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Once Famous Film Star
Now Clerk In S. F. Hotel
"Bronco Billy" Anderson Quit Movies With
Fortune; Writing May Be Next Career
"WHATEVER became of 'Bronco Billy' An-
V deraon?" is a question often asked when
the old-time movie and theatrical fans gather.
He was the swaggering, gun-toting bronco-busting
hero of two decades ago; the man who con
trolled the destinies of the old Essanay studios,
when movies were in their infancy. It was
"Bronco Billy," Gilbert M. Anderson, who first
saw the possibilities of such world-famed stars as
Charlie Chaplin. Gloria Swanson, the Talmadge
sisters, Mabel Normand, Pearl White, and others
too numerous to mention.
He started them on their road to fame early in
the century when he, in company with George K.
Spoor, started the
old Essanay pioneer
flicker factory at
Niles, California.
Spoor was the "S,"
and Anderson the
"A," of that historic
company.
The answer to the
question was found
recently when an
inquiring reporter,
acting on a tip,
dropped into a ho
tel in San Francisco.
Anderson has a
job, but it is noth
ing like the old days
when he controlled
the destinies of
thousands of studio
workers. His pres
ent position calls for
simple duties such
as answering the
telephone, bossing the bell boys and chatting with .
the rather elderly people who make this quiet,
family hotel their home.
For all his present humble surroundings, Ander
son makes it evident that he does not entirely con
sider himself a back number.
A little disconcerted at first when his identity
was established, he finally consented to give a
short interview. He talked of the old days when
he was the glamorous hero of every red-blooded
American youngster.
A battered typewriter sat on a massive desk and
piles of manuscript lay haphazardly about the
room. Anderson was not enthusiastic about telling
his plans for the future, but, as he once was a
writer as well as a producer, manager and actor,
it is to be surmised that he is planning a come
back as a scenario writer.
He had some interesting remarks to make on the
future of Western pictures,, in which he formerly
held the supreme position.
"There is no doubt," he said, "that they are due
for a new era in a more elaborate form. The mod
ern talking pictures have reached a degree of per
fection which we never dreamed of in the old days.
"However,' they lack something of the verve and
spontaneity of our earlier efforts.
"It is my opinion that a great deal can be done
with Western pictures if the right director is found
and allowed to carry out this system, with certain
improvements."
Anderson's long association with the motion pic
ture and theatrical business has been fraught with
many disillusions and disappointments.
Even before the turn of the century Anderson
was working with Thomas Edison in the labor
atory which was to produce the first motion pic
ture. During the years 1906 to 1916 he was virtually
in control of the Essanay studios. At the end of
that time he gave up his interest to enter the field
of theatrical production. He was reputed to be
worth in the neighborhood of $2,000,000.
Bronco Billy"
' Inspiration for Peter B. Kyne's series of "Cappy Ricks" stories was Captain Ralph Peasley, snown above with Mrs.
Peasley and their favorite ship, the Vigilant. Yes, Captain Peasley Is the real life counterpart of Kyne's beloved "Matt
Peasley," but he's retired from the sea now rather than take a command In steam.
Exploits of Captain Peasley Rival
'Cappy Rides' Tales' He Inspired
Reports of' Sailing Vessel Master Made 25 Years Ago When Peter B. Kyne Was a Shipping Cierk
Were Foundation For Novelist's Famous Series of Sea Yarns
MEET Captain Matt Peasley, resourceful and
two-fisted skipper of the "Blue Star" fleet
in real life Captain Ralph E. Peasley, of Aberdeen,
Washington.
Peter B. Kyne pictured Peasley exactly as he
is stalwart, keen of eye, vigorous, friendly and
a masterful sailing man. When you read Kyne's
"Cappy Ricks" stories of romantic Pacific Coast
shipping, you get a perfect view of Captain Peas
ley, even as he is today.
The tall mariner has quit the sea temporarily,
at least but if the sailing ships were abroad again
the chances are he would be right back at his old
command. Not even Mrs. Peasley could keep him
ashore. In fact, Mr's. Peasley probably would go
along!
