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This is a list of characters from the M*A*S*H franchise created by Richard Hooker, covering the various fictional characters appearing in the novel MASH: A Novel About Three Army Doctors (1968) and its sequels M*A*S*H Goes to Maine (1971), M*A*S*H Goes to New Orleans (1974), M*A*S*H Goes to Paris (1974), M*A*S*H Goes to London (1975), M*A*S*H Goes to Vienna (1976), M*A*S*H Goes to San Francisco (1976), M*A*S*H Goes to Morocco (1976), M*A*S*H Goes to Miami (1976), M*A*S*H Goes to Las Vegas (1976), M*A*S*H Goes to Hollywood (1976), M*A*S*H Goes to Texas (1977), M*A*S*H Goes to Moscow (1977), M*A*S*H Goes to Montreal (1977), and M*A*S*H Mania (1977), the 1970 film adaptation of the novel, the television series M*A*S*H (1972–1983), AfterMASH (1983–1985), W*A*L*T*E*R (1984), and Trapper John, M.D. (1979–1986), and the video game M*A*S*H (1983).

M*A*S*H is a media franchise revolving around the staff of the 4077th Mobile Army Surgical Hospital as they attempt to maintain sanity during the harshness of the Korean War.

Overview

Main characters

Benjamin "Hawkeye" Pierce

Benjamin "Hawkeye" Pierce
M*A*S*H character
First appearance	MASH: A Novel About Three Army Doctors
Last appearance	"Goodbye, Farewell and Amen"
Portrayed by	Film: Donald Sutherland Television: Alan Alda
In-universe information
Gender	Male
Title	Captain and Chief Surgeon
Family	Benjy Pierce (father--novel); Daniel Pierce (father--TV)
Spouse	Vanessa Pierce Girlfriend (pretend, in TV episode 1/23)
Hometown	Crabapple Cove, Maine

Captain Benjamin Franklin "Hawkeye" Pierce (Jr. in the novel) was played by Donald Sutherland in the film, and by Alan Alda in the television series. Between long sessions of treating wounded patients, he is found making wisecracks, drinking heavily, carousing, womanizing, and pulling pranks on the people around him, especially Frank Burns and "Hot Lips" Houlihan. In the novel, he serves as a moral center and author's alter ego, chiding Trapper John for calling Major Houlihan "Hot Lips," which he never does himself. Although just one of an ensemble of characters in author Richard Hooker's MASH: A Novel About Three Army Doctors, in the television series Hawkeye became the center of the MASH unit's medical activity. In the television series, he becomes the Chief Surgeon of the unit early in the first season.^[1]

Pierce was born and raised in New England, most often mentioning Crabapple Cove, Maine, as a place that his family had a summer home and with a few references (primarily in the early seasons) to Vermont. His father graduated from medical school and settled as a doctor in Crabapple Cove in 1911. His mother is deceased and he has a sister (like Vermont, they are mentioned in some early episodes and then never again; although, in season 4, he says he was an only child), and he is close to his father. In the novel and film, Hawkeye is married with children, but in the TV series, he is a bachelor and something of a ladies' man (although he fakes being married to Vanessa Pierce Girlfriend in episode 1/23 "Ceasefire".)

He was given the nickname "Hawkeye" by his father, Benjy (Sr.), in the novel and in the series from the character in the novel The Last of the Mohicans, "the only book my old man ever read".^[2] His birth name is taken from a member of Hooker's own family named Franklin Pierce.^[3]

Alternatively, in the lobby of Memorial Hall at Harvard University, the names of Harvard men who died in the Civil War are inscribed. Among those from the Medical School is listed one Benjamin Franklin Peirce .

Although he had a rather unremarkable boyhood, by his own admission he had had several experiences he never forgot. Once when young, he fell overboard in a pond and nearly drowned as a result of a cruel practical joke (which left him with lifelong claustrophobia). When he was 14, his father was angered to find him in bed with a girl and smoking a cigarette. When he was 12, he discovered his father was dating a female bookkeeper; to keep his father's attention all to himself, Hawkeye selfishly ruined their relationship so they couldn't marry.

He attended the fictional Androscoggin College. In the book and the film, Hawkeye had played football in college; in the series, he is non-athletic. After completing his medical residency (possibly in Chicago; he has a familiarity with the city that implies extended time spent there, e.g., "Adam's Ribs"); he had a common law marriage with a nurse, Carlye Breslin, but they broke up after a year. In 1950 he was drafted into the US Army Medical Corps and sent to serve at the 4077th Mobile Army Surgical Hospital (MASH) during the Korean War. He became Chief Surgeon instead of Burns because Hawkeye specialized in cardiothoracic surgery in addition to general surgery, whereas Burns was only qualified in general surgery. Alda said of Pierce, "Some people think he was very liberal. But he was also a traditional conservative. I mean, he wanted nothing more than to have people leave him alone so he could enjoy his martini, you know? Government should get out of his liquor cabinet".^[4]

Pierce has little tolerance for military red tape and protocol, feeling they get in the way of his doing his job, and has little respect for most Regular Army personnel. He never wears rank insignia on his fatigues, usually wears a bathrobe instead of uniform, never polishes his combat boots, and only wears his Class A uniform when he believes appearance can achieve greater good – but does not wear any of the decorations to which he is entitled. (Based on what was told and shown in the course of the series, these would include the World War II Victory Medal, the Army of Occupation Medal,^[5] the National Defense Service Medal, the Korean Campaign Medal, the U.N. Service Medal, the Meritorious Unit Commendation, the Commendation Medal, the Purple Heart, and possibly a Legion of Merit; plus the Combat Medical Badge for his periodic service at battalion aid stations.) On occasion, he assumes temporary command of the 4077th in the absence or disability of Colonels Blake or Potter.

As a surgeon, he does not like the use of firearms and he refuses to carry a sidearm as required by regulations when serving as Officer of the Day.^[6] When he is ordered by Colonel Potter to carry his issue pistol on a trip to a ROK aid station and they are ambushed on the road, he fires it into the air rather than at their attackers. This was after he told the gun "You're fired."^[7] He is also a chronic alcoholic, for three years in Korea drinking every day three times more heavily than the average person and also drinks 12 year old Scotch Whiskey and Seagrams (Canadian whisky); the latter so heavily that in the episode "Bottle Fatigue" Klinger decides to buy stock in Seagrams!

In the series finale, "Goodbye, Farewell, and Amen", Hawkeye experiences a mental breakdown when a Korean woman responds to his frantic demand that she quiet her infant child lest enemy soldiers hear it and discover them, by suffocating it. In talking to psychiatrist Sidney Freedman he first says that the woman had suffocated a chicken, until Freedman led him to admit the repressed memory – the horror of a mother smothering her own baby. He recommended that Hawkeye return to the 4077th for the end of the war to come to terms with what he had endured. (In real life, Pierce would have been up for a Section 8 discharge because of his emotional breakdown after serving in Korea for at least two years in a MASH unit.)

