They don't make em like they used to. WoW!
Posted on 12/13/2006 4:03:46 PM PST by pissant
Some facts about the life of entertainer Bing Crosby:
-He was the first performer to receive Oscar nominations for the same role in two different films: as Father O'Malley in "Going My Way" (1944 - he won) and again in "The Bells of St. Mary's" (1945).
-From 1944 to 1948, he was five times the top moneymaking star at the box office in Quigley Publications annual poll of movie exhibitors, a record later equaled by Clint Eastwood and Burt Reynolds and then surpassed by Tom Cruise, who has been tops six times.
-He was pictured on a 29 cent U.S. postage stamp in the "Legends of American Music" series in 1994.
-At the time of his death in 1977, he was the biggest selling recording artist of all time.
-He is one of only five actors to have a No. 1 single and an Oscar for best actor or actress. The others are Barbara Streisand, Frank Sinatra, Cher and Jamie Foxx.
-He received 23 gold records and was awarded platinum discs for his two biggest selling singles, "White Christmas" in 1960 and "Silent Night" in 1970.
-According to the Guinness Book of Records, Crosby's White Christmas has "sold over 100 million copies around the world, with at least 50 million sales as singles."
-According to ticket sales, Crosby is, at 1,077,900,000 tickets sold, the third-most popular actor of all-time, after Clark Gable and John Wayne. He is also, according to Quigley Publishing Co.'s International Motion Picture Almanac, tied for second on the "All Time Number One Stars List" with three other actors: Clint Eastwood, Tom Hanks and Burt Reynolds. Crosby was the number one box office attraction for five years, beaten only by Tom Cruise who was number one for seven years.
-From the 1940s to the 1960s, he owned 15 percent of the Pittsburgh Pirates baseball team.
-He was the first choice of "Columbo" creators Richard Levinson and William Link to portray the famed detective, but didn't want to take time from his golf game.
-He appeared on approximately 4,000 radio broadcasts, nearly 3,400 of them his own programs, and single-handedly changed radio from a live-performance to a canned or recorded medium by presenting, in 1946, the first transcribed network show on ABC, thereby making that also-ran network a major force. He was the top-rated radio star for eighteen of those years.
-He is estimated to have sold between 500 million and 900 million records worldwide. Most of the sales were singles.
-In 1962, Crosby was the first recipient of the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award.
-Four songs Crosby sang in movies - "Sweet Leilani" (1937), "White Christmas" (1942), "Swinging on a Star" (1944), and "In the Cool, Cool, Cool of the Evening" (1951) - won Oscars.
-His recording of "White Christmas" became the best-selling single for more than 50 years, until overtaken in 1997 by "Candle in the Wind", Elton John's tribute to the late Princess Diana.
Ugh. What a contrast.
Burt? He's got Miller commercials now too.
I have read a few books and enough articles in my life to form my own opinion...here is a long long list of comments and resources from people who worked with him and with his family:
http://www.findadeath.com/Deceased/c/bing/bing_crosby_by_kevin_hassell.htm
I'll forward some truth about Bing when I get time. I've heard this crap for years.
And Spokane just named a theatre after him. His family left T-town for Spokesvegas when he was three. But I'm gonna see what I can do to get a statue of him put in Tacoma.
You choose to believe the worst, when ALL EVIDENCE points to the son lying thru his alcohol soaked brain. But believe as you wish.
excellent. thank you
Wasn't he born in Indiana, PA? My husband's neck of the woods.
When Bing Crosby does push ups, he doesnt push himself up. He pushes the earth down.
Its a known fact that the tears of Bing Crosby can cure cancer. Unfortunately, Bing has never cried in his life.
Wait a minute, those are Chuck Norris facts.
It's hard to tell the two apart!
My USF Dons don't look so good in the early going.
Ha!
and the sirius Christmas music channel plays it about once an hour.
They don't make em like they used to. WoW!
Clearly Peter Faulk was a better choice as Columbo. IMHO!
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