Spring Auction 2014
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 3/27/2014
Betty Grable signed 5 x 7
Betty Grable (December 18, 1916 – July 2, 1973) was an American actress, dancer, and singer.
Grable was celebrated for having the most beautiful legs in Hollywood and studio publicity widely dispersed photos featuring them. Her iconic bathing suit poster made her the number-one pin-up girl of the World War II era. It was later included in the Life magazine project "100 Photographs that Changed the World". Hosiery specialists of the era often noted the ideal proportions of her legs as thigh (18.5"), calf (12"), and ankle (7.5"). Grable's legs were famously insured by her studio for $1,000,000 with Lloyds of London.
Grable appeared in several smash-hit musical films in the 1940s, most notable: Mother Wore Tights in 1947, with frequent co-star Dan Dailey. She came to prominence in 1939 when she signed with Twentieth Century-Fox and signed on to appear opposite Ethel Merman in the Broadway musical Du Barry Was a Lady. But it was not until she was called back to Hollywood to replace Fox's musical queen, Alice Faye, in Down Argentine Way, that she became a household name.
She was known by several nicknames during her heyday in the '40s, including "the girl with the million dollar legs," "the quick-silver blonde," "the queen of the Hollywood musical," and "the darling of the forties."
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