System Mechanic - Clean, repair, protect, and speed up your PC!Larry Linville
1939 - 2000
Larry Linville, who played the bumbling, amorous Major Frank Burns on the television comedy series, Mash, died April 10, 2000. He was 60.
Linville was born in Ojai, California on September 29, 1939. Fascinated with flying jets, he attended the University of Colorado with the intention of majoring in engineering. But an even greater fascination with acting caused him to quit school and pursue a show business career.
He began appearing in stage work in Colorado, including Tennessee William's The Glass Menagerie.
Deciding he needed a deeper knowledge of acting, he won a scholarship to London's Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts. For two years, he studied at the Academy with such budding actors as Sarah Miles, John Hurt and David Warner.
After returning to America, Linville spent most of the 1960's doing stage work in Virginia and California. He made his debut on Broadway in Eugene O�Neill�s More Stately Mansions.
Linville also began to get guest star slots on episodic television, including Judd for the Defense, Mission: Impossible and The Young Lawyers.
After doing a segment on Room 222, producer Gene Reynolds cast Linville as Major Frank Burns on the new television series he was putting together about mobile army surgical hospital activities during the Korean War.
After its debut in 1972, M*A*S*H began an eleven year run. Linville played the bumbling Major Frank Burns who carried on a torrid affair with fellow Major Hot Lips Houlihan, played by Loretta Swit.
Satisfied that he had developed his character fully, Linville left the series after the fifth season, not wanting to become typecast. He continued to be a guest star on TV, as well as appearing as a regular on such series as Grandpa goes to Washington and Paper Dolls.
Linville also became a visiting professor at colleges and universities, and put his dormant engineering skills to work by designing and building his own aircraft.
He was diagnosed with lung cancer in 1998. Part of a lung was removed, but the cancer returned in 2000, and Linville died from complications of the disease in New York City on April 10, 2000,
Linville's wife, Deborah, daughter Kelly, and his parents survived him. His body was cremated and the ashes taken to Sacramento, California.
