Acuff, Roy (15 September 1903–23 November 1992), country music singer and composer, was born Roy Claxton Acuff in Maynardsville, Tennessee, just a few miles north of Knoxville in a spur of the Great Smoky Mountains, the son of Neil Acuff, an attorney and pastor, and Ida Florence Carr. The family moved to Fountain City, a suburb of Knoxville, when Acuff was sixteen, and he spent most of his high school years excelling in sports. After graduation he was invited to have a tryout at a major league baseball camp, but a 1929 fishing trip to Florida resulted in a severe sunstroke, and Acuff was bedridden for a number of months. During his convalescence he reawakened an early interest in music and began to hone his abilities on the fiddle. By the time he had recovered, he had given up his dreams of a baseball career and had determined to utilize his newly discovered musical talent....
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Acuff, Roy (1903-1992), country music singer and composer
Charles K. Wolfe
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Arnaz, Desi (1917-1986), bandleader, actor, and television producer
Tinky ‘‘Dakota’’ Weisblat
Arnaz, Desi (02 March 1917–02 December 1986), bandleader, actor, and television producer, was born Desiderio Alberto Arnaz y Acha III in Santiago de Cuba, Cuba, the son of Desiderio Arnaz II, a landowner and politician, and heiress Dolores “Lolita” de Acha. His early youth was privileged, but the revolution of 1932 broke up his secure home. His father was jailed briefly, and the family ended up in Miami with very little money....
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Bono, Sonny (16 February 1935–05 January 1998), entertainer, songwriter, and politician
Stacey Hamilton
Bono, Sonny (16 February 1935–05 January 1998), entertainer, songwriter, and politician, was born Salvatore Phillip Bono in Detroit, Michigan, the son of Santo Bono, a truck driver, and Jean Bono (maiden name unknown), a beautician. Reared in a working-class environment, Bono was an average student and enjoyed playing the class clown. When he was seven the family moved to Los Angeles, California, where he finished his education. Bono married Donna Rankin in 1954, two years after his graduation from Inglewood High School. They had one daughter....
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Brice, Fanny (1891-1951), comedienne and singer
Herbert G. Goldman
Brice, Fanny (29 October 1891–29 May 1951), comedienne and singer, was born Fania Borach in New York City, the daughter of Charles Borach, a bartender, and Rose Stern. The third of four children, all born on New York’s Lower East Side, she was raised in a Newark, New Jersey, middle-class home complete with household servants and material comforts. Her parents separated in 1902, and Rose moved the family to St. Marks Place in Brooklyn, New York, where Fanny got the remnants of her formal education at public schools....
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Brice, Fanny (1891-1951)
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Canova, Judy (1916-1983), hillbilly singer
Ellis Nassour
Canova, Judy (20 November 1916–05 August 1983), hillbilly singer, was born Juliette Canova in Starke, Florida, the daughter of Joseph Canova, a cotton broker and contractor, and Henrietta Perry, a concert singer. The family was quite musical, and Canova and her brother Zeke and sister Annie studied piano, voice, violin, and horn. Judy, an extrovert—or, as her mother put it, “a natural ham”—from age three, performed at family and church socials. At age twelve she and her best friend entered a series of Jacksonville amateur nights, often taking first place. When the friend dropped out, Zeke and Annie took her spot and the Canova Cracker Trio was born. They sang and did hillbilly comedy and were signed to do local radio. She claimed to have picked up her cornpone lingo from sharecroppers who patronized her father’s cotton gin....
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Cantor, Eddie (September 1892?–10 October 1964), entertainer
Herbert G. Goldman
Cantor, Eddie ( September 1892?–10 October 1964), entertainer, was born Israel Iskowitz in New York City, the son of Mechel Iskowitz, a violinist, and Meta Kantrowitz. Orphaned at the age of three, he was raised by Esther Kantrowitz, his maternal grandmother. He was educated in the public schools of New York’s Lower East Side. His grandmother registered him as “Israel Kantrowitz,” but the name was subsequently anglicized to “Isidore Kanter” by a school official. Kanter, who altered the spelling of his name to “Cantor” upon embarking on a show business career in 1911, grew up on the streets. His grandmother, an Orthodox Jew, earned a living selling candles and other household items and by securing employment for young immigrants as maids in East Side homes....
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Cole, Nat King (1919-1965), pianist and singer
Ronald P. Dufour
Cole, Nat King (17 March 1919–15 February 1965), pianist and singer, was born Nathaniel Adams Coles in Montgomery, Alabama, the son of the Reverend Edward James Coles, Sr., and Perlina Adams, a musician. Cole’s family moved to Chicago when he was four. He first studied piano with his mother, then with bassist Milt Hinton’s mother, and at the age of twelve, classical piano with a Professor Thomas. The family home was located near the Grand Terrace Ballroom, where Cole often heard his first and most important influence, pianist ...
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Cole, Nat King (1919-1965)
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Como, Perry (1912-2001), singer of popular music and television entertainer
Salvatore Mondello
Como, Perry (18 May 1912–12 May 2001), singer of popular music and television entertainer, was born Pierino Roland Como in Canonsburg, Pennsylvania, the son of Pietro Como, a mill hand, and Lucia Travaglini Como, immigrants from Palena, Italy. The seventh of thirteen children, Perry Como earned a few cents a day working after school in a local barbershop in Canonsburg. Later, while attending high school, he operated his own barbershop. Como, performing at wedding receptions and other functions, gained local recognition for his singing ability. One of the few vocalists of his generation to read music, he played both organ and baritone horn....