In an episode earlier in the series, Hawkeye is mistakenly reported dead. He boards a Quartermaster Corps bus/hearse which has dead soldiers aboard, saying he has just about had his fill of war, and admits he is tired of seeing death every day.^[8] In one episode, a temporary replacement surgeon from Tokyo General Hospital, who cut his teeth performing meatball surgery under impossible conditions in the Pusan Perimeter at the start of the war, does indeed crack under pressure and probably received a Section 8 due to his emotional breakdown that prevents him working as a combat surgeon.^[9]

When the Korean Armistice is announced, he states his intention to return to Crabapple Cove to be a local doctor who has the time to get to know his patients, instead of contending with the endless flow of casualties he faced during his time in Korea. He is depicted doing this in Hooker's two sequels, M*A*S*H Goes to Maine and M*A*S*H Mania.

Trapper John McIntyre

Trapper John McIntyre
M*A*S*H character
First appearance	MASH: A Novel About Three Army Doctors
Last appearance	"Abyssinia, Henry" (M*A*S*H) "The Elusive Butterfly" (Trapper John, M.D.)
Portrayed by	Film: Elliott Gould Television: Wayne Rogers (for M*A*S*H) Pernell Roberts (for Trapper John, M.D.)
In-universe information
Gender	Male
Title	Captain
Spouse	Louise McIntyre
Children	Cathy McIntyre (daughter) Becky McIntyre (daughter)
Hometown	Boston, Massachusetts

Captain "Trapper" John Francis Xavier McIntyre appears in the novels, the film (played by Elliott Gould), the M*A*S*H TV series (played by Wayne Rogers), and the spin-off Trapper John, M.D. series (played by Pernell Roberts). He is one of the main characters in the M*A*S*H TV series during the first three seasons and the central character of the latter series. His nickname comes from an incident in which he was caught having sex with a woman in the lavatory aboard a Boston & Maine Railway train: she claimed in her defense that "he trapped me!"

In the book and the film, Trapper John is a graduate of Dartmouth College (having played quarterback on the school's football team) and serves as thoracic surgeon of the 4077th. In the film, he has a dry, sardonic, deadpan sense of humor, while in the M*A*S*H TV series he is more of a class clown. Trapper spends much of his time on the series engaging in mischief with Hawkeye Pierce, with the two playing practical jokes on Majors Frank Burns and Margaret "Hot Lips" Houlihan, heavy drinking, and trying to seduce women. While Trapper expresses great love for his wife and daughters, he also fraternizes with the nurses a great deal with no pretense of fidelity. He admits frankly that his wife collects his pay for a special fund to pay private investigators who will spy on him which will begin the second night he gets home from Korea.

In the film, Hawkeye and Trapper are given roughly equal focus, but in the TV series, the character devolved to become more of a sidekick to the character of Hawkeye. This frustrated Rogers, and in combination with a dispute over the terms of the original five-year contract, he quit the show shortly before production of the fourth season began; the character of Trapper was abruptly discharged from the Army and sent back to the United States. The character of B.J. Hunnicutt was created to replace him, with the two-part Season Four opener created to explain his absence (the third episode introducing Col. Potter was intended to be the premiere episode).

The character returned to television in 1979 in the medical drama series Trapper John, M.D. Now played by Pernell Roberts, the character is depicted in the then-present day as the middle-aged Chief of Surgery at a San Francisco hospital. Regarding his family life, he is divorced from his wife; the only mention of his children is that he has a grown son. This version of the character is in continuity with the film rather than the TV series, but no other characters from either production appear in this series, making Trapper John the only M*A*S*H character to be depicted on-screen in the present day at the time of airing. In the first season, McIntyre's chief nurse, nicknamed "Starch", is said to have served with/worked for him in Korea, but never appeared in the novel, movie, or TV series. Trapper John, along with The Mary Tyler Moore Show's Lou Grant, thus became one of a handful of 1970s television characters to be successfully adapted from situation comedy to drama.

B.J. Hunnicutt

B.J. Hunnicutt
M*A*S*H character
First appearance	"Welcome to Korea"
Last appearance	"Goodbye, Farewell and Amen"
Portrayed by	Television: Mike Farrell
In-universe information
Gender	Male
Title	Captain
Family	Jay Hunnicutt (father) Bea Hunnicutt (mother)
Spouse	Peg Hunnicutt (née Hayden)
Children	Erin Hunnicutt (daughter)
Hometown	Mill Valley, California

Captain B.J. Hunnicutt is played by Mike Farrell in the TV show. He replaced Trapper, both in his position within the unit and as an ally of Hawkeye Pierce and a foil of Frank Burns, appearing in all but one episode of the rest of the series. Although he glibly answers that the initials "B.J." stand for "anything you want", he tells Hawkeye that his name is not an initialism, but simply B.J., derived from the names of his parents, Bea and Jay.

Hunnicutt resided in Mill Valley, California, before he was drafted. He was educated at Stanford University and was a member of the Tau Phi Epsilon fraternity. He is a third-generation doctor in his family. He went through his military training at Fort Sam Houston. When he arrived at MASH 4077 in September 1952 he is 28 years old; later when he meets a medical college friend "Practical Joker" it is revealed that BJ has been both married and practicing medicine for 10 years.

He is devoted to his wife Peg (née Hayden) who writes many letters to him while he is in Korea. The couple has a daughter, Erin, who was born shortly before B.J. left for Korea. In contrast to the philandering Trapper John, B.J. remains generally faithful to his wife and daughter, saying that it's not because he thinks it's morally wrong to do otherwise, but "I simply don't want to." One time he accidentally had an unplanned non-sexual one-night stand while comforting a nurse, and was also similarly tempted into having an affair with a visiting female journalist. The nine months he spends in Korea caused him to have an emotional breakdown because of the separation from his wife and child. However, he was later written as a recreation of Trapper when in one episode ("Movie To-night) he and Hawkeye sing a duet about how they both "work on patients through the day and nurses through the night." He is also more reserved than his predecessor, often serving as the voice of reason when Hawkeye goes too far. Nonetheless, he also participates in and initiates practical jokes, such as secretly switching Major Winchester's clothing for that of other soldiers to make him think he is gaining or losing weight, or filling Frank Burns's air raid foxholes with water. On other occasions, B.J. encourages members of the 4077th to play jokes on each other, starting escalating joke wars for his amusement, with neither side knowing that he is the instigator. Unfortunately, this has often backfired on him when both parties he was pranking find out and retaliate.

While he assumes the same general disregard for military discipline exhibited by both Hawkeye and Trapper — going as far as to grow out a moustache at the start of the 7th season in clear violation of Army uniform guidelines (and would be retained by the character for the rest of the series, though Farrell would shave it off immediately after the series ended)^[10]--B.J. professes stronger moral values. For example, in the episode "Preventative Medicine" he refuses to participate in a scheme to have an overzealous officer relieved of command by performing an unnecessary appendectomy on him. He is a skilled surgeon, willing to take extraordinary measures to save a patient, such as in "Heroes", where he undertakes an experimental procedure he had read about in a medical journal, using a primitive open-chest defibrillator and open-chest heart massage. On another occasion, he gave away a Bronze Star he was awarded because he felt he did not deserve it.^[11]

He actively avoids the finality of farewells, but when the 4077th is disbanded in the series finale, he is last seen riding his Indian motorcycle away from camp, while Hawkeye sees from a helicopter that B.J. has arranged painted white stones into the word "GOODBYE", visible from the air. On an episode of St. Elsewhere, it was mentioned and implied by Dr. Mark Craig (portrayed by William Daniels) that B.J. Hunnicutt had remained in Korea where he was reassigned to another unit following the July 1953 deactivation of the 4077th Mobile Army Surgical Hospital at the end of M*A*S*H's finale and Dr. Craig also mentions serving in Korea with B.J. as his drinking buddy.

