Les Paul and Mary Ford
Les Paul and Mary Ford were a popular 1950s husband-and-wife guitar duo in which Les Paul played lead guitar and Mary Ford sang. In 1951 alone, they sold six million records; the couple were introduced to each other by Gene Autry in 1946 and were married on December 31, 1949. They first appeared in the pop charts in 1950. Between the years 1950 and 1954, Les Paul and Mary Ford had 16 top-ten hits, they had five top-ten hits within nine months. "Tennessee Waltz", "Mockin' Bird Hill", "How High the Moon", "The World Is Waiting for the Sunrise" and "Whispering". From August 1952 to March 1953 they had five more top-ten hits, their 1954 version of "I'm a Fool to Care" went to #6, was featured in a memorable Southern Comfort commercial in 2013 that got over 1 million views on YouTube. In 2009, they were inducted into the Hit Parade Hall of Fame. Paul and Ford are famous for creating a makeshift recording studio in their garage. In their garage studio, they used multitrack recording to record many of their hits including ‘Lover’, ‘Nola’, ‘Brazil’ and ‘Whispering' with only the two of them.
YouTube has a large selection of clips from their syndicated TV show "Les Paul & Mary Ford At Home". Paul and Ford divorced acrimoniously in December 1964, which ended the collaboration between the two; the duo have a star at 1541 Vine Street in the Recording section of the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Paul had hosted a 15-minute radio program, The Les Paul Show, on NBC in 1950, featuring his trio and his electronics, recorded from their home and with gentle humour between Paul and Ford bridging musical selections, some of, successful on records, some of which anticipated the couple's recordings, many of which presented dazzling re-interpretations of such jazz and pop selections as "In the Mood," "Little Rock Getaway," "Brazil," and "Tiger Rag." Several recordings of these shows survive among old-time radio collectors today. The show appeared on television a few years with the same format, but excluding the trio and retitled The Les Paul & Mary Ford Show with "Vaya Con Dios" as a theme song. Sponsored by Warner–Lambert's Listerine, it was syndicated during 1954–55 and was only five minutes long on film and therefore used as a brief interlude or fill-in on programming schedules.
Since Les created the entire show himself, including audio and video, he maintained the original recordings and was in the process of restoring them to up-to-date quality at the time of his death. Jacobson, Bob. Les Paul: Guitar Wizard. Madison, Wisconsin: Wisconsin Historical Society Press, 2012. Larkin, Colin, ed. Encyclopedia of Popular Music, 4th ed. Ed. "Les Paul". Oxford Music Online. Oxford University Press. Web. 22 Feb. 2015. Shaughnessy, Mary Alice. Les Paul: An American Original. New York: W. Morrow, 1993. Wyckoff, Edwin Brit. Electric Guitar Man: The Genius of Les Paul. Genius at work! Berkeley Heights, N. J.: Enslow Publishers, 2008. Episodes of the Les Paul Show from Old Time Radio Researchers Group Library
June Lockhart
June Lockhart is an American actress in 1950s and 1960s television with performances on stage and in film. On two television series she played mother roles and Lost in Space, she portrayed Dr. Janet Craig on the CBS television sitcom Petticoat Junction, she is a Tony Award winner. Born on June 25, 1925, in New York, Lockhart is the daughter of Canadian-born actor Gene Lockhart, who came to prominence on Broadway in 1933 in Ah, Wilderness!, English-born actress Kathleen Arthur Lockhart. Her grandfather was John Coates Lockhart, "a concert-singer."She attended the Westlake School for Girls in Beverly Hills, California. Lockhart made her film debut opposite her parents in a film version of A Christmas Carol, in 1938, she played supporting parts in films including Meet Me in St. Louis, Sergeant York, All This, Heaven Too and The Yearling, she starred in She-Wolf of London. Lockhart debuted on stage at the age of eight, playing Mimsey in Peter Ibbetson, presented by the Metropolitan Opera. In 1947, her acting in For Love or Money brought her out of her parents' shadow and gained her notice as "a promising movie actress in her own right."
