Bobby Wright, ‘McHale’s Navy’ Actor, Singer and Son of Kitty Wells, Dies at 84

Bobby Wright, the singer and son of country music legend Kitty Wells who played the radio operator Willy Moss on the popular ABC comedy McHale’s Navy, died Tuesday at his home in Madison, Tennessee, his family announced. He was 84.

McHale’s Navy, starring Ernest Borgnine, Joe Flynn and Tim Conway, aired for four seasons (1962-66), and Wright appeared on all 138 episodes of the show that was set on the U.S. Navy boat PT-73 in the Pacific during World War II.

He also appeared with the rest of the cast in the features McHale’s Navy (1964) and McHale’s Navy Joins the Air Force (1966).

Wright recorded for Decca, ABC and United Artists Records from 1967-79 and had 21 singles on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart, with the gentle “Here I Go Again” peaking at No. 13 in 1971.

His other singles included “Lay Some Happiness on Me,” “Everybody Needs a Rainbow,” a cover of Terry Jacks’ “Seasons in the Sun,” “Lovin’ Someone on My Mind” and “I’m Turning You Loose.”

One of three kids, John Robert Wright Jr. was born on March 30, 1942, in Charleston, West Virginia. His father was Johnnie Wright, who toured the South in an act called Johnnie & Jack, with Wells often performing with them.

At age 8, he sang with his parents on the country music program Louisiana Hayride out of Shreveport and played guitar.

He and his family moved to Nashville in 1958 when his folks became headliners at the Grand Ole Opry, and he graduated from Madison High School, where he played baseball, basketball and football.

Wright came to Hollywood to audition for director Peter Tewksbury (Father Knows Best, My Three Sons) for a role on television as a Southern youngster who could play the guitar. The show didn’t move forward, but his screen test was seen by a producer on McHale’s Navy (he was billed as John Wright on the show).

While the comedy was still in production, he gave music another try and worked with his mom on one of her 1965 albums.

After McHale’s Navy ended, Wright played a robber on a 1966 episode of CBS’ Pistols ’n’ Petticoats, a short-lived Western that starred Anne Sheridan, and showed up in the 1974 film Catch the Black Sunshine, starring Ted Cassidy and Chris Robinson.

Wright, who also played bass, trumpet and drums, appeared with his parents and sisters, Ruby and Carol Sue, on the syndicated Kitty Wells Johnnie Wright Family Show for years and toured with his parents until they retired from the road in 2007.

Survivors include Carol Sue; his children, LeAnn and Kamela; his grandchildren, Austin, Cassidy, Shelby and Dalton; his great-grandchildren, Hayden, Pazlee, Remi, Fletcher and Axel; his nieces and nephews, Kitty, John Jr., David, Corrie and Stephanie; and his former wife, Brenda.

Wells, a member of the Country Music Hall of Fame, was country’s first female superstar, racking up nearly three dozen Top 10 hits from 1952-65, including the No. 1 smash “It Wasn’t God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels.”