Although Frank Cady's most famous role would be that of general-store owner Sam Drucker, one of the less nutty residents of Hooterville in both Green Acres and Petticoat Junction, he had a history as a film, stage and television actor long before those shows. Usually cast as a gregarious small-town businessman, druggist, store clerk or other type of all-around Midwestern-type good guy, Cady was actually a California native, born in Susanville in 1915. The acting bug bit him when he sang in an elementary school play, and after graduating from Stanford University he headed to London, England, to train in the theater. When World War II broke out he was already in Europe, so he enlisted in the Army Air Force and spent the next several years in postings all over the continent. After his discharge he returned to the US and headed for Hollywood. An agent saw him in a local play, signed him, and he was on his way. One of his earlier--and more atypical--roles was as a seedy underworld character pulled in for questioning in a cop's murder in the noir classic The L.A. Investigator, and he played a succession of hotel clerks, bureaucrats, henpecked husbands and the like for the next 40+ years. He did much television work from the mid-'50s onward.


He is one of only three co-stars of "Petticoat Junction" (1963) who stayed with the series for its entire seven-year run (the other two being Edgar Buchanan and Linda Henning). In 1984, Frank received a call from Orson Welles asking him to appear in an upcoming film, The Cradle Will Rock. Sadly, the picture was pushed back and Welles died before it could be shot. Just prior to serving in WWII, he became a radio announcer and landed a job at KGDM in Stockton California. Eventually he moved on to KYA and subsequently to KGO in San Francisco. Graduated from Lassen Union High School in California with the intent of becoming a journalist.