American Actor Robert Conrad Dies

Editor/

Renowned actor of The Wild Wild West television show of the 60s, Robert Conrad, is dead. He was 84.

Family spokesman, Jeff Ballard, said: “He lived a wonderfully long life and while the family is saddened by his passing, he will live forever in their hearts.”

The late Conrad was born in Chicago, Illinois on March 1, 1935. He worked as a milkman while pursuing a career as a local nightclub singer before moving to Los Angeles in 1958 and booking his first big recurring role on Hawaiian Eye in 1959.

After Hawaiian Eye, the actor went on to star as Secret Service agent James T. West in The Wild Wild West, which ran from 1965 to 1969. The show followed the characters of West and Artemus Gordon as the country’s first Secret Service agents exploring the west during the Ulysses S. Grant administration.

A recipient of the Distinguished Service Award in Broadcasting and an inductee of the Stuntman’s Hall of Fame, Conrad was a longtime supporter of amateur boxing, the Wounded Warriors Project, Paralyzed Veterans of America, the United States Marine Corps, and the Jimmie Heuga Endowment, which provides support to those affected with multiple sclerosis.

A small private service is scheduled for March 1, which would have been Conrad’s 85th birthday. In lieu of flowers, the family requests that donations be made to the Wounded Warrior Project and The Marine Corps Scholarship Foundation.

Conrad is survived by 18 grandchildren and eight children, whom he shares with ex-wives LaVelda Fann and Joan Kenlay.