Young Love

Michael & Dodie Landon - March 11th 1956

The following are extracts from articles on Michael and Dodie Landon.

By Michael Landon (May 1960)

On the dreary December evening when I walked into Dodie Fraser’s life, I was nineteen and miserable – everything seemed to be so wrong, four years ago. A buddy was seeing his girl, she was visiting a friend he was “sure” I would like, and I didn’t have anything better to do. Love? I hadn’t the foggiest idea I’d leap into it. If you’d predicted I was destined to discover my purpose for living on that particular night – and that I’d elope three months later! I’d have flatly denied it. Yet, to my absolute astonishment, I found the person I had decided simply didn’t exist. Dodie was blonde and small, pretty and fun, but far more than that. I was amazed when she promptly introduced me to a handsome boy and said he was her son! He was six and she was twenty-five, she added honestly. A widow since the month before Mark’s birth, she had struggled to earn more money as a legal secretary.

It was a sunny Sunday afternoon when I proposed, as she and Mark and I stood in line for Mr. Toad's Wonderful Ride at Disneyland. By then, we imagined that I could finish college and be an athletic coach, if I didn't get anywhere as an actor. Dodie paid no attention to the friends who told her I was an awful risk. My parents were stunned when I brought home the news of my decision. I was also eager to be the father Mark had never had? Incredible! After my marriage, when they at last came around, they explained that they had declined to meet Dodie and Mark because they had been so worried that I was making a dreadful mistake and couldn't handle the responsibilities I was blindly assuming. That was later, Meanwhile, two weeks before we took the step into marriage, I packed a suitcase, and left home. For one week, I stayed with a buddy who swore I was merely infatuated. He kept introducing me to other girls, and I went on seeing Dodie. Oh, I had last-minute qualms. There had been so much opposition. There were so few people on my side.  Dodie felt that a week quite apart would be wise, so I'd be positive. Her absence, when she flew to Chicago to visit her sister, convinced me I was right in listening to my own heart. When she came back, her boss - who said he couldn't lose a super-secretary - was at the airport with me to greet her. The next day, he went to Mexico with us, along with a friend of Dodie's who was to be her Maid of Honour, because we wanted a very binding ceremony there. It wasn't instantaneous. Across the border, there's a twenty-four-hour wait after the physical examinations. Then the judge who was to marry us went fishing all that next day, and we had to wait until night for him. That brushed away a weekend honeymoon - but the last day I was ever nervous about my marriage was my wedding day.

By Dodie Landon (June 1960)

I’m sure you can tell by now that life with Michael is never dull. It never was, from the day we met. It happened on December 7^th, 1955. He had been brought over to the house by a girlfriend of mine, as a blind date for me. My girlfriend had wanted me to double date with her, and I had said no. I don’t like blind dates. Besides, I had promised to play chess with my boss, an attorney. Mike watched us for a while, and then started to criticize my game. He couldn’t have annoyed me more. I must admit, however, that his criticism was warranted. When I accepted some of his suggestions, the moves proved he was right. I’d also like to use this opportunity to add that in the five years we’ve been married, we must have played 500 games of chess, and he beat me every time but once. I finally managed to get the better of him for the first time a few weeks ago. That made him feel so disgusted that with a surly look on his face he tramped into the den, turned the hi-fi set on and listened to records. Being a good sport in spite of himself, he came back a few minutes later with a grin on his face. “I bet you couldn’t do it again,” he dared me. I accepted the dare – and lost every game since.

By Dodie Landon (1960)

I guess I should have trusted my son’s instincts from the first. He never seemed to be wrong. He knew Michael immediately as his father and then as an actor. And my husband has successfully filled both roles to date. I was still putting the final touches to my make up in front of the full length mirror, when the doorbell rang. “Come in,” I shouted – aware that the caller was Michael Landon and this was to be our second date. A close girlfriend had been going with a boy who was studying acting. Only last week they had arranged for me to me et his friend, Michael – another would-be thespian. I couldn’t quite tell about our first date, but I thought we hit it off pretty well. Michael seemed rather introverted and shy and so he sat in front of the fireplace for quite some time, not saying a word – just staring. Finally, I broke the spell and started asking him questions about himself. He began to open up slowly, but soon we were so entrenched in conversation about his life that I never had a chance to mention Mark. Mark was my son. He was six years old at that time. We have always been very close. Since before my baby was born, I was widowed. We only had each other and over the years, have become unusually close. So I can now well appreciate Michael’s shock when his size 10 shoe almost stepped on my son. But nonchalantly, my little man of the house rolled over, tugged at the handsome visitor’s pants and said, “I like you. Will you be my Daddy?”

