1981 Hugh Beaumont interview

[AKA]

From the St. Cloud Daily Times
Saturday, July 25, 1981
Page 4A

An afternoon with Beaver Cleaver’s dad

Jimmy Olsen’s Planet
Times Editorial Page Editor

GRAND RAPIDS — There’s a large crescent-shaped island out in the southern bay of Wabana Lake — Beaumont’s Island. Pines and poplar crowd the water.

The bow of my rented boat scraped a tiny lip of sand on an inlet toward the island’s northern side. I stepped ashore without getting my feet wet and slung the anchor rope around a convenient pine. Nailed to another tree nearby was a sign — “No Trespassing.”

“All he can do is tell you to get off,” my wife had said while I loaded my camera equipment and briefcase into the boat before crossing the one-half mile of water to the island.

Maybe, I thought. But telling me to “get off” wasn’t all he could do. He might just be a real crack shot with a squirrel gun, for example. Not everyone enjoys a friendly chat with members of the press, after all.

Wabana Lake, named after Chief Wabonegwewis of the Chippewa nation, only has three resorts. John Uradnik owns one of them and it was he who first told me of Beaumont’s Island.

“That’s an island out there,” he pointed across the water. “It doesn’t look much like an island from here, because it’s kind of long and narrow and blends with the opposite shoreline. But that’s Beaumont’s Island, and Hugh Beaumont still lives there. He’s on it right now.”

Where did I know that name, Hugh Beaumont? It was like hearing a few chords from a familiar old tune and not being able to place it. But John read the consternation on my face.

“Hugh Beaumont was the father on Leave It to Beaver,” he volunteered.

As I walked past the deserted caretaker’s cottage close to the inlet, I felt like a trespasser and silently wished John had never mentioned Beaumont’s Island. It was quiet. Too quiet, as they say in the movies. Breezes from the lake caught in the pines and turned the poplar leaves into rustling wind chimes, yet it was still. The stillness a house has when no one is at home.

I found the path from the cottage to the main house higher up. It was then that I thought of turning back. Beaumont hasn’t been in film since I was in high school — nearly 20 years ago — and he suffered a crippling stroke which cut short his career. A man has a right to find an island somewhere and to be left alone.

But I grew up with Leave It to Beaver and so did millions of other now middle-aged Americans. Hugh Beaumont (Ward Cleaver) was the patient father we all wished for and I had forgotten his name. It was time to renew the acquaintance, so I climbed the hill to his house.

My first knock rattled the screen door, clattering through the trees. But no answer from within. A second knock, and a third.

“Com’ on in,” said a familiar voice.

He didn’t seem surprised to see me, but smiled and gripped my hand, brushing aside my apologies for intruding.

“Sit down. Would you like an ashtray?”

We talked quite easily together. About the day and the four-pound northern I’d caught in the morning. And finally, about him.

I tried to avoid phrases like “in those days” out of courtesy and because Beaumont, like any actor, was too clever to tell his age. He hasn’t worked since the Beaver series ended in the early 1960s and he was crippled, but I still didn’t want to put everything in the past tense.

Beaver reruns still play across the country and I was surprised when Beaumont said the series only ran six seasons originally. “Of course, we did 39 shows per season,” he said. “Now they do 13.”

There was no television in Beaumont’s home and he made it quite clear he didn’t want one. “American television is nowhere,” he said later. But that’s not a terminal affliction, he points out. “I predict we will go back to family-type shows. It goes in cycles. Bit by bit by bit it went down” stairstepping the air with his left hand, “and bit by bit by bit it will go up.”

Beaumont directed many of the Beaver shows, and besides acting in them, found time to work toward becoming a Methodist minister. And although he was never ordained, he spent years in the pulpit and has fashioned a personal faith. Beaumont’s religion is a bit like Beaumont’s Island — isolated but friendly. “I spend a lot of time thinking about God,” he said, “and I’m asking the same questions I asked 30 years ago, and I don’t get any answers.”

Now he believes the only way it all fits together is with reincarnation. And he’s had some dreams about it.

