Richard Widmark: A Princeton legacy

We will miss another classmate of Richard Widmark. I wrote about Dorothy (Simon) Dabler back in July 2014. Dorothy died April 28 of this year at the age of 100. God Bless.

Gail M. Castner was born July 5, 1914, in Pompano Beach, Fla., and Richard Widmark was born Dec. 26, 1914, in Sunrise Township, Minn. They would meet and become friends in Princeton toward the end of 1925. They would both be in the sixth grade at Lincoln School, and Gail Castner would be Richard Widmark’s first neighbor his own age when they lived just across the street in Princeton.

Dick’s first home would be living above the family bakery at 514 S. Main, with Gail’s at 441 S. Main. Their paths from Minnesota and Florida would take them through a dozen states and thousands of miles. By the age of 11, they both would have more twists and turns in their short lives to date, than many persons experience in a lifetime. They both had younger brothers, four years younger, who would have intertwining lives the likes of which they write stories about and make movies of.

Gail and Max were born to Rueben and Hazel (Strong) Johnson. Rueben and Hazel divorced when the boys were very young, and Rueben had custody of the boys. He gave them up to Frank and Jennie Castner to raise. Jennie was Rueben’s sister. Hazel had second thoughts on the boys being raised by the Castners. This was in 1921 when Gail was 7, and Max was 3. Hazel had remarried. She had two brothers living in Chicago. She called them. One of the brothers and her new husband came to Princeton. They located the Castner home, forced their way in, and took the children at gun point. It was evening, and Gail and Max were in their pajamas. Her husband and brother planned on taking the boys on the train from Bureau back to Chicago but were apprehended in Bureau at the station, after the Castners called the county sheriff. Frank and Jennie Castner got the boys back and adopted them.

Gail Caster, like Tom Best and Lester Peterson, had an elementary and high school career that mirrored Richard Widmarks or vice versa. Gail and Richard spent many hours together in extracurricular school activities besides all the classes they were in together. They were both in their junior class play and senior class play, where they rehearsed lines together. They were in French Club, Science Club, Hi-Y Club and the National Athletic Scholarship Society, which promoted the four Cs: Clean Speech, Athletics, Scholarship, and Living. They were on the football team together in their junior and senior year.

Gail, like Tom Best and Richard Widmark, had an ear for music and was very gifted. He played most of the brass instruments, the piano and sang. Gail and Lester Peterson sang many duets together at many events. They both had great voices. Gail and his younger brother, Max, were both musically inclined and played in the Princeton City Band in grade school and high school. Gail was also part of the hub of Richard Widmark’s pick up band, the Rhythm Kings, where he was on the trombone and even played the French horn. Widmark played the drums, and Tom Best was on the piano — making music.

Gail made the road trip out west right after graduation with Richard and Tom, in the summer of 1932. Gail was not sure what he wanted to do — continue his education or do something where he could work for himself like his father, so the trip sounded like a good adventure where he could think it out. Tom planned to attend Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill., studying to be a dentist. Richard Widmark was enrolled at the University of Arizona, and the trip would include a look at the campus. They stopped in Sioux Falls, S.D. where Widmark had relatives. Dick, Tom and Gail were visiting at Widmark’s Uncle Leo’s. Dick’s grandmother, Mary Barr, was living with Leo. Dick got a wire from his father telling him the money was just not there for him to attend the Arizona school. This cut the trip short, and a disappointed Richard Widmark and his two friends headed back to Princeton. Widmark ended up at Lake Forest College on a scholarship, and when Tom’s father became ill, he came back to Princeton to run the family business.

Carl and Ethel Widmark had separated when Richard was a junior in high school. They reunited for a short period while he was attending Lake Forest College. Ethel Mae remained in Princeton with her two sons until both graduated. Donald Widmark and his friend, Max Castner, graduated from Logan Junior High School on June 10, 1932. Donald would not attend Princeton High School. He would go to high school in Evanston. The Widmark family would not live in Princeton again after Dick headed off to college, but Ethel and her two sons did visit back in town on Nov. 27, 1936. Ethel had a close friend in Charlotte Bouxine, who with her husband Maurice, ran the Leafy Lane Dairy. The Widmarks were divorced in March of 1941 when Carl was living in Lima, Ohio, and working for the Kemper Thomas Co. selling novelties. Donald Widmark was living with his father in Lima when he got his draft number in October 1940. Later he moved to Los Angeles, Calif., to live with his mother, Ethel Mae. Max Castner and Donald Widmark would not see each other again for 12 years after they graduated from junior high. The meeting would be something neither young man would have ever expected.

Gail Castner started working at the Trimble Greenhouse at 501 E. Peru St. for William Trimble, after the summer trip out west in 1932. He was still living at home at 443 S. Church where the family had just moved to. Max was still in  high school. His father, Frank, was still a carpenter, and his mom, Jennie, was still a great cook. In the fall of 1932, Gail is enrolled as a freshman at the University of Illinois, but he was back in Princeton in 1935 still trying to find himself as a professional. He started working at Nichols Grocery at 648 S. Main. He married Doris Hubbartt on June 6, 1937, in Dixon. They met when she was working at Dykes Restaurant in Princeton.

By 1939, Gail and Doris were living at 206 S. First St., and he was working as an electrician for Swanson’s Electric at 570 S. Main. Harry Swanson was his boss, and Swanson’s Electric Shop had its grand opening on Nov. 17, 1939. Gail and Doris have their first child in August of 1939, a daughter, Tamara. Younger brother, Max, graduated high school in 1936, and by 1939 he was employed as a carpenter for Omen Lumber Co. at 124 S. Main. Things would soon change for the two brothers.

Max Castner left his job at the Omen Lumber Co. and enlisted in the U.S. Army on April 17, 1941. There is a call nationwide, for pilot training to begin in mid-December 1941 by the U.S. Army Air Corps. Gail Castner leaves his job with Swanson’s Electric and joins the Army Air Corps Enlisted Reserve. Gail, Doris, and Tamara are living in Milwaukee, Wis., in July of 1942, when he starts his training, and then Gail is attending the Army Air Corps Flight School in Chicago toward the end of year. By the time the Castner brothers draft notification is listed in the local papers in August of 1943, the boys are already entrenched in the service of their country.

Donald Widmark has enlisted in the Army Air Corps in California and begins training there. Richard Widmark would wear many of the uniforms of the Armed Services on the silver screen but never in real life. We’ll get up in the air next time with the Castner brothers and Donald Widmark as they are slung into the fray of World War II.

I’ll keep checking the rear view mirror for more Richard Widmark, and be back in couple of weeks.