Lorne Greene

Lorne Greene, the performer who played patriarch Ben Cartwright on the long-running Western series Bonanza, pursued a short-lived recording career in the mid-1960s at the peak of his fame. Born in Ottawa, Ontario in 1915, he entered college intending to study chemical engineering, yet soon discovered theater and chose instead to devote himself to the performing arts. Radio work followed, where he rose to become Canada’s best-known newscaster before moving to New York in 1950. There he appeared in Broadway productions and several films. The role of Ben Cartwright came in 1959, and he remained the head of the Ponderosa Ranch until Bonanza left the air in 1973. Seeking to exploit the program’s popularity, NBC sent several cast members into the studio; Greene released his first album in 1963 and scored an unexpected number-one hit the next year with the narrated Western story song “Ringo.” He returned to the charts with “The Man” in 1965 and “Waco” in 1966, ultimately issuing five albums on RCA Victor between 1963 and 1966. After that he resumed full-time acting, most notably in the miniseries Roots and the science-fiction series Battlestar Galactica, while also narrating numerous documentaries. Greene died of surgical complications on September 11, 1987, shortly before he was to reprise his Bonanza character for a television-movie reunion.