But Hugh Beaumont is a hard man to put together. A model father on television, a spare-time preacher, an island dweller, a director and, I learned later, a Trekkie. Star Trek, not Father Knows Best, was his favorite TV show.

And when our conversation wandered to politics, he confided he once had a close call with a candidacy for the State Senate in California. But he laughs about it now and says he was too smart to actually run for office.

What about his old actor friend, Ronald Reagan? “He’s a marvelous person,” Beaumont said without hesitation. “He was always good at helping the little guys — the bit players, extras and so on.” Those were the days when Reagan was president of the Screen Actors Guild, and Beaumont hopes now that as President of the United States he won’t forget the “little guy.”

“It’s too much big business now,” Beaumont worries.

After the stroke, which left him nearly paralyzed on his right side and decades away from active involvement in Hollywood, Beaumont might appear a good candidate for an island. He’s been there each summer for 30 or 40 years — he’s not quite sure — but it hasn’t dulled his wit or kept him from looking to the future.

“I may do a picture,” he said. “A reunion of the Beaver family with the original cast.” CBS is looking at the possibility of a made-for-TV movie which could be in the works as early as this fall. And there’s no doubt in my mind it would be a hit.

But the window shadows were lengthening on Beaumont’s Island and I knew it was time to go. Two hours had slipped by and we had already covered so many topics I’d never be able to pick just a few to write about. But there was one more question.

“What goes through your mind way out here?” I asked.

“This place comes to mind,” he said, looking slowly around the room, taking in the worn plank floor, large stone fireplace and beamed ceilings. “It has feeling, I think.” Then he added after a pause, “I re-did it, and it’s good … it’s home.”

On my way down the hill, I stopped to take a picture of the green house half hidden by the forest. I knew something of the man who lived there and I’d been welcomed, but when I got back to my boat, tied near the “No Trespassing” sign, I still couldn’t shake the feeling of isolation.

“This may be my last year on the island,” Beaumont had said. He couldn’t get around outside anymore without his “stick,” and it was becoming too difficult to make it up the hill from the lake.

All of a sudden that struck me as odd — the island without him. It would be just another chunk of land sticking out of the water, like hundreds of others common to lakes in northern Minnesota. Wabana would lose some of its mystery and John Uradnik couldn’t point to it with the same pride.

But as long as I think of that island in Wabana Lake, it will be Beaumont’s Island.

[stevea]

Fascinating!

[vitoscotti]

Sensational! Wish it was longer. LITB stereotyping really killed the casts future acting prospects. An icon like HB doing bit parts on Petticoat Junction, and other shows. Interesting story part "Now he believes the only way it all fits together is with reincarnation. And he’s had some dreams about it." Apparently his mind was sound. The writer mentioned. He died the next summer at only 73.

[GentlemanJim]

Outstanding story, thanks for sharing it. So Hugh Beaumont started leaning towards reincarnation in his later years? Fascinating.

[AKA]

“I may do a picture,” he said. “A reunion of the Beaver family with the original cast.” CBS is looking at the possibility of a made-for-TV movie which could be in the works as early as this fall. And there’s no doubt in my mind it would be a hit.

I wonder if a Still the Beaver script with a still-living Ward was written, and if so, how much it differed from the finished product.

[PracTz]

It's a bit sadly ironic that Mr. Beaumont believed that his health was deteriorating to the point that he likely wouldn't have been able to have lasted another year living alone in his former family home (it should be noted that, he and his wife had divorced in 1973 and their sons were grown). Yet, he actually managed to muster the strength to visit one of his sons the next year in Munich (then West Germany) only to suddenly die there!

While the 'Still the Beaver' TV movie (1983)(which would set the stage for the 'New Leave It to Beaver' revival series) was dedicated to Mr. Beaumont's memory, oddly enough it had Ward having died in 1977 NOT 1982. But then they had as one of its plot points that the longtime married couple Wally and Mary Ellen being childless while having fertility struggles but the next year that was totally retrotrashed with them being parents of a preteen daughter AND soon will become parents of another kid.

[AKA]

Originally Posted by GentlemanJim

Outstanding story, thanks for sharing it. So Hugh Beaumont started leaning towards reincarnation in his later years? Fascinating.

