Tristram Coffin

Tristram Coffin was born in a Utah mining community, grew up in Salt Lake City, and started acting while in high school. He later continued acting with traveling stock companies. Having earned a degree in speech at the University of Washington, he worked as a news analyst and sportscaster until a Hollywood talent scout approached him with the idea of putting him in films. Coffin's sinister looks served him well in the roles he played in serials like Perils of Nyoka (1942) and Spy Smasher (1942), but there were occasional hero roles, too, as in the feature The Corpse Vanishes (1942) with Bela Lugosi. He donned the bullet helmet and gadget-laden leather jacket of Rocket Man in the 1949 serial King of the Rocket Men (1949). Baby boomers might remember Coffin best as the Arizona Ranger Captain in the 1950s Western series 26 Men (1957).