 When I was dating Michael, I was also seeing an older well-to-do man. He too, wanted to marry me. It is difficult to pinpoint all the reasons that led to my decision to marry Mike, but I know that Mark figured in it about 75%. My other suitor never seemed to take any great interest in Mark and this was so very important to me. Michael and Mark took to each other immediately. I must confess, I sometimes felt left out when Mike came over – they were always so involved. Together they started projects and played together and built a marvellous friendship. Soon Michael became a regular sight at our house and I can’t say I objected in the least. But everything was not easy and though Michael seemed to want to marry me desperately, he was a little younger than I, and, perhaps, less sensible. I tried to tell him how important marriage was and all the responsibilities it involved. Working at  Newberry’s 5 & 10 and taking acting lessons could not support a wife and a child, too. So, we argued and rationalized and finally I decided to go to Chicago for a week. I wanted to give ourselves a trial separation – for Michael to make sure he really wanted me – and I wanted to see my sister. I told him though, that if he still wanted to marry me after the week was over, he should be at the airport to pick me up. However, we missed each other so much that he wired me after a few days and ordered me home for my wedding. During that week, my boyfriend became a man. He accepted me, my son, our cats (which he had previously loathed) and marriage. In one step he became a husband, father and most of all, a man. Mark accepted Michael right from the first. It was not easy at first with me working and Michael holding several jobs. The first year was truly the roughest. I got sick and couldn’t work. We were so broke that we moved into a tiny room in my grandmother’s house. It really seemed as though we were headed for the rocks or the poor house. But somehow we pulled through – because we had each other, I guess, and fate seemed to deal us a good hand. I knew I was a lucky girl to have a son like Mark and a husband like Michael. About a year after our marriage – just when Mike was feeling unusually depressed – he got his first big break – a movie. I Was A Teenage Werewolf. It was a marvellous part and we were sure it would lead to bigger and better things. But it did not – not right then. Even when he was given the opportunity to study in the Warner Bros. Talent School, before we met, fate did not seem to hold the best for him yet. For though he was the only one offered a contract, it was never signed.

Mark is now 11 years old and his father has been my husband for four years. But we are a family with enough love for eight cats, a dog and we hope a new baby. However, I am confident that Mike could not love Mark more if he was his own son (which he now is. Mark was legally adopted several years ago by Mike) and the affection is surely returned. Mark likes to write – particularly fantasies. He probably gets this from his Daddy, who reads science fiction, while I indulge in mysteries. He and Michael spend many Satu rdays together – driving around town, visiting hobby shops or building – for example – a new dog house. Both my son and my husband are extremely good looking. Mark thinks Michael “is the most handsome man I’ve ever seen.” My son is quite a knockout I’m proud to say, with his blonde hair, large clear blue eyes and turned up nose complimented by a few freckles every here and there. He just idolizes Michael and feels he can do  no wrong. I remember one incident in particular, when Michael was working on Tom Dooley. He was injured and had to have 22 stitches on his face. When someone first telephoned to tell the news to Mark, he went into a complete frenzy. He kept saying, “I hope my Daddy will be all right. I hope he won’t die.” He showed continual concern and when Michael arrived home with a huge bandage on his face, that I know frightened Mark terribly, he drew together all his composure as the next man of the house and said consolingly, “Don’t worry, Daddy. They can always shoot you from the other side.”

By Rona Barrett  (1960)

My name is Rona Barrett and I lived with Michael Landon!..... And before you can set your minds a- thinking, may I clarify that statement by saying his wife Dodie, one of my best friends, lived there, too! How did this all happen? Well, it was like this. Over three years ago when I came out to California to meet some of the Young Hollywood Set, Mike was one of the first people I requested seeing. At that time, he was a free lance actor and not many people knew about him. I had seen him in Teenage Werewolf and a close-up shot from a scene in High School Confidential stuck in my mind. He was a gas! It’s hard to explain what makes people friends, but from the moment I met Mike and Dodie we just clicked. Not having any close relatives or friends in Hollywood Mike and Dodie became “overnight” family. The I was shipped back to New York, much to my regret, but wit h great hope in my heart that I’d be back in the “land of entertainment” very soon, and continuing my friendship with the Landon’s. I guess they wanted me to come back too, because the cross-country letters and phone calls were numerous. Then one night I received a phone call at my folks’ house and Mike was screaming on the other end. “When the heck are you coming out here?” Before I could answer him he was continuing, “And I don’t want any more excuses from you. (For months I was telling them that the following month I’d be out there.) We just bought a big old Spanish house up in the hills and we want you to come and live with us!” Little did they know at the time that those were the nicest words I could possibly hear. I had just been given a big writing assignment which would mean my moving out to the coast, and for a couple of days I had walked around in a fog, not knowing where or how I should start. There’s an old saying that you never know a person until you live with them. Living with Mike nigh on a year, I could possibly write a book – if not a volume – on NBC TV’s Bonanza star. From the moment I moved into the big Spanish house with the sunken living room, tiled entrance hall, spiral staircase, five cats and a dog, I knew every day would be an adventure and revelation. Mike was an easy-going humorous guy with a gift of gab for telling stories not to be equalled. However, to those who’d meet him momentarily, he was quiet, shy, reserved, but his answer to a question very deliberate and well thought out. It was obvious though, from anyone’s point of view, no matter how long or short a time you spent with him, that he was exceedingly bright and that his mind was ever searching for new paths to explore. He was a bug on science fiction and his son Mark followed suit. I can remember one day coming home form the studio finding Mike unwrapping a huge box that had just arrived. It was the Encyclopaedia Britannica and as he carefully placed each book on the shelf, he paused for a moment to scan through its contents. As soon as the books were in place, he sat himself down in the den room, selected volume A and proceeded to read it cover to cover. For a moment, I thought he was rather loco. No person can remember every single thing in a book – well, almost no one! That’s night at dinner, I kiddingly said, “Well, brain boy, tell me all you remember from volume A.” Mike got up from the table, left the room and returned in a second with the encyclopaedia. He placed it on my lap, opened the first page on “aardvark” – recited  everything he’d learned about the subject – then proceeded to the next page until by the time he reached page 25, which if I remember vaguely discussed “angus bulls” and we were in the living room on our fifth cup of coffee, he was too pooped to pop! Well, that taught me a lesson. The next time I’ll see anyone reading an encyclopaedia I’ll ask them if they have a photographic memory. Mike does! There were days, however, when Mike enjoyed being by himself, tampering  in the garage with his new electric saw, making tables, building dog houses or getting up at three in the morning to race his sports car through the Hollywood hills. I don’t want to give you a picture of life with the Landons being all rosy and pink, because it wasn’t. Mike is a boy of many moods. If you don’t want your head bitten off in the morning, don’t speak to him until he’s had at least one cup of coffee and a look at the morning paper. And if by chance he’s working all day from five in the morning till eight at night, don’t even say “Hi” to him unless he says it first. If he walks into the house smiling and ready to tell you (without you asking him, of course) about what happened during the day, then you’re in for an evening of pure enjoyment. He’ll rattle on from what they served at breakfast, to how the director shot each scene.