It has been quite awhile since Captain Peasley
and Peter B. Kyne first met, but the passing years
have served only to enhance Kyne's "Cappy Ricks"
characters and build around Captain Peasley an
admiring aura of fame and popularity that makes
him a chosen man wherever he goes.
In his home region of Grays Harbor, he is a
favorite without reservation. Shortly after he re
tired from the sea he ran for port commissioner
and was elected by an enormous majority. Right
now he 'is serving the state as district inspector
for the liquor control board and that is a job
that requires as much application and hard work
as running a ship. Only recently the Aberdeen
Pioneers Association elected him president for
1936.
IT MAY have been Peasley who gave Kyne his
first real start in the writing game. The skipper
does not know. He does know that he first knew
Kyne some 35 years ago when the future author
was clerk or secretary in the main office of Dolbeer
and Carson, San Francisco shipping firm, and Peas
ley was skipper of one of the company's windjam
mers. Among Kyne's many duties at that time was
to peruse reports sent in by the fleet masters. He
was immediately attracted by Captain Peasley's.
They were of such concise and original nature
that in them Kyne found inspiration and subject
matter for what ten years later flowed from his
pen as the story of Matt Peasley, Cappy Ricks and
the latter's beautiful daughter.
"Aw, they call me Matt wherever I go, all right,"
said Captain Peasley, "but Kyne's stories are
mostly all fiction. No skipper could be as good as
that fellow Matt. No shipowner could have so much
fun as Cappy Ricks, but that isn't saying we don't
like to read about them. I know Mrs. Peasley and
I do."
As depicted in Kyne's novel, Peasley's marriage
to the shipping magnate's daughter was a roman
tic event, and as it applies to the real Captain
Peasley's marriage it is not wholly imaginary. Mrs.
Peasley's father was Captain James Dalton, promi
nent in Grays Harbor lumbering and shipping
circles, and she grew up among sawmills and ships.
They were married in 1903, shortly after a great
fire leveled the business district of Aberdeen. Cap
tain Peasley had brought the schooner Wawona
into Willapa harbor for a cargo of lumber, and
while she was burdening there the skipper went
by train to Aberdeen to claim his bride. Their
wedding trip consisted of a brief train journey to
Seattletwo days or so and then they headed
for home. At Gate City they separated, Captain
Peasley taking another train to Raymond, whence
he sailed the following day. At that time he was
sailing the Wawona in the coastwise trade, but,
at that, it was six weeks before he saw his bride
again.
IT WAS some years later that Mrs. Peasley tired
of sitting at home waiting, and decided she would
go to sea, too. So with him she went, and for nearly
two decades the Peasleys sailed together to Hono
lulu, to Callao, to Newcastle and a host of other
ports of the Pacific.
"Yes," said Mrs. Peasley, "I was a poor sailor
at first. But I got so I could 'take it' with the rest
of them. I can remember one time when we were
standing out to sea at Cape Flattery. It was so
rough that every sailor aboard was more or less
sick, but not I. That was after I had gotten my
sea-legs."
Captain Peasley sailed many windjammers in
his 40 years pn the Pacific. Among them were the
four-master Mary E. Foster, the schooner Fred J.
Wood, the schooner Louis, first five-master on the
Pacific Coast and named after Louis Simpson, San
Francisco ship and millowner; the Wawona, Mel
ancton and Vigilant, and many others.
Of them all, both Captain and Mrs. PeaBley like
the big, fast-stepping schooner Vigilant the best.
They took this finely appointed five-master on her
maiden voyage In 1920 and sailed her for nine
years, mostly in the Honolulu lumber trade. She
is still operating between Bcllingham, Wash., and
Honolulu. When the E. K. Wood Lumber Company
of Bellingham and Hoquiam sold her some six
years ago, the firm offered Captain Peasley a Bteam
command, but he would not take it. He retired
rather than go in for steam.
In his four decades as a sailing man on the Pa
cific, nearly 35 years of which were as master,
Captain Peasley never had a wreck. He came close
once on a reef off the coast of Australia, and an
other time in a boisterous blow inside the Straits
of Juan de Fuca, but both times good seamanship
cheated the sea of its prey.
