George Bruce (writer)

George Bruce
Born	Daniel Fry Eyerly II (1898-09-15)September 15, 1898 Danville, Pennsylvania
Died	September 6, 1974(1974-09-06) (aged 75) Riverside, California
Occupations	Pulp-fiction author, screenwriter

George Bruce was the adopted name of a popular pulp-fiction writer of the late 1920s through the early '40s who specialized in World War I aviation stories. In 1937, he moved to Hollywood and penned screenplays for a number of popular films for Paramount, MGM, Columbia, and Edward Small Productions. In the 1950s and '60s, he wrote for a variety of television shows.

Background

George Bruce (1898–1974) was born Daniel Fry Eyerly II, named after his grandfather. His parents were John Osborne Eyerly (1875–1955) and Annie Andrews Eyerly (1878–1982). Daniel Jr., his father, and grandfather were born in Danville, Pennsylvania, in the middle of the state. The elder sibling, Bruce had three brothers (b. 1904, 1909, 1914) and a sister (1906).

Daniel Fry Eyerly I (1850–1934), Bruce's grandfather, was employed for 43 years as a boilermaker at the Montour Iron and Steel Company, then the Reading Iron Works.

Bruce's father, John Osborne Eyerly, followed a different path. He may have been influenced by his uncle John William Eyerly (1861–1917), a lifelong Danville resident and printer in the local newspaper business. J.O. Eyerly's first known professional job was at a local Danville newspaper, The Gem; the four-pager, which eschewed headlines, was described as a “small, but none the less newsy little sheet” When founder Richard W. Eggert retired in 1902, his employee J.O. bought and ran the paper.

By 1904, The Gem had folded and J.O. was living in Scranton, working for the Harrisburg Patriot. By 1906, he had taken a job with the Butterick Publishing Company, Manhattan. In early 1906, he was transferred to their Philadelphia offices to handle Eastern advertising. The family would permanently reside in Philly.

George Bruce claimed to have started writing at age nine, which would have been soon after the move to Philly.

In 1911, J.O. worked for the Philadelphia Item. In 1912, he was in the advertising department of the Philadelphia Bulletin. In 1918, he was superintendent of Allen, Lane & Scott, a Philadelphia mercantile printer.

Daniel F. Eyerly II quit public school in 1911, with only seven years of education under his belt. In 1915, he seemed to follow in his father’s footsteps when he became business manager of the Boy Scout News, the official publication for the Philadelphia Boy Scouts, which had a circulation over 4,000. He was 16 years old.

World War I

On April 25, 1916, now 17, Daniel F. Eyerly enlisted in the U.S. Army. It was a year before America entered the Great War. In the Army, he contracted tuberculosis “in the line of duty” and was sent to the “tuberculosis hospital” at Fort Bayard, New Mexico, for “many months”. On September 11, 1917, he was “honorably discharged on a Surgeon’s Certificate of Disability”.

In July 1918, Eyerly told members of the Danville Club (former Danville residents living in Philadelphia), that he was then or had been a sergeant major in the 6th Cavalry.

Soon thereafter, Eyerly was recorded as an associate editor for the Chilton Company, a Philadelphia firm that published automobile trade magazines.

Early writing

Eyerly left home when he was 21, that is, September 15, 1919, or later. His first known published work appeared in this period, a short story, “Jerry the Crouch”, in the March 1920 Blue Book Magazine. A smartly-written tale of Chicago crooks, it featured characters named Cockney Joe, Fingers Slattery, Dutch Louey, Pompadour Hennessey—and Jerry the Crouch. The author was “George Bruce”. It's Eyerly's first known use of this name, suggesting that it was intended as a penname.

In early 1920, Eyerly moved to Akron, Ohio, and worked for B.F. Goodrich, the rubber tire manufacturer. He used the name George Alden Bruce or George A. Bruce.

In April and May, 1920, four poems by George Alden Bruce were published in the Akron Times. The first, “A Tribute to Women” (April 4), honored the role of mothers during wartime in anguishing over the fates of their sons. The last, “To a Picture in a Frame” (May 16), is an outright love poem, hinting at a motive for the move to Akron; for example:

Lips that are sweetest,
Arms that are deep,
My life is an offering
At thy dear feet.

The next evidence of his presence in the city is “Reward”, the “sweetest song of the decade”, copyrighted on July 12, 1920, with words by George Alden Bruce and music by Nathalie Peguignot, Akron, Ohio. He soon thereafter returned to Philadelphia “owing to illness”.

Going forward, he used the name George Alden Bruce, both as real name and penname, as late as 1928.

