Harriet MacGibbon (born Harriet E. McGibbon; October , â€" February ,
) was an American stage, film, and television actress best known for
her role as the insufferably snobbish, "blue-blooded Bostonian" Mrs.
Margaret Drysdale in the CBS sitcom The Beverly Hillbillies.Harriet E.
McGibbon was born in Chicago to Dr. Walter Peter McGibbon and Gertrude
L. (née Crary) McGibbon. It is not known why she amended her surname
by adding an "a", but she was credited a few times as McGibbon. She
was "finished" at Knox School, Cooperstown, New York, where she
prepared for Vassar. Without staying to receive a diploma, she left to
fulfill her desire for the footlights and studied with Franklin H.
Sargent at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York
City.[citation needed]Later, MacGibbon joined the stock company of
Edward Clarke Lilley at Akron, Ohio. She then went to San Francisco
and played leading roles for Henry Duffy. In Louisville, Kentucky, she
acted with Wilton Lackaye, Edmund Breese, William Faversham, Tom Wise
and Nance O'Neil. There were regular productions, including Ned
McCobb's Daughter, The Front Page, The Big Fight, and a
"transcontinental tour" starring MacGibbon in The Big Fight, which
began in Boston, took in New Haven and Hartford, and ended at Caine's
storehouse. During all of her travels while performing, MacGibbon
managed to remain in Boston long enough to study the harp with Alfred
Holy, first harpist with the Boston Symphony Orchestra. She later said
that when she gave up the instrument, Mr. Holy, "with unconscious
humor", remarked, "What a pity, Miss MacGibbon, you look so lovely
with a harp."[citation needed]She had a long and distinguished career
on the Broadway stage, beginning in at the age of nineteen when she
acted in the play Beggar on Horseback at the Shubert Theatre. In the
late s, she did You Can't Take It With You, the Pulitzer Prize winning
comedy, at the Biltmore Theatre in Downtown Los Angeles. From to ,
MacGibbon portrayed Lucy Kent on the NBC radio soap opera Home Sweet
Home.
) was an American stage, film, and television actress best known for
her role as the insufferably snobbish, "blue-blooded Bostonian" Mrs.
Margaret Drysdale in the CBS sitcom The Beverly Hillbillies.Harriet E.
McGibbon was born in Chicago to Dr. Walter Peter McGibbon and Gertrude
L. (née Crary) McGibbon. It is not known why she amended her surname
by adding an "a", but she was credited a few times as McGibbon. She
was "finished" at Knox School, Cooperstown, New York, where she
prepared for Vassar. Without staying to receive a diploma, she left to
fulfill her desire for the footlights and studied with Franklin H.
Sargent at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York
City.[citation needed]Later, MacGibbon joined the stock company of
Edward Clarke Lilley at Akron, Ohio. She then went to San Francisco
and played leading roles for Henry Duffy. In Louisville, Kentucky, she
acted with Wilton Lackaye, Edmund Breese, William Faversham, Tom Wise
and Nance O'Neil. There were regular productions, including Ned
McCobb's Daughter, The Front Page, The Big Fight, and a
"transcontinental tour" starring MacGibbon in The Big Fight, which
began in Boston, took in New Haven and Hartford, and ended at Caine's
storehouse. During all of her travels while performing, MacGibbon
managed to remain in Boston long enough to study the harp with Alfred
Holy, first harpist with the Boston Symphony Orchestra. She later said
that when she gave up the instrument, Mr. Holy, "with unconscious
humor", remarked, "What a pity, Miss MacGibbon, you look so lovely
with a harp."[citation needed]She had a long and distinguished career
on the Broadway stage, beginning in at the age of nineteen when she
acted in the play Beggar on Horseback at the Shubert Theatre. In the
late s, she did You Can't Take It With You, the Pulitzer Prize winning
comedy, at the Biltmore Theatre in Downtown Los Angeles. From to ,
MacGibbon portrayed Lucy Kent on the NBC radio soap opera Home Sweet
Home.
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