Joseph Cotten (1905-1994)
Historical highway marker QA-36 · Petersburg
Joseph Cotten, actor, was born in Petersburg. At school he excelled in football and on the stage. He appeared in several Broadway productions during the 1930s and joined Orson Welles's Mercury Theater company. Cotten made his film debut in 1941 alongside Welles in Citizen Kane. He later starred in Shadow of a Doubt (1943), Gaslight (1944), and The Third Man (1949), becoming one of Hollywood’s most popular leading men. Cotten won the Best Actor award at the 1949 Venice International Film Festival. He appeared in more than 80 films over four decades and hosted The Joseph Cotten Show on television. He died in 1994 and is buried at Blandford Cemetery in Petersburg.
Department of Historic Resources, 2015