Crime and incarceration

In Philadelphia, Bruce worked for the paper company Attell & Jones, where he met William Arnold Reick (1899–1969), Henry Winfield Bourne (1900–1978), and Leona Lillian O’Toole (1901–1937). Bruce and O’Toole “soon fell in love”. (Bruce was separated from a wife, presumably, his first wife Gertrude Sheehan (1898–1984).) After the employment fell through, the group lived in a boarding house where Bruce and O’Toole “played the part of man and wife”. On Saturday, October 16, 1920, all were kicked out, so Bruce registered them in two rooms in the Hotel Stenton, Philadelphia, claiming to be a theatrical group. On Sunday, they were joined by O’Toole’s friend Elizabeth “Betty” Malloy (1900–). Bruce, the “master mind” of the group, cooked up a plan whereby, with no money, they could go to Miami and from there visit Cuba.

On Monday, Reick and Malloy took the train to Coatesville, 39 miles west of Philly, where Reick was to try and get money from a friend. Meanwhile, Bruce phoned the American Taxicab Company for a limousine. Driver Harry A. Ward showed up at the Hotel Stenton in a 7-passenger Cadillac touring car. Bruce told Ward that he, Bourne, and O’Toole had to reach Coatesville in a hurry because O’Toole’s mother was dying in the hospital there. They sneaked out of the Stenton without paying.

Ward drove the trio along the Lincoln Highway to Coatesville’s Hotel Grand, where Reick and Malloy were waiting in the lobby. The five then told Ward that they were mistaken about the hospital, that it was actually in Philadelphia. On the drive back, near Frazer, Bruce, in the passenger seat, pointed a pistol at Ward and ordered him to pull over. Then, someone in the back clubbed him with a blackjack. He was thrown unconscious onto the side of the road. When he recovered sufficiently, he crawled to the nearest house. The resident called Philly police, who took Ward to Chester County Hospital. He was released the next day. But Bruce’s group had come perilously close to murder.

Near Philadelphia, the hood of the limo flew off; they didn’t stop to retrieve it. They turned southward, kept off the main highways, and “traveled mountainous roads in Virginia seldom traversed by motor vehicles.” They reached Berryville, Virginia on Wednesday morning, stopping at the Service Garage for repairs. Bruce claimed that the group was on their way to Roanoke where Bruce was to “give an entertainment”. He claimed that one of the women was famed film actress Dorothy Gish. He reported that they’d been assaulted by a “big automobile” outside Harpers Ferry, West Virginia that blinded them with headlights, held them up at gunpoint, stole “$3,800 in diamonds and money”, and damaged the limo.

At 1 a.m. Saturday morning, October 23, the group checked into the March Hotel, Lexington, North Carolina, claiming they had been robbed between Natural Bridge, Virginia and Roanoke. Bruce and O’Toole gave their names as Mr. and Mrs. Dan Eyerly. The limo was still missing its hood. Using varying names, and claiming to be “manufacturers of phonograph records”, they tried and failed to raise money around town. On Saturday afternoon, while pretending to repair the limo, they all piled in and sped away without paying the hotel.

Back in Philadelphia, the police were baffled about the possible motive since the group didn’t rob Ward of his money. In the Hotel Stenton, they found evidence that “Mr. and Mrs. George Alden Bruce”, the names under which one of the rooms was registered, were from Akron, thus directing the investigation westward. Chester County Detective William Mullen traveled to Akron. In Philadelphia, the police monitored incoming telegrams. They got their break when O’Toole, betraying her location, wired a friend for funds.

In late October/early November, the band of five arrived in Dublin, Georgia with the limo in bad shape. As they attempted to park on the street downtown, the brakes failed and the limo crashed into the plate-glass window of a jewelry shop. They told the Dublin police that they were in the song-publishing business. As the police held them, while attempting to resolve the financial issue with the jeweler, the heads-up message arrived from the Philly police. The getaway was over. The five were held pending extradition.

Detective Mullen, two policemen, and limo driver Harry Ward took the train to Dublin. The five culprits, waiving extradition, were taken by train back to Philly. Ward identified his assailants, had the limo repaired in town, then drove back.

The five steadfastly maintained they’d never assaulted Ward. Bruce, in his confession, invoked his war record:

I served in the Mexican border war, but was discharged for the reason I had tuberculosis and when the World War broke out I wanted to get into the scrap, but was refused and so I took a Captain’s commission from a man who did not want to go and under his name served across seas in a machine gun company. I was at the Argonne, St. Mihiel and other battles, and was wounded twice and gassed twice and since that time I have had bad spells with my heart at times and the physicians said I had but a short time to live unless I got into a different climate.

If Bruce had indeed been in the 6th Cavalry Regiment, southwest border duty is plausible, as that was an assignment given the 6th. Otherwise, there’s no known evidence Bruce went overseas in the war.

On December 20, 1920, all five pleaded guilty to larceny and were assessed $500 fines. The three men were sentenced to 5–10 years at hard labor and solitary confinement in the Eastern Penitentiary, Philadelphia. The two women were sent to the brand-new State Industrial School for Girls at Muncy.

