The former child star Lauren Chapin, best known for starring as the youngest child on the beloved television series Father Knows Best in the 1950s, died on Tuesday. She was 80 years-old.
Chapin Passes Away
Chapin’s death was announced on Facebook by her son Matthew.
“After a long hard fought battle over the past 5 years, the time has come,” Matthew wrote. “My mother Lauren Chapin passed away from her battle with cancer tonight.”
“I’m at a complete loss for words right now,” he continued. “Please keep my sister and family in your thoughts and prayers as we go through this incredibly tough time.”
Chapin was born in Los Angeles, California in 1945. Her older brothers Michael Chapin (It’s a Wonderful Life) and Billy Chapin (The Night of the Hunter) were popular child stars as well.
Chapin made her debut acting alongside Judy Garland in the 1954 movie A Star Is Born. That same year, she was cast in the beloved sitcom Father Knows Best. Chapin played the precocious Kathy ‘Kitten’ Anderson, the youngest child in the family. She scored the role because she bore a strong resemblance to one of star Robert Young’s four daughters, who was also named Kathy. Young played her father on the show.
Father Knows Best ran for six seasons, and Chapin appeared in 201 of the 203 episodes of the sitcom. She was 9 years-old when she was cast on the show, and she was 15 when it ended in 1960. Later that year, Chapin appeared in an episode of General Electric Theater. She didn’t appear onscreen again for another 16 years, and she ended her career with eleven film and television credits to her name, according to IMDB.
Chapin’s Tumultuous Personal Life
While Chapin played a happy go lucky child on TV, she’s been open about the abuse she was suffering behind the scenes. Her father molested her when she was a child, and her mother was an alcoholic.
By 11 years of age, Chapin admitted that she had a “manic depressive personality.” Things got so bad that she even tried to take her own life at one point.
“It was very difficult to understand how Kathy Anderson could be loved and protected and Lauren Chapin lived a whole different kind of life,” she recalled during a 1989 interview with Regis Philbin and Kathie Lee Gifford. “I didn’t understand how God could let me suffer.”
Chapin dropped out of Pasadena High School when she was a junior. She proceeded to get married at 16, only to get divorced at 18. Chapin’s second marriage was annulled after she discovered that her husband was actually still married to another woman.
In her 1989 interview, Chapin revealed that she was later in a relationship with a man who turned her into a call girl and hooked her on heroin. This became her life for seven years, until she was 25. During this period, Chapin lost eight children to miscarriages. Meanwhile, Chapin had to sue her own mother just to get access to a portion of the money she made from her work on Father Knows Best.
Chapin Turns Her Life Around
Thankfully, Chapin was able to achieve sobriety in 1970. She then became a minister while also working as a talent manager. According to her website, the Party of Five star Jennifer Love Hewitt “got her start in show biz” thanks to Chapin.
Chapin is survived by her brother Michael and her two children, Matthew and Summer. Though her life was not easy at times, Chapin never regretted starring on Father Knows Best.
“If I could be on television again, I would pray for a series like Father Knows Best,” she said in 1981. “One that has no violence, no sex and shows nothing but purity and love.”
Rest in peace, Lauren Chapin.