By Alice Olson (Dodie’s mother) 1960

Five years ago, when I walked into Dodie Fraser’s house on Christmas Eve, it never dawned on me that the young man I was about to meet would have the tremendous effect he’s had on my life as well as my daughter and her son, Mark. He was sitting on the couch playing a magic game with Mark when I walked into the room. He was tall and very youthful and his mop of curly brown hair didn't go unnoticed. However, when I shook his hand and looked into his hazel eyes, I thought he had the sweetest face I'd ever seen. He seemed very shy and quiet, but from the moment I saw his sincere interest in playing with Mark, I knew he was ok in my book. Last fall when I was divorced from my husband I received a phone call one day from Dodie. She said that she and Mike had talked it over and wanted me to come and live with them. They thought I was too timid a person to live by myself. Upon hearing those words, I wanted to accept immediately, but I hesitated long enough to wonder how well a mother-in-law and son-in-law could get along living together under one roof. The many stories of mothers-in-law and sons-in-law made me quite leery. Then Mike got on the phone and said in his most convincing tone, which I’ve learned not to dispute, “Alice, I’ll be down in half an hour to pick you up. You better be packed and ready to move.” Well, that was that! That afternoon I moved into the Spanish house up on the hill and for me my life was never happier. Every morning before Mike left for work, it was one big laugh which my system became accustomed to. Mike was forever misplacing things. One day it was his drivers license, the next his belt and the next his script. Dodie, Mark and I would run up and down the house – like the old Keystone cops – in search of the missing article. Of course the driver’s license was usually in his wallet which was left in the pants he wore the day before, which somehow found their way to the garage. And it never ceased to amaze me when I found his belt out in the patio plant shed, or his script in the fireplace or a $20 bill under the couch pillow.

 If ever a man was meant to be a father, Mike was. His great love for Mark and the new baby are things I cannot even describe. If there’s a baseball game going, or a rodeo in town or some such thing like that, you can be sure Mike and Mark will be there together. They’re more like pals than father and son. And of course, Mike’s concern over the new baby is something not to be believed. I’ve never seen a guy relish diapering a kid so much.

By Michael Landon (1962)

