Jerome Palmer Cowan

 Jerome Palmer Cowan (October 6, 1897 – January 24, 1972)

At 18, Cowan joined a travelling stock company, shortly afterwards enlisting in the United States Navy during World War I. After the war he returned to the stage and became a vaudeville headliner, then gained success on the New York stage. His Broadway debut was in We've Got to Have Money (1923). His other Broadway credits include Frankie and Johnnie (1930), Just to Remind You (1931), Rendezvous (1932), The Little Black Book (1932), Marathon (1933), Both Your Houses (1933), As Thousands Cheer (1933), Ladies' Money (1934), Paths of Glory (1935), Boy Meets Girl (1935), My Three Angels (1953), Lunatics and Lovers (1954), Rumple (1957), and Say, Darling (1958). He appeared in more than one hundred films, but is probably best remembered for two roles in classic films: Miles Archer, the doomed private eye partner of Sam Spade in The Maltese Falcon and Thomas Mara, the hapless district attorney who has to prosecute Santa Claus in Miracle on 34th Street. Cowan also played Dagwood Bumstead's boss Mr. Radcliffe in several installments of Columbia Pictures' Blondie series. In 1964 and 1965, Cowan appeared as the demanding Herbert Wilson in The Tycoon. Earlier in 1963, he appeared on The Real McCoys in its final season on CBS. On January 24, 1972, Cowan died at Encino Hospital Medical Center in Encino, California at age 74. He was survived by his wife and two daughters. Cowan was cremated, and his ashes interred at Forest Lawn-Hollywood Hills.