Josephine Dillon

Although not many people know her name, it can be said that without her, there would be no Clark Gable's achievements in the film industry today.

Josephine Dillon was born on January 26, 1886 in Colorado (Bay of Lancaster, Wisconsin) on April 6, 1912 in Los Angeles and Florence, California. According to the United States Census of 1900, Josephine's family lived in Long Beach, California, where she had four sisters and a brother who lived with her and her parents and her maternal grandmother, Maria, and a servant named Yijie.

Dillon was a high school student in California public schools and graduated from Stanford University in 1908. After graduating from Stanford University, Dillon studied acting in Italy for a year and returned to the United States to work as an actor for Broadway actor Edward Everett Horton's stock company in New York.

According to Josephine Dillon's U.S. passport application dated December 27, 1918, she was hired as an actress at the time, following the death of her father, she had a younger brother, James Wolfensohn Dillon, who served in the 158th Infantry, and Josephine was planning a trip to Turkey for Humanitarian War Relief, the U.S. Committee for Armenian and Syrian Relief based in New York City. Her passport application went on to describe her as 5 '6.5 tall, with dark brown hair and hazel eyes.

After returning home, at some point, the United States ended her trip to Turkey, and Josephine Dillon traveled from California to the Pacific coast, where she founded Dove AG.

She met her future husband, movie star Clark Gable, in Portland, Oregon, and her job was to direct the stage play "The Red Lantern Players." At first, she was Gable's acting coach and patron (paying for his teeth fixed, hair grooming, etc.) Dillon subsequently moved to Hollywood, and in 1924, the same year, she and Gable married on December 12.

Dillon changed Gable's name to "Clark Gable," and the two became the most bizarre couple in Hollywood history.

After arriving in Hollywood, Dillon established the Dillon Corporation, and Gable began to have a small success in the film industry.

After her divorce from Gable, little is known about the rest of Dillon's life, although she still appeared in two films at the age of 60 in 1944. It should be noted that Dillon was seventeen years older than Gable at the time of their marriage. Gable allegedly claimed that their marriage was never consummated. After the divorce, the house Dillon lived in (located at 12746 Landau Street North Hollywood, California) belonged to Gable until 1960, when Gable died, according to his last wishes, leaving the house to her.

Although the U.S. census in 1900 and her death certificate state her birth year as 1884, Dillon's passport application form states her birth year as 1886.

She was allegedly buried in the cemetery of East Calvary in Los Angeles, California, at the age of 87.