Ronald Lee Oliver on Chip Oliver – Those Were the Days

PopEntertainment
Feb 8
3 min read

Updated: 12 hours ago

Ronald Lee Oliver on Chip Oliver

Those Were the Days

By Ronald Sklar

The late Chip Oliver’s life reads like a parable of late-1960s America: discipline and rebellion, muscle and mysticism, Hollywood lights and San Francisco communes. Told here through the voice of his younger brother, Ronald Lee Oliver, it’s also a story about family bonds stretched thin – yet never entirely broken.

Born in his father’s hometown of Kilmichael, Mississippi, he endured a tumultuous childhood with more than a handful of forced family relocations born of his father’s military duties. Chip eventually landed in San Diego, where he excelled in sports – especially football.

He starred at University of Southern California, where his speed and instincts compensated for what scouts considered light weight for a lineman – about 205 pounds. “Chip wasn’t the biggest guy,” Ron recalls, “but he played angry. He played like he had something to prove.”

That edge carried him to the Oakland Raiders, who drafted him in 1968. Fate set up a poetic moment late that season: Chip, the San Diego kid, was finally scheduled to play professionally in his hometown. “He was so excited,” Ron says. “That was the dream – coming home in a pro uniform.” But the moment never landed the way it should have.

By Ron’s account, drugs were already creeping into Chip’s life, amplified by the Raiders’ famously hard-living culture of the era. “That environment,” Ron says carefully, “it wasn’t built for someone who was already restless inside.”

Chip Oliver playing for the University of Southern California football team.

After two seasons, Chip shocked everyone by walking away. Eventually, he went full hippie, dropping out of football entirely and joining a commune – a decision that baffled fans but felt inevitable to those who knew him best.

“Chip was always searching,” Ron says. “Football was one costume. Hollywood was another.”

Hollywood, in fact, had already flirted with him. Chip transitioned from extra work (you’ll spot him walking in the airport in the opening credits of The Graduate) into speaking roles.

In 1969, Chip landed a strange, pivotal part: he played “Meathead” in the second pilot of All in the Family, before Rob Reiner won the iconic role. That appearance became the hinge of Chip’s life – the moment where all paths seemed possible.

Chip Oliver and Carroll O'Connor on the "All in the Family" pilot "Those Were The Days."

“That was the fork in the road,” Ron reflects. “He could’ve stayed, built something real as an actor. But Chip didn’t want a lane. He wanted freedom.”

Freedom led him deeper into counterculture. He eventually joined the One World Family of the Messiah's Crusade, embracing its macrobiotic lifestyle and spiritual absolutism. It also led to estrangement. For years, Chip was largely cut off from his family.

“That was the hardest part,” Ron says. “Not the choices – but losing him while he was still alive.”

Chip Oliver died at 78 from intestinal complications, his later years quiet and removed from the worlds that once celebrated him. Ron, meanwhile, kept creating – acting, writing, hustling, staying connected.

“I carry Chip with me,” he says. “The good, the talent, the questions. He lived like a man chasing truth. Even when it cost him everything.”

In the end, Chip Oliver wasn’t just a Raider, or an actor, or a flower child. He was all of them -- and a brother whose unfinished story still echoes.

If you haven’t yet screened Chip’s 1969 All in the Family pilot, it will blow your mind:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VOTyzkEwQ0s

Find out more about Ronald Lee Oliver’s work here.