Leon Ames

Leon Ames, born Harry Leon Wycoff on January 20, 1902, in Portland, Indiana, was an American actor whose career spanned stage, film, radio, and television across more than five decades. His parents were Charles Elmer Wycoff and Cora Alice (DeMoss) Wycoff, and he later adopted Ames — his mother's maiden name — as his professional surname, explaining in 1935 that Waycoff, the name under which he had appeared in his earliest films, was frequently misspelled and mispronounced. The 1910 census recorded the family living in Fowler, Indiana, where his father worked as a manager of a meat market. During World War I, Ames served in the U.S. Army's field artillery and subsequently in the Army Air Service.

Ames entered the entertainment industry as a stage manager for the Charles K. Champlin Theatre Company, eventually transitioning into acting with the same organization and advancing to the lead role in a production of Tomorrow and Tomorrow in Los Angeles. He spent three years performing with the Stuart Walker Stock Company in Cincinnati before making his Broadway debut in It Pays to Sin in 1933. His subsequent Broadway appearances included Bright Honor (1936), A House in the Country (1937), Thirsty Soil (1937), The Male Animal (1940), The Land Is Bright (1941), Guest in the House (1942), Little Darling (1942), the drama The Russian People (1942), the farce Slightly Married (1943), the drama Winesburg, Ohio (1958), the comedy Howie (1958), and additional productions through 1958.

Ames made his film debut in Quick Millions in 1931, and during the 1940s he worked under contract to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. At MGM he portrayed Mr. Smith in the 1944 musical drama Meet Me in St. Louis, a role that established him as one of Hollywood's most recognizable father figures. He continued in that vein with appearances in Little Women (1949), On Moonlight Bay (1951), and its sequel By the Light of the Silvery Moon (1953). His most prominent dramatic film role came in The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946), in which he played district attorney Kyle Sackett. Later film credits included Peyton Place (1957), From the Terrace (1960), the Walt Disney comedy The Absent-Minded Professor (1961) — in which he played college president Rufus Daggett — and its 1963 sequel Son of Flubber. He was cast as Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox in Tora! Tora! Tora! (1970), and his final screen appearance came in Peggy Sue Got Married (1986), playing the grandfather of Kathleen Turner's character.

Ames made his first radio broadcast in January 1942 on Grand Central Station. On television, he took the lead in the series Life with Father (1953–55), playing Clarence Day Sr., and starred as Stanley Banks in Father of the Bride (1961–62), a role that expanded as he became the series' dominant character. He joined the cast of Mister Ed in 1963 as neighbor Gordon Kirkwood, following the death of actor Larry Keating, and remained with the series through 1965. Additional television work included the title role of judge John Cooper in the syndicated series Frontier Judge, the role of Howard McMann on Bewitched, and appearances on The Beverly Hillbillies, The Andy Griffith Show, My Three Sons, The Ghost and Mrs. Muir, The Jeffersons, Emergency!, and The Littlest Hobo, among others.

Beyond performing, Ames was a founder of the Screen Actors Guild in 1933 and served as its president in 1957. During the 1960s he owned several Ford dealerships in California. In 1980, marking fifty years in show business, he received the Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award.

On February 12, 1964, Ames and his wife were held hostage in their home by an intruder who demanded $50,000 for their release. Ames contacted his business partner, who withdrew the money from a bank and delivered it to the house. After taking the cash, the intruder left Ames bound with tape inside the home and forced Mrs. Ames to drive him in the couple's car, also compelling the business partner and a guest to ride in the trunk. Police, who had been alerted by the partner during the bank visit, surrounded the vehicle and freed all the hostages.

In his personal life, Ames had a son, Robert Fletcher, from a relationship that ended in 1923. He married actress Christine Gossett in 1938; the couple had a daughter, Shelley, born in 1940, and a son, Leon, born in 1943. Christine retired from acting to raise their children, and the marriage lasted until Ames's death. Ames died on October 12, 1993, in Laguna Beach, California, at the age of 91, from complications following a stroke. He is buried at Forest Lawn, Hollywood Hills Cemetery in Los Angeles.