Farley Earle Granger Sr. (1890 - 1978)

Born 29 Jun 1890 in Minneapolis, Hennepin, Minnesota, United States

Ancestors

Husband of Eva Mae (Hopkins) Granger — married 12 Jul 1912 in Alameda, California, United States

Died 7 May 1978 at age 87 in Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California, United States

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Biography

Farley Granger, Sr. was the father of the film actor of the same name, Farley Granger.

Farley was born 29 June 1890 in Minneapolis, Minnesota, the son of Clarence Albert Granger and Clara Hall.^[1]

As a youth, Farley set off for California, where he was married to Eva Hopkins. Farley and Eva were married on the same day as Farley's cousin. The cousins severed as each other's best man, as the following article explains:^[2]

"Alameda, July 12--When Elmer E. Chase Jr. of San Jose this afternoon assisted his cousin, Farley Earl Granger of San Jose, as best man at the wedding that united Granger and Miss Eva Mae Hopkins of Salt Lake City, he insisted that the newly made Benedick should perform the same office for him. Thus it was that Granger attended Chase when he claimed Miss Lesley Greig, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. James Greig, as his bride at the 4 o'clock ceremony, the announcement of which will be a great surprise to many friends of the bride."

"In Christ Episcopal Church at 1 o'clock, Rev. Fletcher Cook read the service which made Miss Hopkins the bride of Granger.[....] The young couples will spend their honeymoons together and are planning to make their homes in San Jose, where the bridegrooms are engaged in business."

They were the parents of one son, named for his father, Farley Earle Granger, Jr.

At one point, when his son was young, Farley Sr. owned "a Willys-Overland automobile dealership, and the family frequently spent time at their beach house in Capitola. Following the stock market crash in 1929, the Grangers were forced to sell both their homes and most of their personal belongings and move into an apartment above the family business, where they remained for the next two years.^[3] As a result of this financial setback and the loss of their social status." Farley Sr. and his wife "began to drink heavily. Eventually the remainder of their possessions were sold at auction to settle their debts, and the elder Granger used the last car on his lot to spirit away the family to Los Angeles in the middle of the night."^[4]

"The family settled in a small apartment in a seedy part of Hollywood,^[5] and Farley and his wife worked at various temporary jobs. Their drinking increased, and the couple frequently fought. Hoping their son might become a tap dancer, Farley Jr.'s mother enrolled him at Ethel Meglin's, the dance and drama instruction studio where Judy Garland and Shirley Temple had started."^[6]

Farley Sr. "found work as a clerk in the North Hollywood branch of the California Department of Unemployment, and his salary allowed him to put a small down payment on a house in Studio City, where their neighbor was actor/dancer Donald O'Connor. At his office, Granger's father became acquainted with unemployment benefits recipient Harry Langdon, who advised him to take his son to a small local theatre where open auditions for The Wookie, a British play about Londoners struggling to survive during World War II, were being held. Granger's use of a Cockney accent impressed the director, and he was cast in multiple roles. The opening night audience included talent agent Phil Gersh and Samuel Goldwyn casting director Bob McIntyre, and the following morning Gersh contacted Granger's parents and asked them to bring him to his office that afternoon to discuss the role of Damian, a teenaged Russian boy in the film The North Star."^[7]

Farley Sr. died 7 May 1978 in Los Angeles, California.^[8]

Sources

1. ↑ "Minnesota Births and Christenings, 1840-1980", database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:FDMZ-J2Q : 5 February 2020), Farley Earle Granger, 1890.
2. ↑ San Francisco Call, Volume 112, Number 43, 13 July 1912.
3. ↑ "United States Census, 1930," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:XCNY-SKB : accessed 12 April 2020), Farley E Granger in household of Farley Granger, San Jose, Santa Clara, California, United States; citing enumeration district (ED) ED 66, sheet 2A, line 24, family 24, NARA microfilm publication T626 (Washington D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 2002), roll 219; FHL microfilm 2,339,954.
4. ↑ Farley Granger, Jr. on Wikipedia.
5. ↑ "United States Census, 1940," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:K9HL-B8Q : 27 July 2019), Farley E Granger in household of Farley E Granger, Councilmanic District 1, Los Angeles, Los Angeles Township, Los Angeles, California, United States; citing enumeration district (ED) 60-1317, sheet 4B, line 62, family 102, Sixteenth Census of the United States, 1940, NARA digital publication T627. Records of the Bureau of the Census, 1790 - 2007, RG 29. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 2012, roll 377.
6. ↑ Farley Granger on Wikipedia.
7. ↑ Farley Granger on Wikipedia.
8. ↑ "California Death Index, 1940-1997," database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:VGTW-GTV : 26 November 2014), Farley Earl Granger, 07 May 1978; Department of Public Health Services, Sacramento.