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Known For

John Agar is known for:

  • King Kong
    In this remake of the 1933 classic about the giant ape, an oil company expedition disturbs the peace of Kong and brings him back to New York to exploit him.
  • Nightbreed
    A troubled young man is drawn to a mythical place called Midian where a variety of monsters are hiding from humanity.
  • Fort Apache
    In John Ford's sombre exploration the mythology of American heroes, he slowly reveals the character of Owen Thursday, who sees his new posting to the desolate Fort Apache as a chance to claim the military honour which he believes is rightfully his. Arrogant, obsessed with military form and ultimately self-destructive, Thursday attempts to destroy the Apache chief Cochise after luring him across the border from Mexico, against the advice of his subordinates.

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Biography

John G. Agar (January 31, 1921 – April 7, 2002) was an American actor. He starred alongside John Wayne in the films Sands of Iwo Jima and She Wore a Yellow Ribbon, but was later relegated to B movies, such as Tarantula, The Mole People, The Brain from Planet Arous, Flesh and the Spur, and Hand of Death. He also starred with Lucille Ball in the 1951 movie The Magic Carpet. Agar was born in Chicago, Illinois, the son of Lillian (née Rogers) and John Agar, Sr., a meat packer (see Agar Hams). He was educated at the Harvard School for Boys in Chicago and Lake Forest Academy in Lake Forest, Illinois and graduated from Trinity-Pawling Preparatory School in Pawling, New York, but did not attend college. He and his family moved from Chicago to Los Angeles in 1942, following his father’s death. During World War II he served in the Army Air Corps, and he was a sergeant at the time he left the army in 1946. He was Shirley Temple's first husband (1945–1950), and they worked together in Fort Apache. His marriage to Temple lasted five years and they had one daughter together, Linda Susan Agar, who was later known as Susan Black, taking the surname of her stepfather Charles Alden Black. Following his divorce from Temple, Agar was married in 1951 to model Loretta Barnett Combs (1922–2000). They remained married until her death in 2000. They had two sons, Martin Agar and John G. Agar III. Agar died on April 7, 2002 at Burbank, California of complications from emphysema. He was buried beside his wife at Riverside National Cemetery in Riverside, California. Agar made six movies with John Wayne: Fort Apache, Sands of Iwo Jima, Big Jake, Chisum, The Undefeated and She Wore a Yellow Ribbon. He also made two movies with Shirley Temple, Fort Apache and Adventure in Baltimore, also starring Robert Young. He is mentioned in the Frank Zappa song "The Radio is Broken" from the album The Man From Utopia (1983). Description above from the Wikipedia article John Agar, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.