Trivia: One of the postwar era's most successful actors, Gregory Peck was long the moral conscience of the silver screen; almost without exception, his performances embodied the virtues of strength, conviction, and intelligence so highly valued by American audiences. As the studios' iron grip on Hollywood began to loosen, he also emerged among the very first stars to declare his creative independence, working almost solely in movies of his own choosing. Born April 5, 1916, in La Jolla, CA, Peck worked as a truck driver before attending Berkeley, where he first began acting. He later relocated to New York City and was a barker at the 1939 World's Fair. He soon won a two-year contract with the Neighborhood Playhouse. His first professional work was in association with a 1942 Katherine Cornell/Guthrie McClintic ensemble Broadway production of The Morning Star. There Peck was spotted by David O. Selznick, for whom he screen-tested, only to be turned down. Over the next year, he played a double role in The Willow and I, fielding and rejecting the occasional film offer. Finally, in 1943, he accepted a role in Days of Glory, appearing opposite then-fiancée Tamara Toumanova. While the picture itself was largely dismissed, Peck found himself at the center of a studio bidding war. He finally signed with 20th Century Fox, who cast him in 1944's The Keys of the Kingdom - a turn for which he snagged his first of many Oscar nods. From the outset, he enjoyed unique leverage as a performer; he refused to sign a long-term contract with any one studio, and selected all of his scripts himself. For MGM, he starred in 1945's The Valley of Decision, a major hit. Even more impressive was the follow-up, Alfred Hitchcock's Spellbound, which co-starred Ingrid Bergman. Peck scored a rousing success with 1946's The Yearling (which brought him his second Academy Award nomination) and followed this up with another smash, King Vidor's Duel in the Sun. His third Oscar nomination arrived via Elia Kazan's 1947 social drama Gentleman's Agreement, a meditation on anti-Semitism which won Best Picture honors. For the follow-up, Peck reunited with Hitchcock for The Paradine Case, one of the few flops on either's resumé. He returned in 1948 with a William Wellman Western, Yellow Sky, before signing for a pair of films with director Henry King, Twelve O'Clock High (earning Best Actor laurels from the New York critics and his fourth Oscar nod) and The Gunfighter. After Captain Horatio Hornblower, Peck appeared in the Biblical epic David and Bathsheba, one of 1951's biggest box-office hits. Upon turning down High Noon, he starred in The Snows of Kilimanjaro. To earn a tax exemption, he spent the next 18 months in Europe, there shooting 1953's Roman Holiday for William Wyler. After filming 1954's Night People, Peck traveled to Britain, where he starred in a pair of features for Rank -- The Million Pound Note and The Purple Plain -- neither of which performed well at the box office; however, upon returning stateside he starred in the smash The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit. The 1958 Western The Big Country was his next major hit, and he quickly followed it with another, The Bravados. Few enjoyed Peck's portrayal of F. Scott Fitzgerald in 1959's Beloved Infidel, but the other two films he made that year, the Korean War drama Pork Chop Hill and Stanley Kramer's post-apocalyptic nightmare On the Beach, were both much more successful. Still, 1961's World War II adventure The Guns of Navarone topped them all -- indeed, it was among the highest-grossing pictures in film history. A vicious film noir, Cape Fear, followed in 1962, as did Robert Mulligan's classic adaptation of To Kill a Mockingbird; as Atticus Finch, an idealistic Southern attorney defending a black man charged with rape, Peck finally won an Academy Award. Also that year he co-starred in the Cinerama epic How the West Was Won, yet another massive success. However, it was to be Peck's last for many years. For Fred Zinneman, he starred in 1964's Behold a Pale Horse, miscast as a Spanish loyalist, followed by Captain Newman, M.D., a comedy with Tony Curtis which performed only moderately well. When 1966's Mirage and Arabesque disappeared from theaters almost unnoticed, Peck spent the next three years absent from the screen. When he returned in 1969, however, it was with no less than four new films -- The Stalking Moon, MacKenna's Gold, The Chairman, and Marooned -- all of them poorly received.The early '70s proved no better: First up was I Walk the Line, with Tuesday Weld, followed the next year by Henry Hathaway's Shootout. After the failure of the 1973 Western Billy Two Hats, he again vanished from cinemas for three years, producing (but not appearing in) The Dove. However, in 1976, Peck starred in the horror film The Omen, an unexpected smash. Studio interest was rekindled, and in 1977 he portrayed MacArthur. The Boys From Brazil followed, with Peck essaying a villainous role for the first time in his screen career. After 1981's The Sea Wolves, he turned for the first time to television, headlining the telefilm The Scarlet and the Black. Remaining on the small screen, he portrayed Abraham Lincoln in the 1985 miniseries The Blue and the Grey, returning to theater for 1987's little-seen anti-nuclear fable Amazing Grace and Chuck. Old Gringo followed two years later, and in 1991 he co-starred in a pair of high-profile projects, the Norman Jewison comedy Other People's Money and Martin Scorsese's remake of Cape Fear. Fairly active through the remainder of the decade, Peck appeared in The Portrait (1993) and the made-for-television Moby Dick (1998) while frequently narrating such documentaries as Wild Bill: Hollywood Maverick (1995) and American Prophet: The Story of Joseph Smith (2000).On June 12, 2003, just days after the AFI named him as the screen's greatest hero for his role as Atticus Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird, Gregory Peck died peacefully in his Los Angeles home with his wife Veronique by his side. He was 87.

