His fame as both a recording artist and television star also led to a motion picture role co-starring alongside John Wayne, Dean Martin, Walter Brennan, and Angie Dickinson in Howard Hawks's western feature film Rio Bravo (1959).

1 single, "Poor Little Fool", and in 1959 received a Golden Globe nomination for "Most Promising Male Newcomer" after starring in Rio Bravo.

[18] The Nelson boys were first played in the radio series by professional child actors until twelve-year-old Dave and eight-year-old Ricky joined the show on February 20, 1949, in the episode "Invitation to Dinner".

[25] Twenty-five years later, Nelson told the Los Angeles Weekly he hated school because it "smelled of pencils" and he was forced to rise early in the morning to attend.

[23] In January 1960, the athletic Nelson brothers formed a trapeze act with stunts in the 1/27/1960 episode of "Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet" titled 'THE CIRCUS'.

[26] Ozzie Nelson was a Rutgers alumnus and keen on college education,[27] but eighteen-year-old Ricky was already in the 93 percent income-tax bracket and saw no reason to attend.

Although his parents permitted him a $50 allowance at the age of eighteen, Ricky was often strapped for cash and one evening collected and redeemed empty pop bottles to gain entrance to a movie theater for himself and a date.

[29] Nelson played clarinet and drums in his tweens and early teens, learned the rudimentary guitar chords, and vocally imitated his favorite Sun Records rockabilly artists in the bathroom at home or in the showers at the Los Angeles Tennis Club.

[34][35][36][37] On March 26, 1957, he recorded the Fats Domino standard "I'm Walkin'" and "A Teenager's Romance" (released in late April 1957 as his first single),[38] and "You're My One and Only Love".

[37][39] Before the single was released, he made his television rock-and-roll debut on April 10, 1957, singing and playing the drums to "I'm Walkin'" in the Ozzie and Harriet episode "Ricky, the Drummer".

[40][41] About the same time, he made an unpaid public appearance, singing "Blue Moon of Kentucky" with The Four Preps at a Hamilton High School lunch-hour assembly[38] in Los Angeles and was greeted by hordes of screaming teens who had seen the television episode.

[34][43] When the television series went on summer break in 1957, Nelson made his first road trip and played four state and county fairs in Ohio and Wisconsin with the Four Preps, who opened and closed for him.

[44] In early summer 1957, Ozzie Nelson pulled his son from Verve after disputes about royalties and signed him to a lucrative five-year deal with Imperial Records that gave him approval over song selection, sleeve artwork, and other production details.

[48] Nelson grew increasingly dissatisfied performing with older jazz and country session musicians, who were openly contemptuous of rock and roll.

[citation needed] Nelson's music was very well recorded with a clear, punchy sound—thanks in part to engineer Bunny Robyn and producer Jimmy Haskell.

[citation needed] While Nelson preferred rockabilly and uptempo rock songs like "Believe What You Say" (Hot 100 #4), "I Got a Feeling" (#10), "My Bucket's Got a Hole in It" (#12), "Hello Mary Lou" (#9), "It's Late" (#9), "Stood Up" (#2), "Waitin' in School" (#18), "Be-Bop Baby" (#3), and "Just a Little Too Much" (#9), his smooth, calm voice made him a natural to sing ballads.

[citation needed] He had major success with "Travelin' Man" (#1), "A Teenager's Romance" (#2), "Poor Little Fool" (#1), "Young World" (#5), "Lonesome Town" (#7), "Never Be Anyone Else But You" (#6), "Sweeter Than You" (#9), "It's Up to You" (#6), and "Teen Age Idol" (#5).

He made his film debut in Here Come the Nelsons (1952) and had a small role in The Story of Three Loves (1953) at MGM directed by Vincente Minnelli playing Farley Granger as a boy.

Nelson guest starred on Hondo (playing Jesse James), and had a support role in The Over-the-Hill Gang (1969) with Walter Brennan and Pat O'Brien.

Nelson was in Fol-de-Rol (1972), guest starred on McCloud, The Streets of San Francisco, Owen Marshall, Counselor at Law, Petrocelli, A Twist in the Tale, The Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew Mysteries, and The Love Boat.

After some early successes with the label, most notably 1964's "For You" (#6), Nelson's chart career came to a dramatic halt in the wake of Beatlemania, The British Invasion, and later the Counterculture era.

He was one of the early influences of the so-called "California Sound" (which would include singers like Jackson Browne and Linda Ronstadt and bands such as Eagles).

Yet Nelson himself did not reach the Top 40 again until 1970, when he recorded Bob Dylan's "She Belongs to Me" with the Stone Canyon Band, featuring Randy Meisner, who in 1971 became a founding member of the Eagles, and former Buckaroo steel guitarist Tom Brumley.

[60] He was watching the rest of the performance on a TV monitor backstage until Richard Nader finally convinced Nelson to return to the stage and play his "oldies."

In 1957, when Nelson was 17, he met and fell in love with Marianne Gaba, who played the role of Ricky's girlfriend in three episodes of Ozzie and Harriet.

"[64][65] The next year, Nelson fell in love with 15-year-old Lorrie Collins, a country singer appearing on a weekly telecast called Town Hall Party.

[76] Nelson, a nonpracticing Protestant, received instruction in Catholicism at the insistence of the bride's parents[76][77] and signed a pledge to have any children of the union raised in the Catholic faith.

By 1975, following the birth of their last child, the marriage had deteriorated and a very public, controversial divorce involving both families was covered in the press for several years.

[91] Blair's parents wanted their daughter buried next to Nelson at Forest Lawn Cemetery, but Harriet dismissed the idea.

[93] On December 31, 1985, Nelson died when the Douglas DC-3 on which he was a passenger crashed into trees, poles, and electrical wires, when it attempted to make an emergency landing while in flight between Guntersville, Alabama, and Dallas, Texas, where he was to perform a New Year's Eve concert.