Did Dan “Grizzly Adams” Haggerty Lose His Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame Because of a Drug Bust?

Here is the latest in a series of examinations into urban legends about TV and whether they are true or false. Click here to view an archive of the TV urban legends featured so far.

TV URBAN LEGEND: Dan Haggerty lost his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame because of a well-publicized drug bust.

Dan Haggerty is best known for his work on the 1974 film, The Life and Times of Grizzly Adams, where Haggerty played a man wrongly accused of murder who flees to the wilderness and becomes a sort of “mountain man.”

The series launched a popular TV series of the same name and Haggerty became a popular television star.

However, Haggerty had some rough patches in his life off of the screen.

In 1984, he was convicted of possession of cocaine in a highly-publicized drug bust.

When that news is combined with the fact that Dan Haggerty is the only celebrity (to date, at least) who has had their star removed from the Hollywood Walk of Fame, it naturally has led to people telling some variation of “Dan Haggerty got his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame removed because of a drug bust.”

That’s not true, and mostly because the whole “he had his star removed” story is, in its own way, not true either.

You see, Dan Haggerty only received a star in the first place because someone misspelled the name of the ACTUAL recipient, old-time film and TV star Don Haggerty.

So does a typo really mean that Dan Haggerty “had a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame but it was removed”?

That seems to be stretching it a bit, doesn’t it?

In any event, since he never really HAD a star to begin with, it could not have been taken away because of his drug bust.

But just in case anyone thinks there were any sort of hard feelings, Haggerty DID ultimately receive a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, as well.

The legend is…

STATUS: False

Feel free (heck, I implore you!) to write in with your suggestions for future installments! My e-mail address is bcronin@legendsrevealed.com.

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