Based on a popular 1947 film that won Loretta Young an Academy Award, The Farmer’s Daughter was a 30-minute situation comedy about a naive, sexy Swedish-American farm girl named Katrin ‘Katy’ Holstrum, who goes to Washington to seek the help of her congressman, Glen Morley, to keep her family’s farm.
She winds up remaining in Washington as the governess of Morley’s two motherless sons.
Katy was played by Inger Stevens, Morley by William Windom, and Morley’s young sons, Steve (aged 4) and Danny (8) by Mickey Sholdar and Rory O’Brien.
Also seen regularly was Morley’s mother, Agatha, played by Cathleen Nesbitt, and the Morley’s butler, Cooper, played by Philip Coolidge.
Appearing occasionally were Alice Frost and Walter Sande as Katy’s parents, Mama and Papa Holstrum, and Nancy DeCarl as Katy’s girlfriend, Pam.
Predictably, Katy and Morley fell in love, and in one of the most-well-viewed telecasts of the time, they were married on 5 November 1965.
The event was heavily publicised, and the famous Washington hostess and former ambassador to Luxembourg, Pearl Mesta, even threw a party to commemorate the event. It was attended by members of the cast and over 300 Washington DC notables.
In spite of the popularity of the marriage episode, The Farmer’s Daughter failed to retain the audiences it needed to keep it on the air, and in 1966 – after three seasons (the first two in black & white and the third in colour) – the show was cancelled.
Tragically, Inger Stevens took her own life at her Laurel Canyon home on 30 April 1970, aged 35.
William Windom died of congestive heart failure on 16 August 2012, aged 88. Cathleen Nesbitt died of natural causes on 2 August 1982 in London, England. She was 93.
Katrin ‘Katy’ Holstrum
Inger Stevens Congressman Glen Morley
William Windom Steven Morley
Mickey Sholdar Danny Morley
Rory O’Brien Agatha Morley
Cathleen Nesbitt Chester Cooper
Philip Coolidge Papa Holstrum
Walter Sande Mama Holstrum
Alice Frost Pam
Nancy DeCarl Senator Ames
David Lewis Margot
Barbara Bostock
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