10/31/2025
Ron Howard with his brother Clint and father Rance, 1970.
Rance Howard wasn’t a Hollywood star in the flashy sense — no scandals, no big headlines, no Oscars. But he was one of those faces you’ve seen a hundred times without realizing it. A man who quietly built a six-decade career, appearing in everything from Cool Hand Luke to Apollo 13, and who happened to raise one of Hollywood’s most respected directors, Ron Howard.
Born Harold Engle Beckenholdt in 1928 in a small Oklahoma town, Rance’s path to film started far from the cameras. After serving in the Air Force, he studied drama at the University of Oklahoma, performing in plays and realizing he loved storytelling more than anything. When he decided to go professional, he changed his name to “Rance Howard” — a name that would later be recognized in hundreds of film and TV credits.
His first break came in the early 1950s when he joined a touring children’s theater company. From there, he hit Broadway in Mister Roberts with Henry Fonda — a solid start for a kid from Oklahoma. Over time, Rance and his wife, Jean Speegle Howard, moved to California, chasing television work. They had two sons: Ron and Clint. Rance encouraged both to act, even taking small TV roles himself just to be around them. When The Andy Griffith Show made little Ron a household name, Rance stayed close, not as a stage dad, but as the grounding force in a family suddenly living under studio lights.
Rance became one of those reliable Hollywood character actors — the type every director wants on set. He played farmers, preachers, judges, sheriffs, and kindly old men. You might spot him in Chinatown, Independence Day, Ed Wood, or A Beautiful Mind. He even appeared in his son Ron’s films — sometimes as a minister, sometimes as a background figure, but always steady, always believable.
He was never chasing fame; he was building longevity. To younger actors, he became a quiet mentor. To casting directors, he was the dependable choice. And to his family, he was the reason the Howards became one of Hollywood’s rare grounded dynasties.
In the final years of his life, Rance was still acting. In his late 80s, he was showing up to sets, hitting his marks, and doing what he’d done since the 1940s — working. In November 2017, he passed away at 89, just a week after finishing a film.
When Ron Howard announced his father’s death, Hollywood responded with a kind of quiet respect reserved for people who had spent a lifetime doing the work without ever demanding the spotlight. Rance Howard was never a leading man, but his career outlasted most who were.
A true definition of an actor’s actor — the man whose face told a thousand stories, even if most people never knew his name.
