Bert Parks (December 30, 1914 – February 2, 1992) was an American actor, singer, and radio and television announcer and host, is best known as the longtime host (1955-1979) of the annual Miss America telecast.
Biography
Parks was born Bertram Jacobson in Atlanta, Georgia, the son of Hattie (née Spiegel) and Aaron Jacobson, who was a merchant. Parks got his first broadcasting job at age sixteen, for Atlanta's WGST radio. He moved to New York when he was nineteen. He was hired as a singer and straight man on The Eddie Cantor Show before becoming a CBS radio staff announcer. Parks became the host of Break the Bank, which premiered on radio in 1945 and went on to television from 1948-1957, and Stop the Music on radio in 1948, and on television 1949-1952.
Other game/quiz shows Parks hosted in the first decade and a half of television (the debut years are noted here) included The Big Payoff (1951), Balance Your Budget (1952), Double or Nothing (1952), Two in Love (1954), Giant Step (1956), Hold That Note (1957), County Fair (1958), Bid 'n' Buy (1958), Masquerade Party (which debuted in 1952 with Parks as a panelist until he became the show's host in 1958), and Yours For A Song (1961). Parks also hosted the pilot for The Hollywood Squares but was not selected to host the series.
He also had a daytime variety show with The Bert Parks Show (1950). He hosted the Miss America telecast from 1955 until 1979. He was unceremoniously fired after the 1979 pageant on the grounds that he was too old. Talk show host Johnny Carson led a campaign on the air of The Tonight Show to have Parks rehired, but this was unsuccessful.
Along with many other celebrities, he hosted NBC radio's "Monitor" at different times during the 1960's.
An audio tape of Parks's classic rendition of the song "There She Is, Miss America" is still used each year in the Miss America contest as the just-announced winner takes her walk down the runway in her newly-earned crown.
Parks did a take-off of his Miss America role in 1990's The Freshman, starring Matthew Broderick. In it, he plays the M.C. of the Gourmet Club dinner in which diners supposedly eat a Komodo Dragon. He sings a take-off of "There She Is, Miss America" in a salute to the dragon.
In 1991 Parks appeared on a episode of the TV series Night Court as himself. He died of lung cancer in 1992.
References
^ http://nl.newsbank.com/nl-search/we/Archives?p_product=AT&p_theme=at&p_action=search&p_maxdocs=200&p_topdoc=1&p_text_direct-0=0EB7D410CF25832A&p_field_direct-0=document_id&p_perpage=10&p_sort=YMD_date:D&s_trackval=GooglePM
^ Wise, James E. (2000). Stars in Khaki: Movie Actors in the Army and the Air Services. Naval Institute Press, 73. ISBN1557509581.
External links
Photo
Preceded by
Bob Russell (entertainer)
Miss America host
1955-1979
Succeeded by
Ron Ely
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Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bert_Parks"
Categories: 1914 births | 1992 deaths | American actors | American game show hosts | American male singers | American television personalities | Lung cancer deaths | Miss America | People from Atlanta, Georgia
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