When Kurt Russell was 12 years old, he faced a fork in his career path. His father, Bing Russell, owned a minor league baseball club, but made the bulk of his money as an actor; the elder Russell played Deputy Clem Foster in the successful TV Western "Bonanza." Kurt, exposed equally to baseball and acting, began following both his father's paths simultaneously, becoming equally interested in being a star little league player or an on-screen child star.

It was around the age of 12 that the young Kurt Russell attracted the attention of Walt Disney. He had already appeared in several hit TV shows like "Dennis the Menace," "Lost in Space," "The Virginian," "Gilligan's Island," and "The Man from U.N.C.L.E.," and Disney saw nothing but potential for the lad. Most notably, Russell had starred as the title character in "The Travels of Jaimie McPheeters," a Western series based on a Pulitzer Prize-winning novel,...