Subscribe to our Free Weekly Newsletter
MICHAEL APTED earned acclaim as a versatile director of dramatic and nonfiction films ranging from Coal Miner’s Daughter, the 1980 biopic in which Sissy Spacek gave an Oscar-winning performance as country music icon Loretta Lynn, to Incident at Oglala, a 1992 documentary detailing events surrounding the 1975 deaths of two FBI agents on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation. Other notable titles on his résumé include Thunderheart (1992), a thriller loosely based on the 1973 occupation of Wounded Knee, S.D., starring Val Kilmer, Sam Shepard, and Graham Greene. Apted passed away January 7 in Los Angeles at age 79.
ED BRUCE, the Arkansas-born singer-songwriter who kicked off his career during the Sun Records era, earned his place of honor in country music history by co-writing (with then-wife Patsy Bruce) “Mammas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys,” which he recorded in 1975 — and later became a smash hit in 1978 for Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings. He also wrote “The Man That Turned My Momma On” for Tanya Tucker and “Restless” for Crystal Gayle, co-wrote “Texas (When I Die)” for Tucker, and enjoyed his greatest success as a solo artist with “You’re the Best Break This Old Heart Ever Had” (written by Wayland Holyfield and Randy Hatch) in 1981. As an actor, Bruce costarred with James Garner in the 1981-82 series Bret Maverick, a sequel to Garner’s classic Maverick TV western, and appeared in features and TV movies including The Last Days of Frank and Jesse James (1986), Louis L’Amour’s Down the Long Hills (1986), Blue Valley Songbird (1999), and Country Strong (2010). He died January 8 at age 81 in Clarksville, Tennessee.
STEVE CARVER directed such notables as Chuck Norris (Lone Wolf McQuade), Warren Oates (Drum), and Ben Gazzara (Capone) during his decades-long career as a filmmaker. But, as The Hollywood Reporter noted, Carver's first love was photography, and a 2019 book he and C. Courtney Joyner co-authored, Western Portraits: The Unsung Heroes & Villains of the Silver Screen, “featured beautiful shots of Robert Forster, Karl Malden, L.Q. Jones, Richard Roundtree, David Carradine, Bo Hopkins, Clu Gulager, Jan-Michael Vincent and many others.” Carver passed away Jan. 8 in Los Angeles due to complications from COVID-19. He was 75.
PETER MARK RICHMAN amassed dozens of film and television credits during his lengthy career. He was a frequent guest star during the Golden Age of TV Westerns, appearing on such series as Rawhide, Zane Grey Theater, The Loner, Iron Horse, The Virginian, Gunsmoke, Lancer, The Wild West, and Bonanza. Richman also costarred opposite Clint Walker in the 1971 TV movie Yuma, and played a supporting role in the 1988 TV movie Bonanza: The Next Generation. He was 93 when he died January 14 in Los Angeles.
HAL HOLBROOK demonstrated exceptional artistry, versatility, and craftsmanship during a stage, screen, and television acting career that spanned eight decades. He entertained millions of theatergoers with his trademark one-man show Mark Twain Tonight! (which he premiered in 1954, and continued to perform until 2017) and made an indelible impact as the cigarette-smoking, shadow-shrouded “Deep Throat” in the classic 1976 Watergate thriller All the President’s Men. Holbrook also portrayed Abraham Lincoln in three TV miniseries — Carl Sandburg’s Lincoln (1974), for which he won an Emmy Award; North and South (1985) and North and South: Book 2 (1986) — and was cast as influential Republican politician Preston Blair in Steven Spielberg’s 2012 film Lincoln. In 2009, he received rave reviews for playing Abner Meecham, an aging farmer who won’t give up his pride or property, in That Evening Sun. When the drama was shown at the Nashville Film Festival — where he received a Lifetime Achievement Award — Holbrook told C&I that, after spending so many years as Mark Twain onstage, he had aged to the point where he could spend less time on pre-performance prep work in his dressing room: “I don’t have to apply as much old-age makeup.” He was 95 when he passed away Jan. 23 at his home in Beverly Hills, California.