Henry Blake

Henry Blake
M*A*S*H character
First appearance	MASH: A Novel About Three Army Doctors
Last appearance	"Abyssinia, Henry" (on screen)
Portrayed by	Film: Roger Bowen Television: McLean Stevenson
In-universe information
Gender	Male
Title	Lieutenant Colonel
Spouse	Mildred/Lorraine Blake
Children	Andrew Blake (son) Molly Blake (daughter) Jane Blake (daughter)
Hometown	Bloomington, Illinois

Lieutenant Colonel Henry Braymore Blake is introduced in the 1968 novel M*A*S*H, and is also a character in the film (played by Roger Bowen) and television series (played by McLean Stevenson). He is a surgeon and the original commanding officer of the 4077th MASH unit. He is beloved for his down-to-earth, laid-back manner by many under his command, especially Hawkeye and Trapper John (with whom he drinks, flouts regulations, and chases women). However, he is scorned for it by those who prefer strict military discipline, such as Frank Burns and Margaret "Hot Lips" Houlihan.

In the film and novel, he is a career Army physician, having been commissioned before World War II. In the television series, he is 44 years old and a reservist called up to active duty and taken from his private practice in Bloomington, Illinois. Henry attended the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, where he was the football team's athletic trainer. He tells Hawkeye he has "a great practice back home", but a "routine" one, and that by serving in Korea, he is doing more doctoring than he would otherwise do in a lifetime.^[12] While Henry is in command of the 4077th, his wife – called Mildred in earlier episodes, Lorraine in later ones (the reason is never explained) – gives birth to a son back in Bloomington. Henry would never meet his son.^[13] As shown in Episode 2/16, "Henry in Love," Blake holds a Commendation Medal, a Purple Heart, an Army of Occupation Medal, the National Defense Service Medal, the Korean War Campaign Medal, and the U.N. Service Medal. He describes his wife in unflattering terms, having very expensive false teeth, varicose veins, a fistful of credit cards, looking like Frank Burns in drag, and that he only married her because she was a good cook. (These terms are quite unfair; in a home movie she sent to him, she is considered more good looking than beautiful). Likewise, when she wrote to him about being tempted to (but not having) an affair with a dentist and that she understood if he was tempted to have an affair, Blake brags to Pierce and Trapper that she had given him permission to have an affair, which she did not. (In fact Blake is a serial adulterer, having interacted with 6 women (Including three M*A*S*H 4077 nurses)).

Henry is a good man and a capable surgeon but unfocused and often ineffective as a commanding officer. Hawkeye Pierce once described him as "if you were on a sinking ship and ran up to the bridge, and discovered the Captain was Daffy Duck."^[14] Company clerk Radar O'Reilly can usually anticipate his wishes and turn them into efficient military orders, but Henry often gets flustered when an important decision needs to be made. For example, in the episode "Rainbow Bridge", he has to decide whether to send his doctors into enemy territory for an exchange of wounded prisoners. He hems and haws before telling his doctors, "Whatever you guys decide is fine with me."

His strength as a commander is his ability to maintain the morale of his unit, which he does through personal loyalty and indulgence of the lunacy that is a hallmark of the 4077th (as well as frequent participation). This success is demonstrated by the unit's outstanding 97.6% casualty survival rate.^[15]

Blake also shows superior skills in assessing medical talent, when he ignores military rank and appoints Hawkeye Pierce as chief surgeon over Frank Burns. (Although junior in rank, Pierce was a specialist surgeon in chest wounds while Burns was a General Practitioner.)

Blake in the TV series is compassionate but pragmatic at times: in the early episode "Sometimes You Hear The Bullet", he bluntly tells Hawkeye "When I went to school as an Army surgeon, they taught me two rules. Rule #1 is that in war, young men die. And Rule #2...is that doctors can't change Rule #1."

When McLean Stevenson decided to leave the show at the end of the third season, his character was scripted to be discharged and sent home as a way to write him out of the series. However, the producers added a final scene to his last episode in which Radar delivers news that Blake's plane has been shot down with no survivors. The characters are shocked by the news; the actors were shocked too, as they were not informed of the script change to have Blake die until just before the scene was shot.^[16] In Richard Hooker's 1977 novel M*A*S*H Mania, which takes place in the early 1970s, Henry Blake has become a General and helps Hawkeye in a scheme to rid Crabapple Cove of a troublesome psychologist.

Sherman T. Potter

Sherman T. Potter
M*A*S*H character
First appearance	"Welcome to Korea: Part 2"
Last appearance	"Saturday's Heroes" (AfterMASH)
Portrayed by	Harry Morgan
In-universe information
Gender	Male
Title	Colonel
Spouse	Mildred Potter
Children	Evelyn "Evvy" Ennis (née Potter) (daughter); Son who is a dentist
Relatives	Corey Ennis (grandson); Sherry Pershing Potter (granddaughter)
Hometown	Hannibal, Missouri

Colonel Sherman Tecumseh Potter appears in the M*A*S*H and AfterMASH television series. He was portrayed by Harry Morgan and replaced the departing character of Henry Blake as commanding officer of the 4077th MASH. The character appeared in all but three of the subsequent episodes.

Potter is from Hannibal, Missouri, one-quarter Cherokee^[17] and possesses a passion and fondness for horses. In typical M*A*S*H inconsistency Potter's birth year was variously mentioned as being either 1883 (he claimed to have joined Theodore Roosevelt's "Roughriders" as a marginally legal 15-year-old enlistee in 1898), 1890, or 1900 or 1902.

The 1900 and 1902 birthdates do not conform to continuity, as they would indicate he would be only around 49–50 during the Korean War.

He later comments that he is 62, making the 1890 birthdate more credible. The 1883 birthdate appears unlikely, since this would have made Potter nearly 70 during the Korean Conflict.

Potter joined the US Army cavalry as a private during World War I and subsequently rose to the rank of sergeant. Although never deployed as cavalry, the 6th and 15th Cavalry Regiments were sent to France and served in the American Expeditionary Forces in 1918.^[18] As the 15th was dismounted and sent into the trenches as infantry to relieve exhausted doughboys,^[19] it seems probable Potter saw combat with this battle-hardened unit in the Great War.

Although his career was in the Horse Cavalry until 1924 when he married, he has told stories about being in the Infantry during World War I. During combat in World War I, at the July 1918 Battle of Château-Thierry, he was mustard gassed, leaving him blind for a month in a French hospital.^[20] In the September - November 1918 Battle of the Argonne Forest, he was "lost for three days, taken prisoner, head shaved and beaten to a pulp".^[20] Several of his teeth were knocked out by his German captors, for which he was later awarded a Purple Heart, one of four he holds: two from World War I, one for his teeth being broken by the Germans and another for having been gassed; one from World War II when his illicit still on Guam blew up on him; and one from Korea, for being shot in the buttocks by a sniper. After the Great War, he went to medical school, and began his service as an Army doctor in 1932,^[7] serving in World War II. One of his most cherished possessions is his Good Conduct Medal, an award "only given to enlisted men," Potter explains to Radar while unpacking that he has a “Good Conduct Medal with a clasp.”^[21] That means he was an enlisted man for at least eight years before he becomes a doctor. It is framed and hung behind his desk during his tenure at the 4077th. However, the earliest a soldier in the army was credited towards this award was 1940, and as a physician Potter would have been a commissioned officer and so ineligible for it at the time. He also has claimed to be in two different theaters of War during World War II: In the summer of 1944 on Guam;^[22] in December 1944 in the Battle of the Bulge.^[23] (Plausible, but unlikely.) Potter is married to Mildred, and they have only one daughter and one grandson in some episodes, while in others he has multiple children and grandchildren.

