Michael Landon - Legacy

Legacy

A community building at Malibu's Bluffs Park was named "The Michael Landon Center" following the actor's death.

Landon's son, Michael Jr., produced a memorial special, Michael Landon: Memories with Laughter and Love, featuring the actor's friends and co-stars. Bonanza co-star David Canary said that one word that described Landon was "fearless" in his dealings with network brass. Melissa Gilbert, who played his daughter on Little House said that the actor made her feel "incredibly safe" and that he was "paternal". Often cited was his bizarre sense of humor, which included having toads leap from his mouth and dressing as a superhero to visit a pizza parlor. In his final 1991 Tonight Show appearance, Johnny Carson related how the actor took him back to a restaurant the two had dined at previously. Carson had been led to believe he accidentally ran over the owner's cat in the parking lot during their first visit. When sitting down to eat the second time, Carson discovered that Landon had helped create a fake menu of dinner items featuring dead cat.

A made-for-TV movie, Michael Landon, the Father I Knew, co-written and directed by his son Michael, Jr., aired on CBS in May 1999. John Schneider starred in the title role as Michael Landon, with Cheryl Ladd as Lynn Noe, and Joel Berti as Michael Landon, Jr. The biopic detailed, from Landon, Jr's point of view, the personal emotional trauma he endured during his parents divorce, and his father's premature death. The movie spanned a timeline from the 1960s through the early 1990s.

A plaque and small playground referred to as the "Little Treehouse on the Prairie" was erected in Knights Park, a central park in Landon's hometown of Collingswood. In 2011, the plaque was removed from the park by the borough and was later given to a local newspaper by an unnamed person. According to the Collingswood, NJ website, the plaque was removed during a fall cleanup with plans to return it to a safer location. The plaque was reinstated next to bench in safer location the following summer