One newspaper article began, "June Lockhart has burst on Broadway with the suddenness of an unpredicted comet."In 1951, Lockhart starred in Lawrence Riley's biographical play Kin Hubbard opposite Tom Ewell. In 1955, Lockhart appeared in an episode of CBS's Appointment with Adventure. About this time, she made several appearances on NBC's legal drama Justice, based on case files of the Legal Aid Society of New York. In the late 1950s, Lockhart guest-starred in several popular television Westerns including: Wagon Train and Cimarron City on NBC and Gunsmoke, Have Gun – Will Travel, Rawhide on CBS. In 1958, she was the narrator for Playhouse 90's telecast of the George Balanchine version of Tchaikovsky's The Nutcracker, featuring Balanchine himself as Drosselmeyer, along with the New York City Ballet. Lockhart is best known for her roles as TV mothers, first as Ruth Martin, the wife of Paul Martin, the mother of Timmy Martin in the 1950s CBS series, Lassie, she replaced actress Cloris Leachman, who, in turn, had replaced Jan Clayton – who had played a similar character earlier in the series.
Following her five-year run on Lassie Lockhart made a guest appearance on Perry Mason as defendant Mona Stanton Harvey in "The Case of the Scandalous Sculptor." Lockhart starred as Dr. Maureen Robinson in Lost in Space, which ran from 1965 to 1968 on CBS, opposite veteran actors Guy Williams and Jonathan Harris. In 1965, Lockhart played librarian Ina Coolbrith, first poet laureate of California, in the episode "Magic Locket" of the syndicated western series, Death Valley Days, hosted by Ronald W. Reagan. In the storyline, Coolbrith develops a tenuous friendship with the teenaged "Dorita Duncan" the dancer Isadora Duncan; the two have identical portions of a broken locket. Sean McClory played the poet author of Songs of the Sierras. Lockhart would appear as Dr. Janet Craig on the final two seasons of the CBS sitcom Petticoat Junction, her character being brought in to fill the void created after Bea Benaderet died during the run of the show. Lockhart appeared as a hostess on the "Miss USA Pageant" on CBS for six years, the "Miss Universe Pageant" on CBS for six years, the "Tournament of Roses Parade" on CBS for eight years and the "Thanksgiving Parade" on CBS for five years.
In 1986, she appeared in Troll. The younger version of her character in that film was played by Anne Lockhart, they had played the same woman at two different ages in the "Lest We Forget" episode of the television series Magnum, P. I.. In 1991, Lockhart appeared as Miss Wiltrout, Michelle Tanner's kindergarten teacher on the TV sitcom Full House, she had a cameo in the 1998 film Lost in Space, based on the television series she had starred in thirty years earlier. In 2002, she appeared in two episodes of The Drew Carey Show as Lewis's mother, Misty Kiniski, alongside fellow TV mom Marion Ross, who played Drew's mother. In 2004, she voiced the role of Grandma Emma Fowler in Focus on the Family's The Last Chance Detectives audio cases. Lockhart starred as James Caan's mother in an episode of Las Vegas in 2004. Lockhart has since guest-starred in episodes of Cold Case and Grey's Anatomy, in the 2007 ABC Family television film Holiday in Handcuffs, in the 2007 feature film Wesley. In February 2013, Lockhart began filming for Tesla Effect, a video game that combines live-action footage with 3D graphics, released in May 2014.