Potter was created as a different type of commanding officer than his predecessor: a "Regular Army" career officer, and close to retirement. But despite his stern military bearing, Potter is a relatively relaxed and laid-back commander, not above involving himself in camp hijinks and understanding the need for fun and games to boost morale during wartime, particularly in the high-pressure atmosphere of a MASH. When Hawkeye and B. J. invite Potter to their tent for a post-surgery drink just after his assuming command, he is very affable and complimentary of their brewing skills, even giving them tips on how to improve their gin still and get a higher yield of alcohol. He also has his eccentricities, including a love of horses from his cavalry days and an ability to use his Regular Army connections to the unit's advantage. Unlike Blake, he is not afraid to put his foot down when the camp's antics get out of hand, but this is motivated by not wanting to see his troops get into trouble outside of the camp. In addition, Potter, who had been managing administrative work before his assignment to the 4077th with the asset of knowing many of his superiors as personal acquaintances, possesses formidable skills as a surgeon and for keeping morale high in the operating room.

Potter is well-liked by his subordinates, especially Radar, who comes to see him as a mentor and father figure after Blake's transfer stateside and subsequent death. Potter receives more respect than Blake did from Major Houlihan, but Major Burns harbors a grudge against him after being passed over for command. In turn, Potter holds Burns's feigned military bearing and subpar medical skills in contempt. Potter takes pride in the competency of the rest of the medical staff despite their antics. Burns's replacement, Major Winchester, has a grudging respect for Potter, even though their personalities are often at odds with one another. Potter initially takes a hard line against Klinger's attempts to get discharged but is convinced to let him continue cross-dressing and eventually assigns him to be his new company clerk after Radar received a hardship discharge.^[24] As an indication of their respect for him, in the final episode Hawkeye and B. J. formally salute Potter as he leaves the camp, one of the few times either is shown doing so.

The character also appeared as a new central character in AfterMASH, a spin-off starring the three cast members who had voted (unsuccessfully) to continue the first series. Potter became chief of staff and chief of surgery of the fictional General Pershing VA Hospital in River Bend, Missouri, where he is joined by Klinger and his wife Soon-Lee, and Father Mulcahy. Among the resident in-patients is one of Potter's subordinates from World War I, who addresses him as "Sarge" as opposed to his retired rank of colonel.

Frank Marion Burns

Frank Burns
M*A*S*H character
Larry Linville as Major Frank Burns on the CBS-TV M*A*S*H series
First appearance	MASH: A Novel About Three Army Doctors
Last appearance	"Margaret's Marriage"
Portrayed by	Film: Robert Duvall Television: Larry Linville
In-universe information
Gender	Male
Title	Captain in Hooker's novel Major in Film and TV series; with a departing promotion to Lieutenant Colonel, in TV series
Spouse	Louise Burns
Children	three daughters
Hometown	Fort Wayne, Indiana

Major (later Lieutenant Colonel) Franklin Delano Marion "Frank" Burns is the executive officer and main antagonist in the film (played by Robert Duvall) and the first five seasons of the television series (Larry Linville). Burns first appeared in the original novel, where he had the rank of captain.

In the novel, Burns is a well-off doctor who attended medical school, but whose training as a surgeon was limited to an apprenticeship with his father in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Nonetheless, he maintains a dismissive attitude toward his better-trained colleagues, blaming others for his failures.^[25] He unjustly accuses a rookie orderly, Boone (Bud Cort in the film), of killing one of his patients and nearly kills another patient, earning him retaliatory assaults from Duke and Trapper John. As Burns holds the same rank as Hawkeye in the novel Blake tries to make sure neither is on duty at the same time, but cannot do so when things get busy. His medical incompetence causes Colonel Blake to instead assign Trapper John as Chief Surgeon. In the novel, the extent of the relationship between Burns and Houlihan is unclear and only rumored to be sexual. In the film, it is overtly sexual and broadcast throughout the camp when Radar puts a microphone under Hot Lips' bunk in her tent. After the "Swampmen" learn that Burns is having an affair with Houlihan, Hawkeye taunts him about it, baiting him to attack just as Blake enters the tent. The next day, Burns is permanently sent away for psychiatric evaluation in a straitjacket, shot full of tranquilizers. In the novel, the confrontation is less violent, and Burns is simply transferred to a VA hospital stateside.

In the film and the subsequent TV series, Frank Burns's rank is that of major. The film version includes elements of the novel's Major Jonathan Hobson, a very religious man who prays for all souls to be saved. In the TV series, he is very high-strung, with a penchant for uttering what are often bizarre or redundant cliches and malapropisms; one example is from "The Interview" (season 4, episode 24), in which Burns describes marriage as "the headstone of American society".

In the TV series, Burns is a firm believer in military discipline and continues to fancy himself a superior surgeon; but his actions invariably reveal his incompetence and require one of the other surgeons to prevent him from making fatal mistakes. Though by military rank Burns is second-in-command of the unit, he is outranked in medical matters by Hawkeye, who reluctantly accepts appointment by Colonel Blake as Chief Surgeon.^[26] Burns longs for command of the 4077th himself and resorts to underhanded means in attempting to achieve this end, such as filing misleading complaints about Blake and unsuccessfully preventing Hawkeye and Trapper from testifying in Blake's defense. When Burns is left in command of the unit (per military regulations), he generally micromanages camp operations, just for the sake of being in command but demonstrates a profound lack of military competence as well.^[27] In "The Novocaine Mutiny", Burns is left in temporary command when the 4077th is inundated with a deluge of casualties. Burns and Hawkeye recount different versions of the events. Burns claims that he was performing superior work, even going so far as to donate blood to a critically wounded soldier in between treating patients and completing the Last Rites benediction in Latin for the deceased after Father Mulcahy passed out from exhaustion. Burns further asserts that the other surgeons could not keep up with him and complained that he was pushing them too hard. In Hawkeye's presumably far more accurate account, Frank was borderline hysterical and performed his triage duties with singular incompetence, which resulted in the near-deaths of multiple casualties. After being confronted by Hawkeye, Burns was knocked unconscious by the operating room door. In an early episode, however, before his character becomes more of a buffoon, he demonstrated himself to be an efficient, though again micromanaging, commander.^[28] In another episode, Burns is gullible enough to believe that the US Army Corps of Engineers is going to make MASH hospitals amphibious.^[29]

A borderline-incompetent surgeon (he twice failed the medical exams and only passed by buying the answers the third time - even so it took him seven years to complete medical school^[30]), his reputation for incompetence has spread even to the South Korean Army.^[31] He also failed to become a nurse when he couldn't fold bed sheets with hospital corners, and in his hometown the local funeral director sends him Thank You cards every Christmas.^[32]

The other doctors of the 4077th have little to no respect for Ferret Face. In one episode, one of Burns's patients had to have emergency surgery because Burns was too lazy to exteriorize a patient's colon during an operation.^[33] Henry Blake once threatened to bust Burns down to male nurse if he didn't get out of his way.^[34] Potter once told Burns his light bulb had been out for as long as he had known him;^[35] and on another occasion, told him that his brain had a charley horse.^[36] Hawkeye told a court of inquiry that Burns had created more widows and orphans than salmonella;^[37] Trapper John sneers Burns couldn't cut salami without bungling it;^[38] B. J. remarked that Hawkeye claimed Burns became a surgeon after washing out of embalming school.^[39] The MASH surgeons get a big laugh when they see a film of his wedding - even then Burns couldn't hold a knife while cutting his wedding cake.^[40] Hawkeye remarked, "Watch the cake die of malpractice!"

