[Vision2020] ‘People Are Funny’ Host Art Linkletter Dies at 97

[Tom Hansen]

Courtesy of today's (May 27, 2010) Spokesman-Review.

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‘People Are Funny’ host Linkletter dies at 97

LOS ANGELES – Art Linkletter, who as the gently mischievous host of TV’s
“People Are Funny” and “House Party” in the 1950s and ’60s delighted
viewers with his ability to get kids – and grownups – to say the darndest
things on national television, died Wednesday. He was 97.

Linkletter died at his home in the Bel-Air section of Los Angeles, said
his son-in-law, Art Hershey.

Linkletter had been ill “in the last few weeks time, but bear in mind he
was 97 years old. He wasn’t eating well, and the aging process took him,”
Hershey said.

Linkletter was known on TV for his funny interviews with children and
ordinary folks. He also collected their comments in a number of
best-selling books.

“An amazing fellow, a terrific broadcast talent, a brilliant businessman.
An all-around good guy,” CNN’s Larry King said about his friend and
frequent guest.

“Art Linkletter’s House Party,” one of television’s longest-running
variety shows, debuted on radio in 1944 and was seen on CBS-TV from 1952
to 1969.

“On ‘House Party’ I would talk to you and bring out the fact that you had
been letting your boss beat you at golf over a period of months as part of
your campaign to get a raise,” Linkletter wrote.

“All the while, without your knowledge, your boss would be sitting a few
feet away listening, and at the appropriate moment, I would bring you
together,” he wrote. “Now, that’s funny, because the laugh arises out of a
real situation.”

Linkletter’s programs – like many of today’s reality TV shows – often
relied on ordinary people sharing too much information on national
television.

But his shows were far gentler than today’s often mean-spirited
productions. His guests experienced, at most, mild embarrassment instead
of utter humiliation. When Linkletter elicited an all-too-revealing remark
from a guest, he did it with devilish charm, not malice.

Though “House Party” had many features, the best known was the daily
interviews with schoolchildren.

Linkletter collected quotes from children into “Kids Say The Darndest
Things,” and it sold in the millions.

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Art Linkletter

http://media.spokesman.com/photos/2010/05/27/linkletter0527_05-27-2010_A6IMTER_t620.jpg

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Some segments from Art Linkletter's "Kids Say the Darndest Things"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JQtG9VHcRG4

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fCHIM-bGiTI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=volqHuTosFA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xfjD5a5AdRg

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Rest well, Art.

Tom Hansen
Moscow, Idaho

“Things turn out best for the people who make the best out of the way
things turn out.”

- Art Linkletter