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Crosby, Bing (1903-1977), singer of popular music
Shoshana Klebanoff
Crosby, Bing (03 May 1903–14 October 1977), singer of popular music, was born Harry Lillis Crosby in Tacoma, Washington, the son of Harry Lowe Crosby, a plant accountant, and Catherine Harrigan. His father was an easy-going descendant of Edmund Brewster, one of the Puritan signers of the Mayflower Compact. His mother, an Irish Catholic, was a strict disciplinarian. Early in his life the family moved to Spokane, Washington, where Crosby grew up. At age six he entered Webster Elementary School (1909–1917), where he received the nickname “Bing.” In 1921 he graduated from the rigidly Jesuit-run Gongaza High School and entered Gongaza University (1921–1925), where he prepared for a law career....
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Crosby, Bob (1913-1993), jazz and popular bandleader and singer, and radio, film, and television personality
Barry Kernfeld
Crosby, Bob (25 August 1913–09 March 1993), jazz and popular bandleader and singer, and radio, film, and television personality, was born George Robert Crosby in Spokane, Washington, the son of Harry Lowe Crosby, a bookkeeper at the Inland Products Canning Company, and Catherine “Kate” Helen Harrigan. He attended Webster High School, North Central High School, and Gonzaga, a Jesuit high school and university. Not a remarkable student, he excelled at sports but chose instead to pursue a career as a singer, following his famous brother, ...
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Crumit, Frank (1888-1943), entertainer
James Ross Moore
Crumit, Frank (18 May 1888–07 September 1943), entertainer, was born in Jackson, Ohio, the son of Frank Crumit, a banker, and Mary C. Poor Crumit. Educated locally and at Culver Military Academy near South Bend in Indiana, he continued his studies in electrical engineering at the University of Ohio (now Ohio University) in Athens, Ohio, graduating in 1910....
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Daniels, Bebe (1901-1971), entertainer
James Ross Moore
Daniels, Bebe (14 January 1901–16 March 1971), entertainer, was born Phyllis Bebe Daniels in Dallas, Texas, the daughter of Danny Daniels (Melville Daniel MacMeal), the actor-manager of a traveling stock theater company, and Phyllis Griffin, his leading lady. From birth Daniels was called “Bebe,” which means baby in Spanish, reflecting her mother’s Spanish ancestry. Daniels first appeared onstage when she was only ten weeks old, and she performed in her first Shakespearean production at the age of four. After her father left the family around 1907–1908, Daniels’s mother took her to Los Angeles, California. She played child roles onstage until a new labor law was passed. In 1910 she made her silent film debut in ...
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Daniels, Bebe (1901-1971)
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DeRose, Peter (1900-1953), composer of popular music and radio personality
James Ross Moore
DeRose, Peter (10 March 1900–23 April 1953), composer of popular music and radio personality, was born in New York City, the son of Anthony DeRose, an Italian immigrant zither player, and Armelina Agresti DeRose, an Italian immigrant. Educated at DeWitt Clinton High School and tutored in music by one of his sisters, DeRose was working as a stock boy for the G. Schirmer music publishers in New York when, one day during his lunch hour, he turned out his first composition, “When You're Gone I Won't Forget You.” Fired for this transgression against the work rules, he sold the song for $25. During the next two years it sold two and a half million copies. DeRose then crossed the street to the G. Ricordi music publishing company, where he was hired as a junior salesman. He promised Ricordi he would write no songs on their time, but within four months the company was displaying six of his newly published songs. Flush with success, DeRose quit his job and in 1923 formed an orchestra with several of his siblings. In 1922 he became an early member of the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers....
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Dragonette, Jessica (14 February 1905?–18 March 1980), popular soprano of the radio
Leigh Davis Soufas
Dragonette, Jessica (14 February 1905?–18 March 1980), popular soprano of the radio, was born in Calcutta, India, the daughter of parents about whom little is known. Orphaned early in life, Dragonette was brought to the United States at the age of six; throughout her childhood she was placed in various institutions operated under the auspices of the Roman Catholic church. She completed her compulsory education at the Philadelphia (Pa.) Catholic High School and later matriculated at Georgian Court College in Lakewood, New Jersey, where she studied languages and religion. The cloistered environment of this school, part of which housed a convent, played a major role in shaping Dragonette’s personality, which—even at the height of her celebrity—was one of introspection and humility. Her lifelong devotion to the Roman Catholic faith may be traced to these formative years spent among the sisters of the convent, many of whom provided Dragonette with the foundations that enabled her to realize her goal of becoming a concert singer....
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Eddy, Nelson (1901-1967), film actor and concert baritone
Charles L. P. Silet
Eddy, Nelson (29 June 1901–06 March 1967), film actor and concert baritone, was born in Providence, Rhode Island, the son of William Darius Eddy, an electrical engineer and inventor, and Isabel Kendrick. Eddy was from a musical family: both of his parents were noted local singers; his grandmother, Caroline Ackerman Kendrick, had been a famous oratorio singer; and his grandfather, Isaac N. Eddy, had been the bass drummer with Reeves’s American Band. In 1915 his parents separated, and his mother moved to Philadelphia. Nelson left school to take a job with her brother at the Mott Iron Works there, and he never returned to finish his formal education. His father stayed in Providence and later remarried. Virginia, a half-sister, was born in 1925. Later, her two sons became favorites of Eddy’s, who had no children of his own....
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Faye, Alice (1915-1998), singing actress
James Ross Moore
Faye, Alice (05 May 1915–09 May 1998), singing actress, was born Alice Jeanne Leppert in New York to Charley Leppert, a policeman, and his wife Alice Moffat Leppert. Educated in New York schools and lying about her age, she began her professional career in 1928 as a dancer for the Chester Hale Troupe and the night-club entrepreneur Nils Thor Granlund. Faye (who legally changed her name in 1935) was a chorine in the eleventh ...
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