Gloria Swanson – family, children, marriages, husband

Gloria Swanson was born in Chicago, Illinois on March 17, 1899. Gloria at a young age wanted to become an opera singer and worked hard for it and finally started singing at the age of 13.

Her visit to the studio in 1914, changed her life forever. She was invited to work as a stock extra at the Essanay Studio and got $13 at the end of each week. She appeared in silent films and everyone knew she was going to be a star. Along the line, she met Charlie Chaplin even though their meeting wasn’t great.

“I started here in Chicago a long time ago, at the Essanay Studios. I’ll never forget the morning I was lined up with a group of other nervous teenagers to be looked over by the great man, Charlie Chaplin. He came and examined us, and he chose me, and I was hired,” she said.

She continued, “But an hour later, I was fired. I guess he didn’t think I was very funny. So I lost my chance to work with Chaplin, and that was a shame because I could have learned so much about comedy.”

It didn’t take long before she was signed to keystone studio and the rest was history.

In her autobiography, she stated that the rejection was a compliment and it encouraged her to do better.

As her stardom began, one of her issues was managing her finance and sorting for the help of Joseph Kennedy, the father of JFK. While working together they fell in love and was having an affair for three years.

Her relationship wasn’t always as explained by her daughter Michelle.

Michelle said in an interview with The Guardian, My mother’s relations with men were mostly disastrous. She was married six times, and she wanted to be eternally in love.

Her marriage to my father, Michael Farmer, an Irish playboy, just over two years. Ultimately, she was looking for men to dominate her, which never really happened.”

She met comedian Wallace Beery, at the age of 17. Along the line she got pregnant and Beery tricked her into aborting a child she wanted to keep.

She got married to Herbert Somborn, a movie company president in 1919. They had a girl named Gloria, but their marriage ended in 1922 because Gloria Swanson was involved with other men while staying married to Somborn.

In 1925, she got married once again to Henry de La Falaise and this time around the marriage lasted for six years.

At the age of 84, Gloria Swanson was laid to rest on  April 4, 1983.