1915-1994

Pat led a hand-to-mouth existence as a child. In 1916 the family moved to Nauvoo where his father pastored the Nauvoo Methodist Church. Pat attended school in several areas of North Alabama. After finishing high school at Moritimer Jordan, Jefferson County he managed to get a scholarship to study theology at Birmingham Southern College, where amateur theatricals captured his enthusiasm.

During those years, Pat met Gene Autry, who took a liking to the young comic and later brought him to Hollywood to replace Smiley Burnette. When Autry inaugurated his starring radio series Melody Ranch in the 1940s, Buttram came aboard as comedy relief. Together Autry and Buttram would make several pictures at both Republic and Columbia studios (Buttram's first was Strawberry Roan (1948)). The two also costarred on Autry's TV show, which ran for 91 episodes in the early 1950s. Fast friends but not bosom buddies, Autry and Buttram became a little closer in 1950 when Pat was severely injured in an on-set accident and Gene gave him the encouragement to hang in there even when the doctors had given up hope

In 1952, Pat married actress Sheila Ryan, whom he had met on the set of "Mule Train". Over the next forty years, Pat prospered in radio, films and television, making stand-up appearances on the Ed Sullivan Show and lending his vocal talents to many animated television shows and films, including several Disney features. He became an immensely popular after-dinner speaker at show-business functions. His subsequent TV roles were in a comical vein, but Buttram made an excellent impression in a feverishly dramatic part in "The Jar," one of the eeriest episodes of The Alfred Hitchcock Hour

In 1965, Buttram was cast as duplicitous peddler Mr. Haney on Green Acres and for the next five seasons kept audiences in stitches as he sold "Mis-ter Douglas" (Eddie Albert) one useless item after another, delivering his laconic sales pitch in his inimitable singsong voice, once described as “a turkey being strangled“. Pat's career spanned the media from radio, television, movies, and into animated characters of Walt Disney productions. Pat's voice appeared in such Walt Disney productions as Robin Hood, The Fox and the Hound, the Rescuers, and the Aristocats. Some of his other movies were "Twilight of Honor," "The Gattlin Gun," "Back to the Future III," 3 Elvis Presley films, "The Hanged Man," and "Roustabout." Off-camera, Buttram was a successful rancher and stock market speculator, as well as a Civil War buff.

In 1980 Pat came back to Winston County to retire. He regained strength from a surgery and after three months returned to Hollywood where he continued personal appearances and his much sought after expertise as an "MC" and/or after dinner speaker. Hollywood acknowledged Pat's contributions to the industry by awarding him a star on the "Hollywood Walk of Fame." He was also honored by a star on the "Alabama Stars of Fame" in Birmingham, Alabama on 3rd Avenue in front of the Alabama Theater. In 1982, Pat founded the Golden Boots to honor actors, directors, stuntpeople and other industry professionals who have made significant contributions to the Western film genre. Proceeds from the annual event are donated to the Motion Picture Health and Welfare Fund.

A couple of his personal quotes:

"My voice never quite made it through puberty. It has been described as sounding like a handful of gravel thrown in a Mix-Master."

"I didn't get along too well with horses. At the beginning, not too well; at the end, terrible. I always say that horses are hard in the middle and dangerous at both ends."

On January 8, 1994, Pat Buttram died in California of Kidney failure. He was brought back to Maxwell Chapel, the church that his grandparents organized in 1916.