In August 1922, Bruce, defended by attorneys, applied for a pardon, and was denied. A year later, defended by his mother, Annie Eyerly, Bruce tried again. Signed by Lieutenant Governor David J. Davis and other state executives, the plea was submitted to Governor Gifford Pinchot.

The plea summarized the offense, however it soft-pedaled the actual events, claiming that Bruce’s pistol had been unloaded; that the chauffer was neither threatened, robbed, nor harmed; and that the southern journey had been provoked by sheer panic. Further, it was a first offense. The resident physician of the penitentiary, Doctor Ungerleider, noted that Bruce was suffering from tuberculosis again. The former resident physician, Doctor Phillips, citing Bruce’s service as Chief Clerk for the Medical Department, “found him to be reliable in every way, strictly honest, unhesitatingly truthful, a willing worker and an intelligent assistant. . . . he has served the State faithfully and well.” In remarks prescient to Bruce’s future success, Phillips observed:

He is extremely well educated and a writer of merit. His spare hours were devoted to the writing of short stories and verse, some of which I have seen in print, and in the best magazines. While working under me he wrote a book length novel, which I understand is to be published in the near future. [Nothing is known of this novel.] . . . I think George Alden Bruce is a coming name in letters.

The pardon was granted on November 2, 1923.

Gates Flying Circus

In May 1924, Bruce surfaced in New Orleans with his wife, assumed to be Gertude Sheehan Bruce. He was a reporter for the New Orleans Item. He also joined an amateur theatrical group, the Lotus Players, who were rehearsing the drama Within the Law. Bruce claimed to be a former “assistant director and scenario editor” for the Hollywood film studio Famous Players-Lasky. He also had a role in the play.

Another arrival to New Orleans in this period was the Gates Flying Circus, the nation’s top aerial entertainers, founded in San Francisco in 1921 by Ivan R. Gates (1890–1932), and featuring daredevil pilot Clyde Pangborn (1895–1958). They traveled from city to city putting on air shows with displays of wing walking, parachuting, upside-down flying, jumping from plane to plane, and other daredevil deeds, often in conjunction with state fairs or other expositions. They routinely drew spectators in the thousands, sometimes tens of thousands. After a run through Texas and Louisiana, they arrived in New Orleans in early May. The Item sponsored a number of events with the circus: commissioning aerial photos of a mass hanging at the town of Amite on May 9; arranging a free 10-day air circus (May 28–June 8) in addition to the commercial events; and awarding readers with free flights, ultimately taking 2,000 airborne. Bruce, then, had ample opportunity to become acquainted with the circus.

The circus’s activities were always preceded by extensive publicity which ranged from flyers circling over the city to newspaper reportage and advertising. They needed advance men to prepare for the shows. The earliest evidence that Bruce had been hired by the circus in this capacity came on May 21. He visited Monroe, Louisiana to finalize arrangements for Gates performances on May 25. Bruce referred to himself as “special representative and reserve pilot.” According to Pangborn’s biographer:

“It was in New Orleans that Gates met a man who could challenge his wildest exaggerations. Gates was so impressed that he hired the word magician, along with another newspaper man; the two to act as advance men for the circus. The man who could make the impossible sound plausible was George Alden Bruce. Bruce’s first job was to produce a brochure, a 24-page color opus in which his imagination conjured impossible feats for the circus’s crew. He was not reticent in listing his own achievements.

There’s no evidence that Bruce learned to fly, though, undoubtedly, he went up as a passenger on many occasions.

Typically, the circus performed for a single day, or as long as a week. In New Orleans, however, the aggressive sponsorship of the Item added continual reasons for them to stay. When they finally departed New Orleans in July 1924, Bruce left with them. For the next few years, he would be advance man and publicist for the circus. His service wasn’t continual. For example, in September 1926, a dormant period for the circus, Bruce, complaining of “rundown health”, returned to Danville to stay with his aunt and uncle for the winter. Using his birth name, he promised to launch an “amateur dramatic association.” Calling on the Danville Morning News offices, he dazzled them with a long list of accomplishments. They included World War honors like the Chevalier of the Crown of Belgium and the Knight of the Imperial Order of Saint Stanislaus. He listed magazines he had appeared in, like The Saturday Evening Post, Cosmopolitan, Hearst’s International, Red Book, Blue Book, etc., plus some French magazines. Mangling the titles, he listed films he had provided technical direction for, e.g., The Black Eagle, starring Rudolph Valentino (actually titled The Eagle), and the 1925 runaway hit WWI drama, The Big Parade; and, additionally, four screenplays for nonexistent films, e.g., The Man Who Died, for the top studio, MGM. Of note, he neglected to mention the Gates Flying Circus in any of this.

By late October, he was back with the circus as “exploitation manager”.

