John Wayne: The Life and Legend (25 page)

Krampe was never sure if the fight—such as it was—lasted eight minutes or twenty minutes. All he knew was that after chasing him and fruitlessly swinging for a long, long time, the man from Texas A&M collapsed from exhaustion and an equally exhausted Krampe fell on top of him. He was the winner, sort of, and received a copper bracelet for his troubles.

Krampe remembered the experience all his long life. Shortly thereafter, he became one of the youngest drill instructors in Marine Corps history. Under the name Hugh O’Brian, he became a TV star in the 1950s and, more than thirty years after the match in San Diego, would be part of John Wayne’s last movie.

Just before he began work on
Reap the Wild Wind,
Wayne filled out his Selective Service questionnaire. He gave his name as “Marion Mitchell Morrison (John Wayne).” On June 24, 1941, the draft board classified him 3-A (registrant with dependents).

That’s how it stayed until December 3, 1943, when he was reclassified 2-A, after a deferment claim was filed by a third party—undoubtedly Herbert Yates and Republic. The 2-A classification meant that the registrant had a talent or skill not replaceable by another person, a corollary to the government’s rating of the film business as an essential industry for reasons of propaganda and morale.

Wayne’s 2-A classification was good for six months, but another third-party request for a deferment was filed a couple of weeks later. Yet another third-party deferment request was filed on April 16, 1944, but the December 1943 deferment had run out before the board could classify the request, so Wayne was classified 1-A on May 3, 1944. On June 12, the April deferment request was acted upon, and Wayne was again downgraded to 2-A. Third-party deferments continued to be filed until May 1945, just as the war was ending, at which time Wayne was classified 4-A: deferred by reason of age. At this point, Wayne was thirty-eight years old.

In practice, the government’s preference toward the movie industry meant that almost any actor or studio employee deemed important could receive an occupational deferment. Stars who served in combat usually enlisted. But many actors didn’t want to claim deferments.

Like Wayne, Gene Autry was under contract to Republic. Autry was thirty-five at the time of Pearl Harbor, married with no children, albeit with three dependents (two sisters and a brother). Autry related how Herbert Yates tried to talk him out of enlisting: “This is an essential industry. We can go to Washington and get you a deferment. You won’t be touched.” But Autry told Yates, “I can’t stay out. It would make me look bad and the movie business look bad.”

Describing his thought processes, Autry wrote “There was nothing noble about it. I would have much rather kept counting my money and firing blanks. But there didn’t seem to me to be any choice. If you were healthy, and able, you either served or you learned how to shave in the dark.”

Autry went into the Army Air Corps in 1942, which only made Yates more determined to keep Wayne at Republic. Truthfully, every studio head was panicked about having their prime corporate assets disappear for a couple of years (at best). Mickey Rooney remembered that “L. B. Mayer didn’t want me going into the service; he didn’t want
anybody
going into the service.” MGM had withheld a telegram from General Hap Arnold, the Air Force chief of staff, offering Clark Gable “a highly important commission.” Even though he was over forty, Gable enlisted in the Air Force in August 1942—Gable’s friend Robert Stack believed he was suicidal over the death of his wife, Carole Lombard. Gable went through a grueling basic training in Miami with men half his age and flew a number of bombing missions as an aerial gunner.

Many actors refused the deferments they could have had for the asking—Henry Fonda was thirty-seven years old with three children when he enlisted in the Air Corps in 1942. Robert Montgomery enlisted in the Navy, as did Douglas Fairbanks Jr. Tyrone Power enlisted in the Marines, William Holden went into the Army. Stars that didn’t go—Gary Cooper, Bing Crosby, James Cagney, among others—were over forty.

Over the years, a fairly extensive list of reasons would be offered by Wayne and family members regarding his rigorously maintained noncombatant status, ranging from old football injuries to extensive dependents. It’s certainly true that in the early days of the war, Selective Service made an effort not to disrupt families, but as the war ground on, and local draft boards had to meet increased quotas, it became normal for fathers to be inducted. By 1944, manpower needs were so extensive that distinctions between men who were fathers and men who weren’t had ceased to exist as far as Selective Service was concerned.