In 1948, Lockhart won a Tony Award for Outstanding Performance by a Newcomer for her role on Broadway in For Love or Money. She has two stars on one for motion pictures and one for television. Both were dedicated on February 8, 1960. In 2013, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration awarded her the Exceptional Public Achievement Medal for inspiring the public about space exploration. In 1951, Lockhart married Dr. John F. Maloney, they had Anne Kathleen Lockhart and June Elizabeth Maloney. The couple divorced in 1959, she mar
New York City
The City of New York called either New York City or New York, is the most populous city in the United States. With an estimated 2017 population of 8,622,698 distributed over a land area of about 302.6 square miles, New York is the most densely populated major city in the United States. Located at the southern tip of the state of New York, the city is the center of the New York metropolitan area, the largest metropolitan area in the world by urban landmass and one of the world's most populous megacities, with an estimated 20,320,876 people in its 2017 Metropolitan Statistical Area and 23,876,155 residents in its Combined Statistical Area. A global power city, New York City has been described as the cultural and media capital of the world, exerts a significant impact upon commerce, research, education, tourism, art and sports; the city's fast pace has inspired the term New York minute. Home to the headquarters of the United Nations, New York is an important center for international diplomacy.
Situated on one of the world's largest natural harbors, New York City consists of five boroughs, each of, a separate county of the State of New York. The five boroughs – Brooklyn, Manhattan, The Bronx, Staten Island – were consolidated into a single city in 1898; the city and its metropolitan area constitute the premier gateway for legal immigration to the United States. As many as 800 languages are spoken in New York, making it the most linguistically diverse city in the world. New York City is home to more than 3.2 million residents born outside the United States, the largest foreign-born population of any city in the world. In 2017, the New York metropolitan area produced a gross metropolitan product of US$1.73 trillion. If greater New York City were a sovereign state, it would have the 12th highest GDP in the world. New York is home to the highest number of billionaires of any city in the world. New York City traces its origins to a trading post founded by colonists from the Dutch Republic in 1624 on Lower Manhattan.
The city and its surroundings came under English control in 1664 and were renamed New York after King Charles II of England granted the lands to his brother, the Duke of York. New York served as the capital of the United States from 1785 until 1790, it has been the country's largest city since 1790. The Statue of Liberty greeted millions of immigrants as they came to the U. S. by ship in the late 19th and early 20th centuries and is an international symbol of the U. S. and its ideals of liberty and peace. In the 21st century, New York has emerged as a global node of creativity and entrepreneurship, social tolerance, environmental sustainability, as a symbol of freedom and cultural diversity. Many districts and landmarks in New York City are well known, with the city having three of the world's ten most visited tourist attractions in 2013 and receiving a record 62.8 million tourists in 2017. Several sources have ranked New York the most photographed city in the world. Times Square, iconic as the world's "heart" and its "Crossroads", is the brightly illuminated hub of the Broadway Theater District, one of the world's busiest pedestrian intersections, a major center of the world's entertainment industry.
The names of many of the city's landmarks and parks are known around the world. Manhattan's real estate market is among the most expensive in the world. New York is home to the largest ethnic Chinese population outside of Asia, with multiple signature Chinatowns developing across the city. Providing continuous 24/7 service, the New York City Subway is the largest single-operator rapid transit system worldwide, with 472 rail stations. Over 120 colleges and universities are located in New York City, including Columbia University, New York University, Rockefeller University, which have been ranked among the top universities in the world. Anchored by Wall Street in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan, New York has been called both the most economically powerful city and the leading financial center of the world, the city is home to the world's two largest stock exchanges by total market capitalization, the New York Stock Exchange and NASDAQ. In 1664, the city was named in honor of the Duke of York.
James's older brother, King Charles II, had appointed the Duke proprietor of the former territory of New Netherland, including the city of New Amsterdam, which England had seized from the Dutch. During the Wisconsinan glaciation, 75,000 to 11,000 years ago, the New York City region was situated at the edge of a large ice sheet over 1,000 feet in depth; the erosive forward movement of the ice contributed to the separation of what is now Long Island and Staten Island. That action left bedrock at a shallow depth, providing a solid foundation for most of Manhattan's skyscrapers. In the precolonial era, the area of present-day New York City was inhabited by Algonquian Native Americans, including the Lenape, whose homeland, known as Lenapehoking, included Staten Island; the first documented visit into New York Harbor by a European was in 1524 by Giovanni da Verrazzano, a Florentine explorer in the service of the French crown. He named it Nouvelle Angoulême. A Spanish expedition led by captain Estêvão Gomes, a Portuguese sailing for Emperor Charles V, arrived in New York Harbor in January 1525 and charted the mouth of the Hudson River, which he named Río de San Antonio.
