I actually saw Sally Rand do her thing as a kid in the early 70's when my Mom took me a show featuring her, Louis Jordan, Rudy Vallee, et al, at a theater in Seattle with tickets I'd won on the radio. We were quite a few row back but Sally (who I think the program said was 67) still had it going on. She did her bubble dance, which made it a very uncomfortable 3 or 4 rather erotically-charged minutes for 12-year-old me sitting next to my mother, and I could see WHY she'd been a sensation in 1934. One of a kind.

She made it to age 75, but is now gone to the Great Burlesque in the Sky!

She always did!

@@mjp96 My 97 year old Aunt was just telling me about her a couple of nights ago, so I had to look her up. I found some videos of her performing her fan dance, and being a retired dancer myself, I was very impressed with her beautiful and graceful dance moves. I haven't seen the bubble dance yet.

F

I would rank Alex Trebek as #1 but would place John Daly as #2.

Bruce Forsyth on The Generation Game has to be No.1 for me. He literally rocked Saturday nights on UK TV in the 1970s. John Daly is excellent though.

@@alfredroberthogan5426 HOOAH!

@@davidsanderson5918 Not a fan of Brucey. John Charles Daly has loads more class.

@@alfredroberthogan5426 John Daly is brilliant and nice. Alex is or was nice.

Robert Q. was absolutely hilarious once he figured her out. He was so sure of himself - and he was right!

Right. I wish this show continues, it would be a success.

That was adorable. He was so excited to answer, I think he was ready to explode to wait for his turn.

That first contestant, Nellie Kokoszka, wrote a beautiful "N". I was in love with her right away.

Similar to the old Lay's Potato Chip commercial, 'It's hard to watch just one.'

corner moose LOL!

I think they subsequently worked together in radio as well...

That story sounds like typical George Burns humor. I laughed out loud when I read it. George Burns was one of the funniest story tellers. In one of his books he said whenever he told Jack Benny a joke, Jack would fall to his knees and slap the floor with his fist laughing so hard.

She was absolutely lovely... she seems so gracious...

John Q. Lewis probably knew about the number of shows were done in "presentation houses", because he most likely frequented those places when he was a young adult. Also, Mr. Lewis was probably a big fan of Sally Rand for many years.

@@LaptopLarry330 Mr. Lewis makes a lot of sexual comments (verging on vulgar a few times) about attractive female guests. I think he is what we would call a "horn dog" these days. So he probably went to strip shows.

Jeremy Ziegler I agree with you about all the reasons that you like this show. Unfortunately, I don't think a modern version of it would have the same class or hold the same interest for me. Even the syndicated "What's My Line?" that aired between 1968 and 1975 did not live up to the original CBS version, in my opinion. I think someone _is_ actually planning a new version of WML now, and I'm kind of afraid to see what they might do to it...

@@savethetpc6406 It would be ruined by the bad taste of today's tv. Set would be painted blue, green, purple and orange.

You're welcome, Sarita-- glad you're enjoying the series!

sarita schwedes I loved her response to Bennett's innocent question, "Are you a lady?" (17:33)!

All in all one of the best MG segments I've seen...and this is honestly the first time I've ever said this (having watched through 1962 at this point)..

+oldfart4751 I would so love to see the BBC shows. From the one and a third shows on KZfaq, from the guest appearances of Eamonn Andrews and a couple of the panelists on the CBS show, I am quite taken with the BBC version. Why did you not save them? (That's a rhetorical question.)

+sarita schwedes I now I just learned to other day that she's my great uncle's daughter

Love your comments, jmccracken1963. I hope you keep on adding them!

jmccracken1963 Revisiting this comment a year later, knowing a lot more about the series than I did when I started, I just wanted to note that Hal wasn't just on vacation-- he was on a 6 week suspension, essentially the first step towards his being fired. Steve Allen joined the panel the week after this, clearly being groomed/auditioned as Hal's replacement. While Hal returned for a few weeks at the end of January 1953, Steve remained on the panel when Hal returned, Steve not missing a show until December.

Nothing wrong with her cleavage that’s for sure.

HI I'M LOOKING FOR A PARTICULAR EPISODE OF A LADY -SINGLE PERHAPS-A CONTESTANT WHO DEFEATS THE PANEL, but she "designs bridges" can you help me find it, Peter from Canada

I use “healthful” occasionally but I’ve been accused of letting antiquated words slip into my speech

+Sam Tomaino Actually I wonder why Block was there at all. And if I may say so, I would put Buddy Hackett in his same category. They are constantly making the effort to be funny and only rarely succeed.

@@trickydick6152 I agree. Buddy was silly but not funny

I thought he had something to do with the auto industry (I guessed vehicle polisher) because of all the RV's made in Elkhart and neighboring cities, and Studebaker not too far away in South Bend. Hopefully our names aren't mud now ... or Stella Mudd!

@@loissimmons6558 Mr. Troast's appearance may be tied to the fact CBS affiliate WSBT in South Bend, IN had signed on the previous Monday, thus making this the first WML? episode aired on the station. Sometimes Mr. Daly would mention new affiliates but didn't here.

Yes, he was!

😁

And I was 4 years old at the time! 1952 was a wonderful year!

I was 8 months old.

I was even younger than Lucinda, though not by so much. Now I'm 64.

The aunt of my great uncle´s sister was 8 seconds old when this was broadcast

I wasn't born yet...

@tinwoods It only would have been egotistical if he had five sons named John

Don Beveridge (who gave well-received talks about business in affiliation with the University of Wisconsin) gave all his children names starting with D and included a Don and a Dawn. So it happens.