SHARON SHOULDERS was a longtime supporter of the Rodeo Historical Society (RHS) and National Cowboy Museum, and widow of 16-time Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association World Champion Jim Shoulders. “Whether she was running the family ranch or serving as RHS president,” said RHS president John McBeth, “Sharon was always hard at work upholding the Western way of life. Though she will be sorely missed, Sharon has left each of us a wonderful example of a life well lived.” Shoulders died Jan. 30 at age 91 from complications of COVID- 19 at her home in Henryetta, Oklahoma.
RICHIE ALBRIGHT, a longtime drummer for Waylon Jennings, played a major role in helping Jennings develop his distinctive outlaw country sound after joining his backup band, The Waylors, in 1964. During a career that spanned five decades, Albright also performed with, and occasionally produced recordings for, such notables as Hank Williams Jr., Willie Nelson, Johnny Cash, Johnny Rodriguez, and Billy Joe Shaver. Jennings often referred to him as his “right-hand man,” and named his son, second-generation rock-country musician Waylon Albright “Shooter” Jennings, in part after his friend and collaborator. Following Jennings’ death in 2002, Albright carried on the superstar’s legacy by performing with Waymore’s Outlaws, a group of Jennings’ former backup musicians. Albright died Feb. 9 at age 81 in Nashville.
CHRISTOPHER CARDOZO dedicated much of his life to preserving and understanding the work of Edward S. Curtis (1868-1952), the renowned ethnographer and photographer of Native peoples across North America, who created over 40,000 compelling images documenting the lives of Native peoples between 1900 and 1930. Cardozo authored nine monographs on Edward Curtis and created and curated one-person Curtis exhibitions that have been seen in nearly 100 venues in over 40 countries, and on every continent but Antarctica. Cardozo assembled the world’s largest and most broad-ranging Curtis collection and was instrumental in increasing awareness, understanding, and appreciation for Curtis’ work. His personal collection has been exhibited in major museums internationally. Cardozo was the founder and board chair of the Edward S. Curtis Foundation. He was also the founder of Cardozo Fine Art, which has pioneered techniques for preserving and revitalizing historic photographs. Cardozo was 72 when he died on February 21.
HENRY DARROW maintained a loyal fan base during the original 1967-71 primetime run, and throughout decades of syndicated reruns, of The High Chaparral, the western drama in which he portrayed the roguish Manolito Montoya. He subsequently made his mark as the first Latino actor ever to play Zorro on television in the 1983 sitcom Zorro and Son, and also provided the voice for the masked swashbuckler in the animated series The Tarzan/Lone Ranger/Zorro Adventure Hour (1980) and The New Adventures of Zorro (1981). Years later, he made history again as the only actor ever to have played both Don Diego (a.k.a. Zorro) and his father, Don Alejandro, when he assumed the latter role in the 1990-93 TV series Zorro featuring Duncan Regehr as the title hero. Darrow was 87 when he passed away March 14 at his home in Wilmington, North Carolina.
GEORGE SEGAL first grabbed attention as a riveting dramatic actor in such ’60s feature films and television dramas as Ship of Fools, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (for which he received an Oscar nomination as Best Supporting Actor), and TV adaptations of Death of a Salesman and Of Mice and Men. He balanced comedy and drama throughout subsequent decades with prominent roles in A Touch of Class (for which he earned a Golden Globe for Best Actor in a Comedy), The Owl and the Pussycat, and Fun with Dick and Jane, among other films, and was most widely recognized in recent years for his work in the long-running sitcoms Just Shoot Me! and The Goldbergs. C&I readers may recall his starring roles in two western films, the 1964 drama Invitation to a Gunfighter (in which he appeared opposite Yul Brynner) and the 1976 comedy The Duchess and the Dirtwater Fox (with Goldie Hawn). Segal died March 23 in Santa Rosa, California. He was 87.
