In life, Jimmy Stewart never talked about his war. But in death, he granted his family \u2014 and now the world \u2014 a greater window into the Academy Award-winning actor turned combat pilot.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cMy father didn\u2019t speak about his war experience very much,\u201d his daughter, Kelly Stewart-Harcourt, told Military Times. \u201cAfter he died, my sister found a journal, a handwritten journal that he had kept during the war\u201d alongside his flight logbook filled with little scribbles, drawings and sketch marks from both Stewart and his men. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The journal, according to Stewart-Harcourt, \u201cdescribed dad\u2019s fears and his uncertainties, uncertainties about the war and the struggles and wanting to please his father. Dad didn\u2019t talk very much about himself, so this was a real look inside dad that we had never had before.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI don\u2019t think [the movie] could have been done without that input,\u201d she added. \u201cIt just made it so much deeper, richer and more profound.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Poignantly, perhaps almost fittingly, the last line of the journal stops mid-sentence. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Wednesday, in honor of Stewart\u2019s birthday, Burns & Co. production has dropped the official \u201cJimmy\u201d trailer starring KJ Apa (\u201cRiverdale\u201d) as the World War II veteran and famed \u201cIt\u2019s a Wonderful Life\u201d star.<\/p>\n\n\n\n