Meet the Andy Griffith You Didn’t Know — the Truth About the Sheriff of Mayberry

The North Carolina Influence

Andy was born June 1, 1926 in North Carolina and it’s obvious that the experience had a great impact on him, with much of The Andy Griffith Show being inspired by it. But it wasn’t all happiness and sunshine — times were tough for the Griffith family. While his parents saved for a house, they stayed with relatives. And because they couldn’t afford a crib, Andy used to have to sleep in dresser drawers. It wasn’t until 1929 when the Griffiths were able to buy their own home.

Music Captured His Heart

Although Andy joined the Mount Airy High School drama department, it was at school that he was able to more fully explore his love for music. A Baptist, he also found inspiration from Grace Moravian Church minister Ed Mickey, who led the brass band and actually is the person that taught Andy to not only sing, but how to play the trombone (which he managed to save up the money to buy his own instrument). Various things solidified Andy’s interest in music. First off, Country Western music was always playing on the family radio, and then there were services at the Haymore Baptist Church, which were filled with hand-clapping, body-swaying and singing. Additionally, he would constantly look at the musical instruments featured in the Spiegel catalog, and then, in 1941, he saw and fell in love with the film Birth of the Blues, which, as the title suggests, is about the start of Jazz.

As quoted in the book Andy and Don: The Making of a Friendship and a Classic American TV Show, Andy said, “I was not athletic and I wasn’t a good student, so I was kind of nobody. So when I started all this music business … I became a little somebody then.”

No Military Service for Andy

When he turned 18 years old, Andy, like everyone else, was required to register with selective services. While he was undergoing a required medical evaluation, they discovered he had a herniated disk in his lower back — sustained years earlier when he had fallen from a tire swing. As a result, his military services were not required.

“What It Was, Was Football”

Attending the University of North Carolina (where he would graduate with a Bachelor of Music degree), he appeared in a number of productions. It was during this time that he developed what became his “aw-shucks” farm boy persona that would serve him well through much of his career.

After graduating, he actually became a teacher of music and drama at Goldsboro High School in North Carolina, which he did for several years. But he also had a need for something more. Some of that came from stories — or monologues — he would deliver on stage, including “What It Was, Was Football,” which he recorded. It took five live performances for him to overcome his nervousness regarding the recording microphone, but it went on to sell more than 50,000 copies.

He Was Married Three Times

Andy had three different wives during his lifetime. His first was Barbara Bray Edwards, a singer, who he asked to marry him three days after they first met. That marriage took place on Aug. 22, 1949, and the couple adopted a son (named Andy Samuel, who would sadly die in 1997 after years of battling alcoholism) and a daughter (Dixie Nann). The marriage lasted until 1972, but was filled with great tension stemming from the fact that while Andy’s career soared, he wouldn’t allow Barbara to pursue one of her own. The following year (obviously Andy didn’t like to drag things out), he married Greek actress Solica Cassuto, which was a marriage that last until 1981. Two years after that, he married Cindi Knight.

‘No Time for Sergeants’

Although Andy first gained attention for stories he would deliver on stage, and the recording of “What it Was, Was Football,” his first real exposure to the public was as Private Will Stockdale in the one-hour 1955 TV version of No Time for Sergeants, written by Ira Levin. The story, about a country boy in the US Air Force (which is believed to have inspired the later Andy Griffith Show spinoff Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C.) aired as part of the anthology series The United States Steel Hour, and it was a role he felt he was born to play. He reprised the character on Broadway in Levin’s expanded script that same year, and then, three years later, in the film version.

A More Dramatic Turn

Starring in 1957’s  A Face in the Crowd, Andy revealed a side of himself that was much darker than anyone had seen up until that point. He plays a drifter turned TV host who uses his fame to gain political power. If you want to see someone as opposite Andy Taylor as you can get, check out this film.

Finding Comedy Gold

It was on the Broadway production of No Time for Sergeants that Andy and Don Knotts first met. The two of them began an immediate friendship, sparked by the fact that Andy recognized Don’s voice as that of Windy Wales on the Bobby Benson radio show. They would, of course, co-star in the film version as well, and that experience would ultimately lead them to The Andy Griffith Show a few years later.

