Fay McKenzie

Fay McKenzie was a leading lady and supporting actress in many movies of the 1930s and 1940s, but is most remembered today by fans of B-westerns as the 'heroine' in some of Gene Autry's westerns in the 1940s. She continued acting into the early 1980s in both features and tv.

Ms. McKenzie was from an acting family. Her parents, Robert and Eve McKenzie, were in movies from the teens, and her two sisters, Ida Mae McKenzie and Ella McKenzie, were active in the 1930s. Ella was married to screen comic Billy Gilbert for over thirty years.

In 1980 I sent this photo to Ms. McKenzie, to her home in California. She returned it promptly. In recent years, she has been dividing her time between her California home and a house she maintains right here in my city, Mount Vernon. I called her once, just to ask a few questions about her career, and she said she enjoyed living here as she could be close to her daughter and grandchildren who live in nearby Bronxville. Every weekday morning, about 5:45, I pass her house on my way to the highway to go to work.