Frank had a poor relationship with his father, who would strike him at the dinner table if he ever talked out of turn. Furthermore, Burn's father pretended to like his son, but actually hated him. His older brother despised him, pinning the nickname of "Ferret Face" on him as a boy. When the Swampmen learn of this, it becomes Frank's nickname at the 4077th as well, used by most of the unit and even on occasion by Major Houlihan.^[41] The one person who genuinely cares about him is his mother; his parents and brother were his only relations at his wedding.^[40] He was scoutmaster of the local Boy Scout troop until he accidentally set fire to himself. He brags about having a large house, an expensive car, a yacht and being a member of two men's clubs.

Burns also has collateral duties as M*A*S*H 4077's Physical Fitness instructor, Food Procurement Officer, Food Inspector (where he came down with a case of food poisoning), and Sanitary Disposal Officer, positions normally filled by a junior officer, not a field grade officer. Every Friday he gives boring, nonsensical orientation lectures to newly arrived enlisted personnel about why the United States is in the Korean War.^[42]

He was in practice for 12 years before going to Korea in 1950. Based on his age and how long he had been in private practice before he was drafted, Burns appears to be an immigrant to the United States from some unnamed country, stating his family had come to America in 1927.^[43] In the season 3 episode "O.R.", Frank has a quiet, insightful conversation with Trapper, where he admits that he grew up in a strict family where he couldn't talk at meals, and that he became a snitch, "so I could talk to somebody."

Although Burns was Hawkeye's archenemy and Blake was Hawkeye's friend, one trait shared by Colonel Blake and Major Burns was a hypocritical attitude toward their marriage vows. Besides Houlihan, Burns has had affairs with his housekeeper, his receptionist,^[44] and two nurses at the 4077th. Blake had affairs with a call girl, an underage girl, three nurses at the 4077th MASH, and a recent college graduate member of the press corps (the last so serious that Henry came close to deserting his family for her).

In addition to his gullibility, Burns was shown to be incredibly greedy, selfish, and occasionally childish. Back home, he is involved in a prescription kickback racket and falsifies his income taxes.^[45] He is also overly suspicious of Koreans, going as far as to claim that South Koreans are communist infiltrators and hustlers, and is openly racist against Native Americans, although Colonel Potter, being part Cherokee, sternly puts a stop to that early on.^[46] He is an ardent supporter of the anti-communist Senator Joseph McCarthy and appears irritated to learn his wife is becoming involved in Republican Party envelope-stuffing campaigns.^[47]

Despite his ongoing affair with Major Houlihan, he is unwilling to divorce his wife because his money, stocks, and house are in her name. In one episode, his greed is such that he turns down a transfer to another unit because he is tricked by Hawkeye and Trapper into thinking there is gold in the hills near the camp.^[48] He twice applied for and received a Purple Heart for being "wounded" in combat: first, for slipping and falling on the way the shower;^[49] and second, for getting a "shell fragment" (actually an eggshell) in his eye. Both medals were stolen by Hawkeye and given to people who deserved them: an underage Marine (played by Ron Howard);^[50] and a Korean mother and her infant son who had been shot just before she gave birth.^[51] An example of his childishness was shown when Burns is passed over for command of the 4077th in favor of Colonel Potter; Frank has a temper tantrum and runs away until he gets cold, tired and hungry.^[21]

Burns's only friend in the unit is head nurse Major Margaret Houlihan, with whom he has an ongoing affair. They believe their romance is discreet, but it is common knowledge in the camp. They share a disdain for the "un-military" doctors, against whom they conspire ineffectively. His wife eventually learns of the affair and threatens him with divorce; he denies it, describing Houlihan as an "old warhorse" and an "army mule with bosoms",^[35] beginning a rift that leads to her engagement to Donald Penobscott, a handsome lieutenant colonel stationed in Tokyo.

Burns becomes even more erratic than usual after Houlihan's engagement and even a little before, such as when she was attending a meeting in Tokyo during Season 4 without him. During Margaret's stay in Tokyo, Burns drinks all of Hawkeye's booze, cleans out Hawkeye and BJ's poker winnings of $200, and confesses that he wants to have affairs with two other nurses besides Houlihan: Nurse Kellye, and an unnamed "little red-haired nurse".^[52] After Margaret becomes engaged, he nearly blows himself up with a grenade in an attempt to prove himself courageous by capturing war prisoners. This leads to him "capturing" a Korean family and their ox, and almost fires his carbine in Potter's office at the suggestion that he is heading for a Section Eight discharge. Distraught and exhausted, Burns, speaking on the telephone to his mother, tells her that Major Houlihan had just pretended to like him, "like Dad used to."^[33]

Following Houlihan's marriage in the fifth-season finale, "Margaret's Marriage" (also Larry Linville's last appearance on camera as Frank Burns), in the two-part sixth-season premiere episode "Fade Out, Fade In" that introduces his temporary (later permanent) replacement, Major Charles Emerson Winchester III, the 4077th learns that shortly after the wedding, Burns suffered a mental breakdown while on a week's leave in Seoul. He accosted a blonde female WAC on the street, begging to manicure her toenails; a blonde female Red Cross worker on a bus, whose buttons he tried to bite off; and an army general and his blonde wife in an offoro bath, mistaking the couple for the Penobscotts. He is transferred stateside for psychiatric evaluation, but although the 4077th is delighted to be finally rid of him, Burns has the last laugh. He telephones Hawkeye and B.J. as he is being shipped back to the United States and tells them that not only has he been cleared of all charges, but has been promoted to Lieutenant Colonel and assigned to a veterans' hospital in his hometown.^[53] As Burns was not above misrepresenting events to make himself look better, e.g., "The Novocaine Mutiny", it is unknown if he was telling the truth. However, Hawkeye's and B.J.'s reaction indicates that on this occasion, Frank was indeed stating the facts.

Frank is last referred to in the second-to-last episode "As Time Goes By", where the question is asked (by Winchester) if anything that was put in the 4077th's time capsule belonged to Burns. Hawkeye says he'd thought about putting in a scalpel but decided not to, reasoning that a later civilization might consider it a weapon.

Nothing further is known about the character's fate post-show from the TV series. However, in the William E. Butterworth MASH Goes To ... books, reference was made to Burns being involved with the Tonsils, Adenoids, and Vas Deferens Society, a group that promotes tonsillectomies and vasectomies for large fees.

