Young Andy Griffith: The Road from Stand-Up Comic to Sheriff of Mayberry

Andy Griffith young would seem to be best represented by The Andy Griffith Show , perhaps the most beloved and popular sitcoms from the 1960s and the one that turned people like Andy, Don Knotts, Jim Nabors and Ron Howard into stars. But in truth, the actor was building up a very different career before the 1960 to 1968 show came along.

Andy Griffith early life

He was born June 1, 1926 in Mount Airy, North Carolina (the inspiration for the fictional Mayberry, North Carolina), his family so poor that he spent his infancy sleeping in a dresser drawer. Very shy growing up, he discovered a gift to make others laugh, and that allowed him to start to become more extroverted. He also gained a greater appreciation of swing music, which impacted him greatly.

At the University of North Carolina, he studied music and appeared in a number of student operettas, and upon graduation taught music and drama at Goldsboro High School in North Carolina. He gradually found himself a monologist — a form of stand-up, but more telling humorous stories than joke after joke — and achieved fame with the routine "What It Was, Was Football," about a naive country preacher doing his best to understand the sport.

His acting debut

It became the subject of a hit single released in 1954, and the following year he found himself starring in an Ira Levin-written television show No Time for Sergeants , a comedy about a fellow from the country who finds himself in the Air Force. The script would be expanded and staged on Broadway in October of that year, with Griffith playing the role again. A movie version, co-starring Don Knotts, was released in 1958, solidifying the stardom of the young Andy Griffith.

A year earlier, in 1957, he made his film debut in A Face in the Crowd , a drama about a power-hungry drifter who becomes a television personality and whose ensuing popularity allows him to attain political power that he uses to manipulate large parts of the population.

Andy on the big and small screen

There would be another big screen comedy in the form of 1958's Onionhead , but television was really where he was destined to be. His second appearance in the medium was in the "Danny Meets Andy Griffith" episode of Make Room for Daddy , the sitcom starring Danny Thomas. The episode introduced the character of Mayberry sheriff Andy Taylor — a far more sarcastic and "energized" version of the character that we'd come to know — and served as a means of introducing the television audience to Griffith and the concept of what would become The Andy Griffith Show . Also appearing in the episode was Ron Howard as Andy's son, Opie; and Frances Bavier as a Mayberry resident before she was cast as Aunt Bee.

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Produced by Danny Thomas, Sheldon Leonard and Griffith himself, The Andy Griffith Show would make its debut in the fall of 1960 and run until 1968, capturing — and never letting go of — the hearts of viewers.

Take a look at Andy Griffith young in the photos that follow.

1940

A portrait of Andy Griffith in 1940.

1952

Andy Griffith makes an appearance on The Steve Allen Show in 1952.

1953

1955

Actors Roddy McDowall and Andy Griffith perform a scene from No Time for Sergeants on the Toast of the Town show hosted by Ed Sullivan in 1955.

1957

Andy Griffith records the soundtrack to his debut film, 1957's A Face in the Crowd .

Actress Mamie Van Doren attends an event as she sits next to Andy Griffith in 1957.

Andy Griffith (center) poses for a photo with his wife, Barbara; and producer/director Mervyn LeRoy (left) at a 1957 event.

1958

Myron McCormick, Don Knotts and Andy Griffith in the 1958 film version No Time for Sergeants .

Trailer for the Andy Griffith film No Time for Sergeants .

The 1958 film Onionhead , starring Andy Griffith and future Odd Couple star Walter Matthau.

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1960

A moment from the 1960 episode of Make Room for Daddy that served as the pilot for The Andy Griffith Show . Shown are Danny Thomas, Marjorie Lord and Andy Griffith.

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