Impresario: The Life and Times of Ed Sullivan (80 page)

Additionally, the New York Public Library’s microfilm collection enabled me to read Sullivan’s newspaper writings back to 1919, from his teenage reporting for the
Port Chester Daily Item
to his last days at the New York
Daily News.

Ed Sullivan’s life was written about voluminously in periodicals after his television show’s debut, and I was able to review countless periodicals with the help of two sources: the New York Public Library, which keeps a file of clippings going back to the 1950s, containing everything from
Time
and
Newsweek
to
Life
and
Editor and Publisher
, as well as many regional newspapers; and the Center for American History, in San Antonio, Texas, which mailed me a thick file of Sullivan-related news clippings.

Among the many books I consulted, a few deserve special mention. Of particular aid were three earlier books about Sullivan and his show:
Always on Sunday, Ed Sullivan: An Inside View
, written in 1968 by CBS press agent Michael David Harris;
A Thousand Sundays: the Story of The Ed Sullivan Show
, written in 1980 by Jerry Bowles; and
Prime Time
, a memoir written in 1979 by Marlo Lewis, who worked with Sullivan to launch his television show. Also helpful was Neal Gabler’s superb
Winchell: Gossip, Power, and the Culture of Celebrity.
Few books have so captured the culture of New York in the 1930s and 1940s.

Of the myriad books on television history I used, none were as helpful and as complete—and as entertainingly written—as
Watching TV: Six Decades of American Television
, by Walter Podrazik and Harry Castleman.

Selected Bibliography

Books

Allen, Mearl L.
Welcome to the Stork Club.
New York: A.S. Barnes & Company, 1980.

Amburn, Ellis.
Buddy Holly: A Biography.
New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1995.

Anderson, John Lee.
Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life.
New York: Grove Press, 1997.

Baker, Jean-Claude.
Josephine: The Hungry Heart.
New York: Random House, 1993.

Baker, Josephine and Jo Bouillon.
Josephine.
New York: Marlowe & Company, 1977.

Bakish, David.
Jimmy Durante: His Show Business Career.
London: McFarland & Company, 1994.

Barnouw, Erik.
The Golden Web: A History of Broadcasting in the United States, 1933–1953.
New York: Oxford University Press, 1968.

Barnouw, Erik.
The Image Empire: A History of Broadcasting in the United States from 1953.
New York: Oxford University Press, 1970.

Barnouw, Erik.
Tube of Plenty: The Evolution of American Television.
London: Oxford University Press, 1975.

Barzman, Norma.
The Red and the Blacklist: The Intimate Memoir of a Hollywood Expatriate.
New York: Thunder’s Mouth Press, 2003.

Bauer, Douglas, editor.
Prime Times: Writers on Their Favorite TV Shows.
New York: Crown Publishers, 2004.

Bedell, Sally.
Up the Tube: Prime Time TV in the Silverman Years.
New York: Viking Press, 1981.

Behr, Edward.
The Good Frenchman: The True Story of the Life and Times of Maurice Chevalier.
New York: Villard Books, 1993.

Bell, Christopher.
East Harlem.
Portsmouth, NH: Arcadia, 2003.

Benny, Joan, with Jack Benny.
Sunday Nights at Seven: The Jack Benny Story.
New York: Warner Books, 1990.

Berg, A. Scott.
Goldwyn: A Biography.
New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1989.

Berle, Milton.
Milton Berle.
New York: Dell, 1974.

Berliner, Louise.
Texas Guinan: Queen of the Nightclubs.
Austin: University of Texas Press, 1993.

Booth, Stanley.
The True Adventures of the Rolling Stones.
Chicago: A Capella Books, 2000.

Bowles, Jerry.
A Thousand Sundays: The Story of the Ed Sullivan Show.
New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1980.

Brady, Kathleen.
Lucille: The Life of Lucille Ball.
New York: Hyperion, 1994.

Breslin, Jimmy.
Damon Runyon: A Life.
New York: Ticknor & Fields, 1991.

Bronson, Fred.
The Billboard Book of Number One Hits.
New York: Billboard Books, 2003.