LARRY McMURTRY often said he was surprised by the passionate response to Lonesome Dove — both his Pulitzer Prize-winning 1985 novel, and the epic 1989 miniseries adaptation starring Robert Duvall and Tommy Lee Jones. Indeed, during a 2006 interview with Cowboys & Indians, when an interviewer noted that both the novel and the miniseries were widely credited with reviving the classic myth of the American West, McMurtry responded: “I always thought of Lonesome Dove as anti-mythic. That’s not the way it was received, of course. Authors very rarely have any control over how their books are read or perceived. But I always thought of it as critical rather than celebratory.”
Of course, millions of readers and viewers would strongly disagree. For them, the Lonesome Dove mythos — which McMurtry was quite happy to sustain and expand in such later novels and miniseries as Streets of Laredo (1993), Dead Man’s Walk (1995) and Comanche Moon (1997) — is our all-American version of sagas spun by Shakespeare and other immortal authors. Robert Duvall told C&I in 2014 that he was originally given a copy of Lonesome Dove by his ex-wife, who insisted that he read because, in her words, “It’s maybe better than Dostoyevsky.” Duvall wound up agreeing with her — although he dropped the “maybe” from his own appraisal. (On the other hand, it should be noted, Duvall strongly disagreed with McMurtry’s observation that he and Jones should have switched roles for the miniseries.)
In his many other novels and screenplays, McMurtry offered other richly detailed and marvelously multifaceted views of both Texas and Texans — and, by extension, of an American West that is both a geographical location and a state of mind. Thanks to him, we have Hud, the enduringly powerful 1963 film based on McMurtry’s novel Horseman, Pass By, starring Paul Newman in one of his signature roles as a charismatically hunky and brazenly amoral Texas Panhandle cattle rancher; The Last Picture Show, the hauntingly raw and elegiac 1971 drama about small-town Texas life in the 1950s, which he and director Peter Bogdanovich adapted from McMurtry’s 1966 novel; and Brokeback Mountain, for which McMurtry and his writing partner Diana Ossana adapted their Oscar-winning screenplay from a short story by Annie Proulx.
And yes, thanks to Larry McMurtry, we have Aurora Greenway — the self-dramatizing grande dame of Houston’s ritzy River Oaks neighborhood — who was played to Oscar-worthy perfection by Shirley MacLaine in the Oscar-winning adaptation of McMurtry’s Terms of Endearment. And who returned to raise a bit more hell before fading away in the film of McMurtry’s The Evening Star. McMurtry spent most of his life creating — and criticizing and celebrating — dozens of full-bodied and unforgettable characters like Aurora. He will be sorely missed, but he left us an incredible legacy.
Larry McMurtry was 84 when he died March 25 in Archer City, Texas.
LEON HALE, widely known as the dean of Houston newspaper columnists, wrote affectionately and informatively about people and places in and around Houston for 65 years. He spent 32 years at The Houston Post until he moved across town in 1984 to The Houston Chronicle, where he remained until 2014. Hale continued to write long after his retirement, and published his final book, See You Down the Road, shortly before his death March 27 at age 99 in Winedale, Texas.
LEE AAKER appeared in such films as High Noon, Hondo, and Ride Clear of Diablo before was cast, at age 11, in the 1954-59 TV western The Adventures of Rin Tin Tin. For 164 episodes, he starred as Rusty, an orphaned youngster who shared many adventures with the resourceful German shepherd of the title while being raised by U.S. Cavalry soldiers at Fort Apache. Aaker did not make a successful transition from child to adult actor, and worked in several other professions before he died April 1 at age 77 near Mesa, Arizona.
JAMES HAMPTON earned at least a footnote in TV sitcom history for his performance as bumbling bugler Pvt. Hannibal Dobbs on F Troop (1965-67). He again donned military mufti in 1976 when he costarred in Hawmps!, a slapstick western comedy loosely based on a short-lived attempt by the U.S. Cavalry to introduce camels into service as pack animals. Hampton’s other film and TV credits include Soldier Blue, The Man Who Loved Cat Dancing, The Longest Yard, Mackintosh and T.J., Sling Blade and The Last Ride. He was 84 when he died April 7 in Fort Worth.
