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I’ve been told that ol’ FB made his first major appearance on Johnny Carson as a guest purporting to be the Mayor of Burbank, and that it was a good joke on Carson as no one told him Brooks was a comedian.

It must be one of the funniest bits of talk show ever filmed

I haven’t seen it. My God, that must be priceless.

The only Foster Brooks I’ve seen is on the old Dean Martin tapes. But I love Johnny and miss that generation of entertainers.

Someday it will surface, I hope. That one as the tipsy airline pilot -- when he starts talking about how it's a big responsibility, having the lives of these people in his very hands -- and Dean Martin has completely lost it, so badly that he has to get a hankie out of his pocket and wipe his eyes, he's laughing so hard but trying to be the straight man. Brooks was hilarious.

We had a neighbor across the way in a crowded but semi-upperscale urban condo 'hood in So Cal. He had a drinking problem, but he was amiable, played music a little too loud, worked in his yard or his boat, and was generally cheerful and productive if a little looped sometimes. Then a gal moved in with him, maybe a wife, and all hell broke lose. With her, anyway. She was beyond a nightmare, screeching and screaming at the guy, and you'd hear kind of a low mumble in reply, to her caterwauling about bounced checks and money for her mother and horrible stuff. We felt so bad for the guy. She'd scream and leave for a few weeks or months, then be back. During the time she was gone he was always happy and singing, we could hear him, to his music as he puttered around the house in peace. We called him Foster Brooks.