Jack Benny (February 14, 1894 - December 26, 1974)

This blog is much too small to recognize all the wonderful contributions and gifts that Jack Benny has given to the world and to comedy. Right now I am just going to talk a little bit about his many television and radio appearances. This list isn't complete, there were quite a few specials and other television functions that I will not touch on. In 1932, he started on radio by hosting "The Canada Dry Program." At first it was on NBC and then moved to CBS until 1933. From 1933 to 1934 he hosted "The Chevrolet Show." Briefly in 1934 he hosted "The General Tire Show." That same year he began hosting "The Jell-O Program" and remained with it until 1942 when he switched to "The Grape Nuts Flakes Program." When that ended in 1944 he began hosting "The Lucky Strike Program." That remained on NBC until 1949 before switching to CBS. It went off the air in 1955. Just a few of the television show's Benny appeared on are "The Colgate Comedy Hour", "Four Star Playhouse", "The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show", "Climax!", "The $64,000 Question", "Bachelor Father", "Make Room for Daddy", "The DuPont Show of the Week", "The Milton Berle Show", "Password", "Bob Presents the Chrysler Theatre", "What's My Line?", "Toast of the Town", "The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour", "The Liberace Show", "The Jackie Gleason Show", "Dinah's Place", "The Red Skelton Show", "The Bob Hope Show", "The Lucy Show", "Here's Lucy", "Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In", "The Flip Wilson Show", "The Dean Martin Show", "The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson", "General Electric Theater", "The George Burns Show" and "The Kraft Music Hall." From 1950 until 1965 he headed up "The Jack Benny Program" on CBS with his loyal cast which included his wife Mary Livingstone, Dennis Day, Eddie "Rochester" Anderson and Don Wilson. Some of Benny's more memorable routines were "Your money or your life" and him turning 39 every year. One of his best remembered catch phrases was "Now cut that out!" Jack Benny...much too great to put into words.

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