Jackson DeForest Kelley (January 20, 1920 – June 11, 1999) was an American actor known for his starring role as Dr. Leonard "Bones" McCoy of the USS Enterprise in the television series Star Trek and six of its subsequent movies, as well as an elderly Admiral Dr. Leonard McCoy in the Star Trek: The Next Generation pilot, Encounter at Farpoint. Shy by his own admission, Kelley was the only cast member of the original Star Trek series program never to have written or published an autobiography.

Early life

Kelley was born in Toccoa, Georgia, the son of Clora (née Casey) and Ernest David Kelley, who was a Baptist minister. Kelley was delivered in their home by his uncle, a prominent local physician. As a child, he sang in the church choir, where he discovered that he enjoyed singing and was good at it. Eventually this led to solos and an appearance on radio station WSB in Atlanta. As a result of his radio work, he won an engagement with Lew Forbes and his orchestra at the Paramount Theater. In one of the Star Trek comic books it was stated that Dr. McCoy's father had been a Baptist preacher, an idea that apparently came from Kelley's own life as the son of a Baptist minister. Kelley had an older brother, Ernest Casey Kelley.

Kelley served in the Second World War as an enlisted member of the Army Air Forces between March 10, 1943 and January 28, 1946. After an extended stay at Long Beach, California, he decided to pursue an acting career and relocate to the state, living for a time with his uncle, Casey. He worked as an usher in a local theater in order to earn enough money for the move. Kelley received encouragement from his mother about this life change, but his father disliked the idea. While in California, Kelley was spotted by a Paramount scout while doing a Navy training film.

Early roles

The first movie of Kelley's acting career was the feature film Fear in the Night. The low-budget movie was a blockbuster hitfact: date=September 2008, bringing him to the attention of a national audience. His next role, in Variety Girl, established him as a leading actor. A few years later, Kelley and his wife, Carolyn, decided to move to New York City. He found work on stage and on live television, but after three years in New York, the Kelleys returned to Hollywood. In California, he received a role in an installment of You Are There, "anchored" by Walter Cronkite. In turn this led to him starring in Gunfight at the O.K. Corral as Morgan Earp. This, his first major role in a big film, was a source of three movie offers.

For nine years, Kelley primarily played villains. He built up an impressive list of credits, alternating between television and motion pictures. However, he was afraid of typecasting, so he broke away from villains by starring in Where Love Has Gone and a television pilot called 333 Montgomery. The pilot was written by an ex-policeman named Gene Roddenberry, and a few years later Kelley would appear in another Roddenberry pilot, Police Story (1967), which was also not picked up.