Robert Lowery (actor)

Robert Lowery (October 17, 1913 – December 26, 1971), born Robert Larkin Hanks, was a motion picture, television, and stage actor who appeared in over seventy films. He was born in Kansas City, Missouri and grew up on Wayne Avenue near the long-demolished Electric Park.

Biography

Lowery's father was a local attorney and oil investor who worked several years for the Pullman Corporation as a railroad agent; his mother, Leah Thompson Hanks, was a concert pianist. He graduated from Paseo High School in Kansas City, and soon was invited to sing with the Slats Randall Orchestra in the early 1930s. Lowery played on the Kansas City Blues minor league baseball team and was overall considered a versatile athlete; his physique and strength was gained from a stint working in a paper factory as a teenager. After the death of his father in 1935, he traveled to Hollywood with his mother and their housekeeper, and enrolled in the Lila Bliss acting school before being signed by Twentieth Century Fox in 1937.

During his career, Mr. Lowery was primarily known for roles in action movies such as "The Mark of Zorro", "Big Town", "The Mummy's Ghost", and "Dangerous Passage". He also became just the second actor to play DC Comics' Batman, starring in a 1949's "Batman and Robin" serial. He also appeared with Ray Danton in the well-known crime drama "The Rise and Fall of Legs Diamond". He was an accomplished stage actor and appeared in "Born Yesterday", "Caine Mutiny", and in several other productions. On television, he was best known for his work on the series "Circus Boy", but also appeared in "Wagon Train", "Playhouse 90" ("The Helen Morgan Story") "Pistols and Petticoats","Hazel" and a memorable episode of Adventures of Superman (the first time a Batman actor shared screen time with a Superman actor).

He was married three times, to three different actresses: to Jean Parker, to Vivan Wilcox, and to Rusty Farrell. He had one child, Robert, who lives in Redondo Beach, California; and two grandchildren. Lowery died unexpectedly of heart failure at 58 in his apartment in Hollywood, California on Christmas night of 1971.

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