The circus, as a byproduct of its glamorous feats of derring-do, produced occasional tragedies. For example, Bruce published a newspaper article about an incident at the Teterboro Airport, New Jersey, wherein Gates flyer Jack “Daredevil” Parks performed a fake fall from a plane, but tripped and swung forward, hitting his head on the wooden propeller. Pilot Pangborn managed to land the damaged plane, but Parks was rushed to the hospital in critical condition. Bruce concluded dryly, “The show went on.” Parks recovered and actually rejoined the circus. But on March 5, 1927, he was dangling from a plane when both his ankle straps broke, dropping him a thousand feet to his death.

The dangerous and largely unregulated state of civil aviation, glaringly illustrated by mishaps in the air shows, led Congress to establish the Air Commerce Act, which created an Aeronautic Branch under the Department of Commerce to regulate pilots and aircraft. It became law on May 20, 1926, but took effect gradually. Effectively, stunt flying was neutered. Years later, Bruce commented, “After the war I was with the Gates Flying Circus until the Department of Commerce frowned on such flying”. On another occasion, he remarked that he “finally left [the circus] to take up fiction writing”. At any rate, the precise time he left Gates is unknown.

Pulp writer

Bruce’s destiny was altered by aviation history a second time when Charles Lindbergh made his solo flight from New York to Paris, landing on May 21, 1927, to great acclaim. On June 13, he received a ticker-tape parade in Manhattan, which happened to be the de facto capital of pulp-magazine publishing. The editors at Fiction House paid heed. With a July 1927 newsstand date, and an August cover date, their all-aviation-fiction magazine, Air Stories, the first of its kind, appeared on the market. It soon attracted competitors. By the end of 1928, there were eight such magazines on the newsstands; by the end of 1929, the number had risen to fifteen.

Bruce jumped on the bandwagon early. He appeared in the fifth issue of Air Stories (December 1927) with a short story, “Flying Circus”. The author’s credit was simply George Bruce. From that point forward, for the rest of his life, it was the name he was known by.

The fictional tale supplies the inside story of the Ace Flying Circus, narrated by the boss of the outfit, i.e., Ivan R. Gates, told in nonstop flying lingo. He says of his pilots, who are reputed to be WWI flying aces, that “not one of those boys had been near the war than the Mississippi River”. Bruce gives a lot of mileage to the “demon advance man”, i.e., Bruce himself. He’s “a publicity man who knows no adjectives below ‘marvelous,’ ‘stupendous,’ ‘death-defying’ and such”. He talks up the outfit so that “when we arrive we can get away with anything up to murder”. Bruce describes the promotional techniques in detail. The names of the pilots are taken from the Gates crew with slight alterations. For the plot, Bruce co-opts two real events into the narrative. The first is the case of Albert Gladney, a teenager who, on March 30, 1925, was given a free ride by the circus but was killed when the plane crash-landed. But the main thread is based on the case of Rosalie Gordon, a chorus girl invited to take a parachute jump at Houston’s Ellington Field on February 17, 1924, shortly before the GFC arrived in New Orleans. In real life, Gordon’s parachute got tangled in the axle of the landing gear, leaving her dangling helplessly below the plane. A rescue was effected when another plane was flown close to hers, allowing a pilot to leap over and drag her to safety. Bruce borrowed the central facts of the real story but altered the details to create a romantic rivalry over “Rosalind Handley” between two of the pilots. And thus was launched his career as a pulp writer.

Bruce was an “overnight sensation.” Fiction House, his main publisher from 1927–32, bought virtually all of his prodigious output. He appeared in the inaugural issues of their other air pulps, Wings (January 1928) and Aces (December 1928), as well as their boxing fiction magazine, Fight Stories (June 1928). But, as recounted for a newspaper profile in 1932, “Aviation stories are his specialty; for them he got his background as a member of Gates’ Flying Circus”. Ultimately, aviation fiction accounted for 76% of his output. Much of it involved Western Front aerial combat drama, the thrust of the air pulps, but domestically-based stories about civil aviation or more modern military aviation themes, played a role. His most active period as a pulp writer were the ten years from 1928–37, when he averaged 38 appearances a year, most of them at novelette length. Ultimately, he appeared over 400 times in the pulps.

The timing of his early success was critical. His only child, George Thunder Bruce (1927–94), was born in New York City on December 24, 1927. “Thunder” was taken after Chief Two Guns Crazy Thunder. Proprietor of a roadside attraction in Arizona, the chief was actually white, pretending to be an Apache.

At his peak, Bruce was so popular that Fiction House published single-issue magazines with his name in the title and reprints of his stories, for example, George Bruce’s Air Novels (1931) and George Bruce’s Aces (March 1931). Fiction House had been founded in 1921 by Jack W. Glenister (1874–1937) and John B. Kelly (1886–1932). Kelly handled the editorial side of the business and was Bruce’s connection to the company from the beginning. When Kelly died on April 4, 1932, Bruce refused to send the new regime any more material. By the end of the year, Fiction House had run out of Bruce manuscripts.

