So he’s gone into banking: there’s a tiger in your account! It’d be a fun cartoon, him catching the Mobil flying horse, chowing down.
There is a Burger King in Illinois (Palatine?) that pre-dated the international joint. They had taken out only a state trademark. When Big BK came to Illinois they made a deal to take over the trademark in Illinois with an exception for their town.
After the MacDonald brothers sold out to Ray Kroc they had to stop using their own name on their place.
I think jhe ran off with the “Man who wears the star.”
Could you blame him?
“The Men Who Wear the Star” were really good singers!
For the younger members of the forum, I can recall when virtually everything came to a halt on Tuesday nights when The Milton Berle Show was broadcast.
It was said that Milty was responsible for the purchase of more TVs than all of the various TV manufacturers’ advertising–combined.
I remember ‘Uncle Miltie’, never understood why anyone would want him as an honorary uncle.
Perhaps the Esso Tiger and the Sinclair Dinosaur went walk about. 
A lot of celebrities have a hard time with fame. When Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy first came to the US, they saw a large crowd on the wharf waiting for their boat, and wondered who the reception was for. They later discovered it was for them.
Was it the Dress?
Berle was a vaudeville relic, used to being on stage. I don’t think his fame changed him. My best guess as to his success was that he was completely comfortable on stage and was himself. Arthur Godfrey was big back then too, another talentless person who was comfortable on stage.
Imagine someone trying to get a laugh with drag these days. In the early days of SNL, when Eric Idle was the host, he and Dan Aykroyd did a ‘drag racing’ (get it?) bit; Dan explained that it just didn’t go over in the US. The Two Ronnies had a drag bit every episode, and you could see why: it required no writing: the 2 Ronnies put on silly dresses and danced for a couple of minutes. (The British audience, it had a live one, loved it.) It was baffling to me. Nobody even tries these days.
You should rent the movie Too Wong Foo.
My late mother was a few years younger than Berle, but she had vivid recollections of playing golf with him when they were both children. Her family and his family were staying at the same boarding house/hotel at Lake Hopatcong, NJ, and Miltie had already been on stage. Mom said that he was okay to be around, but that his mother was an overbearing “stage mother”.
Just to keep this on an automotive footing, let’s not forget that, besides Texaco, Uncle Milty also had Buick as a sponsor. Here is a video, including him driving a '53 Buick convertible, plus a few Buick commercials. Please note the 4 or 5 inches of play in the steering of this brand new car.
They just don’t build 'em like they used to… thank God!
Lots of play in stat steering, for sure.
Never saw the show. I think we got our first TV in 1954.
I think we got ours in either '53 or '54.
The first show we ever saw was The Lone Ranger, but in those days, most of us would watch almost anything on TV. In the NY Metro area, there were only six stations, and none of them went on the air until ~3 PM. Until they began their broadcast day, all you would see on the screen was a test pattern, like this:
And, most of them signed-off for the day by midnight.
I am reminded of thee Nissan.com case where the motor company sued the long time business man and owner of the domain Uzi Nissan. Uzi prevailed but was not awarded court costs anywhere near what was spent. Just researching this and found he sadly died of Covid last year.
Still loved my Maxima
Some of you folks are pretty selective in your flags. So TVs, Merle, Vaudeville, etc. are not off topic but mine is. Welcome to the crazy days but gee took a month but at least in the same century.
Esso tiger … the last time I heard from him was in the 1960’s. At that time when you pulled into the tiger’s gas station 3 attendants would show up in pure white uniforms, the first asking how much & what kind of gasoline you wanted, the second popping the hood to check the oil level, and the third would fill all the tires with air. hmmm … maybe there’s something of benefit w/ that tiger … lol …
do not forget the windshield cleaning.
Oh, yeah, forgot about that. I think it was the guy who checked the oil that did the windshield. What great service car owners had when the tiger was around.
Harold’s Super Service
