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A juvenile film star of international renown, Shirley Temple Black devoted her adult years to diplomacy, working for the U.S. Department of State and serving as an ambassador to Ghana and Czechoslovakia.
BIOGRAPHICAL ESSAY Early Life
Shirley Temple was born in Santa Monica, California, the daughter of George Francis Temple, a bank teller, and his wife Gertrude. Shirley's early life was not merely a waiting period in which she prepared for an adult career; she was a child actor with starring roles in more than forty motion pictures and fifty television productions. It is significant, however, that in her adult résumé of three pages, Shirley Temple Black's childhood achievements are listed in a mere three lines.
From the very start, Shirley was a tough little girl with a surprisingly logical mind. At the age of five, she courageously endured having her lip sewn up without anaesthetic; her father fainted. When placed into the infamous black box on a film set as punishment for delaying the shooting, she quickly deduced that time was a valuable commodity and should not be wasted. An intelligent child, Shirley was full of questions. When challenged by the query, "Why do you ask?," her logical reply was, "Because I do not know."
Her road to stardom was initiated and fully supported by her loving and ambitious mother Gertrude, who took her to dancing school at the age of three for lessons that cost the family fifty cents per week. Her mother was constantly at her side, serving as chauffeur, as chaperone, as seamstress of Shirley's costumes, and as hairdresser of her legendary curls (which were rolled on fifty-four curlers each day).
Shirley was soon discovered and hired at a salary of $50 per week to appear in short films. Among others, she acted in a series of eight Baby Burlesk pictures, which parodied films featuring adult actors. From the waist up, Shirley was dressed as a Parisian seductress, with an off-shoulder blouse and a rose behind her ear, while below, she and the rest of the juvenile cast were in diapers. The series was extremely popular, in spite--or perhaps because--of silly titles such as Polly Tix in Washington and Morelegs Sweettrick, a take-off on Marlene Dietrich.
After the eight Baby Burlesks, five comedy shorts, and various walk-on roles, Shirley Temple was signed to a contract by Fox Studios, later to become Twentieth Century-Fox. She started with a salary of $150 per week, with $25 for Gertrude. Shirley's first full-length picture for Fox was Stand Up and Cheer (1934). Several additional films were released by Fox that same year, the most memorable of which were Little Miss Marker and Bright Eyes. The latter film contained her famous rendition of "On the Good Ship Lollipop," which became a trademark song for Temple and a classic of its genre. The year 1935 marked the release of The Little Colonel, the first of three films in which Shirley danced with Bill "Bojangles" Robinson, the legendary black tap dancer. Known for its memorable scene of the pair dancing on a staircase, The Little Colonel marked the appearance of the first interracial dance team in American motion picture history.
For five consecutive years, from 1934 to 1938, Shirley Temple was named as the most popular film star in the United States; she received star billing at the top of the cast lists for all of her pictures, and thousands of fan letters addressed to her poured into Fox Studios. In 1935, she received a special Academy Award for her "outstanding contribution to screen entertainment during the year 1934"--an impressive testament to her unprecedented box office appeal. She was the darling of Depression-era filmgoers--a cute, curly-haired moppet who could make them forget their problems simply by her ability to sing, dance, and cry on cue. The lead role in the 1937 film adaptation of Rudyard Kipling's Wee Willie Winkie was conveniently transformed into a female role for Shirley. Adaptations of children's classics provided other starring vehicles for Temple in the films Heidi (1937) and Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm (1938). Her next-to-last film at Twentieth Century-Fox was a 1939 adaptation of Maurice Maeterlinck's masterpiece, The Blue Bird, but it did not fare as well as the rest in its Hollywood transfiguration.
As Shirley Temple progressed into adolescence, her star status declined. She left the studios at Twentieth Century-Fox for those at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, but was dropped after appearing in one production. Temple made additional films at other studios during the 1940's, but none matched the success of her earlier productions. While continuing her acting career, she entered the private Westlake School for Girls in Holmby Hills, California, in 1940 and was graduated in 1945. At the age of seventeen, she married John Agar, a marine sergeant who launched his own acting career and appeared with Temple in John Ford's Fort Apache (1948), and in Adventure in Baltimore (1949). Another costar in Temple's later films was the young Ronald Reagan in That Hagen Girl (1947).
