Art Ellison was born in Potsdam, New York, in 1899, and relocated with his family to Kansas City, Missouri in 1914. At the age of 18, he embarked on a career with the Kansas City Power and Light Company (KCP&L),where he spent the next 42 years, working in the credit department until his retirement in 1966.
Ellison's first foray into acting was in 1924, when he took on a role in a musical comedy benefit for the Kansas City Women's Athletic Club building fund. Following this experience, he joined the Chanticleer Players, an amateur theater group in Kansas City, where he worked backstage, appeared in pantomimes and tableaux, and played various roles.
In 1930, Ellison joined the amateur Black-Friars, where he took on lead roles, character parts, and behind-the-scenes duties. He went on to spend much of his stage career with local productions, including the University of Kansas City Playhouse, the Resident Theater, the Missouri Repertory Theater, and the Johnson County, Kansas Playhouse.
During World War II, Ellison made USO appearances and created recruiting records for the armed forces. He also appeared in the radio series "The Air Adventures of Jimmie Allen," a nationally syndicated program produced in Kansas City, as well as television and radio shows, particularly for Kansas City Power and Light.
In addition to his stage work, Ellison frequently acted in industrial films made by the Calvin Company of Kansas City, as well as a few films produced by Centron Corporation of Lawrence, Kansas. He had a role in Centron director Herk Harvey's 1962 feature film "Carnival of Souls," made in Lawrence, and upon his retirement from KCP&L in the mid-1960s, Ellison joined the Actors Equity Association and devoted himself full-time to acting.
Between his Kansas City theater performances and industrial films, Ellison gained roles in the Hollywood films "Paper Moon" and "Shoot it Black--Shoot it Blue," and the network TV movies "Friendly Persuasion" and "Mary White," all of which were shot on location in the Kansas/Missouri area and recruited local acting talent.
In 1979, Ellison suffered a stroke that prevented him from pursuing further acting roles for ten years. He passed away in 1994, at the age of 94. Ellison was respected for his accuracy in mastering dialects and his make-up ability, received several theater awards, and was well-known in the acting community of Kansas City.
His twelve scrapbooks of materials devoted to theater and acting-related activities in Kansas City, dating from 1924 to 1992, are currently archived in the Western Historical Manuscript Collection of the University of Missouri-Kansas City.
