Leon Askin: Hogan's Heroes General Burkhalter Dies at 97

Leon Askin was an Austrian-born actor best known as General Albert Burkhalter on Hogan's Heroes. Born Leo Aschkenasy on September 18, 1907, in Vienna, he fled Austria after the Nazi annexation and reached the United States in 1940.

He appeared in The Robe (1953), One, Two, Three (1961) and Do Not Disturb, and in Broadway's Twentieth Century (1950). On Hogan's Heroes from 1965 to 1971 he played Burkhalter, the bluster-filled superior of Colonel Klink.

Askin's parents were murdered at Treblinka in 1942. He served as a sergeant in the U.S. Army Air Forces and later returned to live in Vienna. He died there on June 3, 2005, at age 97, of natural causes.

Achievements: Role of General Burkhalter on Hogan's Heroes (1965-1971).

Birth: September 18, 1907 - Vienna, Austria.

Profession: Actor.

Interesting Facts: As a boy he recited a poem for Emperor Franz Joseph.