The Padrón Rea
James Whitcomb Riley
James Whitcomb Riley was an American writer and best-selling author. During his lifetime he was known as the "Hoosier Poet" and "Children's Poet" for his dialect works and his children's poetry respectively, his poems tended to be humorous or sentimental, of the 1,000 poems that Riley wrote, the majority are in dialect. His famous works include "Little Orphant Annie" and "The Raggedy Man". Riley began his career submitting poetry to newspapers. Thanks in part to an endorsement from poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, he earned successive jobs at Indiana newspaper publishers during the latter 1870s. Riley rose in prominence during the 1880s through his poetry reading tours, he traveled a touring circuit first in the Midwest, nationally, holding shows and making joint appearances on stage with other famous talents. Riley was an alcoholic, never married or had children, caused a scandal in 1888 when he became too drunk to perform, his publicist blamed his alcoholism and depression on his inability to achieve financial success, despite his fame and popularity.
He was able to extricate himself from poorly negotiated contracts that had limited his earnings and as a result, he became wealthy. By the 1890s, Riley became a bestselling author, his children's poems were illustrated by Howard Chandler Christy. Titled Rhymes of Childhood, the book was his sold millions of copies; as a poet, Riley achieved an uncommon level of fame during his own lifetime. He was honored with annual Riley Day celebrations around the United States and was called on to perform readings at national civic events, he continued to write and hold occasional poetry readings until a stroke paralyzed his right arm in 1910. Riley's chief legacy was his influence in fostering the creation of a Midwestern cultural identity and his contributions to the Golden Age of Indiana Literature. With other writers of his era, he helped create a caricature of Midwesterners and formed a literary community that produced works rivaling the established eastern literati. There are many memorials dedicated to Riley, including the James Whitcomb Riley Hospital for Children.
James Whitcomb Riley was born on October 7, 1849 in the town of Greenfield, the third of the six children of Reuben Andrew and Elizabeth Marine Riley. Riley's father was an attorney, in the year before Riley's birth, he was elected a member of the Indiana House of Representatives as a Democrat, he developed a friendship with the governor of Indiana, after whom he named his son. Martin Riley, Riley's uncle, was an amateur poet who wrote verses for local newspapers. Riley was fond of his uncle. Shortly after Riley's birth, the family moved into a larger house in town. Riley was "a quiet boy, not talkative, who would go about with one eye shut as he observed and speculated." His mother taught him to read and write at home before sending him to the local community school in 1852. He found school difficult and was in trouble. Punished, he had nothing kind to say of his teachers in his writings, his poem "The Educator" told of an intelligent but sinister teacher and may have been based on one of his instructors.
Riley was most fond of Lee O. Harris. Harris encouraged him to pursue it further. Riley's school attendance was sporadic, he graduated from grade eight at age 20 in 1869. In an 1892 newspaper article, Riley confessed that he knew little of mathematics, geography, or science, his understanding of proper grammar was poor. Critics, like Henry Beers, pointed to his poor education as the reason for his success in writing. Riley lived in his parents' home. At five years old, he began spending time at the Brandywine Creek just outside Greenfield, his poems "A Barefoot Boy" and "The Old Swimmin' Hole" referred back to his time at the creek. He was introduced in his childhood to many people who influenced his poetry, his father brought home a variety of clients and disadvantaged people to give them assistance. Riley's poem "The Raggedy Man" was based on a German tramp his father hired to work at the family home. Riley picked up the cadence and character of the dialect of central Indiana from travelers along the old National Road.
