Art Linkletter, the genial television host who was born in Moose Jaw, Sask., and specialized in getting kids to say "the darndest things," died Wednesday at 97, his assistant said.
Linkletter, a mainstay of American broadcasting in the 1950s and ' 60s with shows such as People Are Funny and Art Linkletter's House Party, died of natural causes at his home in Los Angeles' Bel Air community, assistant Jennifer Kramer told Reuters.
Linkletter's shows sometimes featured conversations with celebrities, but emphasized man-in-the-street interviews and comic conversations with children.
At one time in the 1960s, he was host of the Emmy Awardwinning daily show House Party, while also serving as MC on the weekly shows People Are Funny and Linkletter and the Kids. One of his shows featured a regular spot called Kids Say the Darndest Things, in which he elicited funny comments on topics ranging from history to their families.
The segment became wildly popular, thanks to spontaneous responses, such as the eight-year-old boy who said, "My mom is going to have a baby but my father doesn't know."
"My art," Linkletter once said, "is getting other people to perform. . . . People are more interesting to me than anything else."
In 1969, after the suicide of his daughter Diane was linked to LSD use, Linkletter campaigned against drug abuse. He also travelled the world on behalf of World Vision, a Christian charity, and served as a leader of Goodwill Industries, the Arthritis Foundation and the Los Angeles Orphanage.
He was born Arthur Gordon Kelley on July 17, 1912, but was abandoned by his biological family, who left him on the steps of a Baptist church. He was adopted by a family named Linkletter. His new father was an evangelist who moved the family to California.
He attended San Diego State College with the intention of becoming a teacher, but drifted into radio. In 1942, he moved to Hollywood and launched People Are Funny, a talk show 15 years on radio before moving to television.
Soon after, he started House Party, which aired a dozen years on both radio and TV.
With his wife Lois, whom he married in 1935, Linkletter also had two other daughters and a son, Jack, who produced TV programs, and a son, Robert, who died in a 1980 car accident.
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3 comments:
Here is a sample of his show:
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Those WERE the good old days, for sure. Innocent times for most of us.....
Lucky for me, a few years ago I got to meet him at a restaurant. He was with his family celebrating, and my wife and spoke with him for perhaps 15 minutes. He was just like you would expect him to be. Sadly, we don't have a photograph of the evening.
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