Agnes Moorehead

Agnes Moorehead married actor John Griffith Lee in 1930. The couple adopted a son named Sean and raised him until he ran away from their house. Agnes and John divorced in 1952

After separating from John Griffith Lee, Agnes Moorehead married actor Robert Gist in 1954. The couple lived together for four years before parting ways in 1958.

On April 30, 1974, the actress died of uterine cancer in Rochester, Minnesota, at the age of 73. She was buried at the Dayton Memorial Park in Dayton, Ohio.

Agnes Moorehead was born as Agnes Robertson Moorehead on December 6, 1900 in Clinton, Massachusetts, to former singer Mildred and her husband, John Henderson Moorehead.

She started performing at the age of three and first recited The Lord's Prayer in a church. She then moved to St. Louis, Missouri along with her family where her ambition to pursue acting became quite strong.

In 1918, she supposedly graduated from the Central High School in St. Louis. Later on, she earned a bachelor's degree from Muskingum College in New Concord, Ohio. After this, Moorehead attended Muskingum University and received an honorary doctorate from there.

She then earned a master's degree in English and public speaking from the University of Wisconsin while she also taught a public school for five years.

Moorehead then pursued her postgraduate studies at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts and graduated from there in 1929. Later on, she obtained an honorary doctoral degree from the Bradley University in Peoria, Illinois.

Agnes Moorehead started her career in radio, first appearing in the 1929 broadcast ‘Believe It or Not’. She simultaneously performed on stage, starting with the plays ‘Soldiers and Women’, ‘Scarlet Pages’ and ‘Candle Light’.

From 1930 to 1933, she appeared on the radio show ‘Sherlock Holmes’. Soon after this, she performed on the radio programs ‘Evenings in Paris’ and ‘The Gumps’ as well as in the play titled ‘All the King's Horses’.

The actress then did numerous radio broadcasts including ‘The New Penny’, ‘Way Down East’, ‘The March of Time’, ‘Terry and the Pirates’, ‘The Shadow’, ‘The Mercury Theatre on the Air’, ‘The Campbell Playhouse’, ’ Cavalcade of America’ and ‘The Adventures of Superman’. After this, she was cast in more radio shows like ‘Bringing Up Father’ and ‘Bulldog Drummond’.

In 1942, Moorehead started playing the roles of Marilly and Mrs. Elbert Stevenson on the radio programs ‘Mayor of the Town’ and ‘Suspense’ respectively.

In the late 1940s, she got featured in numerous movies such as 'The Youngest Profession', 'Jane Eyre', 'The Seventh Cross', 'Mrs. Parkington', 'Keep Your Powder Dry', 'Her Highness and the Bellboy', 'The Lost Moment', 'The Woman in White', 'Johnny Belinda', 'The Great Sinner' and 'Caged', to name a few.

In the year 1963, Agnes Moorehead played the role of Madame Acanti in the musical ‘High Spirits’. A year later, she was cast as Velma Cruther in the American psychological thriller flick ‘Hush… Hush, Sweet Charlotte’. This role got her nominated for a Best Supporting Actress Academy Award.