Their speech influenced the hundreds of poems he wrote in 19th century Hoosier dialect. Riley's mother told him stories of fairies and giants, read him children's poems, she was superstitious, influenced Riley with many of her beliefs. They both placed "spirit rappings" in their homes on places like tables and bureaus to capture any spirits that may have been wandering about; this influence is recognized in many of his works, including "Flying Islands of the Night."As was common at that time and his friends had few toys and they amused themselves with activities. With his mother's aid, Riley began creating plays and theatricals which he and his friends would practice and perform in the back of a local grocery store; as he grew older, the boys named their troupe the Adelphians and began to have their shows in barns where they could fit larger audiences. Riley wrote of these early performances in his poem "When We First Played'Show'," where he referred to himself as "Jamesy." Many of Riley's poems are filled with musical references.
Riley had no musical education, could not read sheet music, but learned from his father how to play guitar, from a friend how to play violin. He performed in two d
Beatrice Lillie
Beatrice Gladys Lillie, known as Bea Lillie, was a Canadian-born British actress and comedic performer. She began to perform as a child with her sister, she made her West End debut in 1914 and soon gained notice in revues and light comedies, becoming known for her parodies of old-fashioned, flowery performing styles and absurd songs and sketches. She debuted in New York in 1924 and two years starred in her first film, continuing to perform in both the US and UK, she was associated with revues staged by André Charlot and works of Noël Coward and Cole Porter, was paired with Gertrude Lawrence, Bert Lahr and Jack Haley. During World War II, Lillie was an inveterate entertainer of the troops, she won a Tony Award in 1953. Lillie was born in Toronto to wife Lucie-Ann Shaw; some theatre sources incorrectly state. However, most of her obituaries and her autobiography do not mention this name, the online birth registry at FamilySearch gives her birth name as Beatrice Gladys Lillie, her father had been a British Army officer in India and was a Canadian government official.
Her mother was a concert singer. Lillie performed in Ontario towns as part of older sister, Muriel, her mother took the girls to London, where she made her West End début in the 1914 show Not Likely! Lillie followed this with about a dozen London shows and musical revues until 1922. In her revues, Lillie developed her sketches and parodies; these won her lavish praise from The New York Times after her 1924 Broadway début in André Charlot's Revue of 1924, starring Gertrude Lawrence. In some of her best known bits, she solemnly parodied the flowery performing style of earlier decades, mining such songs as "There Are Fairies at the Bottom of Our Garden" and "Mother Told Me So" for every double entendre. Other numbers showcased her exquisite sense of the absurd, her performing in such comedy routines as "One Dozen Double Damask Dinner Napkins", earned her the used sobriquet of "Funniest Woman in the World". She never performed the "Dinner Napkins" routine in Britain because British audiences had seen it performed by the Australian-born English revue performer Cicely Courtneidge, for whom it was written.
In 1926, she returned to New York City to perform. While there, she starred in her first film, Exit Smiling, opposite fellow Canadian Jack Pickford, the younger brother of Mary Pickford; this was followed by The Show of Shows. After a 1927 tour on the Orpheum Circuit, Lillie returned to Broadway in Vaudeville at the Palace Theatre in 1928 and performed there after that. From the late 1920s until the approach of World War II, Lillie crossed the Atlantic to perform on both continents, she played at the London Palladium in 1928. On stage, she was long associated with the works of Noël Coward, beginning with This Year of Grace and giving the first public performance of "Mad Dogs and Englishmen" in Coward's The Third Little Show. Cole Porter and others wrote songs for her. With Bobby Clark, she appeared in London and New York in Walk a Little Faster, in 1935 she starred on Broadway in At Home Abroad, with Bert Lahr she starred in New York in The Show Is On, she returned to Broadway in 1939 in Set in 1944 in Seven Lively Arts.
