Al Hodge

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For "Big" Al Hodge, the Cornish rock musician, see Al Hodge (rock musician).

Albert Hodge (April 18, 1912 - March 19, 1979) was an American actor best known for playing the DuMont Television Network's famous space adventurer Captain Video from December 15, 1950 to April 1, 1955. He also portrayed the Green Hornet on radio from that series' beginnings in January 1936 until January 1943.

Hodge grew up at 326 N. Freedom Street in Ravenna, Ohio; his parents A. E. and Jessie Hodge operated a tailoring and dry-cleaning business upstairs at 210 W. Main Street.

Al made a name for himself in both athletics and acting at Ravenna High School; nicknamed "Abie", he was a track star, drum major and manager of the band, a bass in the boys glee club and even a cheerleader. He graduated from Miami University in Oxford, Ohio in 1934, having focused mainly on drama. After touring with the Casford Players, a troupe of actors, he accepted a job at WXYZ in Detroit, in 1935. In addition to playing Britt Reid, the Green Hornet, he also wrote and delivered daily editorials, narrated football games, wrote ad copy, worked as an early disc jockey, and produced radio dramas and documentaries including The Lone Ranger and Challenge of the Yukon. During the last days of World War II he served in the Navy, winding up bedridden for a year with pleurisy.

In the late 1940s he found work in New York City in a variety of radio and early TV roles, before taking the role of Captain Video from Richard Coogan who wanted to leave the series in order to concentrate on his Broadway career. After the collapse of the DuMont Network in the spring of 1955, Hodge continued in the role of Captain Video on the children's show "Wonderama" and as the host of "Captain Video's Cartoons" from 1955 to 1959, but those series were seen only in the New York City area. His last such appearance was as himself in a short-lived 1961 local series, Al Hodge's Space Explorers.

Hodge moved to California where he guest-starred on Alfred Hitchcock Presents, Mannix, M Squad, Tightrope, Hawaiian Eye, Coronado 9 and other similar drama/detective series, but he was soon back in New York City, working during the late 1960s and early 1970s at increasingly low-paying jobs, eventually as a security guard.

The grave of Al Hodge in Kensico Cemetery

He largely dropped from sight after 1975. For the next four years he lived in a small room in a cheap hotel, a room crammed with collectible items from his career as Captain Video. He died there, alone, in 1979. As late as 1978, Hodge told reporters that he was almost always recognized on the street, and greeted by name, as "Captain Video."

Almost nothing is known of Hodge's private life. He was married three times and had only one child, Diane, a product of his first marriage. He and his third wife, Virginia, a former showgirl, are buried side-by-side at Kensico Cemetery in Westchester County, New York.

[edit] Trivia

The first filmed episode of The Honeymooners ("TV or Not TV?", April 1, 1955) has Ed Norton and Ralph Kramden watching a fictionalized "Captain Video" episode on their new mutually-owned television set (which is turned away from the "Honeymooners" audience; only the rear of the set is seen, with the voice of George Petrie heard as Captain Video and Frank Marth as the "Captain Video" announcer).