When Sky Fighters, a new air pulp from independent publisher William L. Mayer (1906–33) came on the newsstands (July 1932), Bruce headlined every issue and contributed a column, George Bruce Says, commenting on current events. When Mayer died on March 17, 1933, Bruce took over as president and editor, but backed out after a month.

December 1933

January 1934

Instead, he launched his own publishing company, Adventure House, with two new magazines, George Bruce’s Contact and George Bruce’s Squadron, both with August 1933 dates. He headlined every issue and continued the column, before abandoning the venture a year later. Needing a new home, he began selling his stories to the Thrilling pulp chain, which had bought and continued Sky Fighters; he also appeared in their other air title The Lone Eagle (taking Lindbergh’s nickname). Thrilling gave Bruce the opportunity to branch out into detective mysteries in their Popular Detective; a dozen of these stories featured hardboiled detective Red Lacey.

In 1935, he revisited the fictionalization of Gates. Like the 1927 short story, it was titled Flying Circus; unlike the short story, it was a serialization of the entire history of the Gates Flying Circus, beginning in San Francisco in 1919. Like the short, he called it the Ace Flying Circus, but unlike the short none of the character names resemble their real-life counterparts.

In 1937, with a Hollywood career having begun, he jumped ship to a reorganized Fiction House, whom he wrote for exclusively through 1942, but averaged a mere six appearances a year. This concluded his pulp-writing career.

Bruce wrote novelist Ayn Rand in 1943 to compliment her on The Fountainhead. In her reply (his letter is unavailable), she wrote, “You say that you regret having to pursue ‘pure commercialism.’ . . . It is my turn to envy you the ability to be commercially successful while preserving your own vision and standards.”

False biography

Pulp-magazine readers, especially for adventure and war stories, expected authenticity from their favorite authors, thus the editors routinely included autobiographical sketches to complement the fiction. The degree of truth was variable. When Bruce entered the pulp field, his popularity with editors and readers led to a number of these sketches being published. They expand over time, with each including a different subset of details. In Hollywood interviews later on, he repeated the same tales.

With his inaugural appearance in Air Stories (December 1927), Bruce, rewritten in the third person, was described as a:

war-scarred sky hawk who strutted his stuff all over the French, Russian and Austrian fronts to the considerable annoyance of his enemy birdmen . . . Bruce sports medals from almost every nation that participated in la grand guerre. He carries souvenirs of meetings with some of the world’s most formidable airmen. Bruce remembers vividly having had Von Richthofen, famous ace of aces, in his sights more than once, and spending many fast moments dodging tracers from the other’s guns.

According to Bruce his air exploits started early: “I flew in my first airplane in 1912, with a Wright pusher acting as the elevating influence. I made my first solo flight in that year.” (He turned 14 in 1912.) He learned to fly at the “Essington flying field, near Philadelphia. While other youngsters his own age were carrying water for the elephants in the hope of getting a free pass for the circus, George Bruce was toting gasoline and water for ‘an old Curtiss pusher that sometimes took the air—but not for long.’ ”

Of the world war:

When war threatened in 1914, Bruce set sail for Russia, arriving three days before war was officially declared. . . . Russia, being very weak in the air, was glad to give the young flyer from America a commission in the newly organized Imperial Guard Flying Corps. . . . Bruce was shot down on his first three times up. . . . Driven from Russia by the revolution, Bruce next served with the Belgians, and later with the French. He was still going strong on November 7, 1918—four days before the Armistice—when he was knocked down for keeps, spending the next two years in various hospitals in Europe and America.

Of the Gates Flying Circus, he consistently exaggerated his time with them, and later took credit for establishing the outfit, e.g., “For $1200 Bruce was able to buy 14 fully equipped planes. With these, and with his former pals, he organized an air circus which netted him a fortune from ’21 to ’28.” He eventually claimed to have been a stunt flyer.

National organizations

American Fiction Guild

In 1931, with the Depression hurting the pulp-magazine market, and by extension the contributing authors, Bruce suggested to a group of writers at a party that writers needed to organize to protect their rights, word rates, and opportunities. At the initial meeting of the American Fiction Guild (AFG) held in Manhattan’s Hotel Somerset, late 1931, Bruce assumed the presidency. Bruce’s friend and fellow Fiction House air-story author, Arthur J. Burks, became vice-president.

The AFG was a national organization with local chapters, open to authors, illustrators, editors, agents, and publishers. Though the remit was broad, it became a de facto union for pulp writers. When the first elections were held in October 1932, Bruce bowed out of contention and Burks was voted president.

National Air Reserve

Bruce used many of his columns in George Bruce’s Contact and George Bruce’s Squadron to promote the National Air Reserve (NAR), his new organization intended to promote, for national defense purposes, pilot training. The origin date of the NAR, then, corresponds with the first appearance of the magazines on newsstands, July 1933.

