Peter O'Neill (Napoleon's World)

Peter James O'Neill (October 13, 1917 - February 8, 1969) was an American actor, screenwriter and political activist, best known as one of "America's Favorite Gentlemen" during the 1950's and 1960's. Famous for playing soldiers and cowboys in an era when those genres dominated the box office, he later withdrew from acting by the late 1960's to focus on political activism, most notably race relations and combating hunger and poverty. He was an avid supporter of Democratic Vice Presidential nominee Betty Davis, campaigning vigorously for her during the 1968 election, although after her electoral defeat he praised then-President Van Dyke's efforts at continuing the desegregation efforts begun in the early 1950's. While on vacation in Switzerland in 1969, he was killed in a head-on automobile collision that resulted in the deaths of the passengers of both vehicles, a total of 5 people, which included his wife and her sister and brother-in-law.