George Reeves: A Look Back At His Mysterious Life, Career, And Death

Many actors have played Superman over the years, on both the big-screen and small, including Dean Cain in the 1990s on TV’s heralded show Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman, to Christopher Reeve in a series of feature films in the late 1970s and early 1980s, to Henry Cavill in more recent years on the big screen with movies like Justice League (2017/2021).

But it was George Reeves (plural, as opposed to Reeve, singular, and no relation) that many classic Hollywood fans most recall as playing TV’s Clark Kent, the Man of Steel (which is the title of the first movie in which Cavill played the super part in 2013).

According to ComicBook.com, Reeves was born George Keefer Brewer on January 5, 1914, in Woolstock, Iowa, and died tragically on June 16, 1959 (more on that later).

As ComicBook.com goes on to explain, “Reeves’ film career began in 1939 when he was cast as Stuart Tarleton, one of the Tarleton Twins and a Scarlett O’Hara suitor in the film classic, Gone with the Wind. Though Brewer only appeared in a minor role, the film’s unprecedented success resulted in Reeves landing a contract with Warner Brothers who changed his professional name to George Reeves. In 1951 Reeves was offered the role of Superman in a new series titled Adventures of Superman. [minus the ‘the’…