I just learned that Art Linkletter passed away today at 97...
While Art said:
I've learned it's always better to have a small percentage of a big success, than a hundred percent of nothing.
He was better known for listening.
I remember watching Mr. Linkletter with Gramma, after I got home from school. All I remember about his show ("House Party") is the interviews with the kids.
They were hilarious.
I can't get to any sites that have the quotes...
But I remember reading some about "Prisoner" Eisenhower in one of the "Darnedest Things" books. :) And giving away mom's secrets - to the nation.
The show was funny enough that Bill Cosby tried to re-create it (with modest success) in 1998.
Please share your favorite "darnedest thing" quote in the comments, or feel free to link a video.
I did not see what Mr. Linkletter passed away from (at 97, one imagines 'old age'); but I hope those surviving him, including his wife, who married him in 1935(!) take some comfort in how much joy and laughter he shared through the years.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/...
Rest in peace.
Updated: I'm seeing several "thought he was all ready gone" comments - I frequently wonder about people I hadn't heard about in awhile, and I understand where people'd wonder about Art. However, I'd read about him not that long ago in a funny book called "Little Billy's
Letters".
In "Little Billy's Letters" a grown man (Bill Geerhart), took primary school lined paper and a big pencil and wrote to famous and infamous people about a variety of topics, and then created a book of the letters. In a book of letters from "Billy" plus the unabomber and Charles Manson (and followers) and Supreme Court justices, he opened Art Linkletter's letter to him about whether he should quit school.
(January 6, 1999)
... We are now in the Age of Information and Knowledge and Education. Think of the Internet. Think of the computer.
Finish school. High School and also a college degree, or some special training for the computer world.
No young person today can afford to quit school.