Luci Ward

Luci Ward (1907–1969) was an American screenwriter.^[1] She mostly worked on crime B movies and Western films.

Ward was born and raised in Monroe, Louisiana, the daughter of Edgar Ward and Lucille Pipes. She had a brother, Royce, and two step-siblings from her father's second marriage (her mother died when she was young).

Ward began her career as a secretary to First National executives^[2] and screenwriters (including Ben Markson)^[3] before becoming a script girl.^[4] Later, she got a chance to pen her own scripts. She also wrote articles for publications like Cosmopolitan, sometimes using the pen name Brooks Nevins.^[5]

She testified at a National Labor Relations Board hearing that she was hired as a stenographer at Warner Brothers for $25 a week and wasn't given a raise when she was promoted to screenwriter. Warner Brothers then hired her a personal secretary at $32.50 a week.^[6]

She was married to fellow screenwriter Jack Natteford and co-wrote several films with him.^[7]

• Murder by an Aristocrat (1936)
• Mountain Justice (1937)
• Melody for Two (1937)
• Call the Mesquiteers (1938)
• Red River Range (1938)
• The Kansas Terrors (1939)
• The Arizona Kid (1939)
• Beyond the Sacramento (1940)
• Bad Men of the Hills (1942)
• The Fighting Buckaroo (1943)
• Law of the Northwest (1943)
• Riding West (1944)
• Raiders of Ghost City (1944)
• Dick Tracy vs. Cueball (1946)
• Return of the Bad Men (1948)
• Rustlers (1949)

• Jill Nelmes & Jule Selbo. Women Screenwriters: An International Guide. Palgrave Macmillan, 2015.
• Pitts, Michael R. Western Movies: A Guide to 5,105 Feature Films. McFarland, 2012.

• Luci Ward at IMDb

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