Paul Douglas
Douglas was born on March 26, 1892 in Salem, Massachusetts, the son of Annie (Smith) and James Howard Douglas. When he was four, his mother died of natural causes and his father remarried. His father was an abusive husband and his stepmother, unable to obtain a divorce, left her husband and took Douglas and his older brother to Onawa, Maine in Piscataquis County, where her brother and uncle had built a resort in the woods.
Kirk Douglas
Douglas was born Issur Danielovitch Demsky () in Amsterdam, New York, the son of Bryna "Bertha" (née Sanglel; 1884–1958) and Herschel "Harry" Danielovitch (c. 1884–1950; citations regarding his exact year of birth differ). His parents were Jewish emigrants from Chavusy, Mogilev Region, in the Russian Empire (present-day Belarus), and the family spoke Yiddish at home.