Boardman, True

Biography

True Eames Boardman was born Oct. 25, 1909 in Seattle, Washington. He received an A.B. from UCLA in 1934 and an MA from Occidental College in 1971. He began his career as a child actor in silent films working with performers like Charlie Chaplin and Mary Pickford. After several years of acting in film and theater, he began a radio career writing radio drama for programs including Silver Theatre and Lux Radio Theatre . During the Red Scare in the late 1940s, Boardman worked for companies like General Electric and AT&T writing and producing documentaries. He made the transition to television in the late 1940s and went on to write for programs including Daktari, Ironside, My Three Sons, Perry Mason, Silver Television Theatre, and The Virginian . Later in life, Boardman lectured at various academic institutions and in the late 1990s returned to acting as Ralph Waldo Emerson in the one-man show, Apologia Pro Vita Sua . His memoir, When Hollywood and I Were Young, was published in 1995. True Boardman died on August 4, 2003.

From the guide to the True Boardman papers, 1904-1998, (University of California, Los Angeles. Library. Performing Arts Special Collections.)