Actor

1907-01-06 · United States · Female

33 series in the catalog

Helen Kleeb (January 6, 1907 – December 28, 2003) was an American film and television actress. In a career covering nearly 50 years, she may be best known for her role from 1972 to 1981 as Miss Mamie Baldwin on the family drama The Waltons.

Early life

Kleeb was born in South Bend, Washington, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. A. W. Kleeb. Her father worked in the lumber business there, and she said, "We were very poor." Although she saw no theater as a child, she created acts from material she found in library books and performed for "Rotary, Kiwanis, or any other club or organization that would let me get up in front of them and do my act". Her career dreams were settled when her grandparetns took her to a Chautauqua — her first exposure to a theatrical production. Upon graduating from high school she told her parents that rather than going to college she wanted to study at the Ellison-White Conservatory of Music in Portland. Her mother wrote a check and she rode a bus to there.

Career

Kleeb began acting on stage in Portland, Oregon, late in the 1920s, where she attended the Ellison-White Conservatory of Music. She also gained her first radio experience in Portland. In the late 1920s and early 1930s she acted with the Duffy Players. She joined the Alcazar stock theater company in 1935. By then she had a reputation for specializing in roles of "mothers, crochety aunts, and assorted elderly females" even though she was in her mid-20s.

From 1949 to 1951, she performed voices for the radio program Candy Matson. In 1956–1957, Kleeb guest-starred on Hey, Jeannie!, starring Jeannie Carson. In the 1960–1961 television season, Kleeb appeared as Miss Claridge, a legal secretary, on the sitcom Harrigan and Son.

She appeared in episodes of Dennis the Menace, I Love Lucy, Pete and Gladys, Hennesey, Death Valley Days, The Virginian (Season 7, Episode 13, The Big Tiny), Get Smart, The Andy Griffith Show, Green Acres, Bewitched, Gunsmoke (as "Mrs. Randolph" in S1E38's "Unknown Grave" - 1956), Little House: A New Beginning, Highway to Heaven, Room 222, and The Golden Girls as well as in small film roles in The Manchurian Candidate, and Hush, Hush, Sweet Charlotte. She also appeared in a number of episodes of The Waltons, as well as Dragnet, starring Jack Webb, during the 1950s. Kleeb also appeared on many radio drama shows, some now playing on XM Satellite Radio.

Personal life

Kleeb's first marriage and the birth of a son, Tom Pendergast, caused a hiatus in her career. After her first husband's death in 1950, she taught drama at a college before she returned to acting. She is buried in Holy Cross Cemetery, Culver City.