Comes a Horseman (1979)
The Grey Fox (1982)
Anne of Green Gables (1985)
Chase (1985)
The Straight Story (1999)
Note: Farnsworth was inducted into the Hall of Great Western Performers at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma in 1997. In addition, Farnsworth received a Hollywood Walk of Fame star for his contributions in the motion pictures on 1560 Vine Street on August 17, 1992.
Farnsworth was born on September 1, 1920 in Los Angeles, California, to a housewife mother and an Engineer father. He was raised during the Great Depression. When he was seven, Farnsworth's father died. He then lived with his aunt, mother, and two sisters in Downtown Los Angeles.
In 1937, age 16, Farnsworth was working as a stable hand at a polo field in Los Angeles for six dollars a week when he was offered employment with better pay as a stuntman. He rode horses in films such as The Adventures of Marco Polo featuring Gary Cooper and performed horse-riding Stunts in films including A Day at the Races (1937) and Gunga Din (1939). Farnsworth was employed on the set of Spartacus (1960) for eleven months where he drove a chariot.
From stunt work, Farnsworth gradually moved into acting in Western movies. He made uncredited appearances in numerous films, including Gone with the Wind (1939), Red River (1948), The Wild One (1953), and The Ten Commandments (1956).
Farnsworth received his first acting credit in 1963 and went on to act in western films and also television shows. He had a role in Roots (1977). In 1992, he co-starred with Wilford Brimley in The Boys of Twilight. His breakthrough came when he played stagecoach robber Bill Miner in the 1982 Canadian film The Grey Fox. He appeared as a baseball coach in The Natural (1984). In 1985 he was the brother to Marilla and father figure to Anne in Anne of Green Gables. Another prominent role was the suspicious sheriff in the film version of Stephen King's Misery (1990).
Farnsworth became well known in the Pacific North West as the groundskeeper who saw the mythical "Artesians" in the 1980s Olympia Beer advertising campaign.
Note: Farnsworth was inducted into the Hall of Great Western Performers at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma in 1997. In addition, Farnsworth received a Hollywood Walk of Fame star for his contributions in the motion pictures on 1560 Vine Street on August 17, 1992.
On October 6, 2000, after a long illness with metastatic prostate cancer, Farnsworth committed suicide by shooting himself at his ranch. He is interred at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in the Hollywood Hills of Los Angeles in the Columbarium of Purity (N-63294) beside his wife, Margaret née Hill (1919–1985).
