Phyllis Fraser Cerf Wagner (April 13, 1916 – November 25, 2006) was an American actress, journalist, and children's book publisher, and the co-founder of Beginner Books.

She was born as Helen Brown Nichols in Kansas City, Missouri. Her mother was Verda Virginia Owens, daughter of Walter and Saphrona (Ball) Owens, who were of Welsh ancestry. Her two maternal aunts were Jean Owens, wife of radio actor Vinton Hayworth (uncle of Rita Hayworth), and Lela (Owens) McMath, mother of Ginger Rogers. Not long after her birth, her mother moved to Oklahoma City, where Fraser resided until age 16.

At 16, she went to live with her aunt, Lela, and first cousin, Ginger, in California. There, Ginger, who would later be known as actress Ginger Rogers, thought up her new name and introduced her to the Hollywood scene. Between 1932 and 1939, Phyllis Fraser appeared in several movies, most notably Winds of the Wasteland (1936) with John Wayne, and Little Men (1934). In 1932 Fraser had a featured role, later deleted, in the RKO film Thirteen Women, a cult classic starring Irene Dunne and Myrna Loy. Thirteen Women was the only film of Theater Guild actress Peg Entwistle, whose suicide from the Hollywood Sign in September of that year helped begin the Sign's transformation from realestate billboard to a world-famous landmark.

Marion Mitchell Morrison (born Marion Robert Morrison; May 26, 1907 – June 11, 1979), better known by his stage name John Wayne, was an American film actor, director and producer. An Academy Award-winner, Wayne was among the top box office draws for three decades, and was named the all-time top money-making star. An enduring American icon, he epitomized rugged masculinity and is famous for his demeanor, including his distinctive calm voice, walk, and height.

Wayne was born in Winterset, Iowa but his family relocated to the greater Los Angeles area when he was four years old. He found work at local film studios when he lost his football scholarship to USC as a result of a bodysurfing accident. Initially working for the Fox Film Corporation, he mostly appeared in small bit parts. His acting breakthrough came in 1939 with John Ford's Stagecoach, making him an instant star. Wayne would go on to star in 142 pictures, primarily typecast in Western films.

Among his best known films are The Quiet Man (1952), which follows him as an Irish-American boxer and his love affair with a fiery spinster played by Maureen O'Hara; The Searchers (1956), in which he plays a Civil War veteran who seeks out his abducted niece; Rio Bravo (1959), playing a Sheriff with Dean Martin; True Grit (1969), playing a humorous U.S. Marshal who sets out to avenge a man's death in the role that won Wayne an Academy Award; and The Shootist (1976), his final screen performance in which he plays an aging gunslinger battling cancer.

Lew Kelly (24 August 1879 – 10 June 1944) was an American film actor. He appeared in over 200 films between 1928 and 1944.

He was born in St. Louis, Missouri, and died in Los Angeles, California.

Phyllis Dillon (1 January 1948 — 15 April 2004) was a Jamaican ska and reggae singer who recorded for Duke Reid's lucrative Treasure Isle record label in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

Dillon was born in 1948 in Linstead, St. Catherine, Jamaica. Influenced by American singers Connie Francis, Patti Page and Dionne Warwick, she began singing in talent contests. It was during a performance at the Glass Bucket Club in Kingston, Jamaica with the group The Vulcans, that Duke Reid's session guitarist Lynn Taitt discovered Dillon.

Dillon was 19 when she recorded her first record for Duke Reid. In 1967, Reid released Dillon's "Don’t Stay Away". While most of Dillon’s subsequent recordings would be covers of popular and obscure American songs including Bettye Swann's "Make Me Yours", Perry Como's "Tulips and Heather," The Grass Roots' "Midnight Confessions," and Stephen Stills's "Love the One You're With"; "Don't Stay Away" was an original composition featuring Tommy McCook and the Supersonics as the backing band.

Mischa Auer (17 November 1905 – 5 March 1967) was a Russian-born American actor.

Auer was born Mikhail Semyonovich Unskovsky (Михаил Семёнович Унсковский) in St. Petersburg, Russia. His name is usually seen as Mischa Ounskowsky, Mischa being the German transliteration of Misha (the diminutive form of Mikhail), and Ounskowsky being the French transliteration of his surname. Auer's maternal grandparents were Hungarian-born violinist Leopold Auer, and his Russian wife, Nadine Pelikan. Mischa renamed himself after his grandfather.

He began stage work in the 1920s, then moved to Hollywood, where he first appeared in 1928 in Something Always Happens. He appeared in several small and mostly uncredited roles into the 1930s, appearing in such films as Rasputin and the Empress, Viva Villa!, The Yellow Ticket, the George Gershwin musical Delicious, the Paramount Pictures all-star revue Paramount on Parade and The Lives of a Bengal Lancer.

In 1936, Auer was cast as Alice Brady's protégé in the comedy My Man Godfrey, for which he was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. From then on, he was regularly cast in zany comedy roles. Auer is at his zenith in such roles as the ballet instructor, Kolenkov, in the Best Picture-winning You Can't Take It with You (wherein he instructs Ann Miller with the line, "Ah, my little Pavlowa!") and the prince-turned-fashion designer in Walter Wanger's Vogues of 1938.