Even if I never swim the Hellespont or climb Mount Everest, you can figure I’m different than most men. What other guy ever became a father at nineteen of a seven-year-old boy? This character, named Mark, is now thirteen and I’m twenty-five; and for six years he’s been both the light and blight of my life. Things like the time I found my brief case in the refrigerator, and the afternoon on the putting green when the head of my putter fell off. By now he knows I’m a father, the kind who’ll tolerate no nonsense. We have rules he knows must be observed. Dodie and I are sticklers on manners, and Mark gets an allowance for certain chores like taking care of the pool, and extra money for extra jobs. I think he can get away with fibbing to Dodie – she’d believe him if he said he’d taken President Kennedy to lunch – but I know him well enough that I can tell when he’s lying. I laid down the law the day he brought home a pack of cigarettes. Dodie thought it best to try negative psychology and tell him he could smoke a cigarette once in a while if he wanted to. I told him I didn’t care if the other kids did smoke – that if I caught him again, I’d read him out but good. To clinch it, I told him I’d watch him. This still gets him, I think; it stems from the days when he thought I had crystal balls in my eyes. He used to come home from school when he was little, and I’d drive down the same street coming home from work. Once in a while, I’d come home early and see him doing something he shouldn’t, and that night I’d put my hands over my eyes and say, “I’m getting an image, getting an image. I see Mark down at the corner, throwing bottle caps at the wall.” His eyes would open like moonflowers at sunset, and he thought I was a fairly magical fellow. I used to encourage that sort of thing, I guess. I didn’t have to because, from the beginning, he accepted me as his father; but I couldn’t help blowing myself up a bit. I used to be so thin when I was a kid – even when I married Dodie I only weighed 120 pounds – that when I did a play, I’d wear a blue sweat shirt under my white shirt to make me look bigger in the chest and arms. Mark was a well-built kid, and I used to tell him that Clark Kent was a phoney and that I was really Superman. He swallowed the hook, and evidently the news got around the neighbourhood; for one night when I was leaving the house for work, a gang of about eight kids was hanging around at the corner. “hey, mistah,” said the spokesman, “yer kid tells us yer Superman.”

“I’m sorry you found out,” I said. “If my identity is known, I won’t be able to work undercover with the police as effectively.” As you can see, I was being very grand about it.” Yeah?” said the kid. “So if yer Superman, where’s yer Superman suit?” “Under my clothing where it should be,” I answered. “Oh sure,” he smirked. “So let’s see it.” I unbuttoned my white shirt, and when those kids saw the blue underneath they almost crumbled. The leader put out a tentative finger, and when he touched the sweat shirt and felt the rough material, he backed away as though I were – well, as though I were Superman. As for me, I walked away, wishing mightily I could have flown. I did fly, some months later, Mark was downstairs in the living room looking for a book on the shelves by the window, and Dodie and I were upstairs watching television. She asked me to hook a screen that was flapping in the wind, and I was so obliging about it that I fell out the window in the process – right past the window where Mark was standing – and onto the flagstone. Miraculously, I was only bruised; and when I saw Mark looking at me saucer-eyed, I chose to keep my dignity and play up the Superman bit for all it was worth.  Dodie helped by being silent; she was so engrossed in the TV show that she hadn’t even missed me. Since those days, we’ve adopted two boys, namely Josh and Jason. I suspect the future’s going to bring a lot of surprises from those two – for even at six months, Jason is incredibly bright; and Josh, aged two, regards me as the rising and setting sun. Josh figures that as long as I’m around everything’s all right. This is sort of  heart-warming, but he carries it too far. Each night when I come home, he’s standing way up on the stairs, waiting; and the minute I’m inside the door, he makes a flying leap through the air. He knows I’ll catch him, but the thought that some day I may miss makes the hair creep on the back of my neck.  I have a laudable wife in that Dodie puts me at the helm of the clan, and I  dish out the discipline pretty much as I see fit – except for small disagreements  like the talk about smoking, and the matter of the milk. I like to drink milk with my meals, and therefore can’t understand this fetish Dodie has about eating first and then drinking the milk. We can’t come to terms on this one. And when she starts in on Mark, I always have to fall back on my old standby, the example of animals. They eat when they want, sleep when they want, and if they get thirsty while they’re eating, they stop for a drink. “I have yet,” says Dodie, “to see any animal down pickles and milk simultaneously.” This is a crack at my penchant for pickles, which I eat with everything and find particularly succulent when combined with milk. As you can see, I’m not Top Banana around here all the time. If he knows by now that I’m a father, he also knows I’m a pal. For, I’ve taken him fishing in the Sierras, just the two of us; everyday we do a series of push-ups together; we take my javelin over to the school yard and heave it; and then there’s always the most important thing: our talks together  - he can get things off his chest that he couldn’t discuss with his mother, and I’m never too busy to hear out his problems and thoughts – and then tell him of my own mistakes. When I look back on my relationship with my own father and then compare it with my friendship with Mark, I can see that my father was sort of a stranger to me. He was always so wound up in business, thinking up new ideas and worrying about how the old ones were turning out, that I never felt I really knew him. When he died – almost three years ago – I was shocked at the depth of the grief I experienced; I knew then how much he had meant to me. I’m sure he loved me very much too, but I never felt it when I was a boy. The difference with Mark and me is that I love him very much – and he knows it.