DEREK CLARK a fourth-generation cowboy and 15-time National Finals Rodeo saddle bronc rider, began riding horses and competing before his rodeo career, following in the footsteps of his father, grandfather, and great-grandfather. He competed as a saddle bronc and bull rider from 1980 until 2000 and was inducted into the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum Rodeo Hall of Fame in 2018. Clark died April 8 at age 60.
CHARLIE BLACK was a country music songwriter and producer who wrote or co-wrote such hits as “You Lie” (for Reba McEntire), “A Little Good News” (Anne Murray), “I Know a Heartache When I See One” (Jennifer Warnes), “Do You Love As Good As You Look” (The Bellamy Brothers), and “Come Next Monday” (K.T. Oslin). He was inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1991. Black was 71 when he passed away April 23 in Port St. Joe, Florida.
JOHNNY CRAWFORD endeared himself to generations of TV viewers by playing Mark McCain, son of widower, homesteader, and peacekeeper Lucas McCain (Chuck Connors) in The Rifleman during the series’ 1958-63 prime-time run — and, of course, throughout decades of syndicated reruns. Both Crawford (an original member of The Mickey Mouse Club) and Connors generated a distinctive chemistry as costars. “When we got together to do The Rifleman,” Crawford told C&I in 2018, “we just hit it off. He was very easy to work with. And we had such wonderful scripts. In fact, we had several scripts by Sam Peckinpah in the first season. And the father-son relationship was a great handle for a lot of the writers as they told their stories.” Crawford later appeared in movies and other TV series — he was shot by John Wayne’s character in El Dorado — and in more recent years parlayed his ’60s success as a Top 40 recording artist (“Cindy’s Birthday,” “Your Nose is Gonna Grow”) into a second career singing, recording, and performing with his vintage music ensemble, The Johnny Crawford Dance Orchestra. Crawford passed away April 29 in Los Angeles at age 75.
BUDDY VAN HORN began his career as a stuntman for several films and TV series, and was a stunt double for Guy Williams on Zorro, William Smith on Laredo, and James Stewart on Firecreek, before kicking off a lengthy professional relationship with Clint Eastwood as Eastwood’s stunt double on Don Siegel’s Coogan’s Bluff (1968). He subsequently worked as stunt coordinator for such Siegel-Eastwood collaborations as Two Mules for Sister Sara, The Beguiled, and Dirty Harry, and eventually directed three films starring Eastwood: Any Which Way You Can, The Dead Pool, and Pink Cadillac. His other credits as stuntman and stunt coordinator include The Cowboys, Bite the Bullet, The Deer Hunter, Barfly, All the Pretty Horses, and the Eastwood-directed features A Perfect World, Space Cowboys, Mystic River, and Flags of Our Fathers. Van Horn died at age 92 in Los Angeles May 11.
CHARLES GRODIN impressed critics and delighted audiences throughout his decades-long film and TV career with his amusing performances in films ranging from comedy-thrillers (Midnight Run, 11 Harrowhouse) to sophisticated rom-coms (The Heartbreak Kid, Heaven Can Wait) to family-friendly farces (Beethoven, Clifford). Like many actors of his generation, he played supporting roles in episodes of classic TV westerns during the 1960s, including Shane, Iron Horse, The Guns of Will Sonnett, and The Big Valley. The Pittsburgh-born actor also received costar billing in The Meanest Men in the West (a.k.a. Bad Men of the West), a 1974 theatrically released feature that actually was comprised of two ’60s episodes of The Virginian. Grodin was 86 when he passed away May 18 in Wilton, Connecticut.
