Michael Landon Net Worth

Michael Landon's Quotes

• Whatever you want to do, do it now. There are only so many tomorrows.
• I was grown before I realized that other mothers didn't put their heads in the oven.
• I felt my father's presence with me, enlightening my memories, helping me to commit to paper the feelings I had. I really heard my father speaking to me from the other dimension, filling my mind with just the right words. The story came so fast and was so right. In three days, the script was complete.
• I want people to laugh and cry, not just sit and stare at the television. Maybe I'm old-fashioned, but I think viewers are hungry for shows in which people say something meaningful.
• [on his illness] Well, the news shocked the hell out of me. Nothing was further from my mind, since I'm only 54 and, with rare exceptions, I'd been healthy my whole life. Not that I don't deserve to have a cancer. I'm a good athlete and I work out hard--before this happened I could bench press 300, 350 pounds, no sweat --but I've abused my body over the years. I don't want people to think that everybody is a likely candidate for cancer of this type. I think I have it because for most of my life, though I was never a drunk, I drank too much. I also smoked too many cigarettes and ate a lot of wrong things. And if you do that, even if you think you're too strong to get anything, somehow you're going to pay.

Interesting Facts about Michael Landon

1. Children: Mark Fraser Landon (adopted-born October 1, 1948); aka Mark Landon) and Josh Fraser Landon (adopted as newborn in 1960-born February 11, 1960) with Dodie Levy-Fraser. Leslie Ann Landon (born 11 October 1963; aka Leslie Landon), Michael Graham Landon (born June 20, 1965; aka Michael Landon Jr.), Shawna Leigh Landon (born December 4, 1971; aka Shawna Landon) and Christopher Beau Landon (born February 27, 1975; Christopher Landon) with Lynn Noe and Jennifer Rachel Landon (born August 29, 1983; aka Jen Landon) and Sean Matthew Landon (born June 1986) with Cindy Landon. He also had a stepdaughter, Cheryl Ann Pontrelli.
2. Following his death, he was interred at Hillside Memorial Park Cemetery in Culver City, California, the same cemetery as Lorne Green.
3. Actress Melissa Gilbert's son Michael (born 1995) was named after him.
4. His birthplace, Forest Hills, is a neighborhood area in Queens, New York.
5. U.S. President Ronald Reagan and his wife, Nancy Reagan, attended Landon's memorial service the day after his death.
6. Inducted (as a cast member of Little House on the Prairie (1974)) into the Hall of Great Western Performers of the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum in 1998.
7. Always claimed to have chosen his professional name by picking the name Michael Landon out of the Los Angeles telephone directory.
8. His father, Eli Maurice Orowitz, was a studio publicist and theater manager, his mother, Kathleen Margaret 'Peggy' O'Neill, was a popular comedienne and dancer.
9. His father was from a Jewish family and his mother was of Irish Catholic background.
10. Never legally adopted his stepdaughter, Cheryl, because of her birth father's objections.
11. Won the freshman javelin toss at the University of Southern California-Los Angeles.
12. Comedian and ex-talk show host, Johnny Carson was a longtime friend of his and had (in private) always confided in Landon and shared his own issues with him.
13. Before his death, he appeared on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson (1962) to talk about his brave battle against cancer and his life.
14. He was attending USC on an athletic scholarship but tore his shoulder ligaments, which would prevent him from throwing the javelin again.
15. His last wife was former make-up artist Cindy Clerico, whom he met near the end of the "Little House" run in 1981, and married two years later.
16. Grew up in southern New Jersey in the town of Collingswood.
17. Charles Ingalls, Landon's character on Little House on the Prairie (1974), was ranked #4 in TV Guide's list of the "50 Greatest TV Dads of All Time" [June 20, 2004 issue].
18. Studied karate under Chuck Norris, as did the children of his Bonanza (1959) co-star Dan Blocker.
19. Before he became a successful actor, he worked in a warehouse and at a gas station.
20. Had starred with Victor French on two of his successful television series: Little House on the Prairie (1974) and Highway to Heaven (1984).