(1962)

As reluctant as he may be to do so, Mike Landon is forced to ask himself the questions every parent dreads: “Am I an unfit father?”  It is a question he cannot avoid. Only weeks after adopting his third son, Mike and his wife Dodie separated. Then, shortly after, in a Los Angeles courtroom, Mike was named co-respondent in a cross-complaint to a divorce suit. Mannie Baier, a sales representative for a clothing firm, charged that he was not the father of the child by his actress-wife Marjorie Lynn. He named Mike as the “other man.” As we go to press, neither Marjorie nor Mike has had a chance to answer these charges. It is a curious side of fatherhood, however – and perhaps Mike will derive some comfort from it – that, usually, only fit fat hers have the courage to question themselves  and their rights to their children. The real cruelty of Mike’s situation is the fact that his role as a father has so little to do with the actual circumstances that push him into this anguished self-examination. In the beginning marriage for Mike Landon and his lovely Dodie was an exciting and emotionally rewarding experience. But, as in so many marriages, as the years passed Mike and Dodie learned that happiness is never an easy prize. “There were times in our marriage,” Mike said later, “that, for Dodie and me, were the happiest we have ever known. There were times, too, of  fear and disillusionment. But until what happened lately, we always had faith that our marriage would survive.” Mike and Dodie strove desperately at times to walk the tight-rope of those fragile in-between days – and to repair the deepening misunderstandings of the days before. Their separation was the final admission of failure. Yet, at all times, they were both religious in their efforts to conceal the times of discontent from the children. We went to see Mike to see if we could get at the truth of the matter. Naturally, he preferred not to comment on his alleged relationship with “another man’s wife.” It’s a subject loaded with implications which, discussed outside the courtroom, could easily lead to wrong inferences. But on his three sons, on fatherhood and his love for Dodie, Mike was very articulate, willing and eloquent, though he was obviously greatly disturbed by the beating he is taking from all sides. He clasped his hands tensely before him. “They’re my sons,”  he said quietly, “and I’m their father until the day they die – or I die. I am a good father to them, and I think Dodie knows that. She knew it early in our marriage, while she lay in the hospital when I thought she was dying. It was all of a sudden with Dodie. She is a graduate nurse. It’s strange with people who are trained in medicine. They are always the last to admit how ill they are. Dodie was bright and cheerful that morning. I’ll never forget. A few hours later, we were rushing her to the hospital. I didn’t learn until later that, from her training Dodie understood all too well the seriousness of her illness. It was one of the reasons she held off so long, so as not to frighten me. But she knew her recovery was uncertain. They watched Dodie for days before they decided to operate. She was conscious and smiling every time I saw her, but inside she was terrified – and I didn’t know.” The doctors knew an operation was Dodie’s only chance. The night before, Mike and Dodie talked for a while and then Dodie made the startling revelation to Mike. “Mike,” she said, “I called my mother. I told her that if anything happens to me I want you to have custody of M ark. You’re a wonderful father to him, Mike, and he loves you.” Mike tried not to show his concern. “Until that moment,” he explained, “I didn’t realize how terribly serious Dodie’s condition was. I knew how much she, too, loved Mark and to hear that she was now considering the possibility of not surviving the operation turned my heart cold. Yet, in that moment of awful panic and shock over Dodie, I could not help feeling proud that she trusted me that much. She was right, of course. I love Mark as much as if he were my own and I’ve never kept it a secret. It's odd, but I think that Mark is more like me than a natural son could be. But after the operation I had another shock coming.” The doctor called Mike to his office. “Sit down, Mike,” he said. “You’re going to hear bad news.” “I can barely remember the nightmarish thoughts that raced through my brain,” Landon recalls. “Oh, God, I thought, this is it! I know he’s going to tell me that Dodie is dead or dying. At a moment like that, you pray without knowing you’re praying.” Mike listened in cold silence. “This will be a shock to you,” the doctor said, gently, “but you will learn to accept it. Mrs. Landon will not be able to have any more children.” “I wanted to jump for joy,” he said, “but I knew that the doctor would misunderstand. He didn’t know that I was prepared to hear that Dodie’s illness had been fatal. If I had shown the relief I felt, I was afraid the doctor might think I was happy because they’d be no more children. The doctor mistook my silence for shock and kept apologizing, saying he was sorry and assuring me that everything medically possible had been done. So it startled him when unable to contain my feeling an instant longer, I grabbed his hand and cried, ‘Thank God! Thank God!’ That doctor still thinks I’m a monster who doesn’t like children. But I do . Nonetheless, to know I could never have children with Dodie was a hard blow to take. God knows, I wanted to be a father. Then the second shock came. What about Dodie? In pain from surgery, had she learned that she could not have another child? She had. We helped each other through that crisis.” Mike stood up and paced the length of the room. Then he sat down again. “I know the feeling I have inside me for children,” he said. “That’s why I know I’m a fit father. When the ‘Bonanza’ series caught the public’s fancy and we knew the show was a hit – and enough of a hit to be established for a few years – Dodie and I didn’t think of big cars, a house with a pool and the usual sudden-stardom accessories. We put our arms around each other and thought exactly the same thing, together – ‘At last! At last! We can find another son! We adopted Josh, now two. And a year later, we adopted Jason, now one happy year old. They’re wonderful boys. I love them. I think I am a good father. I know I try harder at that than anything else I do –even acting. I hate it when someone calls them adopted. I think adopted is a word that should be used only for the actual legal ceremony and then dropped from then on. They’re my sons – period. Not my adopted sons. But with the success of “Bonanza,” trouble arose in a marriage that had lovingly weathered the tribulations of failure. “I don’t like to say what caused Dodie and me to break up,” says Mike, “but success, take it from me, is much tougher on a marriage than failure. Failure – with two people as much in love as Dodie and I – can keep you together. “All I can say now is that success drove us apart. I’m sorry. I can say no more.” He didn’t have to explain – it’s the oldest Hollywood story in the books. Once you get on top, that struggle to stay there takes over. Success is a ruthless master in Hollywood. Mike Landon, however, is a strong and intelligent man. Though his broken marriage with Dodie may never be repaired, he is not without hope for himself and his sons.   

