Clarence Hailey Long
| Clarence Hailey "C. H." Long, Jr.
(Texas rancher who was the inspiration for the Philip Morris "Marlboro Man" commercial) | |||
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| Born | January 9, 1910 Paducah, Cottle County Texas, USA Resident of Clarendon | ||
| Died | June 29, 1978 (aged 68) Cottle County, Texas | ||
| Spouse | Ellen Theresa Rogers Long (married 1951-1978, his death) | ||
| Religion | Southern Baptist Notes:
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Clarence Hailey Long, Jr., often known as C. H. Long (January 9, 1910 – June 29, 1978), was the rugged Texas cowboy sensationalized as the original "Marlboro Man." Long, then foreman of the JA Ranch, was catapulted to national attention in 1949, when LIFE magazine published a series of Leonard McCombe photographs on ranching in the American West. Long was the basis of the popular Marlboro cigarettes advertising campaign in the 1950s and 1960s for Philip Morris International, but other models followed through 1999.[1]
Biography
Long was born in Paducah in Cottle County in the southern Texas Panhandle. He worked on the 32,000-acre JA Ranch southeast of Amarillo and originally established by John George Adair, a native of Ireland, and Charles Goodnight, the best known of the Texas cattlemen called the "Father of the Texas Panhandle." During World War II, Long served in the United States Navy in the South Pacific.[2]
The then 39-year-old, 150-pound Long was described as a "silent man, unassuming and shy, to the point of bashfulness [with a] face sunburned to the color of saddle leather [with cowpuncher's] wrinkles radiating from pale blue eyes." He wore "a ten-gallon Stetson hat, a bandanna around his neck, a bag of Bull Durham tobacco with its yellow string dangling from his pocket, and blue denim, the fabric of the profession".[3]
Long's Marlboro photographs led to marriage proposals from across the nation, all of which he rejected. In 1951, at forty, Long wed the former Ellen Theresa Rogers (1925-2002) a Massachusetts-born nurse who came to the JA to care for young Cornelia Wadsworth "Ninia" Ritchie, daughter of ranch manager Montgomery Harrison Wadsworth "Montie" Ritchie. The Longs had five sons: Clarence, Roger, Walt, Grant, and John. At the time of her death, Ellen was residing in Raton in Colfax County in northeastern New Mexico. "Ninia" later married and divorced future state Senator Miles Teel Bivins (1947-2009) of Amarillo, whose family also owned ranching properties. Their son, Andrew Bivins, a graduate of the ranch management program at Texas Christian University in Fort Worth, took over management of the JA in 2005.[2]
In 1953, Long joined the First Baptist Church of Clarendon in Donley County, after the death of his father, C. H. Long, Sr., the JA Ranch manager who was killed when thrown from a bronco. The senior Long was in charge of the Hereford herd on the JA. Thereafter, Long was offered a $20,000 (191,000 in 2020 dollars) annual contract to advertise beer. His declining of the offer was highlighted in the June 25, 1955, edition of The Baptist Standard newspaper. Long left the JA in 1956.[2]
Long's tenure at the JA partly paralleled that of Tom Blasingame, known as the oldest cowboy in the American West, having died at the age of ninety-one in 1989, after having worked in ranching for seventy-three years.
Long joked that "If it weren't for a good horse, a woman would be the sweetest thing in the world."[4]
References
- ↑ "Marlboro Man" photographs. LIFE magazine (August 22, 1949).
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 C.H. Long, Jr., exhibit, Panhandle-Plains Historical Museum, Canyon, Texas.
- ↑ Patricia Vettel-Becke. Shooting from the Hip: Photography, Masculinity, and Postwar America. Google Books. ISBN 0-8166-4302-4. Retrieved on May 22, 2020.
- ↑ 100 Photographs That Changed the World by Life. digitaljournalist.org. Retrieved on May 22, 2020.
