Mike Connors (born August 15, 1925) is an American actor best known for playing Joe Mannix in the long-running detective television series, Mannix. Before that, he had played a crime-fighting investigator, wielding a .38 handgun hidden in his back, in the TV series Tightrope.
Born Krikor Ohanian in Fresno, California, he graduated from UCLA where he was a member of the Phi Delta Theta Fraternity. An avid basketball player who was nicknamed "Touch" by his teammates, he is credited in his early films, such as Island in the Sky (1953), Swamp Women, a.k.a. Swamp Diamonds and Five Guns West (1955) as Touch Connors.
In 1956, still billed as Touch Connors, he played an Amalekite herder in Cecil B. DeMille's The Ten Commandments starring Charlton Heston.
His three TV series were CBS's Tightrope (September 8, 1959-September 13, 1960), CBS's Mannix (September 16, 1967-August 27, 1975) and ABC's Today's F.B.I. (October 25, 1981-August 14, 1982).
He currently lives in Encino, California.
He attended the "Hollywood Collectors & Celebrities Show", at Beverly Garland's Holiday Inn, in North Hollywood, California.
He is of Armenian heritage.
His "Touch" nickname comes from his college basketball playing days.
Because of his Armenian heritage, Connors has been tapped by Amenian-American documentary film maker J. Michael Hagopian to narrate several of his documentaries on the Armenian genocide.
Best remembered by the public for his starring role in Mannix (1967).
