Sylvia Field

Sylvia Field, born Harriet Louisa Johnson on February 14, 1901, in Allston, Massachusetts, was an American actress whose career spanned stage, film, and television across more than six decades. She died on July 31, 1998, at a nursing home in Fallbrook, California, at the age of 97.

Field attended Arlington High School in Arlington, Massachusetts, before launching her professional acting career on the stage. She made her Broadway debut in 1918 at the age of 17 in The Betrothal, beginning a stage career that would continue through 1948. Her Broadway credits included Oh, Mr. Meadowbrook!, the comedy But Not Goodbye, Popsy, Something for Nothing, and Matrimony Pfd., among other productions.

Her transition to film came with the 1928 drama The Home Girl. Subsequent screen appearances included Voice of the City (1929), Nobody's Darling (1943), Junior Miss (1945), and All Mine to Give (1957). Field's final onscreen appearance came in Kathleen Collins' 1980 film The Cruz Brothers and Mrs. Malloy.

Field began taking on television guest roles in the late 1940s, and in 1949 she starred in a locally produced sitcom about her own life called The Truex Family. In 1952, she joined the cast of the NBC sitcom Mister Peepers as Mrs. Remington, a role she held until the show concluded in 1955. That series co-starred her real-life husband, actor Ernest Truex. Throughout the mid-to-late 1950s, Field continued to appear in episodic television, with guest roles on Producers' Showcase, Star Tonight, General Electric Theater, and The Ann Sothern Show. In 1957, she appeared on Perry Mason as defendant Belle Adrian in the episode "The Case of the Angry Mourner," and in 1958 she played Aunt Lila in the Walt Disney serial Annette, starring Annette Funicello.

Field's most recognized role came in 1959, when she began playing Martha Wilson, the wife of neighbor George Wilson, on the CBS sitcom Dennis the Menace. The character was written out of the series in 1962 following the death of Joseph Kearns, who had portrayed George Wilson. Field continued guest starring on television into the 1960s, appearing on the ABC sitcoms Our Man Higgins, which featured Stanley Holloway, and Hazel. In 1966, she appeared on Petticoat Junction as Laura Bentley in the episode "Young Love," again working opposite Ernest Truex.

Field was married three times. Her first marriage, to Robert J. Frowhlich, lasted from 1924 to 1929. Her second husband, Harold Moffat, whom she married in 1930, died in 1938; together they had one daughter, Sally Moffat Kellin, who was married to actor Mike Kellin. In 1941, Field married Ernest Truex, and the two remained together for 32 years until Truex's death in 1973.