"Scotty" Beckett, seven-year-old Hollywood motion picture actor, is one up on his playmate, Freddie Bartholomew, now.
"Scotty" did yesterday what every child actor in the cinema city has been wanting to do for some time. He climbed around on the Hawaii Clipper, Pan-American Airways' giant flying boat.
It was quite a treat for the little star, for he has spent most of his two weeks' vacation in Oakland lying in bed recovering from a brain concussion.
"Scotty," whose real name is Scott Hastings Beckett, came to Oakland a little more than a week ago to visit with playmates, with whom he was raised. The youngster was born here, at Merritt Hospital, October 4, 1929.
The day after he got here, 'Scotty' was playing on a scooter with an Oakland friend, when the vehicle upset, spilling the little actor on his head.
HAPPY ENDING
So it really was a happy ending to his misfortune when he got the chance to watch the Clipper land yesterday and to make a personal tour of the craft.
He did just the things any seven-year-old would, clamboring up on the aluminum back of the ship, dropping down into the cabin, asking the attendants a host of questions, and he even got to sit in the pilot's seat and hold the controls, right where Capt. W. G. Culbertson had been a few moments before.
Principally, though, "Scotty" slipped one over on his pal, young Bartholomew. And as soon as he gets back to Hollywood, "Scotty's" going to look up Master Freddie and tell him of the coup.
It seems a bit of rivalry exists between the child actors, rivalry that was climaxed several weeks ago at a party.
WANTS TO BE A PILOT
The youngster has an older brother attending U.C.L.A. now, and 'Scotty' intends to go to college himself some day and to study aviation. He would like to be a Clipper pilot.
"He wanted to be a deep-sea diver a week ago," said his mother, Mrs. Ruth Slavan Beckett.
Young "Scotty" will have Clipper information at his finger-tips when he returns to report to friend Freddie. To prove he wasn't reading Pan-American publicity releases, 'Scotty' had his picture taken with the big ship.
HAS MANY ROLES
The Beckett boy, as Pan-American crew members will testify, is extremely smart for his age. He's in the high fourth grade at school, and while not featured like Bobby Breen or Freddie Bartholomew he has had some good picture parts.
He played Prema, the little Indian boy in "Charge of the Light Brigade"; Frederic March's son in "Anthony Adverse"; and a host of other similar parts. He was with Greta Garbo in "Countess Waleska," to be released soon. He was her son in that, and is now a great friend of the actress. His latest picture, also unreleased, was with Jean Parker in "Life Begins With Love."
His father, Ralph E. Beckett, an oil man, died four years ago.
"Scotty" and his mother are visiting here with her cousin, Mrs. J. H. Slavan, at 921 East Twenty-first Street."