Loretta Young

This "round-eyed kitten" crouched atop a staircase is Loretta Young at nineteen. From the age of fourteen, she girlfriended Hollywood's most amorous men on-screen—and, later, occasionally off. Indeed, her "jug-eared" adopted daughter, Judy, was rumored to be her own offspring by Clark Gable. Limpid-eyed Loretta (born Gretchen) made movies almost at the rate at which she smoked cigarettes. In 1953 she stubbed out her ninety-fourth flick and switched to television: The Loretta Young Show put out stunning gowns, sentimentality, and squeaky-clean morals. Since then she has done a lot for the Los Angeles-area Catholic Charities and, according to a new, unauthorized biography, Loretta Young: An Extraordinary Life (Delacorte), popularized that bane of the profaning classes, the swear box.