Edgar Bergen

American ventriloquist and radio comedian whose career in vaudeville, radio, and motion pictures spanned almost 60 years. Bergen was best known as the foil of his ventriloquist’s dummy Charlie McCarthy. The Edgar Bergen-Charlie McCarthy Show was a permanent fixture on American network radio from 1937 until 1957. Other characters created by Bergen, such as Mortimer Snerd and Effie Klinker, were woven into the perennially popular program, which was rated as radio’s most popular in 1937–40 and 1942–43 and among the top seven from 1937 to 1952.

Bergen’s parents took him on a visit to their native Sweden when he was four years old; there he learned the language that various of his later characters would occasionally articulate. He attended public schools in Chicago where, when he was 11, he discovered a facility for vocal tricks that gave him an interest in ventriloquism. He had the head of the dummy Charlie McCarthy carved (although he made the body himself) while he was still in high school. By the time he attended Northwestern University, he was proficient enough to earn his expenses with ventriloquism and magic tricks.

He went into vaudeville and performed in nightclubs in the United States and Europe. During World War II Bergen took Charlie with him to entertain American service personnel, touring the Aleutian Islands, Alaska, and Greenland and appearing on many special radio shows. After their radio show terminated, Bergen and McCarthy appeared often as guests on variety television shows.