Cecil B. DeMille

Born in Ashfield, Massachusetts in 1881 and raised in New York, DeMille started as a stage actor in 1900 before moving into writing and directing plays. In 1914, he shot The Squaw Man, the first full-length feature filmed in Hollywood, marking the town's arrival as the industry's new center. He co-founded what became Paramount Pictures and spent the next four decades turning out 70 films that frequently dominated the box office several at a time. His 1923 The Ten Commandments held Paramount's revenue record for a quarter-century; The King of Kings reached 800 million viewers; Samson and Delila…