Burns's departure from the series stemmed from the expiration of Linville's original five-year contract for the series, which he opted not to renew, concluding that there was simply no room for further development in the character.

Margaret "Hot Lips" Houlihan

Margaret "Hot Lips" Houlihan
M*A*S*H character
First appearance	MASH: A Novel About Three Army Doctors
Last appearance	"Goodbye, Farewell and Amen"
Portrayed by	Film: Sally Kellerman Television: Loretta Swit
In-universe information
Nickname	Hot Lips
Gender	Female
Title	Major
Family	Alvin Houlihan (father)
Spouse	Donald Penobscott (divorced)
Hometown	Fort Ord, California

Major Margaret J "Hot Lips" Houlihan appears in the novel, the film (played by Sally Kellerman), and the TV series (Loretta Swit). She is the Regular Army head nurse of the 4077th and begins allied with Major Frank Burns against the more civilian doctors of the unit. Later in the series, particularly after the departure of Burns, she becomes a more sympathetic character, softening her attitude while still serving as a foil for their antics.

Margaret is an army brat, born in an Army base hospital in 1920, the daughter of career artillery (or cavalry) officer Alvin "Howitzer Al" Houlihan (played by Andrew Duggan in the TV series). The series implies she is ethnic Irish: In the pilot episode Blake refers to her by her full name as O'Houlihan; while Colonel Potter remarks that she comes from a race that likes to settle arguments with their fists ("Souvenirs"). She entered nursing school in 1938 and graduated in 1942 when she joined the Army. She served in World War II but it is unknown if she served stateside or overseas. (Interestingly, on the rare occasions Houlihan is shown wearing her Class A uniform, while her ribbons include the usual Korean War decorations everyone received and commendation medals, she does not have an American Campaign Medal, an Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal, or a European-African-Middle Eastern Campaign Medal, a World War II Victory Medal, or an Army of Occupation Medal. However, as a similar omission exists regarding Colonel Potter's decorations, this may simply have been an error by the costume department.)^[54] She did mention that she had served in Berlin in 1948.^[55]

She is the head nurse of the 4077th MASH, the highest-ranking female officer in the unit, and fiercely protective of the women under her command. The character was inspired by two real-life Korean War MASH head nurses: "Hotlips" Hammerly,^[56] an attractive blonde of similar disposition,^{[citation needed]} and Janie Hall.^[57][56]

Her nickname "Hot Lips" has different origins in the original novel, film, and TV show. In the novel, the phrase is first used by Trapper John McIntyre, when he is flirting with Margaret after learning about her affair with Frank Burns. Calling her "Hot Lips", Trapper suggests that they should get together since he has become Chief Surgeon and she is the Chief Nurse.^[58] In the film, the nickname originates from a scene in which she has a tryst with Burns. Unbeknownst to them, a hidden PA microphone is broadcasting their conversation to the whole camp, including her growl to Frank, "kiss my hot lips". In the TV show, the origin of her nickname is never shown or explained in detail, though it seems to refer to various aspects of her passionate nature. Midway through the series, the "Hot Lips" nickname phases out, with characters addressing her as either Margaret or Major Houlihan, though her nickname is still referenced occasionally. For instance, in the sixth-season episode "Patent 4077", when Margaret is in a bad mood after losing her wedding ring, a nurse describes her as "Hot Lips Houlihan: Blonde land mine".^[59] In another episode, Colonel Potter was passionately kissed by Margaret after granting her a 72 hour leave to visit her husband in Tokyo; when she turned him loose, he said, "Do you know what I like about a nurse with hot lips? Exactly!"^[60] In the seventh-season episode "None Like It Hot", after Margaret talks about a bathtub that is supposed to be kept secret, Hawkeye says to her, "Would you please keep your hot lips sealed?",^[61] and in the second part of the two-part eighth-season episode "Good Bye, Radar", Radar says, "Wow! Hot Lips!" after he is kissed by Margaret.^[62] She is one of the few Americans in the 4077th who speaks Korean, though most of her Korean seems medically related.^[63]

Early on in the TV series, she is a stern "by-the-book" head nurse but willingly goes against regulations for her gain. She uses her sex appeal to her professional advantage as well as personal satisfaction, as shown by her relationship with Frank Burns. In early seasons she had several liaisons with visiting colonels or generals who were "old friends". She is an experienced surgical nurse, so although she thoroughly disapproves of the surgeons' off-duty tomfoolery, she can set her personal feelings aside to appreciate their skills, such as when she came down with appendicitis and asked that Hawkeye, not Burns, perform the surgery if needed.^[64]

In later years, she becomes a more relaxed and less criticizing member of the unit, tempering her authority with humanity. Key episodes in this development include the season 5 episode "The Nurses", in which she plays the role of a stern disciplinarian, but breaks down in front of her nurses revealing how hurt she is by their disdain for her; and "Comrades In Arms" (season 6), in which Hawkeye and Margaret make peace as they endure an artillery barrage together while lost in the wilderness, though they had also shown more mutual respect for one another before, when they have to go help a front-line aid station in "Aid Station" (season 3). She confesses to Klinger that she envies him for having a hometown – as an army brat she has moved around so much she could never make any friends. Drinking problems appear to run in her family. She once told Frank that half of her salary went to support her mother; half of that money went towards drying her out, the other half for bail money (her mother was a kleptomaniac).^[65] In one early episode, Houlihan herself was a hard drinker who drank a quart of brandy a day. Although the series presumes that she is an only child, in the same episode she tells Frank about her younger sister (a captain) who was engaged to be married.^[65] Although she projects a tough persona she is an emotionally lonely person who had only four close friends in her adult life (once in college and three in nursing school). In one early episode she is very angry at herself when she finds her college roommate has a dream marriage with a rich doctor, children, a great house, a swimming pool, and a washing machine - all of which could have been hers.

Her long-standing affair with Frank ends after she finally realizes that Burns has no intention of divorcing his wife to marry her; she does have an engagement and subsequent marriage to Lieutenant Colonel Donald Penobscott. The marriage does not last long; she later finds out a visiting nurse had had an affair with him. Though he promises to work things out with her, he has himself permanently transferred to San Francisco. She divorces him, regaining her self-confidence. In the wake of her split with Burns, she becomes more comfortable with at least some of the unit's more unorthodox ways and as time progresses, becomes a willing participant in some of the hijinks. Despite their long-running mutual antagonism, Hawkeye and Margaret came to develop respect and affection for each other, reflected in a long passionate farewell kiss in the final episode. She returns to the US to take a position in an Army hospital.^[66]

In the series of novels co-written with (or ghost-written by) William E. Butterworth, Houlihan reappears as the twice-widowed Margaret Houlihan Wachauf Wilson, both husbands having expired on the nuptial bed through excessive indulgence in her still-outstanding physical charms. Her career has taken a new direction as the head of the "God Is Love in All Forms Christian Church, Incorporated", a cult or sect with the unusual distinction that its entire congregation consists of gay men. Most of these are extremely flamboyant and the Reverend Mother herself is conspicuously glitzy and glittery. However, it appears that Margaret genuinely cares for her flock and is not merely shaking them down in pursuit of material gain.

Charles Emerson Winchester III, M.D.

