It's Not Dean Martin

I wonder if Jack Benny thought, as he was taking a limo to Palmer House in Chicago to perform in 1969, that when he was born in that city, there were no limos—at least ones that were powered on their own. However, the Palmer House was there in 1894, and still is today.

Here’s a little story from December 4, 1969, describing the cute and funny entrance Jack used in his show there. It’s a little sad reading about him being left alone before he went on stage. But Jack enjoyed making people laugh, and that’s why he continued performing across the continent until pancreatic cancer stopped him not too many weeks before his death; he certainly was in no need of money.

Benny's Like Liquor, Gets Better With Age
By BOB GREENE
Chicago Daily News Service
CHICAGO—The people in the Empire Room, their clothes bright and glittering, were dancing while the man sang "You're Nobody Till Somebody Loves You." The room was all gold and green and white, and on every spotless table was a little white card. On each card was the famous face of Jack Benny.
Jack Benny is the reason that all the people had dressed so expensively and fought the traffic and paid so much money to be crowded into the Empire Room of the Palmer House.
They were waiting for him to come on stage and tell jokes to them. While they waited, Jack Benny sat, all alone, in front of a rollaway cart in his 19th-floor suite.

A VISITOR walked into the room and there was Benny—this old comedian who has had it all and is a part of everyone's memories—sitting in a blue bathrobe, eating dinner alone at the little cart.
He is 75 years old and he does not look young any more, but still he takes six months from every year to go on the road and make people laugh. His wife, Mary Livingston, does not like to travel, so he goes with his writer, Hilliard Marks, and his manager, Irving Fein. Tonight both of them were out of the hotel, so he finished the meal by himself before getting dressed and shaving and having his face made up to go on stage.
"It keeps getting easier," Benny said. "Every year the audiences are easier. I don't get a bad audience any more. It's not so much of a challenge. So I make my own challenge. I keep making myself do different kinds of things.
The lights in the Empire Room went down. Everyone was looking toward the stage.
The announcer said: "And now . . . the star of our show, Dean Martin!", and in walked Benny, right through the main entrance, holding a drink in his hand.
"I'm not really Dean Martin," he said. And then he gave The Look. Just folded his arms and looked around the room. The people were almost screaming. He didn't have to say a thing.
"HERE," I have to get rid of this drink," he said. He walked over to a man at a nearby table. "Do you want it?" the man took the drink.
"That'll be a dollar," Benny said. The laughter again.
It was like that for more than an hour. He talked about all the familiar things—George Burns, money, his wife, Bob Hope. And what he said earlier was right. The crowd wasn't even a real challenge. They were happy just to be seeing Jack Benny.