Howard Petrie

Howard Petrie was an American actor who worked in radio, television, and film. Born in Beverly, Massachusetts, he grew up in Concord, Arlington, and Somerville, and after finishing high school in 1924 he briefly worked as a bank clerk and sold securities before a sales call to a radio station led to announcing work. He joined WBZ in Boston in 1929 and moved to NBC in New York the following year, becoming head announcer for many of the network's programs, and he won announcing awards in 1936 and 1942. In 1943 he went to California as announcer for The Judy Canova Show. A producer spotted him in 1947 and gave him a character part, and standing six foot four he went on to play big man roles in more than thirty feature films and forty television shows, often Westerns. He died in 1968.