the State Historical Society of Missouri
![A publicity photo of Gordon “Wild Bill” Elliott. [Find a Grave / William Bjornstad]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2023-10/1.-gordon-wild-bill-elliott.jpg?h=698ee15c&itok=liAhLhoD "A publicity photo of Gordon “Wild Bill” Elliott. [Find a Grave / William Bjornstad]")
Gordon “Wild Bill” Elliott was one of the film industry’s top moneymakers in westerns…
![David Rowland Francis. [State Historical Society of Missouri, Straus Studio Photographs, P0879]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2024-01/1.-david-rowland-francis_0.jpg?h=b1c9098b&itok=Jlt-ze6G "David Rowland Francis. [State Historical Society of Missouri, Straus Studio Photographs, P0879]")
Mayor of St. Louis, governor of Missouri, secretary of the interior, president of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition…
![Lloyd Gaines. [University of Missouri School of Law, Lloyd Gaines Collection]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2021-09/1-Lloyd-Gaines.jpg?h=416ef11d&itok=iYyUVG7t "Lloyd Gaines. [University of Missouri School of Law, Lloyd Gaines Collection]")
Lloyd Gaines’s efforts to obtain a legal education in Missouri resulted in a Supreme Court…
Kate Leila Gregg, a professor of English at Lindenwood College in St.…
![W. C. Handy playing at the fifth annual American Negro Music Festival in St. Louis’s Sportsman’s Park in 1944. [State Historical Society of Missouri, Arthur Witman 120mm Photograph Collection (S0732), 732.31462]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2020-06/Handy-at-Sportsman%27s-Park.jpg?h=3922e451&itok=pT3BzbVU "W. C. Handy playing at the fifth annual American Negro Music Festival in St. Louis’s Sportsman’s Park in 1944. [State Historical Society of Missouri, Arthur Witman 120mm Photograph Collection (S0732), 732.31462]")
Although William Christopher Handy spent relatively little of his long life in Missouri,…
![Jean Harlow in a publicity photo. [New York Public Library Digital Collections, Billy Rose Theatre Collection Photograph File, ID# TH-190010]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2020-06/Jean-Harlow-Pub-Still.jpg?h=4cc55283&itok=QHj0lS7X "Jean Harlow in a publicity photo. [New York Public Library Digital Collections, Billy Rose Theatre Collection Photograph File, ID# TH-190010]")
Jean Harlow was born Harlean Carpenter in Kansas City, Missouri, on March 3, 1911. Her…
![Phoebe Apperson Hearst. [State Historical Society of Missouri, Ralph Gregory Photographs Collection (P0604), P0604-10921]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2020-07/Phoebe-Apperson-Hearst.jpg?h=1b8b84bf&itok=qbqmm_sb "Phoebe Apperson Hearst. [State Historical Society of Missouri, Ralph Gregory Photographs Collection (P0604), P0604-10921]")
When she was a little girl in pigtails, Phoebe Elizabeth Apperson sometimes rode on the…
![William Hirth. [Boone County Historical Society, Henry Holborn Studio Photography Collection]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2022-04/1.%20William%20Hirth.jpg?h=e5a74f32&itok=MB2afVqJ "William Hirth. [Boone County Historical Society, Henry Holborn Studio Photography Collection]")
Born in Tarrytown, New York, on May 28, 1875, William Hirth moved to Missouri with his…
Born on April 27, 1896, at Winters, Texas, Rogers Hornsby began his professional baseball…
![Rupert Hughes and his second wife, Adelaide Manola Mould Bissell. [Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, LC-DIG-ggbain-32320]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2022-04/1.%20Rupert%20Hughes.jpg?h=70a94650&itok=RrY2h_E1 "Rupert Hughes and his second wife, Adelaide Manola Mould Bissell. [Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, LC-DIG-ggbain-32320]")
Rupert Hughes, a versatile popular writer, was born in Lancaster, Missouri, on January 31,…