Hope: Entertainer of the Century (73 page)

This book would not have been possible without the generous help and cooperation of Linda Hope, Bob Hope’s daughter. She sat for several hours of interviews; allowed me access to her father’s papers, both at the Library of Congress and at the Hope home in Toluca Lake; and in general made sure all doors were open to me during the researching of the book. I am enormously grateful and honored that she placed her confidence in me to tell the story of her father’s extraordinary life and career. For someone as dedicated as she is to her father’s legacy, it must have been difficult at times to relinquish control and trust a journalist to tell that story fairly and honestly. I sincerely hope the finished product justifies her trust.

I am grateful also to the many other members of the Hope family who shared their recollections and insights with me, especially Bob’s surviving son, Kelly Hope, and grandchildren Miranda and Zachary Hope. I also want to thank Jim Hardy, Jan Morrill, and all the staff members of Hope Enterprises for their help during my reporting and research.

I am appreciative and touched that so many former colleagues and friends of Bob Hope’s were generous enough to spend time with a strange reporter, ransacking their memories to help me piece together my story. Many of them were, understandably, quite old, and it saddens me that so many have passed away since our interviews. I feel privileged to have been able to record some of the last reminiscences of a vanishing show-business generation.

Much of my time was spent in libraries, and I want to thank all the people who facilitated my work. Mike Mashon, head of the Library of Congress’s National Audio-Visual Conservation Center, in Culpeper, Virginia, was a gracious host for my many days of research there. Sam Brylawski and Alan Gevinson, curators of the two Hope exhibits assembled for the Library of Congress, were invaluable
in guiding me through the mountain of material. Rebecca Jones was an always-congenial minder while I was in Culpeper, and Karen Fishman kept me focused while I was at the main library in Washington, DC.

At the Paley Center for Media in New York City, where I spent many long hours watching and listening to Hope TV and radio programs, I’m grateful to Richard Holbrooke for making the process so pleasant and efficient, and to Carrie Oman, for always opening the doors. For research help, I would also like to thank Bill Hooper, custodian of the magazine archives at Time Inc.; Angela Thornton and Susan Weill, in the
Time
magazine research library; Karen Pedersen, at the Writers Guild of America library; Ann Sindelar at the Western Reserve Historical Society library; Jim Ciesla, who tracked down some key Cuyahoga County court records for me; and the entire staff of the Motion Picture Academy’s Margaret Herrick Library, for making sure I always wrote in pencil.

I’m a writer who likes doing my own research, but I could not have done as thorough a job without the help of three people: Caroline Stevens, who supplemented my work at the Library of Congress, both in Culpeper and Washington; Konni Corriere, who prowled some of the back shelves at the Margaret Herrick Library; and Nona Yates, who was an expert guide through the California court and real estate records.

Alan Blackmore, a retired schoolmaster in Weston-super-Mare, England, has done more work on the Hope genealogy than anyone else, and he was an invaluable resource in sorting through the family’s history in England. He also provided me with a copy of Jim Hope’s unpublished memoir, “Mother Had Hopes,” with its fascinating chronicle of the family’s early years in England and later in Cleveland.

I am indebted to Meg and Kay Liberman, who gave me a copy of their father Frank Liberman’s unpublished memoir, with its thoughtful and candid reminiscences of Hope and his world. Elizabeth Frank was kind enough to transcribe for me some key passages from the journal of her father, Melvin Frank. I spent an entertaining afternoon in Los Angeles with Miles Krueger, Broadway archivist extraordinaire, who showed me the only surviving footage of Hope’s appearances on Broadway. Richard Behar, my former
Time
magazine colleague, excavated his notes and tape-recorded interviews for the article he wrote on Hope’s finances for
Forbes
magazine. Michael Feinstein supplied me with rare early recordings of “Thanks for the Memory” by Al Jolson and the songwriters Robin and Rainger. And my brother Paul Zoglin helped me navigate the genealogical archives and locate many key census and immigration documents.

Jim Shepherd, of the Bob Hope Theatre in Eltham, England, and local historian John Kennett were welcoming hosts and tour guides on my visit to the town where Hope was born. In Cleveland, Mike Gavin was most helpful in showing me the neighborhoods where Bob grew up, providing me with family photos, and in many other ways.

Jeff Abraham, one of the great students of old-time comedy, was an irreplaceable resource throughout, leading me to countless new finds, recordings, and sources. Stephen Silverman, of
People
magazine, provided me with insights into the Hope family and introductions to several relatives who became valuable sources. Dick Burgheim, the great Time Inc. editor, my former boss at
TV-Cable Week
and author of a 1967
Time
cover story on Hope, was an inspiration and sounding board for me throughout. And Bill Faith, author of the most definitive Hope biography to date, was most generous in giving his time and help to a fellow biographer.

In addition to the people quoted in the book, many others were important in connecting me with sources, providing background, and helping me develop my ideas. Among them I would especially like to thank Mary Altman, Robert Bader, Gary Giddins, Gloria Greer, Joanne Kaufman, Dennis Klein, Kristiina Laakso, Robert Morton, Richard Niles, Robert Osbourne, Marvin Paige, Hermine Rhodes, Jeff Ross, Richard Schickel, Marion Solomon, Maureen Solomon, and Bill Zehme.

