Radio and television mirror (Nov 1939-Apr 1940)

The action of Ex-Lax is thorough, yet gentle! No shock. No strain. No weakening after-effects. Just an easy, comfortable bowel movement that brings blessed relief. Try Ex-Lax next time you need a laxative. It's good for every member of the family. 101 and 2Si Enchanted Love (Continued from page 11) called Meanie. Breathless with excitement she spoke to him. "Can you win this race?" she asked. Track rules, of course, forbade him answering such a question. His valet, however, spoke up promptly. "Sure he can, little lady!" he said with confidence. "Want him to win it for you?" "Oh, yesl" she pleaded. "That would be wonderful!" "Okay, then, it's in the bag," the valet told her. Back she flew to her father and coaxed a dollar from him "for a hot dog and a bottle of pop." The chum wheedled a like amount from her dad and together they made their first horse race bet — $2.00 on Meanie to win. Meanie with J. Westrope up romped in by six lengths and paid $20.20 for every two dollars on his nose. It was a veritable fortune to the little girls but the money was nothing to Eschol compared with the great honor which had been done her. Back she ran to the jockey's room to thank him. Her profuse gratitude left him red with embarrassment and he strode off mumbling something about "okay, it was nothing." "Isn't he wonderful?" Eschol murmured to her chum. "Isn't she wonderful?" Jackie demanded of the startled stranger he bumped into on his way out. Dared by her chum, Eschol telephoned him the next day, using the handy excuse of again thanking him for winning the race for her. The next day he telephoned her. Then it was time for her to go home. She did not see him again until the winter of 1934. IN the summer of that year she came to Hollywood with her mother for a vacation. Mrs. Miller had played in pictures nine years before and in renewing old friendships, called upon her agent. Two weeks later her young daughter had a contract and a new name. Breaking into the movies was as simple as that for Nan. Quite as simply, too, was she destined to win the coveted role of Kathy in "Those We Love" which, four years later, was to prove such a favorite story of radio audiences. She was spotted by a producer on her first air appearance in the Lux Theater presentation of "She Loves Me Not" with Bing Crosby and Joan Blondell and promptly was signed as Kathy. Exciting as her debut in the movies was, one little thought kept prodding at the back of Nan's mind: how and where was a boy named Jackie Westrope? Day by day his image grew in her heart. She spent Christmas of 1934 with her father in Houston. One day he was thumbing through a racing form. "Guess who is riding at Santa Anita?" he teased Nan, thinking of her puppy-love crush of the year before. "None other than your old beau, Jackie Westrope." The hours dragged until Nan could get back to California where her hero was riding a stone's throw from Hollywood. Again she made the first move, sending him a note. Quite obviously Jackie had not forgotten her, for he telephoned promptly and came to call on her that very night, bring 58 ing as a gift a gadget bracelet. "Jackie gave me a magnificent diamond bracelet this Christmas," Nan said, "but lovely as it is, that first junky bit of jewelry still is infinitely more precious to me." A romance of any significance between a fourteen-year-old girl and an eighteen-year-old boy might seem difficult to credit were it not for one thing: Nan always had dressed and looked older than her real age and she took good care Jackie did not discover the truth! At that time he believed her to be sixteen and, in fact, did not learn her real age until a short time before their marriage. TWO golden years slipped by with 1 them having dates whenever possible. The nature of his career perforce took him away from Hollywood many months at a time, for a jockey must follow the seasons at the scattered tracks throughout the country. They wrote each other faithfully, however, and kept a standing telephone date each Sunday night. Twice he flew across the continent to spend a few glorious days at her side. Then the ugly thing happened which threatened to ruin their idyllic happiness. They speak freely of it now but it wounded them deeply at the time. Snobbish busybodies sat in judgment on the romance and said "Thumbs down!" By innuendo and sneering cracks, Jackie was accused of fortune hunting and trying to trade on Nan's fastgrowing fame! The charge manifestly was unfair on both counts. J. Westrope was a national figure in his profession long before the name of Nan Grey was born that afternoon in an agent's office and his fan following numbered in the hundreds of thousands. Further, it is no secret a successful jockey makes very good money indeed. Many a sunny afternoon Jackie earned a cool $5,000 or $10,000 for a single race and his annual income tax receipt would give many a movie star a first class case of the envies! Nan had social prejudice to fight. It would ruin her career, she was told by self-appointed advisors (and her studio bosses were not among them!) if she continued to associate with a jockey and to marry him would be tantamount to signing a Hollywood death warrant. Definitely he was out of her class! Nan's blunt answer always was the same. She had known and loved Jackie long before the movies played any part in her life, she said. Further, the profession of jockey was an honorable one and quite as important in the scheme of things as acting before a camera. Any criticism on that score was intolerable to her. Staunch in their love and faith, Nan and Jackie weathered the storm of prejudice and disapproval and became engaged on a February afternoon in 1938. After a year's engagement they decided to be married in Phoenix, Arizona, on May 4, 1939, when Nan would have fifteen free days before starting her new picture, "The Underpup." A business manager was sent ahead to complete the arrangements. At the last minute Nan was RADIO AND TELEVISION MIRROR