NED BEATTY honed his acting craft in regional theater before breaking through as co-star of Deliverance (1972), his first feature film. During his decades-long showbiz career, he established himself as a much-in-demand character actor with standout performances in such diverse films as Network (for which he received an Academy Award nomination), White Lightning, Nashville, All the President’s Men, Superman, Hear My Song, and Spring Forward. C&I readers may remember his work in the TV movies The Ballad of Gregorio Cortez, Outlaws: The Legend of O.B. Taggart, and Crazy Horse, and his performance as Judge Roy Bean in the 1995 miniseries adaptation of Larry McMurtry’s Streets of Laredo. (Fun fact: Beatty had a small role in the 1972 feature The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean.) In 2004, he won a Drama Desk Award as Outstanding Featured Actor in a Play for his performance as Big Daddy in a New York revival of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. Beatty passed away June 13 in Los Angeles. He was 83.
NORMAN S. POWELL worked as a production manager for such classic TV westerns as Wanted: Dead or Alive, The Big Valley, and The Westerner before starting his lengthy career as production executive for CBS. Among his other credits: He was executive producer for Black Fox, the 1995 western miniseries starring Christopher Reeve and Tony Todd, and produced two Gunsmoke TV-movie spin-offs, Gunsmoke: The Long Ride (1993) and Gunsmoke: One Man’s Justice (1994). Powell died June 16 in California. He was 86.
RICHARD DONNER made a significant impact and attracted a large fan base as a director with The Omen (1976), Superman (1978), The Goonies (1985), and the Lethal Weapon franchise. Before launching his feature filmmaking career, however, he earned his spurs by directing such TV westerns of Zane Grey Theatre, Wanted: Dead or Alive, The Tall Man, Wagon Train, The Rifleman, Have Gun — Will Travel, The Wild Wild West, and Bearcats! He also directed the classic Twilight Zone episode “Nightmare at 20,000 Feet” — and the 1994 big-screen reboot of Maverick starring Mel Gibson, Jodie Foster, and James Garner. Donner died July 5 at age 91 in Los Angeles.
WILLIAM SMITH began his career as a child actor in the 1940s and made his final movie appearance last year in the comedy Irresistible. During his nearly 75 years in TV and movies, he often played seriously intimidating badasses like Falconetti in Rich Man, Poor Man, Colonel Strelnikov in Red Dawn, and the title character’s father in Conan the Barbarian. For two seasons, he played Joe Riley, an outlaw who got a shot at redemption as a Texas Ranger, in the TV western Laredo. (The pilot episode was released in theaters under the title Backtrack in 1969.) Smith also guested on Wagon Train, Custer, The Virginian, The Guns of Will Sonnett, Daniel Boone, Death Valley Days, Gunsmoke, Kung Fu, and Alias Smith and Jones, among many other TV series, and appeared in such films as Mail Order Bride, The Losers, C.C. & Company, Piranha, The Last American Hero, Twilight’s Last Gleaming, and American Me. Movie buffs still marvel at Smith’s resilience in two of the longest, bloodiest fight scenes in movie history — with Rod Taylor in Darker Than Amber (1970) and Clint Eastwood in Any Which Way You Can (1980). Smith died July 5 in Los Angeles. He was 88.
Alex Cord played everything from a Mafioso in The Brotherhood to a CIA operative in Airwolf during his decades-long career. But many people associate him most closely with westerns, given his lead performances as the Ringo kid in the 1966 Stagecoach remake, a gritty gunslinger in A Minute to Pray, A Second to Die, and a Cheyenne brave in Grayeagle. Because of these films and his guest-starring roles in several TV westerns, he received a Golden Boot Award in 2001. Cord was 88 when he died Aug. 9 in Valley View, Texas.
Nanci Griffith received a Grammy Award for her 1993 album Other Voices, Other Rooms, a collection of folk tunes that had inspired her own songwriting career, which she recorded with such fellow artists as Emmylou Harris, John Prine, Arlo Guthrie, and Guy Clark. She wrote or co-wrote hit songs recorded by Kathy Mattea (“Love at the Five and Dime”), Suzy Bogguss (“Outbound Plane”) and others, and recorded several albums of songs written by herself and others. She was widely praised for the distinctive sound of her vocals on Texas folk-country classics like “Lone Star State of Mind” and “Last of the True Believers” and in 2008 received a Lifetime Americana Trailblazer Award from the Americana Music Association. Griffith passed away Aug. 13 in Nashville. She was 68.
