Herbert Nelson; Actor With Wide-Ranging Credits

Herbert Nelson, an actor whose credits ranged from the soap opera “The Guiding Light” to the television series “Maude,” died Thursday at 76. Nelson suffered a stroke at the Actors Fund of America Nursing Home in Englewood, N.J., a suburb of New York City.

Nelson’s career began in the 1930s with tent repertory and stock theater in the Midwest where he also did more than 30 live radio shows in Chicago, including “Perry Mason,” “Betty and Bob,” “The Carters of Elm Street” and “Dan Harding’s Wife.” In 1940 he moved to New York with “The Guiding Light.”

He was cast in his first Broadway role in 1941 in S.J. Perelman’s “The Night Before Christmas” and helped launch the nation’s first state-subsidized theater, the Virginia State Theater, in Abingdon, Va. Nelson was also a founding member of the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists union.

The 1950s was marked by many roles in live television dramas and daytime serials, including “Believe It or Not,” “The Honeymooners,” “Perry Mason” and four years with Hal Holbrook in “The Brighter Day.”

He performed many times at the New York Shakespeare Festival under the direction of Joseph Papp, including a role in 1964 as Desdemona’s father, Brabantio, in “Othello.”

While he worked in New York, Nelson’s home was in suburban Leonia, where he was active in civic affairs. He moved to Venice, Calif., in 1968, and lived there until 1989. He appeared in such films as “When the North Wind Blows,” “The Great Northfield, Minnesota Raid,” “The Hindenburg” and others.

During the late 1960s and 1970s, Nelson appeared in many television series, including “The Bold Ones,” “The Waltons,” “Little House on the Prairie” and “Maude.”