1.
William Conrad
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William Conrad was an American actor, producer, and director whose career spanned five decades in radio, film, and television. A radio writer and actor, he moved to Hollywood after his World War II service and he created the role of Marshal Matt Dillon for the popular radio series Gunsmoke and narrated the television adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle and The Fugitive. Finding fewer onscreen roles in the 1950s, he changed from actor to producer-director with television work, narration, and a series of Warner Bros. films in the 1960s. Conrad found stardom as a detective in the TV series Cannon and Nero Wolfe, and as district attorney Jason Lochinvar J. L. Fatman McCabe in the legal drama Jake and the Fatman. William Conrad was born John William Cann, Jr. on September 27,1920, in Louisville and his parents, John William Cann and Ida Mae Upchurch Cann, owned a movie theatre, and Conrad grew up watching movies. The family moved to Southern California when Conrad was in high school and he majored in drama and literature at Fullerton College, in Orange County, California, and began his career as an announcer, writer, and director for Los Angeles radio station KMPC. Conrad served as a pilot in World War II. On the day he was commissioned in 1943 at Luke Field and he left the United States Army Air Corps with the rank of captain and as a producer-director of the Armed Forces Radio Service. William Conrad estimated that he played more than 7,500 roles during his radio career, at KMPC, the 22-year-old Conrad produced and acted in The Hermits Cave, the Los Angeles incarnation of a popular syndicated horror anthology series created at WJR Detroit. Conrad was the voice of Escape, a radio series. He played Warchek, a policeman, in Johnny Modero, Pier 23, a detective series starring Jack Webb. He played newspaper editor Walter Burns opposite Dick Powells reporter Hildy Johnson in the ABC radio drama The Front Page, most prominently, Conrads deep, resonant voice was heard in the role of Marshal Matt Dillon on CBS Radios gritty Western series Gunsmoke. Conrad voiced Dillon for the shows run, and he wrote the June 1953 episode Sundown. When Gunsmoke was adapted for television in 1955, executives at CBS did not cast Conrad or his radio costars despite a campaign to get them to change their minds and his other credits include Suspense, Lux Radio Theater, and Fibber McGee and Molly. In The Wax Works, a 1956 episode of Suspense, Conrad performed every part, because of his CBS Radio contract, he sometimes appeared on shows on other networks under the pseudonym Julius Krelboyne. In January 1956, Conrad was the announcer on the debut broadcast of The CBS Radio Workshop, Conrad directed and narrated the 1957 episode Epitaphs, an adaptation of Edgar Lee Masterss poetry volume Spoon River Anthology. And 1489 Words remains a favorite of many, a powerful Conrad performance proving that one picture is not necessarily worth a thousand words, a lovely way to end a day, a decade, or an era. As an actor in films, Conrad was often cast as a threatening figure
2.
Henry Slesar
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Henry Slesar was an American author, playwright, and copywriter. He is famous for his use of irony and twist endings, after reading Slesars M Is for the Many in Ellery Queens Mystery Magazine, Alfred Hitchcock bought it for adaptation and they began many successful collaborations. Slesar wrote hundreds of scripts for television series and soap operas, Henry Slesar was born in Brooklyn, New York City. His parents were Jewish immigrants from Ukraine, and he had two sisters named Doris and Lillian. After graduating from the School of Industrial Art, he found he had a talent for ad copy and design and he was hired right out of school to work for the prominent advertising agency Young & Rubicam. It has been claimed that the coffee break was coined by Slesar. During World War II, for years he served in the United States Air Force. Afterwards, he opened his own agency, Slesar was married three times, to Oenone Scott, 1953-1969, to Jan Maakestad, 1970-1974, and to Manuela Jone in 1974. He had one daughter and one son, in addition to writing chiefly under his own name, Slesar published under several pseudonyms, particularly on early short stories. These included, Clyde Mitchell - a Ziff Davis house pseudonym used by science fiction and fantasy authors in Amazing Stories and Fantastic. Slesar used the Mitchell name for The Monster Died at Dawn in Amazing Stories, Leslie - Slesar chose this name, which he used from 1956 to 1964, again for Paul Fairman as well as other magazines. In Amazing Stories he published stories as Marriages Are Made in Detroit, Reluctant Genius, No Room in Heaven. In Fantastic he published stories as Death Rattle, My Robot, Abe Lincoln—Android, The Marriage Machine. Ivar Jorgensen - This pseudonym, a name, was also used by Robert Silverberg, Randall Garrett, Harlan Ellison, Howard Browne. Slesars use of the name appeared in Fantastic for Cowards Death, E. K. Jarvis - another Ziff Davis house name, also used by Robert Silverberg, Harlan Ellison, Paul W. Fairman, Robert Bloch, and Robert Moore Williams. Slesar used it for Get Out of Our Skies. in Amazing Stories, lawrence Chandler - Another Ziff Davis house name, shared by Howard Browne, Slesar used it for Tool of the Gods in Fantastic. Sley Harson - Nearly an anagram of Slesars name, he used it in collaboration with his friend Harlan Ellison, together they published Sob Story in The Deadly Streets. Gerald Vance - Another Ziff Davis house name, shared by William P. McGivern, Rog Phillips, Robert Silverberg, Slesar sold the story The Lavender Talent to Paul Fairman at Fantastic
3.
