Glenn Ford, the rangy, laconic actor who in a long and prolific career in films and television portrayed characters from gallant leading men to saddle tramps, died Wednesday. He was 90.
Ford, a top box-office draw in the 1950s whose career spanned more than five decades and more than 100 films, was found dead at his Beverly Hills home by Fire Department paramedics just before 4 p.m.
For The Record
Los Angeles Times Saturday September 02, 2006 Home Edition Main News Part A Page 2 National Desk 3 inches; 113 words Type of Material: Correction
Glenn Ford obituary: The obituary of Glenn Ford in Thursday's California section said the actor "was found dead at his Beverly Hills home by Fire Department paramedics just before 4 p.m." According to information supplied to The Times by the family after the obituary appeared, paramedics were called to the family home by Ford's daughter-in-law, Lynda, after a caregiver had determined that Ford was having difficulty breathing. Paramedics were unable to resuscitate the 90-year-old actor. Efforts to find a representative of the family for further information on Ford's death Thursday night were unsuccessful, and initial information in the obituary should have been attributed to an official statement from the Beverly Hills Police Department.
Largely out of the public eye since the early 1990s, Ford was saluted by American Cinematheque at Hollywood's Egyptian Theatre in May on his 90th birthday. Ford, who had suffered several strokes, had been expected to attend but ultimately missed the event because of fragile health.
In his prime, Ford posted a string of memorable credits that included "Gilda," "The Big Heat," "The Blackboard Jungle," "3:10 to Yuma," "The Teahouse of the August Moon," "Don't Go Near the Water," "The Courtship of Eddie's Father," "Pocketful of Miracles" and "The Rounders."
He could play an ambitious, crooked gambler with a soul-saving sense of honor ("Gilda") or an idealistic yet tough-minded teacher ("Blackboard Jungle").
As a youth, Ford portrayed a Depression-era store clerk who hitchhiked west in "Heaven With a Barbed Wire Fence," his first feature picture in 1939. As a middle-aged character actor, he was the surrogate father of "Superman" (1978) in the first feature-length film treatment of the comic book character.
And although he was never nominated for an Oscar, he was a longtime Hollywood favorite.
Ford, who was under contract to Columbia Pictures for many years, got along well with studio chief Harry Cohn, who was famous for his parsimonious purse strings and flaming temper.
Ford recalled in a 1981 interview that Cohn had sent for him when he left Columbia after his contract had expired and that the studio boss shook his hand fondly and said: "You know why we always got along together, Glenn? Because you never were afraid of me."
In the 1970s, Ford began concentrating on television, portraying Sheriff Sam Cade in "Cade's County"; the narrator of the children's series "Friends of Man"; and the Rev. Tom Holvak, a poverty-stricken preacher, in "The Family Holvak."
The last character, in the 1975-77 series, was based, Ford told The Times in 1975, on his grandfather, Thomas Ford, a rural minister in Quebec, Canada, the actor's native land.
