Hal Baylor
American boxer and actor From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
American boxer and actor From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Hal Harvey Fieberling[1] (born Hal David Britton; December 10, 1918[2] – January 15, 1998)[3] known by his stage name Hal Baylor, was an American boxer and screen character actor. He had a professional boxing record of 16-8-3,[4] and later appeared in 76 films and over 500 episodes of various television shows.[5]
Hal Baylor | |
|---|---|
Hal Baylor in 1956. | |
| Born | Hal David Britton December 10, 1918 San Antonio, Texas, U.S. |
| Died | January 15, 1998 (aged 79) |
| Other names | Hal Fieberling |
| Education | Washington State College (attended) |
| Alma mater | Chico State College (attended) |
| Occupation(s) | Boxer, actor |
| Years active | 1940-1947 (boxer) 1948-1978 (actor) |
| Spouses |
|
| Children | 2 |
Born in San Antonio, Texas to David Locke Britton and Thelma Hallie Bowles,[2] he grew up in Oakland, California[6][7] when his mother remarried to Walter H. Fieberling during January 1925.[8] After Oakland High School, he attended Chico State College where he played on the football team.[9] He transferred to Washington State College in the Fall of 1938, where he pledged Phi Delta Theta.[10] But by December 1939 he was working as an apprentice butcher in a meat market on 14th Street in Oakland.[11]
Fieberling had his first amateur fight in San Francisco, during June 1938, while still a college student.[12] Representing the Athens Athletic Club of Oakland, he won the State Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) novice heavyweight title in a single bout on points.[13] A newspaper report on his first boxing match mentioned he was left-handed.[13] He repeated the triumph in August 1939, this time taking the State AAU heavyweight title by knocking out 6' 6" 225 lb. Jack Hillman of the San Francisco Olympic Club.[14][15] However, the following month he lost a rematch on points to Hillman, his first amateur defeat.[16]
After just five amateur fights, Fieberling signed a professional contract with manager Ray Carlen in May 1940.[17] He kayoed Phil Latonia in the third round for his first professional win,[18] and three weeks later did the same to Bob Schaunbelt.[19][20] Sportswriters labeled him "the butcher boy"[21][22] and printed photos of him at his daytime job.[23][24] Columnists also called him "Handsome Hal" and "Prince Hal" for his good looks.[21][25]
Over the years reports of his height varied from 6' 2" (188 cm) to 6' 4 1/2" (194 cm).[26] All his matches were as a heavyweight, with his weight varying from a pre-boxing high of 227 lbs. (103 kg),[12] to a low of 189 lbs. (85.7 kg) after his return from the Pacific War.[27] Following the war he resumed professional boxing, until he busted his hand in a 1947 fight with Dutch Culbertson.[28] His career record was 52-5 as an amateur[fn 1] and 16-8-3 as a professional.[4] Sports columnist Eddie Muller said years after Fieberling left the ring that "he didn't amount to much because he never took the game too seriously".[29]
Fieberling was a private at a US Marine Corps recruit depot during January 1943,[30] making the rank of sergeant by November 1943.[1] He was assigned stateside through April 1944, enabling him to continue boxing.[31] He took part in the landings on Saipan and Tinian,[26][32] finishing the war as a Staff Sergeant with the 18th Anti-Aircraft Artillery Battalion.[33]
Fieberling began his acting career in the 1948 boxing film Joe Palooka in Winner Take All. The film's star, Joe Kirkwood, had spotted him at a boxing arena.[34] During filming of a boxing scene Kirkwood threw the wrong choreographed punch and Fieberling accidentally kayoed him.[34] Fieberling was an official witness a year later when Kirkwood took his final exam for U.S. naturalization.[35]
