Ralph Livingstone Edwards

Ralph Livingstone Edwards (June 13, 1913 – November 16, 2005)

Edwards was a radio and television host, radio producer, and television producer, best known for his radio-TV game shows Truth or Consequences and This Is Your Life. After some part-time announcing jobs, he got his big break in 1938 with a full-time job for the Columbia Broadcasting System on WABC (now WCBS), where he worked with two other young announcers who would become broadcasting fixtures - Mel Allen and Andre Baruch. The young director had an assured, professional manner, and in a few years he was well established as a nationally famous announcer. It was Edwards who introduced Major Bowes every week on the Original Amateur Hour and Fred Allen on Town Hall Tonight. Edwards perfected a chuckling delivery, sounding as though he was in the midst of telling a very funny story. This "laugh in the voice" technique served him well when 20th Century Fox hired him to narrate the coming-attractions trailers for Laurel and Hardy movies. He later used the conspiratorial chuckle frequently when surprising someone on his programs. In 1948 Edwards created, produced, and hosted This Is Your Life on NBC Radio, moving to NBC-TV in 1952-1961. Celebrity subjects included Marilyn Monroe, Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy, Bob Hope, Andy Griffith, Buster Keaton, Barbara Eden, Bette Davis, Shirley Jones, Jayne Mansfield, and Carol Channing. Edwards produced dozens of game shows, including About Faces, Knockout, Place the Face, It Could Be You, Name That Tune (1970s version) and The Cross-Wits. In 1981, with Stu Billett, he executive-produced The People's Court, the first program of its type. In 1996, along with Stu Billett, they also did Bzzz!. Edwards also burnished the career of another game show host, his protégé Bob Barker. When Truth or Consequences returned for another NBC run in late 1956, Edwards hired Barker, a popular West Coast radio and TV personality. On November 16, 2005, Edwards died of heart failure in Los Angeles, California. He is interred at Forest Lawn-Glendale.