Bert Parks (December 30, 1914 – February 2, 1992) was an American actor, singer, and radio and television announcer and host, best known as the longtime host (1955-1979) of the annual Miss America telecast.
Parks was born Bertram Jacobson[1] in Atlanta, Georgia, the son of Hattie (née Spiegel) and Aaron Jacobson, who was a merchant.[2]
Radio
Parks got his first broadcasting job at age 16, for Atlanta's WGST radio. He moved to New York when he was nineteen. He was hired as a singer and straight man on The Eddie Cantor Show before becoming a CBS Radio staff announcer. Parks became the host of Break the Bank, which premiered on radio in 1945 and was telecast from 1948 to 1957, and Stop the Music on radio in 1948 and on television from 1949 to 1952.
Along with many other celebrities, he hosted NBC radio's Monitor during the 1960s.
Television
Parks has unique distinction of hosting the oldest TV game show that still exists (on kinescope). The television show is Party Line on NBC (broadcast from NYC NBC flagship station WNBT) which involved viewers calling in to answer questions and win $5 prize. The show was only broadcast from June - August 1947, thus making the surviving episode preserved on kinescope the oldest known game show and one of the oldest surviving television shows that was recorded. Commercial kinescopes did not come out formally until fall of 1947 (as co-sponsored by NBC, DuMont, Kodak), and only some episodes of Kraft Television Theater as also from 1947 (February and June of that year) are known to still exist and pre-date Party Line.
Other game/quiz shows Parks hosted in the first decade and a half of television (the debut years are noted here) included The Big Payoff (1951), Balance Your Budget (1952), Double or Nothing (1952), Two in Love (1954), Giant Step (1956), Hold That Note (1957), County Fair (1958), Bid 'n' Buy (1958), Masquerade Party (which debuted in 1952 with Parks as a panelist until he became the show's host in 1958), and Yours For A Song (1961). Parks also hosted the pilot for The Hollywood Squares but was not selected to host the series.
He also had a daytime variety show with The Bert Parks Show (1950). He hosted the Miss America telecast from 1955 until 1979. He was unceremoniously fired after the 1979 pageant as the Organization attempted to attract a more youthful audience. Talk show host Johnny Carson led a campaign on the air of The Tonight Show to have Parks rehired, but this was unsuccessful.
Recordings
A recording of Parks's classic rendition of the song There She Is, Miss America is still used each year in the Miss America contest as the new reining titleholder takes her walk down the runway in her newly-earned crown.
Parks did a take-off of his hosting role in The Freshman (1990), starring Marlon Brando, Matthew Broderick and Bruno Kirby. In it, he plays the emcee of the Gourmet Club dinner in which diners supposedly eat a Komodo Dragon. He sings a spoof of There She Is, Miss America in a salute to the dragon.
Parks appeared on the TV series WKRP In Cincinnati in the 1980 episode "Herb's Dad", playing Herb Tarlek, Sr., father of the series' character Herb Tarlek, Jr. In 1991 Parks appeared on an episode of the TV series Night Court as himself.
Parks died of lung cancer on February 2, 1992 at the age of 77.
References
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