Trivia: Though actor Ed Flanders is a dead ringer for the late President Harry Truman, he was curiously not cast as Truman in the 1979 TV miniseries Backstairs at the White House, but instead as Calvin Coolidge. No matter: Flanders was Truman in MacArthur (1976) and several other film and TV reenactments of the war years. Outside of his many fictional trips to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Flanders has been seen in such films as Grasshopper (1970) and The Exorcist 3. As Dr. Donald Westphal on the TV series St. Elsewhere (1984-88), Ed Flanders made headlines in 1987 for being the first mainstream-TV character to "moon" the audience (in close-up, yet).

Trivia: Dan O'Herlihy studied architecture at the National University of Ireland, but his heart was in the acting highlands. After racking up stage credits with the Gate Theater and the Abbey Players, O'Herlihy turned to films in 1946, impressing critics and filmgoers alike with his breakthrough role in Odd Man Out. He made his American movie bow in Orson Welles' MacBeth (1948), playing the not inconsiderable role of MacDuff; shortly thereafter, he appeared with his MacBeth co-star Roddy MacDowall in an economically budgeted adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson's Kidnapped. In 1952, he earned an Academy Award nomination for his near-solo starring turn in Luis Bunuel's The Adventures of Robinson Crusoe. Maturing into a versatile character player, he could also be seen as FDR in MacArthur (1977), the frothing-at-the-mouth villain in Halloween 3: Season of the Witch (1983), a benign lizardlike alien in The Last Starfighter (1984), and the dark-purposed cyborg-firm exec in the RoboCop films. His TV credits include blarney-spouting Doc McPheeters in The Travels of Jamie McPheeters (1963), town boss Will Varner in The Long Hot Summer (1965), "The Director" in A Man Called Sloane (1979), intelligence agent Carson Marsh in Whiz Kids (1984), and Andrew Packard in Twin Peaks (1990). Dan O'Herlihy was the brother of director Michael O'Herlihy.

Trivia: The son of a New Zealand marine commander, actor Nicolas Coster was born in London. He attended the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts, then moved to New York, where he studied at Sanford Meisner's Neighborhood Playhouse. A businesslike type best suited to executive roles, Coster has spent most of his time in TV daytime drama: Young Dr. Malone, Secret Storm, As the World Turns, Somerset, Another World, One Life to Live, All My Children and Santa Barbara. Even his first prime-time stint was the weekly soap opera Our Private World (1965). Coster's film credits include All the President's Men (1976), Reds (1981), and Betsy's Wedding (1991); he has also done stage and commercial voiceover work. An avid scuba diver, Nicolas Coster is licensed as a U.S. Coast Guard skipper in his off-hours.