The same year, Lillie appeared in the film On Approval. Other Broadway appearances included Inside USA, An Evening with Beatrice Lillie, Ziegfeld Follies of 1957, Auntie Mame and High Spirits, her few other film appearances included a cameo role as a revivalist in Around the World in 80 Days and as Mrs. Meers in Thoroughly Modern Millie, her last film. After seeing An Evening with Beatrice Lillie, critic Ronald Barker wrote "Other generations may have their Mistinguett and their Marie Lloyd. We have our Beatrice Lillie, have we seen such a display of perfect talent." Sheridan Morley noted in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography that "Lillie's great talents were the arched eyebrow, the curled lip, the fluttering eyelid, the tilted chin, the ability to suggest in innocent material, the possible double entendre". Lillie was married, on 20 January 1920 at the church of St. Paul, Drayton Bassett, Staffordshire, England, to Sir Robert Peel, 5th Baronet. Following the marriage, she was known in private life as Lady Peel.
She separated from her husband, but the couple never divorced. He died in 1934, their only child, Sir Robert Peel, 6th Baronet, was killed in action aboard HMS Tenedos in Colombo Harbour, Ceylon in 1942. During World War II, Lillie was an inveterate entertainer of the troops. Before she went on stage one day, she learned, she refused to postpone the performance, saying "I'll cry tomorrow." In 1948, while touring in the show Inside USA, she met singer/actor John Philip Huck. He was a former US Marine three decades younger, who became her friend and companion for the rest of their lives, she boosted his career; as Lillie's mental abilities declined at the end of her career, she relied more and more on Huck, whom her friends viewed with suspicion. She suffered a stroke in the mid-1970s, in 1977, a conservator was appointed over her property. Lillie retired from the stage due to Alzheimer's disease. Julie Andrews remembered that Lillie, as Mrs. Meers in Thoroughly Modern Millie (filmed in 19
Lee J. Cobb
Lee J. Cobb was an American actor, he is best known for his performances in On the Waterfront, 12 Angry Men, The Exorcist. He played the role of Willy Loman in the original Broadway production of Arthur Miller's 1949 play Death of a Salesman under the direction of Elia Kazan. On television, Cobb starred in the first four seasons of the Western series The Virginian, he played arrogant and abrasive characters, but had roles as respectable figures such as judges and police officers. He was twice nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, for The Brothers Karamazov and On the Waterfront. Cobb was born to a Jewish family of Russian and Romanian extraction, he grew up in the Bronx, New York, near Crotona Park. His parents were Benjamin Jacob, a compositor for a foreign-language newspaper, Kate. Cobb studied at New York University before making his film debut in The Vanishing Shadow, he joined the Manhattan-based Group Theatre in 1935. Cobb performed summer stock with the Group Theatre in 1936, when they summered at Pine Brook Country Club in Nichols, Connecticut.
During World War II, Cobb served in the First Motion Picture Unit of the United States Army Air Forces. Cobb entered films in the 1930s playing middle-aged and older characters while he was still a youth, he was cast as the Kralahome in the King of Siam. He played the sympathetic doctor in The Song of Bernadette and appeared as Derek Flint's supervisor in the James Bond spy spoofs In Like Flint and Our Man Flint, he reprised his role of Willy Loman in the 1966 CBS television adaptation of the famous play Death of a Salesman, which included Gene Wilder, James Farentino, Bernie Kopell, George Segal. Cobb was nominated for an Emmy Award for the performance. Mildred Dunnock, who had co starred in both the original stage version and the 1951 film version, again repeated her role as Linda, Willy's devoted wife. In August 1955, while filming The Houston Story, Cobb suffered a heart attack and was replaced by Gene Barry. In 1957, he appeared in Sidney Lumet's 12 Angry Men, the unique trial jury deliberations drama, as the abrasive Juror #3.
