Chuck Roberson

Known for ActingBorn 1919-05-10Died 1988-06-08Shannon, Texas, USA

Charles Hugh Roberson (May 10, 1919 – June 8, 1988) was an American actor and stuntman. Roberson was born near Shannon, Texas, the son of farmer Ollie W. Roberson and Jannie Hamm Roberson. Raised on cattle ranches in Shannon, Texas, and Roswell, New Mexico, he left school at 13 to become a cowhand and oilfield roughneck. He married and took his wife and daughter to California, where he joined the Culver City Police Department and guarded the gate at MGM Studios. Following army service in World War II, he returned to the police force. During duty at Warner Bros. studios during a labor strike, he met stuntman Guy Teague, who alerted him to a stunt job at Republic Pictures. Teague had been John Wayne's stunt double for many years and was able to show him the ropes. Chuck also resembled John Carrol whom Roberson doubled in his first picture, Wyoming (1947). He played small roles and stunted in other roles in the same film. He graduated to larger supporting roles in Westerns for Wayne and John Ford, and to a parallel career as a second-unit director. His television appearances include The Lone Ranger, The Adventures of Kit Carson, Lawman, Death Valley Days, Have Gun – Will Travel, Laramie, Gunsmoke, The Virginian, Laredo, Bonanza, Daniel Boone, and The Big Valley. Roberson also appeared in Disney's television Westerns The Swamp Fox and Texas John Slaughter. They were part of The Wonderful World of Color. Before that, he portrayed a Confederate Prison Captain in The Great Locomotive Chase. In 1980 he published an autobiography, The Fall Guy: 30 Years as the Duke's Double. Roberson died of cancer on June 8, 1988, in Bakersfield, California, and is buried in Forest Lawn Cemetery, Hollywood Hills, California, next to his brother, actor Lou Roberson. Bob Dylan drew him as Long Tom in his Beaten Path series, the drawing is entitled "Untitled 1" and is based on a frame from the film Winchester '73 (1950). Roberson and Wayne Burson, another stuntman, were partners in breeding and training racehorses, with Roberson furnishing the horses from his Bakersfield, California, ranch and Burson training them.Read more

Movies & web series

Jesse James Rides Again

Outcasts of Black Mesa

Haunted Trails

John Wayne's 'The Alamo'

Panic!

The Wonderful World of Disney

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance

Rio Bravo

Mr. Terrific

The Second Greatest Sex

The Searchers

The Big Country

Cattle Town

Spartacus

El Dorado

Law of the Golden West

Have Gun, Will Travel

Lost in Space

Trail of the Rustlers

The Shootist

Red River

Rawhide

Winchester '73

Miracle Mile

The Sons of Katie Elder

The Man from Laramie

The Gallant Legion

The Lucy Show

Alias Smith and Jones

The Alamo

Daniel Boone

Shenandoah

Mail Order Bride

Shock Corridor

How the West Was Won

Big Jake

Sergeant Rutledge

The Misfits

FM

The Naked Spur

Hills of Oklahoma

Calamity Jane

The War Wagon

The Far Country

The Last Sunset

Chisum

Nevada Smith

Cheyenne Autumn