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Katharine Hepburn was a friend of McCrea and his wife, actress Frances Dee. Hepburn reportedly felt he was one of the best actors with whom she had worked and was disappointed his career wasn't more successful. She reportedly believed McCrea should have been ranked alongside Spencer Tracy or Humphrey Bogart.

Well-respected as a horseman, he was regarded as one of the two best riders in Western films along with Ben Johnson, who had been a real cowboy.

Met the real Wyatt Earp in Hollywood in 1928 and ended up playing the iconic lawman in Wichita (1955) .

A very young McCrea was advised by Will Rogers to put the money he made from acting into real estate, a venture that made the novice actor a millionaire.

The grandson of a western stagecoach driver who had fought against the Apaches, he raised his own horses, was a passionate outdoorsman and large-scale rancher, invested wisely in livestock and real estate.

I have no regrets, except perhaps one: I should have tried harder to be a better actor.

People say I'm a one-note actor, but the way I figure it, those other guys are just looking for that one right note.

[in 1978] I liked doing comedies, but as I got older I was better suited to do Westerns. Because I think it becomes unattractive for an older fellow trying to look young, falling in love with attractive girls in those kinds of situations . . . Anyway, I always felt so much more comfortable in the Western. The minute I got a horse and a hat and a pair of boots on, I felt easier. I didn't feel like I was an actor anymore. I felt like I was the guy out there doing it.

[about Ride the High Country (1962)] When it came out the studio didn't sell it. But the critics grabbed onto it. Neither Randy Randolph Scott nor or I had ever gotten such criticism. We were surprised, though we knew it wasn't a regular shoot-'em-up. I really enjoyed "Ride the High Country", Both Randy and I were washed-up actors playing washed-up lawmen.

After 87 pictures in 47 years, I knew when to quit.