Richard Bernard “Red” Skelton (July 18, 1913 – September 17, 1997) was an American comedian who was best
known as a top radio and television star from 1937 to 1971. Skelton's show business career began in his teens
as a circus clown and went on to vaudeville, Broadway, films, radio, TV, clubs and casinos, while pursuing
another career as a painter.

Born in Vincennes, Indiana, Skelton was the son of a Hagenbeck-Wallace Circus clown named Joe who died in
1913 shortly before the birth of his son. Skelton himself got one of his earliest tastes of show business
with the same circus as a teenager. Before that, however, he had been given the show business bug at age ten
by entertainer Ed Wynn, who spotted him selling newspapers in front of the Pantheon Theatre, in Vincennes,
Indiana, trying to help his family. After buying every newspaper in Skelton's stock, Wynn took the boy
backstage and introduced him to every member of the show with which he was traveling. By age 15, Skelton had
hit the road full-time as an entertainer, working everywhere from medicine shows and vaudeville to
burlesque, showboats, minstrel shows and circuses. While performing in Kansas City in 1930, Skelton met and
married his first wife, Edna Stillwell.

On December 04, 1945, The Raleigh Cigarette Program resumed where it left off with Skelton introducing some
new characters, including Bolivar Shagnasty and J. Newton Numbskull. Lurene Tuttle and Verna Felton appeared
as Junior's mother and grandmother. David Forrester and David Rose led the orchestra, featuring vocalist
Anita Ellis. The announcers were Pat McGeehan and Rod O'Connor. The series ended May 20, 1949, and that fall
he moved to CBS. Ironically, given that his peak of popularity came with his television show, in recent years
recordings of the Red Skelton radio show have become much easier to come by than the TV show.

Skelton was the first CBS television host to begin taping his weekly programs in color, in the early 1960s,
after he bought an old movie studio on La Brea Avenue (once owned by Charlie Chaplin) and converted it for
television productions. He tried to encourage CBS to tape other shows in color at the facility, although most
shows were taped in black and white at Television City near the Farmers Market in Los Angeles. Although CBS
occasionally would use NBC facilities or its own small color studio for specials, the network avoided color
programming except for telecasts of The Wizard of Oz and Rodgers and Hammerstein's Cinderella until the fall
of 1965, when both NBC and ABC began televising most of their programs in RCA's compatible color process. By
that time, Skelton had abandoned his own studio and moved to Television City, where he resumed color programs
until he left the network. In 1962, CBS expanded his programs to a full hour

When he was presented with the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences' Governor's Award in 1986, he
received a standing ovation. "I want to thank you for sitting down," Skelton said when the ovation subsided.
"I thought you were pulling a CBS and walking out on me."

Near the end of his life, Skelton said his daily routine included writing a short story a day. He collected
the best stories in self-published chapbooks. He also composed music which he sold to background music
services such as Muzak. Among his more notable compositions was his patriotic "Red's White and Blue March."

Red Skelton died in a hospital in Palm Springs, California of pneumonia on September 17, 1997. He was 84
years old. At the time of his death, he lived in Anza, California. He is buried in Forest Lawn Memorial Park
Cemetery in Glendale, California.

Image:Eleanor Roosevelt with Red Skelton, William Douglas, Lucille Ball, and John Garfield