'WHATEVER IT IS YOU WANNA DO; dO IT NOW...WE ONLY HAVE SO MANY TOMORROW'S"
--Michael Landon
When Michael Landon passed away in 1991 of pancreatic cancer, a tabloid television show ran the caption, "Say it ain't so, Joe.". Yes, he was Little Joe Cartwright, the youngest of three brothers on "Bonanza"... but most from my generation probably remember him as Charles Ingalls on the iconic "Little House on the Prairie". Who didn't pretend he was their daddy?...I know I did!
The story goes that when Landon's daughter Cheryl became seriously ill, her father prayed to God and said that if he would spare her and make her well, Landon would dedicate the rest of his life to serving God, and getting his message out. Cheryl recovered, and Landon apparently kept his promise, bringing us roles such as Jonathan Smith, the angel sent by God to help people in need on "Highway to Heaven" and Father Dowling in the lesser known series, "The Father Dowling Mysteries."
Two of his earliest roles were as Tony Rivers in "I was A Teenage Werewolf"(57), and as Tom Dooley in the western, "The Legend of Tom Dooley". (59). He was born Eugene Maurice Orowitz on October 31st 1941. The ever changing cast of his show "Highway to Heaven" was like a cornucopia of unknown actors who became very familiar faces, such as Shannon Dougherty, Paul Walker, Helen Hunt, Matthew Perry and Will Wheaton. Actress Melissa Gilbert who played Laura on "Little House on the Prairie," recalled the shock of learning that the man who played her TV dad was terminally ill: "He was always larger than life to me. I remember him putting his cigarettes out in his glove, and believing he was just really strong.". On October 6, 1995, Gilbert gave birth to a son, whom she and then husband Bruce Boxlightner named Michael. Gilbert has also recalled interviews, that her TV dad decided to have the sets for "Little House" destroyed when the series was completed, so that no one else could ever use them. Interestingly, Landon's daughter Cheryl was interviewed by "Unsolved Mysteries.". In a story about the unexplained, Cheryl claimed that she often found roses...left by her late father, and that she could often hear her dad talking to her.
