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IValkvr EndsTall StoriesBy JOAN HANAVERNEW YORK lt;INS - Clint Walker, 6'6 of TV cowboy star, wants to make it clear he never water skiied on his hands, bent an iron horseshoe with his bare grip or sprained a horse's back.We might as well come to a little understand!:*® right here and now, said the star of ABC-TV's Cheyenne series on Warner Brothers Presents.”I don't see how this phony publicity is necessary, Walker drawled, anil proceeded to give some examples of the tall tales being circulated about him. j Somebody said 1 could bend a horseshoe like an ordinary man could bend a hairpin. I hid for two weeks in case somebody asked me to do it.TAKES FALLThey said 1 was learning to water ski on my hands. These Idiots don't realize someone's going to ask you to do it. Last time 1 went skiing I skiied on my hands for ten minutes—on my head, too —because I took a fallAnother time they said I jumped off a boulder onto a horse's back. I got a lot of indignant letters about that. the 235-pound star said sadly * He also wants to add that, contrary to the publicity boys, he owns neither a swimming pool nor a $1,000 suit.The dark-haired, blue-eyed big man on a small screen has the kind of real-life history, however, that doesn't need imaginative touchesHe grew up in the Mississippi river towns of Hartford. Wood-river and Alton. Ill . where his father lt;6'3 worked as a pipe fitter, boxer, wrestler, athleticcoach and musician.# 'Tip afraid to go back to Alton now. There'll be people who will resent all this business about me being a football hero and state wrestling champ. I never had time for wrestling and football then—I was setting up metal milk bottles as targets in a carnival when I ;was nine.”When he was II he was a pin-setter in a bowling alley and in the following years worked as a messenger, harvest hand, on river boats and in a steel foundry. When he was old enough he served a hitch in the merchant marine and then in 1948 married his Alton sweetheart.In 1950 he and his wife and daughter set out for Texas where he made a bare living on construction jobs, punching cattle and prospecting. Next he moved on to California where be worked as a vacuum cleaner salesman, night club bouncer, private detective and truck driver.WORKED IN VEGAS1 Then I heard about guys making a lot of money in Las Vegas.” Clint explained In Vegas he found l job as deputy sheriff and eventually, through contacts made in Nevada, got a small role in The Ten Commandments.”I'm in a position now ” the western star said in a soft but determined drawl, where 1 can refuse to go along with the phony stuff. I kind of resent these guys. I don't want to worry about making a liar out of myself or being called on to do something 1 can'tdo I don't figure I've led that dull a life ”♦mm m ▼
Newspaper Details
Anderson Herald Bulletin
Anderson, Indiana, US
Thu, Jun 07, 1956
Page 18
Full Page
Clipped by
Anonymous
CO, USA 08 Jan 2017
Other Publications Near Anderson, Indiana
Anderson Sunday Herald
Anderson Herald Bulletin Sunday
Anderson Democrat
Anderson Herald Bulletin
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