Tommy Rettig
Former child actor Tommy Rettig in syndicated anthology Western TV series Death Valley Days in 1962
Born	Thomas Noel Rettig (1941-12-10)December 10, 1941 Queens, New York, U.S.A.
Died	February 15, 1996(1996-02-15) (aged 54) Marina del Rey, California, U.S.A.
Occupation(s)	Actor,software engineer, author
Years active	1946–1994
Spouse	Darlene Portwood ​ ​ (m. 1959⁠–⁠1977)​

Thomas Noel Rettig (December 10, 1941 – February 15, 1996) was an American child actor, computersoftware engineer, and author. He portrayed the character "Jeff Miller" in the first three seasons ofCBS'sLassie television series, from 1954 to 1957, later seen insyndicated re-runs with the titleJeff's Collie. He also played the young orphan adopted by British starDavid Niven in an episode of the TV anthology seriesFour Star Playhouse (Season 1, episode 13), entitled "No Identity.” He also co-starred with another former child actor,Tony Dow, in the mid-1960s television teensoap operaNever Too Young and recorded the song by that title with the group, The TR-4.

Rettig was born to aJewish father, Elias Rettig, and aChristianItalian–American mother, Rosemary Nibali, inJackson Heights in theQueens borough ofNew York City.^[1] He started his acting career at the age of six, on tour with starMary Martin in the musicale playAnnie Get Your Gun,^[2] in which he played Little Jake.

Rettig was selected from among 500 boys auditioning for the role of Jeff Miller, to star as the first dog owner in the first versionLassie television series, between 1954 and 1957.^[3] His character was a young farm boy who lived with his widowed mother, Ellen (Jan Clayton 1917–1983), grandfather (George Cleveland, 1885–1957), and his belovedcollie, Lassie.

In addition to his famous role as Jeff Miller in theLassie television series on theCBS network, Rettig also appeared in 17  other feature films, includingSo Big (1953),The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T. (1953), written by famed children's books authorDr. Seuss, and following inRiver of No Return (1954) withMarilyn Monroe andRobert Mitchum.^[3] It was his work with a dog inThe 5000 Fingers Of Dr. T. that ledanimal trainerRudd Weatherwax to urge him to audition for theLassie role, for which Weatherwax had also supplied the collie.

Rettig later told interviewers that he longed for a life as a normal teenager, and after four seasons, he was able to get out of his contract. He was also critical of the treatment and compensation of child actors of his day. He reportedly received no residual payments from his several years work in theLassie series, even though it was later very popular in syndication re-runs, widely shown under the changed titleJeff's Collie.

Rettig graduated in 1959 fromUniversity High School inLos Angeles. In the same year at the age of 18, he was cast as Pierre in the episode "The Ghost of Lafitte", set inNew Orleans, of theABC short-lived western seriesThe Man from Blackhawk (1959–1960), starringRobert Rockwell as a roving insurance investigator. ActressAmanda Randolph was cast in the same episode, as Auntie Cotton.^[4]

At age 19, Rettig had a prominent guest-starring role in the January 1961Wagon Train episode "Weight of Command".^[5] Then in its fourth season onNBC,Wagon Train was the second highest-rated prime-time series that year on American network television. The5 ft 4 in (164.5 cm) Rettig played the part of a 16-year-old boy, Billy, who is traveling with his family on the wagon train. Although his father reluctantly allows his son to go on a buffalo hunt with assistant wagon master Bill Hawks (Terry Wilson), Billy frets that his father doesn't think of him as being a man yet. When the hunters are attacked by a band of renegade Indians, they take refuge in an empty house. Hawks manages to escape, but the wagonmaster Major Seth Adams (Ward Bond) makes the difficult decision not to attempt Billy's rescue, lest risking the entire wagon train to be vulnerable to attack. Hawks, who had promised Billy he would be rescued, is outraged by the decision to abandon the besieged youth to his fate. When Billy manages to survive the Indian attack on his own, he earns his father's respect.