Brooks, Tim, and Earle Marsh.
The Complete Directory to Prime Time Network TV Shows
, 1946—Present. New York: Ballantine, 1979.

Bruck, Connie.
When Hollywood Had a King: The Reign of Lew Wasserman, Who Leveraged Talent into Power and Influence.
New York: Random House, 2003.

Buskin, Richard.
Phyllis Diller: Like a Lampshade In a Whorehouse, My Life In Comedy.
New York: Penguin Group, 2005.

Cantor, Eddie.
Take My Life.
Garden City: Doubleday & Company, 1957.

Castleman, Harry, and Walter Podrazik.
Watching TV: Six Decades of American Television.
Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 2003.

Chernow, Ron.
Titan: The Life of John D. Rockefeller.
New York: Vintage Books, 1998.

Clarke, Donald.
All Or Nothing At All: A Life of Sinatra.
New York: Fromm International, 1997.

Coffey, Michael, editor.
The Irish in America.
New York: Hyperion, 1997.

Coleman, Ray.
The Man Who Made the Beatles: An Intimate Biography of Brian Epstein.
New York: McGraw-Hill, 1989.

Davies, Hunter.
The Beatles: The Authorized Biography.
New York: McGraw-Hill, 1968.

Davis, Stephen.
Jim Morrison: Life, Death, Legend.
New York: Gotham Books, 2004.

DeMille, Cecil B.
The Autobiography of Cecil B. DeMille.
New York: Garland Publishing, 1959.

Densmore, John.
Riders on the Storm: My Life with Jim Morrison and the Doors.
New York: Delacorte Press, 1990.

Dewey, Donald.
James Stewart: A Biography.
Atlanta: Turner Publishing, 1996.

Edwards, Anne.
Katharine Hepburn.
New York: St. Martin’s Griffin, 2000.

Edwards, Anne.
Shirley Temple: An American Princess.
New York: William Morrow and Company, 1988.

Eells, George.
Hedda and Louella: A Dual Biography of Hedda Hopper and Louella Parsons.
New York: G.P. Putnam’s and Sons, 1972.

Eliot, Marc.
Cary Grant: A Biography.
New York: Harmony Books, 2004.

Eliot, Marc.
Walt Disney: Hollywoods Dark Prince.
New York: Carol Publishing Group, 1993.

Ellis, Edward Robb.
The Epic of New York City.
New York: Old Town Books, 1966.

Epstein, Daniel Mark.
Nat King Cole.
New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 1999.

Erdman, Andrew L.
Blue Vaudeville: Sex, Morals, and the Mass Marketing of Amusements, 1895–1915.
London: McFarland and Company, 1965.

Fields, Armond, and Marc Fields.
From the Bowery to Broadway: Lew Fields and the Roots of American Popular Theater.
New York: Oxford University Press, 1993.

Fisher, Charles.
The Columnists.
New York: Howell, Soskin, 1944.

Fisher, Eddie.
Been There, Done That.
New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1999.

Fisher, James.
Eddie Cantor: A Bio-Bibliography.
Westport: Greenwood Press, 1997.

Gabler, Neal.
Winchell: Gossip, Power and the Culture of Celebrity.
New York: Random House, 1994.

Gauvreau, Emile.
My Last Million Readers.
New York: E.P. Dutton & Co., 1941.

Gehring, Wes D.
W.C. Fields: A Bio Bibliography.
Westport: Greenwood Press, 1984.

Geller, Debbie.
In My Life: The Brian Epstein Story.
New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2000.

Gentry, Curt.
J. Edgar Hoover: The Man and the Secrets.
New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1991.

Goldman, Albert.
The Lives of John Lennon.
New York: William Morrow and Company, 1988.

Goldman, Herbert G.
Banjo Eyes: Eddie Cantor and the Birth of Modern Stardom.
Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997.

Goldsmith, Martin.
The Beatles Come to America.
Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, 2004.

Gray, Barry.
My Night People: 10,001 Nights in Broadcasting.
New York: Simon & Schuster, 1975.

Guaralnick, Peter.
Last Train to Memphis: The Rise of Elvis Presley.
Boston: Little, Brown, and Company, 1994.