In 1959, on CBS' DuPont Show of the Month, he starred in the dual roles of Miguel de Cervantes and Don Quixote in the play I, Don Quixote, which years became the musical Man of La Mancha. Cobb appeared as the Medicine Bow, Wyoming owner of the Shiloh Ranch, Judge Henry Garth in the first four seasons, of the long-running NBC Western television series The Virginian. In 1968, his performance as King Lear with Stacy Keach as Edmund, René Auberjonois as the Fool, Philip Bosco as Kent achieved the longest run for the play in Broadway history. One of his final film roles was that of Washington, D. C. Metropolitan Police homicide detective Lt. Kinderman in the 1973 horror film The Exorcist about a demonic possession of a teen-age girl in Georgetown, D. C, his last television role was as a stalwart overworked elderly physician still making house calls in urban Baltimore, in Doctor Max, a TV pilot for a potential series which never materialized. He appeared alongside British actor Kenneth Griffith in an ABC television documentary on the American Revolution called Suddenly an Eagle, broadcast six months after his death.
Cobb was accused of being a Communist in 1951 testimony before the House Un-American Activities Committee of the U. S. House of Representatives of the Congress, by Larry Parks, himself an admitted former Communist Party member. Cobb was called to testify before HUAC, but refused to do so for two years until, with his career threatened by the blacklist, he relented in 1953 and gave testimony in which he named 20 people as former members of the Communist Party USA. Cobb explained why he "named names", saying: When the facilities of the government of the United States are drawn on an individual it can be terrifying; the blacklist is just the opening gambit—being deprived of work. Your passport is confiscated. That's minor, but not being able to move without being tailed is something else. After a certain point it grows to implied as well as articulated threats, people succumb. My wife did, she was institutionalized; the HUAC did a deal with me. I was pretty much worn down. I had no money. I couldn't borrow.
I had the expenses of taking care of the children. Why am I subjecting my loved ones to this? If it's worth dying for, I am just as idealistic as the next fellow, but I decided it wasn't worth dying for, if this gesture was the way of getting out of the penitentiary I'd do it. I had to be employable again. — Interview with Victor Navasky for the 1980 book Naming Names Following the hearing, he resumed his career and worked with Elia Kazan and Budd Schulberg, two other HUAC "friendly witnesses", on the 1954 film On the Waterfront, seen as an allegory and apologia for testifying. Cobb married Yiddish theatre and film actress Helen Beverley in 1940, they had two children, including actress Julie Cobb, before their 1952 divorce. Cobb's second marriage was to school teacher Mary Hirsch, with whom he had two more children before his death. Cobb died of a heart attack in February 1976 in Woodland Hills and was buried in Mount Sinai Memorial Park Cemetery in Los Angeles, his death came the day before his Exodus co star Sal Mineo was murdered.
He was inducted into the American Theatre Hall of Fame in 1981. Crime and Punishment Waiting for Lefty Johnny Johnson Golden Boy Death of a Salesman King Lear McCarthyism Second Red Scare Lee J. Cob
Brown Derby
The Brown Derby was the name of a chain of restaurants in Los Angeles, California. The first and most famous of these was shaped like a man's derby hat, an iconic image that became synonymous with the Golden Age of Hollywood, it was opened by Wilson Mizner. The chain was started by Herbert K. Somborn in the 1920s; the original Brown Derby restaurants had closed or had been converted to other uses by the 1980s, though a Disney-backed Brown Derby national franchising program revived the brand in the 21st century. It is incorrectly thought that the Brown Derby was a single restaurant, the Wilshire Boulevard and Hollywood branches are confused. There is a non-related chain of steakhouse restaurants first founded in 1941 in Akron and franchised in 1962; this chain was founded by Ted and Gus Girves, the full name of these restaurants is "Girves Brown Derby". As of 2019, five of the Girves chain are still in business today. A former Girves Brown Derby restaurant in the past has offered Hollywood-style food.