At Simon & Schuster, I am forever indebted to David Rosenthal, who commissioned this book and shared my conviction that a major biography of Hope was overdue, and to his successor, Jonathan Karp, who showed such enthusiasm for a project he inherited. I was incredibly lucky to have an editor, Priscilla Painton, who is also a great friend and a longtime colleague from
Time.
She was an astute and constructive critic of the book, a godsend during some of the tough times I endured during its writing, and an absolute pleasure to work with from beginning to end. Her assistants, Sydney Tanigawa and Sophia Jimenez, along with the entire production staff at Simon & Schuster, made the process as easy as I could imagine.

My agent, Kris Dahl, was, as always, a great rock of support and dedicated friend every step of the way. I will always be grateful for her advice and unshakable faith in me, both on this book and over the years.

Finally, I must thank the most important person in my life, my wife, Charla Krupp, who died of breast cancer during the writing of this book. We were married for nineteen years, and she was my greatest editor, adviser, cheerleader, and life inspiration. She read early drafts of the first few chapters of this book, and her tough criticism inspired me to keep striving to meet her high standards, even in her absence. I cannot express the sorrow I feel that she is not here with me to share what she helped produce. I only hope that it carries some of her spirit, as I do every moment of every day.

© HOWARD SCHATZ

RICHARD ZOGLIN
is a contributing editor and theater critic for
Time
magazine. His book
Comedy at the Edge: How Stand-Up in the 1970s Changed America
is considered the definitive history of that seminal era in stand-up comedy. Zoglin is a native of Kansas City, Missouri, and currently lives in New York City.

MEET THE AUTHORS, WATCH VIDEOS AND MORE AT

SimonandSchuster.com

authors.simonandschuster.com/Richard-Zoglin

ALSO BY RICHARD ZOGLIN

Comedy at the Edge: How Stand-Up in the 1970s Changed America

INTRODUCTION

“World’s Last Bob Hope Fan”
:
Onion,
July 31, 2002,
http://www.theonion.com/articles/worlds-last-bob-hope-fan-dies-of-old-age,3061/
.

“To be paralyzingly”
: Christopher Hitchens, “Hopeless,”
Slate.com
, August 1, 2003,
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/fighting_words/2003/08/hopeless.html
.

“I grew up loving him”
: Woody Allen, interview with author.

“Do you think anybody here knows”
: Larry Gelbart, interview with author.

“the unabashed show-off”
: Leo Rosten, “Bob Hope: Gags and Riches,”
Look
, February 24, 1953.

“Bob had no intellectual curiosity”
: Katherine Green, interview with author.

“Everybody came to attention”
: Sam McCullagh, interview with author.

“He was funnier than the monologues”
: Gelbart, interview with author.

a starstruck stewardess fawned
: Arthur Freeman, letter to the editor,
Times of London
, July 31, 2003.

The bishop who was to introduce Hope
: Recounted by Nathaniel Lande, interview with author.

“Once you worked for Hope”
: Hal Kanter, interview with author.

“What time can you get here?”
: Frank Liberman, unpublished memoir.

“Now you’re talkin’ ”
: Ibid.

“Bob, this gal comes from New York”
: J. Anthony Lukas, “This Is Bob (Politician-Patriot-Publicist) Hope,”
New York Times Magazine
, October 4, 1970.

“the world’s only happy comedian”
: Lupton A. Wilkinson, “Hope Springs Eternal,”
Los Angeles Times
, December 7, 1941.!

“Deep down inside”
: “Fish Don’t Applaud,”
Time
, October 25, 1963.

every morning Bob Hope would get up
: Elliott Kozak, interview with author.

“Playing the European theater”
: Bob Hope,
I Never Left Home
(Simon & Schuster, 1944), 15.

“It is painfully obvious to us”
: Richard Schickel,
Intimate Strangers: The Culture of Celebrity
(Doubleday, 1985), 217.

“I believe this operation can take place”
: Letter from Howard Luck, October 1969, Hope archives, Library of Congress.

“This is just to thank you for the lemon pie”
: Letter from Hope, July 10, 1974, Hope archives.

“She is in the hospital”
: Letter from Donna Moore, October 8, 1967, Hope archives.

“Dear Kelly
:
Remember me?”:
Letter from Hope, October 24, 1967, Hope archives.

CHAPTER 1: OPENING

“Lord Hope, 17th baronet”
:
Birmingham News Age-Herald
, December 15, 1935, Hope archives.

“lured the aristocratic scion”
:
Brooklyn Daily Eagle
, undated, Hope archives.

the family moved from Borth
: The account of Avis’s early years comes largely from Jim Hope’s unpublished memoir, “Mother Had Hopes,” which is based primarily on the recollections of his mother. Some of it is corroborated in a report on Hope’s genealogy done for the Hope family by Research International in 1979 (Hope archives).

The records of the parish school
: Alan Blackmore, interview with author. A grade school would presumably be more scrupulous in obtaining the correct birth date of its students.

suggests that Avis was most likely taken
: Ibid.

By the time she appears
: 1891 census records, administrative county of Glamorgan, Wales. Avis may also be listed in the 1881 census for Borth as well, but the entry is confusing. A nine-year-old girl whose name appears to be “Ivis Towis,” born in Middlesex, London, is recorded as a “boarder,” living with a woman named Jane Lewis and her son John. Intriguingly, a man named Abraham Lloyd Lewis and his family are living on the same street.

“Why, she’s just a baby”
: J. Hope, “Mother Had Hopes,” 19.

“I have not seen a handsomer man”
: Ibid., 50.