The Joe Higgins Centennial

Actor Joe Higgins (1925-1998) was born 100 years ago today.

Higgins was a bit player best known for playing sheriffs in commercials, PSAs, and television shows, frequently with the tag line, “You in a heap of trouble, boy!” — very much in the spirit of Jackie Gleason’s character in Smokey and the Bandit. Higgins also had recurring roles on three major tv series, The Rifleman (1960-63, as Nils the blacksmith); Arrest and Trial (1963-64), a series that originated a format that was later adopted by Law and Order; and the Saturday morning kids’ show Sigmund and the Sea Monsters (1973-75). I’d seen him on screen many times in the past, but the thing that made me look into his background was that he was in the cast of Medicine Man, the ill-fated pilot for the sit-com starring Ernie Kovacs and Buster Keaton.

Though Higgins had been acting on stage since the age of nine, and had also done some radio, his path to film and television was somewhat unusual. He took time out for college and actually had a Ph.D. in aviation education (who knew there was such a thing?) from Embry–Riddle Aeronautical University.

Higgins’ movies included Geronimo (1962), Flipper (1963), Flipper’s New Adventure (1964),The Loved One (1965), Namu The Killer Whale (1966), The Perils of Pauline (1967), and Six Pack Annie (1975). He also did scores of guest shots on television shows like The Twilight Zone, Have Gun -Will Travel, Bonanza, I Dream of Jeannie, My Favorite Martian, The Monkees, The Big Valley,Mod Squad,That Girl,Ironside, Gunsmoke, Adam-12,Hee Haw, Movin’ On, and The Dukes of Hazzard. Come to that, if Sorrell Booke had not been available, Higgins would have made a great Boss Hogg.

Though he tended to play Southern and Western characters, Higgins’ background was solidly midwestern. His formative years were spent in Indiana and Ohio. Without a doubt doubt there are characters like the ones he played in those states too.