Broadway Vet & 'Waltons' Patriarch Ralph Waite Dies at 85

The Desert Sun reports that Ralph Waite, best known as patriarch John Walton Sr. on the long-running 1970s TV series The Waltons, has passed away at his Palm Desert home on Thursday, February 13th. He was 85.

Commenting on the news of her Waltons co-star's passing, actress Michael Learned told PEOPLE yesterday evening, "I'm a little emotional right now. It's such a shock." She continued, "I don't think people realized the skill behind what he was doing. He had such a great heart. ... Ralph had suffered a lot of great tragedy in his life, but he always overcame it and was there for everyone. I just will miss him terribly. We were kind of like a celibate husband and wife. We never crossed that line, but we were dear, loving friends."

Judy Norton, who portrayed eldest Walton daughter Mary Ellen on the show told PEOPLE, "We were a real family. It wasn't just a group of people who got together and worked and then went our separate ways. We have all stayed in contact very much over the years. We were all together again just a matter of months ago.

She added, "From the beginning there was a special quality to the group. When we were on the set we looked to Ralph onset as a father figure."

In addition to his role on The Waltons, Waite portrayed the slave ship third mate Slater in the mini-series Roots. Most recently he starred as Mark Harmon's ficitonal father, Jackson "Jack" Gibbs, on the CBS hit NCIS.

Waite made his professional stage debut in the 1960 off-Broadway production of Jean Genet's The Balcony. He went on to appear in eight Broadway productions including The Watering Place, Slapstick Tragedy, Marathon '33, Blues for Mister Charlie, The Father, Traveller Without Luggage, The Trial of Lee Harvey Oswald, and An American Daughter.

To post a comment, you must register and login.