It had been the custom for many years for Bing Crosby to take his sons to the ranch each summer for several weeks before going on to Hayden Lake, Idaho, prior to their return to school.

[2] That same year, Phillip began his national service with the Army and was posted to West Germany in February 1956 to join his twin.

Phillip had sung with his brothers on their father's radio shows and they participated in a record with Bing in 1950 called "A Crosby Christmas" which charted at number 22 in the Billboard lists in December, 1950.

After leaving the army, Phillip recorded four tracks for UPA-Chevron on July 29, 1958, including "Thanks" in which his father ad-libbed various comments.

Phillip and Dennis had an amusing linking role on the Bing Crosby Show aired on ABC-TV on March 2, 1959.

An appearance on The Phil Silvers Show on November 14, 1958, followed, and they made their debut as a singing group at Tucson, Arizona in 1959.

The frères—Gary, Phillip, Dennis and Lindsay—have a superlative act that is likely to abash those skeptics who surmised the boys would trade merely on the lustrous family name.

Bing took the place of Gary to sing "Joshua Fit the Battle of Jericho" with his sons, who also sang two other songs themselves.

[6] To promote the album, the brothers appeared on the I've Got a Secret show and taught the panel how to lip-sync to "I Can't Give You Anything but Love.

Eventually, Phillip decided to embark on a solo career, and he had parts in several films, as well as one of the Ben Casey episodes.

Having developed his act, Phillip went to Vietnam with Bob Hope twice to entertain the troops and enjoyed the experience so much that he returned there himself to sing on several occasions.

[13] Crosby was married four times to: In his later years, Phillip's health was not good and he had problems with his back and knees following a motorcycle accident.

"[15] Despite a promising start to life, the Crosby brothers were clearly overwhelmed by their emotional problems, which resulted in heavy drinking.