Early life and education

Leachman attended the Theodore Roosevelt High School in her home town of Des Moines, Iowa, where she effectively grew up. She had two sisters and she was the youngest of the three. All of them used to work at the Leachman Lumber Company – a family operated business. Interestingly enough her youngest sister – Claiborne Cary was also an actress but she was at the same time a great singer. It is known that her grandmother was of Czech, Bohemian descent.

Cloris got through college and majored in drama at the University of the State of Illionis. She also went through the Northwestern University where she used to be a member of the Camma Phi Beta. There she met one of her classmates – Paul Lynde, who went on to become a famous comedian. Ever since she started competing for the Miss America as Miss Chicago back in 1946, Cloris started to appear on both television series and movie productions.

Professional career

Leachman got her debut all the way back in 1947. Even though she was an extra in the movie called Carnegie Hall, this definitely started to open professional doors for her. She played her first actual role in Kiss Me Deadly which aired back in 1955 and was directed by Robert Aldrich.  Leachman is definitely a highly regarded actress and she has her eight primetime as well as one daytime Emmy award to show for it. She has more than 20 nominations for the work that she has done in television.

Back in 1977 she was a guest star on The Muppet Show and a year later – in 1978, she got the Sarah Siddons Award for the work that she did in theatre. All of those successes, amongst many more, have gathered her significant net worth of approximately $21 million.

Personal Life

Cloris was married for 26 years between 1953 and 1979 to the impresario of Hollywood George Englund. In fact, her former mother-in-law was also an actress who played Samantha Stevens on Bewitched. As a result of the marriage with her husband, Leachman is now a mother of five. The names of her children are George, Dinah, Morgan, Adam and Bryan. Unfortunately the latter passed away back in 1986.  Some of her kids are also in the show business and Morgan, for instance, was on the Guiding Light show where he played the role of Dylan. He was on the show for over ten seasons between 1980 and the early 1990s. Cloris has a different view on religion and she claimed that she is an atheist back in 2012.