Carol Donell

Carol Donnell was a beautiful Pentagon worker who was spotted and signed by a talent scout on a whim. She had a short but sweet Tinsel town adventure after that, perhaps getting the best out of her sojourn. She retired to become a wife and mother, and led a happy family life. Let’s learn more about her!

EARLY LIFE

Carolyn Jane McDonnell, was born on June 9, 1921, in New Jersey, daughter of Charles H. McDonnell and Carolyn Huttman. She was their only child. Her father was a manual laborer.

Carol grew up in New Jesey until the late 1920s. Great Depression hit in 1929, when Carol was only 8. Her parents, hoping to find a job and better living arrangements, hopped onto their Model A Ford and just drove around. Carol and her parents lived like many people of that time – driving from job to job, with no permanent residence. While on the road, the pre-teenage Carol slept on top of blankets with a pillow, on the trunk  on the back seat. It was a hard life, but the family unit was strong and they managed to pull trough such a lifestyle for more than a year.

They eventually settled in her father’s birth state, in Decatur, Illinois. There Carolyn graduated from high school and attended Business College. Shortly after working at Woolworth’s and, when WWII started, as the Executive Secretary to the Director at the local Ordinance Plant, she enlisted in ‘This Man’s Army” where she served on the General Staff of Military Intelligence at the newly built Pentagon. A talent scout on duty in Washington noticed her, ans she was offered a contract with RKO, which she accepted. And off the went!

CAREER

Carol was in Hollywood for a really, really short time, but she appeared in some pretty solid movies, not a bad record for such Tinseltown brevity!

Nocturne is an interesting film noir. A true B production, with George Raft (after his golden years were already over), the movie boasts a compelling main character, a detective who is a music apassionato, a mama’s boy, and very devoted to living the life his own way. It’s a bit more meat on the bones than with your standard noir characters. The story and the mystery are pretty well written (although slightly formulaic), but it’s Raft’s character and his mother that make this a bit out of the box experience.

Carol then appeared in The Locket, one of the best female centric film noirs. Laraine Day plays a mentally unstable young woman ads we follow her dramatic life. The highlight of this movie is the unusual structure – it’s episodic, with the shunned lovers each telling their own version of the female lead. This multi perspective movies are often intriguing when well done, and the director knows exactly what he wants to do. Robert Mitchum is in the leading man role. The complex framing device somehow makes the focus of the actors, and only Laraine gives a role of any depth (she’s top!

Carol’s last movie was The Woman on the Beach. Her third noir, and a third interesting noir (Carol quite nailed it here with her slim but intriguing output!). This is a deeply psychological movie, with top notch actors and a melancholic atmosphere. Robert Ryan and Joan Bennett play ill fated lovers, who love each other but she has a much older, blind husband, played by Charles Bickford. Subtle and not so subtle drama enfolds, but the wast sandy beaches and the complex emotional interplay between the leads makes this film an unique experience, and certainly different than the usual noir fare.

That was it from Carol!

PRIVATE LIFE

Carol may have been in Hollywood for only a few brief months, but she used her time there wisely – she took the opportunity to learn all about high fashion, went from Brunette to Blond, and met acting legends like Cary Grant and Ronald Reagan. This would serve her well in her future life, as she remained a true glamorous fashion plate.

Carol retired from Hollywood to marry her beau, lawyer Ralph McAfee, in June 1946. Here is the article about their nuptials:

Carol Donell, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Charles H. McDonnell. 1053 West Tuttle street, is here from Hollywood enroute to New York where on Tuesday she is to be married to New York Attorney Ralph L. McAfee in the home of his brother at Aidsfcy-on-thc-Hudson. Miss Donncll is relinquishing an acting contract with RKO radio studio signed last year upon her release from the Wac as technical sergeant. Mr. McAfee was a captain in Military Intelligence during the war and is now a member of the law firm of Cravath, Swaine and Moore in New York City where they will live after a wedding trip by plane to Montreal, Canada.

McAfee was born on October 20, 1914, in Berry, Texas, to Jessie McAfee and Annie Reeves. He was the fourth of five children. The son of a Methodist minister, was raised in Waco and Kerens, Texas. He attended Southwestern University and graduated from Columbia University in 1936 and the Columbia Law School in 1939. When WW2 hit he became an infantry officer in the Army, serving in the China-Burma-India theater from 1942 to 1944 and as an intelligence staff officer in Washington from 1944 to 1945, where he met and fell in love with Carol.

Thus began Carol’s  life as a soccer Mom & Wall Street Lawyer’s “Bride” (as he husband always called her). The couple had three children: Horace Michael, born on August 31, 1957, Marc Charles, born on May 9, 1963, and Caroline. McAfee became a trial lawyer who handled cases for companies such as the Allied Corporation, the Bethlehem Steel Corporation, CBS Inc., Chemical Bank, Royal Dutch/Shell Group and the St. Louis-San Francisco Railroad. The McAfees were socially very conscious, and Ralph was working with the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, and was a chief counsel for a number of students at Jackson State University in a landmark suit charging civil rights violations by the Mississipi Highway Patrol.

Carol led an equally fulfilled life as her hubby. Except being a great wife and mother, she made time to volunteer at the County Hospital, was very active with The Junior League and pursued her keen interest in New Age by reading authors like Joseph Campbell, de Chardin, Hillman, Bly…

McAfee died on February 11, 1986. Carolyn moved to Florida to enjoy her golden years, and did not remarry.

Carolyn McAfee died in 2020, at the ripe old age of 98.