Legendary broadcaster Art Linkletter is dead at 97

[Amerigo Vespucci]

Legendary broadcaster Art Linkletter is dead at 97

http://www.cnn.com/2010/SHOWBIZ/TV/05/26/obit.art.linkletter/index.html?hpt=Sbin

By Alan Duke, CNN
May 27, 2010 11:34 a.m. EDT



Los Angeles, California (CNN) -- Art Linkletter, the easygoing, smooth-voiced emcee famed for his long-running hosting gigs of the radio and television shows "House Party" and "People Are Funny," and author of "Kids Say the Darndest Things," has died, according to his spokeswoman.

Linkletter "died peacefully at home with his family on Wednesday," a statement from the family said. He was 97.

"Just one month earlier, while being honored at an event, he was asked what he considered his greatest life accomplishment," the statement said. "He responded 'Family.'"

Linkletter rose to fame as a radio announcer in San Diego, later becoming a program director. In 1944, he launched "Art Linkletter's House Party," a daytime CBS radio show that moved to television in 1952 and ran until 1969.

"Kids say the darndest things," was Linkletter's often-repeated phrase because of his humorous interviews with children. It became the title of his best-selling book, a country music hit and was reprised by Bill Cosby as a 1998 TV show.

The phrase began as a segment on "House Party." Linkletter would ask several children their thoughts on various topics; their responses were often hilariously absurd.

"I was Oprah before there was Oprah," he once told The Wall Street Journal.