  Yet his fitness as a father, in the eyes of the public – who, he hastens to admit have given him everything – may be criticized. That public should remember that this fitness is proven not by the father but by the sons. Mike’s so ns are everything children should be. They are well-cared-for, well-adjusted, polite and alert. Still, no parent, natural or adoptive knows how good a job he’s done with a child until that child reaches comparative maturity, or a time when his actions give promise of intelligent adulthood. “It is easy to say I love my sons,” Mike points out, “because I do. But there is no real way a man can prove that he loves his children. It’s what he gives them that is the greatest proof. It is what he teaches them to become and, at last, what they do become. You can’t rush them through their young years just to find out how good a job you’ve done. All you can do is give them your heart, your honesty and your knowledge. I’ve heard that all a parent can do is hope for his children. I think that I, as a father, can go farther than that. I am giving my sons hope. They need it as much as I do.

By James Gregory (1962)

I heard about the separation from a mutual friend. It was a shock. I’d often visited the Landon’s in their various homes down through the years – they had a habit of buying a place, moving in, fixing it up and selling it at a profit – and although I’d heard occasional rumours of domestic flare-ups, they seemed to patch them up quickly. For a visitor, a day at the Landon’s was always a treat. As we all sat around the pool, Dodie would fill me in on the latest Hollywood gossip, and Michael might talk about his independent production plans. Mark would be swimming, or else up in his room talking with some schoolmate. Josh, who’s now two, would be toddling around the house under the watchful eye of the maid, and year-old Jason would be sitting up in his play pen in the sun room. The Landon’s always liked their houses big, once Michael had achieved enough success on TV and in the movies to afford something with a dozen rooms. Perhaps this was because they remembered all too well the bleak period, shortly after their marriage six years ago, when Michael and Dodie and Mark had to share a single shabby room and lived on a diet which consisted largely of canned franks and beans. In those days Michael was just another unemployed actor. Well, not just another one. At the age of nineteen he had married Dodie, a twenty-five-year-old widow whose husband had been killed and had left her with a son to raise. So in addition to himself, Michael had to worry about taking care of Dodie and Mark. Why had Michael married so young – and why had he chosen a woman six years older than himself? In the answer to that question lies perhaps a great deal of the answer to why he later left her. Michael met Dodie on a blind date. They hit it off right away, and he admitted at the time that he’d never really felt comfortable dating girls younger than he. So apparently the fact that Dodie was six years older was an advantage in his eyes, not a handicap. And nobody ever came more motherly than Dodie! You can see that for yourself, by the fact that she adopted two babies when it didn’t look as though she could have any more, as well as taking care of all those pets around the place. As if that weren’t enough, when Michael had become successful and she had some help, she started doing volunteer work at the Los Angeles Health Department. Dodie wasn’t happy unless she was helping or mothering somebody. Well. of course you can imagine what happened. Michael saw a chance to get out from under his mothers thumb, and yet  have all the advantages of a mom without having to knuckle down to her authority. In Marrying Dodie, he fled from one mother to another. Naturally, when his mother saw what was happening, she opposed the marriage with almost frantic determination. But it didn’t do any good. His father eventually sided with Michael and the young couple eloped to Mexico. After the honeymoon, Michael found himself with a ready-made family on his hands, but at first he seemed to love it. He took Mark, who was then seven, out hunting. He even became cub-master for Mark’s cub scout pack. And he delighted in making the family decisions, though Dodie’s subtle influence was probably responsible in large part for Michael’s career progress and for the smoothly-run home they always had, whether it was one room or a mansion. Dodie knew how to keep Michael happy – or at least she seemed to. She once said that she believed in giving her husband all the freedom he wanted – and Michael wanted plenty. He was unquestionably attractive to girls, yet Dodie let him spend every Friday night out, without ever asking where he went or with whom. Actually, most if not all of the time off was spent playing poker with some of his buddies, but he could have been carrying on with every actress in Hollywood and Dodie still wouldn’t have questioned him. “We both keep our individuality, and both live our own lives, “ she said at that time. “Actually, we have completely different interests. Our only mutual interests are the kids.” Apparently this was not enough to keep them together, though the glue held for six years. Last year the family’s happiness seemed complete. They gave a big Bar Mitzvah party for Mark after he turned thirteen, and they adopted Josh. A second baby was taken away from them by the mother before the adoption was final, but they were lucky enough to find a replacement, and little Jason joined the family. Michael eagerly began making plans for his independent movie. They decided to move to a ranch, then changed their minds and instead bought a roomy modern house in town. But symptoms of trouble had already developed. And Dodie, who had always willingly given interviews to help Michael’s career, told a writer how one such crisis almost led to divorce toward the end of last year. One day, she said, he simply told her he wasn’t happy and asked for a separation. She thought over what might be wrong, and decided that for five years all her time and efforts had been devoted to working and saving for the family, not for herself. She’s become a little dowdy. And all day Michael was exposed to glamorous actresses at the studio. So, for the first time in their marriage, she began spending some money on her own appearance. In addition to trips to the beauty parlour, she splurged on a beautiful mink coat, bought expensive clothes. The strategy seemed to work. Michael changed his mind about a separation and the marriage continued. Then, in March of this year, the big break-up came, Michael told Dodie, “I want a divorce!” and this time there was no changing his mind. He packed and left. Dodie, stunned and confused, went to Palm Springs alone to think things over. A friend who has known the Landon’s for five years confessed that the break-up was a complete surprise to him, although he’s known about Mike and Dodie’s intermittent family conflicts. And, although he was sympathetic to both of them, his praise went mainly to Dodie. “If ever an actor had a perfect wife, this was the one,” he said sincerity evident in his voice. “No wife was ever more loyal or more understanding. She gave Michael the freedom an actor requires, but which most wives don’t understand. Never until this past year did she spend any money on herself. It all went for Michael and the children. And Michael was devoted to her. I just can’t understand what happened! It changed overnight. I don’t think there’s any other girl though. In fact, I’m still hoping they get back together.”

