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Michael Landon (October 31, 1936 – July 1,
1991), born Eugene Maurice Orowitz, was an United
States|American actor and television
director|director. Landon's father was
Judaism|Jewish, his mother was not. Landon
considered himself Jewish.

Landon was best known for his starring roles in
three TV series spanning three decades. In the
1960s he starred as "Little Joe" on Bonanza. In
the 1970s and into the 1980s he starred as Charles
Ingalls in Little House on the Prairie
(television)|Little House On The Prairie and
starred in Highway to Heaven as an angel, also in
the 1980s. Landon also directed the last two
series.

In high school, Landon excelled at track,
especially with the javelin throw|javelin. He
earned a scholarship to University of Southern
California|USC, but could no longer attend after
tearing a ligament in his arm. At this point he
started taking small roles and bit parts, but
decided his birth name was not appropriate for an
aspiring actor and changed his name to Michael
Landon. He decided on the name by picking it out
of a Los Angeles, California|Los Angeles phone
book.

Landon was discovered by producer Herman Cohen,
who cast the young man in his first big role as
teenager Tony Rivers in I Was a Teenage Werewolf
(1957 in film|1957). He also gained exposure as
Tom Dooley in the Western movie|western The Legend
of Tom Dooley (1959).

That same year he started starring in the then-new
TV series Bonanza as "Little Joe." The youngest
brother in the Cartwright family and always a
ladies man, he quickly became one of the show's
most beloved characters. Late in the series,
Landon asked for permission to direct a few
episodes of the series, which was granted. The
show ran for 14 years, from 1959 to 1973, and
spanned 461 episodes.

Soon after the cancellation of Bonanza, Landon
started a new project in 1974, a television film
called Little House on the Prairie based on the
popular book by Laura Ingalls Wilder. Little House
would later develop into a television series.  He
not only starred in the show as the patriarch
Charles Ingalls, but served as the producer,
writer, director and executive producer. He served
mostly in these capacities for the series' eight
years, which ended in 1982.

In 1984 he began his role in Highway to Heaven as
Jonathan Smith, an angel who tried to save people
by helping them turn their lives around. When his
friend and co-star, Victor French, died of lung
cancer in 1989, Landon cancelled the series.

Landon had produced all three of his series for
NBC, but after ending Highway he was let go. He
then went to CBS and in 1991 starred in a two hour
pilot called Us (TV movie)|Us. This was meant to
be another winning series for Landon, but he was
soon diagnosed with pancreatic cancer that had
spread to the liver. His last public appearance
was on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson in
June. A few weeks later, Landon passed away in
Malibu, California with his family, children and
colleagues by his side. He was interred in the
Hillside Memorial Park Cemetery in Culver City,
California.

Landon was married three times. His first wife was
Dodie Frasier, a legal secretary who was six years
his senior. He adopted her son, Mark, and together
they adopted another boy. A few years later in
1962, he divorced Dodie to marry (Marjorie) Lynn
Noe, a model (person)|model, who had a young
daughter from a previous marriage. By all
accounts, Landon treated her like his own child
and had four more children with Lynn. This
marriage was believed to be very happy and
different from typical "Hollywood marriages", so
the tabloids jumped at the affair Landon started
with another woman.  Cindy Clerico was a make-up
artist and stand-in for one of the stars; they met
on the set of Little House. Clerico was 21 years
his junior. They married in 1983 and had Jennifer
Landon|Jennifer (born in 1983) and Sean (born in
1986).

His co-star on Little House, Melissa Gilbert,
named her son, Michael Garrett Boxleitner (1995),
after Landon.

For his contribution to the television industry,
Michael Landon has a star on the Hollywood Walk of
Fame at  1500 N. Vine Street. In 1998, he was
inducted posthumously into the Western Performers
Hall of Fame at the National Cowboy & Western
Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.

The late actor's daughter Jennifer, has starred as
Gwen Norbeck on the soap opera As the World Turns
since 2005.

==External link==
*imdb name|id=0001446|name=Michael Landon