Bruce was stunned at how fast the organization took off: “we never imagined any response to be as immediate and eager as has been evidence during the three weeks since the organization of the Reserve”. With the burden of running Adventure House and the NAR—and writing air stories—Bruce’s workday went from 8:30 a.m. to midnight. He hired an experienced magazine editor whose work consisted of “selecting and editing stories of battles above the clouds, and checking on the technic of aspects of aircraft and guns”. After a year, the NAR was active in many U.S. cities. For example, in March 1934, the Monroe, Louisiana unit reported a membership of 655. There was even a branch in the Philippines.

The NAR was loosely modeled after the AFG, structured as a national organization based in New York City with self-governing local chapters around the country. The NAR headquarters and Adventure House shared the same address (80 Lafayette Street). As with the AFG, which was active simultaneously, Bruce had Arthur J. Burks as a partner; Burks was appointed “National Chief-of-Staff, with rank of Major”. According to Burks, the NAR

wasn’t a circulation teaser like most departments. George actually enrolled people in his outfit and, more than that, called meetings of his members. I attended some of those meetings . . . Members of the National Air Reserve were general officers in the army, reserve officers, lawyers, senators, congressmen, doctors.

Bruce recruited other well-known allies. Jay Blaufox (1892–1965), National Adjutant, wrote a column for George Bruce’s Squadron titled Let’s Fly and also sold fiction to the air pulps. Clyde Pangborn, star of the Gates Flying Circus, was a “Major on the National Council”. A former Marine Corps flyer, Ken Collings (1888–1941) had been chief pilot for the Gates Aircraft Corporation (an Ivan Gates venture after the GFC waned). Collings published an article on airplane safety in the American Mercury, then started appearing with fiction in Squadron and other air pulps. When the NAR published a newsletter, The Tocsin, Collings contributed a column, Sky Writings.

Bruce’s top goal was to obtain federal government backing to the pilot training mission by contributing officers, trainers, mechanics, etc. From approximately 1935 through early ’37, Bruce divided his time between New York and Washington, D.C. With the sponsorship of South Carolina representative, and WWI veteran, John J. McSwain (1875–1936), Bruce pushed a bill to establish a Junior Air Corps Reserve, which ultimately failed to get through Congress.

The NAR faded away for multiple potential reasons: the failure of the bill; the death of McSwain on August 6, 1936; lack of resources for the ambitious mission; the lessening of necessity for the NAR by developments in aviation, or differences in legislative priorities; Bruce’s loss of a forum when Adventure House folded in 1934; or his transition from pulp writer to screenwriter.

Hollywood

Film

In late 1933, independent producer Ken Goldsmith (1899–1943) purchased Bruce’s novelette “Born to Hang” (George Bruce’s Contact, December 1933) to develop it for the screen. Bruce planned to leave for Hollywood, but the production came to nothing. Nevertheless, it demonstrated Bruce’s desire to move into film.

In November 1936, Bruce’s first novel Navy Blue and Gold was published, a saga of three football players at the U.S. Naval Academy, Annapolis, Maryland, one of whom was named Gates. By January, it was sitting on a bestseller list alongside Gone with the Wind. By March, MGM had purchased film rights. Early evidence of Bruce’s presence in Southern California was his March 16 interview on a Long Beach radio show, Literature on Parade.

Bruce was hired to write the Navy Blue and Gold screenplay. Meanwhile, independent producer B. P. Schulberg teamed Bruce with Paramount staff writer Frank Partos to adapt a James Edward Grant story. She's No Lady, a minor comedy of jewel thieves, starring Ann Dvorak, hit theaters on August 12, a few days after Bruce bought a North Hollywood estate at the foot of the hills. Navy Blue and Gold opened in November, starring James Stewart and Robert Young. The film turned a profit of $297,000. Bruce’s career transition was set.

He quickly followed up with the screenplay, from his story, for the MGM boxing drama The Crowd Roars, starring Robert Taylor. Released on August 5, 1938, it was an even bigger hit than Navy Blue and Gold with a profit of $761,000.

About April 1938, on loan from MGM, Bruce began writing for independent producer Edward Small, who would provide his most productive market. Bruce wrote at least 17 screenplays for Small from 1938–52 (two went unfilmed). The first was The Duke of West Point (released December 15, 1938), and this time the sport was ice hockey. To prepare, Bruce spent a week at West Point.

The publication of such a tidbit illustrates Bruce’s relationship with the Hollywood press. Over the years, news of his career appeared frequently in the columns of Louella Parsons, Hedda Hopper, and other journalists.

After penning nine films for Edward Small productions (1938–42), Bruce returned to MGM to write films for some of the studio’s biggest stars (1942–47). They included Stand by for Action (1942; Robert Taylor, Charles Laughton); Keep Your Powder Dry (1945; Lana Turner); Fiesta (1947; Esther Williams); and Killer McCoy (1947; Mickey Rooney).