Tom T. Hall earned the nickname “The Storyteller” for writing enduringly popular hit songs for himself — including “(Old Dogs, Children and) Watermelon Wine,” “I Love,” “Country Is,” “The Year That Clayton Delaney Died,” “A Week in a Country Jail,” and “Faster Horses (The Cowboy and the Poet)” — and such artists as Jeannie C. Riley (“Harper Valley P.T.A.”), Alan Jackson (“Little Bitty”), and Johnnie Wright (“Hello Vietnam”). He also achieved success as a novelist and short-story writer, joined the Grand Ole Opry in 1971, and hosted the syndicated TV show Pop! Goes the Country from 1980 to 1982. Hall died Aug. 20 in Franklin, Tennessee, at age 85.
Don Everly made music history with his younger sibling Phil as the hit-making, groundbreaking, and genre-blending duo The Everly Brothers. They were instrumental in shaping the sound of 1950s and ’60s rock ’n’ roll with such classics as “Bye Bye Love,” “Wake Up, Little Susie,” “Cathy’s Clown,” “Bird Dog,” and “All I Have To Do Is Dream” — The Beatles often cited the duo’s tight harmonies as major vocal influences — while often reaching the No. 1 spot on the country music charts. They were members of the inaugural class of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1986 — and inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 2001. Don Everly was 84 when he passed away Aug. 21 at his home in Nashville.
Ed Asner collected a total of five Emmy Awards for playing the gruff but principled news editor Lou Grant in two different series, the 1970-77 sitcom The Mary Tyler Moore Show and the 1977-82 drama Lou Grant. He also earned Emmys for his performances in the miniseries Rich Man, Poor Man (1976) and Roots (1977). But C&I readers may remember him best for co-starring opposite John Wayne in Howard Hawks’ El Dorado, playing a greedy rancher whose offer of employment is rejected by The Duke. Like many actors of his generation, Asner earned his spurs in episodes of classic TV westerns, including Outlaws, The Virginian, Gunsmoke, A Man Called Shenandoah, Iron Horse, and The Wild Wild West. He was 91 when he died Aug. 29 in Los Angeles.
DON MADDOX was the last surviving member of The Maddox Brothers & Rose, a trend-setting band that combined rockabilly, honky-tonk, and early rock ‘n’ roll with notable success during the 1940s and ’50s. As The New York Times noted, the siblings “were renowned for their exuberant fusion of barnyard twang and gutbucket R&B, as well as for their uproarious stage antics. The fringed, embroidered costumes they wore — designed by the Hollywood rodeo tailor Nathan Turk — were equally dazzling, a harbinger of the Western resplendence sported by Buck Owens in the 1960s and later by Gram Parsons and the Flying Burrito Brothers.” Maddox, who played fiddle with the group, died Sept. 12 at age 98 in Medford, Oregon.
DON COLLIER specialized in westerns throughout most of his decades-long acting career. He played continuing roles as Marshal Will Foreman in Outlaws (1960-62), ranch foreman Sam Butler in The High Chaparral (1967-71) and shopkeeper William Tompkins in The Young Riders (1989-92), and appeared opposite John Wayne in the movies El Dorado (1966), The War Wagon (1967) and The Undefeated (1969). His other credits include the films Seven Ways from Sundown (1960), Incident at Phantom Hill (1966), 5 Card Stud (1968), and Tombstone (1993), such TV series as Gunsmoke, The Virginian, and Bonanza, and the TV-movies Gunsmoke: To The Last Man (1992), Gunsmoke: One Man’s Justice (1994), and Bonanza: Under Attack (1995). The DVD Don Collier: Confessions of An Acting Cowboy was released in 2020. Collier died September 13 in Harrodsburg, Kentucky. He was 92.
