Barbara Stanwyck died Jan.20, 1990. The Irish kid from Brooklyn asked that her ashes be strewn at Lone Pine — where she rode in several of her westerns. Jump to Comments ...

Though it belongs—or appears to belong—to the gutter-bound caste of celebrity biography, A Life of Barbara Stanwyck: Steel-True, 1907-1940 puts one in a philosophical frame of mind.

Celebrity biographies are rarely as long and dense as Victoria Wilson's nearly 900-page tome about screen star Barbara Stanwyck (Volume 1, no less, ending right before World War II). Such ...