Max Baer Jr. is best remembered as Jethro Bodine from The Beverly Hillbillies, but what became of this legend after the show ended?

Max Baer Jr is 84 years old today.

Comedy program The Beverly Hillbillies followed the Clampett family’s saga, with Jed Clampett, played by Buddy Ebsen, gaining fortune at an alarming rate.

Jed became a millionaire instantly and decided to relocate to Beverly Hills, California. The story’s turning point? The family kept up their backwoods lifestyle.

The streetwise Jed brought his Clampett family clan, and one of the many famous personalities stood out.

Jethro Bodine, the son of Jed’s cousin, Pearl, was played by Max Baer Jr, a naive and borderline dimwitted man who demonstrated his excellent arithmetic skills with his multiplication classic “five gozinta five one times, five gozinta ten two times.”

It was an instant hit when The Beverly Hillbillies first broadcast in 1962. According to IMDB, it soared to the top spot faster than any other show in television history within the first three weeks of its launch.

The show was a hit among television viewers. It lasted 11 years, with nine seasons and 274 episodes, before being discontinued in 1971.

In 1964, The Beverly Hillbillies was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best TV Show Comedy and four Emmy nominations.

On the other hand, Max’s persona had a silly year-to-year grin. His chuckle made everyone else laugh, and, most importantly, he made everyone believe his character, Jethro Bodine, was real.

Max had honed his southern drawl by listening to Andy Griffith and Jonathan Winters recordings. He was able to do this while maintaining a perpetually idiotic expression on his face, which made people chuckle.

By playing the rustic bumpkin Jethro, Max Baer Jr became an American comic star. Not only that, but the show provided Max with his big break.

Unfortunately, his life following the show did not go as planned. This is the story of the guy behind Jethro Bodine, a character Hollywood couldn’t get enough of.

Max Baer Jr. was born in Oakland, California, on December 4, 1937. He is the son of boxing champion Max Baer and Mary Ellen Sullivan.

It would be a long time before Baer Jr entered the acting world. In 1949, he appeared in a theater version of Goldilocks and the Three Bears at the Blackpool Pavilion in England.

Ultimately, a combination of chance, luck, and a lot of self-confidence got him part of a lifetime in The Beverly Hillbillies.

Baer Jr. grew up in Sacramento before moving to Santa Clara to study. He graduated from Santa Clara University with a Bachelor of Business Management in 1959, but a year later, he found himself in a Los Angeles parking lot.

Max Baer Jr chose to ride his motorcycle to Los Angeles the year following graduation. He wound himself on the Warner Bros. lot, where an executive recognized him as James Garner.

After Baer Jr. was noticed, he wanted to try acting. Despite knowing nothing about acting, he quickly signed his first one-year contract. Instead, he reasoned that he might as well go for it.

He had modest parts and guest appearances on television in shows including 77 Sunset Strip, Maverick, and Hawaiian Eye.

Even though his career wasn’t taking off, he opted to stay, and soon he found himself with the best job he’d ever had: a sitcom about a country bumpkin family who become wealthy through oil.

After an open audition, he landed the role of Jethro Bodine in The Beverly Hillbillies, receiving $1000 for the pilot and $500 for the following show.

“It’s extremely difficult to be subjective or objective about yourself when you play a part like Jethro,” Baer Jr told Medium.

“You simply do the best you can with the material you’re given, and then you attempt to contribute to it [with your performance] as much as possible.

Yet, in the end, the audience has the final word. We liked what you did or we didn’t like what you did. And you don’t have any other method of assessing it.”

The show was a big success at this time. Baer never made more than $800 per episode, but he had a special place in the hearts of the American television audience.

Max Baer Jr. felt he was doing well and, more importantly, making people laugh.

“You must perform well. And, in my situation, it’s fine if I’ve made people laugh, even if it’s at my expense. “I don’t care,” remarked Baer Jr. “They can laugh with or at me. It makes no difference as long as they laugh.

So if I can make them laugh, I’ll consider my performance a success. I don’t know what level of success it achieved. Yet I can say it accomplished its purpose.”

A feature-length remake of the iconic TV show starring Dolly Parton debuted in 1993. Regrettably, it did not enjoy the same level of success. Honestly, it’s hard to believe after they cast someone else in the part of Jethro.

On Beverly Hillbillies, celebrated actress Donna Douglas portrayed mountain beauty Elly May Clampett.

In 2013, she applauded Max Baer Jr. for his outstanding performance as Jethro, who may not have been the brightest bulb in the bulb box.