Utah born-and-bred Roger Francke (soon to be re-christened Rod Dana) had an itch to scratch—one that took him to sunny southern California, where an uneventful start as an actor resulted in small roles in both film and television. Disenchantment grew quickly while observing filmmakers like Roger Corman, Bert I. Gordon and Herman Cohen grind out classics for the drive-in crowd. He decided to leave tinsel town behind and continue his neglected medical studies overseas.


Though he had every intention of returning to the studious life, he found himself once again in front of the cameras—this time in Italy, where his star rose as he took the lead in over a half dozen Spaghetti Westerns and action flicks un- der the moniker Rodd Dana and, later, Robert Mark (not to be confused with the German actor Rudolph Zehetgruber, who sometimes appeared under the name Robert Mark in European films in the early 1970s).


Despite the fact that this renewed acting ca- reer was undertaken as a means to an end, Dana proved popular enough with the movie-going public that his reinvigorated vocation might have continued on for many years into the future had it not been for a serious fall from a horse while filming an oater in Spain. This near-death expe- rience turned the actor again away from the en- tertainment biz and onto a more spiritual path, one in which he would try to find answers to his many questions about life and death, a search that took him to the villages of India and the peaks of Tibet.


Today, Rodd Dana’s lifestyle is completely different to his former days in Los Angeles and Rome. With his wife Marge and numerous ani- mal companions, he resides in the mountains of Utah where he runs a large park while continu- ing the search that began after that terrible day on the movie set in Spain. Despite a jovial indif- ference to his work as an actor, there remains a creative spark in Rodd Dana. Under the nom de plume Jon Christian Eagle, he has written and published CONVERSATIONS WITH THE DEVIL, DIALOGUES WITH THE SOUL—CLOSE ENCOUN- TERS OF A VERY DIFFERENT KIND that talks about his life-changing accident and his quest to sort out the mysteries of life. —MB


What can you tell us about your early life? Roger Neal Francke was born on August 8, 1934 on what was, I am told, the hottest day in Vernal, Utah history. However, in their capricious- ness, the gods surprised the residents of this small mountain community the following day by quickly swinging the pendulum in opposition and laying very wet snow over the entire mile-high portion of the state. I later heard that this led those who had read some of the pre-Velokovskian theories to speculate that this was the polar shift that the pseudo-scientific groups had long promised. The Bible thumpers were certain that St. John, or somebody higher up, had been right and the four gruesome guys in bed sheets, astride their with- ered nags, would soon be galloping over the high Utah mountains, and anyone who wasn’t a mem- ber of the chosen Church would certainly be in for a sorry ride South.


Any siblings? Rodd Dana in his Hollywood days.


I had the family more or less to myself until July 1937, when the stork dropped twin brothers down one of our four chimneys, depriving me of my “only-child” privileges. I was always trying to sell my two brothers to Indians from the nearby Ute reservation when they came to visit my MD father and RN mother who, years before, had been in charge of the hospital on the reservation. I re- member that one old Chief, John Pohasik, gave me fifty cents for the pair, when I had only asked for a quarter. He had gotten down the front walk and through the white picket fence with them when the realization of what I had done overwhelmed me. I ran after him begging him not to put them in his wagon; I even offered him back his fifty- cents. My parents and the Chief were certain I had learned my lesson; however, I remember that I tried to sell the twins at least three more times—always to the delight of any who were in on the deal. A sister was born when I was 12, and to this day, she is one of my greatest allies and mentors.


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