Temple decided to give up her film career in 1949 and eventually obtained a divorce from Agar, who suffered from alcoholism. On December 16, 1950, Shirley Temple married Charles Alden Black, a naval commander from a prominent California family who went on to establish himself as a successful business executive. After her second marriage, Temple chose to remain in retirement in order to devote attention to rearing her children. Although Temple attempted a comeback, appearing in the NBC television series The Shirley Temple Storybook in 1958 and again on The Shirley Temple Show in 1960, she was discouraged by the shows' poor reception. Undaunted, she turned her attention to politics.
Life's Work
While living in Washington, District of Columbia, with her second husband, Shirley Temple Black got her first taste of national and international politics. By 1960, she had begun to participate actively in Republican politics, serving as a successful speaker at various fund-raisers for party candidates, including Richard M. Nixon. As governor of California, her longtime friend Ronald Reagan appointed Black to serve as a member of his finance committee and to serve on the California Advisory Hospital Council. She made her own foray into the political arena when she ran for the congressional district seat representing her home county of San Mateo, California. The seat became vacant in 1967 as a result of the death from leukemia of Republican incumbent J. A. Younger. Facing an all-male field of seven Democrats and four Republicans, Black was unprepared for the rough political campaign that followed. With her child star image satirized in an Off-Broadway play and on television and her political aspirations written off as the misguided ambitions of a rich society matron, Black lost the election to fellow Republican Peter McCloskey.
Determined to devote her life to public service, Black was gratified when President Richard M. Nixon appointed her to serve as a U.S. representative to the United Nations' Twenty-fourth General Assembly from 1969 to 1970. Black became a member of the U.S. delegation to the United Nations Conference on Human Environment held in Stockholm, Sweden in 1972, and a member of the U.S. Commission for UNESCO. She also served on the U.S.S.R.-U.S.A. Joint Commission for the Cooperative Treaty on the Environment held in Moscow between 1972 and 1973.
Personal tragedy threatened to curtail Black's political career. She was diagnosed with breast cancer and had a mastectomy on November 3, 1972. In a news release issued after the operation was deemed successful, Black expressed her hope that other women would be encouraged by her example and would not allow fear to prevent them from undergoing this life-saving surgery. The response to her plea was gratifying: The American Cancer Society reported a 30 percent increase in women seeking information on the detection of breast cancer. Three weeks after her operation, Black wrote a well-informed article on breast cancer for publication in McCall's magazine.
Although the Watergate scandal and subsequent upheaval within the Republican Party also threatened to prevent Black from further advancement, President Gerald R. Ford eventually rewarded her for her faithful support of the party by naming her to the post of U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of Ghana in western Africa. Black had demonstrated a long-standing interest in African affairs and had established friendships with many of the African representatives at the United Nations. Quickly dispelling rumors about having attained the appointment in return for reputedly large campaign contributions to the Republican Party, Black focused her attention on learning more about Ghana by attending numerous State Department briefings and studying the history and native languages of the country. Arriving in the capital city of Accra in December of 1974, Black and her family were greeted warmly. Benefiting from the country's respect for matriarchal leadership and its admiration of her as a film celebrity, Black conducted herself well under trying circumstances and made strides in improving relations between Ghana and the United States. Despite her success, she was recalled from her post in 1976 as a result of a diplomatic snafu over Ghana's last minute cancellation of a visit from U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger.
Upon her return to the United States, Black was appointed to serve as chief of protocol under President Ford. The first woman to hold this post, Black was responsible for making proper presentation of foreign diplomats to the president and for overseeing all ceremonial matters connected to the executive branch. Black's finely honed social skills and ease in making public appearances allowed her to complete her duties with distinction. Her final assignment as chief of protocol was to prepare for the presidential inauguration of Jimmy Carter in 1977.
