Andy Samuel Griffith

born on June 1, 1926, in Mount Airy, North Carolina, Andy Griffith hit stardom in the late 1950s acting in film, TV and Broadway productions while also creating albums of comedic monologues.

Andy got his start in the 1950s playing a country yokel, on radio and in recorded routines like "What It Was,Was Football."

Griffith and his wife moved to New York, where he made his television debut as a guest monologist on the Ed Sullivan Show in 1954.

That same year, he won the role of Will Stockdale in the TV version of Ira Levin's play, No Time for Sergeants. When the play was produced on Broadway in 1955, it became a hit, and Griffith was nominated for a Tony Award for outstanding supporting actor.

He made his feature film debut in 1957, in the provocative A Face in the Crowd, directed by Elia Kazan.

Like his co-star and fellow southerner, Don Knotts, Griffith went on to reprise his role in the 1958 film version of No Time for Sergeants, which met with a mixed critical reception.

He was also a regular, with Knotts, on the NBC variety series, The Steve Allen Show, from 1959 to 1960.

In 1960, Griffith earned another Tony nomination, this time for best actor in a musical, for Destry Rides Again.

Griffith's 1960 guest appearance as a small-town mayor on the sitcom Make Room for Daddy led CBS to give him his own sitcom

The Andy Griffith Show was a gentle comedy that cast Griffith as a warm-hearted smalltown sheriff in the southern town of Mayberry . The show stopped filming in 1968 and is still playing today.