JANE POWELL enjoyed her greatest success during the Golden Age of Hollywood, appearing in such movies as A Date with Judy (1948), Royal Wedding (1951), Small Town Girl (1953) and Hit the Deck (1955). C&I readers might know her best for acting opposite Howard Keel in Seven Brides for the Seven Brothers (1954), the classic MGM musical about seven male siblings in 1850 Oregon who take a unique approach to finding spouses. Powell was 92 when she passed away on September 16 in Wilton, Connecticut.
PETER PALMER played the strapping and sweet-natured title character in the 1956 Broadway musical and 1959 movie Li’l Abner, both based on the long-running Al Capp comic strip about an extended hillbilly family in the mythical community of Dogpatch. He also had a supporting role as Sgt. James Bustard in the short-lived 1967 TV series Custer, and guested on episodes of The Texan and Lancer. Palmer died September 21 at age 90 in Tampa, Florida.
BOB MOORE, a longtime member of the Nashville country music studio scene, earned a reputation for being the most-recorded bass player in country music history. As Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum CEO Kyle Young said in a statement. “He was the heartbeat behind classics including Patsy Cline’s ‘Crazy,’ Sammi Smith’s ‘Help Me Make It Through the Night,’ Kenny Rogers’ ‘The Gambler,’ and hundreds of other recordings that changed the course of country music.” Moore was 88 when he died in September 22 in Nashville.
MICHAEL TYLO portrayed Alcalde Luis Ramone, the tyrannical commandant of early 19th-century Los Angeles, in the 1990s Family Channel reboot of Zorro. The series was filmed on location — a fact, Tylo admitted in a 1990 interview, that greatly displeased him. “He is a man who doesn’t want to be there,” he said, “so I use the fact that I don’t want to be in Spain and it works well.” Tylo — who also played Dee Boot in Lonesome Dove — died September 28 in Henderson, Nevada. He was 72.
TOMMY KIRK is warmly remembered by many C&I readers for his affecting performance as Travis Coates, an 1860s rancher’s son who bonds with a heroic Labrador retriever, in the Walt Disney production Old Yeller (1957). He played the character again in Savage Sam, a 1963 sequel, and also starred in several other Disney films and TV series, including The Shaggy Dog (1959), Swiss Family Robinson (1960), The Horsemasters (1961), and The Misadventures of Merlin Jones (1964). Kirk passed away at age 79 in Las Vegas on September 28.
BETTY LYNN is best remembered by TV viewers for her role as Thelma Lou, the uncommonly patient girlfriend of Don Knotts’ bumbling Deputy Barney Fife, in the long-running and enduringly popular sitcom The Andy Griffith Show. Although she left the series after Knotts departed to pursue a film career, she reprised the character for the 1986 reunion TV movie Return to Mayberry, in which Barney and Thelma Lou finally were married. Lynn — who also guested in other TV series such as Lawman, Wagon Train, and Sugarfoot, and played Viola Howell Slaughter in the 1958-61 Walt Disney western Texas John Slaughter — died Oct. 16 at age 95 in Mount Airy, N.C.
DEAN STOCKWELL began his decades-long career in stage, screen, and television as a child actor, most notably as the title character in Joseph Losey’s The Boy with Green Hair (1948), and went on to appear in dozens of movies and TV series, including the westerns Stars in My Crown (1950), Cattle Drive (1951), Gun for a Coward (1957), The Gambler, Part III: The Legend Continues (1987), Son of the Morning Star (1991), and Bonanza: The Return (1993). He received a Golden Globe for his performance as Al Calavicci in the 1989-93 cult-fave sci-fi TV series Quantum Leap, and an Oscar nomination as Best Supporting Actor for Jonathan Demme’s Married to the Mob (1988). Stockwell died Nov. 7 in Rancho de Taos, N.M. He was 85.
ARLENE DAHL was an actress and MGM contract player active during the 1950s and ’60s, starring or co-starring in films such as the westerns Ambush and The Outriders (both 1950), and the 1959 sci-fi adventure Journey to the Center of the Earth. She later launched successful careers as author, fashion, and cosmetics entrepreneur, and syndicated astrology columnist. She was 96 when she passed away Nov. 29 in New York City.
