Page 8 - carey-bunse_habs_ca2712

) HARRY CAREY RANCH
(Clougherty Ranch)
HABS No. CA-2712 (Page 8)

) make something of a tourist attraction of his ranch, much as Hoot Gibson would do with
15
his nearby ranch and rodeo grounds.

The move of these Western film stars into the remote and picturesque landscape of the
_)
Santa Clarita Valley may be seen as the actors' attempt to cement an association in the
) public mind between these actors and the West. Ironically, virtually none of the early
Western film stars were actually from the American West. Harry Carey had been born in
Brooklyn. Tom Mix was from Pennsylvania. William S. Hart was born in Newburgh,
)
New York, and although his family moved to the Midwest for several years, they
returned to New York when he was in his early teens. The great Western film director,·
) John Ford, had been born in Cape Elizabeth, Maine. Only "Hoot" Gibson, a Nebraskan
by birth, could claim a directly Western heritage prior to his involvement with the West
)
of film .
.
The move of Harry Carey and the other Western film stars ( and the Western film
industry) into the ranch land of the Santa Clarita Valley was the culmination of many
factors. It was no doubt in part self-promotional; it has always been the duty of film stars
to promote their own careers. It is also likely that these men had internalized their film
imagery. As noted, the output of silent films stars was prodigious by comparison with
modem film actors and directors. Carey, for example, made 19 films in 1917, all of them
Westerns. He continued to make a large number of Western films through the period in
which he built his ranch house in the valley, and although his rate slowed in the late
1920s, he continued to be a prolific Western star. In fact, by the late 1920s Harry Carey
had been making Western films for nearly two decades. By the end of his career he had
made hundreds of Western films and likely had spent thousands of hours on horseback.
His contemporaries, Hart, Gibson, and Tom Mix had similar, if not greater, success, as
did Gene Autry, who bought a ranch in the area decades later. Although their
() involvement with the Western way of life was directed toward the production of-films,
() these men were surely comfortable with the facts of that lifestyle, having devoted such
large parts of their lives in activities associated with the American West.

The Life and Career of Harry Carey, Sr.

Harry Carey was probably the most prolific of the actors who worked in the Santa Clarita
Valley during the early years of the Southern California film industry. Born Henry
() DeWitt Carey in New York on-January 16, 1878, Carey's upbringing and early life were
decidedly eastern. He was named for his father, Henry George Carey, who was a New
York Special Session Judge and the owner of a sewing machine factory. The younger
Henry attended Hamilton Military Academy, but turned down West Point to go to New
York University where he played on the football team, performed in school theater
,) productions, and studied law. Carey did not pursue a career in law and instead wrote a
()
15
Leon Worden, "Santa Clarita Valley in Pictures," https://scvhistory.com (1996-2000); Harry Carey, Jr., Company
j
of Heroes: My Life as an Actor in the John Ford Stock Company (New Jersey: Scarecrow Press, 1994 ), 44-53.