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Barbara Billingsley Mortensen, “June Cleaver” on Leave It To Beaver, grave, tombstone, Woodlawn Memorial Cemetery, Santa Monica, California, photo

Barbara Billingsley Mortensen, “June Cleaver” on Leave It To Beaver, grave, tombstone, Woodlawn Memorial Cemetery, Santa Monica, California, photo

The tombstone and grave site of Barbara Billingsley Mortensen, born as Barbara Lillian Combes, December 22, 1915 in Los Angeles, California. Throughout her thirty-five year acting career, she used the stage name of Barbara Billingsley. Billingsley was the surname of her first husband. Mortensen was the surname of her third husband. She was the mother of two sons from her first marriage.

Billingsley began her film acting career in 1945 and appeared in a number of films in small, often uncredited roles. The role she came be identifed with began in 1957 when she was cast as June Cleaver in the Leave It To Beaver television series which was originally broadcast between 1957 and 1963. Fellow cast members included Hugh Beaumont (husband, Ward Cleaver); Tony Dow (oldest son, Wally Cleaver); Jerry Mathers (youngest son, Theodore, but usually called “The Beaver”); Ken Osmond (Eddie Haskell); Robert Stevens (Larry Mondello); Frank Bank (Clarence “Lumpy” Rutherford) and others. Twenty years later, Billingsley and many of the original cast members returned in The New Leave It To Beaver Show which was broadcast from 1983 to 1989. Between the two Leave It To Beaver series and afterward, Billingsley again appeared in a number of movie and television roles. Her most memorable and surprising movie role was as a hip talking grandmother type in the 1980 movie, Airplane! Her last film role was as Miss Ruthie in the TV movie, Secret Santa.

Barbara Billingsley Mortensen died on October 16, 2010 at Santa Monica, California. She was 94 years old. Her remains are buried in Woodlawn Memorial Cemetery, Santa Monica, California.

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