Jack Benny Times May-August 2007

[shimp scrampi]

Another fun issue Laura! Congratulations.

Two amazing things: James Doohan's daughter - the Benny fan - I love Eddie Carroll's bit. And, by my calculations the wee sprite would have been fathered by "Scotty" when he was about 80! Lordy, the man kept more than the "Enterprise"'s engines running.

Second, the Goldie, Fields and Glyde ad is great. A bit of elaboration on your text, is that "Glyde" actually was George Burns. Obviously Jack and Bing Crosby weren't part of the original "Goldie Fields and Glide", but George was. According to his 1954 autobiography (which is a lot more accurate than his later '70s and '80s book), he formed the act with Hymie Goldberg and Nat Fields. George was the blackface part of the act, Nat Fields the "Jew", and that would leave Hymie Goldberg as the "hick" part. The timing fits and everything. George mentions he was in this act when he was around sixteen years old.

[shimp scrampi]

Geez, I just learned that two days after I posted the above, Cynthia Lindsay, who was the co-author of George Burns' 1954 autobiography "I Love Her, That's Why" (introduction by Jack Benny), passed away at the age of 92. She had quite an amazing life, and was also known for a good biography of Boris Karloff as well (with whom she was quite close).

Link to a tribute by friends of hers: http://www.xanapus.com/cynthia.htm