By Rona Barrett (August 1962)

Confucius say: When air smell bad keep nose out of it. I couldn’t. The rumour that there was real trouble brewing in the Michael Landon household kept coming in to me loud and clear. And since I was practically a member of the family (I lived with the Landon’s almost a year), I had to see if I could help. Sunday evening I called the Landon house. The Swedish maid Annika answered the phone. No one else was home except the two youngest children, Josh and Jason. Dodie was out. Annika said Mike had driven Mark, his teen-age stepson, back to school. I thought that rather strange. Mark’s new school is several hours away from Los Angeles and Mike is usually too tired to make a trip like that. Something told me something was about to happen. Monday morning. I was still disturbed. When I called the house at 8:30 A.M. Dodie was “out” again. This was most unusual. And Mike wouldn’t come to the phone. He, too, had suddenly disappeared. Really alarmed now, I hi-tailed it in my car to their new house, which I had never seen. The new house which, I had heard, Michael had never wanted. No cars were in the driveway when I reached it. I quickly rang the front doorbell. Annika answered. “No one’s at home,” she blurted out. But I had already gotten my foot in the doorway just as she was about to close the door on me. Now I was sure something was wrong. As little Jason came crawling on all fours to me, handsome little Josh began tugging on my dress. “Mrs. Landon has gone away for the week,” Annika hastily stated. “She left last night and I don’t know where,” she said in halting English. “And Mr. Michael?” “He’s gone, too, and I don’t know when he come back.” My curiosity was really aroused. I asked Annika if she could show me the new house. She was reticent, but little Josh had already grabbed tight hold of my hand and was pulling me through the hallway. Little Josh pulled me to his daddy’s room. Books, suitcases, shoes, clothing, and sandwich wrappings were strewn about. I wondered if Mike was packing to go on another of his P.A. tours. But no one was home to give me any answers. Just as I was about to leave, wondering where my two friends had disappeared, I heard their little corvette pull into the driveway. Mike bounded up the stairs. He was surprised to see me, but he covered up his surprise with a big hello and a kiss on my cheek. He politely asked me how I was, then promptly disappeared. I called to him asking if I could join him. He called back, “If you want to.” I found Mike in his private room knee deep in clothes. He was throwing them at a rapid pace into plastic overnight bags and suitcases. The strangest, chilliest feeling crept through my bones and I gently inquired, “Are you going away?” Mike shook his head, “Yep!” “So many suitcases?” “Yep!” And then that awful sickening feeling which comes over you when you discover something you know you shouldn’t have, swept through me. I stood watching him for a few moments and then I finally said, “You’re going for good.” “Yep!” Then he gathered his bags under his arms, bent down to kiss little Josh, and proceeded down the stairs to the garage. He threw his belongings into the small car. I tried to get him to talk. I thought maybe I could change his mind. But Mike couldn’t be swayed. He was moving out for good and no one was going to stop him.  I had walked myself, innocently, into Confucius’ smelly air! I had gotten myself a scoop story – a story I wished wasn’t taking place. It is no longer a secret that for the past year problems had been mounting in the Michael Landon household. Those close to the situation, however, hoped that with Dodie Landon’s intelligence and Mike’s devotion to his marriage, the two would overcome their problems. Nothing helped. The air just grew mistier and the clouds became greyer. Dodie rarely expected Mike to escort her into the social world those last months. He always had an excuse. He was either too tired, or there was a hunting or fishing trip which he just had to take. Friends began to wonder when Dodie started showing up at parties with her old friends instead of Michael. But she always had an answer for them. “Something wrong with Mike and me?” she’d laugh. “Why, you’re all crazy. Mike and I have the best marriage going in all of Hollywood – next to the Nick Adams', of course,” she’d retort. 

