“That’s another fine mess you’ve gotten me into.” – Oliver Hardy.

Oliver Hardy Biography

Norvell Hardy was born on 18 January 1892 in Harlem, Georgia, USA. He was the son of a civil war veteran called Oliver, who had fought and been wounded fighting for the Confederates at the Battle of Antietam. His mother was Emily Norvell who was descended from Captain Hugh Norvell who had arrived in Williamsburg, Virginia sometime before 1635.

(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});

Norvell’s father died when he was less than twelve months old. He was the youngest of five children, although tragically, his brother Sam had died when they were children as the result of an accident on the Oconee River. Norvell had managed to pull Sam from the water, but he was unable to revive him.

Norvell was known to be a somewhat difficult child and as a result was sent to a military academy in Milledgeville, Georgia and then when thirteen years old he attended junior high at the Young Harris College in North Georgia. He wasn’t a huge fan of formal education and ran away from boarding school in order to sing with a theatrical group he had joined. His mother, recognising that he had a talent for singing and that he had gained an interest in theatre, sent him to Atlanta where he studied music and singing with Adolf Dahm-Petersen. Norvell skipped some lessons though in order to make a little money, and sang at the Alcazar Theatre for $3.50 per week. It didn’t last though, and he ended up back at Milledgeville.

As a tribute to his father, Norvell added the name Oliver in front of his own sometime before 1910 and appears in the U.S. census for 1910 as Oliver N. Hardy. From that point forward he used the name Oliver on all formal documents and communications.

In 1910 a movie theatre opened in Milledgeville, which is where Oliver was now calling home. He worked in the theatre in a number of different roles including as projectionist and manager, but as he saw more and more movies on the big screen he started to believe that he could do a better job. Oliver wanted to get into the movie industry and a friend suggested that Jacksonville, Florida may be a good starting point as he knew some films were being made there. Oliver Hardy moved to Jacksonville in 1913. At night he sang at the local cabaret and vaudeville theatres. He had a regular job there during the day at the Lubin Manufacturing Company, which is where he met Madelyn Saloshin and they were married on 17 November 1913.

All the time he was working in Jacksonville, Oliver Hardy stayed on the lookout for work in the film industry and his patience paid off when in 1914 he acted in his first movie, called Outwitting Dad. However, he found that his large size, he was over six feet tall and weighed more than 300 pounds, restricted him to playing certain roles. These were usually along the lines of the “hired muscle” or the villain. He did however also find that his size lent itself quite nicely to comedy roles. Over the next twelve months, Oliver Hardy had appeared in more than 50 single reel short films for the Lubin company.

Over the next few years, Hardy worked for a number of different studios including Pathé and Edison in New York before returning to Jacksonville to work for the Vim Comedy Company. Although Vim closed down after Hardy found that they were stealing from the payroll, the company was bought by the King Bee studio, leading Oliver to work with Bill Ruge, Billy West and Ethel Burton Palmer. He was by this time known as a comedy actor but occasionally played the part of “the heavy” well into the 1920’s.

In 1917, Oliver Hardy moved to Los Angeles and worked as a freelance actor for a number of studios in Hollywood. He separated from his wife in 1919 and by November 1921, they were divorced. Seven days after his divorce had been finalised...