Tommy Rettig with Lassie
Lassie (also known as Jeff’s Collie) was televised from Sunday, September 12,
1954, to Saturday, March 24,1973, It was one of the longest running dramatic
series on television, airing for seventeen seasons on CBS and first-run syndication
for its final two seasons. The show was sponsored by Campbell’s Soup Company
for the entire nineteen- year run. Stars Tommy Rettig and Jan Clayton left the
show in 1957.
The original cast of Lassie included left to right, Gramps
(George Cleveland), Doc Weaver (Arthur Space), Ellen
Miller (Jan Clayton), and Jeff (Tommy Rettig), with Lassie
and Pokey.
Tom Rettig, after the child star thing ended for him, went into the software business. He developed a suite of programmer’s utilities and was pretty successful. I met him at a developer’s conference in LA back in the late 1980’s. I heard a while ago that he died young. Too bad. He seemed like a nice guy.
Rettig also had a part in Dr. Seuss’s only movie, “The five thousand fingers of Dr. T”. It was a musical. Hans Conried played the villain.
loved this series , esp the ones with jeff in them, ty for posting it