Learn Who The Famous People Born on February 14th Are – Jack Benny And More!!!

 BENJAMIN KUBELSKY (JACK BENNY)  was a comedian, vaudevillian, and an actor for radio, television and film.  He’s considered one of the leading entertainers of the 20th century.   His usual role was that of  someone who was comically “tight” with his money and insisting that he was 39 years old whatever his actual age might have been.  He also tried the violin but played it badly.  He was born in 1984, in Waukegan, Illinois, the son of a Jewish saloonkeeper/haberdasher who came to America from Poland.  His mother came from Lithuania.  His weekly radio show, The Jack Benny Program (NBS-1932-1948 & CBS-1949-1955) was one of radio’s highest rated programs.  It made Benny famous. Then there was the television version of his program that aired from 1950-1965.   He also acted in movies, including The Hollywood Revue of 1929  which won an Academy Award.  (d. 1974)

 HUGH MALCOLM DOWNS  was born in Akron, Ohio in 1921.  He is a retired broadcaster, TV host, producer and author.  He’s been anchor of 20/20, (1978-1999), host of The Today Show, announcer for The Tonight Show (w/ Jack Paar), host of the Concentration game show, host of PBS talk show Over Easy (1977-1983).  He earned a degree in gerontology from Hunter College while he was doing the PBS show.  He also was  co-host of the talk show Not for Women Only.  He was a special  consultant to the UN for refugee problems (1961-1964) and as Chairman of the Board of the United States Committee for UNICEF.  He is a member of the Board of Governors of the National Space Society and president and chair of its predecessor National Space Institute.  There is an asteroid named after him;  71000 Hughdowns.

 PAUL EFTHEMIOS TSONGAS  was born in 1941 in Lowell, Massachusetts.  He was educated at Dartmouth, Yale Law School, and Kennedy School of Government (Harvard).   Tsongas served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1975-1979;  the Peace Corps in Ethiopia from 1962-1964;  and as the Peace Corps Country Director in the West Indies from 1967-1968.   He was a United States Democratic Senator from Massachusetts from 1979-1985.  The diagnosis of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma in 1984 caused him to retire from the senate to fit his illness.  In 1992 he ran for the Democratic nomination for president.  He lost out to Bill Clinton.  In 1997 the cancer came back.  He died of pneumonia and liver failure on January 18.

 DAVID FRANCIS DRAVECKY is a Christian motivational speaker, an author and former Major League Baseball player for the San Diego Padres (1982-1987) and the San Francisco Giants (1987-1989).  He is remembered for his fight against cancer that ended his career as his team was reaching the World Series.  A cancerous desmoids tumor was found in his pitching arm.  In October 1988 he underwent surgery on the arm to eliminate the cancer cells.  However, in July 1989, as he was pitching in a game, his bone snapped and he Dravecky collapsed.  His left arm and shoulder were amputated in 1991.   The baseball career was finished.  He became a motivational speaker and an author about his battle with cancer, his book Comeback  was published in 1990, and When You Can’t Come Back in 1992, written with his wife Jan and Ken Gire.  He’s also written a Christian motivational book titled Called Up  and Comeback has been republished as a ‘self-titled autobiography for children in 1992.  He won the 1989 Willie Mac Award honoring his spirit and leadership.

 RENEE FLEMING was born in Indiana, Pennsylvania in 1959.  She is a Grammy Award winning (3 times) soprano who specializes in opera and lieder.  She has a full lyric soprano voice.  She studied at the Crane School of Music, State University of  New York at Potsdam.  She won a Fulbright Scholarship enabling her to work in Europe and then followed up by studies at The Juilliard School.    Fleming has sung roles in Italian, German, French, Czech, and Russian and English.  Her roles include Countess Almaviva in Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro, Desdemona in Verdi’s Otello, Violetta in Verdi’s La traviata, the title role in Dvolak’s Rusalka, the title role in Massenet’s Manon, and Thais,  the Marschallin in Richard Strauss’s Der Rosenkavalier, and the title heroine in Arabella.  She performs in opera houses and concert halls all over the world.   She was awarded the Swedish Polar Prize in 2008,

  GREGORY OLIVER HINES  was born in New York City in 1946.  He is an actor, singer, dancer and choreographer. With his brother Maurice,  Hines started at early  studying with choreographer Henry LeTang.  He was lead singer and musician in a rock band called Severance (1975-1976).  His movie debut was in Mel Brooks’ History of the World, Part 1 and later on appeared in movies such as The Cotton Club, White Nights, Running Scared, Tap and Waiting to Exhale.  In1997 he had his own series, The Gregory Hines Show on CBS.  He also had a recurring role on Will & Grace.  His Broadway debut happened in The Girl in Pink Tights, (1954) and for his earned Tony Award nominations for  Eubie (1979) and Comin’ Uptown (1980).  For Jelly’s Last Jam he earned the Drama Desk Award and a Tony.  Hines died of liver cancer on August 3, 2003.

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