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Paul Ford
Paul Ford Weaver (November 2, 1901 – April 12, 1976) was an American character actor and comedic actor who came to specialize in portraying authority figures whose ineptitude and pompous demeanor were played for comic effect, notably as Mayor George Shinn in the 1957 Broadway musical comedy The Music Man, followed five years later by repeating the role in The Music Man, (starring Robert Preston and Shirley Jones), and on television as U.S. Army Colonel John T. Hall on several seasons of the military comedy The Phil Silvers Show (1955–1959).
Ford was born Paul Ford Weaver in Baltimore, Maryland. His father was described as "a well-to-do businessman" who lost his fortune when his investment in a soft-drink company failed.
At an early age, he showed an adept talent for performance, but was discouraged when directors thought he was tone-deaf.[citation needed]
After attending Dartmouth College for one year, Ford was a salesman before he became an entertainer.
He took his middle birth name, which was his mother's maiden name, as his stage last name. The change occurred after he failed an audition as Paul Weaver, but was successful when he auditioned again as Paul Ford.
In later years, Ford made his distinctive voice one of the most recognized on films and television of his era. His later success, however, was long in the making, and he did little acting in his early adult years but instead raised his family during the Great Depression of the 1930s.
32nd President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's New Deal programs to combat the Great Depression of the 1930s, especially the Public Works Administration (PWA) and Works Progress Administration (WPA) programs, provided young Ford, then in his early 30s, with meaningful work and experience plus his first contact with acting and entertainment. Because of this positive influential contact, to the day he died, Ford was a devoted political / social Liberal and Progressive, becoming a staunch "FDR Democrat" for the rest of his life.[citation needed]
He first ventured into entertainment in a puppet theater project sponsored by the New Deal program in the Works Progress Administration (WPA) to combat the Great Depression providing employment in the Federal Theatre Project for authors, academics, actors and musicians during Roosevelt's administration. Years later in 1958 after he became nationally known on TV, he said of that opportunity: "I got on the puppet project of the WPA and helped write and put on shows for the Federal Theater. We did puppet shows at the New York World's Fair in 1939 to 1940, and I served as narrator, a kind of 'Hoosier' cornball in beard."
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Paul Ford
Paul Ford Weaver (November 2, 1901 – April 12, 1976) was an American character actor and comedic actor who came to specialize in portraying authority figures whose ineptitude and pompous demeanor were played for comic effect, notably as Mayor George Shinn in the 1957 Broadway musical comedy The Music Man, followed five years later by repeating the role in The Music Man, (starring Robert Preston and Shirley Jones), and on television as U.S. Army Colonel John T. Hall on several seasons of the military comedy The Phil Silvers Show (1955–1959).
Ford was born Paul Ford Weaver in Baltimore, Maryland. His father was described as "a well-to-do businessman" who lost his fortune when his investment in a soft-drink company failed.
At an early age, he showed an adept talent for performance, but was discouraged when directors thought he was tone-deaf.[citation needed]
After attending Dartmouth College for one year, Ford was a salesman before he became an entertainer.
He took his middle birth name, which was his mother's maiden name, as his stage last name. The change occurred after he failed an audition as Paul Weaver, but was successful when he auditioned again as Paul Ford.
In later years, Ford made his distinctive voice one of the most recognized on films and television of his era. His later success, however, was long in the making, and he did little acting in his early adult years but instead raised his family during the Great Depression of the 1930s.
32nd President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's New Deal programs to combat the Great Depression of the 1930s, especially the Public Works Administration (PWA) and Works Progress Administration (WPA) programs, provided young Ford, then in his early 30s, with meaningful work and experience plus his first contact with acting and entertainment. Because of this positive influential contact, to the day he died, Ford was a devoted political / social Liberal and Progressive, becoming a staunch "FDR Democrat" for the rest of his life.[citation needed]
He first ventured into entertainment in a puppet theater project sponsored by the New Deal program in the Works Progress Administration (WPA) to combat the Great Depression providing employment in the Federal Theatre Project for authors, academics, actors and musicians during Roosevelt's administration. Years later in 1958 after he became nationally known on TV, he said of that opportunity: "I got on the puppet project of the WPA and helped write and put on shows for the Federal Theater. We did puppet shows at the New York World's Fair in 1939 to 1940, and I served as narrator, a kind of 'Hoosier' cornball in beard."