Hollywood Goes to War: When Clark Gable Traded the Silver Screen for the Skies
Our American Stories
iHeartPodcasts
4.6 • 817 Ratings
🗓️ 7 November 2025
⏱️ 30 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
On this episode of Our American Stories, by the time America entered World War II, Clark Gable was already one of the most famous men in the world. Known for Gone with the Wind and his larger-than-life charm, he could have easily stayed home, untouchable and adored. But at forty-one, Gable did something no one expected: he enlisted as a private in the Army Air Corps, insisting, “I just want to be sent where the going is rough.”
The studio lights faded into the background as he trained alongside men half his age, learning to fly combat missions over Europe. His fame followed him wherever he went, but on base, he was just another soldier doing his part. Behind the uniform was a man determined to prove that courage wasn’t limited to the screen.
Historian Roger McGrath tells the story of Clark Gable’s service, from Hollywood’s red carpets to the open skies of war, where the King of Hollywood became a patriot who led by example.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is an I-Heart podcast. |
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| 0:33.7 | Music This is Lee Habib, and this is Our American Stories, and we tell stories about everything here on this show, from the arts to sports and from business to history, and everything in |
| 0:54.3 | between, including your stories, send them to Our American Stories.com. They're some of our |
| 0:59.1 | favorites. Clark Gable was a Hollywood star and among the most famous figures in the world |
| 1:04.8 | when two events altered his life. One of those events was the Japanese sneak attack on Pearl Harbor. He sent a |
| 1:12.1 | telegram to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt asking for a role in the war effort. The president |
| 1:17.4 | replied, Stay where you are. Gable didn't. Here to tell the story is Roger McGrath. And |
| 1:25.4 | Roger has appeared on numerous history channel documentaries |
| 1:28.2 | and is a regular contributor here on Our American Stories. |
| 1:33.0 | Here's McGrath. |
| 1:36.8 | Clark Gable was known as the King of Hollywood. |
| 1:40.4 | He appeared in more than 60 movies over a span of 37 years. |
| 1:44.1 | He won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his role in... He appeared in more than 60 movies over a span of 37 years. |
| 1:52.2 | He won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his role in It Happened One Night, the big hit of 1934. |
| 1:56.0 | He was nominated for Best Actor two more times. |
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