Clint Walker, star of TV's 'Cheyenne,' dies at age 91

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Clint Walker, the towering, strapping actor who handed down justice as the title character in the early TV western "Cheyenne," has died, his daughter said Tuesday.

Walker died Monday of congestive heart failure at a hospital in his longtime home of Grass Valley, Calif., at age 91, his daughter, Valerie Walker, told The Associated Press.

"He was a warrior, he was fighting to the end," said Valerie Walker, a retired commercial pilot who was among the first women to fly for a major airline.

Clint Walker, whose film credits included "The Ten Commandments" and "The Dirty Dozen," wandered the West after the Civil War as the solitary adventurer Cheyenne Bodie in "Cheyenne," which ran for seven seasons on ABC starting in 1955.

Born Norman Eugene Walker in Hartford, Ill., he later changed his name in both public and private life to the more cowboyish Clint.

He worked on Great Lakes cargo ships and Mississippi river boats and in Texas oil fields before becoming an armed security guard at the Sands Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas.

There, many Hollywood stars, including actor Van Johnson, saw the 6-foot-6, ruggedly handsome Walker and encouraged him to give the movies a try, which Walker said he did after realizing the money would be better and the bullets would be fake.