Mike was just a kid, when he married. Only 19. Dodie was nearly eight years his senior, a widow with a little son. Their marriage was a big responsibility for a teen-age boy. Some people felt he was just looking for a mother replacement then. But Mike protested. They were all wrong. The only girl for him was Dodie Fraser. When Dodie went off to Chicago to visit relatives and Mike had time to think things over alone, he sent her an urgent telegram: “If you don’t come back to me, I’ll die!” Dodie was convinced. Mike must really be in love. So she went back home and they were married. And for nearly seven years she lived with a lie. In this past year Dodie has had to face the fact that she’s been to Mike more like a mother than a sweetheart and wife. This has been the hardest, cruellest thing she’s ever had to accept.  “Every day was like a nightmare,” she told me. “I’d wake up and look at Michael lying next to me and say, ‘He’s not my son, he’s my husband!’ But I knew I was only fooling myself. We hardly spoke to each other any more, hardly made love. We were like two strangers   who didn’t know what to say. And when we did speak, it was usually with angry words. I thought maybe the problem was in me. I had always said I never wanted to compete with the glamour gals Mike worked with at the studio. But I began wondering if this might be the reason I was losing my husband. So I did a complete revamp job. I threw out every stitch of clothing I owned and bought a glamorous new wardrobe. Secretly, I had always wanted to be a femme fatale, but when Mike had fallen in love with me he had told me, ‘Dodie, what I love about you most is your simplicity.’ And so that’s the way I was. I didn’t believe in making up a great deal or pretending that our home was a movie set. I did what I thought Michael wanted – until I realized my husband was growing up and that with these new pangs of growth came a change in his attitude about everything that surrounded him.” Seven years ago, no one needed to tell Dodie Fraser that an eight-year age gap between a woman and a man gave a marriage bad odds. But it seems the fates destined them to be one, and Dodie, a great believer in the occult, astrology in particular, was even convinced by her astrologer friends that the marriage could work. In the beginning they were right. It seemed the “stars” had matched a perfect union. To those who didn’t know, there didn’t seem to be an age difference between them. Dodie was young looking, fresh and bright. She had a gregarious personality. She liked people; so did Michael. But he was quiet, shy and slightly reticent until he got to know a person. Then Mike was full of fun. He was a great mimic who could keep a party going all by himself. During most of their married life, they almost always had a houseful of people. When Mike and Dodie moved into their first big house, they had to take in a couple of boarders in order to help pay the rent. And if an actor or relative needed a place to rest his weary feet or get a delicious home- cooked meal, their home was always open. I personally feel that Mike inwardly resented having all those people around. He’s the kind of guy who really likes to be by himself. When he began doing the Bonanza TV series,  he would come home many nights completely exhausted. The house would be filled with strange voices. And the resentment would grow even deeper. Unfortunately, Mike was never one of those people who could talk out his resentments. And Dodie was one of those rare creatures who had sympathy for the whole human race. 

Then came the day when Mike began growing up. He realized a home wasn’t complete until it included a full family. He had known Dodie wasn’t going to bear him any children when he married her. But he loved children and they discussed adopting a child. They finally agreed that this might solve all their problems. After little Josh came into their lives, they were again a perfectly contented family. Now he had adopted one, he wanted a half dozen more and so they applied for little Jason. Suddenly in the last six months, Mike began to change. There was no way of getting him out of the house with Dodie. He preferred staying home, going out with the boys, or spending weekends hunting and fishing. He became more indifferent and quieter. Then one morning he turned to Dodie and said he wanted a divorce. He was sick and tired of the animals, the house, the people, and Dodie’s appearance. However, as far as Dodie could see, there was no one particular girl who was behind the disintegration of their marriage. Besides, Dodie had never worried about female competition. Her philosophy had always been: “If he wants to see another girl, he can as long as he doesn’t go back twice and comes home to me every night.” Unfortunately, no matter how broad-minded a woman thinks she is, every relationship totters at least a little if even a hint of an infatuation exists. Then one afternoon, Mike came home and said he wanted out. 

The end had finally come for Michael and Dodie Landon. A few weeks ago, Dodie filed for divorce after Mike was named correspondent in another divorce suit – a suit in which a Hollywood husband maintained his wife’s unborn child was not his. As we go to press, Dodie tells that, while she is getting a California divorce, she will consent to Mike’s getting a quickie Mexican divorce. Then if he wishes to remarry soon, he may.

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