Trivia: American actor Ivan Bonar was a versatile and highly competent supporting actor who worked on stage, screen, and television.

Trivia: Costello, a character actor, has been on screen since the '60s.

Trivia: American stage actress Marj Dusay began making films in the mid '60s. She had supporting roles in productions like Sweet November (1968), Pendulum (1968), the Clint Eastwood-directed Breezy (1973), MacArthur (1976) and Made in Heaven (1987). Television has also afforded Dusay ample opportunity to flex her acting muscles. Marj Dusay played Myrna Clegg on the daytime drama Capitol (1982-87), then went on to a stint as Pamela Capwell on another soap, Santa Barbara (1984-92).

Trivia: Though he acted in feature films and on television, Art Fleming will best be remembered as the charter host of the long-running TV game show Jeopardy, a position he held from 1964 to 1974. In the late '50s, the young Fleming appeared on the television Western The Californians (1958-1959) and played Ken Franklin in International Detective (1959). Much later, Fleming guest starred on series like Starsky and Hutch, Lou Grant, and Kingston: Confidential.

Trivia: American character actor Dick O'Neill began showing up in films in 1961. Most of O'Neill's movie roles were in the supporting category, e.g. his portrayal of Sol Zuckermann in The Buddy Holly Story. His extensive TV credits include recurring roles on at least four weekly series. Dick O'Neill was seen as Judge Praetor D. Hardcastle in Rosetti and Ryan (1977), street-smart Malloy in Kaz (1978), corporate vice president Arthur Broderick in Empire (1984), and Fred Wilkinson in the 1987 episodes of Falcon Crest. Fans of the detective series Cagney and Lacey will remember O'Neill for playing Charlie Cagney. Before entering film and television, O'Neill was a well established supporting actor on the New York stage where he appeared on and off Broadway. In the early '50s, O'Neill was a charter member of the Arena Stage in Washington, D.C. For the last seven years of his life, O'Neill served on the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Screening Committee.

Trivia: Before making his career switch to acting, G.D. Spradlin had been a prosperous Texas business tycoon and a highly respected history teacher. In films from 1968's Will Penny, the actor is perhaps best remembered for his work as on-the-take Senator Pat Geary in The Godfather, Part 2 (1974). His regal, assured bearing made him a natural for such forceful characterizations as LBJ in the 1990 TV movie Robert Kennedy and His Times. Spradlin has also played his share of high-ranking military officers, most memorably in Apocalypse Now (1979). A somewhat more avuncular G. D. Spradlin was seen in the role of Baptist minister (and erstwhile movie producer) Reverend Lemon in Ed Wood (1994).

Trivia: Though seemingly born with a battered bulldog countenance and a rattly voice best suited to such lines as "We don't like you kind around these parts, stranger," tough-guy character actor Kenneth Tobey was originally groomed for gormless leading man roles when he came to Hollywood in 1949. Possessing too much roughhewn authority to be wasted in romantic leads, Tobey was best served in military roles. One of these was the no-nonsense but likeable Capt. Patrick Hendrey in the 1951 sci-fi classic The Thing From Another World, a role that typed him in films of a "fantastic" nature for several years thereafter. From 1956 through 1958, Tobey co-starred with Craig Hill on the popular syndicated TV adventure series Whirlybirds; up to that time, televiewers were most familiar with Tobey as Jim Bowie in the ratings-busting Davy Crockett miniseries. Though often consigned by Hollywood's typecasting system to workaday villain roles, Kenneth Tobey has not be forgotten by filmmakers who grew up watching his horror-flick endeavors of the 1950s; he has been afforded key cameo roles in such latter-day shockers as Strange Invaders (1983) and Gremlins 2: The New Batch, and in 1985 he reprised his Thing From Another World character in The Attack of the B-Movie Monsters.

Trivia: Lead actor Barry Coe has appeared in film since 1956.

