Robert Hogan: The Wire and Peyton Place actor dies aged 87

Hogan served as a member of the US Army in Korea and later gave up a career in engineering before taking up acting

Actor Robert Hogan is seen in a still image from the series The Fugitive (Facebook/Peyton Place Revisited)

American actor Robert Hogan, who appeared in mainstream TV shows such as The Wire, Peyton Place, and Law & Order, has died at the age of 87.

According to an announcement by his family, Hogan died on 27 May at his home in coastal Maine after battling complications from pneumonia.

He had been living with vascular Alzheimer's disease for the past eight years.

In his six decade-long career, the late actor guest starred in more than 100 television shows such as The Rockford Files, She Wrote, The F.B.I., Barnaby Jones, Gunsmoke, 77 Sunset Strip and Alice to name a few.

In 1965 and 1970, he had two guest shots on CBS’ Hogan’s Heroes, where the main character was named after him by Bernard Fein, the co-creator of the series.

According to the Hollywood Reporter, Hogan had tried out for the main role, but CBS wanted to sign with a “name” actor, offering the part to Van Johnson before Bob Crane joined in.

Species II and Blue Christmas are some of the films he acted in. He also won the Outer Critics Circle Award in 1998 for his performance as famous attorney Clarence Darrow in Never the Sinner, a show about the Leopold and Loeb murder trial in the 1920s.

He made appearances in the soap operas As the World Turns, Another World, All My Children and One Life to Live.

Hogan was born in Jamaica, Queens, and served as a member of the US Army in Korea.

After an honourable discharge, he joined the New York University to study engineering where he changed his career to take up acting.

“After the first semester (at NYU), however, an astute professor suggested he take an aptitude test to determine if engineering was really the best fit for the gregarious young man,” his family wrote in his obituary.

“The test results produced two words: The arts. As Bob would say, ‘That’s when I gave acting a try,’” it said.

Hogan’s surviving family — wife Mary Hogan, his children Chris, Stephen and Jud, first wife Shannon Hogan and grandchildren Susanna and Liam — have requested that donations be made to the nonprofit organisation DOROT in New York City or at the Alzheimer's Association, instead of sending flowers.