Trivia

Best known as the voice of Amos Jones and George "Kingfish" Stevens on the long running radio show "Amos n' Andy".

Gosden and Charles J. Correll's "Amos 'n' Andy" (1928-1955) was inducted into the Radio Hall of Fame in 1988.

A longtime friend and neighbor of Frank Sinatra, he was Sinatra's best man at his wedding to fourth wife Barbara Sinatra in 1976.

Gosden and his partner Charles J. Correll began developing their "Amos 'n' Andy" characters, along with over 100 additional minor personalities on Chicago radio in the late 1920s. First heard on WEBH and followed on WGN the team hit gold when they were picked up on NBC's Red Network as a quarter-hour serialized show, captivating audiences each night at 7:00 pm (except Sundays). They were to radio what Milton Berle would be to TV some 20 years later: they popularized a medium, at one point capturing 60% of all radio listenership and being credited for selling 4.4 million radios.

He was awarded a Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for Radio at 1777 Vine Street in Hollywood, California.

He served in the US Navy during World War I.

Biography in: "Who's Who in Comedy" by Ronald L. Smith; pg. 17-19, article titled 'Amos and Andy'. New York: Facts on File, 1992. ISBN 0816023387.

His daughter Virginia Marie was born in the spring of 1930. His son Craig Leigh was born in September, 1949. Virginia and another son were from his first marriage. Craig was from his marriage to Jane Stoneham.

Biography in: "The Scribner Encyclopedia of American Lives". Volume One, 1981-1985, pages 332-334. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1998.

Profiled in "Old-Time Radio Memories" by Mel Simons (BearManor Media).

He died of heart failure at the U.C.L.A. Medical Center in Los Angeles, CA, on the morning of December 10, 1982.

Biography in: "American National Biography". Supplement 1, pp. 240-241. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002.