The Set-Up (1949) was Fieberling's third film and first credited role. The picture included the entirety of a four-round bout between star Robert Ryan, portraying a second-rate pug on the skids, and Fieberling, playing a mob-controlled fighter. Reviewers praised the realism of the boxing and the lack of cliches.[36][37] Ryan told a columnist that shooting the bout with Fieberling took 10 days to capture 11 minutes of filming.[38] "Each afternoon I went home with a headache. Fieberling hits hard. Once Hal knocked me cold for several seconds. He gave me a black eye, mussed up my nose, and made me glad I didn't follow boxing as a profession."[38] Fieberling said of Ryan: "There's one actor who can go more than two rounds in the Mocambo."[28][fn 2]
Fieberling received more publicity nationwide from The Set-Up than he ever had from his boxing career, which had been confined to California. He had three more films released during 1949,[39][40][41] one of which, Sands of Iwo Jima, was considered his most remembered film role.[4]
In March 1950 Fieberling made his earliest known television appearance, when he and his then wife along with three other couples guested on The Frank Webb Show, a local program on KFI-TV Channel 9 in Los Angeles.[42] Later that year he performed on two episodes of The Lone Ranger. Television would prove very lucrative, but it also diminished his standing with neighbor kids, one of who told him: "You're not so tough. I saw the Lone Ranger beat the stuffing out of you".[43]
By 1952 he decided to adopt the stage name "Hal Baylor" as he felt it was "easier to spell and pronounce than Fieberling".[44] The choice was meant to honor his great-great-grandfather, Robert E. B. Baylor, the founder of Baylor University.[45]
Oakland sportswriter Alan Ward said of Baylor in late 1957: "He works constantly and remuneratively in movies and television... He has the face and structure of a college football hero but Hollywood usually casts him as a villain. A baby-faced villain. And invariably in westerns."[44] Thirteen years later, he echoed the same thoughts on Baylor in another column: "Readers have seen Hal Baylor, nee Fieberling, on movie and TV screens scores of times. Usually he's the villain, rarely a hero".[46] Baylor agreed with the assessment of his career: "Recently I had a sympathetic part and got to kiss the girl. It was quite a departure from the norm. As a rule I'm the complete heel".[46]
From 1959 he made television commercials for Kellogg's OK breakfast cereal as Big Otis the Scotsman until he was replaced by Yogi Bear.[47]
Baylor's last film performances came in 1975, with three movies released that year: A Boy and His Dog, Cornbread, Earl and Me, and Hustle. His last television work was an episode of CHiPs broadcast during 1978.
“Like Elam and Van Cleef, Hal is a very pleasant fellow off screen. He has the quiet gentle manner of a man who doesn't have to prove anything to anyone. He bears no marks from his prize-fighting career, or his countless on-camera brawls. "You name the actor" he said resignedly, "he's beaten me up". John Wayne, John Payne, Robert Ryan, Robert Mitchum are naturally on the list. And Tab Hunter. "He gave me a sound thrashing," Hal said deadpan.” —Interview in Anaheim Bulletin[5]
He was the founder and longtime president of a charitable organization called The Spotlighters,[fn 3] consisting of show business personalties who raised money for the San Fernando Valley Youth Center.[48][49][50] He also took part in celebrity golf tournaments benefiting charities.[51][52] He was a partner in an exclusive outdoor sports development near Jackson Hole, Wyoming and told sportswriter Alan Ward: "Someday I'll retire there and hunt and fish and watch the late, late movies."[46] In 1983 Baylor donated scripts and photos from his career to the American Heritage Center of the University of Wyoming.[32] Baylor died in Los Angeles on January 15, 1998.[3]