When Ronald Reagan succeeded Carter as president in 1981, Black was invited to share her expertise as a foreign affairs officer by cochairing State Department seminars that prepared appointees for their future duties as ambassadors and diplomatic envoys. For her extraordinary services, Secretary of State George Shultz named Shirley Temple Black a Career Foreign Service Officer in 1988, the only person to receive such an honor. In the spring of 1989, Black accepted an appointment as U.S. ambassador to Czechoslovakia extended to her by President George Bush. During her tenure in Prague, Black witnessed Czechoslovakia's "Velvet Revolution," which marked the country's peaceful transition to a democratic government, and she worked closely with the new republic's president, Václav Havel, before leaving her post as ambassador in 1992.
Summary
Shirley Temple Black's legendary popularity as a juvenile film celebrity opened the door for her later success as a government appointee, but it also served as something of an obstacle. Undaunted by allegations that she was not fully qualified to serve as an international diplomat, Black employed her no-nonsense flair for public relations and demonstrated her determination to master the skills necessary to work as a foreign affairs officer. Always eager to help others, she used the occasion of her own battle with breast cancer in 1972 to help educate women about the importance of early detection. Proud of her accomplishments as an actor, Black was recognized by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences with a second special Oscar in 1980. Most of all, drawing upon the international goodwill created by her well-loved film image, Black managed to establish impressive credentials as an American diplomat and helped train other foreign service officers who followed. Few individuals, male or female, have negotiated such a successful transition between such diverse careers.
AWARDS
Areas of Achievement:
Film and diplomacy
FURTHER READINGS Black, Shirley Temple. Child Star: An Autobiography. McGraw-Hill, 1988. By far the most reliable source on the author's life as a child star who was exceptionally intelligent and unspoiled by fame. Black leaves her narrative unfinished, saving room for a projected sequel. A perceptive and competent work, filled with humor and honesty that reflect Black's adult personality. Contains forty-eight pages of black-and-white illustrations, a filmography, and an index
Edwards, Anne. Shirley Temple: American Princess. William Morrow, 1988. A substantial work by an experienced author of celebrity biographies. Covers Black's life up through the mid-1980's. Illustrated with thirty-two pages of black-and-white photographs in addition to a detailed filmography, copious notes, and an index
Fiori, Carlo. The Story of Shirley Temple Black: Hollywood's Youngest Star. Dell, 1990. Intended for younger readers, this juvenile biography provides a concise summary of Black's life. Contains a list of film titles and twelve pages of illustrations
Greene, Graham. Graham Greene on Film: Collected Film Criticism, 1935-1940. Ed. John R. Taylor. Simon & Schuster, 1972. Among other pieces, this work includes Greene's biting review of Wee Willie Winkie written for London's Night and Day magazine, in which he called Shirley Temple "a complete totsy" whose "dimpled depravity" emerged from beneath a "mask of childhood." Furor over the article resulted in a lawsuit that Greene and the magazine lost
Haskins, James. Shirley Temple Black: Actress to Ambassador. Viking Kestrel, 1988. A short work written by a leading author of juvenile biographies. Lacks notes or a filmography, but is charmingly illustrated with twelve drawings by Donna Ruff
Minott, Rodney G. The Sinking of the Lollipop: Shirley Temple vs. Pete McCloskey. Diablo Press, 1968. This small press book chronicles Black's unsuccessful 1967 campaign for California's Eleventh Congressional District seat and analyzes the factors leading to her defeat by fellow Republican Pete McCloskey
Source Citation: "Shirley Temple Black." DISCovering U.S. History. Gale Research, 1997. From Vera Laska, "Shirley Temple Black." Great Lives from History, Frank N. Magill, ed. American Women Series, Vol. 1. Salem Press, 1995. Reproduced in Student Resource Center College Edition. Farmington Hills, Mich.: Gale Group. October, 2001. http://galenet.galegroup.com/servlet/SRCCE/