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African-American actor Jeff Burton played only one notable film role in a career lasting a decade, but it was a memorable one, as Dodge, one of the two astronauts marooned with Charlton Heston's Taylor in the movie Planet Of the Apes. Born in 1925, he served 11 years in the United States Army, including combat in the Korean War. Burton turned to acting in the early 1960s, and made his screen debut in an early TV movie, Great Gettin' Up In The Morning -- that drama, written by Ann Flagg, directed by Richard Franchot, and produced by the CBS Network, concerned the first day of classes at a newly integrated school, and was ground-breaking in its subject matter for a network-made production (and the cast included Nichelle Nichols and Don Marshall, both later familiar faces on network television). Because of his commanding height and manner, Burton was often cast in authoritative and "operational" roles, including police officers, military men, and federal agents, on programs including Dragnet and The FBI. His day job during those years was with the parole department of the City of Los Angeles. In 1967, he was cast as Dodge, the luckless astronaut who ends up stuffed and displayed in the simian museum in Planet Of the Apes. Burton did get bigger roles after that, occasionally also playing villains as well. He retired from acting after the mid-1970s and passed away in 1988.