Charles Schulz had a similar change in his theology late in life: “I do not go to church anymore, because I could not be an active part of things. I guess you might say I’ve come around to secular humanism, an obligation I believe all humans have to others and the world we live in.”

This doesn’t necessarily mean he became an atheist, of course, but at the very least, there was a definite softening of his faith — a decidedly far cry from the Christian themes he put in some of his earlier strips and TV specials.

[vitoscotti]

The article writer didn't press Hugh Beaumont more on the reincarnation topic. Like do you have an inkling who you are reincarnated from?

[AKA]

Originally Posted by vitoscotti

The article writer didn't press Hugh Beaumont more on the reincarnation topic. Like do you have an inkling who you are reincarnated from?

Maybe he did, but there were space limitations. It seems the reporter is still alive; I wonder if he still has the audio recording of this interview 40 years later.

[stevea]

Originally Posted by PracTz

While the 'Still the Beaver' TV movie (1983)(which would set the stage for the 'New Leave It to Beaver' revival series) was dedicated to Mr. Beaumont's memory, oddly enough it had Ward having died in 1977 NOT 1982. But then they had as one of its plot points that the longtime married couple Wally and Mary Ellen being childless while having fertility struggles but the next year that was totally retrotrashed with them being parents of a preteen daughter AND soon will become parents of another kid.

Brian Levant, heavily involved in the Still the Beaver/The New Leave it to Beaver TV show, gave fascinating interviews on the Beaver DVD set (I think). Since he seemed to be a walking encyclopedia on anything Beaver, he might have known the answer as to why the movie writers chose to have Ward dying several years earlier than Beaumont's actual death.

[Dude111]

Fascinating indeed!!!!!

[AKA]

Originally Posted by stevea

Brian Levant, heavily involved in the Still the Beaver/The New Leave it to Beaver TV show, gave fascinating interviews on the Beaver DVD set (I think). Since he seemed to be a walking encyclopedia on anything Beaver, he might have known the answer as to why the movie writers chose to have Ward dying several years earlier than Beaumont's actual death.

Maybe they wanted enough time to have passed since Ward’s death for the characters to have moved on from their grief.

[GentlemanJim]

Originally Posted by vitoscotti

The article writer didn't press Hugh Beaumont more on the reincarnation topic. Like do you have an inkling who you are reincarnated from?

Me personally? Let me begin by saying that I do not consider myself an advocate of reincarnation. But at the same time, I don't consider it any less likely than any of the other dogma than has been preached to me since that first slap on the butt.

My own home brew theory on the subject, (IF there is any merit to the concept, at all) is that we are likely not necessarily confined by species. Just because you are a person now, is no guarantee you were a person before, or will be afterwards.

You might come back as a crow, a goat, or even a goose. And let me give you an absolute assurance, this thread constitutes the most thought that I've given the subject in the past 10 years....it's not something I devote much attention to.

What I actually believe is that once you are dead, you rot in a box. Reincarnation would be a "so THAT's the real deal?" moment for me.


Why I found the reincarnation subject in the story to be interesting is due to Beaumont's experiences as a minister. Obviously he had been searching for meaning, and by his own admission had not found the answers he had hoped for.

[AKA]

Originally Posted by GentlemanJim

What I actually believe is that once you are dead, you rot in a box. Reincarnation would be a "so THAT's the real deal?" moment for me.

I agree. I think once you’re dead, you’re dead. Lights out, that’s all she wrote. The idea of eternity doesn’t appeal to me. Even eternal bliss would get boring after a while, a concept brilliantly examined in the final episode of The Good Place.

Originally Posted by GentlemanJim

Why I found the reincarnation subject in the story to be interesting is due to Beaumont's experiences as a minister.

Same. Actually, I used to be an intern on pastoral staff of a church (really an evangelical cult) in Northern California. Ten years ago this summer I admitted to myself, and eventually to my family and friends, that I’m an atheist. I walked away and never looked back.

That’s one of the reasons deconversion stories fascinate me, and why I basically have that Charles Schulz quote in my back pocket.

[Babalu]

Great story.

Another demonstration of how little we really know about people that we think we know from TV.