Connie Stevens
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She was of Italian and Irish descent. She adopted her fathers name of Stevens as her own. Her parents divorced and she lived with her grandparents and attended Catholic boarding schools, actor John Megna was her half-brother. At the age of 12, she witnessed a murder in Brooklyn and was sent to live with friends in Boonville. Coming from a family, Stevens joined the singing group called The Fourmost with Tony Butala. Stevens moved to Los Angeles with her father in 1953, when she was 16, she replaced the alto in a singing group, The Three Debs. She enrolled at a school, sang professionally, and appeared in local repertory theater. Stevens started working as an extra and stand-in. After shed appeared in four B movies, Jerry Lewis saw her in Dragstrip Riot, soon after that, she signed a contract with Warner Brothers. She played Cricket Blake in the television detective series Hawaiian Eye from 1959 to 1963. In a televised interview on August 26,2003, on CNNs Larry King Live, Stevens recounted that while on the set of Hawaiian Eye she was told she had a telephone call from Elvis Presley. She didnt believe it, but in fact it was Elvis and her first album was titled Concetta. She had minor hits with the standards Blame It On My Youth, Looking For A Boy. She and Byrnes also appeared together on ABCs The Pat Boone Chevy Showroom and she had hit singles as a solo artist with Sixteen Reasons, her biggest hit, reaching #3 on the Billboard Hot 100, and a minor #71 hit Too Young to Go Steady. Other single releases were Whyd You Wanna Make Me Cry, mr. Songwriter, and Now That Youve Gone. She starred in the Broadway production of Neil Simons The Star-Spangled Girl with Anthony Perkins in 1966 and she appeared in stage productions in summer stock, including The Wizard of Oz, Carousel Theatre, California and Any Wednesday, Melodyland, Anaheim, California. In the 1970s Stevens started singing the Ace Is The Place theme song on Ace Hardware TV commercials in Southern California and her risque 1976 action movie Scorchy has never been released on DVD. In the spring of 1977 Stevens appeared in a episode of The Muppet Show
4.
Dean Jones (actor)
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Dean Carroll Jones was an American actor best known for his light-hearted leading roles in several Walt Disney films between 1965 and 1977, such as The Love Bug. Jones also originated the role of Bobby in Stephen Sondheims Company, Jones was born in Decatur, near the larger neighboring city of Huntsville, Alabama, to Andrew Guy Jones, a traveling construction worker, and the former Nolia Elizabeth Wilhite. His parents are interred at Roselawn Gardens Of Memory in Decatur, as a student at Riverside High School in Decatur, Jones had his own local radio show, Dean Jones Sings. Jones served in the United States Navy during the Korean War, Jones attended Asbury University in Wilmore near Lexington, Kentucky. A member of its Class of 1953, he did not graduate, on March 4,2011, he later addressed the ceremony for the dedication of Asburys Andrew S. Miller Center for Communications Arts. After appearing in film and television roles, Jones made his Broadway debut in the 1960 play There Was a Little Girl. He stepped into the role in Boston, Massachusetts, at one days notice. In 1960 he also played Dave Manning in the Broadway comedy Under the Yum-Yum Tree, after achieving success in film and television, Jones was set to return to Broadway as the star of Stephen Sondheims musical Company in 1970. Shortly after opening night, Jones withdrew from the show, due to stress that he was undergoing from ongoing divorce proceedings, Director Harold Prince agreed to replace him with Larry Kert if Jones would open the show and record the cast album. Jones agreed, and his performance is preserved on the original cast album, in 1986, Jones, by then having become a Christian, starred in Into the Light, a musical about scientists and the Shroud of Turin, which closed four days after it opened. He had far more success touring in the one-man show St. John in Exile as the last surviving Apostle of Jesus Christ, a performance was filmed in 1986. He made one more Broadway appearance, in 1993, at the Vivian Beaumont Theater and he portrayed a soldier in both Imitation General with Glenn Ford and Never So Few with Frank Sinatra. Jones had a role in an episode of ABCs Stagecoach West. He portrayed Joe Brady, one of two outlaws, with Harold J. Stone as Tanner and they are trapped during a sandstorm in a frontier house with series stars Robert Bray and Richard Eyer as Simon and Davey Kane, respectively. The outlaws are sought by the United States Army for armed robbery, the young woman of the house, Martha Whitlock, played by Diana Millay, was recently deserted by her husband. She becomes attracted to Jones character, who considers himself a failure since he had been orphaned at an early age. In the story line, it is determined that Brady is not guilty of the robbery and shooting of the guards, but is culpable as an accessory after the fact. Jones subsequently starred in the NBC television sitcom Ensign OToole, produced by Four Star Television, portraying an easy-going and his co-stars included Jack Mullaney, Jack Albertson, Jay C
5.
