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After retiring as a popular Hollywood leading man of late silents and early talkies, Charlie Farrell became a resident and one of the early founders of the desert city of Palm Springs, California. Shortly after, he opened the well known and sought-after Palm Springs Racquet Club in the city with another actor, Ralph Bellamy. When he was owner and proprietor of Charlie Farrell’s Racquet Club in Palm Springs, California he became a major force in the prosperity of Palm Springs in the 1950s, Farrell was elected mayor of the community in 1953, a position that he held for seven years. During this era and going forward, the Chi Chi Club was in vogue as was The Doll House, where the bar stools were equipped with seat belts. Farrell was best known for his work with Janet Gaynor in 12 screen romances between 1927 and 1934. He retired from films in the early 1940’s, but returned to do a television series in the 1950’s where he appeared as Gale Storm’s widowed father in the popular “My Little Margie” (1952). He passed away in 1990 at 89 years of age.