Television Arrives Just in Time

Careers are a funny thing, oftentimes running hot and then cold before getting hot again. Andy had done remarkably well for himself with the standup routines, and the TV, stage, and film versions of No Time for Sergeants, but then things started to change. He appeared in a film called Onionhead that tanked — the audience recognizing it for what it was, which was an attempt to cash in on No Time’s success and didn’t do much to shake up that film’s formula. And then, in 1959, he returned to Broadway in the musical Destry Rides Again, which didn’t fare that well.

But destiny came calling from the ashes of Destry in the form of producer Sheldon Leonard, who had the idea for a series and wanted Andy for it. It was, in rough form, the concept for what became The Andy Griffith Show, the idea being they would do a pilot on one of Sheldon’s other series, The Danny Thomas Show, and spring the show from there. Andy was reluctant — he wasn’t crazy about the idea of the small town sheriff — but he did like the producer and agreed, particularly because he would own half the show.

Andy Left Mayberry, but the Show Continued

Don Knotts left The Andy Griffith Show following the fifth season, and Andy himself followed three years later, this despite the fact that Season 8 saw the show topping the ratings. Andy was ready to move on, but instead of the show ending, it launched its own reboot. The focus for the new show, to be titled Mayberry R.F.D., was that F-Troop’s Ken Berry would play widower Sam Jones, a town resident who lives with his son, Mike (Buddy Foster). As The Andy Griffith Show was coming to an end, it’s last few episodes switched the focus to Sam, with him interacting with familiar faces from the town. With the launch of Mayberry R.F.D., Andy would marry girlfriend Helen Crump (Aneta Corsaut), and he and Opie would move away to Charlotte, North Carolina. The new show would enjoy a three-season run, concluding in 1971.

Back to the Big Screen

His first role after departing Mayberry saw Andy starring in 1969’s Angel in My Pocket, in which he played homespun minister, Reverend Samuel. D. Whitehead, who moves with his family to a small town. There he attempts to win the support and trust of the town’s churchgoers. It was supposed to be a more dramatic turn, but gradually took on a softer tone that made it not that dissimilar to his television series. This was intended to be the first in a five-year, 10-picture deal, but when Universal told him they would like to team him up with Don Knotts for the next film, he managed to get out of the contract. It wasn’t anything against Don, he just didn’t feel the studio had faith in him.

‘Headmaster’ (1970 to 1971)

Following Angel in My Pocket, Andy was actually finding it hard to get work. His manager, Dick Lenke, struck a deal with CBS to bring him back to television that would pay Andy $3.5 million a year for five years. The show that resulted was 1970’s Headmaster, which was a comedy-drama that saw him playing Andy Thompson, the headmaster of a private school in California known as the Concord School. The show co-starred Claudette Nevins as his wife, Margaret, and Jerry Van Dyke as Mr. Purdy, his best friend and the school’s athletic coach. Unfortunately, the show failed to connect with the audience and was canceled after 14 episodes.

‘The New Andy Griffith Show’ (1971)

After the failure of Headmaster, in early 1971 Andy starred in this show, which saw him as the mayor of a small North Carolina town known as Greenwood. Named Andy Sawyer, his wife was played by Lee Meriwether, with Marty McCall and Lori Rutherford as their kids, T.J. and Lori. The tone was much closer to The Andy Griffith Show, and the premiere featured guest appearances by George Lindsay as Goober and Paul Harman as Emmett, their characters from that series. Don Knotts even appeared as an unidentified character, who was clearly Barney Fife. All three welcomed Andy to town and while their appearance gave the show’s premiere strong ratings, those ratings shrank and it was canceled after 10 episodes.

‘Pray for the Wildcats’ (1974)

Andy was desperate to change his image and hoped this 1974 TV movie would do it. He plays business executive Sam Farragut, a sociopath who, after killing someone, pursues several executives who had been hoping to work with him through the desert on dirtbikes. It co-stars Robert Reed, William Shatner, Marjoe Gortner and Angie Dickinson. Unfortunately, it didn’t do much for him. Later in the year, he starred in the TV movie Savages, which saw him accidentally murdering someone and pursuing the one witness to the crime.