Trivia: Specializing in middle-aged characters even in his twenties, American actor Charles Cyphers has been a familiar face on the TV-movie landscape since the early '70s. Cyphers was particularly well served by director John Carpenter, who cast the actor in Assault on Precinct 13 (1975), Halloween (1978), The Fog (1980), and Escape From New York (1981). Carpenter also featured Cyphers as Sam Phillips in the made-for-TV Elvis (1979). Perhaps it's coincidence, or perhaps a private joke between actor and director: Whatever the case, Cyphers' character names in his Carpenter films are often lifted from real life. For example, he played Dan O'Bannon in The Fog (screenwriter O'Bannon is Carpenter's most frequent collaborator) and Leigh Brackett in Halloween (Brackett, a female screenwriter, worked on such films as Rio Bravo, which Carpenter remade as Assault on Precinct 13). On TV, Charles Cyphers was seen on The Betty White Show (1975), as Hugo Muncy, White's cross-dressing stunt double.

Trivia: American actor Warde Donovan appeared in Paramount films before WW II then dropped out to become a Naval officer. Following the war, he hosted "The Warde Donovan Show." Following his Broadway debut in the late '40s he went on to forge a successful Broadway career. He also worked on television as an actor and a talk-show host. During the 1970s, he appeared in several Disney comedies.

Trivia: Having served as a bombardier in World War II, Russell Johnson used the GI Bill to finance his studies at the Actor's Lab. Between performing assignments, Johnson supported himself by driving a cab and working the assembly line at a ballpoint pen factory. His first movie break (indeed, his first movie) was in director Paul Henreid's For Men Only (1952), an exposé of barbaric college-fraternity initiation ceremonies; Johnson was suitably loathsome as the sadistic frat leader who is exposed as a snivelling coward in the climax. The balance of the 1950s found Johnson appearing in several fondly remembered science fiction efforts like It Came From Outer Space (1953), This Island Earth (1955), Attack of the Crab Monsters (1956) and The Space Children (1958). He carried over this relationship with the Unreal into his classic performance as an anguished time-traveller desperately attempting to prevent Lincoln's assassination in the 1961 Twilight Zone installment Back There. In 1964, Russell Johnson took his first steps into TV sitcom immortality when he assumed the role of "The Professor" (aka Roy Hinkley) in Gilligan's Island, a role that he'd continued to essay on and off for the next two decades in Gilligan cartoons and TV-movie spin-offs. Johnson worked in television through the 1980s and early '90s before retiring from acting; he died in 2014 at age 89.

Trivia: As the son of legendary Hollywood director William Wellman, Sr. -- the man responsible for the first Best Picture winner, Wings (1927) -- and actress Dorothy Coonan, actor William Wellman Jr. followed in the footsteps of his show-business family and maintained a nearly constant presence in films and television over the decades. He began his career by focusing largely on action-oriented genre fare, such as the Western Darby's Rangers (1958) and the war drama Lafayette Escadrille (1958, both directed by his father), the Lewis Milestone-helmed combat film Pork Chop Hill (1959), and the premier Billy Jack installment, Born Losers (1967). The Trial of Billy Jack marked his reunion with director-star Tom Laughlin. In the late '70s and early '80s, Wellman became involved with Mark IV Pictures, an evangelical Christian production outfit best known for its Thief in the Night film series (on the book of Revelation); he acted in the 1981 series installment Image of the Beast, and appeared in and scripted the 1983 installment Prodigal Planet. Wellman also became active in television; his small-screen assignments include work in the miniseries The Blue and the Gray (1982) and James A. Michener's Space (1985) as well as the 1994 telemovie Lies of the Heart: The Story of Laurie Kellogg.

Trivia: American movie stunt man John McKee began accepting acting roles somewhere around 1945. Though his name is not listed in The Baseball Encyclopedia, we can safely assume that McKee had some pro baseball experience of some sort. He was seen as a ballplayer in such films as It Happens Every Spring (1949), Three Little Words (1950), Angels in the Outfield (1951), Pride of St. Louis (1952), The Big Leaguer (1953) and The Kid From Left Field (1953). As late as 1978 he was still in uniform, playing Ralph Houk in the made-for-TV One in a Million: The Ron LeFlore Story. John McKee was also on call for military-officer roles, notably in the war films The Gallant Hours (1960) and McArthur (1976).