Who starred in multiple Classic TV shows?

A few days ago I was reading about the death of actor Pernell Roberts on IMDb. He was the last surviving member of the "Bonanza" cast. (Ironically, he was the first to leave the show.) Roberts later starred in "Trapper John, MD", a series about the post-war medical practice of MASH doctor Trapper John McIntyre. Could this be considered a true spin-off of MASH? If so, this may be the only time the same actor wasn't used to portray the character in the 2nd show (unlike Frasier, The Jeffersons, etc).


Anyway, it got me to thinking "What actors starred in multiple Classic TV shows?" (By "starred", I mean in the regular or recurring cast, not a guest-starring role.)

The most well-known would be Lucille Ball. She was in "I Love Lucy", "The Lucy Show", and "Here's Lucy". (Then again, were these really three different shows, or just a remix of the same theme?)

The first one that came to me was Sally Field. She was the title character in both "Gidget" and "The Flying Nun", before going on to a film career.

Fred Gwynne played one of the 2 main cops in "Car 54 Where Are You?", then starred as Herman Munster in "The Munsters".

One that crossed 2 decades was Bob Denver. After playing Maynard G. Krebbs ("the G stands for Walter") in "The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis", he of course went on to play Gilligan.

If we wanted to stretch the boundaries of the Classic TV era, we could also consider Larry Hagman, who played Jeannie's master Major Tony Nelson in "I Dream of Jeannie", before playing the completely different J.R. Ewing in "Dallas". I could also go on about Ron Howard and Don Knotts, but I'm not going to mention any of these 3, so as not to incur the wrath of you-know-who.


In the co-star category, a few stand out:

Gale Gordon appeared in "Dennis the Menace" as John Wilson, the replacement 'Mister Wilson' (presumably after Dennis wore out the first one!) Later he was in "The Lucy Show" as Mr. Mooney, Lucy Carmichael's windbag of a boss.

William Frawley was in "I Love Lucy" as neighbor Fred Mertz, and later played Bub in "My Three Sons".

Speaking of the Mertzes, Vivian Vance played Fred's wife Ethel, then essentially repeated the same role in the other Lucille Ball shows as Vivian.

William Schallert is probably best known as Martin Lane, Patty's father in "The Patty Duke Show". He was also one of Dobie Gillis' teachers. I don't know what other TV shows he was in, but he's just the type that would appear as a storekeeper in "Leave it to Beaver", or some such part.

Ann B. Davis was Bob Cummings' gal Friday in "Love That Bob", but is better known as Alice in "The Brady Bunch".

Richard Deacon played essentially the same role (pompous bore) as Fred Rutherford in "Leave it to Beaver" and as Mel Cooley in "The Dick Van Dyke Show".

Don DeFore was Ozzie Nelson's neighbor Thorny Thornapple, and also Hazel's boss 'Mister B' in "Hazel".

One that is probably all but forgotten is Angela Cartwright. She played the younger daughter in both "Make Room for Daddy" and "Lost in Space".


I'm sure there are others, but I was doing this post off the top of my head, and also wanted to leave something for others to comment on.