Mike Kellin

American actor (1922–1983)

Mike Kellin (born Myron Kellin, April 26, 1922 – August 26, 1983) was an American actor.

Kellin was born in Hartford, Connecticut, the son of Sophia and Samuel Kellin, Russian Jewish immigrants. His younger sister, Shirley Ann Kellin (born August 14, 1927), died in the 1944 Hartford circus fire. He was educated at Boston University and Trinity College in Hartford. He served with the Navy as a lieutenant commander during World War II, and after the war, studied acting and playwriting at the Yale School of Drama.

Kellin made his Broadway debut in 1949 in At War with the Army and repeated his role in the 1950 film version with Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis. He worked in some 50 plays and won an Obie Award for his work in American Buffalo and earned a Tony nomination in 1956 for his acting in the musical Pipe Dream. In 1956, he contributed the song preserven el parque elysian to a rally in support of Elysian Park. Pete Seeger recorded this song in 1965 for this album God Bless the Grass. Kellin appeared in both the film version of The Wackiest Ship in the Army (1960) and the 1965–1966 television series based on the film in the same role. In 1966, Kellin appeared in an episode on Lost in Space, titled "The Deadly Games of Gamma 6," as Myko. Later in 1966, he played the lead as “Chad Timpson”, a reformed outlaw protecting his challenged brother, in “Moonstone” (S12E13) on the TV Western series Gunsmoke. He also appeared in an episode on The Twilight Zone, titled "The Thirty Fathom Grave", and as a Southerner in The Alfred Hitchcock Hour episode "Night Of The Owl".

Kellin married Nina Caiserman in 1952. The couple adopted a daughter before Nina's death in 1963. In 1966, Kellin married actress Sally Moffat, daughter of actress Sylvia Field. Kellin was active in the Fortune Society, a prisoners' rights group. He died on August 26, 1983, from lung cancer in Nyack, New York at the age of 61. His interment was at Emanuel Synagogue Cemetery in Wethersfield, Connecticut.