Editing Gummo Marx (section)

== Career==
[[File:Four Marx Bros Mr Green Reception New Orleans Times-Democrat 11 May 1913.png|thumb|1913 advertisement for "Green's Reception" at the Greenwall. Left to right, Groucho, Chico, Harpo and Gummo.|left]]
Gummo was the first of his brothers to make his debut on stage, pretending to be a dummy in an act with his uncle Henry Shean (né Heinemann Schoenberg), the brother of [[Al Shean]], in 1899.{{Citation needed|date=May 2024}} Milton was put into a costume with a [[papier-mâché]] head and pretended to be a dummy while Henry pretended to work him.{{Citation needed|date=May 2024}} The act may have only been performed once and was not helped by Shean's deafness or Milton's stammer.<ref>{{cite book|last=Bader|first=Robert S.|title=Four of the Three Musketeers: The Marx Brothers on Stage |date=2016|publisher=Northwestern University Press|location=Evanston, IL|pages=53–54|isbn=9780810134164}}</ref>

Gummo, who in an interview said he never liked being on stage,{{Citation needed|date=May 2024}} left the group and joined the military during World War I. He was not sent overseas because the armistice was signed shortly afterward.{{Citation needed|date=May 2024}} Gummo's younger brother Zeppo took his place in the group. After his Army career, Gummo went into the [[raincoat]] business.<ref>{{citation |title=Current Biography |url=http://tc.education.pitt.edu/library/MS-ReSearch/I-Search2009/MarxBrothersCurrentBio.html |publisher=[[H. W. Wilson Company|The H. W. Wilson Company]] |access-date=November 29, 2011 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120426010905/http://tc.education.pitt.edu/library/MS-ReSearch/I-Search2009/MarxBrothersCurrentBio.html |archive-date=April 26, 2012 }}</ref> He later joined with Zeppo and operated a [[talent agency|theatrical agency]].<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=CWdn5BCtHwYC&q=%22milton+marx%22&pg=PA92|title=The Marx Brothers: Their World, Their Movies, Their Lives, Their Humour and Their Legacy|first=Robert Graham|last=Anstey|date=June 5, 2017|publisher=West Coast Paradise Pub.|isbn=9781896779850|access-date=June 5, 2017|via=Google Books}}{{Dead link|date=April 2024 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref> After that collaboration ended, Gummo represented his brother Groucho and worked on the television show ''[[The Life of Riley]]'', which he helped develop.{{Citation needed|date=May 2024}}

Gummo represented other on-screen talent and a number of writers, and was well-respected as a businessman. He rarely required contracts, believing that if the people he represented liked his work, they would stay with him.<ref>Simon Louvish (2000) ''Monkey Business: The Lives and Legends of the Marx Brothers''. New York: Thomas Dunne, 337&ndash;8. {{ISBN|0-312-25292-7}}</ref> Around the time he left his brothers' Vaudeville act, Marx applied for a patent for a clothes-packing rack.  On October 28, 1919, Marx was granted patent US1320335A.<ref>[https://patents.google.com/patent/US1320335A/en?q=milton+marx Patent US1320335A: Devices facilitating the insertion of articles or materials into bags e.g. guides or chutes], US Patent Office, 1919.</ref>

Gummo may have received his [[nickname]] because he had a tendency to sneak around backstage, creeping up on others like a "gumshoe" private [[detective]]. Another explanation cited by biographers and family members is that Milton, the sickliest of the brothers, often wore [[Galoshes|rubber overshoes]], also called "gumshoes", to protect himself in inclement weather.<ref>{{cite book|last=Bader|first=Robert S.|title=Four of the Three Musketeers: The Marx Brothers on Stage |date=2016|publisher=Northwestern University Press|location=Evanston, IL|page=170|isbn=9780810134164}}</ref> According to Zeppo in a much later BBC TV interview, Gummo may have received his [[nickname]] because he was usually chewing gum.<ref>BBC Archives</ref>