{{short description|American actress}} {{Use mdy dates|date=May 2016}} {{Infobox person |image = Allene Ray Famous Film Folk.jpg |caption = Allene Ray from ''Famous Film Folk: A Gallery of Life Portraits and Biographies'', 1925 |occupation = Actress |birth_date = {{Birth date|1901|1|2}} |birth_place = Devine, Texas, U.S. |death_date = {{death date and age|1979|5|5|1901|1|2}} |death_place = Temple City, California, U.S. | spouse = William "Larry" Wheeler (1925-1958, his death) }} '''Allene Ray''' (born '''Allene Ray Burch''';<ref name="mnp">{{cite news|last1=Griffith-Jones|first1=Margaret|date=March 5, 1978|title=Star of silent screen sagas lives quietly in Temple City|page=4|work=Monrovia News-Post|location=California, Monrovia|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/75966545/allene-ray/|access-date=April 18, 2021|via = Newspapers.com}}</ref> January 2, 1901 – May 5, 1979) was an American film actress.
==Early years== Born in Devine, Texas, Ray grew up on her father's ranch with her four sisters and two brothers. She was learning to ride by age 3, and by age 20 she had become "an accomplished horsewoman."<ref name="mnp" />
Her first job related to films was selling tickets at a movie theater, and her first appearance on film came when Harry Myers arrived in Texas. He shot two reels of film with Ray before he left. Her next opportunity in film came in 1920 when she won a publishing company's beauty contest after her sister submitted her picture as an entry.<ref name="mnp" />
==Career== Winning the contest led to her signing with a talent agency, which dropped her last name for professional purposes. She made two films in Texas for the Sawyer and Lubin agency before Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer bought her contract.<ref name="mnp" />
Ray became a serial heroine for Pathe Pictures, acting and performing stunts that included riding her horse, "teetering on the roofs of buildings and jumping into lakes".<ref name="mnp" /> She explained during an interview in 1978 that the company did not hire stunt people; each actor and actress had to do his or her stunts.<ref name="mnp" />
Her screen credits include ''Honeymoon Ranch'' (1920), ''West of the Rio Grande'' (1921) and ''Partners of the Sunset'' (1922). The latter she made for the Lubin Corporation. In making ''The Fortieth Door'' (1924), Ray decided to wear a brunette wig as the film featured an Egyptian heroine. She was teamed with action star Walter Miller for a long string of serials, including ''The Way of a Man'' (1924), ''Sunken Silver'' (1925), ''Hawk of the Hills'' (1927), and ''The Black Book'' (1929).<ref>''Film Daily Year Book of 1940'', "Serials Released Since 1920," p. 265.</ref> The Miller-Ray partnership ended abruptly in 1929, when the new talking-picture technology revealed that Ray's high, piping voice didn't fit her adventurous screen personality.
Allene Ray did make a few talking pictures, playing undemanding ingenue roles in only five more films: the first talking B-Western feature ''Overland Bound'' (1929), the first talking Western serial ''The Indians Are Coming'' (1930), ''Westward Bound'' (1930), ''Gun Cargo'' (filmed in 1930, unreleased until 1949), and ''The Phantom'' (1931).
==Personal life== On July 20, 1925, Ray married film producer Larry Wheeler in Tijuana, Mexico.<ref>{{cite news |title=Allene Ray Weds Producer |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/75969699/allene-ray/ |access-date=April 18, 2021 |work=The San Francisco Examiner |date=July 30, 1925 |page=13|via = Newspapers.com}}</ref> After she left the film business in 1931, Ray worked as a seamstress and a fitter in Temple City, California, after which she enrolled in a real-estate school and passed a test to become a broker. She worked with her husband, who had also left motion pictures for a career in real estate.
In 1940, they moved to Temple City, California, and remained married until his death in 1958.<ref name="mnp" /> She continued as a realtor until she retired in 1965.<ref name="mnp" />She died from cancer in 1979, aged 78, in Temple City.{{Citation needed |date=April 2021}}
==Partial filmography== {{div col}} * ''Your Friend and Mine'' (1923) * ''Times Have Changed'' (1923) * ''The Way of a Man'' (1924) * ''The Fortieth Door'' (1924) * ''Ten Scars Make a Man'' (1924) * ''Galloping Hoofs'' (1924) * ''Sunken Silver'' (1925) * ''Play Ball'' (1925) * ''The Green Archer'' (1925) * ''Snowed In'' (1926) * ''The House Without a Key'' (1926) * ''Melting Millions'' (1927) * ''Hawk of the Hills'' (1927) * ''The Man Without a Face'' (1928) * ''The Yellow Cameo'' (1928) * ''The Terrible People'' (1928) * ''Overland Bound'' (1929) * ''The Black Book'' (1929) * ''The Indians Are Coming'' (1930) * ''Westward Bound'' (1930) * ''The Phantom'' (1931) {{div col end}}
==References== {{Reflist}} *''Los Angeles Times'', "New Sparkler Comes To Coast", August 27, 1922, p. II37. *''Los Angeles Times'', "Blonde Brunette Tresses Puzzle for Allene Ray", July 20, 1924, p. B40.
==External links== {{Commons category|Allene Ray}} *{{IMDb name|0712735}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Ray, Allene}} Category:1901 births Category:1979 deaths Category:20th-century American actresses Category:American film actresses Category:American silent film actresses Category:Western (genre) film actresses Category:Deaths from cancer in California Category:Actresses from San Antonio Category:Film serial actresses