Ed Friendly
American television producer (1922-2007)
Edwin Samson Friendly Jr. (April 8, 1922 – June 17, 2007) was an American television producer. He was responsible for creating the television programs Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In, Little House on the Prairie, and Backstairs at the White House.
Born in New York City, Ed Friendly served with the United States Army in the Pacific Theater of Operations during World War II. After the war, he worked at the advertising agency of Batten, Barton, Durstine & Osborn. He began his television career in 1949, working for ABC as director of sales before briefly moving to Barry & Enright Productions in 1953, and then moving to CBS as a contract producer and then, in 1959, to NBC as vice president of special programs.
Friendly moved to California in 1967 and formed his second production company George Schlatter-Ed Friendly Productions with George Schlatter, and then his third own production company, Ed Friendly Productions, Inc. after Schlatter and Friendly broke their partnership in 1972. He received the Western Heritage Award from the National Cowboy Hall of Fame in 1975 for Little House on the Prairie and in 1978 for Peter Lundy and the Medicine Hat Stallion, an adaptation of the 1972 children's novel San Domingo, the Medicine Hat Stallion by Marguerite Henry.
Thoroughbred horse racing
Friendly was introduced to racing Thoroughbred horse ownership in 1970, when he bought a racehorse in partnership with his close friend Lorne Greene. He subsequently expanded his racing interests, partnering with his first wife, Natalie, in a large (around 70) stable of horses.
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Reception evidence should be dated and situated: later canonical status may differ sharply from the work’s initial circulation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 11, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q2460482. VIAF identifies the subject as 11912213. The Library of Congress control number is no97045852. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1922, 2007, 1949 and 1953.
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This entry incorporates text from “Ed Friendly” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.