AllMovie

A former manicurist, Arleen Whelan had been playing movie bits for nearly a year when she was signed to a 20th Century-Fox contract in 1938. Largely confined to programmers and "B"-pictures, Whelan managed to cop the plum role of pioneer wife Hannah Clay in John Ford's Young Mr. Lincoln (1939). Her career peaked in the mid-1940s; by the 1950s, she had to make do with Republic westerns, though Young Mr. Lincoln director John Ford did secure her a good part in The Sun Shines Bright (1953). Married three times, Arleen Whelan's first husband was Egyptian leading man Alex D'Arcy.