Leslie Townes "Bob" Hope (May 29, 1903 – July 27, 2003) was an English-born American comedian, actor, entertainer and producer with a career that spanned nearly 80 years and achievements in vaudeville, network radio, television, and USO Tours.

[5] He was the fifth of seven sons of William Henry Hope, a stonemason from Weston-super-Mare, Somerset, and Welsh mother Avis (née Townes), a light opera singer from Barry, Vale of Glamorgan,[6] who later worked as a cleaner.

The family emigrated to the United States aboard the SS Philadelphia, passing through Ellis Island, New York on March 30, 1908, before moving on to Cleveland, Ohio.

[14] Silent film comedian Fatty Arbuckle saw them perform in 1925 and found them work with a touring troupe called Hurley's Jolly Follies.

Within a year, Hope had formed an act called the "Dancemedians" with George Byrne and the Hilton Sisters, conjoined twins who performed a tap-dancing routine on the vaudeville circuit.

[18] After five years on the vaudeville circuit, Hope was "surprised and humbled" when he failed a 1930 screen test for the RKO-Pathé short-subject studio at Culver City, California.

He soon signed with the Vitaphone short-subject studio in Brooklyn, New York, making musical and comedy shorts during the day and performing in Broadway shows in the evenings.

[30] The sentimental, fluid nature of the music allowed Hope's writers—he depended heavily upon joke writers throughout his career[31]—to later create variations of the song to fit specific circumstances, such as bidding farewell to troops while on tour or mentioning the names of towns in which he was performing.

Hope had seen Lamour performing as a nightclub singer in New York,[33] and invited her to work on his United Service Organizations (USO) tours of military facilities.

[34] Hope and Lamour were lifelong friends, and she remains the actress most associated with his film career although he made movies with dozens of leading ladies, including Katharine Hepburn, Paulette Goddard, Hedy Lamarr, Lucille Ball, Rosemary Clooney, Jane Russell, and Elke Sommer.

[38] They had planned one more movie together in 1977, The Road to the Fountain of Youth, but filming was postponed when Crosby was injured in a fall, and the production was canceled when he suddenly died of heart failure that October.

[51] Likely the most unusual of his television specials was Joys!, a parody of murder mystery narratives, where the audience discovers at the end of the broadcast that Johnny Carson was the villain.

The comic, originally featuring publicity stills of Hope on the cover, was entirely made up of fictional stories, eventually including fictitious relatives, a high school taught by movie monsters, and a superhero called Super-Hip.

[citation needed] Hope reprised his role as Huck Haines in a 1958 production of Roberta at The Muny Theater in Forest Park in St. Louis, Missouri.

[56] His 90th birthday television celebration in May 1993, Bob Hope: The First 90 Years, won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Variety, Music Or Comedy Special.

[63] A television special created for his 80th birthday in 1983 at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., featured President Ronald Reagan, actress Lucille Ball, comedian-actor-writer George Burns, and many others.

[64] In 1985 he was presented with the Life Achievement Award at the Kennedy Center Honors,[65] and in 1998 he was appointed an honorary Knight Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (KBE) by Queen Elizabeth II.

While aboard RMS Queen Mary when World War II began in September 1939, Hope volunteered to perform a special show for the passengers, during which he sang "Thanks for the Memory" with rewritten lyrics.

His wife, Dolores, sang from atop an armored vehicle during the Desert Storm tour, and granddaughter Miranda appeared alongside him on an aircraft carrier in the Indian Ocean.

[73]Along with his best friend Bing Crosby, Hope was offered a commission in the United States Navy as lieutenant commander during World War II, but FDR intervened, believing it would be better for troop morale if they kept doing what they were doing by playing for all branches of military service.

[79] During a short stint in 1960, Hope became a part owner of the Riverside International Raceway in Moreno Valley, California, along with Los Angeles Rams co-owner Fred Levy Jr.[80] and oil tycoon Ed Pauley for $800,000 (adjusted to $7.0 million in 2020).

[84] Such early films as The Cat and the Canary (1939) and The Paleface (1948) were financially successful and praised by critics,[85] and by the mid-1940s, with his radio program getting good ratings as well, he was one of the most popular entertainers in the United States.

Former First Lady Nancy Reagan, a close friend and frequent host to him at the White House, called Hope "America's most honored citizen and our favorite clown".

[111] On June 10, 1980, he became the 64th—and only civilian—recipient of the United States Air Force Order of the Sword which recognizes individuals who have made significant contributions to the enlisted corps.

Also, East 14th Street near Playhouse Square in Cleveland's theater district was renamed Memory Lane-Bob Hope Way in 2003 in honor of the entertainer's 100th birthday.

She was described as a "former Ziegfeld beauty and one of society's favorite nightclub entertainers, having appeared at many private social functions at New York, Palm Beach, and Southampton".

As Richard Zoglin wrote in his 2014 biography Hope: Entertainer of the Century, Bob and Dolores always claimed that they married in February 1934 in Erie, Pennsylvania.

[136][137][138][139][139][140] Hope had extensive relationships with US Presidents from Franklin D. Roosevelt to Bill Clinton and often made topical political jokes in his comedic material.

As an example, he hosted boxing champion Joe Frazier, actress Yvonne De Carlo, and singer-actor Sergio Franchi as headliners for the April 25, 1971, show at Philharmonic Hall in Milwaukee.

[177][178] After his death, newspaper cartoonists worldwide paid tribute to his work for the USO, and some featured drawings of Bing Crosby, who had died in 1977, welcoming Hope to Heaven.