First actress to win an Oscar for "Best Actress in a Supporting Role" (Anthony Adverse (1936))
Her daughter died in October 1965.
In 1936 she became the first actress, tied with Maria Ouspenskaya, of currently 53 actresses to receive an Oscar nomination for their film debut. She was nominated (and won) Best Actress in a Supporting Role for Anthony Adverse (1936).
In high school plays, she studied at the Minneapolis School of Dramatic Arts.
Joined the Chatauqua theatre circuit in 1920 as an ingenue and a year later became a member of the John Keller Shakespeare Company where she toured Canada and America in productions of "Hamlet," "Julius Caesar," "The Merchant of Venice" and "Macbeth."
She was blacklisted with her husband in 1948.
Was going to play the Wicked Witch of The West in the The Wizard of Oz (1939), but instead of making the witch similar to Snow White's beautiful but wicked queen, as was originally planned, they decided the witch should be ugly. Gale then refused the role.
Was one of the main inspirations for the look of the Evil Queen/Witch in Walt Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) and was ironically rejected {due to her looks as previously mentioned) as the evil witch in The Wizard of Oz (1939), a film that sought to capitalize on the popularity of the former and fairy tales like it.