June Lockhart Was The Coolest TV Mom Ever

Actress June Lockhart passed away on Thursday just under four months after he 100th birthday.

Lockhart was best known for her portrayal of maternal figures Ruth Martin on Lassie from 1958 to 1964 and Dr. Maureen Robinson on the 1960's TV series Lost in Space from 1965 to 1968 and Dr. Janet Craig from 1968 to 1970. The daughter of actors Gene and Kathleen Lockhart, June's acting career spanned nearly 9 decades.

A fairly strong case can be made that Lockhart was the coolest TV mom ever. Not that she was the only one. I mean Barbara Billingsley who played June Cleaver on Leave it to Beaver will always have cool points for speaking jive. And Mrs. C. is the only one who could get away with telling the Fonz to sit on it.

Yet Lockhart was in a class of her own. Although she generally played conventional mother roles on TV, her outlook and perspective on life were radical for the times. 

Lockhart was a fixture at rock concerts, drove army tanks, rode in hot air balloons and hang gliding. She once hosted a Halloween party and hired a band called the Hour Glass to perform. That band later became The Allman Brothers Band. Her Lost in Space co-star Bill Mumy recounted how Lockhart would sneak him and Angela Cartwright to seek shows at L.A.'s Whisky-a-Go-Go.

Even more notably, Lockhart stood up for the LBGTQ community at a time when it was still taboo to do so. It occurred during a 1970 episode of The Virginia Graham Show and Lockhart challenged Graham in a such a gentle, motherly way, the audience immediately sided with Lockhart. Given that Lockhart spent nearly her entire life in Hollywood, she and her family undoubtedly knew people who identified as LBGTQ and viewed them with compassion and understanding and not to be treated with contempt and scorn.

June Lockhart comes across as someone I would like to have known. Had I met her I have no doubt the memory would have been a happy one. R.I.P.