This image shows Hollywood movie star Robert Montgomery standing with fellow ambulance driver Stuart Benson in front of an American Field Service (AFS) ambulance in Paris, France. Montgomery (born Henry Montgomery, Jr.) was an American actor, Academy Award nominee, and former president of the Screen Actors Guild before volunteering as an ambulance driver with AFS in June of 1940. He drove an ambulance in France and was engaged in evacuating wounded soldiers to Vouvray when Paris fell to Germany, and consequently returned home to the United States that same year. Montgomery toured California to raise funds with AFS World War I camion driver Whitney B. Wright (TMU 133), and joined the U.S. Navy Reserve as an officer for three years before the war ended.
After World War II Montgomery made his directing debut with the film Lady in the Lake (1947), became a consultant and coach to President Dwight D. Eisenhower on his broadcasts to the nation, and also created the Emmy Award-winning television series Robert Montgomery Presents (1950-1957). Montgomery’s daughter, Elizabeth, made her television acting debut on her father’s television show, and later starred as Samantha Stephens in the television comedy Bewitched.
