The Modest Man Was 39

Not only was Jack Benny’s death front page news, papers made space for sidebar stories, too. That’s how beloved Benny was to millions of people when he passed away December 26, 1974.

Here’s one of the many side stories that appeared in print. It’s from syndicated columnist Marilyn Beck, who managed to reach many of Jack’s long-time celebrity friends and get them to speak. She saw Jack a few weeks before he died.

Benny Was a Likeable, Charitable Guy
By MARILYN BECK
HOLLYWOOD—Although the thought of death frightened him, Jack Benny died the way he wanted to die—looking forward to his next work assignment.
"Work keeps me young; I never want to retire," the grand old trouper told me recently. He was just 49 days short of his 81st birthday when the end came; yet he was still acting like a "kid" of 39 until a few months ago.
Even a collapse and a hospital siege last October couldn't keep him down for long. The spring in his step had been dulled a bit, but the mind and the sparkle in his eyes seemed as lively as ever when he snapped back to prepare his annual NBC "Farewell" special, and to get ready for February co-starring stints with Walter Matthau in the MGM film adaptation of "The Sunshine Boys."
The last time I saw him, when he arrived at the Beverly Hills Hotel on Dec. 8 to receive the Outstanding Lifelong Achievement Award from the Hollywood Women's Press Club, he told me: "I still feel like I'm 39."
BUT AS IT turned out, his days were numbered, and the press club event would mark his final public appearance. Stricken with stomach pains before he had a chance to accept the award, he was rushed to doctors who would discover several weeks later their famed patient was suffering from inoperable cancer of the pancreas.
Paying a visit to his Beverly Hills home on Thursday night, while he slipped into his final, sedated sleep, were such famed friends as Frank Sinatra, Gov. Ronald Reagan, Danny Kaye, Rosalind Russell, Johnny Carson, and Bob Hope. It was Hope who summed up the sadness of the crowd by saying: "We'll be lost without him. Jack's got one of the most charitable hearts there's ever been in this business."
Hope also made the undeniable point: "This is the beginning of the end of an era; guys who started out together in vaudeville, who've been close all these years—and who've always been there to step in for one another at a minute's notice."
It's amazing, actually, that so many of the old crowd are still around, Bob realizes.
HOPE IS 71, George Burns (Benny's closest buddy, who underwent open heart surgery in August) is 79. Along with 84-year-old Groucho Marx and George Jessel, who's in his late 70s, they formed the group of cronies whose friendship spanned over half a century. They shared vaudeville bills in the ’20’s, went on to vie as radio comedy kings of the ’30’s — and have spent much time together during their twilight years in kibitzing sessions at the Beverly Hills’ Hillcrest Country Club, reliving the old days and the ribald stunts they’d pulled.
Jessel came close to collapsing when informed of Benny’s death. “We were friends for over 50 years,” he said. “And I’m destroyed over this. But I know that if there's a place where the good go — there will be a place for Benny.”
Though Jessel has delivered the eulogies of many filmland notables, Benny requested last year that Bob Hope handle such a task for him. At this point Bob is wondering what anyone can say that’s not already known about the gentle man who added so much to all our lives — who kept millions laughing and listening to his radio “family” that included his wife, Mary Livingstone, Rochester, Dennis Day and Don Wilson. And which fostered the gags that would become legend about Benny’s stinginess, his Maxwell automobile and his assaults on the violin.
ACTUALLY, he started out in vaudeville as a "straight" violinist, practiced religiously on the instrument even during all those years we laughed at his fractured treatment of "Love in Bloom," and in recent times raised millions for charity through violin performances with symphony orchestras.
Services will be held Sunday at Hillcrest Memorial Park, Los Angeles. He leaves behind a wife of 47 years who retired from show business in 1950; an adopted daughter, Joan; and four grandchildren.
The man who accomplished so much in a long life time and left only one thing undone, he had completed only three chapters of his autobiography at the time of his death. "It's really not important if I finish the book," he told me last fall. "After all, what does the world really care about the life and opinions of Jack Benny?"
Modesty was one of the most endearing qualities of the man born Benjamin Kubelesky in Waukegan, Ill., on Valentine's Day, 1894.