What old-time TV sidekick started out as a middle-weight boxer named Harry Smith?
Harold J. Smith, born in Canada on May 26, 1912, played the Lone Ranger’s trusted companion, Tonto, on TV. By the time Smith began his television career, though, he was known as Jay Silverheels. A member of the Mohawk First Nations, Silverheels was born on the Six Nations of the Grand River First Nation near Brantford, Ontario; he was the first Native American to get a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Consistently cast as an “Indian” in early movies, Silverheels performed alongside Clayton Moore in 1949, in a film called The Cowboy and the Indians. Moore went on to play the titular role in The Lone Ranger.
