Dorothy McGuire

She married Life magazine photographer John Swope in 1943 and remained with him till his death in 1979.

She had two children from this marriage, a daughter named Topo, who became an actress, and a son named Mark who became a photographer and an artist.

Her health deteriorated steadily after she fell down and broke her leg in 2001.

Dorothy McGuire was born Dorothy Hackett Mcguire in Omaha, Nebraska on June 14, 1918. Her father was a lawyer named Thomas Johnson Mcguire and her mother was Isabel Flaherty.

Dorothy studied at the ‘Omaha Junior College’ in Nebraska and then in ‘Ladywood Convent’ in Indianapolis, Indiana.

She enrolled at the ‘Pine Major Junior College, Chestnut Hill, Wellesley, Massachusetts in 1936 and graduated from there in 1938 at the age of 19.

She started her acting career at the age of 13 with an appearance on the stage of the ‘Omaha Community Playhouse’ in Nebraska in the play ‘A Kiss for Cinderella’ starring Henry Fonda.

Dorothy McGuire started as an understudy for Martha Scott in the Broadway play ‘Our Town’ in 1938 and also in ‘Bachelor Born’ and ‘Stop Over. She eventually replaced Martha Scott in the play.

She increased her stage experience with the plays ‘My Dear Children’ starring John Barrymore, ‘Swinging the Dream’, ‘Medicine Show’, ‘The Time of Your Life’ and ‘Kind Lady’.

She got a start in films with the help of producer David O. Selznick who brought her to Hollywood after being impressed by her acting on the Broadway stage. He put her on contract and in 1943 loaned her to ‘20th Century Fox’ opposite Robert Young in the film ‘Claudia’ in the role of ‘Claudia Naughton’.

In 1945 she starred in ‘A Tree Grows in Brooklyn’ directed by Elia Kazan in the role of ‘Katie Nolan’, a mother struggling to raise her family living in a Brooklyn tenement.

She next starred opposite Robert Young in ‘The Enchanted Cottage’ as ‘Laura Pennigton’ in the same year.

Dorothy McGuire was nominated for an ‘Academy Award for Best Actress’ in 1947 for the film ‘Gentlemen’s Agreement’.

In 1976 she won an ‘Emmy Award’ nomination for for ‘Rich Man, Poor Man’.

She was awarded a star on the ‘Hollywood Walk of Fame’ for her contribution to the motion picture industry.