Ironically, Caroll Spinney had a rather unpleasant experience with Richard Dawson once...
In his book, he writes about him and Oscar being on
The Dinah Shore Show (he simply hid his bent elbow behind the seat he was sitting in, and having Oscar appear to be standing behind it, all of this while Richard Dawson was the guest before him; at one point, Caroll thought it would be a fun idea to try and have Oscar banter with Richard, so he had Oscar ask, "So Dawson, how's everything over at
Hogan's Heroes? Heh-heh-heh!" Apparently Richard wasn't too happy with that, and as a result, neither Caroll or Oscar got a word in for the rest of the show: Richard was given the floor, kept it, and didn't give it back.
He clearly had mellowed quite a bit in his final years, but there are those stories that continuousloy circulate of him being something of an egotistical jerk who could be difficult to work with, and according to the stories, he wasn't proud of his work on
Hogan's Heroes (though in his last interview, he speaks very highly of the show, and the people he worked with, and was happy to have been a part of it).
EDIT: Actually, here is the Family Food parody...