Actor/Singer David Soul, Raised in Sioux Falls, Dead at 80

Actor/singer David Soul, who was raised in Sioux Falls, has passed away at the age of 80.

Soul died in London, Thursday (January 4), after what his family says was a 'valiant battle for life'. No official cause of death has been disclosed.

He's best remembered for his role as Detective Sergeant Kenneth 'Hutch' Hutchinson in the ABC television series 'Starsky & Hutch', which ran for four seasons from 1975-1979.

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David Richard Solberg was born August 28, 1943 in Chicago and moved with his family to Sioux Falls two years later after his father Richard took a position as a history and political science professor at Augustana College

Soul graduated from Washington High School in 1961 and later attended Augie for two years, eventually dropping out of college to move to Mexico for a year before hitchhiking to Minneapolis in search of a singing career.

In 1967, his first big break came in a most unusual role.

Decades before 'The Masked Singer', Soul was recruited by Merv Griffin to appear on his talk show as 'The Covered Man', performing for the next four months as a mystery singer.

Later that year he launched an acting career that included early appearances in shows like 'I Dream of Jeanie', 'Flipper', 'Star Trek', and 'All in the Family'.

One of Soul's first big movie roles came in 1973's 'Magnum Force', where he played vigilante cop John Davis in the second Clint Eastwood 'Dirty Harry' film.

In 1975, he landed a spot starring alongside Paul Michael Glaser on 'Starsky & Hutch'. Initially, the show was a moderate success, landing in the Top 20 in the ratings after the first season. But it struggled over the next three years and was canceled in May of 1979 after 93 episodes.

Capitalizing on the popularity of 'Starsky & Hutch', Soul launched a solo music career in 1975. His debut album, David Soul, went all the way to #2 on the UK charts.

A 1976 re-issue of that album included the single 'Don't Give Up On Us', which became a massive hit, topping the Billboard Hot 100 for one week in April of 1977, knocking ABBA's 'Dancing Queen' out of the top spot. 'Don't Give Up On Us' was also a number-one song in  Great Britain, Australia, New Zealand, and Canada.

Soul released four more solo albums between 1977 and 1997.

After a number of TV and film roles in the 1980's, Soul moved to England in the 1990's, where He began as career as a stage actor on London's West End.

In 2004, he had a brief cameo in the movie version of 'Starsky & Hutch', which starred Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson in the title roles.

That same year, Soul became a British citizen.

He's survived by his fifth wife, Helen, as well as five sons and a daughter.