Jimmy Noel

Herbert James "Jimmy" Noel was born May 15, 1903 in Haverhill Massachusetts, the youngest of four children, and son of Walter and Annie Noel. After graduating from high school, Noel worked in entertainment as a theater actor, musician, and singer. He eventually started his own band, specializing in blues music.Noel was married at least twice. The first marriage was to to Delories Ziegfield (distantly related to Florenz Ziegfield) in 1933. It ended in divorce after about a year. The second marriage was to Dawn Hope, a theater actress who was the daughter of the well-known and eccentric actress Adele Blood Hope. The marriage ended after 18 months under unusual circumstances, when Dawn Hope took her life following the couple's unexpected visit to a nudist camp (neither of them was a naturalist). Neither marriage produced children.Not much is known about Noel for the next ten years, except that he lived in the Los Angeles area. Around 1949, he emerged as a stuntman, double, and actor in bit roles for movies,.The rapid growth of television required many more actors and extras, and the Western genre gained popularity in the early 1950's. The reliable Noel had the natural look of a cowboy, and he found work in such as "Range Rider," "The Gene Autry Show," " Annie Oakley," and "Death Valley Days." When the public's love of Westerns caused a wide proliferation of the genre in the late 1950's, Noel was kept busy, albeit in extra or bit roles. His 147 appearances on "The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp" was second only to the show's star Hugh O'Brian, and he worked on most other Westerns of the era, including those on CBS.But it was "Gunsmoke" where Noel found steady work. He had 227 appearances on the show. More importantly, his close similarity, from a distance, to costar Milburn Stone (Doc) landed him weekly work on the series.When Gunsmoke went off the air in 1974, Noel found work much scarcer. His health declined in later years, and he spent the last four years of his life at the Motion Picture Country House and Hospital in Woodland Hills, dying on January 31, 1985. Show less «