Charles Emerson Winchester III
M*A*S*H character
First appearance	"Fade Out Fade In"
Last appearance	"Goodbye, Farewell and Amen"
Portrayed by	David Ogden Stiers
In-universe information
Gender	Male
Title	Major
Family	Honoria Winchester (sister) Charles Winchester II (father)
Hometown	Boston, Massachusetts

Major Charles Emerson Winchester III is a supporting character in the television series, played by David Ogden Stiers. The name Charles Emerson Winchester was derived from three real street names in the city of Boston.^{[citation needed]} He was introduced in the show's sixth season as a replacement for Frank Burns, both in the unit's surgical team and as a foil for Hawkeye and B.J. Though Winchester embodied some antagonistic qualities similar to Burns such as pompousness and formality, he proved during his time on the series to be a very different character than his predecessor, being far more intelligent, humane, kind, and skilled in surgery. Also, where Burns was always the fall guy and butt of Hawkeye's roasts, jokes, and insults, Winchester often was able to match wits with Hawkeye and even zinged him back, which Hawkeye seemed to actually respect. Winchester's suffix of "the third" was not present in the character's name until season 8.

Charles Winchester was born in his grandmother's house in the Boston, Massachusetts neighborhood of Beacon Hill, and is part of a wealthy family of Republican Boston Brahmins. After finishing his secondary studies at Choate, he graduated summa cum laude class of 1943 from Harvard College (where he lettered in Crew and Polo), completed his M.D. at Harvard Medical in Boston in 1948 (graduating first in his class^[67]), and worked at Massachusetts General Hospital. Before he was drafted to join the US Army during the Korean War, he was on track to become chief of cardiothoracic surgery.

Winchester's commanding officer in Tokyo, Colonel Horace Baldwin (Robert Symonds), transferred him to the 4077th on temporary duty in retaliation for the major's gloating attitude about beating him at cribbage for $672.17 (equivalent to about $7,130 in 2022).^[68] After Burns ran amok in Seoul on leave and was promoted and transferred back to the United States, Colonel Potter asked for, and got, Winchester's transfer to the 4077th made permanent.

Assigned to quarters in "the Swamp" with Hawkeye and B.J., Winchester found the conditions there appalling, calling the camp upon his arrival "an inflamed boil on the buttocks of the world." Keeping with the show's tradition of replacement characters who are in some way the antithesis of their predecessors, Winchester is as skilled a surgeon as Burns was inept — although he had to learn how to perform battlefield medicine, a.k.a. meatball surgery, to increase his efficiency with the large number of critical patients that typically arrived at one time. Winchester does adjust accordingly, although his skill as a surgeon inadvertently frustrates his hope of being transferred back to Tokyo since Colonel Potter considers him too valuable to lose. He is as cultured as Burns was lowbrow; in one episode during a verbal joust with Pierce and Hunnicutt, Winchester matches them true story for true story due to his cultured upbringing and skill, culminating in him revealing he even once dated actress Audrey Hepburn (producing a candid photograph of them as proof). to the astonishment and chagrin of B.J. and Hawkeye.^[69] However, Winchester still has to adjust to the realities of field medicine. Although the character was originally intended to develop a romance with Houlihan,^{[citation needed]} the chemistry between the two was not there, so Charles and Margaret maintain a platonic, professional friendship. This showed through when Col. Baldwin came to the camp on an official visit and Winchester tried to curry his favor in hopes of being reassigned. However, when Baldwin mistook Major Houlihan as a prostitute Winchester procured for him and tried to sexually assault her, Baldwin offered to reassign Winchester if he supported his false accusation that Houlihan made advances on him. After much internal struggle, Winchester refused to cooperate and told Colonel Potter everything while finally giving Baldwin his true opinion of him as an insufferable superior, forcing him to leave in public humiliation while Winchester's comrades applauded his act of conscience.

Winchester is often adversarial with Hawkeye and B.J., but joins forces with them if it is justified. He has a keen but dry sense of humor and enjoys practical jokes as well as the occasional prank to get revenge on his bunkmates for something they did, or for his own amusement. Behind his snobbery, he was raised with a sense of noblesse oblige and was capable of profound – albeit sometimes misguided – acts of kindness. For example, in "Death Takes a Holiday" he quietly gifts an orphanage with expensive chocolates (a tradition in his family) while the camp assails his stinginess because true charity must be anonymous. Initially outraged to find that they were traded on the black market, he learns that the candies were sold to buy an entire month's worth of food for the orphans. As the orphanage director apologizes, Winchester reflects: "It is I who should be sorry. It is sadly inappropriate to give dessert to a child who has had no meal." Humbled, he retreats to the Swamp, where Klinger brings him a Christmas dinner made up of party leftovers, and they exchange quiet Christmas greetings, on a first-name basis. In "Morale Victory", he sends for a copy of the score for Ravel's Piano Concerto for the Left Hand to encourage a pianist who can no longer play with his injured right hand. In "Run for the Money", he stands up for a wounded soldier whose comrades and commanding officer mock his stuttering, encouraging the young man to live up to his intellectual potential. At the end of the episode, he listens to a recorded letter from his sister Honoria, who turns out to likewise be a stutterer.

Classical music is one of his great loves, helping him to maintain his morale. In the series finale, following the sudden death of the Chinese POWs he has been teaching a work by Mozart, Winchester states that music has transformed into a haunting reminder of the horrors of the war. (David Ogden Stiers was the conductor in residence for the Newport Symphony Orchestra for a decade or more.)

After the war ends and the 4077th is disestablished, he returned to Boston, where the position of Chief of Thoracic Surgery at a prestigious hospital awaits him.

Walter "Radar" O'Reilly

Walter "Radar" O'Reilly
M*A*S*H character
First appearance	MASH: A Novel About Three Army Doctors
Last appearance	W*A*L*T*E*R
Portrayed by	Gary Burghoff
In-universe information
Gender	Male
Title	Corporal Second Lieutenant Corporal-Captain
Hometown	Ottumwa, Iowa

Corporal (briefly, and unofficially, Second Lieutenant and Corporal-Captain) Walter Eugene "Radar" O'Reilly appears in the novels, film, and TV series. He also appeared in two episodes of AfterMASH, and starred in the television pilot W*A*L*T*E*R. The character was portrayed by Gary Burghoff in both the film and on television, the only regular character played by a single actor. His full name is never given in the original novel or film, but on the TV series it is Walter Eugene O'Reilly, 'Walter' being picked by Burghoff himself. The later novels by Richard Hooker and William Butterworth give his name as J. Robespierre O'Reilly.