Fieberling married Jacqueline Anstey, whom he had known at Oakland High School, on February 3, 1940 in Reno, Nevada.[53] They had a son Michael, born in late 1941, before separating on May 15, 1942.[54] She filed for divorce and was granted preliminary alimony and child support on May 27, 1942.[54]
While a sergeant in the USMC, stationed in San Diego, Fieberling married Margaret Jeanne MacLean in Los Angeles, on November 27, 1943.[1] They had a daughter Paula in August 1955.[55]
Hal Baylor and Shirley Hickey (née Croose), were married on August 14, 1965.[56][57]
| Year | Title | Role | Notes & Cites |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1948 | Joe Palooka in Winner Take All | Sammy Talbot | Uncredited.[58] |
| In This Corner | Uncredited.[58] | ||
| 1949 | The Set-Up | Tiger Nelson | The screenplay was by Art Cohn, a former Oakland sportswriter, who had covered Fieberling's early boxing career.[36] |
| The Crooked Way | Coke | [39] | |
| Yes Sir, That's My Baby | Pudge Flugeldorfer | Fieberling is a married football-playing G.I. Bill student at a small college.[40] | |
| Sands of Iwo Jima | Pvt. 'Sky' Choynski | [41] | |
| 1950 | Destination Big House | Bill Storm | Uncredited |
| Dial 1119[fn 4] | Lt. 'Whitey' Tallman | [34] | |
| Joe Palooka in the Squared Circle | Pinky Thompson | ||
| For Heaven's Sake | Expectant Father | Uncredited | |
| 1951 | Inside Straight | Foreman | Uncredited |
| Up Front | Smitty | Uncredited | |
| The Guy Who Came Back | Navy Man | Uncredited | |
| Jim Thorpe – All-American | Player | Uncredited | |
| Year | Title | Role | Notes & Cites |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1951 | The Wild Blue Yonder | Sgt. Eric Nelson | [59] |
| 1952 | Fort Osage | Olaf Christensen | Uncredited |
| Down Among the Sheltering Palms | Soldier | Uncredited | |
| Breakdown | Joe Thompson | Plays champ | |
| Big Jim McLain | Poke | [26] | |
| One Minute to Zero | Pvt. Jones | [60] | |
| 1953 | The Sun Shines Bright | Rufe Ramseur Jr. | [61] |
| Woman They Almost Lynched | Zed | Uncredited | |
| Champ for a Day | 'Soldier' Freeman | [62] | |
| 99 River Street | Sailor Braxton | Uncredited | |
| Island in the Sky | Stankowski | ||
| Hot News | Augie Grotz | [63] | |
| Flight Nurse | Sgt. Jimmy Case | [64] | |
| 1954 | Prince Valiant | Prison Guard | Uncredited |
| River of No Return | Young Punk | Uncredited.[65] | |
| Tobor the Great | Max | ||
| This Is My Love | Eddie Collins | [66] | |
| Black Tuesday | Lou Mehrtens | ||
| 1955 | Outlaw Treasure | Ace Harkey | |
| 1956 | Away All Boats | Chaplain Hughes | Sports columnist Alan Ward expressed surprise at Baylor playing a Navy chaplain.[67] |
| The Burning Hills | Braun | Baylor plays a hired gunfighter.[68] | |
| 1957 | Kiss Them for Me | Big Marine in Nightclub | Uncredited |
| 1958 | The Young Lions | Pvt. Burnecker | |
| 1959 | Operation Petticoat | Military Police Sergeant | Uncredited |
| 1963 | Johnny Cool | Gambler | Uncredited |
| 1964 | Quick, Before It Melts | Prison Guard | |
| 1967 | The Gnome-Mobile | Male Nurse | Uncredited |
| Fitzwilly | Motorcycle Cop | Uncredited | |
| 1970 | The Cheyenne Social Club | Barkeep at Lady of Egypt | |
| WUSA | Shorty | ||
| 1971 | The Barefoot Executive | Policeman | |
| The Grissom Gang | Chief McLaine | [69] | |
| Evel Knievel | Sheriff | [70] | |
| 1972 | Pickup on 101 | Railroad cop | |
| Ulzana's Raid | Curtis | Uncredited | |
| 1973 | Emperor of the North | Yardman's Helper | [71] |
| One Little Indian | Branigan | ||
| 1974 | Herbie Rides Again | Demolition Truck Driver | |
| The Bears and I | Foreman | [72] | |
| 1975 | A Boy and His Dog | Michael | Baylor played a killer android in this post-apocalyptic cult favorite. |
| Cornbread, Earl and Me | Mr. Wilson | ||
| Hustle | Police Captain | ||
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