One MGM film in this period, Salute to the Marines (1943; Wallace Beery), closely followed the military career of old friend Arthur J. Burks. Beery’s character, Sergeant Major Bailey, is a trainer who’s frustrated he’s never won any battle ribbons, as Burks had been a frustrated trainer. Bailey retires to civilian life, as Burks did when he became a full-time pulp writer. Pearl Harbor leads Bailey to rejoin the service, as it did for Burks. “Bailey engages in combat, with heroic but fatal consequences”; Burks’s destiny was more prosaic, as he remained a trainer, albeit at a higher rank.

Bruce’s second go-round with MGM was the pinnacle of his Hollywood years, as exemplified by a 1943 party he gave in honor of poet Carl Sandberg. Other guests included novelist Sinclair Lewis, actor/director Erich Von Stroheim, and director Andre de Toth. Mickey Rooney, on the piano, provided entertainment.

Bruce, earning $1500 a week, called his film work “literary prostitution”.

In 1948, Bruce returned to writing scripts for Edward Small. Five were produced through 1952, after which he made a clear break by moving into television. Notwithstanding the break, Bruce was involved with several other commercial films from 1958–62. In his film career, about 30 of his screenplays were produced.

Television

Bruce’s career as a television writer spanned from 1954–61. An apparent freelancer, he wrote episodes for a number of shows for the three main networks, ABC, CBS, and NBC, as well as for syndication.

His first known episode was “The Long Trail”, starring Anthony Quinn, for the anthology series Schlitz Playhouse. He wrote eight episodes for the series (1954–55), two for Playhouse 90 (1956–57), eleven for Crossroads (1956–57), seven for The Lawless Years (1959–61), and a number of other random episodes and TV movies, for a career total of about 50.

Personal life

In the 1940s and early ’50s, Bruce was involved in three relationships that kept him in the public eye through widely-reported news events.

Violet Popovics

On January 26, 1940, Louella Parsons reported that Bruce had been divorced a few days earlier. On January 27, he “eloped” to Phoenix with aspiring Hungarian actress Violet Popovics (1906–97) whose stage name was Mitzi Mackar. (She had gained notoriety in 1932 for shooting and wounding Chicago Cubs shortstop Billy Jurges in a lover’s quarrel, alleged to be partial inspiration for the 1952 novel (and 1984 film) The Natural.) Gertrude Bruce and son Thunder lived in Long Beach.

After two trial separations, Violet Bruce filed for divorce on April 28, 1943. The “decree was granted on the grounds of cruelty after Mrs. Bruce testified that her husband was sullen and moody and disapproved of her friends.”

Erna Rubinstein

In approximately November 1943, Bruce began a romance with Hungarian concert violinist Erna Rubinstein (~1907–), who he’d met at a private recital. She had debuted in the U.S. as a teenage prodigy in 1922, soloing for the New York Philharmonic at Carnegie Hall.

The couple married on June 11, 1944, in Bruce’s home, with Wallace Beery serving as best man.

By January 1945, the couple was separated and Rubinstein filed for divorce, testifying that she gave up her career for him. Two weeks later, they withdrew the suit. On July 29, Rubinstein walked into a Beverly Hills police station and reported that Bruce had struck her several times, loosening three teeth. Bruce was held, released on bail, arraigned, and a trial date was set. The divorce suit was refiled, wherein Rubinstein claimed that Bruce twisted her hand so badly she couldn’t play the violin. Thus, the relationship was acrimoniously litigated in two separate courts. Bruce was acquitted in the assault trial when the Bruces’ household help testified that, at the time of the alleged assault, Rubinstein had gone upstairs with a “$25 make-up box” (a gift from Bruce) and emerged with “streaky and awry” make-up which was then presented to the police as bruising; at a juror’s request she was asked to apply the make-up in court with the effect reproduced. In the divorce trial the following March, after a bevy of allegations from both sides, the judge denied Rubinstein alimony or community property, declaring that “the crowning piece of merciless cruelty was when she disgraced him publicly by having him arrested as a man who beats his wife.”

Luz Grant

In 1947, Bruce began a relationship with Luz Estefania Grant (1906–95), the recently widowed wife of wealthy hotel owner Alexander Grant (1902–47). A native of Lima, Peru, she a son, 20, and a daughter, 16. In May 1948, Bruce moved into the guest house on her Encino ranch. On October 8, they married in Tijuana, although Bruce’s divorce from Erna Rubinstein wasn’t complete. Six months later, Grant loaned Bruce $1,000 to help wind up the divorce. On October 7, 1950, Bruce had the Mexican marriage annulled in order to clear the way for a legal marriage. When Bruce’s divorce from Rubinstein became final, Grant changed her mind about getting married, and Bruce sued her for the return of approximately $31,000 worth of gifts. On September 29, 1951, two days before the trial began, Grant told police that her Los Angeles apartment had been burgled of two pieces of jewelry valued at $11,000, items that Bruce was suing to regain. After the trial was over, Gertrude Bruce sued her ex-husband for three years of unpaid alimony. In the Bruce-Grant case, the judge rendered a split decision.

