Bonnie Bartlett

Bartlett was born in Wisconsin Rapids, Wisconsin, the daughter of Carrie Archer and Elwin Earl Bartlett,^[2] and was raised in Moline, Illinois. Her father had been an actor in stock productions across the country, but he gave up acting because her mother wanted to settle in Wisconsin.^[3][4]

In 1947, she graduated from Moline High School.^[5] Afterward, she attended Northwestern University, where she earned her degree in 1951.^[6]

Bartlett debuted in television playing the heroine Vanessa Dale Raven on the soap opera Love of Life from 1955 to 1959, replacing actress Peggy McCay. She then moved on to night-time roles in the 1960s.^[7]

She portrayed Grace Snider Edwards on Little House on the Prairie from 1974–1977 and as Ellen Craig on St. Elsewhere. Each role began as infrequently recurring characters. As Grace Snider Edwards, her character's prominence in the series gradually increased from 1975–1977 following the courtship by and marriage to Isaiah Edwards, played by Victor French. In St. Elsewhere, she took on greater prominence in the 1984–1985 season when the storyline included Ellen and Mark's marital problems. The storyline deepened in the next season when their son was killed and they had to raise their granddaughter. Further difficult material included Ellen and Mark's divorce and slow reconciliation following the loss of their granddaughter in a custody dispute with her birth mother.^[8] Bartlett won back-to-back Emmys for her portrayal of Ellen Craig.^[9]

For many years, Bartlett accepted only small guest appearances on such programs as The Golden Girls, Gunsmoke, The Rockford Files, and The Waltons. Her acting career picked up considerably in the 1980s, including the TV miniseries V and North and South: Book II, as well as the pivotal role as the mother of Arnold Schwarzenegger and Danny DeVito's characters in the 1988 film, Twins.

Bartlett and husband William Daniels made Emmy Awards history in 1986 when they became the second real-life married couple to win acting awards on the same night. Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne first accomplished the feat in 1965.^[10] Bartlett and Daniels won for their portrayals of Dr. Mark and Mrs. Ellen Craig on the TV series St. Elsewhere. They later acted together again when she played a college dean who employed her husband's character, in a season of Daniels's ABC series Boy Meets World, and their characters later married.^[11]

When St. Elsewhere ended in 1988, Bartlett's career moved to a wide variety of guest-starring appearances, including major roles on Wiseguy as a tough and corrupt matriarch of a sewage business; as Andrea Drey, secretary general of the United Earth Oceans Organization on seaQuest DSV; on Home Improvement as Lucille Taylor (Tim "the Tool Man" Taylor's mother); and on ER as Ruth Katherine Greene. Bartlett had a feature-film role to in Valediction.

Bartlett and Daniels both served on the Screen Actors Guild's board of directors.^[12]

Bartlett was added to the Hall of Honor at her alma mater, Moline High School in Moline, Illinois.^[5]

Bartlett met William Daniels, at Northwestern University. They were married on June 30, 1951.^[13]

In 1961, she gave birth to a son, who died 24 hours later. They adopted two sons: Michael, who became an assistant director and stage manager in Los Angeles, and Robert, who became an artist and computer graphics designer based in New York City.^[14][15]

• Bartlett Daniels, Bonnie (January 8, 2023). Middle of the Rainbow: How a wife, mother and daughter managed to find herself and win two Emmys. BearManor Media. ISBN 979-8-887-71044-0.

• Bonnie Bartlett at IMDb  
• Bonnie Bartlett at AllMovie  
• Bonnie Bartlett at The Interviews: An Oral History of Television