Trivia: The son of a Jewish movie-publicist father and an Irish Catholic musical-comedy actress, Michael Landon grew up in a predominantly Protestant New Jersey neighborhood. The social pressures brought to bear on young Michael, both at home and in the schoolyard, led to an acute bedwetting problem, which he would later dramatize (very discreetly) in the 1976 TV movie The Loneliest Runner. Determined to better his lot in life, Landon excelled in high school athletics; his prowess at javelin throwing won him a scholarship at the University of Southern California, but a torn ligament during his freshman year ended his college career. Taking a series of manual labor jobs, Landon had no real direction in life until he agreed to help a friend audition for the Warners Bros. acting school. The friend didn't get the job, but Landon did, launching a career that would eventually span nearly four decades. Michael's first film lead was in the now-legendary I Was a Teenage Werewolf (1957), widely derided at the time but later reassessed as one of the better examples of the late-'50s "drive-in horror" genre. The actor received his first good reviews for his performance as an albino in God's Little Acre. This led to his attaining the title role in 1959's The Legend of Tom Dooley, which in turn was instrumental in his being cast as Little Joe Cartwright on the popular TV western Bonanza. During his fourteen-year Bonanza stint, Landon was given the opportunity to write and direct a few episodes. He carried over these newfound skills into his next TV project, Little House on the Prairie, which ran from 1974 to 1982 (just before Little House, Landon made his TV-movie directorial bow with It's Good to Be Alive, the biopic of baseball great Roy Campanella). Landon also oversaw two spinoff series, Little House: The New Beginning (1982-83) and Father Murphy (1984). Landon kept up his career momentum with a third long-running TV series, Highway to Heaven (1984-89) wherein the actor/producer/director/writer played guardian angel Jonathan Smith. One of the most popular TV personalities of the '70s and '80s, Landon was not universally beloved by his Hollywood contemporaries, what with his dictatorial on-set behavior and his tendency to shed his wives whenever they matured past childbearing age. Still, for every detractor, there was a friend, family member or coworker who felt that Landon was the salt of the earth. In early 1991, Landon began work on his fourth TV series, Us, when he began experiencing stomach pains. In April of that same year, the actor was informed that he had inoperable pancreatic cancer. The courage and dignity with which Michael Landon lived his final months on earth resulted in a public outpouring of love, affection and support, the like of which was seldom witnessed in the cynical, self-involved '90s. Michael Landon died in his Malibu home on July 1, 1991, with his third wife Cindy at his side.

Trivia: The son of a movie stunt man, Victor French made his screen entree in westerns, where his unkempt beard and scowling countenance made him a perfect heavy. He carried over his robbin' and rustlin' activities into television, making multiple appearances on such series as Gunsmoke and Bonanza. It was former Bonanza star Michael Landon, a great friend of French's, who "humanized" the veteran screen villain with the role of farmer Isiah Edwards in the weekly TV drama Little House on the Prairie. French temporarily left Little House in 1977 to star in his own sitcom, Carter Country, in which he played an affable Southern sheriff who tried his best to accommodate the ever-changing racial relationships of the 1970s. In 1984, Landon cast French as ex-cop Michael Gordon, whose bitterness at the world was softened by the presence of a guardian angel (Landon), in the popular TV series Highway to Heaven. French directed every third episode of this series, extending his directorial activities to the Los Angeles theatre scene, where he won a Critics Circle award for his staging of 12 Angry Men. In contrast to his earlier bad-guy roles, French went out of his way in the 1980s to avoid parts that required him to exhibit cruelty or inhumanity. Victor French died in 1989, shortly after completing work on the final season of Highway to Heaven.

Trivia: The daughter of comedian Jackie Gleason, American actress Linda Miller saw little of her restless father during her childhood and even less after he became a major TV star in the '50s. Despite first-hand experience with the rigors and heartaches of showbiz, Miller decided to pursue an acting career, herself. Not wishing to capitalize on Gleason's fame, she adopted her married name, Miller, for her professional moniker (her husband of many years was playwright/actor Jason Miller). Miller's films included King Kong Escapes (1968), One Summer Love (aka Dragonfly, 1976), and An Unmarried Woman (1978), while her television jobs included a regular role on the 1983 series The Mississippi.

Trivia: Known for portraying conniving TV vixens, dark-haired actress Shannen Doherty started her career at age ten after moving to Los Angeles with her family. When Michael Landon saw her guest-starring appearance on the TV drama Father Murphy, he cast her as Jenny Wilder for the 1982 season of Little House on the Prairie. In 1985, she played bratty little sister Maggie in the teen movie Girls Just Want to Have Fun with Sarah Jessica Parker. She continued playing a bratty kid in the TV drama Our House as Wilford Brimley's granddaughter Kris before graduating to bratty teenager in the supreme black comedy Heathers with Winona Ryder. But her most recognizable role came in 1990 with Aaron Spelling's FOX series Beverly Hills 90210. As the twin sister of Jason Priestley's Brandon Walsh, the character of Brenda Walsh became one of television's meanest teenagers. She left the show in 1994 in a much-publicized huff due to some disagreements, causing the producers to digitally remove her from episodes and promotional materials. For the rest of the '90s, she appeared in forgettable films and made-for-TV movies, but somehow remained in public view due to her frequent arrests, cameo appearances, turbulent romantic life, and tendency to get into fights with celebrities. In 1998, she found a place for herself as the witch Prue Halliwell on the TV series Charmed, with fellow grown-up child stars Alyssa Milano and Holly Marie Combs as her witch sisters. Several TV movies followed, including Satan's School for Girls and Hell on Heels: The Battle of Mary Kay. In 2003, she hosted the reality-based program Scare Tactics and starred in the made-for-TV thriller Nightlight.In 2008, the actress reprised her role as Brenda Walsh on the reinvented 90210. Though she appeared in only a handful of episodes, Doherty continued to enjoy resurgence in popularity with her 2010 appearance on the popular ABC series Dancing With the Stars. In 2012, Shannen participated in WeTV's reality television series Shannen Says, which follows the actress and her as she prepares for her wedding to photographer Kurt Iswarienki.