Additional

George Bruce lived in Palm Springs, California from the mid-1950s until his death in 1974 at age 75.

Miscellaneous

• Despite his background, Bruce never had an aviation film produced. He had a close call with uncredited contributions to the script of A Yank in the R.A.F. (Fox, 1941). Another screenplay, for Republic Pictures, Wings of the Dragon, sounds like an air movie, but was never made.
• In her November 27, 1946, column, Louella Parsons reported that Jack Warner, head of Warner Brothers, had purchased an original story, The Persian Cat, for married stars Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall. A year later, it was reported that Bruce was writing the screenplay. The film was never made.
• In 1951, Bruce owned a boat named Thunderer.

Selected broadcast history

Radio

• George Bruce’s Air Stories of the World War was a syndicated radio show that (based on surviving information) ran throughout 1932.

Film

• She’s No Lady (1937)
• Navy Blue and Gold (1937)
• The Crowd Roars (1938)
• The Duke of West Point (1938)
• The Man in the Iron Mask (1939)
• Miss Annie Rooney (1942)
• Two Years Before the Mast (1946)
• Walk a Crooked Mile (1948)
• Rogues of Sherwood Forest (1950)
• Valentino (1951)
• Kansas City Confidential (1952)
• Fury in Paradise (1955)
• Ride a Crooked Trail (1958)
• Solomon and Sheba (1959)
• Beauty and the Beast (1962)

Television

• Cameo Theatre (1955), “The Whisper of a Witness”
• Climax! (1956), “The Sound of Silence”
• Crossroads (1957), “In God We Trust”
• The Detectives (1961), “Quiet Night”
• The DuPont Show with June Allyson (1960), “I Hit and Ran”
• Ford Television Theatre (1956), “Front Page Father”
• Johnny Midnight (1956), “Somebody Loves You”
• Men of Annapolis (1957), “Crucial Moment”
• The Pepsi-Cola Playhouse (1955), “Passage Home”
• Playhouse 90 (1957), “Snowshoes: A Comedy of People and Horses”
• Tightrope! (1960), “Big Business”
• TV Reader's Digest (1955), “The Brainwashing of John Hayes”

Selected fiction

Magazines

• “Jerry the Crouch”, Blue Book Magazine, March 1920 (first known published work)
• “Flying Circus”, Air Stories, December 1927 (first aviation story)
• “Fangs of the Gray Wolf”, Over the Top, October 1928
• The Lost Legion, Air Stories, October 1928–March 1929 (first serial)
• “Wings Against the Moon”, Airplane Stories, May 1929
• “The Ace Without a Country”, George Bruce’s Aces, March 1931
• “Zeppelin”, Action Stories, September 1931
• “Satan’s Torch”, George Bruce’s Sky Fighters, 1932
• “The Fall Guy”, Black Aces, January 1932
• Flying Circus, Argosy, Nov. 30, 1935–Jan. 4, 1936 (6-part serial)
• “They Died in Vain”, Sky Fighters, January 1937
• “Three Men—and a Boat!”, Liberty, July 10, 1937
• “Vickers Over Verdun”, Aces, Spring 1938
• “The Judas Jackpot”, Bull's-Eye Detective, Fall 1938
• “The Tarnished Ace of the Silver Circus”, Wings, Winter 1939
• “Solo Showdown”, Wings, Fall 1942 (last pulp story)

Books

• Navy Blue and Gold (NY: William Caslon Company, 1936; NY: Grosset & Dunlap, 1937)
• Too Tough to Die (Caslon, 1936)
• Claim of the Fleshless Corpse (NY: Dodge Publishing Company, 1937)

Resources

• Frank Gruber, The Pulp Jungle (Los Angeles, CA: Sherbourne Press, 1967)
• Carl M. Cleveland, “Upside-Down” Pangborn: King of the Barnstormers (Glendale, CA: Aviation Book Company, 1978)
• "From the Scrapbooks: A Letter from George Bruce". Age of Aces. December 8, 2021. A July 28, 1932, letter from George Bruce to fan Robert Alfred O’Neil.
• "From the Scrapbooks: A Seasonal Mystery". Age of Aces. December 24, 2021. A 1932 Happy New Year cartoon from George Bruce, drawn by Jonny Pike.

Stories

• "'The Laughing Major' by George Bruce". Age of Aces. December 11, 2020. Downloadable story from Aces, December 1931.
• "'The Flaming Arrow' by George Bruce". Age of Aces. February 1, 2019. Downloadable story from The Lone Eagle, August 1934.
• "'War Eagle' by George Bruce". Age of Aces. October 16, 2020. Downloadable story from Sky Fighters, November 1937.