Profile of Tommy Bond on Famous Like Me

Thomas Ross Bond (September 16, 1926 - September 24, 2005) was an American actor. A native of Dallas, Texas, Bond was best known for his work as a child actor in the Our Gang (Little Rascals) comedies, and also for being the first actor to portray the role of "Superman's pal" Jimmy Olsen on-screen.

Biography

Early years and Our Gang

Bond got his start at the age of five when a talent scout for Hal Roach studios approached the lad as he was leaving a Dallas cinema with his mother. The scout asked him if he would like to act in films because he "had a great face" and set up an appointment with Hal Roach in Los Angeles. Hal Roach was gathering new talent for his popular Our Gang comedies. Bond's grandmother Jane Quine Sauter volunteered to drive the boy to L.A. by motor car. The year was 1931, in the depth of the Great Depression. It proved to be a grueling journey, punctuated by flash floods and encounters with tarantulas, on mostly dirt roads from Dallas to L.A.

Bond was most notable for appearing in Roach's Our Gang short subjects series (later broadcast on television as The Little Rascals). From 1932 to 1934, he appeared in the series under his own name as a supporting character. He returned to Our Gang in 1937 to replace Leonard Kibrick in the bully role. His bully character, named Butch, always competed with Carl "Alfalfa" Switzer for Darla Hood's affections. Bond appeared in twenty-seven Our Gang shorts (twelve as "Tommy", and fourteen as "Butch") before leaving the series for good in late 1939.

While an Our Ganger, Bond appeared in a number of outside films, such as those featuring fellow Hal Roach Studios comedians Charley Chase and Laurel and Hardy. He also worked as a voice actor, most notably as the voice of "Owl Jolson" in Tex Avery's 1936 Looney Tunes cartoon, I Love to Singa.

Later years

After serving in the U.S. military during World War II, Bond returned to acting ,and appeared in a handful of East Side Kids features alongside former on-screen rival Carl Switzer. In the late 1940s, Bond became the first actor to portray cub news photographer Jimmy Olsen in two Superman film serials, Superman (1948) and Atom Man vs. Superman (1950). He also appeared as Joey Pepper in several installments of the Five Little Peppers serial.

In 1951, Bond graduated from college and quit acting to pursue television directing and production work for various local television stations in the Los Angeles area. In his latter years he lived in the Fresno area, he served as a spokesman for a number of Our Gang related materials. Thomas Ross "Butch" Bond retired from a local television station in 1991, and published his autobiography, Darn Right It's Butch: Memories of Our Gang/The Little Rascals, in 1994. Bond's son, Thomas, Jr., is a film and television producer, and is today the owner of the American Mutoscope and Biograph Company.

Tommy Bond, Sr. died on September 24, 2005, at the age of 79, of complications from heart disease at Northridge Hospital in southern California.

Further reading

Bond, Tommy, w. Genini, Ron (1994). Darn Right It's Butch: Memories of Our Gang/The Little Rascals. Delaware: Morgan Printing. ISBN 096-309765-2.

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