John Lupton

The 1956-1958 ABC-TV Western series "Broken Arrow" is not nearly as well known beyond genre fan circles as "Gunsmoke," "Bonanza," and the like. But in its day, it was truly groundbreaking, mostly for the way it positively presented its Native American themes and protagonists. John Lupton starred as United States government agent Tom Jeffords, while co-star Michael Ansara portrayed Apache chief Cochise. Like the 1950 James Stewart Western movie of the same name, which won a Golden Globe as the best film promoting international standing, the Lupton-Ansara series was based on the novel by Elliott Arnold, "Blood Brother." Lupton started out in the New York theater and had the good fortune very early on to hook up with a national tour of "As You Like It," featuring Katharine Hepburn. The legendary actress made introductions on his behalf to MGM, which led to a string of small parts in '50s Hollywood movies. Lupton's other major TV role was that of Thomas Horton Jr. on the soap opera "Days of Our Lives," a run that started in 1965 and re-occurred into the 70s. For a number of decades, Lupton was able to mix a healthy amount of TV series and national commercial work, spanning everything from "The Rockford Files" to "The Virginian."