Cesar Romero
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Cesar Julio Romero Jr. was an American actor, singer, dancer, voice artist, and comedian who was active in film, radio, and television for almost 60 years. Cesar Julio Romero Jr. was born in New York City on February 15,1907 and his mother was said to be the biological daughter of Cuban national hero José Martí. His father was born in Barcelona, Spain and emigrated to the United States in 1888 and his mother was a concert singer. He grew up in Bradley Beach, New Jersey, and was educated at Bradley Beach Elementary School, Asbury Park High School, the Collegiate School, and the Riverdale Country Day School. However, that changed dramatically when his parents lost their sugar import business. Romeros Hollywood earnings allowed him to support his family, all of whom followed him to the American West Coast years later. Romero lived on and off with various members for the rest of his life. On October 12,1942, he enlisted in the United States Coast Guard as an apprentice seaman. He reported aboard the Coast Guard-manned assault transport USS Cavalier in November 1943, according to a press release from the period, Romero saw action during the invasions of Tinian and Saipan. The same article mentioned that he preferred to be a part of the crew and was eventually promoted to the rating of Chief Boatswains Mate. At 63 Romero was very tall for an actor, and routinely played Latin lovers in films from the 1930s until the 1950s and he starred as the Cisco Kid in six westerns made between 1939 and 1941. Romero danced and performed comedy in the 20th Century Fox films he starred in opposite Carmen Miranda and Betty Grable, such as Week-End in Havana and Springtime in the Rockies, in the 1940s. He also played a role as Sinjin, a piano player in Glenn Millers band. In The Thin Man, Romero played a supporting role opposite the films main star William Powell. Many of Romeros films from this period saw him cast in small character parts, such as Italian gangsters. Romero had a role as the Pathan rebel leader, Khoda Khan, in John Fords 1937 British Raj-era actioner Wee Willie Winkie. He also appeared in a turn as a subversive opponent to Frank Sinatra. 20th Century Fox, along with mogul Darryl Zanuck, personally selected Romero to co-star with Tyrone Power in the Technicolor historical epic Captain from Castile, while Power played a fictionalized character, Romero played Hernán Cortés, a historical conquistador in Spains conquest of the Americas
6.
