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William Powell was an actor from the 1920s to the 1960s. He was born in 1892 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and he was far from an overnight success. He became a stage actor when he was 20, and it would be 12 years before he went to Hollywood, and for the first seven years, he worked for Paramount Pictures, mostly playing villains! He became a star with The Canary Murder Case in 1929, which was made as a silent movie, but remade with sound, and it was Powell's wonderful voice that made him a star. In 1931, he switched to Warner Bros., and then in 1934 to MGM, where he became a top star, first with Myrna Loy in Manhattan Melodrama, and then with her again in The Thin Man the same year (he was nominated for the Best Actor Academy Award for this first film in the series). He had been married to Carole Lombard from 1931 to 1933 (and they made My Man Godfrey together, for which he was nominated for the Best Actor Academy Award), and he was also very memorable in his movies with Kay Francis, which included One Way Passage. In 1935, he made Reckless with Jean Harlow, and the two were engaged, but she became ill, passing away from kidney failure in 1937. Powell took a year off after her death, but returned to make many Thin Man sequels and other successful movies. In 1940, he married Diana Lewis after only knowing her for three weeks, and she was 27 years his junior, but their marriage lasted the rest of his life! As he aged, he seamlessly moved to older leading parts and character roles, including in Life With Father (for which he was nominated for the Best Actor Academy Award), Mister Roberts, and scores of others! He retired in 1955, and lived a quiet life until he passed away in 1984, at the age of 91. He lived a most remarkable life!

Important Added Info: This index card has been personally autographed (signed) by William Powell! He likely signed it in the last few years of his life, when he was in his late 80s, and the autograph was written with a shaky hand, which certainly makes sense. The index card could be matted with a vintage or repro still and framed together to make a cool display!

Note that this autographed item is part of a remarkable collection. In our last three all-signed auctions, we auctioned hundreds of items from this collection and now we are auctioning 50 signed index cards (plus 224 signed photos and repros that have a different note on those)!
     In the 1970s, our consignor was a teacher who taught a film class, and he also part-time ran the local movie theater (and he saved all the presskits from the movies the theater showed).
     Starting in the late 1970s through the late 1980s, he wrote to famous celebrities, and enclosed an 8x10 from his collection, and he wrote a literate personalized letter, talking about his work as a film teacher, and discussing his favorite movie by that star.
     See our other note with the 224 signed photos from this consignor for more about how he acquired them. But in additional to sending photos, he would also enclose an index card, and mention that the star could sign the index card if they didn't want to sign the photo. He found that many, many stars would sign both! This auction is for one of 40 index cards which he received back from the celebrities who he had written to.
     He of course does not have any "Certificates of Authenticity", but he only kept ones he felt were surely authentic, and those are the ones we are auctioning. However, bidders can certainly compare the signatures to known examples on the internet to judge for themselves.

As is true of all the signed items we are currently auctioning, we give every buyer 30 days in which to review what they purchased and they can return any item as long as it is within 30 days of the end of the auction. On non-signed items, we give a "lifetime guarantee" on everything we auction, but on signed items, we give the above modified guarantee of 30 days after the auction closes.

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