BORN in Maine, Captain Peasley comes of a long
line of seafaring men. Like his ancestors, he
went to sea at a tender age and at 22 he was en
trusted with his first command. Most of his sea
faring life he spent on the Pacific, and to South
Africa he went only in Kyne's imagination, there
to further the "Blue Star" line's interests by sub
duing that redoubtable person called "All-Hands-and-Feet"
The roughest sea Captain Peasley ever experi
enced was in late January, 1921, when he was a
few hundred miles off the ccfaat of Washington
with the schooner Vigilant. A hurricane blew up,
the same storm that felled billions of feet of West
ern Washington timber.
The log of that voyage tells a vivid story of a
tumultuous sea after the barometer skidded to
29.01 and a gale of 100-mile intensity raged for
four hours. Mrs. Peasley was along, and she says
it was a harrowing experience, although the stout
Vigilant survived without great damage.
Recently the sturdy Vigilant was reported long
overdue in a bad storm. En route to Honolulu from
Seattle, she was out 53 days before word was heard
on the Pacific Coast of her. Captain Peasley's faith
in the staunch craft was vindicated, however, when
she limped into port, pretty well battered, but still
sailing. A couple of seamen were hurt in the raging
seas which smashed over the Vigilant.
On Grays Harbor there are legendary tales of
windjammer skippers who sailed their ships right
up to the docks at Hoquiam and Aberdt'P. TYz.
is a matter of some 12 miles of what was Uien tor
tuous channel. It is not all legend. Twenty years
ago Captain Peasley sailed the schooner Fred J.
Wood over the bar and almost up to Hoquiam.
"I could have warped her up to the dock at
Blagen's mill, I think," said Peasley, "but r. dredge
was squatted right in the middle of the channel
at Grays Harbor City and we had to let ;he tug
boat hook on. That tug had tried to keep up with
us all the way from Westport, and believo me, we
gave them a race!"
CAPTAIN PEASLEY is a vigorous man, young
looking and with ever a twinkle in his keen
eyes. He stands about six feet three inches and has
the straight figure of youth. His famous mustache
and shock of black hair are but slightly touched
with gray. Before he started on his new job with
the state liquor control board he was a faithful
attendant at meetings of the Aberdeen lodge of
Elks, where a special seat was always his.
Before the war he and Kyne met occasionally,
but for many years now the famous writer aiiJ
noted mariner have never crossed trails. If and
when they do, there should result an interesting
reunion and a fine picture for the newspapers.
K BUD LANDI?
BUD: Now our first contestant. A little closer
to the mircrophone please you're not very tall.
AMATEUR: I'm a little short this week but I'll
be all right payday.
BUD: That was a quick comeback, young lady.
Ever been on the. air before.
A.: Once, February twenty-ninth.
BUD: Leap Year day, eh? All right, if you do
well today, I'll see that you get a chance to broad
cast every February twenty-ninth.
A.: I'd love steady work, but I couldn't plunge
into it like that. Maybe I'd better get my experi
ence gradually.
BUD: If you're going to be a radio star you
might as well get used to it.
A.: I couldn't get material together that fast. It's
no snap grinding out jokes Leap Year in and Leap
Year out.
BUD: Don't worry, the public mind turns over
every three years. That means you have a' year's
grace and can use the same gags over and over.
A.: Just like professionals?
BUD: Sure. If your stuff becomes well seasoned
you might even got a sponsor.
A.: I'd rather use new gags and retain my ama
teur standing.
BUD: As you like. Tell me, are you married?
A.: No, it's just mike-fright that makes me look
so sad.
BUD: Come now, this Is Leap Year your big
chance to take a husband.
A.: Whose husband shall I take?
BUD: I mean, pick out a young man and pop the
question a quick wedding is half the battle.
A. : Not for me, life's too short.
BUD: Married people live longer.
A.: No they don't it only seems longer.
BUD: Anyway, think it over. If you get tc be a
radio star it will be great to tell your children
about it in later years.
A.: I'd rather stay single and tell my grand
children how much fun I had!
Sound: BONG!
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