Ralph Elliott Margetts photograph collection, circa 1955-1972

Ralph E. Margetts was born March 7, 1909 in the Marmalade District in Salt Lake City. He then moved to a house on 71 North First West Street that the family purchased with the last bit of inheritance from his uncle Phil Margetts, the actor. Here he spent most of his childhood, and attended the Lafayette School on State Street until it burned down in about 1917. Margetts spent the summer of 1916 working at the Golden Reef Mine, seven miles outside of Frisco, Utah for a Mr. Rolfing. He then moved to West Junior High School where he completed the eighth and ninth grades, and from there went to the L.D.S. (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) High School grounds where he finished grade school and high school, and eventually attended the L.D.S. Business College as well.

In 1928 Margetts went on an L.D.S. mission to Belgium. During his mission he found time to attend lectures at the Universite de Paris at Sorbonne. He became president of the district in Switzerland, and at the end of his two and one-half year term, he was asked by Golden Wolfe to stay an additional five months, which he did, somewhat unwillingly. He finally returned to Salt Lake City in 1931.

Returning home in the height of the Great Depression, Margetts became aware of his family's poor financial situation, and after only two weeks accepted a position as a mine "mucker" with his uncle in Aspen, Colorado. The uncle, his father, and his brother were reopening some old mines such as the Durrant and the Smuggler, and some of the gold mines on Independence Pass. He stayed two years. Margetts' intention was to save enough money to be able to register at the University of Utah upon his return, but the twelve-hundred dollars he had earned was reduced to twenty-five when the Aspen Bank crashed.

Upon his return to Salt Lake, Margetts entered the L.D.S. Business College to become a stenographer, as they were in great demand at that time. He graduated after fourteen months. During this time he also sold shoes for the firm of Feltman and Kerm.

Margetts then set out for Hollywood with his friend Ellis Johnson in 1933. Johnson had relatives there who owned a plumbing business. On the way to Hollywood, the two witnessed the closing of the diversion tunnels at the newly-completed Hoover Dam. After only a day in Hollywood, Margetts ran into Helen Morris, who was on her way to an audition for Orson Welles' The Ideal Husband at the Gateway Theater. Margetts joined her, which turned out to be a very fortuitous decision. The play required a French accent and Margetts gave it a try and was given the part on the spot. Ellis Johnson got a part in the play as well. Although he was not payed for the part, Margetts was able to meet several important actors and actresses of the time such as Caroline Bellamy. Margetts stayed on to play in several of their shows, including Chick Sales' plays The Elephant Shepherd and The Specialist. During this time he subsisted on income from Ellis' relative, Johnson Fox, who, in addition to his plumbing business, kept bees and hired Margetts to build bee frames and apply the wax base. They also had an arrangement with the police department to pick up bee swarms. To supplement this income, Margetts also landed a job selling shoes again for Feltman and Kerm, as he had in Salt Lake, and got odd jobs as a make-up artist at the studios. Ellis Johnson eventually got discouraged with Hollywood and went back to Salt Lake, which left Margetts to a little room on Selma Street. As might be expected, Margetts was attending as much theater as he could afford over this period of time, and met important actors and actresses while doing so. After about seven years in Hollywood, Margetts accepted a position as an assistant manager at one of Feltman and Kerm's San Francisco stores, and left to live in Oakland. He did not remain long.

After returning to Salt Lake in about 1940, Margetts became involved in many small theater movements such as the The Playbox Theater, with Robert Hyde Wilson, the Phil Margetts Theater, which was started by Phil Peterson, and the Deseret Theater, organized by the L.D.S. Church. During this time he continued to sell shoes, now for Z.C.M.I., until the U.S. entered World War II.

Margetts immediately enlisted in the Navy where he became a third-class petty officer and was sent to Treasure Island in the San Francisco bay. Margetts was in the Armed Guard Center, which provided crews for liberty ship guns, and kept track of their pay and records. Margetts became especially efficient at handling train reservations for the men, sending them to Armed Guard Centers in Seattle, Los Angeles, and New York. During this time he also married Winnifred. He spent the next six years there, and was discharged in May of 1947.

Again returning to Salt Lake, Margetts enrolled at the University of Utah upon the advice of C. Lowell Lees, and went to work on the Summer Festival production of Promised Valley. During this period Margetts also acted as property manager for the theater under C. Lowell Lees, managed three shows in Kingsbury, and taught beginning French. He received his master's degree in 1949, and completed all of the course work for his Ph.D. by 1952 or 1953, finally receiving the degree in 1959.

Margetts became director of the theater at Chico State College in 1953, and held the title of associate professor. He produced five to seven plays a year, established a children's theater, and did research on Julia Dean Hayne, the subject of his doctoral dissertation.

After returning briefly to Salt Lake in 1957, Margetts accepted a non-faculty position at Southern Illinois University with the foreign service section, in charge of educational programs in Mali and Vietnam, both French-speaking countries. He remained there for two years.

Margetts returned to the University of Utah and remained a professor in the Theater Department until his retirement, directing and producing countless plays.

(The information in this biography was pulled from an interview with Margetts conducted by Everett L. Cooley for the Everett L. Cooley Oral History project that is available in the Manuscripts Division under Accession 814.)