Robert Lewis Bell was born on January 18, 1922 in Flint, Michigan. His
father was an assembly worker at General Motors and his mother was a
housewife. He had two older brothers. After graduating high school, a
friend's family offered to take him along to Arizona, where he dug
ditches, worked as a carhop and lumberjack, and signed onto
construction jobs. His show business career began as a U.S. Cavalryman
extra for the motion picture
Arizona (1940), where he also helped
build the village of "Old Tucson" for the movie.
Although he was certifiably blind in his right eye, he succeeded in
passing the Marine Corps physical in 1941, by memorizing the eye
charts. Less than a year later, however, he was given a medical
discharge but decided to try again, only this time, with the Navy. With
the help of a sympathetic Navy doctor, he was accepted and served in
San Francisco and, later, the Philippines, until 1946.
Upon his discharge, he returned to Flint, where he joined a community
theater production and was subsequently offered a job as an announcer
and disc jockey at WMRP Radio. A year later, he moved to South Bend,
Indiana's WHOT Radio where he met and married copywriter Carol
Atkinson. In 1950, they moved to Indianapolis, where he broke into
television on WFBM-TV.
Bell's flair for comedic character acting surfaced in 1953, when he was
paired with variety/talk show host
Wally Phillips at WLWT-TV and WLW Radio
in Cincinnati, Ohio. In 1956, the stations' Executive Vice President,
Ward Quaal, left the company to become General Manager of WGN
Continental Broadcasting Company (WGN-TV & Radio) in Chicago and
brought Bell, Phillips and the show's writer/director/producer
Don Sandburg along. During the
four years that followed, Phillips and Bell starred on their own
variety series, which included "The Wally Phillips Show" and "Midnight
Ticker". Bell also doubled as a staff announcer. From 1959 until 1968,
he hosted "The Three Stooges" weekday afternoon showcase as "Andy
Starr", the elderly custodian of the Odeon Theater. But it was in 1960
when WGN-TV asked him to portray the character that would make him a
Chicago television legend, "Bozo the Clown".
Alan Livingston created "Bozo" for
Capitol Records in Hollywood, California in 1946. He hired voice artist
and former circus clown, 'Pinto
Colvig', to
portray the character on the recordings and first Bozo television
series, "Bozo's Circus", on KTTV-TV in Los Angeles in 1949. In the late
1950s, Livingston and Capitol briefly parted ways and sold the
licensing rights to Larry Harmon, whose
business partner, Jayark Films Corporation, began distributing Bozo
limited-animation cartoons to television stations along with the rights
for each to hire its own live Bozo host.
Chicago's Bozo debuted on June 20, 1960 starring Bob Bell on a live
30-minute "Bozo" show weekdays at noon, performing comedy sketches and
introducing Bozo cartoons. The program was placed on hiatus in January
1961 to facilitate WGN-TV and Radio's move from Tribune Tower in
downtown Chicago to the city's northwest side. The show was expanded to
an hour and returned as "Bozo's Circus" on September 11, 1961 with
additional cast members, a 13-piece orchestra, comedy sketches, circus
acts, cartoons, games and prizes before a 200+ member studio audience.
The show and Bell's portrayal achieved a popularity and success unlike
any locally produced children's show in the history of television. His improvisational skills on live television,
double-entendres and
Jackie Gleason-like mannerisms
also attracted a huge adult following. The program began airing
nationally via cable and satellite in 1978, and studio audience
reservations surpassed a 10-year wait. In 1980, the series moved to
weekday mornings as "The Bozo Show" and aired on tape delay.
Bell retired in 1984 with the show remaining #1 in its timeslot.
Immediately following his retirement, the Chicago Chapter of the
National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences Board of Directors
honored him with their Governors' Award. Fellow cast members throughout
his 24-year run as Bozo included Ned Locke as Ringmaster Ned, Bob
Trendler as Mr. Bob, Don Sandburg as Sandy the Tramp, Ray Rayner as
Oliver O. Oliver, Roy Brown as Cooky the Cook, Marshall Brodien as
Wizzo the Wizard, and Frazier Thomas. Joey D'Auria took over the Bozo
role until 2001.
After raising four children, Bell and his wife Carol moved from
Deerfield, Illinois to Lake San Marcos, California, an area he had
visited while serving in the Marine Corps during World War II. In
addition to presiding over the Kiwanis Club of Lake San Marcos, he
served on the board of directors of a community educational association
that raised funds for the local school system.
In 1986, he was greeted with a lengthy standing ovation when he
returned for a special guest appearance as himself during a live
broadcast of "The Bozo 25th Anniversary Special" from Medinah Temple in
Chicago. Ten years later, he became the first portrayer of Bozo to be
inducted into the International Clown Hall of Fame in Wisconsin.
On December 8, 1997, Bob Bell passed away due to heart failure at the
age of 75 in San Marcos, California. Illinois Governor Jim Edgar and
Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley proclaimed April 18, 1998 "Bob Bell Day"
in the State of Illinois and City of Chicago as Addison Street near the
WGN-TV Studios was named "Bob Bell Way." In 1999, actor and Chicago
native Dan Castellaneta, best known as the voice of Homer Simpson and
Krusty the Clown on "The Simpsons" television series, revealed during a
national television interview that his voice characterization of Krusty
was based on Bob Bell's Bozo. Considering Bell's sly sense of humor,
there's no doubt he would be proud.
