Celebrity Watch!

Yvonne Craig: 1st Actress to Play Batgirl in 'Batman' TV Series Dies at 78

Craig died at her home in Pacific Palisades, Calif., Monday night after battling breast cancer, her family said in a statement. She is best known for her role as Batgirl in the 1960s TV series.

Craig originated the role of Batgirl in the show's third and final season in 1967, kapowing and zzonking the bad guys alongside Adam West and Burt Ward's dynamic duo of Batman and Robin.

"I hear from women that I was their role model," she told CNN in an interview earlier this year. "'When I was a little girl, I realized that girls could kick butt just like guys,' [they'd say]."

She also had a memorable role as the green-skinned Orion slave girl Marta who wanted to kill Captain Kirk in a third-season episode of "Star Trek."

But even beyond those two well-remembered roles, Craig had a long and illustrious career that began as the youngest member of a ballet company.

Her post-"Batman" TV stint lasted several years and spanned many of the hit shows of the time, including "The Six Million Dollar Man" and the "Mod Squad."

In later years, Craig worked as a real estate broker, did voice over work for the Nickelodeon cartoon "Olivia," and, with her sister, went into the prepaid phone card business.

She wrote a memoir, "From Ballet to the Batcave and Beyond," and was publicly vocal about her support for free mammograms for women who couldn't afford them.

Craig leaves behind her husband, Kenneth Aldrich; her sister and two nephews.

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Former NFL star and longtime sportscaster Frank Gifford, who enjoyed a successful transition from the playing field to the broadcast booth, died Sunday of natural causes in his Connecticut home, his family said.

Gifford, who was married to talk show host Kathie Lee Gifford, was 84.

"It is with the deepest sadness that we announce the sudden passing of our beloved husband, father and friend, Frank Gifford," the Gifford family said in a statement.

By the time Gifford joined the New York Giants as their number one draft pick in 1952, he already had established his gridiron bona fides in high school and college -- despite his father's wishes.

Gifford was born in Santa Monica, California, in 1930 to Weldon and Lola Mae Gifford. His father was an oil worker, and the family traveled the country for his job before settling in Bakersfield, where Gifford attended high school.

"My dad tried to get me to quit playing football in high school. I hurt my ankle and, of course, everyone in my family had always gone right into the oil fields, and there was a concern that I was really going to be hurt, on his part," Gifford told CNN's Larry King in 1993.

He retired from professional football in 1964.

Gifford was one of the first American sports stars to shift into television sportscasting. He became part of ABC's "Monday Night Football" lineup in 1971, joining fellow NFL veteran Don Meredith and broadcaster Howard Cosell.

He was inducted into into College Football Hall of Fame in 1976 and the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1977.

In 1986, he made headlines for marrying Kathie Lee Epstein Johnson, who was 23 years younger.