William Conrad created the role of Marshal Matt Dillon for the radio series Gunsmoke and narrated the television adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle and The Fugitive.
31 Facts About William Conrad
2.
The family moved to Southern California when William Conrad was in high school.
3.
William Conrad majored in drama and literature at Fullerton College, in Orange County, California, and began his career as an announcer, writer, and director for Los Angeles radio station KMPC.
4.
William Conrad left the United States Army Air Forces with the rank of captain and as a producer-director of the Armed Forces Radio Service.
5.
William Conrad estimated that he played more than 7,500 roles during his radio career.
6.
At KMPC, the 22-year-old William Conrad produced and acted in The Hermit's Cave, the Los Angeles incarnation of a popular syndicated horror anthology series created at WJR Detroit.
7.
William Conrad was among the supporting cast for the espionage drama The Man Called X ; the syndicated dramatic anthology Favorite Story ; the adventure dramas The Count of Monte Cristo, The Voyage of the Scarlet Queen, The Green Lama, and Night Beat ; Romance ; Hollywood Star Playhouse ; Errol Flynn's The Modern Adventures of Casanova ; and Cathy and Elliott Lewis's On Stage.
8.
William Conrad was the voice of Escape, a high-adventure radio series.
9.
William Conrad played Warchek, a menacing policeman, in Johnny Modero: Pier 23, a detective series starring Jack Webb, and was in the cast of Webb's crime drama Pete Kelly's Blues.
10.
William Conrad was Dave the Dude in the syndicated drama anthology series The Damon Runyon Theater ; Lt.
11.
William Conrad voiced Dillon for the show's nine-year run, and he wrote the June 1953 episode "Sundown".
12.
In "The Wax Works", a 1956 episode of Suspense, William Conrad performed every part.
13.
In January 1956, William Conrad was the announcer on the debut broadcast of The CBS Radio Workshop, a two-part adaptation of Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, which Huxley himself narrated.
14.
William Conrad directed and narrated the 1957 episode "Epitaphs", an adaptation of Edgar Lee Masters's poetry volume Spoon River Anthology.
15.
William Conrad appeared in Body and Soul, Sorry, Wrong Number, Joan of Arc, and The Naked Jungle.
16.
In 1961, William Conrad moved to the production side of the film business, producing and directing for Warner Bros.
17.
William Conrad was the executive producer of Countdown, a science-fiction thriller starring James Caan and Robert Duvall that was the major studio feature debut of director Robert Altman.
18.
William Conrad narrated the documentary Design For Disaster, produced by the Los Angeles City Fire Department, about the November 1961 Bel Air wildfire that gutted several neighborhoods, at the time the worst conflagration in Los Angeles history.
19.
Late in life, William Conrad narrated the opening and closing scenes of the 1991 Bruce Willis feature film Hudson Hawk.
20.
William Conrad could be heard introducing Count Basie's Orchestra and Frank Sinatra on Sinatra's 1966 Live at the Sands album.
21.
William Conrad intoned a rhyming narration heard over the credits of the 1970 John Wayne film Western Chisum.
22.
William Conrad's voice is heard in the Clio Award-winning 1971 public-service announcement about pollution featuring Iron Eyes Cody, created for Earth Day by Keep America Beautiful and the Ad Council.
23.
From 1973 to 1978, William Conrad narrated the TV nature program, Wild, Wild World of Animals.
24.
William Conrad performed the role of Denethor in the 1980 animated TV version of JR R Tolkien's The Return of the King.
25.
William Conrad guest-starred in NBC's science-fiction series The Man and the Challenge and in the syndicated skydiving adventure series Ripcord, with Larry Pennell and Ken Curtis.
26.
In 1957, William Conrad was married to former fashion model Susan Randall, and the couple had one son, Christopher.
27.
In 1980, William Conrad married Tipton "Tippy" Stringer, a TV pioneer and the widow of NBC newscaster Chet Huntley.
28.
William Conrad helped manage his career during their 14-year marriage.
29.
William Conrad died of a heart attack at age 73 in Los Angeles on February 11,1994.
30.
William Conrad was buried in the Lincoln Terrace section of Forest Lawn, Hollywood Hills Cemetery, California.
31.
William Conrad was posthumously elected to the National Radio Hall of Fame in 1997, and to the Broadcasting and Cable Hall of Fame.