Photoplay (Jan-Jun 1948)

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For two years, ever since he was eleven, Alan Ladd had been pumping that bicycle along the dusty road. Ten miles to a Hollywood public pool and ten miles home again. In between swims he’d done odd jobs at the pool, counting towels, sweeping out the lockers — anything the attendants would let him help at. Not that they ever let him swim free for his efforts— he did odd jobs around the neighborhood to earn his admission money. At the towel counter or in the locker rooms, however, he got a chance to talk to the older fellows. The almost grown-up guys with the rippling chests and bulging biceps, who ordinarily wouldn’t bother being friendly with a youngster who was nothing but bones and gumption. One of them, a black-haired giant named Roy Varney, had been the special object of the small Ladd’s worship. Sometimes it was amusing and sometimes it was annoying, the way Alan was always underfoot. Hanging around outside the shower, following him out to the diving board, watching him with a stubborn devotion. Asking him, “How d’ya do that one— will you do it again so I can see?” “Sure, kid — ” the tall guy would say, tolerantly poising himself once more. “You draw up your feet — and give a twist — just before you hit the water — see?” “Betcha I can do it — ” The youngster would be out on the end of the board, dispensing the sincere flattery of imitation. Sometimes the imitation didn’t quite come off, and he’d hit the water in a resounding belly-whopper. Belly-whoppers hurt — you feel as if your stomach’s been split wide and your lungs slapped into a jelly. But always the little kid would shake the water out of his nostrils and his ears, climb back on the board and — maybe — take another belly-whopper. “I’ll say one thing, there’s nothing he’s afraid to try — ” Varney would say to the other big fellows, at first. “And he keeps at it until he can do it,” he added later. And then, as the months went on, things had gradually reversed themselves. After a while it had been the big fellows who were standing around watching Alan. “Look, kid,” said Varney one day, “I’m going to take you over to meet Clyde Swendson. Know who he is?” CLYDE SWENDSON— only one of the greatest swimming coaches in the world! Alan knew him by name, but with no slight hope of any closer acquaintance. The boy’s face was so intense, it was Varney who gulped. “Look, fellow — it’s nothing to get too excited about — or scared about, either. All I want you to do is your best — which I think is plenty good. But that’s me talkin’ — Swendson is a pretty hard guy to impress. Maybe you hadn’t better say anything to your folks yet, in case nothing comes of it — ” Then he’d gone to see the great man. . . . And something had come of it. “Tell your Mom you’re going to be pretty busy for the next three or four years.” He could imagine her face when he told her, all lit up with surprise and pride. He speeded the pumping of the bike’s pedals so that the dust flew up from under its tires and gave his still wet hair an even sandier color. Dive “Mom — Mom — where are you? Hey, Mom, bet you’d never guess what I’ve got to tell you!” Mrs. Ladd was a tiny woman. Somehow she’d never seemed to grow as big as her eyes or her dreams — dreams of her son Alan. She wasn’t nearly as surprised as he thought she’d be. Thirteen years before, in Hot Springs, Arkansas, Alan’s Mom had looked at her only son for the first time, and visioned greatness. The family was a poor one but her son would make his own advantages — and they would be big ones. When Alan was eight and the family fortunes were on the negative side, they’d trekked West. IT had taken them three weeks to make the trip to California. It hadn’t been all milk and honey. The Valley home was their third move in the interest of comfort; at first they had lived in Alhambra and then in Hollywood. The Hollywood house backed up to the Paramount Studios and sometimes young Alan was successful in hauling his patched trousers and scuffed shoes over the high fence to watch the actors at work on a sound stage. Even though it was never too long until some studio employee spied him and chased him off the lot, he'd been a little sorry when they’d moved “out in the country.” He’d forgotten all that when he learned to have his fun in a pool. And now, here he was, listening to Mona tell her husband the news that evening: “ — and I wouldn’t be surprised if he turned out to be one of the best swimmers in the whole world,” she finished. Alan’s stepfather was a man given neither to scoffing nor to swallowing such enthusiasm whole. The kid was a little young — still, faith had been said to move mountains, maybe it could also grow muscles. Meantime, coach Swendson was applying his belief in a more practical manner. “You’re going to be pretty busy — ” proved to be an understatement. Six days a week, after school until supper time, he kept the kid in the tank. A merciless schedule which left no time for any other usual boys’ activities. “I don’t know how, but you’re beginning to fill out your clothes — ” said Mom. “Maybe you’re just water soaked — ” Such spare time as he had, Alan spent swimming under the garage at home. “Dry” swimming in the sand which filled in between the hard ground and the raised wooden floor of the building. A better breast-stroke resulted — other gradual developments consisting of a bulge in the garage’s floor-planks and a warp in their landlord’s disposition. Most Spartan of all his training efforts was the two-plank arrangement he took to bed with him at night. A two-by-four strapped under each leg from knee to foot, the foot tied down flat. Breaking down the arch so that the foot has a perfect point from heel to toe is a painful process. . . . Lying awake in the dark, the kid reminded himself of the coach’s words: “You’re good, now — but what you’re going to be is great.” None of it was too hard, except explaining to the fellows at high school why he couldn’t go out for track or football or any of the other school games. For a freshman, who traditionally feels he is in the magic halls of high by mere suffrance anyhow, it was a little bitter. “S’matter, Frosh, no school spirit?” his superiors, the Sophs, would ask ( Continued on page 84) 82 Turn to Page 99 for the New Clothes Modeled by the Stars