The Tragic Story of Anissa Jones from ‘Family Affair’
When Family Affair premiered on CBS in 1966, audiences instantly fell in love with little Buffy Davis, played by Anissa Jones, and her beloved doll, Mrs. Beasley. Buffy represented the sweet innocence of childhood, and her character became one of the most recognizable faces on television. With her blond pigtails and adorable smile, Jones was thrust into the spotlight but things quickly turned tragic, and the young actress passed away shortly after her 18th birthday.
Who was Anissa Jones?
Jones was born on March 11, 1958, in Lafayette, Indiana, and later moved with her family to California. She started her acting career young, appearing in commercials before landing the role of Buffy at just eight years old. The show was a success and ran until 1971, but when the cameras stopped rolling, Jones faced the harsh reality that often comes with early fame.
What happened to Anissa Jones after Family Affair?
After five years on a hit sitcom, she struggled to find work and didn’t want to go back to having a normal childhood. Many casting directors could only see her as Buffy, and Jones grew frustrated at being typecast as the little girl she no longer was.
In 1972, in a UPI interview promoting his Disney films, former costar Johnny Whitaker, who played Jody, said that over the course of filming Family Affair, “Anissa Jones and I became great friends. But I don’t see any of them anymore.”
Her life at home was equally difficult. Jones’ parents divorced, and she was caught in custody battles that left her without much stability. By her teenage years, she had drifted away from acting altogether. When she turned 18 in March of 1976, she inherited the money she had earned on Family Affair. Reports suggest that a large part of her earnings, estimated in the hundreds of thousands of dollars, were spent within just a few months. Without the structure of work or school, Jones began surrounding herself with friends who led her toward destructive choices, including drugs.
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During the mid-’70s, “what happened to Anissa Jones?” was a common question written into newspaper entertainment columns. An August 25, 1973 edition of the Pottsville Republican newspaper wrote that, “It may seem hard to believe of one so young, but Anissa Jones has retired. She just wants to be a plain ordinary schoolgirl these days. And — this may be hard to believe, too —but she’s now a teen-ager.”
The untimely death of Anissa Jones
On August 28, 1976, Jones was sadly found dead in Oceanside, California. The coroner ruled her cause of death as a drug overdose, specifically “combined drug intoxication.” She was only 18 years old. Several days after her death, her doctor, Dr. Don Moshos, was arrested in connection with her passing; he was charged with a felony for allegedly prescribing Jones powerful and unnecessary drugs that led to her death. He died himself that December, before he could stand trial.
The loss shocked her former costars and fans alike and her story is often cited as a reminder of the dangers of being a child star. Unfortunately, her brother died of a drug overdose as well, just about a decade later in 1984.
Jones was not the only cast member of Family Affair who struggled afterwards; Johnny Whitaker also grapped with addiction before eventually becoming a certified drug counselor, and Brian Keith, who played Uncle Bill, died by suicide in 1997, at the age of 75.
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