TV actress Loretta Swit

 Loretta Swit is a legend of American television.

That's because she played head nurse Major Margaret "Hot Lips" Houlihan on the long-running CBS sitcom "M*A*S*H", the acclaimed series about an Army hospital along the front lines of the Korean War.  A career Army officer and a stickler for discipline, Major Houlihan had little tolerance for civilian mannerisms and was fiercely patriotic, which presented inevitable clashes with the draftee doctors she served with - Hawkeye Pierce and Trapper John McIntyre, and later B.J. Hunnicutt.    Bur she grew to respect her fellow hospital personnel while demanding a lot of respect for herself. 

One long-running joke about Margaret was her affair with a married reservist doctor - Major Frank Burns - that they tried to keep secret lest they be called out for hypocrisy over their conservative cultural values.  But everyone in Korea knew about it . . . except, apparently, General MacArthur's pipe-stuffer. 😃

Loretta Swit played Major Houlihan as an accidental feminist in the one place - the military - where a woman could have independence and a professional career in the early 1950s.  Ironically, much of her personality was dictated by the influence of Alan Alda, who played Hawkeye and who was greatly active in promoting feminism in the 1970s.   

Ms. Swit held her on on "M*A*S*H" as the only regular female member of the cast . . . and, apart from Alan Alda, the only regular cast member to last for the series' entire eleven-year run (1972 to 1983).  But the latter situation almost didn't come to pass.  In 1981, she played police officer Christine Cagney in the CBS television movie Cagney and Lacey, about two New York City policewomen (both Irish, of course!).  When the movie was turned into a series, Ms. Swit wanted to reprise her role but was unable to because of contractual obligations to the producers of "M*A*S*H."  (Sharon Gless played Christine Cagney in the "Cagney and Lacey" series.  Tyne Daly played Mary Beth lacey in both the TV movie and the series.)    

Since "M*A*S*H," Loretta Swit has worked steadily in theater and has made guest appearances on other TV shows.  She's also heavily involved in animal-rights activism.  And, she's known for being one of the sweetest people in Hollywood - a far cry from the hard-nosed Army nurse she played so well for a decade and change.