“What’s that, Lassie? Timmy’s trapped in the well?” The go-to Lassie reference, of course, is the seventeen-season TV show that ran from 1954 to 1973. But the collie had a popular film career first, making its debut in 1943’s Lassie Come Home (alongside a young Roddy McDowall) and starring in seven films, including 1946’s Courage of Lassie (above). Though Lassie was a female character, she was actually portrayed by a male dog named Pal, whose descendants went on to play the title role in the long-running television series.
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