Don DeFore
| Don DeFore | |
|---|---|
DeFore in 1962
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| Born |
Donald John DeFore August 25, 1913 Cedar Rapids, Iowa, U.S. |
| Died | December 22, 1993 (aged 80) Santa Monica, California, U.S. |
| Cause of death | Cardiac arrest |
| Resting place | Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery |
| Education | Washington High School |
| Alma mater | University of Iowa |
| Years active | 1936–1987 |
| Spouse(s) | Marion Holmes (m. 1942) |
| Children | 5 |
Donald John "Don" DeFore (August 25, 1913 – December 22, 1993) was an American film, radio, and television actor. DeFore is best known as Erskin "Thorny" Thornberry, the Nelson family's neighbor on the long running sitcom The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet and as George "Mr. B." Baxter on the 1960s sitcom Hazel.
DeFore was one of seven children born in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, to Joseph Ervin, a railroad engineer who worked at the Chicago and North Western Transportation Company and was also a local politician, and Albina Sylvia DeFore (née Nezerka). DeFore's mother, who occasionally directed plays at their local church, was of Czechoslovakian descent. After graduating from Washington High School in Cedar Rapids, DeFore attended the University of Iowa. He initially studied law while also playing basketball, track, and baseball before becoming interested in acting. Since acting was not a major study at the university, he left and enrolled at the Pasadena Community Playhouse, where he won a scholarship and stayed for three years.
During this time he and four fellow students wrote a play called Where Do We Go From Here. It was presented in a little theater in Hollywood with Don in the cast. As a young man, DeFore toured the country in stock companies for several years before making his Broadway debut in 1938, when Oscar Hammerstein II offered to take it to Broadway and DeFore and five of the original cast members went along. The show ran for four weeks, and Don was soon recognized as a member of legitimate theater. He remained in New York and won a key role in The Male Animal, which ran for almost a year on Broadway and eight months on the road.
In Hollywood, DeFore's first screen appearance was in a bit part in 1936's Reunion. By the early 1940s and billed as Don DeForest, he was last cast in speaking roles in multiple film appearances including: Right to the Heart (1942), The Male Animal (1942), The Human Comedy (uncredited, 1943), A Guy Named Joe (1943), Thirty Seconds over Tokyo (1944), The Affairs of Susan (1945), You Came Along (1945), Without Reservations (1946), It Happened on 5th Avenue (1947), Ramrod (1947), Romance on the High Seas (1948), My Friend Irma (1949), Too Late for Tears (1949), Dark City (1950), Southside 1-1000 (1950), She's Working Her Way Through College (1952), The Guy Who Came Back (1951), A Girl in Every Port (1952), Jumping Jacks (1952), Battle Hymn (1957), A Time to Love and a Time to Die (1958), and The Facts of Life (1960).
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