Bob Steele (January 23, 1907 – December 21, 1988) was an American actor.

Biography

He was born Robert Adrian Bradbury in Portland, Oregon, into a vaudeville family. His parents were Robert North Bradbury (1886–1949) and the former Nieta Catherine Quinn (1886–1978). After years of touring, the family settled in Hollywood, California, in the late 1910s, where his father soon found work in the movies, first as an actor, later as a director. By 1920, Robert Bradbury hired Bob and his twin brother, Bill (1907–1971), as juvenile leads for a series of adventure movies titled The Adventures of Bob and Bill.

Steele's career began to take off for good in 1927, when he was hired by production company Film Booking Offices of America (FBO) to star in a series of Westerns. Renamed Bob Steele at FBO, he soon made a name for himself, and in the late 1920s, 1930s and 1940s starred in B-Westerns for almost every minor film studio, including Monogram, Supreme, Tiffany, Syndicate, Republic (including several films of the Three Mesquiteers series) and Producers Releasing Corporation (PRC) (including the initial films of their "Billy the Kid" series), plus he had the occasional role in an A-movie, as in the adaptation of John Steinbeck's novel, Of Mice and Men in 1939.