Rettig also guest starred in the detective television seriesPeter Gunn, as Kevin Daniels in the 1961 episode "I Know It's Murder". He played a young clairvoyant who hires Peter Gunn (Craig Stevens) to prevent the murder of his mother by her new husband Mark Eustis, played byHayden Rorke.

From 1965 to 1966, Rettig co-starred with another former child actor,Tony Dow (famous fromLeave it to Beaver), in the ABC televisionsoap opera for teens,Never Too Young.^[6] With the group "The TR-4", he recorded the song by that title on the Velvet Tone label.^[7] While he was the TR-4's co-manager, he did not sing with them. Rettig only co-wrote the song in hopes that the TV soap would use it as the series' theme song. The record was produced byJoey Vieira, who under the stage name Donald Keeler played Rettig's sidekick Porky on "Lassie".^[8] Producers ofNever Too Young, however, chose not to use it.^[9] Rettig was subsequently cast as Frank in the 1965 episode "The Firebrand", of theNBC education /high school drama seriesMr. Novak (1963-1965), which starredJames Franciscus.

As an adult, Rettig preferred to be called "Tom". He found the transition from child star to adult to be difficult, and he had several well-publicized legal entanglements relating to illegalrecreational drugs, a conviction for growingmarijuana on his farm in 1972, and acocaine possession charge in 1976, of which he wasexonerated.^[10] Some years after he left acting, he became amotivational speaker, which—through work on computer mailing lists—led to involvement in the early days ofpersonal computers.

For the last 15 years of his life, Rettig was a well-knowndatabaseprogrammer and author.^[11] He was an early employee ofAshton-Tate and specialized in (sequentially)dBASE,Clipper,FoxBASE and finally,FoxPro. Rettig moved toMarina del Rey, California in the late 1980s.^[12]

Rettig returned to television after 23 years, making a guest appearance as a grown-up Jeff Miller in the final episode of the syndicated television seriesThe New Lassie (1989–1992), along withJon Provost (born 1950; played second Lassie owner Timmy Martin, 1958–1964), titled "The Computer Study", which aired on March 7, 1992; he also co-wrote the episode. The updated series featured appearances from earlier Lassie veteransRoddy McDowall (1928–1998), who had starred inLassie Come Home in 1943, the first feature-length Lassie film, and also actressJune Lockhart (born 1925), who had not only starred in the 1945 sequel feature filmSon of Lassie, but also co-starred on the second version television series, portraying new dog owner Timmy Martin's mother Ruth in the succeeding years (1958–1964), after Rettig andJan Clayton (1917–1983), left the show.

On February 15, 1996, Rettig died ofheart failure at age 54.^[13] He was cremated at theInglewood Park mortuary and his ashes were scattered at sea, three miles offMarina del Rey, California, with the ashes of his friendRusty Hamer in a combined ceremony.^[14]

• Castro, Luis; Hanson, Jay; Rettig, Tom (1985).Advanced programmer's guide: featuring dBase II and dBase II. Ashton-Tate.ISBN 9780912677057.
• Rettig, Tom; Moody, Debby (1988).Expert Advisor: dBase III Plus. Addison Wesley.ISBN 9780201171976.
• Rettig, Tom; Moody, Debby (1989).Tom Rettig's Clipper Encyclopedia. Addison Wesley.ISBN 9780553347982.
• Rettig, Tom; Sander, Ellen; Moody, Debby (1990).Tom Rettig's FoxPro Handbook. Bantum Books.ISBN 9780553349375.

• Best, Marc.Those Endearing Young Charms: Child Performers of the Screen (South Brunswick and New York: Barnes & Co., 1971), pp. 215–219.
• Dye, David.Child and Youth Actors: Filmography of Their Entire Careers, 1914–1985. Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Co., 1988, pp. 197–198.
• Holmstrom, John.The Moving Picture Boy: An International Encyclopaedia from 1895 to 1995, Norwich, Michael Russell, 1996, pp. 230–231.

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