Peter Whitney

Peter Whitney (born Peter King Engle; May 24, 1916 – March 30, 1972) was an American actor in film and television. Tall and heavyset, he played brutish villains in many Hollywood films in the 1940s and 1950s. Early years Whitney grew up in California. His schools included the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama in London. He studied drama at the Pasadena Playhouse. Career Whitney appeared in the films Destination Tokyo (1943), Action in the North Atlantic (1943), Mr. Skeffington (1944), Murder, He Says (1945) (in which he played a dual role), The Big Heat (1953), In the Heat of the Night (1967), The Ballad of Cable Hogue (1970), and others before becoming well known for his work in television. In the 1958–1959 season, Whitney had a co-starring role as Buck Sinclair, a former sergeant of the Union Army, in all 39 episodes of the ABC western series The Rough Riders. He also guest-starred on the ABC/Warner Brothers western series Colt .45. He performed the part of Ralph in the 1958 episode "Mantrap". He played United States Secret Service agent Gunnerson in the episode "Savage Hills," and Brock in "Dodge City or Bust" on the ABC/WB series, Maverick. In 1960, in the episode "Surface of Truth" of another ABC/WB western series, Lawman, Whitney played Lucas Beyer, a crude white man who has lived for ten years with the Cheyenne Indians.