Lock Martin and the Tip Toppers Club

Creator

Preview

Identifier

20130801

Description

Lock Martin, who towers more than seven feet, stoops to get in Meacham Field's airport door. Miss Ruby Mae Graeves, gave California skyscraper an honorary membership in the Tip Toppers Club here. She is Club secretary. Joseph Lockard "Lock" Martin Jr. (October 12, 1916 - œ January 19, 1959) was an American performer afflicted with giantism, best remembered for essaying the part of the robot Gort in The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951). He was from Pennsylvania and had a series of jobs related to his height, e.g. he directed traffic at Bob's Big Boy drive-in restaurant in Van Nuys, CA in 1951. He also travelled with Spike Jones and His City Slickers and appeared on their television show in the early 1950s. He was regularly employed as a doorman at Grauman's Chinese Theater in Los Angeles when he was hired for the role of Gort, although this was not his first acting job. He was also filmed for a part in The Incredible Shrinking Man as a circus giant, but his scenes were deleted. He was nicknamed "the Gentle Giant" as he liked reading stories to children and for a time had a local show devoted to that. Martin was married to Ethel Babcock from 1946 until his death in 1959.

Archival Date

1952-09-21

Collection Name

Fort Worth Star-Telegram Collection

Collection Number

AR406-6-533

Original Format

Negatives, Black & White

File Format

JPG

Rights

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License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License

Subjects

Celebrities; Actors