The Tragic Story of Stanley Fafara, Whitey on ‘Leave It to Beaver'”

LEAVE IT TO BEAVER, (from left): Hugh Beaumont, Barbara Billingsley, Jerry Mathers, Tony Dow, (1963), 1957-63. — Everett Collection

When Leave It to Beaver premiered in 1957, Stanley Fafara became a familiar face to viewers as Hubert “Whitey” Whitney, one of Beaver’s fellow mischievous friends. Whitey was often right in the middle of Beaver’s adventures, and he quickly became a favorite among fans. But once the cameras stopped rolling, Fafara’s real life took a very different turn; the actor struggled with drugs, and on September 20, 2003, his 54th birthday, he died in a Portland hospital following complications from surgery.

Born in San Francisco on September 20, 1949, Fafara grew up in Studio City, California. His mother steered him toward acting at a young age, and by the age of 4, he was already appearing in commercials and TV westerns. At the age of 7, he and his older brother, Tiger, attended an open casting call for a new sitcom that would become Leave It to Beaver. Both were hired, with Stanley playing Whitey and Tiger cast as Tooey, one of Wally Cleaver’s friends. During this time, he also appeared in a few other shows including Wagon Train and Wanted: Dead or Alive.

After Leave It to Beaver ended in 1963, Stanley returned to being a regular teenager at North Hollywood High School. He later fell in with the rock group Paul Revere and the Raiders, and while it may have seemed glamorous at the time, that period marked the beginning of drinking and drug use that would shadow him for decades.

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“My life was a blessing and a curse,” Fafara said, according to the Los Angeles Times. “At one time I had money …. There were times when I’d walk around with $16,000 in my pocket.” He said fame gave him access to drugs, money and women, and that he took full advantage of it. His parents tried to help by sending him to live with his sister in Jamaica, where he picked up painting, but he continued to struggle with substance abuse. Back in Los Angeles, he briefly married and divorced, worked odd jobs and drifted back into dealing drugs. By the early 1980s, his addictions had led to multiple pharmacy burglaries, a jail sentence and an ongoing battle.

Fafara eventually moved to Portland, Oregon, with a girlfriend, but the relationship dissolved as his heroin use worsened. At his lowest point, he lived in a motel and weighed less than 130 pounds, nearly unrecognizable as the boy who once played Whitey. In 1995, he entered detox and finally began turning his life around. He moved into a clean and sober house, then a subsidized rooming building where he lived on disability checks.

On his door, he taped a sign that read “Last Chance.” He told a reporter, “This is my last chance. If I fail, I’ll have to set up shop on the street.” Although his later years were quiet and far removed from Hollywood, Fafara found a kind of peace in sobriety, although he struggled with hepatitis C from his drug use. He died following complications from a surgery to remove a hernia. He was survived by a daughter and a grandchild.