Screen grab of 26 year old Gwen Gaze, with her trademark smile and blonded hair for the film Underground Rustlers (1941). The film can be watched here at the Internet Archive. Note – photos of Gwen Gaze are uncommon, so most of the photos used here are screen grabs or from contemporary newspapers.

The Five Second Version
Gwen Gaze was an Australian born actor who appeared in about a dozen Hollywood films in the late 1930s, mostly Westerns. Born in Melbourne in 1915, her father – singer and actor Leslie Gaze (1880-1957) –  had brought the family to Los Angeles in the early 1920s. She studied for two years at RADA in London before her first role in a B film with John Wayne in 1937. In 1944 she married and mostly retired from films, although she maintained an interest in performing all her life. She became a US citizen in 1940. Her uncle was highly regarded illustrator Harold Gaze (1884-1963)

In 1939, 24 year old actor Gwen Gaze told a journalist in Hollywood that she was eager to return to the land of her birth to appear in an Australian film. “If they would pay my expenses… I would work for buttons” she reportedly said.^[1]The Sun (Sydney) 11 June 1939, P12, Via National Library of Australia’s Trove<script type="text/javascript"> jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_12993_20_1').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_12993_20_1', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top center', relative: true, offset: [-7, 0], });</script> It was a very witty comment, but she did not return to Australia. She had left Australia at the age of 7 with her parents, and grew up in Pasadena in California. Like so many other young women in Hollywood’s golden age, Gwen Gaze‘s film output ended up being very modest – between 1937 and 1949 she had roles in perhaps a dozen or so movies.

<figure class="aligncenter size-full is-resized"><figcaption>25 year old Gwen in her 1940 US naturalisation document. Via Ancestry.com </figcaption></figure>

Alta Gwendolen Gaze was born in Brighton, a southern suburb of Melbourne Australia, in 1915. ^[2]Births Deaths and Marriages, Victoria, Certificate 18975/1915<script type="text/javascript"> jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_12993_20_2').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_12993_20_2', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top center', relative: true, offset: [-7, 0], });</script> Her Adelaide born father, Leslie Gaze (1880-1957) was an actor and singer,^[3]The Advertiser (Adelaide) 29 Mar 1912 P8 “THROUGH ADVERSITY.” Via National Library of Australia’s Trove<script type="text/javascript"> jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_12993_20_3').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_12993_20_3', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top center', relative: true, offset: [-7, 0], });</script>^[4]Referee (Sydney) 17 Mar 1915, P15 “THE IDEALS OF LESLIE GAZE” Via National Library of Australia’s Trove<script type="text/javascript"> jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_12993_20_4').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_12993_20_4', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top center', relative: true, offset: [-7, 0], });</script> her mother Alta May nee Tomlinson (1885-1948) was “a brilliant pianist,”^[5]The Bulletin. Vol. 54 No. 2771, 22 Mar 1933. P18 Via National Library of Australia’s Trove<script type="text/javascript"> jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_12993_20_5').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_12993_20_5', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top center', relative: true, offset: [-7, 0], });</script> born in Chicago.