The New Movie Magazine (Dec 1929-May 1930)

Romance of John Boles, Grandson of Texas Pioneers around that by getting special permission from the officials of the school. I remember that John Love lost one declamation while a member of the society." It was in High School that he threw his arm away in a series of baseball games near Greenville, thereby hindering his athletic career at the University of Texas. He pitched two successive games in this series. His mother said that when he stepped from the street car in front of his home after the game she immediately saw that he was not feeling well and asked him what was wrong. "Nothing, mother," he answered, "I'm feeling all right." But he wasn't, he was very ill for about three weeks as a result of the strain to his pitching arm. /^\N graduation from High w School in June, 1913, John Love Boles entered the University of Texas. He enrolled in the fall of the same year for pre-medical work. He believed that the medical profession gave more relief from monotony than the banking business in which his father was engaged. "John Love always liked out-ofdoor life instead of inside and confining activities," Mrs. Boles explained. He worked hard at his studies at the university and also found time to be chosen to the Beta Theta Pi, national fraternity, and to membership in the Arrowhead, a social organization on the campus An early picture of John (left) and his brother, Jake, who is now with the Federal Reserve Bank in Dallas, Texas. Jake has a splendid voice, too. complishments the ability to entertain, and he sang quite a bit while in France. He attended a musical event while in Paris. Being close to the orchestra which wTas then entertaining, he began singing as they played. A leading French voice instructor was near and heard him. He approached Boles with enthusiasm over his voice and offered to give him free lessons. John Love received a number of these lessons but the duties of his office compelled his absence so often that he was forced to drop them. After a year and a half in the army and following the Armistice, John Love Boles returned to the States and to Dallas to take up the cotton business, studying voice in his spare time. It was while engaged in this business that Oscar Seagle, the baritone, heard him and became enthusiastic over his voice. Boles then became one of Seagle's pupils. He went East with Seagle, dropping the cotton business after seven months. He went to France to study under Jean de Reske. Upon his return to the United States, he became a member of the cast of "Little Jesse James," and a number of other musical comedies. It was during his stage career that he was heard by Gloria Swanson who engaged him for her leading man in the production of the motion picture "The Loves of Sunya." It was during his university career that he met TT is interesting to note that the number 13 is John Marcelite Dobbs, and, immediately following his grad ■*■ Love Boles' lucky number. You will remember that it was on Friday 13 that he received the offer to enter uation from the university in 1917 they were married John Love wanted to enlist in the World War, which started right after his graduation, but his professors at the university insisted that the army needed surgeons far more than it needed army men. They prevailed upon him to continue his work in medicine and surgery, giving him the opportunity to complete it in time to enlist. But the United States could not wait. John Love Boles was the first Greenville boy's name to be drawn in the first draft, and he, with seven others, were assigned to Camp Travis at San Antonio. He was then singing with a Chautauqua chorus. His company was Company H, 359th Infantry, but he was transferred again, this time to the Intelligence Department. Soon afterwards he was sent abroad, where he was stationed in Paris. "EVERYWHERE *-* John Love went, it seemed there was music," his mother said. And it is so. He soon numbered among his other ac 56 the movies as Gloria Swanson's leading man, and looking back we find that his graduation from High School was in the year 1913 and that there were thirteen boys and thirteen girls in the graduating class!. A number of his friends in Greenville remember clearly that John Love Boles worked diligently nearly every summer between school terms, and often on Saturdays during school session. It was from pure joy of having something to do, though, for it was not necessary that he work. His parents were, and are, one of the foremost families in Greenville. J. M. Boles, his father, has been in the banking business in Greenville since before John Love's birth, and is now connected with the largest banking institution in the city {Cont'd on page 117) An athletic group at the University of Texas, with John Boles at the extreme right of the first row. Boles always liked sports, particularly baseball.