Ralph Malph
In the early seasons, Ralph was considerably "cooler" than Richie and Potsie, being a member of the gang, The Gems, and having a hot rod car.Ralph was – along with Richie and Potsie, and later Chachi – part of a band that, in some episodes, performed at Arnold's Drive-In (and later, Fonzie & Big Al's) and other venues.In one episode where they were feuding, "Ralph vs. Potsie", they divided the apartment with white tape and assigned each other one side of the room, but they eventually patched up their differences.Originally, his father owned a woman's dress store in town and his name was Harry Malph (played by Mike Monahan in the first-season episode "Because She's There"), but when the show shifted to a studio audience format in the third season, Ralph's father was shown to be an optometrist, Mickey Malph, played first by Alan Oppenheimer and then subsequently and more famously by Jack Dodson.Additionally, in the same first-season episode, Ralph's mother was named Hazel and was played by Gracia Lee; from the third season onward, however, she was referred to as Minnie Malph, and her character was never shown on camera again.