Parley Baer
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Parley Edward Baer was an American actor in radio and later in television and film. Born in Salt Lake City, Utah, Baer had a circus background and he studied drama at the University of Utah. Early in his career, Baer was a circus ringmaster and publicist and he left those roles for military service in World War II. In the 1950s, he had a job training wild animals at Jungleland USA in Thousand Oaks, California. Still later, he served as a docent at the Los Angeles Zoo. Baer was a member of the United States Army Air Force during World War II, serving in the Pacific Theatre, Baer was director of special events at KSL in the 1930s. In 1952, he began playing Chester, the deputy to Marshal Matt Dillon on Gunsmoke, eventually ad-libbing the characters full name. Baers portrayal of Chester was generally considered his finest and most memorable role and, as he often said, the one he found most fulfilling. Other recurring roles included Eb the farm hand on Granbys Green Acres, Gramps on The Truitts and his later radio work included playing Reginald Duffield and Uncle Joe Finneman on the Focus on the Family series Adventures in Odyssey in the 1980s and 1990s. Radio playwright and director Norman Corwin cast Baer as Simon Legree in the 1969 KCET television reading of his 1938 radio play The Plot to Overthrow Christmas, as an on-camera performer, Baer was recognizable by his distinctive voice, his paunchy appearance, and his balding head. Often he portrayed fussy, bossy, and/or obstinate officials or neighbors, henson, and in the late 1990s, Miles Dugan on The Young and the Restless. He also appeared as an executive on Gomer Pyle, U. S. M. C. Baer was cast twice on Walter Brennans sitcom, The Real McCoys and he also guest starred on the CBS sitcoms Dennis the Menace, with Jay North, and Angel, starring Annie Fargé. In the latter, he carried the lead as Dr. Mathews in the single episode The Dentist, in 1961, Baer guest starred on Marilyn Maxwells short-lived ABC drama series, Bus Stop. On April 13,1962, he appeared, along with Frank Ferguson and Royal Dano in ABCs crime drama Target and he was cast as hotel owner Mr. Kringelein in the 1962 film, Gypsy, opposite Natalie Wood and Rosalind Russell. In 1964, Baer was cast as a sheriff in an episode of Mickey Rooneys short-lived Mickey sitcom, brockway, the owner of a toy manufacturing firm. Baer was cast as Horace Greeley, who came to Colorado in 1859 in the Pikes Peak Gold Rush, in the 1965 episode The Great Turkey War of the syndicated series, Death Valley Days. In the story line, a fledgling Denver copes with vandalism and the theft of turkeys, Baer made at least two appearances on Petticoat Junction. In the 1966 episode, Jury at the Shady Rest, he was Bailiff Tucker, then, in the 1969 episode, The Glen Tinker Caper, he was Judge Madison
7.
Virginia Gregg
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Virginia Lee Gregg was an American actress known for her many roles in radio dramas and television series. Born in the Illinois city of Harrisburg, she was the daughter of musician Dewey Alphaleta, when Gregg was 5, she and her family moved to Pasadena. She attended Jefferson High School, Pasadena Junior College and Pacific Academy of Dramatic Art, before going into radio, Gregg played the double bass with the Pasadena Symphony and Pops. She was a member of the Singing Strings group heard initially on KHJ in Los Angeles in 1937 and later on CBS, Gregg was a prolific radio actress, heard on such programs as The Adventures of Sam Spade, Dragnet, Dr. On the radio series Have Gun–Will Travel, Gregg portrayed Miss Wong and she had the role of Betty Barbour on One Mans Family and played Richard Diamonds girlfriend, the wealthy Helen Asher, on the radio series Richard Diamond, Private Detective. She later guest starred in an episode of the version of Richard Diamond. Gregg once said of her work as an actress on television, I work steadily. She added, When casting people have a call for a woman who looks like the wrath of God, Gregg may be best remembered for her many appearances in Dragnet. Jack Webb used her in dozens of roles on both the radio and TV versions of the show, as well as in the 1954 film version of Dragnet, in later years, she appeared on other shows produced by Webbs production company, Mark VII Limited. Gregg supplied the voice of Mrs. Bates in Psycho as did Jeanette Nolan and Paul Jasmin, only Gregg did the voice in the sequels Psycho II and Psycho III. She voiced Tarra on the 1967 animated TV series, The Herculoids and she reprised that role when the series was revived in 1981 as part of the Space Stars animated series. Gregg married producer Jaime del Valle in 1948, and they had three children, Gregg, Jaime, and Ricardo and they were divorced December 22,1959. She was active with the Recording for the Blind Inc. organization, making recordings as a volunteer, Gregg died from lung cancer in Encino, California, September 15,1986, aged 70. She was survived by her three sons, Gregg, Jaime and Ricardo del Valle, official website Virginia Gregg at the Internet Movie Database Virginia Gregg at Find a Grave
8.
