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Comment by My other half on June 1, 2008 at 8:26pm

Jay Silverheels
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Jay Silverheels
Born May 26, 1912
Six Nations Indian Reserve, Brantford, Ontario, Canada
Died March 5, 1980
Woodland Hills, California, USA

Jay Silverheels (May 26, 1912 – March 5, 1980) was a Canadian Mohawk Indian actor.
Contents


* 1 Early history
* 2 Film career
* 3 TV career
* 4 Personal life

Early history

Born Harold J. Smith on the Six Nations Indian Reserve, in Brantford, Ontario, Canada, Silverheels excelled in athletics and lacrosse as a boy before leaving home to travel around North America, appearing in boxing and wrestling tournaments. He lived for a time in Buffalo, New York. In 1938 Silverheels placed second in the middleweight section of the Golden Gloves tournament.

Film career

Silverheels began working in motion pictures in 1937. During the early years of his screen career, he was billed variously as Harold Smith or Harry Smith, and appeared in low-budget features, westerns, and serials. From the late 1940s he played in more prestigious pictures, including Captain from Castille starring Tyrone Power, Key Largo with Humphrey Bogart, (1948), Broken Arrow (1950) with James Stewart, War Arrow (1953) with Maureen O'Hara, Jeff Chandler and Noah Beery, Jr., Walk the Proud Land (1956) with Audie Murphy and Anne Bancroft, Alias Jesse James (1959) with Bob Hope, and Indian Paint (1964) with Johnny Crawford.

TV career

Silverheels was best known for his appearances as the Lone Ranger's friend Tonto. In addition to starring in the Lone Ranger television series from 1949 to 1957, Silverheels appeared in the films The Lone Ranger (1956) and The Lone Ranger and the Lost City of Gold (1958).

Following the end of the Lone Ranger television series, Silverheels found himself typecast as Tonto and had trouble finding further acting work. Silverheels was also hindered by a changing attitude, as some felt that the Tonto character was equivalent to a Native American Uncle Tom. Subsequently, Silverheels was forced to work as a salesman to supplement his acting income. He also began to concentrate on writing poetry influenced by his youth on the Six Nations Indian Reserve and appeared on television reciting his poetry.

But despite the typecasting, Silverheels had a tendency to poke fun at his character in later years. In the late 60s, he appeared playing Tonto in a comedy sketch on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson. In the sketch, Tonto decided he wanted a temporary change of scenery and seek other employment from The Lone Ranger (whom Silverheels referred to in the sketch only as Kemo Sabe). An audio copy of this sketch appears on the 1973 record album Here's Johnny: Magic Moments From The Tonight Show.

In the early 1960s he helped to establish the Indian Actors Workshop in Echo Park, California as a place where Native American actors could develop their acting skills. It is still active.

His last filmed appearance was on an episode of Dusty's Trail.

Personal life

Silverheels was also quite fond of raising, breeding and racing horses in his spare time. Once, when asked about possibly running Tonto's famous Pinto horse Scout in a race, Jay laughed off the idea: "Heck, I can outrun Scout!"

Married in 1945, Silverheels was the father of two boys and a girl. He died of stroke in Woodland Hills, California and was cremated. His ashes were returned home to Six Nations Indian Reserve
Coyote And Buffalo Jay Silverheels Download
Coyote And Frost Giant Jay Silverheels Download
Coyote And The Day Of Naming Jay Silverheels Download

Comment by My other half on June 1, 2008 at 11:50am

I have quite a bit of westerns- anyone interested?

Comment by My other half on May 29, 2008 at 4:18pm

I thought I would post something to kick my membership off- http://www.4shared.com/dir/7337018/92999db9/sharing.html
I have some Wikipedia info on Jay Silverheels but nothing on these files. Enjoy!

Comment by Gyongi Fekete on May 15, 2008 at 9:03pm

Thank you so much for the interview with James Arness, please look up the Archive of American Television Interview with him on video.google it is very good also
Cheers