Burl Ives

 Described by one writer as "a character long before he became an actor," Burl Ives went from humble origins to become one of the world's most beloved folk singers as well as a widely respected film, stage, radio and television performer. Ives was able to captivate audiences with his incredible voice, vast repertoire of traditional ballads - more than 3,400, according to the Library of Congress - and a gentlemanly, homespun persona. He was born in Hunt City, an unincorporated town in Jasper County, Illinois, near Newton, Ives traveled about the U.S. as an itinerant singer during the early 1930s, earning his way by doing odd jobs and playing his banjo. He was jailed in Mona, Utah, for vagrancy and for singing "Foggy Dew" (an English folk song), which the authorities decided was a bawdy song. In early 1942, Ives was drafted into the U.S. Army. He spent time first at Camp Dix, then at Camp Upton, where he joined the cast of Irving Berlin's This Is the Army. He attained the rank of corporal. When the show went to Hollywood, he was transferred to the Army Air Forces. He was honorably discharged, apparently for medical reasons, in September 1943. Between September and December 1943, Ives lived in California with actor Harry Morgan. In December 1943, Ives went to New York to work for CBS radio for $100 a week. In 1946, Ives was cast as a singing cowboy in the film Smoky. His version of the 17th-century English song "Lavender Blue" became his first hit and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Song for its use in the 1949 film So Dear to My Heart.

His movie credits took off in the 50's and they include the role of Sam the Sheriff of Salinas, California, in East of Eden (1955), he played himself in Elia Kazan's classic A Face in the Crowd (1957), Big Daddy in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958) , roles in Desire Under the Elms (1958), Wind Across the Everglades (1958), The Big Country (1958), for which he won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor and Our Man in Havana (1958), based on the Graham Greene novel. In the 1960s, Ives began singing country music with greater frequency. In 1962, he released three songs that were popular with both country music and popular music fans: "A Little Bitty Tear", "Call Me Mister In-Between", and "Funny Way of Laughin'" Ives had several film and television roles during the 1960s and 1970s. In 1962, he starred with Rock Hudson in The Spiral Road, which was based on a novel of the same name by Jan de Hartog. He also starred in Disney's Summer Magic (1962) with Hayley Mills, Dorothy McGuire, and Eddie Hodges, and a score by Robert and Richard Sherman. In 1964, he played the genie in the movie The Brass Bottle with Tony Randall and Barbara Eden. he was also in Ensign Pulver (1964), the sequel to Mister Roberts (1955).

Ives' "A Holly Jolly Christmas" and "Silver and Gold" became Christmas standards after they were first featured in the 1964 NBC-TV presentation of the Rankin/Bass stop-motion animated family special Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. Johnny Marks had composed the title song (originally an enormous hit for singing cowboy Gene Autry) in 1949, and producers Arthur Rankin, Jr. and Jules Bass retained him to compose the TV special's soundtrack. Ives voiced Sam the Snowman, the banjo-playing "host" and narrator of the story, explaining how Rudolph used his "nonconformity", as Sam refers to it, to save Christmas from being cancelled due to an impassable blizzard. The following year, Ives rerecorded all three of the Johnny Marks hits which he had sung in the TV special, but with a more "pop" feel. He released them all as singles for the 1965 holiday season, capitalizing on their previous success. He starred in short-lived O.K. Crackerby! (1965–66), a comedy which costarred Hal Buckley, Joel Davison, and Brooke Adams, about the presumed richest man in the world, replaced Walter Brennan's somewhat similar The Tycoon on the ABC schedule from the preceding year.

He played Walter Nichols in the drama The Bold Ones: The Lawyers (1969–72), a segment of the wheel series The Bold Ones. Ives performed in other television productions, including Pinocchio (1968) and Roots (1977). In 1976 he was a guest on Little House on the Prairie. Ives occasionally starred in macabre-themed productions. In 1970, for example, he played the title role in the horror film The Man Who Wanted to Live Forever, in which his character attempts to harvest human organs from unwilling donors. In 1972, he appeared as old man Doubleday in the episode "The Other Way Out" of Rod Serling’s Night Gallery, in which his character seeks a gruesome revenge for the murder of his granddaughter. When America Sings opened at Disneyland in 1974, Ives voiced the main host, Sam Eagle, an Audio-Animatronic. Ives lent his name and image to the U.S. Bureau of Land Management's "This Land Is Your Land – Keep It Clean" campaign in the 1970s. He was portrayed with the program's fictional spokesman, Johnny Horizon. He costarred with George Burns and Brooke Shields in Just You and Me, Kid (1979) In 1982 he played Carruthers, a dog trainer, in Samuel Fuller's controversial and critically acclaimed film White Dog. He starred with Farrah Fawcett in the ABC miniseries Poor Little Rich Girl (1987). His last film was Two Moon Junction (1988).

In 1989, Ives officially announced his retirement from show business on his 80th birthday. However, he continued to do occasional benefit concert performances on his own accord until 1993. Ives, a longtime smoker of pipes and cigars, was diagnosed with oral cancer in the summer of 1994. After several unsuccessful operations, he decided against further surgery. He fell into a coma and died from the disease on April 14, 1995, at his home in Anacortes, Washington, just two months before his 86th birthday.