Amidst the profusion of reasons for Wayne not going into the service, the one that appears to be the most medically valid was the presence of a recurring ear infection. “He had an ear infection actually caused from . . . that film he made called
Reap the Wild Wind,”
said Michael Wayne. “It never left and every time he’d get in the water it would come back. So he was actually 4F.”

As studio archives attest, Wayne did indeed have a recurring ear infection, but then he didn’t have to go into the Navy.

Yet, contrary to those who feel it convenient to regard Wayne as a classic case of war wimp, it is clear that he did make some effort to get into the service. On August 2, 1943, he filled out an application for the OSS, under the name “Marion Robert Morrison (John Wayne).” The application stated that his nickname was Duke, that he was six feet three and three quarters inches tall, that he weighed 212 pounds, and that he used intoxicants “moderately.”

His memberships were listed as Sigma Chi fraternity, the Screen Actors Guild, the American Federation of Radio Artists, and the Hollywood Athletic Club. His foreign language was Latin, with a “slight” proficiency in speaking and a “fair” proficiency in reading. Sports and hobbies were listed as “swimming, above average; small boat sailing, average; football, played college ball at University of Southern California; squash and tennis, fair; deep-sea fishing, 7 marlin in two years; hunting, good field shot; horseback riding, have done falls and posse riding in pictures, not as easy as it sounds.”

His character references were impeccable and calculated to appeal to Wild Bill Donovan, the founder of the OSS: Commander John Ford, and Commander Frank Wead. Also used as references were Bö Roos, MGM producer and screenwriter James Kevin McGuinness, and Robert Smith, managing editor of the Los Angeles
Daily News
.

Wayne’s current Selective Service classification was left blank, and under particular qualifications he noted “Having a natural inclination and being suited physically and mentally to outdoor activity and having the ability to get along with any class of people might have a particular bearing on the position in which I might be of value to the Service.”

Wayne followed up, going to Washington to interview with Donovan personally. Irene Nelson was one of Donovan’s secretaries and remembered that “I couldn’t believe [Wayne] was sitting there, right next to me at my desk.”

What happened next is less a matter of record, more a matter of inference. According to Wayne, Ford introduced him to Donovan after first telling Donovan that Wayne would be good for something like the small boat work Sterling Hayden was doing in Cairo and Yugoslavia (Hayden was a superb sailor and organized a splinter fleet of schooners and caïques to run the German blockade). Wayne said that he had three pictures to make first and then wanted to “get in.” Donovan introduced him to a major whose name Wayne couldn’t remember.

Fade out.

Fade in.

Wayne has finished the three pictures and his marriage is on the rocks. He calls the major but has difficulty finding him. When he finally makes connections, the major is a colonel and asks why Wayne didn’t answer the letter.

“A letter?” asked Wayne.

“I sent you a letter,” said the colonel, “and said we were getting too many lieutenants and if you wanted to get in, you better get back here.”

In this telling, it was Josie’s fault for not forwarding the letter. But Irene Nelson, Donovan’s secretary, said that Donovan didn’t take Wayne because he didn’t think he had any of the outside interests that might qualify him for undercover work.

Between the documents and an anecdotal mélange of excuses including recurring ailments or missed communications, it’s possible to figure out a likely scenario.

In Wayne’s letters to John Ford during the first two years of the war, he speaks often of his desire to finish just a few more pictures before he enlists, and in a handwritten, undated letter that’s been provisionally ascribed to May 1942, he comes right out and asks for help: “Dear Pappy, Have you any suggestions on how I should get in? Can I get assigned to your outfit and if I could would you want me? How about the Marines? You have Army and Navy men under you—have you any Marines or how about a Seabee or what would you suggest? . . . I just hate to ask favors, but for Christ sake you can suggest can’t you!!!”