Hack, Richard.
Puppetmaster: The Secret Life of J. Edgar Hoover.
Beverly Hills: New Millennium Press, 2004.

Halberstam, David.
The Fifties.
New York: Fawcett Columbine, 1993.

Halberstam, David.
The Powers That Be.
Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 2000.

Harris, Michael David.
Always on Sunday, Ed Sullivan: An Inside View.
New York: Signet Books, 1968.

Haskins, Jim, and N.R. Mitgang.
Mr. Bojangles: The Biography of Bill Robinson.
New York: William Morrow and Company, 1988.

Havig, Alan.
Fred Allen’s Radio Comedy.
Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1990.

Haygood, Wil.
In Black and White: The Life of Sammy Davis, Jr.
New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2003.

Hopper, Hedda.
The Whole Truth and Nothing But.
Garden City: Doubleday & Company, 1963.

Josefberg, Milt.
The Jack Benny Show: The Life and Times of America’s Best-Loved Entertainer.
New Rochelle, NY: Arlington House, 1977.

Jowitt, Deborah.
Jerome Robbins: His Life, His Theater, His Dance.
New York: Simon & Schuster, 2004.

Kammen, Michael.
The Lively Arts: Gilbert Sedes and the Transformation of Cultural Criticism in the United States.
New York: Oxford University Press, 1996.

Kanfer, Stefan.
Ball of Fire: The Tumultous Life and Comic Art of Lucille Ball.
New York: Random House, 2003.

Kanfer, Stefan.
Groucho: The Life and Times of Julius Henry Marx.
New York: Random House, 2000.

Kean, Jane, as told to Kris Paradis.
A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Honeymooners … I Had a Life.
Boalsburg, PA: BearManor Media, 2003.

Kelley, Kitty.
His Way: The Unauthorized Biography of Frank Sinatra.
New York: Bantam Books, 1987.

King, Alan.
Name-Dropping: The Life and Lies of Alan King.
New York: Scribner, 1996.

Kissel, Howard.
David Merrick: The Abominable Showman.
New York: Applause, 1993.

Kisseloff, Jeff.
The Box: An Oral History of Television, 1920–1961.
New York: Penguin, 1995.

Klingaman, William K.
1929, The Year of the Great Crash.
New York: Harper and Row, 1989.

Klurfeld, Herman.
Winchell: His Life and Times.
New York: Praeger, 1976.

Koskoff, David E.
Joseph P. Kennedy: A Life and Times.
Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1974.

Kriegel, Mark.
Namath, A Biography.
New York: Penguin Group, 2004.

Kunhardt, Philip B.
P.T. Barnum: America’s Greatest Showman.
New York: Alfred A. Knopf. 1995.

Kuntz, Tom, and Phil Kuntz, editors.
The Sinatra Files.
New York: Three Rivers Press, 2000.

Lackmann, Roon, editor.
The Encyclopedia of American Radio.
New York: Checkmark Books, 1996.

Laszlo, Andrew, ASC.
It’s a Wrap!
Hollywood: ASC Press, 2004.

Lax, Eric.
Woody Allen: A Biography.
New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1991.

Laurie, Joe, Jr.
Vaudeville: From the Honky Tonks to the Palace.
New York: Henry Holt and Company. 1953.

Lawrence, A. H.
Duke Ellington and His World.
New York: Routledge, 2001.

Learner, Laurence.
King of the Night: The Life of Johnny Carson.
New York: William Morrow and Company, Inc., 1989.

Leaming, Barbara.
Katharine Hepburn.
New York: Crown Publishers, 1995.

Leonard, John.
A Really Big Show: A Visual History of the Ed Sullivan Show.
New York: Penguin Group, 1992.

Leonard, John.
Smoke and Mirrors: Violence, Television, and Other American Cultures.
New York: The New Press, 1997.

Levy, Shawn.
King of Comedy: The Life and Art of Jerry Lewis.
New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1996.

Lewis, Frederic Allen.
Only Yesterday, An Informal History of the 1920’s.
New York: Harper and Row, 1931.

Lewis, Frederic Allen.
Since Yesterday, The 1930’s in America.
New York: Harper and Row, 1939.