Kirk Alyn was an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 actor

Actor

An actor is a person who acts in a dramatic production and who works in film, television, theatre, or radio in that capacity...

, best known for being the first actor to play Superman

Superman

Superman is a fictional comic book superhero appearing in publications by DC Comics, widely considered to be an American cultural icon. Created by American writer Jerry Siegel and Canadian-born American artist Joe Shuster in 1932 while both were living in Cleveland, Ohio, and sold to Detective...

 on screen, in the 1948 film serial

Serial (film)

Serials, more specifically known as Movie serials, Film serials or Chapter plays, were short subjects originally shown in theaters in conjunction with a feature film. They were related to pulp magazine serialized fiction...

 Superman

Superman (serial)

Superman is a 15-part black-and-white Columbia film serial based on the comic book character Superman. It stars an uncredited Kirk Alyn and Noel Neill as Lois Lane. It is notable as the first live-action appearance of Superman on film and for the longevity of its distribution...

, and its 1950 sequel Atom Man Vs. Superman

Atom Man vs. Superman

Atom Man vs. Superman , Columbia's 43rd serial, finds Lex Luthor , secretly the Atom Man, blackmailing the city of Metropolis by threatening to destroy the entire community...

.
Born John Feggo, Jr. in Oxford, New Jersey

Oxford Township, New Jersey

Oxford Township is a Township in Warren County, New Jersey, United States. As of the United States 2010 Census, the township population was 2,514...

 to Hungarian

Hungary

Hungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...

 immigrant parents, Alyn was educated at Columbia University

Columbia University

Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...

.

In 1942, he married actress Virginia O'Brien

Virginia O'Brien

Virginia Lee O'Brien was a popular American actress, singer, and radio personality known for her comedic roles in MGM musicals of the 1940s.-Life and career:...

, with whom he had two daughters and a son before they divorced in 1955.
Alyn started out as a chorus boy on Broadway

Broadway theatre

Broadway theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500 or more seats located in the Theatre District centered along Broadway, and in Lincoln Center, in Manhattan in New York City...

, appearing in notable musicals such as Girl Crazy

Girl Crazy

Girl Crazy is a 1930 musical with music by George Gershwin, lyrics by Ira Gershwin and book by Guy Bolton and John McGowan. Ethel Merman made her stage debut in this musical production....

, Of Thee I Sing

Of Thee I Sing

Of Thee I Sing is a musical with a score by George Gershwin, lyrics by Ira Gershwin and a book by George S. Kaufman and Morrie Ryskind. The musical lampoons American politics; the story concerns John P. Wintergreen, who runs for President of the United States on the "love" platform...

, and Hellzapoppin' in the 1930s.

He also worked as a singer and dancer in vaudeville

Vaudeville

Vaudeville was a theatrical genre of variety entertainment in the United States and Canada from the early 1880s until the early 1930s. Each performance was made up of a series of separate, unrelated acts grouped together on a common bill...

 before moving to Hollywood

Hollywood, Los Angeles, California

Hollywood is a famous district in Los Angeles, California, United States situated west-northwest of downtown Los Angeles. Due to its fame and cultural identity as the historical center of movie studios and movie stars, the word Hollywood is often used as a metonym of American cinema...

 in the early 1940s to make feature films, where he was successful only in gaining bit parts in low-budget films before landing the role of Superman in 1948.

Alyn also starred in movie serials, including Federal Agents Vs.