Peggy Rea

Peggy Jane Rea (March 31, 1921 – February 5, 2011) was an American actress born in Los Angeles, California, whose career spanned stage, film, and decades of television work, frequently in matronly supporting roles.

Before pursuing acting, Rea left UCLA to enroll in business school. In the 1940s she secured a position as a production secretary at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. She subsequently worked as an assistant to writer-musician Kay Thompson, a professional relationship that ended in April 1948. Among the reported points of friction were Rea's choice to stay at the Algonquin Hotel rather than the Essex House, where Thompson was lodging, and an incident in which Rea slipped away on the eve of a New York opening to attend a performance of Born Yesterday on Broadway without informing Thompson. Despite the professional break, Rea maintained friendly contact with Thompson's mother, brother, and younger sister.

Following her departure from Thompson's employ, Rea joined the National Road Company production of Tennessee Williams' A Streetcar Named Desire, playing Eunice Hubbell opposite Anthony Quinn during the 1948–1949 run. She subsequently appeared on Broadway in 1950, with credits that included the musical Out of This World and a Broadway production of A Streetcar Named Desire.

Rea built an extensive television résumé over the following decades, appearing in episodes of I Love Lucy, Bonanza, Have Gun – Will Travel, Gunsmoke, The Wild Wild West, Hazel, The Phil Silvers Show, Burke's Law, Ironside, Marcus Welby M.D., Emergency!, All in the Family, Maude, The Odd Couple, Gidget, Busting Loose, Hunter, MacGyver, and The Golden Girls, among others. Her recurring television roles included Peggy across eight episodes of Have Gun – Will Travel, Mrs. Roniger and additional characters on Gunsmoke from 1962 to 1971, Cousin Bertha and Martha Burkhorn on All in the Family, and various roles on The Red Skelton Show from 1966 to 1971.

Rea became widely recognized for her portrayal of Lulu Coltrane Hogg in The Dukes of Hazzard, a role she played in 19 episodes across the series' seven-year run beginning in 1979. The character was the wife of corrupt Hazzard County Commissioner Jefferson Davis "Boss" Hogg, portrayed by Sorrell Booke. That same year, after an earlier guest appearance as a landlady, Rea joined the regular cast of The Waltons as Rose Burton, a cousin of Olivia Walton who served as a surrogate parental figure following the departures of Ellen Corby, Michael Learned, and subsequently Ralph Waite. Her character remained on the series until the spring of 1981, when Rose received a marriage proposal from Stanley Perkins, played by William Schallert, shortly before the show's cancellation. Rea reprised the role of Rose in the Waltons Thanksgiving Reunion television film in 1993.

During the 1990s, Rea appeared as Ivy Baker in the first season of Step by Step from 1991 to 1992, and as Jean Kelly in Grace Under Fire from 1993 to 1998, accumulating 51 episodes in the latter role. Her film credits included Norman Lear's Cold Turkey and Norman Jewison's In Country.

Rea died of heart failure on February 5, 2011, in Toluca Lake, California, at the age of 89.