You younglings might remember her as the passenger that translated jive into English in the 1980 Airplane! movie, but.my generation used to see Leave It To Beaver on reruns.
She basically became 'America's Mom' thanks to that June Cleaver role. She was also the last of the surviving women who played the mothers on those 50's family shows such as Harriet Nelson, of The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet; Jane Wyatt's Margaret Anderson, of Father Knows Best; and Donna Reed's Donna Stone, of The Donna Reed Show.
Leave It To Beaver started on CBS in 1957, then moved to ABC the next year until it ended its run in 1963 and lived on in syndication.
Another icon of my youth is gone. Rest in Peace, Barbara.
