Karin Jan Smithers (born July 3, 1949) is an American actress. She is known for playing
Bailey Quarters on the
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainm ...
sitcom ''
WKRP in Cincinnati
''WKRP in Cincinnati'' is an American sitcom television series about the misadventures of the staff of a struggling fictional radio station in Cincinnati, Ohio. The show was created by Hugh Wilson and was based upon his experiences working ...
'' (1978–1982).
Life and career
Smithers grew up with her parents and three sisters in
Woodland Hills, Los Angeles
Woodland Hills is a neighborhood bordering the Santa Monica Mountains in the San Fernando Valley region of Los Angeles, California.
Geography
Woodland Hills is in the southwestern region of the San Fernando Valley, which is located east of Ca ...
, and attended what is now
William Howard Taft Charter High School
William Howard Taft Charter High School is a public school located on the corner of Ventura Boulevard and Winnetka Avenue in the Woodland Hills district of the San Fernando Valley in Los Angeles, California, within the Los Angeles Unified Schoo ...
there. She first reached the public eye as a teenager when she was profiled and featured on the March 21, 1966 cover of ''
Newsweek
''Newsweek'' is an American weekly online news magazine co-owned 50 percent each by Dev Pragad, its president and CEO, and Johnathan Davis, who has no operational role at ''Newsweek''. Founded as a weekly print magazine in 1933, it was widely ...
'' seated on the back of a motorcycle. She received offers from Hollywood agents as a result of that appearance.
James Brolin
James Brolin (, born Craig Kenneth Bruderlin; July 18, 1940) is an American actor. Brolin has won two Golden Globes and an Emmy. He received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame on August 27, 1998. He is the father of actor Josh Brolin.
He ...
[ and was stepmother to his two children from a previous marriage; together they have one daughter, Molly Elizabeth (b. 1987). Smithers filed for divorce from Brolin in 1995.
After living in ]Halifax, Nova Scotia
Halifax is the capital and largest municipality of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Nova Scotia, and the largest municipality in Atlantic Canada. As of the 2021 Census, the municipal population was 439,819, with 348 ...
, Canada, she now lives in Ojai, California.[ In June 2014, Smithers attended a reunion of surviving ''WKRP in Cincinnati'' cast members hosted by the ]Paley Center for Media
The Paley Center for Media, formerly the Museum of Television & Radio (MT&R) and the Museum of Broadcasting, founded in 1975 by William S. Paley, is an American cultural institution in New York with a branch office in Los Angeles, dedicated to ...
.
Television and Filmography
References
Further reading
*
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Smithers, Jan
1949 births
Living people
Actresses from Los Angeles
American film actresses
American television actresses
People from Woodland Hills, Los Angeles
20th-century American actresses
William Howard Taft Charter High School alumni
21st-century American women