Henry Travers

Fondly remembered as Clarence, James Stewart's guardian angel ("angel second class"), in Frank Capra's It's a Wonderful Life (1946).

Mary's (1945), but it's as the somewhat befuddled angel Clarence Oddbody assigned to James Stewart in the classic It's a Wonderful Life (1946) that Travers will forever be known.

Travers' kindly, grandfatherly demeanor became familiar to filmgoers over the next 25 years, especially in films like High Sierra (1941), where he played Joan Leslie's kindly but slyly observant uncle, and the generous Mr. Bogardus in The Bells of St.

Appears in seven Oscar Best Picture nominees: Dark Victory (1939), Mrs. Miniver (1942), Random Harvest (1942), Madame Curie (1943), The Bells of St. Mary's (1945), The Yearling (1946) and It's a Wonderful Life (1946), with Mrs. Miniver being the only winner.

He gained more stage experience there on Broadway working with the Theatre Guild, and began his long film career with Reunion in Vienna (1933).

Henry Travers' two cousins on his mother's side of the family, Thomas H. Hornibrook and his son Samuel W. Hornibrook, were killed by the Irish Republican Army on April 27, 1922, in County Cork, Ireland, during an anti-Protestant campaign to punish suspected informers. There was no evidence the two men were informers. Their bodies were never recovered.

British-born Henry Travers was a veteran of the English stage before emigrating to the U. S. in 1917.

Active on Broadway from 1901-1938 (early in his career credited as Travers Heagerty, his birth name).