- Born
- Died
- Birth nameWilliam James Hawthorne Jr.
- Jim Hawthorne was born on November 20, 1918 in Victor, Colorado, USA. He was an actor and writer, known for Aim, Fire, Scoot (1952), Army Daze (1956) and The Checkers & Pogo Show (1967). He was married to Leah M. Uransky. He died on November 6, 2007 in Santa Barbara, California, USA.
- SpouseLeah M. Uransky(1947 - May 1967) (divorced, 3 children)
- Local radio comic Hawthorne was signed by Jules White, and teamed with Joe Besser in a handful of short comedies, effectively taking on the role of Joe's straight-man.
- The Colorado-born Hawthorne came to fame in 1947 on Pasadena radio station KXLA (now KRLA) when, as Time magazine reported a year later, he suddenly turned his show into a carefree, wit-loose 'Hellzapoppin on the air.' And he once played 10 minutes of Bach, which he interlaced with assorted comments and the sound of a barking seal.
The off-beat Hawthorne voiced a slew of characters that populated his show, including Skippy (a mischievous old man who made fun of him), Eggbert (his "engineer") and Scrappy (an aptly named piece of paper he'd carry on conversations with by crinkling it against the microphone).
Hawthorne would introduce commercials by banging two cymbals together. Then he might play the commercials at extremely slow or extremely fast speeds. He did the same with records and, if he was really bored with one, he'd drag the needle across it.
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