Ken Osmond

Ken Osmond was born Kenneth Charles Osmond on June 7, 1943 in Glendale, California, the son of Pearl Hand and carpenter‑propmaker Thurman Osmond. From the moment he stepped foot on a set at age four, his mother pushed him into auditions, dance classes, diction drills and even equestrian lessons, shaping a prodigy who quickly moved from uncredited extra work to spoken parts. By nine he had a line in So Big and continued to appear in films such as Good Morning, Miss Dove and Everything But the Truth, while guest‑starring on series like Lassie, Wagon Train and The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet. His early career was a whirlwind of commercials, minor film roles, and television appearances that honed his timing and gave him a reputation as a reliable child performer. In 1957, at age fourteen, he auditioned for the iconic role of Eddie Haskell on Leave It to Beaver; originally slated as a one‑off, his performance impressed producers so much that the character became a staple of the show’s six‑season run, appearing in 97 episodes. The mischievous, duplicitous teen quickly entered the American cultural lexicon, embodying the archetype of the insincere flatterer. After the series ended, Osmond struggled with typecasting, landing only sporadic roles on shows such as Petticoat Junction and The Munsters, and appearing in the films C’mon! Let’s Live a Little and With Six You Get Eggroll. Faced with dwindling opportunities, he enlisted in the Los Angeles Police Department in 1970, serving as a motorcycle officer and surviving a 1980 shooting that left him with a bullet‑proof vest story that later aired on Top Cops. After retiring from law enforcement in 1988, he revived Eddie Haskell for the 1983 TV movie Still the Beaver and the subsequent series The New Leave It to Beaver, this time sharing the screen with his own sons, Eric and Christian. He earned a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Young Artist Foundation in 1987, and continued to make cameo appearances into the 1990s and 2000s, including a role in the 1997 feature remake of Leave It to Beaver. Osmond co‑authored a memoir, Eddie: The Life and Times of America’s Preeminent Bad Boy, published in 2014, and remained active in fan conventions until his death on May 18, 2020, from complications of COPD and peripheral artery disease.