoon, Bengal Brigade and The Seven Year Itch in May 1954, Sign of the Pagan (June), Smoke Signal (August) and Abbott and Costello Meet the Keystone Kops (September), all without success. Eastwood was eventually given a minor role by director Jack Arnold in the film Revenge of the Creature, which was the sequel to The Creature from the Black Lagoon which had been released just months earlier.McGilligan (1999), p. 64 Eastwood played the role of Jennings, a white-coated lab technician who assists the doctor (John Agar) in researching "Animal Psychology". He blames a cat for killing one of the lab rats, but discovers he misplaced it in his pocket. His scene was shot in one day, July 30, 1954, on Stage No. 16 at the Universal lot, although much of the rest of the film was shot at Marineland south of St. Augustine, Florida.