JOANNE SHENANDOAH was one of the most acclaimed and honored Native American musicians of her generation. She was fondly eulogized on the Native American Music Awards (NAMA) Facebook site as an artist “whose beautiful embellishing voice, strong Iroquois traditions, unequivocal elegance and courteous grace made her a prominent role model and highly respected musical matriarch” who “sang with deep roots from her ancestors and flawlessly incorporated her oral traditions into contemporary folk, country and Americana formats.” She recorded more than 15 albums — including Shenandoah Country, a collection of country-flavored songs, released in 2021 — and received a Grammy Award for her contributions to the 2005 album Sacred Ground: A Tribute to Mother Earth. Shenandoah was 64 when she passed away Nov. 22 at the Mayo Clinic in Scottsdale, Arizona.
MICHAEL NESMITH Most folks will always remember Michael Nesmith best as the wool-capped singer-guitarist for The Monkees, the ersatz Beatles group that started out as the focus of a 1960s sitcom, but whose music proved to be enduringly popular — on records, tapes, CDs and digital downloads, and in live performance — decades after the quartet departed from prime time.
And yet for some of us in the C&I bunkhouse, the Houston-born singer-songwriter — who passed away Friday at age 78 — will also be treasured for his work in a county-flavored vein. Whether he recorded as a solo artist or with his First National Band, performing his own compositions or classics made famous by others, the multitalented Nesmith left a lasting impression on our hearts and minds.
BETTY WHITE When news reached Bill Anderson and Naomi Judd about the death of beloved film and TV actress Betty White — who passed away Thursday just short of her 100th birthday — the country music greats recalled the happy times they spent with her.
“I had the privilege of working alongside Betty White on many occasions back in my game show days of the late ‘70s and early ‘80s,” Anderson remembered. “We appeared together on Match Game, Tattletales, and Password Plus, and she always went out of her way to make me feel welcome. She kept us all laughing with her incredible sense of humor, while at the same time always performing as the consummate professional. I feel so honored to have known her.”
Added Judd: “Betty and I worked together at American Humane Association. We shared our passion rescuing abused animals. She may have looked like she’d just come from a bridge party, but then she’d crack a joke with a sexual innuendo. She was one of my role models. I also knew her late husband, Allen Ludden when I was a contestant on Password.”
STONEWALL JACKSON, who made history in 1959 as the first artist to join the Grand Ole Opry before signing a recording contract, was mourned by friends and admirers after the country music legend’s death Saturday at age 89.
“I had the pleasure of working some concerts with Stonewall when I was just starting out on my career,” said T.G. Sheppard. “He always lit up each and every room he walked into. He was truly one of the great legends and trailblazers of our industry. Gone but never forgotten!”
Jackson “was a real character,” said Rhonda Vincent. “His style was reflected in everything he did. I most recently was driving around Nashville and noticed his tour bus parked. Oh, the stories that bus could tell. He made no apologies for who he was. I admired his grit, and how he stood up for what he believed in. My sincere condolences to his family.”
David Frizzell recalled: “I first met Stonewall in the late ‘50s right before I went into the Air Force while working with my brother Lefty. Stonewall was always a lot of fun to be around and I enjoyed hearing him sing all his hit songs on the package shows. It was always an honor to be on the same stage with him.”
“The Grand Ole Opry has always been a place of fellowship for all artists,” said Lee Greenwood, “and I am saddened to hear of Stonewall’s passing. Although Stonewall and I never recorded or performed together outside of the Opry, his songs have had and always will have a lasting impact on country music. Stonewall will be missed.”
Jackson — admiringly described by Joe Bonsall of The Oak Ridge Boys as “one of the honky-tonk heroes of the ‘50s and ‘60s” — scored his first hit single in 1958 with “Life to Go,” a song written by a young George Jones. He followed that with such chart-toppers as “Waterloo” (which became his signature song), “Smoke Along the Track,” “Don’t Be Angry,” “I Washed My Hands in Muddy Water” and “B.J. the D.J.”