Opened in 1926, the original restaurant at 3427 Wilshire Boulevard remains the most famous due to its distinctive shape. Whimsical architecture was popular at the time, the restaurant was designed to catch the eye of passing motorists; the Brown Derby name originated from a Malverne, New York-based restaurant of the same name, a popular hang-out for vaudevillians in the 1920s. It was founded by Wilson Mizner as a small cafe, across the street from the popular Hollywood hot spot the Cocoanut Grove at the Ambassador Hotel. Wilson was the front man. Warner put up the money. Wilson Mizner sat in booth 50 every day; the cafe was successful enough to warrant building a second branch later. The original, derby-shaped building was moved in 1937 to 3377 Wilshire Boulevard at the northeast corner of Wilshire Boulevard and Alexandria Avenue, about a block from its previous location. In September 1980, the restaurant closed without warning. Local preservationists unsuccessfully tried to stop the building from being bulldozed, but the demolition was completed in November and replaced by a parking lot.
The parking lot was replaced in late 1985 by a shopping center known as the Brown Derby Plaza. The domed structure was incorporated into the third floor of the building, is vacant. Despite its less distinctive Spanish Mission style facade, the second Brown Derby, which opened on Valentine's Day 1929 at 1628 North Vine Street in Hollywood, was the branch that played the greater part in Hollywood history. Due to its proximity to movie studios, it became the place to be seen. Clark Gable is said to have proposed to Carole Lombard there. Rival gossip columnists Louella Parsons and Hedda Hopper are recorded as regular patrons. In "L. A. at Last", the first of the Hollywood episodes of I Love Lucy, Lucy and Fred have lunch at the Brown Derby. During the misadventure, the trio dines in a booth with Eve Arden on one side and William Holden on the other; this leads to the famous disaster scene in which Lucy inadvertently causes a waiter to hit Holden in the face with a pie. In 1947's Fun and Fancy Free component "Mickey and the Beanstalk", the cartoon ends with Willie the Giant's stomping through Hollywood looking for Mickey Mouse.
Before the scene closes, Willie notices The Brown Derby restaurant and picks up the restaurant looking for Mickey. Willie notices the restaurant looks like a hat, places it on his head, stomps off with the HOLLYWOOD lights blinking in the background. Like its Wilshire Boulevard counterpart, it was the home of hundreds of celebrity drawings and caricatures. Jack Lane drew many of these caricatures between 1947 and 1985. Another artist whose work was displayed was Nicholas Volpe, he was commissioned by the Brown Derby to paint portraits of up to 200 top recording artists to be displayed in the restaurant's Hall of Fame Record Room. In addition, his Oscar-winning star portraits were displayed in the restaurant's "Academy Room," created for showing Volpe's art; the Hollywood Brown Derby is the purported birthplace of the Cobb salad, said to have been hastily arranged from leftovers by owner Bob Cobb for showman and theater owner Sid Grauman. It was chopped fine, because Grauman had just had dental work done, couldn't chew well.
The Hollywood Brown Derby closed for the last time at its original site on April 3, 1985, as a result of a lease dispute. The building was occupied by a restaurant called Arbat Continental Restaurant when the building was hit by an early morning fire that destroyed the kitchen. After the fire in 1987, the building remained unoccupied and deteriorated further while suffering frequent break ins from homeless squatters and teenage gang members; as a result of damage caused by the 1994 Northridge earthquake, the building at 1628 North Vine Street was declared unsafe by the City of Los Angeles and was the first building in Hollywood ordered to be demolished. The building was demolished the following month; the building was home to a restaurant and bar called Premieres of Hollywood, which catered to the revitalization of Hollywood Boulevard and the style of "Old Hollywood". Premieres of Hollywood was destroyed during the L. A. riots in 1992. A few hand-painted wall tiles from the original Hollywood Brown Derby are held by the Jurus family, who started
