Edgar Bergen

Edgar John Bergen (February 16 1903 – September 30 1978) was an Academy Award-winning American actor and radio performer, best known as a ventriloquist. Bergen was born Edgar John Bergen in Chicago, Illinois, to a Swedish family and grew up in Decatur, Michigan. He taught himself ventriloquism from a pamphlet when he was eleven. A few years later he commissioned Chicago woodcarver Theodore Mack to sculpt a likeness of a rascally Irish newspaperboy he knew. The head went on a puppet named Charlie McCarthy, who became Bergen's lifelong sidekick. At age sixteen, he came to Chicago, where he attended Lake View High School and worked at a silent movie house. His first performances were in vaudeville and one-reel movie shorts, but his real success was on the radio. He and Charlie were seen at a New York party by Elsa Maxwell for Noel Coward, who recommended them for an engagement at the famous Rainbow Room. It was there that two producers saw Bergen and Charlie perform. They then...