Radar is from Ottumwa, Iowa, and joined the army right out of high school. He seems to have extra-sensory perception, appearing at his commander's side, with whatever paperwork is required, before being called; and finishing his sentences before the C.O. is anywhere near the end of them. He also has exceptionally good hearing, able to hear helicopters before anyone else and to tell from the rotor sounds if they are coming in loaded or not. It was these abilities that earned him the nickname "Radar". The character is inspired by company clerk Don Shaffer, who also was born in Ottumwa and nicknamed "Radar" by his compatriots, and who served alongside Hornberger in Korea.^[70]

In the film, Radar was portrayed as worldly and sneaky, a characterization that carried into the early part of the series. He carries with him a pocketful of passes for any potential scam that might arise and has a racket of selling tickets for spying through a peephole into the nurses' shower. Another time, he cons nearly every member of MASH 4077 into buying mail-order shoes. As was allegedly done a couple of times in World War II,^[71] he successfully mailed a jeep home, one piece at a time.^[72] He is known for his tremendous appetite for heaping portions of food, is not averse to drinking Henry Blake's brandy and smoking his cigars when the colonel is off-duty, and he occasionally drinks the moonshine liquor that Hawkeye and Trapper make in their still. ^{[citation needed]}

Soon after the pilot episode, Burghoff noted that the other characters were changing from the film portrayals and decided to follow. He and writer Larry Gelbart evolved Radar into a naïve farm boy,^[73] who still sleeps with his teddy bear and whose favorite beverage is Nehi brand grape soda. He has a virginal awkwardness with women and a fondness for superhero comic books. In season 3, he remarked that he would be glad to live past age 18, though other ages are given in other episodes, and by then the actor was pushing 30. The show continued to portray him as very young even as his hairline receded (all of the actors would age a decade during this protracted retelling of a 3-year war).

He runs the camp public address system and radio station, which are often used in minor gags; in one episode he transmits messages to a Navy carrier by Morse code.^[74] Another occasionally recurring gag is Radar's ineptitude with the bugle; he invariably mangles any calls he tries to play, almost never plays the correct call for the situation (e.g., playing Mess Call for Assembly), and his bugle has suffered abuse such as being shot out of his hand^[75] and thrown into a roaring bonfire.^[76]

Radar frequently looks to the doctors for advice, and increasingly regards Henry Blake and then Sherman Potter as father figures, having lost his elderly father at a young age. Radar is also one of the very few people Hawkeye Pierce has ever saluted (an event that occurred after Radar was wounded during a trip to Seoul and was given a Purple Heart, and again when he leaves to go home), showing just how much Pierce respects him. Radar is briefly promoted to Second Lieutenant as the result of a poker game debt,^[77] but soon returns to the ranks after discovering that life as a commissioned officer is more complicated than he had originally thought. Radar was also briefly "promoted" to the made-up rank of Corporal-Captain by Hawkeye in the two-part episode "Welcome to Korea".^[78]

Radar appeared in every episode of the show's first three seasons. After season five, doing the series had become a strain on the actor's family life, and he had his contract changed to limit his appearances to 13 episodes per season out of the usual 24. By season seven, Burghoff started experiencing burnout and decided it was time to quit; he finished season seven, then returned the next season for a two-part farewell episode titled "Good-Bye Radar" in which Radar was granted a hardship discharge after the death of his Uncle Ed to help on the family farm, which he accepted after being satisfied that Klinger could adequately replace him.

Radar left his teddy bear behind on Hawkeye's bunk as a parting gift and symbol of his maturity. (In the final regular episode of the series titled "As Time Goes By", Radar's teddy bear is put into the unit's time capsule to symbolize the soldiers who arrived as boys and left as men.)

In 1984, Burghoff guest-starred in two episodes of AfterMASH as Radar, now living on the family farm in Iowa. These appearances led to W*A*L*T*E*R, a television pilot for a proposed spin-off series.

In the pilot (and proposed series), the O'Reilly family farm had failed and Radar had moved to St. Louis and become a police officer. Production never proceeded past the pilot, which aired once on CBS.

Father John Mulcahy

Father John Mulcahy
M*A*S*H character
First appearance	MASH: A Novel About Three Army Doctors
Last appearance	"Saturday's Heroes" (AfterMASH)
Portrayed by	Film: René Auberjonois Television: William Christopher (George Morgan for the pilot)
In-universe information
Gender	Male
Title	1st Lieutenant Captain
Family	Kathy (sister)
Hometown	Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

1st Lieutenant (later Captain) "Father" John Patrick Francis Mulcahy, SJ – the order of his given names were not presented consistently in the series – appears in the novel, film (played by René Auberjonois) and TV series (played by William Christopher except in the pilot where he is played by George Morgan). He is a Catholic priest and serves as a US Army chaplain assigned to the 4077th. He was played by George Morgan in the pilot episode of the series, but the producers decided that a quirkier individual was needed for the role.^[79]

In the novel and film, Mulcahy is familiarly known by the nickname "Dago Red", a derogatory reference to his Italian–Irish ancestry and the sacramental wine used during Holy Mass. While most of the staff is not religious, they treat Mulcahy with some respect. It is Mulcahy who alerts the doctors that the camp dentist "Painless" is severely depressed. Afterward, Mulcahy reluctantly helps the doctors to stage the famous "Last Supper" faux suicide, to convince Painless that he should continue with life. He is bewildered by the doctors' amoral pranks and womanizing behavior, but is usually forgiving of their jokes and sarcastic remarks, commenting once that "humor, after all, was one of His creations". When Radar places a hidden microphone inside Hot Lips's tent as she and Frank Burns have sex, members of the camp listen in, and Mulcahy at first mistakes their conversation (and noises) for an episode of The Bickersons, leaving abruptly when he realizes otherwise.

He is from Philadelphia and is frequently seen wearing a Loyola sweatshirt. He has a sibling, Kathy, who is a Catholic nun.^[80] He impishly refers to her as "my sister the Sister". His sister's religious name is Theresa.^[81] He is an amateur boxer and boxing fan; an old priest and mentor in Jesuit school taught his students that boxing built character and Mulcahy coached boys in the sport at his local CYO chapter before being assigned to the 4077th. There is a running joke that Mulcahy always wins the betting pools. On one occasion, when asked how he knows what bet to place, he looks to the sky with a smile. His luck at poker is unremarkable, however. He donates his winnings to the local orphanage.

Mulcahy understands that many of his "flock" are non-religious or have other faiths, and does not evangelize them overtly. Rather than lecturing from an authority, he seeks to teach by example ("Blood Brothers"), or by helping someone see the error of their ways ("Identity Crisis"). In the early part of the series he was a stock character of comic relief who usually talked about the Korean orphans taken care of by Catholic nuns. Although his quiet faith in God is unshakable, Mulcahy is often troubled over whether his role as chaplain and religious leader has importance compared to the doctors' obvious talent for saving lives. This is despite being told by Cardinal Reardon, a prelate visiting Korea to evaluate the effectiveness of the chaplains serving there, that "you're a tough act to follow" after listening to his sermon concerning a soldier diagnosed with leukemia, at that time a death sentence.^[82] This leads him to periodically prove himself, such as volunteering for a dangerous mission to demonstrate his courage to a soldier who had shot himself in the foot to get out of combat duty ("Mulcahy's War"), and putting himself in harm's way to retrieve or negotiate for medical supplies ("Tea and Empathy", "Out of Gas"). He is repeatedly passed over for promotion but eventually rises to the rank of Captain after Colonel Potter intercedes on his behalf ("Captains Outrageous").

Although he is ordained as a Catholic priest, Mulcahy demonstrates both an inclination towards Christian ecumenism and a studious interest in, and familiarity with, non-Christian faiths. This is demonstrated in his agreeing to perform Protestant church services for Colonel Potter ("Change of Command"), offering a prayer in Hebrew for a wounded Jewish soldier ("Cowboy"), and explaining the rituals of a Buddhist wedding to other attendees from the camp ("Ping Pong"). Zdroj:https://en.wikipedia.org?pojem=Father_Mulcahy
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