John Hoyt
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John Hoyt was an American film, stage, and television actor. Hoyt was born John McArthur Hoysradt in Bronxville, New York, the son of Warren J. Hoysradt, an investment banker and he attended the Hotchkiss School and Yale University, where he served on the editorial board of campus humor magazine The Yale Record. He obtained a bachelors and a degree from the latter school. He worked as an instructor at the Groton School for two years. Hoyt performed with regional theater groups, before joining Orson Welless Mercury Theatre in 1933. Under his birth name, he worked as a standup nightclub comedian. In the latter activity, Hoyt performed impressions of famous entertainers and his impersonation of Noël Coward was so remarkable that he was hired for the original cast of the Broadway comedy The Man Who Came to Dinner, in which he played Beverley Carlton. He made his Broadway debut in 1931 in William Bolithos play Overture, Hoyt shortened his surname in 1945, the year before his film debut in O. S. S. He played the strict Principal Warneke in the 1955 film Blackboard Jungle and he played an industrialist in the 1951 film When Worlds Collide. Hoyt appeared in one Shakespearean film, MGMs Julius Caesar, reprising the role of Decius Brutus, in 1953, he portrayed Elijah in the biblical film Sins of Jezebel. He guest-starred on the anthology series Crossroads. In 1958, Hoyt was cast as rancher Clete Barron in the episode Trouble in Paradise Valley of the western series Frontier Doctor. In 1958 and 1959, Hoyt was cast in two episodes of the CBS crime drama Richard Diamond, Private Detective and he appeared as Burnison in The George Dale Case and as Harding, Sr. in Murder at the Mansion. On November 17,1959, Hoyt appeared as the mentally troubled Colonel Brandon in the episode The General Must Die on NBCs Laramie western series, Hoyt was cast as Antoine Rigaud in the 1959 episode About Roger Mowbray of another NBC western series, Riverboat. In 1959, Hoyt was cast as John Cavanagh in The Mourning Cloak episode of the ABC/Warner Brothers crime drama Bourbon Street Beat, about this time, he also guest-starred on the ABC/WB western series The Alaskans and in Grant Sullivans syndicated western series Pony Express. Also in 1959, Hoyt was cast in an episode of The Rifleman and he played Gus Fremont, the cruel uncle of Johnny Clover as portrayed by Dennis Hopper. In 1960 and 1961, he appeared in the episodes Burnetts Woman and The Salvation of Killer McFadden of another ABC-WB dramatic series, Hoyt guest-starred on at least three CBS sitcoms, Bringing Up Buddy, Hogans Heroes, and Petticoat Junction. He was cast as Dr. Philip Boyce in the episode of NBCs Star Trek
9.
Max Steiner
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Maximilian Raoul Max Steiner was an Austrian-born American music composer for theatre and films. He was a prodigy who conducted his first operetta when he was twelve and became a full-time professional, either composing, arranging, or conducting. He worked in England, then Broadway, and in 1929 he moved to Hollywood, Steiner was referred to as the father of film music. Steiner composed over 300 film scores with RKO Pictures and Warner Bros. and was nominated for 24 Academy Awards and he was also the first recipient of the Golden Globe Award for Best Original Score, which he won for his score to Life with Father. A lot of his scores are available as separate soundtrack recordings. Steiner was born on May 10,1888, in Austria-Hungary and he was the only child in a wealthy business and theatrical family of Jewish heritage. His father was Gabor Steiner, Viennese impresario, carnival exposition manager, Steiners mother was a dancer in stage productions put on by his grandfather. His godfather was the composer Richard Strauss, Max Steiner often credited his family for inspiring his early musical abilities. His parents sent Steiner to the Vienna University of Technology, and he studied various instruments including piano, organ, violin, double bass, and trumpet. He also had courses in harmony, counterpoint, and composition, for his early achievements he was awarded a gold medal by the academy. Steiner first entered the world of music when he was fifteen. He wrote and conducted the operetta, The Beautiful Greek Girl, the opera ran for a year and led to opportunities to conduct other shows in various cities around the world, including Moscow and Hamburg. He was invited to London to conduct Lehars The Merry Widow and he stayed in London for 8 years conducting musicals at Dalys Theares, the Adelphi, the Hippodrome, the London Pavilion and the Blackpool Winter Gardens. In England, Steiner wrote and conducted theater productions and symphonies, but in 1914, World War I started and he was interned as an enemy alien. Fortunately, he was befriended by the Duke of Westminster, who was a fan of his work and he arrived in New York City in December,1914, with only $32 to his name. Steiner soon acquired employment and worked in New York for fifteen years as a director, arranger, orchestrator. These productions include operettas and musicals written by Victor Herbert, Jerome Kern, Vincent Youmans, Steiners credits include, George Whites Scandals, Peaches, Lady, Be Good. In 1927, Steiner orchestrated and conducted Harry Tierneys Rio Rita, tierney himself later requested that RKO Pictures in Hollywood hire Steiner to work in their music production departments
