During the '50s and '60s it seemed like every time you turned around, there was Bert Freed as a detective, gangster, sheriff or greedy small-town businessman, and sci-fi fans will remember him as the police chief taken over by the Martians in the classic _Invaders from Mars . It seems as if he appeared in just about every cop and detective series on TV at one time or another. He retired from acting in 1981, and died of a heart attack in Canada in 1994 while on a fishing trip with his son.
First actor to play the role of Lt. Columbo, in a 1960 episode of "The Chevy Mystery Show" , eight years before Peter Falk became famous in the part.