There is no response from Ford in either his or Wayne’s papers.

Wayne made thirteen pictures during World War II at four different studios, and his hard work during the war years, not to mention the attendant lack of competition from stars who were in the service, meant that his career was given a huge boost simply by his presence. The poor boy from Glendale was either deeply embarrassed by Donovan’s indifference to the offer of his services, or, alternatively, couldn’t tear himself away from his ascending success.

This could have been overlooked if Wayne had hurled himself into war work, as, for instance, John Garfield did in starting the Hollywood Canteen, or as Bob Hope did in ceaselessly entertaining the troops. But according to Mary Ford, who was at the Canteen all the time—she ran the kitchen—Wayne’s attendance was spotty. Besides making movies, he was divorcing his first wife, courting his second, and spending a lot of time with Ward Bond and other assorted cronies.

It’s probable that Wayne was emotionally committed to working under Ford’s command, was embarrassed about Donovan shying away from him at the height of the war, and simply wasn’t willing to enlist and take his chances. Certainly, he had an image of himself as an officer under Ford. But, as he would say, “I would have had to go in as a private. I took a dim view of that.”

Right after Christmas in 1943, Wayne embarked on a major USO tour to the southwest Pacific, from Brisbane, Australia, to New Guinea to New Britain, playing several shows a day and visiting hospitals. The tour lasted for several months, in a tough theater—New Guinea consisted of hard rock, soft mud, and natives who thought nothing of dining on human flesh if the supply of wild pigs ran low. As Keith Honaker, a soldier in New Britain, said, “Going into battle was a diversion for us. We had absolutely nothing to do from the standpoint of recreation—we didn’t even get newspapers, very seldom got any letters.”

Wayne would claim that the only time he was ever truly frightened in his life came in a very rough flight over the Coral Sea. “I thought it was pretty stormy, and when it became more than uncomfortable, I looked back at a bunch of fighter pilots that were being shipped to Nadzab, and I saw that their faces were paler than the moon.” Since the professionals were scared, Wayne felt he had leave to be terrified.

One of the men backing up Wayne in his show was Benjamin DeLoache, who later became a professor of voice at Yale. DeLoache was born in 1906 and made his debut in 1928 with Stokowski and the Philadelphia Orchestra. After that, he’d sung the American premiere of Alban Berg’s
Wozzeck.
During the war, he’d been entertaining troops in Alaska, then Australia. After he hooked up with Wayne’s unit, the star told him, “You know, Ben, I’d look like a fool if I put on that cowboy thing of mine. So there’s nothing I can do, really, but I can introduce you, and I’ll get you the biggest audiences that you ever sang for in your life.”

Some days they’d do seven and eight shows, with DeLoache singing songs from
Oklahoma!,
and Wayne closing things out with a stirring rendition of “Minnie the Moocher.” Then they’d go through the hospitals and talk to the men. “We were together a great, great deal,” remembered DeLoache, “and I got to know him very well. John was a man of remarkable humility. He never took any credit for anything that God had to do with. What I mean by that is, he knew what he had done about his career, but he also knew the things about his career that he had nothing to do with. He had a wonderful humility along with that very, very strong personality.”

Keith Honaker was a battalion adjutant on New Britain when he noticed a big man walking up a dusty road full of blown-up palm trees and bomb craters. The man was wearing a big hat and a Flying Tigers jacket. Honaker’s first thought was that it was a smart-ass GI, but it turned out to be John Wayne, whose first words were, “Partner, where is Fred Stofft?”

Fred Stofft, Duke’s pal from Glendale, was now a colonel commanding a battalion fighting in New Britain in an area called Arawe. Stofft had told people that Wayne and he had been childhood pals, but nobody believed him. Stofft came back from the front to be told there was somebody who wanted to see him in the shower, which consisted of a five-gallon can hanging from a canvas sling in a palm tree, with another hunk of canvas for a shower curtain.