+MarcBrewer By this time, Hal Block was virtually on the chopping block and about to be dismissed, shortly, from the show, due to his incessant habit of stepping over the line with regards to inappropriate or at least unnecessary innuendo comments to and about the female guests...deservedly so, I feel. Fred Allen was a much funnier panelist when he took over the open seat.

+MarcBrewer No doubt that Hal would have claimed to be Miss Rand's biggest fan! WML would eventually come up with better replacements for Hal. IMHO, Robert Q Lewis wasn't one of them. The two that he was on in place of Hal lacked a certain spark or edge, although he was cute when he figured out who the MG was and had to wait through two turns of wrong guesses before it got to him. He was so emphatic (though able to keep himself from blurting out the answer as Hal was wont to do), I was a bit surprised the others didn't pass it to him.

LOL!

Johan Bengtsson I don't know much about Godfrey except what I've read (and I have read that Robert Q. and he were feuding during this time period), but I get the impression they must have been close previously. Wikipedia says of Lewis, "He frequently sat in for Arthur Godfrey, who was considered his tutor. Lewis often credited Godfrey with giving him his first big breaks in show business." I wonder what had happened? Probably something on Godfrey's end, as I gather he could be volatile.

It was just so cliché and predictable. Pretty contestant, horny humor from panelist #4.

Actually most of them before this did indeed do so. Sally Rand was an aberration

+juliansinger Hmm. Let me take a moment for a small conference with Miss Rand. No, I don't think a centerfold model would be today's equivalent of Miss Rand. A centerfold model is someone posing for still photographs and could be from any profession. Miss Rand was quite the artful performer as a dancer and an illusionist. As noted else where in the comments, she never actually performed nude, just with the illusion of it. (Although she does sometimes appear sans clothing and fans or bubbles not covering her breasts in some of her photos, presumably for admirers.) That's one down and nine to go! While striptease is still being performed today, the performers tend to be local or regional and none are anywhere near approaching the stature of Miss Rand, Gypsy Rose Lee, Ann Corio or any other stars of the heyday of the art form. For the closest to someone like Sally Rand, I can go in two directions, though both are a stretch. In one direction would be someone like Madonna or Cher, who while known more for singing than dancing, incorporate a lot of dance and physicality into their performances, often with skimpy costumes. In the other direction would be someone like Rupaul who incorporates the art of illusion as her primary artistic form (albeit a much different illusion), while also dancing and singing in her own natural voice. She (using the female pronoun when talking about this persona; Rupaul accepts either pronoun) also performs her craft the old-fashioned way: strictly through illusion and makeup artistry, with no surgery or hormones involved. And she evokes a time when some of the top burlesque performers were drag queens.

+Barbara G I think most often he's making sure they are standing on the "mark" that's on the floor (you can occasionally see John and/or the contestant, look down or refer to it) that indicates where they should stand for a camera shot that's been set up. There may also be an element of John's wanting to reassure them in case they're nervous.

Also he wants them facing the camera

I've never noticed a guest being awkward about John doing that. I think it's endearing of him and as another poster commented it may help to relax them.

Um. . . Sally Rand was the Mystery Guest, not the tax collector!

Ah, here she is, one tax collector and a mud pack maker later :)

What's My Line? Sorry about that, this was the first full episode I found on you tube.

That was Dorothy Schoech on February 27, 1955.

PepsiMama2 Lewis is obviously trying to replicate Hals humor by taking the questions to the same direction. Hal always led the questions to "is this product ladies underwear".

PepsiMama2 - Sally Rand was a fan dancer and bubble dancer in burlesque shows who was as well known by the general public in the early half of the 20thc. as was Gypsy Rose Lee. She died broke and Sammy Davis, Jr., paid her final expenses. She was never nude, but appeared to be so by wearing long johns, etc.

I believe it is.

"Francis was known for wearing a heart-shaped diamond pendant, a gift from Gabel, which she wore on nearly all of her _What's My Line_ appearances. A mugger robbed her of the pendant as she was leaving a New York City taxi in 1988." en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arlene_Francis

Eaten by crocodiles.

His special kind of humour is much missed

According to the owner of the channel, it's not coincidence. He was on a multi-week suspension that was leading up to him getting fired.

The idea was that some products are luxury items (champagne, caviar, fur coats, etc.), and some are merely decorative (sculptures, paintings, and such) and so are not necessary. By useful, they meant necessary.

You should hear Orson Welles as a guest panelist. He wasn't quite the right fit to be there permanently, and probably wasn't interested, but he thought outside the box. I love the show where he asks the guest "if your work might be more appropriately performed in another century?"

+Edwin Rivera She was known as a "fan dancer", doing what passed for an erotic act where she concealed her supposed nudity with fans and balloons and such (though she was never really nude onstage at all). Probably the panel had a hard time because she hadn't been a major celebrity, really, since the mid 1930s.

Thank you. I am watching at this moment a Jan. 18 1953 What's My Line. June Havoc. She made me laugh but I have never herd of her. I will look her up.

Edwin Rivera Well, that's quite a coincidence then-- cause June Havoc was the sister of Gypsy Rose Lee, who was probably the only burlesque dancer in history more famous than Sally Rand! (June was a movie actress.)

+What's My Line? An erotic dancer who used fans and balloons but was not nude???? Then what was she hiding with the fans and balloons???

PepsiMama2 The fact that she wasn't really nude.

According to the person who runs this channel, Hal was on a multi-week suspension at the time, and eventually got fired.

jayonnaj18 he was born of American parents from Boston. His father was working there

Um, what?