Maybelline founder Tom Lyle Williams

Showing posts with label Tom Harmon. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Tom Harmon. Show all posts

Mark Harmon's Mother "Elyse Knox," Maybelline model, most popular word search on my blog.

Maybelline Pin Up Girl, Elyse Knox, 1944.

Maybelline ushers in The Pin Up GirlThe Bomb Shell and The Girl Next Door during World War 11 - creating an American Ideal for beauty, style and fashion.  Elyse Knox was one of Maybelline's World War 11 models contracted for her sexy yet innocent face during the 1940's.  Knox was a B-movie starlet in the Hollywood System playing secondary roles until she landed a role with Lon Chaney Jr. in The Mummy's Tomb; one of the series of Mummy horror films made by Universal Studios. 

Knox became well known after Maybelline placed her full page glossy autographed picture on the back of magazines after appearing as herself in Universal Studios 1944 production of "Follow the Boys."  One of the World War 11 morale-booster films made for both the soldiers serving overseas as well as civilians at home.



Knox was also a Pin Up Girl during the War, appearing in such magazines as YANK, a weekly put out by the United States Military.  Ads like this combined with Maybelline ads on the back of movie magazines, created a desire in all Service Men to return to the arms of their sweet All American girls - with those Maybelline eyes
 .




In Late 1944 Knox was signed by Monogram Pictures to portray Anne Howe, the love interest of fictional boxer Joe Palooka in Joe Palooka, Champ.  Based on the very popular comic strip.  The instant success of the May 1946 film led to  Knox appearing in another five Joe Palooka productions.  She retired from film making in 1946 after appearing in the musical There's a Girl in My Heart but continued doing Print ads like the one above for Maybelline while appearing on the Bing Crosby radio show where she met foot star Tom Harmon.  She married fashion photographer Paul Hesse one of Maybelline's official photographers, divorced and married Tom Harmon in 1944.

The couple had three children, Kristin, who married Ricky Nelson and had Tracy, twins Gunnar and Lars, and a son Sam who modeled and acted in film and TV (TJ Hooker.) And Kelly..... and Mark Harmon of NCIS.

MARK HARMON'S MOTHER, MAYBELLINE MODEL, ELYSE KNOX DIES AT 94.


During the ’30s to the ’60s movie magazines around the world were overflowing with glamorous photographs of movie stars. One of the most interesting photographers working during this period was Paul Hesse who helped pioneer the use of color film in commercial art. (Old Movies Nostalgia.)




Paul Hesse and Elyse Knox.
Elyse Knox married fashion photographer
Paul Hessewho had shot many of her print ads and magazine covers. 


                                            Elyse Knox

MAYBELLINE LIGHTS THE WAY TO NEW EYE BEAUTY, signed Elyse Knox.  By 1938 Paul Hesse had earned his reputation as one of the best commercial photographers working in New York. He was traveling to Hollywood several times a year to shoot glamorous photos of the stars for Photoplay magazine and he became the first photographer to use color in a national advertising campaign



Elyse Knox
Hesse enjoyed working with actors and he created many popular celebrity endorsed ad campaigns for companies such as  Maybelline, Rheingold Beer, Chesterfield Cigarettes, Lipton Tea, Royal Crown Cola and Studebaker automobiles. He also shot many photos for American Magazine.


     Elyse Knox
His colorful and hyper-realistic portraits of celebrities had a very distinct style that is still noticeable today. 



Elyse Knox.
The actress Greer Garson once said that Paul Hesse was, “greatly in demand by the leading national magazines to create cover-portraits to delight the eye. The result would be a true-to-life likeness but idealized, or glamorized if you will, by his superb technique in producing only delectable color values.”

Elyse Knox.
In 1940 Hesse decided to move to Los Angeles where he opened a new studio on Sunset Boulevard that became a gathering place for Hollywood stars and industry bigwigs. According to the book Masters of Starlight: Photographers In Hollywood, he was awarded the title of “Hollywood’s Photographic Ziegfeld” by a committee of unnamed movie stars in recognition of his contribution to their careers. 


Elyse Knox dies at 94; 
B-movie actress inthe 1940s.

Elyse Knox appeared in nearly 40 films. She was


perhaps best known for the only horror film she ever 


made, 'The Mummy's Tomb,' with Lon Chaney Jr. as the

 

monster who kidnaps her.





Elyse Knox and Tom Harmon.


While appearing on the Bing Crosby radio show, Elyse 

Knox met football star Tom Harmon


They were engaged to marry, but ended the relationship 


when Harmon entered the U.S. Army Air Corps in 1942.


Later that year, Knox married fashion photographer

Paul Hesse  The marriage was brief. Following her


divorce and Tom Harmon's return from World War II


during which he survived two plane crashes and being 


(lost in the jungle), she and Harmon married in 1944.


Knox's wedding dress was made from silk from the


parachute Harmon used when bailing out of his crippled 


plane.


   

Tom Harmon
 The couple remained together until his death in 1990. 


Please click on link below for past post on Elyse Knox.



Link to past post about NCIS and Maybelline cousin, Brian Dietzen, Jimmy Palmer in the show.





Stay tuned for more Maybelline Stars

 photographed by the Great Paul Hesse.