‘Winter Kill’ (1974)

This TV movie saw Andy as Sam McNeill, police chief of a northern California town that is a resort area in the mountains. A thriller, the drama had McNeill attempting to solve the case of a serial killer. Intended as a pilot, it didn’t sell, so Andy’s character was renamed Sam Adams and was set at the center of a 1975 TV series called Adams of Eagle Lake. It lasted all of two episodes before being canceled. Another pilot the following year, Street Killing, didn’t go to series. Things were not going well for him.

‘Salvage 1’ (1979)

Andy had a minor success (certainly bigger than anything since The Andy Griffith Show) playing Harry Broderick, the owner of Jettison Scrap and Salvage Co. Specializing in reclaiming trash and junk, he comes up with a plan to recover various pieces of equipment left on the surface of the moon during the Apollo space program and sell it. Assisting is Joel Higgins as former astronaut Addison “Skip” Carmichael and Trish Stewart as NASA fuel expert Melanie “Mel” Slozer. The success of the 1979 pilot led to the production of 18 additional episodes. In 1980, he starred in two episodes of a show called The Yeagers.

Guest Star Andy Griffith

Whereas Don Knotts won five Emmy Awards for his role as Barney Fife, Andy never actually won any. He was finally nominated for a dramatic turn in the 1981 TV movie Murder in Texas (based on a true-crime bestseller focusing on the strange deaths of a Houston plastic surgeon and his wife), but didn’t take home the gold. He appeared in several more TV movies and started to make guest-star appearances in shows like Fantasy Island, Hotel and The Love Boat.

‘Matlock’ (1986 to 1995)

In 1984, Andy had played a prosecutor in the TV miniseries Fatal Vision. Brandon Tartikoff, who had become president of NBC Entertainment, saw what the actor had done in that role and and recognized the potential for something more. Inspired by the success of Angela Lansbury in Murder, She Wrote, he wanted to design a series around Andy as a lawyer. That show was Matlock, which saw him cast as Benjamin Leighton “Ben” Matlock, described as a “folksy and popular though cantankerous attorney.” The show took much of his charm from The Andy Griffith Show and wrapped it up in a character who had enough differences from Andy Taylor to make him intriguing to the audience. As a result, Andy finally had the hit he had spent decades looking for. The show would produce 193 episodes and an initial TV movie over the course of nine seasons.

‘Return to Mayberry’

Produced in 1986 in between the Matlock TV movie pilot and series, this made-for-TV movie reunites most of the original cast in what would be the only such reunion. Andy Taylor, who has been US Postal Inspector in Cleveland, returns to Mayberry to run for sheriff, but is reluctant to do so when he learns that Barney Fife is running as well. At the same time, the now married Opie is expecting his first child, while trying to decide whether or not he wants to become a reporter in Binghamton, New York.

There’s much more, but suffice to say it was a wonderful opportunity to catch up with the characters from The Andy Griffith Show and recapture a little bit of the magic of the original series. There was also something reassuring to note that as much as the world had changed by 1986, Mayberry itself hadn’t. There’s a reason the TV show captured the imagination of so many people over the decades, and this film was a gentle reminder as well as a chance to check in on some old friends one more time.

A Final Andy and Opie Reunion

In October 2008, Andy appeared with Ron Howard in a Funny or Die video endorsement for Barack Obama's presidential campaign. It was wonderful seeing "Opie" reunited with his "Pa" one last time. The same video also has a great reunion with Ron Howard and Henry Winkler, reprising their respective Happy Days roles of Richie and Fonzie.

His Final Years

In the latter part of his life, Andy was plagued with a number of health issues. In 1983, he was diagnosed with Guillain-Barre Syndrome, which resulted in paralysis below the knees and it took him seven months before he could walk again. In May 2000, he underwent quadruple heart by-pass surgery. Seven years later, he suffered a fall which resulted in hip surgery, and on July 3, 2012 he died from a heart attack at the age of 86 in his North Carolina home.

Toward the end of his career, Andy would guest star on several TV series and have parts in a number of feature films. After a number of difficult years, he managed to accomplish much of what he had set out to do. He achieved stardom early on with The Andy Griffith Show, and successfully reconnected with the television audience via Matlock two decades later. Now that is a pretty incredible story.